Veckatimest
Grizzly Bear
There's something sinister about the way the drummer for Grizzly Bear plays. I'm not referring to the way he looks - I've never seen him. But there is something alternately robotic and primordial about his approach. It's distinctly not human - in fact, I'd be impressed but not surprised if drummer Christopher Bear was an actual fucking grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis in scientific terms). Hey, if they can dance and play with those little red balls, they can probably hit the drums with those paws. Okay, so that's a pretty crazy idea, but I swear it's the kind of stuff I think of when I listen to these guys. Hauntingly beautiful, like a natural vista of forest and mountain ranges, you might not realize how much you like this music until long after you first hear it.
Superficial Gossip
Ringo Shiina
In Japan, I get the feeling that even the more popular singer/songwriters feel less constrained by genre and era than they do in the U.S. and EU countries. Despite being one of the top female pop musicians/icons in her country, Ringo Shiina leaps across and between genre boundaries as often as the most experimental groups here. Shiina is so famous and renowned in her home country that, at the ripe old age of 30, she has already received an award from the Japanese goverment for her work. On this album, she moves comfortably from soul/R&B to funk to jazz to 50's musical to modern rock and electro - and she succeeds on all fronts, crafting an album so catchy and so unpredictable that I bet Mike Patton would kill to have made this. Awesome.
Carboniferous
Zu
Remember the band Morphine? Imagine if, after Mark Sandman died, they hired a new bass player and changed their sound to all-instrumental math-metal (a la Meshuggah) and made a ton of records in Italy, before signing to Ipecac and getting Mike Patton to do some guest vocals. That's pretty much how this sounds. Um, did I mention that it's awesome? Yeah, it is.
Le Mani Destre Recise Degli Ultimi Uomini
Secret Chiefs 3 (as Traditionalists)
Trey Spruance is the kind of genius I can never get enough of. He and his group of ridiulously talented musicians, the Secret Chiefs 3, are so multifaceted in the sheer number of genres they're capable of tackling that they've had to subdivide themselves into fictional "satellite bands" that specialize in particular sub-categories of music. In this case, we have one of the satellite bands, Traditionalists, making an album-length soundtrack to an imaginary Italian thriller/horror film. It's of course unbelievably amazing and well worth your time and $$$ - I just wish the film was real.
Wavering Radiant
Isis
Just putting out a new album automatically gets Isis a place on my "best of" list - all they have to do is not fuck it up, which they never do, so this one is pretty much a no-brainer for me. For those who don't know, Isis is pretty much the quintessential post-metal band, even though no one's exactly sure what post-metal is (hint: take sludge/doom metal, add keyboards - for atmosphere, not for virtuosic displays or solos - and long instrumental passages [some bands don't even have a vocalist], and you're pretty close). For those who do know the band, the question with regard to Isis is probably always going to be, "Is it as good as Oceanic?" The correct answer to that question will likewise always be: who cares? Oceanic is a great album but Isis have better things to do than satisfy fans of that album by making endless sequels to it. If you love Isis and want to hear something new from them, Wavering Radiant doesn't disappoint.
Black Clouds & Silver Linings
Dream Theater
Thank god for prog-metal. No need to worry whether or not I'm a dork for liking Dream Theater. I *know* I am. There are more chops on display on a single DT track than most bands ever use in their entire career. It's refreshing to me to hear a band that doesn't hold back - these guys know how to play the fuck out of their instruments and they're not afraid of doing so. As usual there are a lot of lengthy tracks here with lots of contrasting sections - if you don't like 20-minute-long songs, don't bother with this one - actually, don't bother with prog, period.
Octahedron
The Mars Volta
I have noticed a tendency for Cedric Bixler-Zavala to parody certain stock phrases in his lyrics as a way of saying something familiar/catchy while subverting cliche. So, for example, "Since we've been wrong" subverts the usual "since you've been gone." That's just one reason I dig The Mars Volta. Another one, of course, is composer/guitarist/multi-instrumentalist/mastermind Omar Rodriguez-Lopez's amazing musical gifts. This time around we get a bit more slow, melodic stuff, but if you're thinking this is a bid for mainstream success, how do you explain titles like "A Halo of Nembutals," and lyrics like "What a foul little temptress/your daughter's become"? And that's just one of the rare lines that doesn't sound like someone narrating their all-time worst acid trip. These guys are my favorite maniacs.
Middle Cyclone
Neko Case
I haven't heard any writer personify a tornado until Neko Case did it with the lead track on this album. "This Tornado Loves You" is one of the strangest love songs I've ever heard, but it's no less emotional for that. A lot of Neko's songs are like that - strange, yet strangely touching. All kinds of odd characters seem to inhabit the songs on this album, including birds, prison girls, and (I think) Sorrow. In "The Magpie To The Morning," besides the titular bird, there's also a mockingbird and a vulture, which "wheels and dives/Something on the thermals yanked his chain/He smelled your boring apex/Rotting on the train tracks/He laughed under his breath/Because you thought that you could outrun sorrow". On "Fever," Neko herself seems to be running from Death, whose "peculiar" songs she overhears. When he finally hears her "tiny heartbeat," he gives chase: "I heard him coming/shrapnel spitting from his wheels/His scything arms rake for my heels". Damn.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Best of 2009 Pt. X: Hold Time by M. Ward
For once an album whose charms aren't difficult to explain. M. Ward writes great songs, he covers other people's great songs (Buddy Holly, Don Gibson and Billie Holiday here), he plays great guitar, his voice is charming - what's not to love? Critics say Hold Time isn't as good as his earlier albums, which makes me glad I haven't heard them. I'll have something to look forward to, and if I disagree with the critics, even better.
I guess it's cheating to make this review so much shorter than the others, but I feel like if I kept going it would be just so many words. You should listen to this album - I think it's great. If I had to pick some adjectives to describe it, I'd say it was alternately blissful and contemplative - this is largely an upbeat album, as far as I can tell. Even the slow numbers seem more thoughtful than melancholy to me - like sitting back and gazing at the stars or watching the clouds go across the sky.
