White Chocolate Bunny Ears

Nicola Roberts. Cinderella's Eyes (2011).

2012-01-26T07:10:00.000-08:00

No one foresaw that during the Girls Aloud hiatus the most critically acclaimed solo release would be by the shy and slightly awkward red head of the group, yet that was exactly what happened when Nicola came out with Cinderella’s Eyes last year.
For those unaware, Girls Aloud are the best selling female singing group in UK history, with over 20 top 10 singles, knocking Bananarama out of first place in that category. Solo albums by Girls Aloud members, Cheryl and Nadine, sold well, but disappointed the critics who had formerly praised the group for their innovative pop songs, written and produced by the hit making machine, Xenomania.

For her debut album, Nicole co-wrote all of the tracks, with the help of some top electronica musicians and producers, such as Diplo, Dragonette, and Metronomy. Nicole’s appealingly quirky vocal style is reminiscent of Gwen Stefani, Kate Bush, and I even hear Katie White of the Ting Tings, and Marnie Stern to some degree.

This is the kind of Pop that doesn’t translate too well into the US markets. It’s positive, has lots of energy, relies on melodic content, and it’s a little eccentric. US Pop seems in contrast, to me, predominately stuck in wooden, faux R’n’B grooves, takes itself too seriously, and is afraid to branch out into something more idiosyncratic.

Well, however you look at it... Nicola Roberts has something special, no denying it. Cinderella's Eyes is probably my most favorite release of 2011.

Pizzicato Five

2011-12-15T10:56:00.000-08:00

Something or other happened in Tokyo in the late 80's/early 90’s that inspired musicians to evoke and emulate the latter period of the mid-60’s, a trend that began as a form of anti-pop but ended up being the signature sound of Japanese pop by the late 90’s.

As Momus said in an article in the Guardian, probably over 10 years ago (or more):
“The epicenter of global retro culture is Shibuya, the trendy shopping district of west Tokyo which gave Shibuya-kei (literally 'Shibuya style') its name. Here the record shops are the best stocked in the world. Fashions change every five minutes, and the moment a style is invented it's also revived and parodied. Shops and museums are the same thing, and shopping and curating are creative activities on a par with making art.” http://imomus.com/jpop.html

A couple dozen bands could have been filed under Shibuya-kei by the end of the 90’s, but my favorite was Pizzicato Five. P5 was a prolific and long-lived band, beginning back in 1979, and they released over two dozen records during their career. The band sustained a number of personnel changes, which eventually left only the duo of mastermind Yasuharu Konishi and the profoundly chic Maki Nomiya. Together, they produced the classic P5 sound before breaking up at the dawn of the millennium.

Almost unfathomably stylish, they adopted references to mid-60’s British and American pop, some French yé-yé and lounge, mixing in occasional touches of drum ‘n’ bass, house, and elements of sampling from DJ culture. This kind of thing was repeated later by non-Japanese bands such as Mono, The Postmarks, and Bittersweet, but with one important distinction: P5’s wit and whimsy puts a smile on your face instead of a shadow over your heart. They have inspired a second generation of Japanese musicians, such as Hideki Kaji, The Aprils , and The Lady Spade.

Their sense of humor was visually extended to their videos, some of which are joyously goofy:

Twiggy Twiggy (1994)

It may require a certain taste to appreciate P5’s aesthetisized pastiches. However, their songwriting skills were strong enough to offset the sometimes archness of their presentation:

Baby Portable Rock (1996)

Some of the earlier stuff reminds me of the gentle jazz ballads of later period Swing Out Sister (who are enormously popular in Japan), but by the late 90’s P5 seemed to embrace a pop sound full of infectious energy:

La Règle Du Jeu (1999)

Yasuharu Konishi seems to be still involved with his Readymade Entertainment label, and he wrote the score for a musical, Talk Like Singing, that ran in New York in 2009.

Maki is still recording, performing as a solo artist, and blogs about culture and fashion. Here’s a recent picture of Maki with Yasuharu from her blog.

I heart Jeff Beck.

2011-11-17T11:08:00.001-08:00

I love Jeff Beck. Renowned since the 1960’s for his paint-peeling lead guitar work, combined with his tough guy stance, and avocation as a hot rod enthusiast, his image is ripe for rock star parody. In fact, the characterization of Nigel Tufnel in This Is Spinal Tap owes at least some of its inspiration to Beck. But I believe his legacy will endure as a player in possession of one of the most refined senses of nuance and sensitivity. Since his 1975 album, Blow By Blow, Beck has populated his albums with slow ballads that demonstrate a level of taste that is almost indescribable.

Clearly a master of his instrument, Beck transcends the category of “great rock guitar player.” He is, rather, an artist in possession of a talent on the highest plane of refinement. Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers, Diamond Dust, Goodbye Pork Pie Hat, Angels (Footsteps), and Where Were You, are a few of the tunes where the our jaw-dropping is not in relation to the number of notes Beck can play, but in the exquisite finesse with which he is able to express melodic ideas:

Beck has mentioned as long ago as the mid 80’s that he wanted to work with a symphony orchestra, saying how he listens to lots of classical music and would love to work within that context. He finally fulfilled that ambition on Emotion & Commotion (2010), which includes a rendition of Somewhere Over the Rainbow:

Trish Keenan / Broadcast

2011-10-13T11:17:00.000-07:00

I’m fairly late in eulogizing Trish Keenan, but there is no reason to omit my own brief tribute to her and her band, Broadcast. I always liked Broadcast, but I didn’t really “get” them until recently when I connected them to their influences in mid-sixties psychedelia and early electronic music. This would have been, of course, obvious to any of their fans, but it just clicked for me since lately I’ve been interested in why the mid-sixties holds a profoundly mysterious and unshakable attraction for me. According to Simon Reynolds, in his new book, Retromania, it was around 1966 that the last really new thing appeared in Pop culture, and we’ve been recycling ever since. It was also about that time, at age 10, I think I started to become aware that culture could be something beyond mere entertainment. At that time, culture was represented primarily for me by The Beatles and The Avengers (you have to start somewhere).

Broadcast's beguiling sound combined almost folksy, lullaby melodies, with layers of experimental effects evoking vintage electronic music, wrapped in an atmosphere of creepy darkness. Their first full length album, Noise Made By People (2000), was reminiscent of mid-60’s pop. HaHa Sound (2003) delved into a more swirling, psychedelic style, and Tender Buttons (2005) was reduced to minimal arrangements, à la Young Marble Giants. Their compilations of rarities and B-sides are treasured for their more experimental work, some of it sounding very much like Julian House’s project, The Focus Group.

The last couple of weeks, I’ve been playing Broadcast’s 3 full-length albums over and over and over, along with their collaboration with The Focus Group, Witch Cults of the Radio Age (2009), which, I suppose, must stand as their last release. The first track from their first album, Come On Let’s Go, has continued to have some kind of haunted hold on me. I’ve been going to sleep with it running in my head, and then waking up to it still looping in my mental ear. There’s something about the beginning that is so unsettling. At first it sounds as if it’s in the Lydian mode, until the second chord, which is the tonic, and you realize that it all started on the IV chord instead of the I. The B section is quite sophisticated too, it’s a stream of lovely modulations. The bones of Broadcast was great songwriting, the results of which evoke, for me, what could have been hits by 60’s British girl singers, like Petula Clark, Lulu, or Cilla Black, if they had collaborated with Delia Derbyshire.

Here’s the official video for Come One Let’s Go, from 2000.

Broadcast performing Come On Let's Go live on Jools Holland's Later show in May 2000, two months after the release of their first full-length, The Noise Made By People.

Trish died in January of this year from complications with pneumonia after battling the illness for two weeks in intensive care, having contracted H1N1 following the band's December 2010 tour in Australia.

Broadcast performing Lunch Hour Pops live at the HiFi bar, Melbourne, Australia, only 4 weeks before Trish’s passing:

One more video, this one directed by Trish for the song, Black Cat, from the album Tender Buttons (2005). It appears Trish had an eerie and beautiful eye for visual art as well:

Genesis / Motown

2011-09-15T12:24:00.000-07:00

Back when Peter Gabriel was still with Genesis, the band was quoted as saying one of their big influences was Motown. Right.

However, when Watcher of the Skies recently popped up on my iPod during a shuffle, I noticed how tight the rhythm section of Michael Rutherford and Phil Collins sounded. Not exactly the Funk Brothers, you know, but still, I thought, maybe there is something to that...

Now, almost 40 years later, Phil Collins has recorded an album with the surviving members of the original Funk Brothers. OK, so maybe they were serious about the Motown thing after all.

The Who’s Greatest Hits (2009).

2011-08-26T12:13:00.000-07:00

Not being a fan of The Who I, however, readily admit to absolutely loving their early singles. I must say, I prefer these guys in shirts adorned with targets and arrows, rather than fringe. The first 8 cuts of the latest version of their greatest hits (there are about 5 compilations) have lots of chiming Rickenbacker guitar pushed through brilliant Vox and Marshall amps It’s pure mid-sixties, and Pete Townshend primarily invented that sound. Even though The Beatles also made use of the Rickenbacker 6, and 12 string guitars, George Harrison’s approach was more “composerly,” and studied, than Pete’s extroverted strumming. One might assume his thrashing was to make up for lack of technique as a soloist. Maybe so, but his sense of time is impressive. Check out his playing in I Can’t Explain, The Who’s first single, released way back in ‘64. The guitar solos are mostly rhythm parts, with a few licks thrown in. In the second solo, Pete works in a quarter note triplet riff that is pretty startling as a device for that time.

The video is quite stunning as a depiction of what looked cool in the clubs in London, 1964. But there are so many creepy boys doing freakish dance moves, it leaves me rather speechless. Where are all the girls? Unspeakably odd.

Halfway through the video the band is in another club, and Roger looks exactly like David J from Bauhaus.

The Kids Are Alright, from their 1965 album, was released as a single in 1966, reaching #41 in the UK and #85 in the US. Townsend said their “greatest hits” should be more properly be called their “greatest flops.” The video is priceless, showing the band in très chic mod styles, and a somewhat awkward lack of stage presence. Note Roger’s shirt, buttoned down, and buttoned up to the throat. And check out his mod hairdo: that little puffed up bouffant where the hair is brushed back from the crown of his head is so very au courant. Keith has his Union Jack shirt on, and Pete is in that long Edwardian jacket. These boys really knew how to dress.

Amelia Fletcher

2011-07-21T12:29:00.000-07:00

With degrees from Oxford University (DPhil, MPhil and BA with honors), Dr Amelia Fletcher is the Chief Economist and Senior Director of Mergers for the UK’s Office of Fair Trading, which is a non-ministerial government department set up to protect consumer rights.