I think Hold Time is one of the best albums of 2009. Listen for yourself and decide if you think I'm right.
I guess it's cheating to make this review so much shorter than the others, but I feel like if I kept going it would be just so many words. You should listen to this album - I think it's great. If I had to pick some adjectives to describe it, I'd say it was alternately blissful and contemplative - this is largely an upbeat album, as far as I can tell. Even the slow numbers seem more thoughtful than melancholy to me - like sitting back and gazing at the stars or watching the clouds go across the sky.
I think Hold Time is one of the best albums of 2009. Listen for yourself and decide if you think I'm right.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Best of 2009 Pt. IX: Moondagger by Deastro
When Deastro mastermind Randolph Chabot sings, "I'm a prophet of how things should be," he's not kidding, as far as I'm concerned. This is a fantastic album. Everything about it is close to perfect. Even the artwork for it is pretty much perfect. Chabot is an ambitious guy: his music is grandiose and majestic, like church music with a dance beat; meanwhile, his lyrics reference literature from Cormac McCarthy to medieval poetry (in the same stanza). He's young, he's talented and he's got a lot to beat his chest about.
Most of the tracks feature a traditional band with guitar, bass and drums and peppered with lots of synths. Besides sometimes sounding like disco church music, Deastro's songs remind me a bit of Deerhunter and Wolf Parade (maybe it's all that cavernous reverb), but a lot of the melodies seem more "naive" and carefree-sounding. New Order must also be mentioned, which seems like a clear reference point on "Kurgan Wave Number One" in particular. There's also a distinct Beach Boys-via-Panda Bear influence, which Chabot seems to directly acknowledge by directly quoting the vocal melody of "Bros" toward the end of one of the songs, the epically-titled "Daniel Johnston was stabbed in the heart with the MOONDAGGER by the King of Darkness and his Ghost is writing this song as a warning to all of us!"
There are two instrumentals on Moondagger and both are so well done that you realize this guy could easily get by without even bothering with lyrics. However, Chabot's lyrics are pretty great for the most part. Besides the literary references, religion (and perhaps the subversion of religion) comes up a lot: "I’m dancing for the world with a pentecostal fervor/While sonny the druggy cherokee gets his face kicked in/I’ve got a boombox blaring backward hallelujahs/I’ve got your picture in my pocket stained with rainbow watermarks." But even when he's writing a more traditional song of heartbreak, he saves himself from mediocrity via great lines like these (which to my mind recall Faust): "I’ll access the stars/I’ll read between the lines/Consort with scientists and maniacs/oh to find/A way back home a way back to your arms".
I realize that most of you aren't going to feel the way I do about this album, but I hope you'll give it a chance. The Pitchfork reviewer (I know I mention them too much) seemed almost offended that Chabot even *tried* to make an album as great as this. I hope most people aren't as arrogant and jaded as a lot of music critics seem to be - personally, I try not to lose my sense of wonder, my optimism, and most of all, my humility in the face of talent and hard work.
Maybe I feel compelled to say these things because this is the last review I'm finishing in this series. I hope you all like some of these albums half as much as I do - if not, I hope you all have music that you love just as much, or if not music, some other kind of art that fills you with joy and wonder the way the music of The Decemberists, John Zorn, Sunn 0))), Sunset Rubdown, Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors, Passion Pit, Bibio, Deastro and M. Ward has filled me with their new albums these past six months. Stay tuned as tomorrow I will present the runners up, albums that are also great but didn't quite make my own personal top 10.
Most of the tracks feature a traditional band with guitar, bass and drums and peppered with lots of synths. Besides sometimes sounding like disco church music, Deastro's songs remind me a bit of Deerhunter and Wolf Parade (maybe it's all that cavernous reverb), but a lot of the melodies seem more "naive" and carefree-sounding. New Order must also be mentioned, which seems like a clear reference point on "Kurgan Wave Number One" in particular. There's also a distinct Beach Boys-via-Panda Bear influence, which Chabot seems to directly acknowledge by directly quoting the vocal melody of "Bros" toward the end of one of the songs, the epically-titled "Daniel Johnston was stabbed in the heart with the MOONDAGGER by the King of Darkness and his Ghost is writing this song as a warning to all of us!"
There are two instrumentals on Moondagger and both are so well done that you realize this guy could easily get by without even bothering with lyrics. However, Chabot's lyrics are pretty great for the most part. Besides the literary references, religion (and perhaps the subversion of religion) comes up a lot: "I’m dancing for the world with a pentecostal fervor/While sonny the druggy cherokee gets his face kicked in/I’ve got a boombox blaring backward hallelujahs/I’ve got your picture in my pocket stained with rainbow watermarks." But even when he's writing a more traditional song of heartbreak, he saves himself from mediocrity via great lines like these (which to my mind recall Faust): "I’ll access the stars/I’ll read between the lines/Consort with scientists and maniacs/oh to find/A way back home a way back to your arms".
I realize that most of you aren't going to feel the way I do about this album, but I hope you'll give it a chance. The Pitchfork reviewer (I know I mention them too much) seemed almost offended that Chabot even *tried* to make an album as great as this. I hope most people aren't as arrogant and jaded as a lot of music critics seem to be - personally, I try not to lose my sense of wonder, my optimism, and most of all, my humility in the face of talent and hard work.
Maybe I feel compelled to say these things because this is the last review I'm finishing in this series. I hope you all like some of these albums half as much as I do - if not, I hope you all have music that you love just as much, or if not music, some other kind of art that fills you with joy and wonder the way the music of The Decemberists, John Zorn, Sunn 0))), Sunset Rubdown, Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors, Passion Pit, Bibio, Deastro and M. Ward has filled me with their new albums these past six months. Stay tuned as tomorrow I will present the runners up, albums that are also great but didn't quite make my own personal top 10.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Best of 2009 Pt. VIII: Ambivalence Avenue by Bibio
Like a lot of the best releases on Warp (one of my favorite record companies), Ambivalence Avenue is an album that rewards careful listening, especially in headphones. So much so that I didn't quite realize what was so great about it until I donned my own pair of Sennheisers and sat down to do nothing else but listen. Just one example: Fire Ant's stuttery, spaced-out middle section's cavernous excitement can really only be appreciated on a good pair of 'phones.
On the other hand, the title track, with its entrancing 3/4 rhythm and wonderful instrumental refrain, can be appreciated on any kind of sound system. Said refrain features the kind of cheery, unpretentious melody that one hardly seems to hear anymore. It almost reminds me of old Jethro Tull or some other 60's English folk-rock.
Jealous of Roses continues this exploration of the past with what sounds like late 60's funk à la Sly Stone: funky wah-wah guitars and falsetto vocals (mountainous gobs of spring reverb on the latter). All The Flowers shifts gears again, this time into some nice acoustic fingerpicking - I'm just guessing here but I think this is a pitch-shifted guitar and not some weird instrument with a sopranino range. Anyway, the sound is bright and bell-like, which seems to be a sound Bibio (aka Stephen Wilkinson, from somewhere in West Midlands, England) enjoys and may suggest a nostalgic looking-back to childhood.
Sugarette starts off with a high-pitched bell-like synth, a looped arpeggio that seems to linger after it disappears. Soon synth bleeps appear that sound straight out of Super Mario Bros. and take over the track - perhaps a reminiscence of a childhood spent playing Nintendo games (the aforementioned Fire Ant also features a recording of children playing some type of ancient video game). S'vive has as its foundation what sounds like a sample from a wind-up musicbox, all chimes and innocence.
There is a charming sense of wide-eyed wonder that pervades pretty much every minute of Ambivalence Avenue. Although in Jealous of Roses he chides, "You speak of love as a symptom of conformity," for the most part Wilkinson seems content simply to observe, record and report, rather than cast judgment, as in my favorite lyric moment on the album (from the track Haikuesque): "When she laughs/The piano in the hall/Plays a quiet note." This song also exemplifies another interesting feature of this album: many of the songs seem to "end" before the track itself does. In this case, after the song fades out, a recording of a man repeating a short prayer ("The Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me") plays over ambient synths, ending after a minute and fading out with the sound of tolling church bells. More reminders of childhood, perhaps?
But more than the innocence, more than the fun changes of sound and playing-with of genre, it's Bibio's sense of melody that gets me. He never seems to get bogged down in mere ambience or sounds and beats. There's always a strong melodic hook at play, no matter how weird things get. Even in Dwrcan, which features some of the album's most complex layering of beats and sounds, there are melodies that create lift and move the track along. So that when the glitchy, Autechre-ish beats appear about halfway through, you're already floating along on a cushion of airy, flowing notes and chords. Eventually the beats disappear and the last minute is a slow melody for ambient strings that fades out gradually. When all is silent, you may be tempted to play the whole album again. It's a temptation to which I've given in many times these past few weeks.
On the other hand, the title track, with its entrancing 3/4 rhythm and wonderful instrumental refrain, can be appreciated on any kind of sound system. Said refrain features the kind of cheery, unpretentious melody that one hardly seems to hear anymore. It almost reminds me of old Jethro Tull or some other 60's English folk-rock.
Jealous of Roses continues this exploration of the past with what sounds like late 60's funk à la Sly Stone: funky wah-wah guitars and falsetto vocals (mountainous gobs of spring reverb on the latter). All The Flowers shifts gears again, this time into some nice acoustic fingerpicking - I'm just guessing here but I think this is a pitch-shifted guitar and not some weird instrument with a sopranino range. Anyway, the sound is bright and bell-like, which seems to be a sound Bibio (aka Stephen Wilkinson, from somewhere in West Midlands, England) enjoys and may suggest a nostalgic looking-back to childhood.
Sugarette starts off with a high-pitched bell-like synth, a looped arpeggio that seems to linger after it disappears. Soon synth bleeps appear that sound straight out of Super Mario Bros. and take over the track - perhaps a reminiscence of a childhood spent playing Nintendo games (the aforementioned Fire Ant also features a recording of children playing some type of ancient video game). S'vive has as its foundation what sounds like a sample from a wind-up musicbox, all chimes and innocence.
There is a charming sense of wide-eyed wonder that pervades pretty much every minute of Ambivalence Avenue. Although in Jealous of Roses he chides, "You speak of love as a symptom of conformity," for the most part Wilkinson seems content simply to observe, record and report, rather than cast judgment, as in my favorite lyric moment on the album (from the track Haikuesque): "When she laughs/The piano in the hall/Plays a quiet note." This song also exemplifies another interesting feature of this album: many of the songs seem to "end" before the track itself does. In this case, after the song fades out, a recording of a man repeating a short prayer ("The Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me") plays over ambient synths, ending after a minute and fading out with the sound of tolling church bells. More reminders of childhood, perhaps?
But more than the innocence, more than the fun changes of sound and playing-with of genre, it's Bibio's sense of melody that gets me. He never seems to get bogged down in mere ambience or sounds and beats. There's always a strong melodic hook at play, no matter how weird things get. Even in Dwrcan, which features some of the album's most complex layering of beats and sounds, there are melodies that create lift and move the track along. So that when the glitchy, Autechre-ish beats appear about halfway through, you're already floating along on a cushion of airy, flowing notes and chords. Eventually the beats disappear and the last minute is a slow melody for ambient strings that fades out gradually. When all is silent, you may be tempted to play the whole album again. It's a temptation to which I've given in many times these past few weeks.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Best of 2009 Pt. VII: Manners by Passion Pit
Passion Pit employ the type of synth sounds the kids of my generation told ourselves we hated in the early 90s. Whether you listened to Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg's P-Funk-leavened hits, or whatever other vaguely angst-y music you were into (in my own case a curious blend of 70s rock and jazz, 80s punk and Primus), the synth-driven pop of the 1980s was decidedly lame in the flannel era (those two great early-90's bastions of taste, Beavis & Butthead, when coming across videos of "80s music," almost invariably made sounds of disgust before giving the inevitable verdict: "This sucks. Change it."). It wasn't until later in the decade that we realized we missed the sounds of our childhood and weren't in such a hurry to grow out of that stuff after all.