Oh, and yes, she’s also that girl from Talulah Gosh/Heavenly/Marine Research, and currently, Tender Trap. While Amelia shows no sign of leaving her day job, she has earned the status of true legend as a leading light in the world of alternative British Pop. Tender Trap’s last album, Dansette Dansette, came out just last year, and Fletcher still makes quality music 25 years after her debut. In fact, Amelia seems blessed with an unending stream of melodic ideas, always sounding effortless, full of cheer and wit. Her music stays inventive and fresh while dwelling inside the stylistic confines of jangly Indie Pop.

Talulah Gosh (the band and the song) from way back in 1987:

Talulah Gosh Talulah Gosh

Vezi mai multe video din muzica

Here’s Amelia’s band, Heavenly, as seen in 1990:

At the age of 45, a respected professional, wife and mother, Amelia is still able to pull off being as twee as she wants to be. This is good news for all of us of a certain age; that is, you can grow up, be an adult, and still be a nerdy dweeb with loads of cuteness:

The Rolling Stones. Their Satanic Majesties Request (1967).

2011-06-28T13:54:00.000-07:00

You have to be of a certain age (okay, you have to be old) to remember, or even understand, that before being the “world’s greatest rock and roll band,” the Rolling Stones were for a time restlessly looking for an identity, going broke, and repeatedly facing ridiculously harsh penalties for possession of pot. And then they lost the leader of the band. (Sadly, who today remembers that musical genius and multi-instrumentalist, Brian Jones, started the Stones?). The Rolling Stones began as an R&B cover band forced into writing their own material by their manager, who actually quit during the making of Their Satanic Majesties Request because the band insisted on producing themselves.

Viewed at the time as the Beatles’ only competitors, in reality, Lennon and McCartney barely took a look over their shoulders to see what the Glimmer Twins were up to. Rather, they were taking notes on Brian Wilson’s latest vocal miracles with the Beach Boys.

So, in 1967, as The Beatles were dropping Sgt. Pepper, Jimi was unleashing Are You Experienced, and we saw the debut albums by The Doors, and The Velvet Underground, the Stones released their contribution to 1967, Their Satanic Majesties Request. Long thought to be the nadir of execrable self indulgence, few admit to having any regard for this most anomalous of Stones releases.

But is it really all that bad? Let’s talk about Sing This All Together (See What Happens). No, we really can’t talk about that one. Mick said, “Anyone let loose in the studio will produce stuff like that.” Maybe, but no one would release it. As Keith put it, in an absurdly obvious understatement, "There is a change between material on Satanic Majesties and Beggars Banquet.” Oh, you think?

However, we do have She’s A Rainbow. Ingeniously arranged, it features prominent piano work by Nicky Hopkins, who plays beautifully articulated sections of swirly, filigreed Baroque figures. The silly but stylish lyric is about a girl arrayed in lots of different colors. They nailed the zeitgeist on that one. And who can forget the fractured string quartet at the end playing like some parody of a Ligeti nightmare? The strings were arranged by John Paul Jones, who would become the bass player for Led Zeppelin the following year. Great stuff.

Then there’s 2,000 Light Years From Home. A palpable description of alienation with the sound of a rocket engine slowing down and some of the best creepy Mellotron ever recorded, as played by Brian Jones.

So, Their Satanic Majesties has some classic highlights, among a few missteps symptomatic of the times. One would have thought Jagger was responsible for the experimentation here, as he often admitted to being bored by sticking only to rock & roll. But, oddly enough, accounts have suggested Keith leading these sessions, most often aided by close collaboration with Brian Jones, who apparently was able to play any instrument he could lay his hands on.

The truth is, the badass Stones never fit into the hippy dippy flower power era of the 60’s. Just look at the cover of Satanic Majesties. They seem to be saying, "Yeah, we're down with all this groovy psychedelic stuff. Well, actually, no, we're not."

The Stones didn’t really come into their period of greatness until the brackish dawn of the sleazy, disenchanted 70’s, after the disillusionment of the Altamont tragedy. Suddenly, with the Beatles disbanded, and the death of 60’s idealism, it seemed nobody did naughty better than the Stones, and they found their niche just by being themselves.

Every Stones fan and rock critic will tell you Exile On Main Street is their masterpiece and pinnacle. Seeing things differently, I would call Exile the beginning of the end. For me, Beggars Banquet, Let It Bleed, and Sticky Fingers were the unbeatable trio of albums from conception to execution that they would never improve upon. On Exile, I can hear them start to imitate themselves, which is usually the first glimpse of creative downturn. But I’m probably alone there.

I love their now more neglected work from 1966, like Mother’s Little Helper, Paint It Black, and Lady Jane, all from Aftermath, as well as Ruby Tuesday, from Between The Buttons. These were baroque, chamber pop songs based in social commentary on the hip, new middle class trends in London. It was the pithy and unflinching criticism and fashionable depictions in these tunes that made the Stones seem like enlightened and intelligent observers of the latest empty fad.

Would anyone, I wonder, agree that perhaps their greatest achievement was Gimme Shelter? It’s a portrayal of desperation overcome at the very last moment by redemption (“Love, sister, is just a kiss away”). Here, the Stones pull off a brilliant and heartfelt balance between the dark and the light that remains remarkably mature and untouchable. It summarizes for me what the Stones, at their best, were really all about. The studio recording features the harrowing vocal solo by Merry Clayton, which projects the performance onto a profound level of spiritual terror.

Gimme Shelter live (live vocal anyway, but a fine performance nonetheless by Mick):

The Bird and The Bee. Diamond Dave (2009).

2011-05-03T11:05:00.000-07:00

Here's a band I never give a thought to, which is unfair because every time they show up in a shuffle play on my iPod I remember how much I like them. They epitomize much of what I esteem in music I most cherish: beauty and style, humor, and skillfully meticulous arrangements. Greg Kurstin has worked with some of my most favorite artists, such as Kylie, and Sophie Ellis-Bextor. Inara George's voice is rare; utterly relaxed but precise as a laser.

The duo wrote an implausible tribute to David Lee Roth, which is hilarious:

Japan

2011-04-05T12:24:00.000-07:00

After the Punk movement reduced popular music to its essential building blocks, bands were free to design their new sounds from scratch. They could be post-punk, new wave, new Romantic, whatever, as long as they weren't Prog (of course).

One of the bands ahead of that curve was Japan. They were already glamming it up during the Punk explosion, so they were not initially successful, except in, well, Japan! Luckily, they stuck with it until everyone else caught up with them. It didn’t hurt that the band was full of musical geniuses. The lovely David Sylivian stole the show, looking like a wax mannequin of Warhol, and sounding like Bowie with seasonal allergies. But one cannot possibly speak of Japan without acknowledging the fluid and idiosyncratic fretless bass work of Mick Karn. Karn was a self-taught bassoon player who actually won an audition to a symphony orchestra without knowing how to read music. He made his own fretless bass in the 1970’s simply by removing the frets.

Here’s the band performing The Art of Parties (the groove here is absolutely wicked, and it’s live!):

From the same concert, Still Life In Mobile Homes:

Sadly, Karn lost a battle with cancer in January of this year at the age of 53, having only been diagnosed about six months earlier. Safe journeys, Mick.

Beaumont. this is... Beaumont (2000).

2011-03-09T13:37:00.000-08:00

Keith Girdler, who had recorded originally with the band Blueboy, on Sarah Records, and subsequently in Arabesque, Snowdrops, and Lovejoy, put together Beaumont in 2000, with Lorraine Carrol (vocals), Dick Preece (keyboards), Leigh Saunders (trumpet, keyboards), and two former members of Blueboy: Martin Rose (drums, percussion) and Cath Close (vocals).

Unspeakably twee, the songs refer to plimsolls, tank tops, teardrops, and sipping cherry soda through straws. Brief instrumentals punctuate the disc, sounding like outtakes from the soundtrack of some lost Julie Christie film. It evokes, but does not directly imitate, the mid-1960’s, and it drips with wistful charm and beauty.

Keith Girdler was diagnosed with cancer in 2004 and died three years later, at the age of 46.

For those of you feel even Belle and Sebastian is too testosterone-fueled and macho for your delicate sensitivities, Beaumont might be just what you’re looking for.

Girls and Maths:

Caramel Snow. Laboratory Glassware (2011).

2011-02-22T12:24:00.000-08:00

Shoegazey pop with lyrics from a Spam email. More info on Myspace.

Bryan Ferry. Olympia (2010) ...and why it’s not the second coming of Avalon (1982).

2011-01-27T10:42:00.000-08:00

Ex-Roxy members convened this past year for Bryan Ferry’s new album, Olympia. The official press release states, “Bryan Ferry reunited on record with members of Roxy Music, including Brian Eno.” But don’t expect an updated version of For Your Pleasure, or Avalon. The press release doesn’t even mention Manzanera, Mackay, or Thompson by name and, try as you will, it’s pretty challenging to identify what Eno is doing on the record. As Mackay says on his Web site, “I have read that I played on Bryan's upcoming record Olympia. Just for the record I may have done but I am not sure!” It seems Olympia started as a Roxy reunion, but got bogged down in Steely Dan proportions of perfectionism, and eventually became another Ferry solo outing.

For those of us that have Avalon burned in our memory, the first track of Olympia starts with a shock of recognition: it’s the same pulsating string sound from “True To Life.” That seems to tease us with the idea that Roxy is now reformed, picking up where Avalon left off. But this is not the case. In fact, the opening is a red herring. Olympia has, to my ears, nothing to do with Avalon. Olympia is more burnished wood than polished pearl. It’s smooth, but you can see the grain underneath. Avalon was many shades of sleek cool. Olympia has some brightness, but it’s mostly darker and tougher.

Without the co-writing contributions of Mackay and Manzanera, Olympia forgoes harmonic complexity in favor of groove and texture, which is typical of Ferry’s solo work. The core band, supplemented, as usual, with lots of guest players, creates under, one would assume, Ferry’s direction, a weighty bed of swirling layers for Bryan’s observant ruminations. Practically every track has that now definitive Ferry ending: no fade, no chord, just a single unison note, a device we first heard at the end of “While My Heart Is Still Beating,” from, of course, Avalon.

The collaboration with Groove Armada on “Shameless” provides Ferry with a newer, updated and welcome context, but the track is marred by the distracting borrowing of the bleeping synth from Annie’s “Greatest Hit” (1999). On Annie’s original it has a bit more filtering, more of a “wah” sound on the attack, and it’s a semitone higher, but it’s essentially the same motif. Otherwise, the tunes are layered with guitar parts that creep like the roots of trees looking for water. Ferry is able to orchestrate atmospheric yet muscular arrangements that generate heft without overpowering the etchings of his vocals.

At 65, Bryan’s voice is now fragile and frayed. With Avalon, Ferry completely dropped the artifice of weird vocal mannerisms that had made his voice so distinctive and strange, and oddly appealing. Since then he has crooned to us, close to our ear, with something just more than a whisper.

Roxy fanatics tend to express disappointment over Avalon because it’s perceived as less experimental, too safe and soft compared to their idiosyncratic earlier work. True, it is pretty easy on the ears. But it’s the work of an adult who had been through some hurt and heartbreak (Bryan was in his late 30’s when he recorded it), and Avalon is all about reflection of the past, or even the present as it fades right in front of us. It’s a monument to beauty, nuance, and poignancy. From moment to moment, Avalon presents itself as an elegant flow of meticulous detail; there’s not a single jarring event, or questionable note. In that regard, it’s the first of the Bryan Ferry solo albums to come, and indeed there are the minimum of co-writing credits on Avalon.

But on stage at least, Roxy Music has reunited, as Ferry is touring with Manzanera and Mackay as a group (original Roxy drummer Paul Thompson having fallen out due to poor health), visiting Europe, Japan, and Australia. And they sound (and look) pretty darn good doing the old stuff:

50/50 - various artists (2010).

2010-12-28T08:46:00.000-08:00

Jon Nelson at Some Assembly Required put together an astounding compilation this year called 50/50. Sound artists were invited to create 50 second compositions using at least 50% recycled sound from broadcast media.

References to social and political commentary are mixed with collages and mashups of popular music. Jon did a fantastic job of sequencing and making sense of the wide variety of the 50 tracks. Although you would expect a lot of experimentation with this kind of thing, I was surprised at how entertaining, and frankly hilarious, this comp is. Apparently, there is something about sampling broadcast media that brings out the sense of humor in sound artists.

My own track, Lifetime Pop Head (#30), is a mashup of fragments from Kylie’s Can’t Get You Out Of My Head, Once In A Lifetime by Talking Heads, and an EZPop popcorn TV commercial from the 1950’s. I was a little concerned that my submission might be too whimsical, but I needn’t have worried. The chilled austerity or barrages of noise often associated with a term like “sound art” is nowhere in evidence here. 50/50 is clever, goofy, ridiculous, thought provoking, and full of inspired creativity. It’s never boring. The time limitation required composers to basically get in, make a coherent statement, and then get out in less than a minute. I was impressed at the consistent level of wit and skill displayed by the dozens of composers involved. It’s guaranteed to bring a smile to any music lover, not just fans of experimental electronic music.

After 12 years of hosting his radio show, Jon is has recently made the tough decision to retire Some Assembly Required. 50/50 is an impressive way to close this portion of his career, which will certainly continue in some other form, we hope.

It’s worth ordering the CD for the cool artwork, or download it from the usual suspects.

Lesley Duncan/Elton John/David Bowie. Love Song (1971).

2010-11-05T11:32:00.000-07:00

Whatever you make of the flamboyant Sir Elton John now, there was a time around 1970, starting out as solo artist (after failing his audition for King Crimson!), when he was taken quite seriously as a critically acclaimed, sensitive singer-songwriter. His 1971 album, Tumbleweed Connection is, in fact, a flat-out masterpiece. But there is a track on Tumbleweed that he didn’t write, and it’s one of the very rare instances of Elton covering someone else. That haunting tune, simply titled, Love Song, has always held a wistful allure for me. It was written by Lesley Duncan, and I always wondered who she was and how that song ended up on Tumbleweed. Love Song is singled out as the “the most memorable track on the album,” by David Prakel, in his book, Rock 'n' Roll on Compact Disc (1987).

I had just downloaded a compilation of British pop songs from the mid-60’s that includes a track credited to Lesley Duncan, and wondered if it was the same person. Doing some research on the Interwebs led me to learn more about Duncan and the legacy of Love Song. I found it has been covered by more than 150 artists over the years, but Duncan was never able to pull off a successful career as a featured artist herself, although she sang backup on numerous records, including Dark Side of the Moon. Before Elton recorded his version of Love Song, I was amazed to find out David Bowie had recorded it on a demo tape for his folk duo Feathers, with John Hutchinson singing lead. That demo helped Bowie get signed to Philips/Mercury, shortly before making Space Oddity.

Here’s Bowie singing backup and probably playing 12-string guitar on his demo of Love Song:

After years of singing with the stars and releasing a couple of commercially neglected albums, Lesley retired to Mull, in the Inner Hebrides, with her second husband, Tony Cox. She was well known in her town, not as a singer, but as a smiling, cheerful woman who was often seen working in her garden.

After struggling for years with cerebrovascular disease, Lesley succumbed in March of this year at age 66. A recording of Love Song was played to her as she lay on her hospital bed. Her husband sensed a tremor of recognition in her body while it played, just before she passed away.

Uffie. Sex Dreams and Denim Jeans (2010).

2010-10-21T20:19:00.000-07:00

Uffie polarizes critics. From “catchy, fresh-sounding and brilliantly self-referential” on MusicOMH, to “Uffie sucks at just about everything” on Tiny Mix Tapes, writers are at odds on whether Uffie’s debut is treasure or trash. Critics hating on her get themselves tied in knots attempting to express their indignation: “This is an anti-review. It’s supposed to be bad. Therefore you cannot raise an objection. See?” Or, “I’d rather not have to endure seeing someone eat their own sick,” both of these from the charming Drowned In Sound review.

Collaborating with French producers, Mirwais, Mr Oizo, and Feadz, Uffie came up with this debut album four years after she became a sensation at age 19 with only a few tracks posted on her Myspace page (where the stats for plays are stratospheric). Since then she got married, got divorced, and had a baby.

As soon as I heard Uffie’s album I wanted to listen to it over and over. Its appeal only strengthened with repetition. Many of the tracks sound classic to me, in the sense that they could become reference points, or maybe already have done (see the debate over Ke$ha).

Sex Dreams and Denim Jeans is like a kinetic sculpture made of Jolly Ranchers. The colors are bright, it’s transparent, it’s sweet with a slight edge of tartness. So, why all the critical objections? She does brag quite a lot about being a success, and she outrages some by saying she’s not a lyricist, but just an entertainer. Whether or not she’s a good or bad rapper isn’t even the point, I think she’s just using her voice as one part in a musical thing which we’ll call a “song,” for lack of better terminology. I find her lazy lack of “flow” a refreshing relief. I believe she’s playing a role that happens to be based on her life, similarly to how Andy talked about himself in the 60’s. It all comes off as a little too ironic and artistic to be taken at face value. It’s not what it is, it is what it’s about (claro?).

I think I figured out what the fuss is all about. Her music is neither ground-breaking Electro, nor is it innovative Hip Hop. It’s actually just another hybrid sub-genre of Pop. Hip Hop, Electro and Synthpop are simply reference points push-pinned up on Uffie’s personal inspiration wall. And that irritates purists with no sense of humor.

Pop The Glock

Edvard Grieg - Notturno Op 54, No 4, for Piano (1891).

2010-10-07T11:39:00.000-07:00

I first heard this piece at an exhibit of Norwegian art at the Elvehjem (now the Chazen) Museum of Art in Madison, Wisconsin, around 1980. It pretty much overshadowed the most beautiful paintings in the exhibit and stopped me in my tracks while I took in its chilling and deep mournfulness.

Thirty years later, it retains its spell over me. It's performed here by Mark Gasser:

Daphne Guinness - “Through art, you create your own world."

2010-09-16T17:15:00.000-07:00

Lately, I’ve been deriving some inspiration from the career of Daphne Guinness. An heiress of the brewing family, daughter of Lord Moyne, she spent summers in Cadaques, Spain, among a contingent of Surrealist artists, where Salvador Dali was a frequent visitor.

Daphne is a designer, has directed a couple of videos, written articles on fashion, and created a scent for Comme des Garcons. For me, she is reminiscent of characters, both real and fictional, from the 19th century who dedicated their lives to outré aesthetics. She’s a throwback to artistic thinkers and writers such as Wilde, Huysmans, and Baudelaire for whom the pursuit of style was not an avenue for self-aggrandizing ostentation, but rather a process of spiritual discovery.

In her own way, she has made herself into a work of art, as well as a work in progress. True to the Surrealist motivation to “épater le bourgeois,” Daphne is well-known as a icon of eccentricity.

Speaking of her outlandish style, she says, “I do it for the old people who laugh at me in airports.” She did, after all, attend a prominent clown school in London.

Daphne explains her style (or attempts to):

Here’s the video she directed to announce her fragrance:

Dubstar

2010-08-05T16:51:00.000-07:00

Pithy, poignant, and at times deep and bitter, the underrated British trio, Dubstar, gave the world some expertly composed and executed gems of Indiepop. Chris Wilkie played deft and tasteful guitar parts, while Steve Hillier crafted sophisticated harmonies on keyboards. The memorable Sarah Blackwell delivered her cool vocals with perfect intonation and a Yorkie accent.

Dwelling beneath the appealingly polished surfaces of their sound were profound observations of intimate human experience. Music this light has never been so heavy. The Day I See You Again is a positively chilling account of making a date with an ex. Elevator Song is a sweet ode to promised fidelity. Ghost conjures up images of loneliness and loss (I'll trace the whole world to find your ghost, but wherever I go I'm alone) that any songwriter would envy.

Their biggest hit, the wondrous Stars, is simply a miracle. This is the place where mere Pop attains the plateau of bliss:

It’s best to go straight for Stars: The Best of Dubstar, as some of the previously unreleased versions of songs on it are better than the originals.

Strawberry Switchblade (1985).

2010-06-22T20:27:00.000-07:00

Their Goth, proto-Harajuku Girls regalia suggested some kind of post New Wave, novelty act. However, despite their intimidating appearance, Strawberry Switchblade was actually a couple of nice girls from Scotland that worked really hard at writing and performing their original tunes. Jill Bryson and Rose McDowall only released one album as a duo, and it was filled with Pop gems as catchy as Bananarama at their best, and some lovely slow ballads that linger when they're over.

The album, produced by Queen bassist, John Deacon, has a crisp, punchy sound, and is full of deluxe and glittery, state of the art (as of 1985) digital instrumentation (I'm thinking, probably the Emulator II, or the Ensoniq Mirage: two cutting-edge, 8-bit samplers that came out in 1984).

They reached the UK top ten with the single, Since Yesterday (with a little help from Jean Sibelius' 5th Symphony).

The cheesy video is all you'd hope it would be:

The Radio Dept.