By now it's perhaps clichéd to reminisce over and to enjoy (with varying degrees of irony) the cheesiest of 80s music. It's been embraced everywhere, from VH-1 to YouTube to popular films (The Wedding Singer being one of the earliest examples that comes to mind; The Hangover, which features Mike Tyson listening enraptured to Phil Collins' AOR staple In The Air Tonight, is just the latest in a line of such references). We're truly living in a post-Rickroll age.
With 80s nostalgia a kind of cliché and darker angst seemingly reserved for hard rock and metal, what's a new indie rock band to do? Many go the "early R.E.M." route of mysterious lyrics and lo-fi production, wrapping the music in a kind of echoey haze. Music that seems to be about something and is vaguely earnest, but earnest about what you're not sure.
Bands like Passion Pit, usually burdened with the moniker "electro-pop," are following a different path. Using synthesizers and drum machines that either are, or are capable of replicating, the ones from 25 years ago (Yamaha's DX-7 is the most famous and most ubiquitous - with literally lots of "bells and whistles" and other bright sounds, this keyboard was used by pretty much any pop group from the mid-80s you can think to name), they're trying their best to write songs that suggest the past and its summoning of idealized childhood, while keeping things rooted in the present via modern production (both hi- and lo-fi) and, uh, mysterious lyrics. In effect, they are indie bands in retro-pop clothing. MGMT and Deastro are other examples, but on Manners, Passion Pit seems the most committed to the "good times" aesthetic. I think the Pitchfork reviewer compared listening to this album to remembering a great night out with friends, and it does have that character, even if the singer writes lyrics like, "That's a frosty way to speak/to tell me how to live next to your potpourri" and "Walls came crumbling/my thin skin trembling/with these salty wounds/my stolen gold inside the emperor's tomb."
Lyrics aside, this is not subtle music; it's more of a "wall-of-synths" experience. They go for the big and glorious choruses which, again, somehow feel like an idealized childhood where every wish is granted and magic is pretty much everywhere.
In other words, Manners is pretty much about fun and simple pleasures. And it's very consistent. All you have to do is check out the video for "The Reeling" and you'll get the vibe of the whole album. To quote Pitchfork again (because they are my betters, and one's betters must be respected and quoted often), "if you like one Passion Pit song, you'll probably like them all." I like 'em all.
By now it's perhaps clichéd to reminisce over and to enjoy (with varying degrees of irony) the cheesiest of 80s music. It's been embraced everywhere, from VH-1 to YouTube to popular films (The Wedding Singer being one of the earliest examples that comes to mind; The Hangover, which features Mike Tyson listening enraptured to Phil Collins' AOR staple In The Air Tonight, is just the latest in a line of such references). We're truly living in a post-Rickroll age.
With 80s nostalgia a kind of cliché and darker angst seemingly reserved for hard rock and metal, what's a new indie rock band to do? Many go the "early R.E.M." route of mysterious lyrics and lo-fi production, wrapping the music in a kind of echoey haze. Music that seems to be about something and is vaguely earnest, but earnest about what you're not sure.
Bands like Passion Pit, usually burdened with the moniker "electro-pop," are following a different path. Using synthesizers and drum machines that either are, or are capable of replicating, the ones from 25 years ago (Yamaha's DX-7 is the most famous and most ubiquitous - with literally lots of "bells and whistles" and other bright sounds, this keyboard was used by pretty much any pop group from the mid-80s you can think to name), they're trying their best to write songs that suggest the past and its summoning of idealized childhood, while keeping things rooted in the present via modern production (both hi- and lo-fi) and, uh, mysterious lyrics. In effect, they are indie bands in retro-pop clothing. MGMT and Deastro are other examples, but on Manners, Passion Pit seems the most committed to the "good times" aesthetic. I think the Pitchfork reviewer compared listening to this album to remembering a great night out with friends, and it does have that character, even if the singer writes lyrics like, "That's a frosty way to speak/to tell me how to live next to your potpourri" and "Walls came crumbling/my thin skin trembling/with these salty wounds/my stolen gold inside the emperor's tomb."
Lyrics aside, this is not subtle music; it's more of a "wall-of-synths" experience. They go for the big and glorious choruses which, again, somehow feel like an idealized childhood where every wish is granted and magic is pretty much everywhere.
In other words, Manners is pretty much about fun and simple pleasures. And it's very consistent. All you have to do is check out the video for "The Reeling" and you'll get the vibe of the whole album. To quote Pitchfork again (because they are my betters, and one's betters must be respected and quoted often), "if you like one Passion Pit song, you'll probably like them all." I like 'em all.
Best of 2009 Pt. VI: Bitte Orca by Dirty Projectors
I know, another album that's being hyped to death. I had previously written off Dirty Projectors, having only heard Rise Above. But this is way more engaging and fun to listen to, and somehow still just as bizarre. Put on your headphones so you don't miss anything or annoy your roommates and dig in, kids. "Cannibal Resource" starts the album with a head-nodding beat and the strangest harmonic progressions this side of 20th century classical music. Luckily this song also features lead singer/musical mastermind Dave Longstreth on vocals, so you'll know right away what you're in for. By contrast, the album's single, "Stillness is the Move," leaves the vocal chores entirely to Amber Coffman and Angel Deradoorian, the group's female singers/instrumentalists extraordinaire.