2010-05-27T06:36:00.000-07:00

Sweden has its share of death metal, doom metal, gloom metal, metallic metal, etc., but what the country has really succeeded in is its export of Pop music. ABBA conquered the world in 70's and we continue to be charmed or irritated by their evergreen oeuvre.

Every country has its Pop music, but unlike, say Poland, or Portugal, Sweden has successfully competed and pushed hitmakers past the US/UK hegemony of Pop with bands like Roxette, A-Ha, the Cardigans, and Ace Of Base, et al. Less known, but no less worthy of attention, are The Radio Dept., The Bridal Shop, Cinnamon, and Action Biker (whom I've already written about and interviewed here).

Swedish pop is clean and shiny, and so pretty, it's all white and gold. The most refined example I can think of is Club 8, a duo so delicate it seems they might break if they dare take a breath.

I do love The Radio Dept., a band that looks a bit rough around the edges, but make the most appealing fuzzy pastel noises. Many of their tracks start with a beat that rocks out, only to be washed over with lovely, fizzing guitar strumming. Johan Duncanson always sounds like he's singing through a length of plumbing. I really admire a band that can write a tune called "Pet Grief," which is not meant as a metaphor, but is actually about consoling a friend (presumably feminine) going through that sad process. And it's done without irony or phony naivete. The song's plainspoken earnestness is sweet and poignant:

Jim Sande. Harvest Bell Ride (2010).

2010-04-14T11:19:00.001-07:00

American composer Jim Sande has had one foot in the Pop/Rock world and the other in the contemporary minimalist genre for years. He has led bands such as The Executives, and Boy In The Button, performed as a classical guitar soloist, and produced several CDs that meld a Pop sensibility with modern classical music. Much of his work has been written for, recorded, and performed by, The Jim Sande Ensemble. That ensemble, in existence for 20 years, has included a variety of vocalists, percussionists, keyboard players, and guitarists.

Sande is also an astute commentator on the financial and political aspects of life in the US. He shares these observations daily on his blog, Sande.

As a solo composer, Jim has completed several CD's of carefully orchestrated chamber/Pop music, including Prim (2001), and Particle (2006), both of which collect instrumental and vocal pieces. With his current release, Harvest Bell Ride, Sande dispenses with the reliable conventions of popular music (vocals/guitar/drums) and dives into the deep waters of the virtual digital orchestra.

On Harvest Bell Ride, Jim Sande presents a collection of compositions that display his skill at orchestration, balance, and thoughtful arrangements. Ideas flow at an accessible pace, the sections of each piece relating to each other as reflections or contrasts to what preceded. Sande employs a vast array of timbres with a sensitive touch. Textures remain light and transparent. The instrumentation is never occluded by density. We can savor individual parts as they are fitted into ensemble structures. Although orchestral in nature, the effect is more chamber orchestra, as one can sense the air between the lines, which may have resulted from the mix of varying reverb settings. It's a CD that one should settle into and spend time with, as the pieces seem to benefit from being taken as a whole, rather than piecemeal. In that way, it is more of a complete work, rather than a series of random tracks.

I asked Mr. Sande a few questions about his latest CD:

All of your work on disc includes at least a few vocal pieces, did you intend from the beginning of this project not to have any?

Yes, I planned on making an all instrumental CD. The work on "Harvest Bell Ride" is less about song form and more about longer forms and through composed music. Pretty much all of my singing has been in the context of my music work with songs. The songs on my previous CDs and the music on "Harvest Bell Ride" are still basically put together in the same way though, part by part, section by section. So in this sense the songs and longer works are similar. Overall for me its all about trying to make a complete piece of music. If you sing it has to work as a totality, if you use found or modified sounds its still about the total overall piece. I work on songs and long form music from the perspective of a music writer/composer rather than as a singer or instrumentalist.
On the other hand when I am working and piecing things together, I find a few instrumental parts by singing a melodic part for an intended instrument. So there is singing in this way throughout all of it.

This new record, for the most part, features the sound of acoustic instruments that we associate with classical music. Was finally having access to convincing digital reproductions of these instruments any impetus for the composition of the pieces?

Yes, as you know when you get a new toy it can be inspiring. There's something to be said about that too. I like to try to freshen up at least some of my palette of sounds when I start on a new disc. If I didn't do that I would still be working with a Roland XP-10. This is the thing right. When we work with computers everything is evolving, sounds change, some samples get better, especially the way a company like Vienna Instruments can sample orchestral instruments. There are very smart and talented people out there who have a good sense about how to do these things like make sample libraries and they learn new tricks and keep upgrading. I do like details in sound. If the sampled violin gets closer to a real violin, well that's just heavenly. Still it's not the same. There are limitations. However I can't bring myself to use sampled guitar sounds. I couldn't do that. But I have no conscience about using virtually every other instrument from a sampled library. If I am going to use guitar, I have to play a real guitar. In truth, I do some manipulation to many of the samples, either with panning, delays, eqs, and sometimes filters. The sounds from orchestral instruments like the oboe or bassoon are so rich. They make a wonderful basis for electronic manipulation because they are so rich.

In your own description, the music on Harvest Bell Ride has something to do with forms of contemplation. Was this intentional from the outset, or was it more something that emerged as a theme during the writing process?

The theme emerged while I was in the process of working on the disc, maybe about 25% of the way into it. This is something that I have learned to do over time and the years. Its not a comfortable thing to do, but just start working without a clear picture and see where it will lead you. It seems to work for me so far on the personal level. I hope I'm not jinxing myself by saying this. The disc has the theme of these non formal contemplative activities that we all do without thinking of the activity as being contemplative. An example might be when we watch a fire in a fireplace, we can let go of our major concerns, soften the intensity of our worries, and open up some healthy space in our minds. As the fog about where this music project was going away and this idea became clearer in my mind, the work on the music becomes like a type of research. You begin thinking about the theme, you might contemplate the idea when you're out for a walk, and you do this over a period of time and learn something. Music writing like any creative activity can do this, it can teach you something if you're willing to suspend at least a part of your absolute control over the process. You might even go and do some supportive reading and such. So I got a new disc out of the process, but I also got a better understanding about one facet of our shared human behavior and how we get on and along in our lives. Its helpful.

Through most of your career, people have remarked on your skills as a guitarist (Sande was a student of renowned classical guitarist, Oscar Ghiglia). Apart from one instance, the guitar is nearly absent from this recording. Are there limitations to that instrument that made it inadequate for your current work? Or did it just not sound right in this context?

My history with music starts with voice as a choir boy in grammar school, guitar as a tweener, and then teen on piano. My first idea about what to achieve with music was to be a decent guitar soloist in the style of the rock idols. In music school the spark of wanting to put together orchestral work began when we went through the history and theory of Western music. I approached this for a long time with classical guitar study as a way into classical music. This incidentally has its limitations. So I have had this intention for a long time to work on producing orchestral music. When I'm put on the firing line and I have to choose what my main interest in music is, its music writing, even though everybody around here keeps asking me if I still play the guitar. Over the last ten years I have been formally studying piano again, going through classical repertoire. The way into putting together orchestral work on the do-it-yourself computer is through the keyboard controller with MIDI using sampled orchestral instruments. That's the name of that game. I never even tried a guitar MIDI controller. Guitar as a composing device has its limitations for me. A lot of my music is harmonically driven and the notes are simply clearer and more understandable even simply looking at it on a keyboard rather than a guitar, and I know my way around the guitar reasonably well. The guitar seems to impose patterns and shapes that are idiosyncratic to the guitar which is perfectly fine and nice, but it has problems for me. People have obviously done amazing things with writing on the guitar. If you write music on the guitar, it's going to be that, guitar music, whether its clean, distorted, harmonized, digitally manipulated, etc etc. On the other hand, I once heard that Berlioz wrote on the guitar. After that comes, I don't know maybe Villa Lobos. There are others and the work is wonderful. I do have the intention and spark to do a guitar based disc. I am curious to see if the approaches to music that I've learned recently will translate in guitar music.

How much extra work is needed to mix what is essentially a chamber orchestra, compared to a Rock band arrangement?

They are different animals. A rock mix is strong and drum punchy and the method to do that is an imperative for the music. Since this disc was primarily orchestral sounding I decided to forget about the rock mix completely. Basically I hit on the idea of mixing each section pretty much as I completed that section, otherwise it would become a nightmare to go back and mix 60+ tracks which is the number on the title cut. So if I got an introductory section to my liking note-wise, I would immediately pan the instruments and do a 90% done mix before I would move on to the next section including eq, reverb, and such. Incidentally panning in my opinion is underrated. The panning effects in DAWs are outstanding and in themselves can create unique sounds, especially the dynamic panning effects. Also I would color code each section's grouping of instruments. You need to keep it orderly or chaos will ensue. I found that doing the mixing as the section was completed would reveal what instruments I wanted to highlight. This helped if there was an abrupt segue, one without preceding space or silence, then the next dominant instrument could be centered with supportive parts surrounding. At the end of the process I would go through the piece often many times to remove any internal digital distortion as best as I could and then to finally add a little bit of compression to give everything a slight lift. Inter-channel internal distortion is problematic in DAWs. When your studio is based around a laptop, the meters do not indicate internal distortion so you have to listen closely and sometimes raise the volume a bit otherwise you can miss it. That's my experience so far. Some people recommend using -3 as the base setting instead of 0 to help with this. The short answer is yes, it takes a lot of time, and you need to have an orderly plan or else it will get messy fast especially when you want to mix.

Having a virtual orchestra at your fingertips allows you to play any instrument, which one was the most fun to try out?

That's easy. Its the saxophone. Vienna has very good sax sounds. When I find the sampled sax sound that has the honking and polyphonic Sam Rivers/Ornette articulation, I will get it without question. We may like the guitar and the piano but to try to emulate some inspired free jazz sax player, that would be a real joy in the context of any type of music.

Thanks, Jim!

Lush. Superblast! (1992).

2010-03-18T10:48:00.000-07:00

Working on my own songs recently has led me to revisit bands whose sound has influenced what I like about Pop music. Prime among those would be the British band, Lush.

They didn't really take off in the States until their third album, Lovelife (1996), by which time they had embraced a trendier Britpop sound, and I had started to lose interest. They effectively broke up soon after that with the tragic suicide of their drummer, Chris Acland, although it took a year and a half of mourning before they could even announce that they had quit as a group.

Their first album, Spooky (1992), reached #7 on the British charts, and includes one of my favorite tracks of theirs, appropriately titled, Superblast. It epitomizes their appeal for me: icy cool vocals, and radiant layers of distorted guitars strummed in shimmering harmony:

Faye Wong. Fu Zao (1996).

2010-03-12T08:06:00.000-08:00

Faye Wong is a legendary C-pop diva, songwriter, actress, and model. Beloved by fans who call themselves "Fayenatics," she has sold almost 10 million albums, and is wildly popular across China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Her name is often preceded by the designation, tiānhòu 天后, meaning Heavenly Queen. She has been attuned to and influenced by Western music, and names Cocteau Twins as one of her all time favorite bands.

With Fu Zao, Faye was ready to take artistic risks, resulting in one of her more experimental albums. It remains Faye's personal favorite, however her audience in Hong Kong and Taiwan were not so receptive of its style. The Fayenatics loved it and made it a cult hit. On Fu Zao, Faye actually collaborated with Cocteau Twins, as they wrote two of its tracks for her just prior to the breakup of the band. Subsequently, Robin and Simon of the C. Twins continued to write for Faye.

It is evident that Faye pays homage to Cocteau Twins throughout this CD. We can hear the arpeggiated guitar parts through delay lines, the flat planes of sustained harmony, the simple drum loops, and the abrupt endings associated with the revered Scottish trio. Faye even mimics the vocal mannerisms of Elizabeth Frasier, not an easy task to accomplish. Although the C. Twins' overall approach to sound is iconic, and highly influential, I can't think of anyone else who's ever dared to attempt to emulate Frasier's beautiful, but eccentric, style of warbling. The two songs actually written by Cocteau Twins, track 4, Fracture, and 8, Repressing Happiness, fit right in with Wong's originals. In fact, if forced to guess, you might fail to surmise exactly who wrote what, although Fracture does kind of stand out as having greater depth compared to the other tracks. Myself, I would bet Repressing Happiness was a Faye tune, and Decadence would be by the Twins - so wrong.

Jon Hassell. Last Night The Moon Came Dropping its Clothes in the Street (2009).

2010-02-11T11:45:00.000-08:00

Jon Hassell has been doing pretty much the same thing for over 30 years, yet he always sounds up to date. I wouldn't say that his most recent CD, Last Night The Moon Came Dropping Its Clothes In The Street, is necessarily "stripped down," since that would imply something is missing. But it's almost as if Hassell said to his band, "Let's make a groove, now take away the 97% of stuff that isn't necessary." It's like listening to ice melt. It's cool, it's light, but also deep and dark. Hassell plays and composes like a natural phenomenon. Imagine you're in a forest, listening to the play of wind, birds, creaking trees, distant noises. It may coalesce into something like a concert or composition, but it's your brain making sense out of gentle chaos. Hassell is elemental that way. Ideas are dropped and evaporate in a perpetual hazy present. The way time is kept in these tunes is remarkably subtle. Bassist Peter Freeman mostly keeps a hesitant pulse, while the drummers, Helge Norbakken and Pete Lockett, have more of an ornamental and filigreed relationship to time.

Part of Hassell's genius is with whom he chooses to play, and how, I suspect, he coaches his collaborators to proceed. I'm thinking of his album, "City," which made monumental and occasionally aggressive statements. Twenty years after that release, he plays with different personnel but some of the same sonorities appear to be revived, now evolved into the most ethereal of forms. His current band, Maarifa Street, are marvelously sympathetic to Hassell's vision of sound.

A good friend and jazz aficionado told me connoisseurs value a player's tone almost above the notes they play. Hassell's tone is certainly part of his music's appeal. Ghostly, and disembodied, it's like a wordless, vibrato-less, mezzo-soprano, or an alto flute. His style of playing epitomizes the disappearance of the artist, at the same time affirming the intelligence he imparts with the power of a few well-chosen notes over a flurry of tones. North African violinist, Kheir Eddine M'Kacich, achieves a gentle vocal style as well, and beautifully matches Hassell's approach.

Hassell has always been inspired by the real world, yet his sound has always been other-worldly. Now he seems to be playing from some plane beyond reach. If it sounds silly to use descriptions like that, and much too new-agey, Hassell's music forces you to confront the limitations of language. One is tempted to be effusive, while the music remains ineffable.

"Fourth World" is a term Hassell has used for decades to describe his "continual exploration of ways in which exotic musics from the tribal cultures of the Southern hemisphere might be fused with the technological possibilities of the Western World" (from the Jon Hassell website). That "continual exploration" has led on this disc to an incredibly refined and empyrean realm.

Annie. Don't Stop (2009).

2010-01-26T12:41:00.000-08:00

Annie's followup to her brilliant debut, Anniemal (2005), finally arrived last November after years of tantalizing frustration. My daughter has almost doubled in age since Anniemal came out, which she loved.

So, how does it compare? There's nothing quite as sticky as "Chewing Gum," on Don't Stop. For that, you'd have to get the single, "I Know You're Girlfriend Hates Me," which was released earlier in 2009.

The new album is less bedroom electronica, with fewer digital squiggles, blups and buzzes. The new songs are still pop, but with more of a filled-out rock band arrangement. Guitars are a lot more prominent, and the drums and percussion sound more "live," (whatever that means in 2010).

The songs on Anniemal frequently revealed a touching sensitivity, with occasional flashes of a confident and analytic sarcasm. The ratio is reversed on Don't Stop, with most of the songs displaying self-assuredness, humorous cattiness, challenges, and kiss-offs. It's pretty amusing, and fun. On the whole, it's spunky and perky pop with a rockier edge, although Annie is working with a variety of producers here, so some of the tunes have a completely synthetic glow:

Songs Remind Me Of You
Some high points: the tribal drum corps and chanting in the opening "Hey Annie," which starts out very Missy, and ends up quite cosmic, and the song built around the ultimate insult for a musician: "I Don't Like Your Band."

George Pringle. Salon des Refuses (2009).

2009-11-24T13:37:00.000-08:00

Connoisseurs of electronic music might scoff at her canned beats and off kilter MIDI programming, but George definitely has it - I just don't know what "it" is.

There are four CDs in my car right now, Immolate Youself by Telefon Tel Aviv, Pop Ambient 2007, and 2008, and Salon des Refuses by George Pringle. Today I was listening to Row by Thomas Brinkmann on my iPod, but the CD I can't stop playing again and again from the beginning is the one by Ms. Pringle.

It's hard to pinpoint exactly what it is that makes George Pringle so different, so appealing. Her clap-trap drum tracks won't give Xenomania any sleepless nights. She can sing, but hardly ever does, preferring to deliver her lyrics/stories as monologues with F. Scott Fitzgerald's powers of social critique. Her mind is like a closet stacked with overflowing shoe boxes full of trivia and details, you pull one out and the rest follow. But it's more poetry than stream of consciousness I hear. It must be the voice: an upscale, cynical, yet vulnerable instrument she uses to depict her tales of observation and loneliness.

The last year has revealed a raft of electropoplettes, and some are quite good, but I don't recall any of them being described with the words, "outsiderness" and "self-parody," as the Independent did when discussing George.

She first got attention on Myspace, which, if you do music, and are actually making an effort to get noticed there, is (as some of you must have found out by now) virtually impossible (although it's happened a couple of notorious times). George has pretty much gone it alone, using the built-in mic on her Mac to record tracks all by her lonesome on GarageBand, releasing her own record and getting gigs without a booking agent. She's been subsequently profiled in such high-profile journals such as The Independent, The Guardian, and The Times (London). This is the type of exposure you don't get just because you're a girl doing music on your own. I was thinking of contacting La Pringle for an interview, but then I found this, and realized I couldn't do it any better myself. It even includes embedded videos, so I won't bother posting any here - just give it a click, please.

Joy Division / New Order

2009-11-10T13:46:00.000-08:00

I can't think of another band that lost it's frontman and focal point, yet regrouped and emerged as an even greater popular and critical success. Genesis lost Peter Gabriel and enjoyed an upsurge in appeal, but critical esteem - well, no.

Joy Division, with it's epileptic and depressed Ian Curtis, seemed to find a shadowy corner somewhere at the end of the punk era, hinting at a haunted netherworld that was both raw and spooky. They foreshadowed Goth bands like Bauhaus, and contemporary post-punk revivalists such as Interpol.

After Curtis's suicide, the band stayed together and brought in Stephen Morris's girlfriend Gillian to play keyboards. Now renamed New Order, the band turned out sleek, terse music that flirted with the dance club but retained its punky muscle.

As you can see in this video, the members exude what I would call an attitude of "ordinary genius." In other words, they don't look at all like gods of rock and roll, but they possessed an aesthetic sensibility that set them above just about anything else going on in popular music at the time. Things I love about this video: Gillian turning the knob of a synth module, Stephen looking sheepish, and the Joy Division poster on the wall. The serenity displayed on their faces opposes the cliched depiction of the Romantic "struggle" of the artiste. This is about as far as you can get from "Rock" and still remain "Rock." Their almost militant stance against the Rock stereotype actually seems "punk" to me. It's "cool," in the sense of detachment, but it still rocks like a sledgehammer. It's an enigma.

Saint Etienne. Fox Base Alpha (1991/2009).

2009-09-21T12:01:00.000-07:00

While the Beatles are getting a great deal of attention for the reissue of their remastered recordings, Saint Etienne is also in the process of re-releasing their entire recorded output with additional discs of supplementary material, starting with their first CD, Fox Base Alpha.

One can only imagine artists such as Springsteen or Dylan receiving such special treatment in the States. Saint Etienne's fans are often completists, so the band will most likely have no problem selling scads of these repackaged gems. Despite the seeming homogeneity of pop music worldwide, Saint Etienne is recognized in the UK as a marvelous and sublime entity, while being only a rare delicacy around these parts. But true fans anywhere are inspired to an almost religious level of unconditional devotion. Lucky folks in the UK are being treated to concerts during which they will perform the entire Fox Base Alpha record.

While the trio produces their own dance-pop masterpieces, they have occasionally covered other tunes, most notoriously, Neil Young's "Only Love Can Break Your Heart." Here's a live performance on Top Of The Pops of a hit single originally recorded in the 70's by Jigsaw. Anything Saint Etienne touches they make their own, so it ends up sounding like something they would have written anyway.

Who Do You Think You Are:

One of the (many) things I appreciate about Saint Etienne is how they maintain a profound level of chic while being kind of surreal and whimsical. And they've never been too cool to be a little silly. The royal getup that Pete is wearing during this performance is the same costume he wore in the official video (unavailable on YouTube), in which he portrays a king with Elvis glasses. A very recent and fascinating interview with Bob Stanley is here, if you're interested in his thoughts on the history of pop music.

More divine silliness below if you're up for a personal favorite. (Note the modulation between the verse in E Dorian mode and the chorus in F Major, using a F#7 chord going to the B flat IV chord in the new key, at the 1:06 mark - total genius!)