I find it hard to describe this album. It's a unique formula, comprised of Amber and Angel's harmony vocals (including some crazy hocketing toward the end of "Remade Horizon"), Dave's own peculiar vocal melodies (some people really hate his voice, but I think it's perfect for the music he creates), lots of guitars and other stringed instruments (I think I hear mandolins but it could be something more exotic) plucking strange arpeggios and riffs, all over some deep, solid grooves provided by the bass and drums. It's a wonderful world to lose yourself in. The songs typically don't feature anything like a standard chord progression, and the guitars are rarely used to just strum chords, but even when they do, the effect is never anything like a standard folk or rock song. Melodies and whole sections come and go without repeating themselves. And yet each track has at least something resembling a chorus or a catchy hook. Overall, I guess I'd say they strike the middle ground between "serious compositions" and ordinary songs.
Longstreth writes all the music for Dirty Projectors (although Amber got co-writing credit for "Stillness"), the project he began as a freshman at Yale University's School of Music. The album he made that first year of college - The Glad Fact - is astonishing and well worth listening to. In fact, most of the Dirty Projectors' back catalog is worth seeking out, although I'm still not crazy about Rise Above.
I find it hard to describe this album. It's a unique formula, comprised of Amber and Angel's harmony vocals (including some crazy hocketing toward the end of "Remade Horizon"), Dave's own peculiar vocal melodies (some people really hate his voice, but I think it's perfect for the music he creates), lots of guitars and other stringed instruments (I think I hear mandolins but it could be something more exotic) plucking strange arpeggios and riffs, all over some deep, solid grooves provided by the bass and drums. It's a wonderful world to lose yourself in. The songs typically don't feature anything like a standard chord progression, and the guitars are rarely used to just strum chords, but even when they do, the effect is never anything like a standard folk or rock song. Melodies and whole sections come and go without repeating themselves. And yet each track has at least something resembling a chorus or a catchy hook. Overall, I guess I'd say they strike the middle ground between "serious compositions" and ordinary songs.
Longstreth writes all the music for Dirty Projectors (although Amber got co-writing credit for "Stillness"), the project he began as a freshman at Yale University's School of Music. The album he made that first year of college - The Glad Fact - is astonishing and well worth listening to. In fact, most of the Dirty Projectors' back catalog is worth seeking out, although I'm still not crazy about Rise Above.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Best of 2009 Pt. V: Merriweather Post Pavilion by Animal Collective
I confess: I'm really late to the party. I didn't know about Animal Collective until I read this post from Hipster Runoff. I also didn't know about Hipster Runoff until I followed a link there from another blog. Shame on me! But I have an excuse: I'm incredibly unhip. Also, the past few years have been rather odd and complicated for me, the end result being that my knowledge of what has been going on in indie music since about 2005 is practically nil. And even before that I wasn't really too savvy (I tend to be the guy who discovers a "cool new band" way later than everyone else, although Metacritic helps me out these days).
So when I first heard Merriweather Post Pavilion in January, I was flabbergasted. I didn't know what the hell was going on. Parts of it sounded like the Beach Boys, parts of it sounded like rows of effects pedals jamming with themselves. I hadn't a clue, but I had the feeling that if I listened to it enough, it might begin to make sense to me. I was right: repeated listenings made all the odd noises and samples seem more natural and many of the vocal lines started to careen around in my head at random times during the day. Before I knew it, I was hooked, and I had to hear more. So I started collecting their earlier records, and again I was shocked. They were even weirder, with crazier vocals and more acoustic instruments instead of synths and samples. Eventually I was sitting there listening to Here Comes The Indian in my headphones, paying attention to everything I heard, and it struck me that these guys were, if not geniuses, close enough for me.
I think Animal Collective have made some of the best and most interesting music of this decade. If you've never heard anything by them, I highly recommend taking the same route I did. Start with Merriweather and work your way backwards. If you're as slow as I am, be prepared to listen a few times before the beauty of this music starts to sink in.
This review feels redundant because I know this album was hyped to death and most people have already heard it and made up their minds already. But I had to write something, even though I wanted to just write "DUH" and be done with it. Ok, now I'm really done with it.
So when I first heard Merriweather Post Pavilion in January, I was flabbergasted. I didn't know what the hell was going on. Parts of it sounded like the Beach Boys, parts of it sounded like rows of effects pedals jamming with themselves. I hadn't a clue, but I had the feeling that if I listened to it enough, it might begin to make sense to me. I was right: repeated listenings made all the odd noises and samples seem more natural and many of the vocal lines started to careen around in my head at random times during the day. Before I knew it, I was hooked, and I had to hear more. So I started collecting their earlier records, and again I was shocked. They were even weirder, with crazier vocals and more acoustic instruments instead of synths and samples. Eventually I was sitting there listening to Here Comes The Indian in my headphones, paying attention to everything I heard, and it struck me that these guys were, if not geniuses, close enough for me.
I think Animal Collective have made some of the best and most interesting music of this decade. If you've never heard anything by them, I highly recommend taking the same route I did. Start with Merriweather and work your way backwards. If you're as slow as I am, be prepared to listen a few times before the beauty of this music starts to sink in.
This review feels redundant because I know this album was hyped to death and most people have already heard it and made up their minds already. But I had to write something, even though I wanted to just write "DUH" and be done with it. Ok, now I'm really done with it.
Best of 2009 Pt. IV: Dragonslayer by Sunset Rubdown
Spencer Krug seems to like saving the punchline for the end. There's a part of almost every song on Dragonslayer, usually between 1 and 2 minutes before the end, where something new is revealed. In the first few songs, to get the listener to notice what's going on, the music actually stops for a second - this is where most songwriters would end. Instead, the song continues with new lyrics, sometimes a new melody, and always a slightly different take on things. It's sort of like a bridge, but it's a bridge to nowhere - we never get back to the chorus or verse. (The one seeming exception to this rule, "Nightingale/December Song" still changes the lyrics of its refrain at the end.) This, along with Krug's usual lyrical tendencies (he seems to be having a conversation with someone he knows and you don't) helps explain the beguiling difficulty of this album. These songs demand your attention, yet expecting them to make sense is probably asking too much.