Hug My Soul:

Keiichi Sugimoto (Fourcolor, Fonica, Filfla). Interview.

2009-09-09T06:27:00.000-07:00

I'm fairly obsessed with Keiichi Sugimoto's music. Keiichi is a Japanese laptop composer/guitarist with a highly refined sense of taste and style.

He records under various project names such as Fourcolor, Fonica, and Filfla, collaborates with singer Moskitoo, and is part of the band Minamo. Except for his last release, Frolicfon, which presented live, exuberant drums upfront in the mix, his music sounds pretty much the same: delicate electronic textures interweaved with layers of simple and attractive guitar parts.

Keiichi is also a graphic designer and runs the Cubic Music label. He writes music for TV advertisements in Japan for McDonald's, Ritz crackers, and Häagen-Dazs, and has released music on such uber-chic labels as 12k , Tomlab, and apestaartje. His music epitomizes what I would identify as one particular slice of contemporary Japanese aesthetics: cool, intimate, delicate, sensitive, pretty, undemonstrative, detailed, and minimal. I appreciate work that can at once sound random and tightly controlled. That's a tough dichotomy to straddle, yet Keiichi makes it seem unforced and natural.

FilFla live at [F]luister:

FourColor/Filfla - Berklee College of Music - 10/20/08:

There is little available information out there about Keiichi, except for some reviews of his records, and his own blog. Motivated by curiosity and admiration, I contacted him for an interview. He very quickly agreed and sent back his responses. Although he expressed an insecurity about his grasp of English, I felt his answers were clear and precise. (I did a slight amount of editing just to clarify tense in some cases, or for singular and plural agreement.)

When you compose, do you have a sound in your head, or do you improvise until you find something interesting?

yes, mostly i have imagined sounds in my head when i compose.
some times, i do make sounds by improvisation.

Do you have a goal in composing music? To quiet the mind? To create a fictional space?

maybe i don't have the goal.
because, i have to develop all the time.

How do you know when a new song is finished and doesn't need any more development?

mostly i have a plan for making tracks.
it's like, compose --> recording --> mixing --> mastering.
i just make along like that.

What influenced you to create music in the beginning?

it happens suddenly.
for example, when i saw an interesting building or when i heard
interesting sounds in town...

What record are you most proud of?

very difficult question.
every work is special for me.
so i can't choose anything.

Your last cd was a Filfla release. Will you release any new music on cd soon?

yes, i will.
maybe next is me and other members of the project "minamo" for release.
also, i have some idea for new works.

What kind of guitar do you play?

electric guitar: fender jaguar
electric acoustic guitar: morris
and 12 string gibson guitar, no brand classical guitar

What software do you use when you perform live? Do you use loops, or linear arrangements? What kind of digital processing do you use? Max/msp, Pluggo?

i use ableton Live when i perform.
i use both loops and linear arrangements.
i have used pluggo before. but recently i just use default
plug-ins of ableton live.

What guitar effect pedals do you like?

delay, looper.

Are you busier with music or graphic design?

music.

How did you get involved in doing music for television advertisements?

mostly, from music production.
some other advertisements are directly from clients of companies.

Will you come back to the United States for any performances?

i hope.
no ideas or offers right now.
but, i really want to perform in us as soon as possible!

That's great! Thank you Keiichi!

You can listen to some of Fourcolor's here.

Lene Lovich. Lucky Number (1979).

2009-09-02T06:48:00.000-07:00

Another bit of nostalgia here from the end of the 70's. I was quite captivated with this tune when it came out, but I don't believe I ever saw the video.
Lene Lovich is truly one kooky chick. She makes Bjork look like Nancy Reagan.

The bald guitarist is Les Chappell, her longtime collaborator and life partner.

My favorite line is, "There's something in the air besides the atmosphere."

Lucky Number

David Bowie. Boys Keep Swinging (1979).

2009-08-25T11:25:00.000-07:00

I remember seeing this video, very late at night in 1979, on some random TV show. At the time, all I was really listening to was classical music and prog rock, so I had no previous interest in David Bowie, I thought he was just some wacko. When this video came on, it took me by surprise, and I sensed there was more going on with him, in fact, I believed I was seeing "art."

It's not that the video is weird. Weird isn't always good, or even interesting, sometimes weird is just dumb. Boys Keep Swinging is chilling in a metaphysical way. Note the lack of special effects. It's essentially a theatrical performance. It's not spontaneous or tossed off, it's premeditated and carefully staged.

There are two parts, the "performance" and the "runway show." In the performance part, Bowie performs enthusiastically in eerie isolation, doing his awkward/cool rock and roll dance, without a band or any visible audience. It's like a claustrophobic peepshow. If you haven't seen this, or forget what happens next, I won't spoil it for you, but David takes some female personas for a stroll down a catwalk. It's has you wondering at first, "Is that him? It can't be him. Oh, yes, it's definitely him!" The cheap set design for the "runway" section is completely fabulous, it would have been ruined if it were of a higher quality. And don't forget cheap can look expensive on film, this was meant to look tacky. The female characters are deftly mimed in brief cameos and each of them is individually defined with a few ingenious bits of actor's business.

How can I not mention Adrian Belew's guitar solo that accompanies the runway portion? It's a sublime and unbounded bit of ecstatic improvisation.

Yuan Quan. Short Stay No. 2 (2008)

2009-08-21T07:24:00.000-07:00

I came across this video while our family was in Guangzhou, China for our second adoption. Our son was taking a nap and I found myself watching the V Channel, which is the Asian music video channel.

I had read in the NY Times that Chinese pop was generic and bland. Some of it is, but I found a lot of the music really delightful, pretty, delicate, and light as air, and that's not a crime. I saw a band that did some really sweet Indie pop reminiscent of the NY band Ivy.

And I was impressed by this video, “Short Stay No. 2″ by Yuan Quan. At least I think this is the video, it looks like it, but I remember it sounding different, more of a samba. Either way, it's probably something most folks in the states would never see, and it has a refreshing charm. Yuan Quan is apparently quite a big deal in China. She's an actress and musician, and she has compiled a collection of travel related songs under the series title, Short Stay that she recorded with musicians living in each of the cities she visited.

Yuan Quan. Short Stay No. 2:

Röyksopp and Robyn - "The Girl and the Robot." 2009

2009-06-10T13:39:00.000-07:00

I've been listening closely to Junior, the new album by Röyksopp. Even if you think you've never heard of this Norwegian electronic duo, I'm pretty sure you are already familiar with some of their music,
and here's why:
Please don't hold this against them.

Anyway, what's really impressive on this disc is the second track, called The Girl and the Robot, a techno tinted pop tune with a sophisticated chord progression, evoking a 19th century art song as it might have been written by Grieg over a hundred years ago. This lovely harmonic sequence goes like this, in a minor: iv / VI / #VII / i / VII / VI / iv / i. It's interesting how the progression avoids the more obvious use of the dominant chord, substituting the iv chord instead, which has a softening effect. Using a #VII chord is also a brilliant substitution for the V chord, and gives the song a unique flavor.

The track is a collaboration with the truly peerless Swedish pop singer-songwriter, Robyn. There is an official video for this which is rather fabulous , but I prefer the version Röyksopp performed live on tv with Robyn (notice the cheers when the audience recognizes her!):

Other tracks feature vocals by Anneli Drecker, Karin Dreijer from The Knife, and Lykke Li from, presumably, some other planet. All worth a careful listen.

Anthony Adverse. The Incredible Anthony Adverse (1988).

2009-01-30T06:33:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I second guess my own taste. When my most favorite musical discovery of 2008 was a campy, easy-listening album from the mid 1980's, I fear I am losing my grip. Then, I have to remember, I rarely find myself in consensus with the mainstream over what is commonly being hailed as good, or the greatest, or the best thing ever in music anyway . I just go my own way, and that often leads me into some strange locales.

The Incredible Anthony Adverse was a best-seller for el Records, which makes sense because it's truly an eccentric gem. The cover of the CD boasts, "On screen or off, an original from the outset," a typically colloquial yet oblique declaration from the el Records myth makers. But, "original" certainly defines her.

The disc launches with a brief, and gothically gnarly, instrumental for chamber orchestra. The first vocal track is an outlandish recounting of the Garden of Eden story, complete with diminished chords, the Cookie Monster-ish voice of God, and a kazoo solo. It's ebullient, ridiculous, and campy, the whole album being a camp masterpiece. El Records specialized in the stylized, the artificial, and the outmoded, combined with a sensibility for the literate, humorous, and ironic. Anthony Adverse was able to fully engage herself in these tunes, and takes them on with utter conviction whether they require a throaty cabaret voice, a mellow jazz voice, or a "mod" pop voice. Her singing is a bit like acting, she comes up with a character for every necessity. It gets you wondering though, what was the motivation behind this strange recording, what were the circumstances, and what is it with all these eccentric songs that mix pop, with jazz and novelties?

The best of the songs have a timeless quality that is difficult to pin down. The Red Shoes Waltz, Maria Celesta, and Grisha's Birthday all have a vaguely mid 1960's tint. Now Listen sounds more antiquated, like a small vocal group from the 1950's. The high point for me, emerging after many, many spins, would have to be Imperial Violets, an impeccable tune which turns up as #55 on Jonathan Bogart's thoughtful list of 100 best songs of the 80's:

Imperial Violets

The songs on this disc still continue to draw me in. I listen closer and closer each time, attempting to catch all the lyrics, hear how the instruments fit together, and to decipher the chord changes which are incredibly svelte, sublime and deceptive.

Credit is due Louis Philippe, who wrote most of the songs on this disc, including all the best ones. He also provided the arrangements and most of the vocal and instrumental background. Let's admit, a fair number of popular songs are just riffs with a vocal layered above, the tunes of which employ a few steps of the blues scale. Louis Philippe wrote these songs the old fashioned way. There are distinct melodies within defined structures, and sophisticated modulations crafted in harmonies that borrow from the jazz and classical idioms.

In the late 1970's, the teenaged Julia Gilbert was a member of a couple of punk bands, Popular Theory, and Five Or Six. Subsequently recruited by Mike Alway as a solo artist for el Records, she was renamed Anthony Adverse, and paired with Louis Philippe for the album The Red Shoes, a tribute to the 1948 Powell/Pressburger film. The original is long out of print, but those tracks are included on this "best of" collection, which appends some of her singles to the Red Shoes song cycle, along with covers of 60's hits by Mary Wells and the Shangri La's.

After The Red Shoes album, Anthony Adverse released Spin, a collaboration with the late composer and songwriter, Daemion Barry, which seems now very dated as a late 80's production, and sadly lacks the eccentricity which make el Records releases so engagingly outre.

Julia Gilbert retired the Anthony Adverse persona before the 90's even began, leaving behind very few images, and apparently no interviews or videos. Today, Julia writes scripts for the long running TV series in the UK, Eastenders. Over twenty years later, there is a lingering nostalgia over her haunting image. Momus recently posted in his blog about meeting her once, and being fairly starstruck in her presence.

The sound of The Incredible Anthony Adverse has the power to immediately obliterate the everyday world, plunging you into a whimsical and insular daydream of refined and charming kookiness. Once you enter it, it's very difficult to leave.

(Please click on the cover of the album below to hear these extraordinary tracks)

"A Chacun Son Gout," or, "There's No Accounting for Taste!"

2008-12-29T06:48:00.000-08:00

My ridiculously and improbably succinct best-of-the-year roundup of favorite music from 2008:

We Started Nothing - The Ting Tings.

Alpinisms - The School of Seven Bells.

Also noted, music I turned to most during the year when I couldn't decide what to listen to :

I Put A Record On - Gudrun Gut.

The Incredible Anthony Adverse - Anthony Adverse.

(...anything by Kylie).

Happy New Year!

Je Suis Animal

2008-12-10T08:26:00.000-08:00

Just discovered this lovely, boy/girl, British/Norwegian, Indiepop band that blends influences from Broadcast, Electrelane, and Lush into a tasty treat.

The video for The Mystery of Marie Roget is fabulous viewing even without the music. Of course, it's styled to look like a 1920's silent film, and borrows some images from the 1928 Bunuel/Dali collaboration, Un Chien Andalou.

The title of the song comes from a short story by Poe. The girls in particular look incredibly authentic in this:

Their debut album, Self-taught Magic from a Book, has just come out on the Angular Recording Corporation.

Roisin Murphy. Mansion. October 24, 2008.

2008-10-30T12:39:00.000-07:00

It's incredible that this past Friday night was the very first performance of Murphy in New York City. She's a veteran of the music biz in the UK and Europe, having been the extroverted half of electronica duo Moloko for ten years and six albums. During her show at Mansion, she highlighted tracks off her new album from last year, Overpowered, still yet to be released in the US. She performed one Moloko tune, but her somewhat experimental debut solo album, Ruby Blue, was represented only by the title track, and Ramalama. (Why didn't she do Sow Into You, one of her best, if not THE best, of all her solo work?). If you weren't one of the lucky ones able to be there, here's a good idea of what it was like:

The set list was as follows:
Cry Baby
You Know Me Better
Checkin' On Me
Dear Miami
Primitive
Ruby Blue
Movie Star
Forever More
Let Me Know
Overpowered
Tell Everybody
Ramalama

Murphy connected well with her adoring audience, projecting into the crowd and crouching down to grab hands. She commented that she's waited a long time to to play NY, "but I'm here now." There is word that she will return next spring during a full tour. Roisin has maintained that performing is very important to her. I was reminded of Peter Gabriel's early days with Genensis. Their music was compelling and entrancing to hear, and in performance took on the dramatic aspects of theater. Roisin changed costumes almost for every song: looking like a sleek biker chick, Little Red Riding Hood, or a plaid deer. My favorite outfit was probably the furry wings. My own snaps didn't turn out too well, but there are some superb photos and video posted on other blogs here, here, and here.

Murphy's NY debut was actually part of the CMJ marathon - a five day showcase of over 1,000 bands from around the world. She certainly outclassed (and outdressed) the mostly unknown, low-profile indie bands playing all over the city, often for free.

This was certainly the only time I will even get near the ultra swanky club, Mansion, formerly Crobar, in Chelsea. Looking almost decrepit from the outside, the interior is surely somebody's idea of - what? High style? Maybe a 21st century version of Morris Lapidus, full of the same self-important desire to dazzle, but without the surrealism. Mansion is huge, but it felt like we were packed into phone booth as I stood shoulder-to-shoulder with other fans on the main floor, maintaining my balance while being jostled by clubbers who tried to dance, or even just breath. But the venue was an excellent choice to showcase Roisin's flashy, glitzy electro-pop.

The Ting Tings. We Started Nothing (2008).

2008-09-09T11:14:00.000-07:00

The cute boy/girl duo of Jules and Katie aspire to mindless silliness, and they certainly achieve that, however they can't hide their creative musicianship. One gets the impression they could actually play prog rock if they wanted to, but thank goodness have chosen instead to deal in bratty Indiepop.

The opening track, Great DJ, bounces along amiably, flirting with an augmented I chord along the way, until the chorus kicks in with a modulation to the parallel minor, and you suddenly know The Ting Tings are into something very special.

Great DJ:

They flopped as a full band previously known as Dear Eskimo. Disenchanted with the music industry, Jules and Katie made music for fun, and were surprised by their new success from just doing what they love. Steve Jobs plucked them from obscurity for an iPod commercial, and we all heard how good they were (licensing is the new radio).

They're at that exciting point in their career where they will still play a little club in upstate NY (Valentine's in Albany, to be specific), a record store appearance in Missouri, then have a spot on the freak show otherwise known as the VMA awards on MTV (for the most part preempted by a commercial interruption, unfortunately).

They make enough noise as a just a duo, and in live performances play guitar and drums with a flexible setup of electronics to allow for some improvisation.

Shut Up And Let Me Go:

The whole album is cohesive and concise at 37 minutes. The last track seems to drag, but would probably be effective at a live gig. Each track has some nice details you may only notice with headphones, so it's worth a close listen. Traffic Light would fit beautifully on an album of music for children. Katie can sing, but often exclaims in a sing-songy chant like a demented cheerleader, or a more spastic George Pringle. Do we really care that Shut Up And Let Me Go, and We Walk are built on practically the identical rhythm? No, we don't.

Interview - Action Biker

2008-07-30T07:02:00.000-07:00

Swedish musician Action Biker has released her debut album, Hesperian Puisto, the title of which is named after a park in Helsinki. Sarah Nyberg Pergament credits influences as diverse as Moondog, Francoise Hardy, Syd Barrett, Flying Lizards, and Maurice Ravel. And yes, it's actually possible to perceive hints of all these inspirations.

The texture of her carefully arranged songs feature tendrils of delicate melodic lines woven in distinct counterpoint. The finely etched details of her compositions are probably due to her many years studying classical music. The brief tracks are interspersed with even briefer miniatures like diverting intermissions between vocal tracks. A fan of old musicals, she even does an idiosyncratic cover of the old standard, "By Myself," from the 1937 musical, "Between The Devil," by Dietz and Schwartz, performed by Fred Astaire in the 1953 film, "The Bandwagon." Fans of Au Revoir Simone or Broadcast should love this album.

Her thin, girlish voice is perfectly matched to her vulnerable and delightfully personal lyrics, including a quirky tribute to her favorite grocery store.

ICA Lapis:

The title track is based on this lovely chord progression: A flat Maj7 / g min7 / d min / C Maj7.

Hesperian Puisto:

I recently interviewed Sarah about her new album and her musical background:

Your new album is lovely. Are you happy with the way it turned out?

Thanks. Yes I guess I am. But it was quite difficult to finally decide that it was finished, but after working on it for a few years I felt it was important to complete something. The second one will be much easier to make and won't take another five years!

I know the name Action Biker comes from an old computer game. Why do you use a pseudonym?

I like to keep some distance between who I am and what I do I guess. Even though it's very related. It was my friend Anton who came up with the idea of the name. He was a big Commodore 64 enthusiast and he just decided that that was to be my artist name... if ever I'd release something. This was after I'd made one or two songs, and I had no idea that people would actually would come to hear them.

Why did you choose to record the tune, "By Myself?" And are you playing flute on that, or is it a sampler?

I'm a big fan of old musicals, especially the ones with Fred Astaire. In the musical "Bandwagon" he gets off a train and starts to sing this song to himself. I chose to include some flute on it since my father is a professional flautist, and I felt I wanted to include him on the record somehow.

Your songs are very meticulously put together. Did you study classical music?

I used to play violin for ten years and the piano for seven years. But I gave it up when I was fourteen. I took some singing lessons a few years later. I've grown up with classical music, since my parents are classical musicians and I listen a lot to it still.

There are a number of short tracks on Hesperian Puisto. What role do these miniature compositions play in flow of the album?

It's just something that felt natural to me, since I've done a lot of tracks like this that I guess maybe don't seem to make sense at all but still they are part of what I do. I just wanted to be honest. I wanted to include things I like to do.

As I listen to the album, I keep feeling it is telling a story, rather than just a collection of tracks. True of false?

I'm not sure. If that's how people feel that's fine. The record and my lyrics are quite personal even if the subjects vary a lot. A difficult break up or thoughts about refrigerators. I never intended to do a story though.

What software and equipment do you use for producing music?

Reason and Cubase.

Swedish pop acts, for example: Komeda, Club 8, Cardigans, and Robyn, are all very different from each other. Yet, they seem to have certain qualities in common, such as lightness, poise, restraint, melodic inventiveness, and pretty surfaces. How do you think the Swedish national character is reflected in its pop music?

I don't know really, since both the light pop and hard rock scene is quite big here. The Indiepop scene here has got quite a reputation during the last couple of years, I don't know how it reflects the Swedish people though. We're told to be quite introverted and shy, maybe we need to make music to express ourselves. Aaah! I don't know!

I read an article in Spin magazine that the Swedish government takes an active role in supporting pop music. How has the Swedish government helped you in career in any way?

Not in any way whatsoever! But I've never tried, I'm happy to work on my own without support, I really don't care about money or anything, not even gigs that much. This is something I do on my spare time. I get my money for being a student, I sure wish they'd help the students more over here!

I read that you played the NYC Popfest at the Cake Shop in June. How did you like performing in New York? Will you be returning to the US any time soon?

I must say I got a strange feeling somehow. I can't explain it. I liked it, but I was very jet lagged so I felt quite confused. I'd love to return some day. I had a wonderful time in New York. I loved Central Park.

Thank you Sarah!

Interview: Gudrun Gut

2008-07-02T06:11:00.000-07:00

During her long career, Gudrun Gut has appeared on over 50 releases, and has been involved in the German music scene since the early 80's, playing in bands such as Mania D, Matador, Malaria!, Miasma, and was a member in the first incarnation of Einsturzende Neubauten. She is also the founder and owner of two record labels, Moabit Musik in 1990, and Monika Enterprise in 1997. After working so long in group contexts, Gudrun was inspired to produce an album with a carefully chosen range of invited collaborators, releasing the fascinating "Members of the Ocean Club," in 1996. The release party for that album spawned a regular club night in Cologne, and a tour, eventually establishing a presence as a radio show in 1997, which continues to broadcast across Germany, as well as Siberia and China.