The whole album seems to have an elegiac feel, as if Krug is saying goodbye to something, although it's not exactly clear what that something is. "I think maybe these days are over," he sings on the opener, "Silver Moons." If I can indulge myself in a little armchair analysis, I'll take a guess that the complexity of Krug's songs has something to do with a fear of making music that is "merely" pop. And yet his lyrics seem to me also to reveal a fear of being so obscure as to be regarded as irrelevant. In other words, I think he's grappling with a need to feel like what he's doing is very important. I think this explains not only the complexity but also the grandiosity of many of his songs: the allusions to Classical figures and themes, the march-like choruses where he sings a line and his bandmates have to repeat it. I'm not saying this to criticize him - all his tricks work, pretty much. But the last song on the album, "Dragon's Lair," seems to indicate a longing to break out of the indie world and into something bigger, longer-lasting and more meaningful: "So you can take me to the dragon’s lair/or you can take me to Rapunzel’s windowsill./Either way it is time for a bigger kind of kill." Your guess is as good as mine as to what those two alternatives represent, but like the song says, either way it must be "bigger".
The whole album seems to have an elegiac feel, as if Krug is saying goodbye to something, although it's not exactly clear what that something is. "I think maybe these days are over," he sings on the opener, "Silver Moons." If I can indulge myself in a little armchair analysis, I'll take a guess that the complexity of Krug's songs has something to do with a fear of making music that is "merely" pop. And yet his lyrics seem to me also to reveal a fear of being so obscure as to be regarded as irrelevant. In other words, I think he's grappling with a need to feel like what he's doing is very important. I think this explains not only the complexity but also the grandiosity of many of his songs: the allusions to Classical figures and themes, the march-like choruses where he sings a line and his bandmates have to repeat it. I'm not saying this to criticize him - all his tricks work, pretty much. But the last song on the album, "Dragon's Lair," seems to indicate a longing to break out of the indie world and into something bigger, longer-lasting and more meaningful: "So you can take me to the dragon’s lair/or you can take me to Rapunzel’s windowsill./Either way it is time for a bigger kind of kill." Your guess is as good as mine as to what those two alternatives represent, but like the song says, either way it must be "bigger".
Friday, July 10, 2009
Best of 2009 Pt. III: Monoliths and Dimensions by Sunn O))))
When I was 12 I started playing guitar. My first instrument was a $40 electric that had no name on it. I was immediately struck by the fact that it was capable of more than simply playing notes. Lacking a proper amplifier, I found an adapter cable and plugged the guitar into my Magnavox bookshelf stereo. The sound that came out was low-volume and polite, but if I turned it up enough I'd get feedback. This was interesting.
The only guitar hero I had when I started playing was Frank Zappa, whose style was far too advanced and outlandish for me to imitate. What I discovered, when I finally did get a proper guitar amp, was that even if your technique wasn't up to par, you sure could make a lot of noise. And that noise was sometimes more fun to make than playing actual notes.
I went on to take lessons and improve my technique to near-mediocre levels, but now and again I would give in to my impulse for sonic experimentation. Usually when I would get some new toy, like a chorus or delay pedal. This was fun for me but I never thought of recording these experiments - they were just for my own immediate pleasure. Thank god there are people in the world who are more visionary than me.
Sunn O)))) makes music that starts with the premise that sound itself is pleasurable and worth listening to. More specifically, we're talking about the sound of a heavily-distorted, downtuned guitar. Since the band consists of two guitarists, drums are very often (but not always) left out of the equation. Over the years, they've experimented with adding various things to their sludgey guitars: effects, vocals, keyboards. However, Monoliths and Dimensions represents their biggest, most elaborate experiments thus far. Teaming up with Evyind Kang and a host of orchestral instruments as well as a choir, they expand their sound vertically a great deal, even as it continues to crawl and lumber along at the pace of a chained sloth on Demerol.
The first track, "Aghartha" is a bit deceptive, as it is closest to the group's past recordings. Featuring a Hungarian vocalist who croakingly intones some sort of poetry in a register usually reserved for one's death rattle, the track also includes a couple of upright basses, conch shells, Tibetan horns, violin, viola, piano, English horn, French horn, clarinet and hydrophone. These, however, are used not to form some kind of New Age aura around the guitars but to create squeakings, scrapings, snappings, buzzings and drones. In other words the mood is not lightened in any way by the inclusion of "classical" instruments - quite the opposite in fact.
The real shock comes with track 2, "Big Church," which begins not with the sound of distorted anything, but with a female choir intoning some mysterious chords. The track as a whole is very clearly divided into three parts, each part ending abruptly with the tolling of a church bell (how appropriate can you get?). The choir and the guitars interact throughout, and the whole thing works so well that after hearing it, you wonder how they can top this. And indeed, the third track seems a bit of a retreat, again featuring mainly the guitars and the Hungarian dude again (okay, okay, his name is Attila Csihar and he sang on a Mayhem album; happy?). A smaller, male choir makes a cameo appearance and some brass and synths are also used, if sparingly.
But like that old Vanessa Williams song goes, Sunn 0))) saved the best for last. Closing number "Alice," which I gather is a tribute to Alice Coltrane, sees them totally going for it and letting Eyvind Kang and his ensemble take over. The result is the brightest (go ahead and think of the obvious pun, I won't stop you) music they've ever performed. This change in tone is as unexpected as it is welcome. The track's beginning by no means assures us that this will be the case, coated as it is with evil-sounding chords and menacing echoes. But something happens over the course of this track's 16 minutes. Something I've never heard in Sunn 0)))'s music until now, and something I rarely hear happen in any music written after the early 20th century: development. Rather than remain in stasis or juxtapose contrasting material, the music is slowly transformed from one thing into another. It happens so gradually, in fact, that it's almost impossible to hear. Yet by the end, none of the original mood of darkness and forboding remains. When trumpets and horns start to sound major chords more than halfway through the track, it seems like the most natural thing in the world. Gradually the guitars disappear and harps and violins take their place. A trombone blows a gentle melody which turns into a solo as the music fades into silence. It's enough to make you weep for joy. It's an absolute triumph - this track alone would make this album worthy of "best of" status. Jean Sibelius and Gustav Mahler would both approve, I think.
The only guitar hero I had when I started playing was Frank Zappa, whose style was far too advanced and outlandish for me to imitate. What I discovered, when I finally did get a proper guitar amp, was that even if your technique wasn't up to par, you sure could make a lot of noise. And that noise was sometimes more fun to make than playing actual notes.
I went on to take lessons and improve my technique to near-mediocre levels, but now and again I would give in to my impulse for sonic experimentation. Usually when I would get some new toy, like a chorus or delay pedal. This was fun for me but I never thought of recording these experiments - they were just for my own immediate pleasure. Thank god there are people in the world who are more visionary than me.
Sunn O)))) makes music that starts with the premise that sound itself is pleasurable and worth listening to. More specifically, we're talking about the sound of a heavily-distorted, downtuned guitar. Since the band consists of two guitarists, drums are very often (but not always) left out of the equation. Over the years, they've experimented with adding various things to their sludgey guitars: effects, vocals, keyboards. However, Monoliths and Dimensions represents their biggest, most elaborate experiments thus far. Teaming up with Evyind Kang and a host of orchestral instruments as well as a choir, they expand their sound vertically a great deal, even as it continues to crawl and lumber along at the pace of a chained sloth on Demerol.
The first track, "Aghartha" is a bit deceptive, as it is closest to the group's past recordings. Featuring a Hungarian vocalist who croakingly intones some sort of poetry in a register usually reserved for one's death rattle, the track also includes a couple of upright basses, conch shells, Tibetan horns, violin, viola, piano, English horn, French horn, clarinet and hydrophone. These, however, are used not to form some kind of New Age aura around the guitars but to create squeakings, scrapings, snappings, buzzings and drones. In other words the mood is not lightened in any way by the inclusion of "classical" instruments - quite the opposite in fact.
The real shock comes with track 2, "Big Church," which begins not with the sound of distorted anything, but with a female choir intoning some mysterious chords. The track as a whole is very clearly divided into three parts, each part ending abruptly with the tolling of a church bell (how appropriate can you get?). The choir and the guitars interact throughout, and the whole thing works so well that after hearing it, you wonder how they can top this. And indeed, the third track seems a bit of a retreat, again featuring mainly the guitars and the Hungarian dude again (okay, okay, his name is Attila Csihar and he sang on a Mayhem album; happy?). A smaller, male choir makes a cameo appearance and some brass and synths are also used, if sparingly.
But like that old Vanessa Williams song goes, Sunn 0))) saved the best for last. Closing number "Alice," which I gather is a tribute to Alice Coltrane, sees them totally going for it and letting Eyvind Kang and his ensemble take over. The result is the brightest (go ahead and think of the obvious pun, I won't stop you) music they've ever performed. This change in tone is as unexpected as it is welcome. The track's beginning by no means assures us that this will be the case, coated as it is with evil-sounding chords and menacing echoes. But something happens over the course of this track's 16 minutes. Something I've never heard in Sunn 0)))'s music until now, and something I rarely hear happen in any music written after the early 20th century: development. Rather than remain in stasis or juxtapose contrasting material, the music is slowly transformed from one thing into another. It happens so gradually, in fact, that it's almost impossible to hear. Yet by the end, none of the original mood of darkness and forboding remains. When trumpets and horns start to sound major chords more than halfway through the track, it seems like the most natural thing in the world. Gradually the guitars disappear and harps and violins take their place. A trombone blows a gentle melody which turns into a solo as the music fades into silence. It's enough to make you weep for joy. It's an absolute triumph - this track alone would make this album worthy of "best of" status. Jean Sibelius and Gustav Mahler would both approve, I think.
Best of 2009 Pt. II: Alhambra Love Songs by John Zorn
This is the second in a series of blurbs about my favorite albums from the first half of 2009.
Alhambra Love Songs
John Zorn
If I didn't know John Zorn's catalog better, I'd think he was being ironic. The guy who made Naked City, who appropriated punk rock and death metal within his schizophrenic, manic, avant-jazz, cut-and-paste compositions; the guy who used Mike Patton - one of the smoothest vocalists in rock music - almost entirely for his screaming and other non-melodic vocal noises; the guy who seemingly never met a genre he didn't like for at least 15 seconds - has made an album of nothing but jazz-based piano-trio compositions, an album so genteel and free from chaos or noise that it would upset no one.
In reality of course, this isn't as shocking as my silly lead-in makes it seem. There is plenty of precedent in Zorn's prior work for the kind of beautiful calm espoused in these gem-like pieces. However, I believe this is the first time he's delivered an album this thoroughly chilled-out. Like the eye in the center of a hurricane, Alhambra Love Songs is eerily calm. Not all of the songs are equally placid, but even the more uptempo numbers like "Moraga" and "Larkspur" don't feature any jarring sounds or off-putting harmonies.
My first impression of this album was that, while it was superficially appealing, there was not a lot to distinguish one track from another. Boy is that wrong. The diversity of this music is in its melodic composition, not in its instrumentation. If you think about it, that's much harder to do than simply dazzling the listener with lots of exotic "weird" instruments or effects. Over and over again, Zorn impresses with the depth and beauty of the melodies he has composed for this album. Some of the tracks touch on Latin jazz; others seem to draw on Zorn's wealth of Masada material. Each one is a self-contained world.
Considering the sheer mass of Zorn's output, it's hard to assess his work as a whole. I'm certainly not going to try. But I will say that of the several dozen Zorn albums I've heard, this one strikes me as one of the most successful and fully realized.
Alhambra Love Songs
John Zorn
If I didn't know John Zorn's catalog better, I'd think he was being ironic. The guy who made Naked City, who appropriated punk rock and death metal within his schizophrenic, manic, avant-jazz, cut-and-paste compositions; the guy who used Mike Patton - one of the smoothest vocalists in rock music - almost entirely for his screaming and other non-melodic vocal noises; the guy who seemingly never met a genre he didn't like for at least 15 seconds - has made an album of nothing but jazz-based piano-trio compositions, an album so genteel and free from chaos or noise that it would upset no one.
In reality of course, this isn't as shocking as my silly lead-in makes it seem. There is plenty of precedent in Zorn's prior work for the kind of beautiful calm espoused in these gem-like pieces. However, I believe this is the first time he's delivered an album this thoroughly chilled-out. Like the eye in the center of a hurricane, Alhambra Love Songs is eerily calm. Not all of the songs are equally placid, but even the more uptempo numbers like "Moraga" and "Larkspur" don't feature any jarring sounds or off-putting harmonies.
My first impression of this album was that, while it was superficially appealing, there was not a lot to distinguish one track from another. Boy is that wrong. The diversity of this music is in its melodic composition, not in its instrumentation. If you think about it, that's much harder to do than simply dazzling the listener with lots of exotic "weird" instruments or effects. Over and over again, Zorn impresses with the depth and beauty of the melodies he has composed for this album. Some of the tracks touch on Latin jazz; others seem to draw on Zorn's wealth of Masada material. Each one is a self-contained world.
Considering the sheer mass of Zorn's output, it's hard to assess his work as a whole. I'm certainly not going to try. But I will say that of the several dozen Zorn albums I've heard, this one strikes me as one of the most successful and fully realized.
Best of 2009 Pt. I: The Hazards of Love by The Decemberists
Partly inspired by Paste Magazine, I present to you the first in a series of blurbs about my favorite albums of the first half of 2009.
The Hazards of Love
The Decemberists
The critics seemed a bit divided on this album, but I'm obviously a big fan. What irks me is that even a lot of the reviewers who have praised it have been rather sheepish about it, almost like they're embarrassed to admit to liking it. The PopMatters reviewer called it "pretentious" and thought that having children sing on one of the tracks was an "egregious miscalculation" - he also felt that the lyrics, "though excellent throughout, do sometimes border on self-parody." I think your review borders on self-parody, douchefuck!
Pitchfork's Marc Hogan rated it 5.7 out of 10 and said reading the lyrics is "[t]oo much work, not enough payoff." Of course, nobody from Pitchfork could ever admit loving an album with lyrics so vivid and poetic. They prefer their lyrics to be pointlessly obscure, like the stuff Spencer Krug tosses off on any of his several dozen releases each year.
But the real beauty to be found here is in the music, which is arranged to perfection and has melodies that will haunt you for days and weeks after hearing them. The upright bass in "The Hazards of Love 1" is just one example of how evocative the instrumentation is on this album. When it first appears at just under a minute into the track, it plays whole notes, functioning as nothing but a low cushion of vibration on which Colin Meloy sings the song's refrain. It then asserts itself properly with a slow, understated arpeggiated phrase of its own, while the music continues to build steam into the next verse. It's one of those moments that is simultaneously satisfying on its own and yet also seems to build excitement and energy.
Moreover, the album is unified musically in ways that suggest classical forms. For example, the harmonies in the album's instrumental intro form the basis of whole songs later on. Throughout, themes and their variations appear and reappear. In other words, this album is carefully crafted - and who hates good craftsmanship? People who think they are too jaded or cynical or hip to be moved by mere musical sounds, I suppose. And also the tone-deaf: let's not forget them. Their inability to hear the beauty in melody and harmony is pitiable, and we should feel sorry for them. But they shouldn't be writing music reviews.
The Hazards of Love
The Decemberists
The critics seemed a bit divided on this album, but I'm obviously a big fan. What irks me is that even a lot of the reviewers who have praised it have been rather sheepish about it, almost like they're embarrassed to admit to liking it. The PopMatters reviewer called it "pretentious" and thought that having children sing on one of the tracks was an "egregious miscalculation" - he also felt that the lyrics, "though excellent throughout, do sometimes border on self-parody." I think your review borders on self-parody, douchefuck!
Pitchfork's Marc Hogan rated it 5.7 out of 10 and said reading the lyrics is "[t]oo much work, not enough payoff." Of course, nobody from Pitchfork could ever admit loving an album with lyrics so vivid and poetic. They prefer their lyrics to be pointlessly obscure, like the stuff Spencer Krug tosses off on any of his several dozen releases each year.
But the real beauty to be found here is in the music, which is arranged to perfection and has melodies that will haunt you for days and weeks after hearing them. The upright bass in "The Hazards of Love 1" is just one example of how evocative the instrumentation is on this album. When it first appears at just under a minute into the track, it plays whole notes, functioning as nothing but a low cushion of vibration on which Colin Meloy sings the song's refrain. It then asserts itself properly with a slow, understated arpeggiated phrase of its own, while the music continues to build steam into the next verse. It's one of those moments that is simultaneously satisfying on its own and yet also seems to build excitement and energy.
Moreover, the album is unified musically in ways that suggest classical forms. For example, the harmonies in the album's instrumental intro form the basis of whole songs later on. Throughout, themes and their variations appear and reappear. In other words, this album is carefully crafted - and who hates good craftsmanship? People who think they are too jaded or cynical or hip to be moved by mere musical sounds, I suppose. And also the tone-deaf: let's not forget them. Their inability to hear the beauty in melody and harmony is pitiable, and we should feel sorry for them. But they shouldn't be writing music reviews.
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