A particularly captivating track and accompanying video from "Members of the Ocean Club" is "Firething," a collaboration with underground Australian chanteuse, Anita Lane. Filmed on location at the original Ocean Club, the video combines a mood of bewitching glamour, and the intimate sense of eavesdropping on a private conversation. A vague sense of danger is offset by a barely detectable sense of humor, which takes the whole thing into the realm of an askew psychodrama:

In 2007, Gudrun released her first "real" solo work with minimal outside collaboration entitled, "I Put A Record On." References are made to a variety of genres of music, tango, sludgy blues, polka, and even some swinging, lounge-y kitsch. She uses bits and pieces from the standard building blocks of popular music, but assembles them into unfamiliar collages. Loops are grainy, and murky, as if channeled from antique Victrolas. The percussion parts have just a hint of techno. Her vocals, usually in English, are cool and unemotive, purred like Dietrich, or Morticia Addams, whispering from the crypt. Some of the vocals are merely spoken, but Gudrun's alto is delivered in such a soft, mellifluous style that you accept her sing-songy performance as melodic. Her compositions are pop based, but not like any "pop" you have ever heard. No shiny, glittery surfaces. Everything is sepia, hand-tinted, or black & white, and slightly deteriorated and dusty. The tracks are interleaved with channels of mystifying noises, looping like some arcane machinery running in the background. Although the arrangements are uncomplicated, repeated listenings are rewarded with the perception of new levels that were unnoticeable even after a dozen or more run-throughs. Her work was rewarded this year with an in-depth cover story in The Wire.

The opening track, Move Me, is composed of a queasy mix of delay lines and loops of a wheezy tango accordion. The track spins through your head like a mesmerizing blur, reminding me of the work of Philip Jeck, or Tom Recchion. When Gudrun's voice emerges, it suddenly becomes an accessible pop song, one however that manages to intriguingly bridge a divide between "sound art" and "pop:"

Gudrun is in the midst of performing around Europe this summer, in Germany, as well as Belgium, Italy, Spain, and she recently played in Moscow, which she described to me as a "fantastic" experience. She graciously took time to answer some questions that were on my mind:

How does living in Berlin affect your work?

oh- i love living here. berlin gives me freedom. its nice to know that there are some like minded people living close. i guess the fact that i have to kind of prove myself in this surrounding does affect my work.

Did your study of art influence your music?

yes i guess that my interest in art does matter.

What do you envision as the best way to listen to your music: on headphones, a good stereo system in a quiet room, or a club?

oh whatever is most comfortable.

Why are your lyrics primarily in English?

because that way i get a little distance to the lyrics- my vocal style is pretty private 'cause i do not sing loud- and i like to have that little language border. english has a different melody in itself. on the other hand i do enjoy german lyrics as well. blätterwald is german - because it's a free flow improv, and that doesn't work so well in a second language. i have a lot of english speaking friends as well- so english as a language is very important for my day to day communication.

How much time do you spend working on your own music every day?

ha- depends- at the moment i am still refining the live material and i always try new pieces and do new edits for the live sets. but at the same time i listen a lot to other music- once for the radio show we do every week and then for the label as well. i find this inspiring too.

Do you begin your work with ideas, or by messing around with sounds?

for new writing- i mess around. i love and need chaos for writing. chaos makes the ideas come without limitation - and out of this mess i love to create something new. organize it. collage it. the lyrics i have mostly roughly written before and then built it all together with the music.

What equipment or software do you use?

i use macintosh computer with logic and ableton live programs. for vocal recording and editing i go into logic. the more loop based stuff i prefer to do in ableton- more and more i do work the whole song with ableton. and i use it for live as well. otherwise mostly plugins. nice and simple. i have a good vocal mic and a focusrite vocal compressor. my set up is pretty simple- no big mixing console- sometimes i mix at the oceanclub studio.

The tone of "Members of the Ocean Club" is very crisp and pretty, whereas the sound of "I Put A Record On" is distinctly different, much darker and more organic. What kind of sound world were you intending to create on the new album?

different time- in the 90s i wanted a smooth sound. and i had johnny klimek coproducing- there were many guests artists- it was quite hard to get a unique, altogether sound happening. this time i wanted to have it rougher and produce, program and mix the album by myself- be totally responsible for it. there were a couple of doubts and insecurities- but i was happy to overcome them.

Why do you think Monika Enterprise has survived and succeeded for over 10 years?

quality. monika is an artist label. it all depends on the artist. and they are good. :-)

You're performing quite a bit over the summer. What are your live shows like?

i have a laptop and a mic and have accompanying videos with similar images like the album artwork. the set is loop based and i play tracks from the album differently arranged and mixed as well as short parts of tracks as references which i blend in and rearrange i use snippets from some of my old recordings- just short sound files. some might recognize or not. its half instrumental and half with vocals.

Will you be performing in New York?

would like to but no plans so far.

Hopefully, that will change! Thank you so much, Gudrun.

Earthquake Orphans

2008-05-23T07:25:00.000-07:00

As the death toll in China's Sichuan province has surpassed 55,000, consider that thousands of the survivors are children who have lost their parents - read the story.

Please contibute to an accountable charity.

Interview: Mia Clarke

2008-05-01T11:30:00.000-07:00

As guitarist with Electrelane, Mia Clarke provided a critical element to the group's sound, holding down rhythmic parts, contributing supportive counter melodies and delicate arpeggios, as well as rocking out with heavy riffs. Her extended solos during live shows were riveting improvisations that included glorious distortion and escalating squeals of feedback. Mia has also published extensive music criticism in a variety of outlets, notably in The Wire, and Pitchfork, among others. After about 10 years together, the band has taken an open-ended break that they are calling an "indefinite hiatus." While in Brighton, awaiting a visa to return to the US, Mia had time to answer a few of my probing inquiries about her early musical influences, the working method with Electrelane, guitar gear, and her newly adopted hometown of Chicago. Off the road for the first time in over a year, she is already very busy with a new band, as well as some exciting new projects and collaborations.

Who or what influenced you to pick up the guitar? What made you keep playing? What were some of the first things you tried to play?

When I was 15 I saw Fugazi in my hometown of Brighton, England. It was the first time I went to a show by myself, and remains one of my strongest memories; it was the beginning of everything in terms of my love of music and desire to play it, and that feeling was so exciting. The day after the show, I went to the pawn shop down the street and bought an electric guitar for about 30 pounds.

I never really took to playing other people's songs, although I did give a few Bob Dylan covers a shot. I became bored practicing alone in my bedroom and wanted to be in a band, playing with other people. Then, a little while later, I joined Electrelane. I consider that as the time I really began playing guitar, and I still think that writing music with other people, and getting comfortable improvising, is one of the best introductions to learning an instrument.

What was the first band you ever saw perform live?

Radiohead, 1996, in Brighton, when I was 13.

If you hadn't pursued a career in music what might you be doing otherwise?

I probably would have focused on writing, or become a zoologist.

When I saw Electrelane perform I don't think I noticed you using any ear protection - any thoughts or concerns on extended exposure to volume?

That's very perceptive of you! Foolishly, I never used earplugs when I rehearsed or played live shows with Electrelane, as I found them very difficult to get used to. It felt like playing music inside a fish tank! However, I now have a proper pair, fitted to my ears, and use them all the time-- in fact, I can't imagine playing without them.

The sound that Electrelane came up with was quite unique, not entirely "rock" or "pop." To what do you attribute the unique style that the band achieved?

I think it was a combination of everyone's musical background and interests. Ros and Verity were classically trained when they were younger, whereas Emma and myself were not. I think this produced an interesting dynamic when we were writing songs together, particularly in terms of the structure of songs. At times there could be conflict, but I think it generally kept things interesting. And, although we shared a love of many of the same bands, we each had our own areas of interest, and I think this came through in our ideas when improvising together (which is how almost all of our songs first took shape).

How do you view the role you had in helping to shape the Electrelane sound?

I'm really not sure! I think the 'Electrelane sound' developed as a result of the four of us writing music together, and playing off one another's ideas. It's hard to say exactly how much a particular instrument affected the overall sound, as it was part of the whole.

Are there unreleased items by Electrelane that might see the light of day, interesting demos, alternate takes, videos?

There are a couple of unreleased songs knocking around, but not many. We recorded lots of different radio sessions over the last few years, so there's quite a bit of material from those, plus personal video footage that we shot while on the road. We released 'Electrelane: Singles, B-Sides, and Live' a couple of years ago, which complied a few previously unreleased tracks. It would be great to release a disc of live material one day, or even a DVD, but we don't have any plans at the moment.

What were your feelings toward the end of your last tour about the band and the future, knowing the end was eminent? How well are you adjusting to not being on the road now?

I felt it was the right time to move on and, personally, I needed the change. Of course the last tour was emotional for everyone, and it was a very surreal experience-- sometimes sad, sometimes fun. Our final show, in Brighton, was very intense. I miss the momentum of touring a lot though and would love to get back on the road soon. I get 'itchy feet' very quickly!

An Electrelane show seemed to slowly build on rhythmic propulsion until it would have to stop, or just explode from its own momentum. What was it like to have to come down from that level of intensity night after night?

It was generally a real rush, and could be so much fun. We often felt exhausted after playing, especially headlines shows. There's rarely much time to relax after playing though, as we'd usually have to sort out the merch stall, pack up, load the van etc. A few beers would help though! It was always rewarding to play a show after a long day driving, or being stuck hanging around a venue.

I know you used your Hagstrom guitar on tour, and I think you were using a Vox amp. Can you give us a list of the equipment you used on tour?

I used the Hagstrom, which replaced the Gibson SG I had been using for years, and the Vox Amp. The only other gear I had were pedals, all Boss: Overdrive, Tuner, Digital Delay, Compression Sustainer, and Tremelo.

Do you suffer from "gear lust?" Do you look through instrument catalogs and go to music stores and look longingly at amplifiers and guitars?

I never really look through gear catalogs. However, I am longing for a Les Paul Custom. I've been borrowing one from a friend from time to time but would love my own. The sound through the Vox is beautiful. I'd also be thrilled to own a HiWatt stack-- but that's about $4,000, so it's out of the question at this point in time! I also tried out a Fulltone Overdrive 2 Mosfest, which I prefer to the Boss pedal, so that's a more affordable addition to the wish list...

You've written quite a bit music criticism, would there be a book in your future?

I don't think I'll write a music book, but I plan to concentrate more on fiction writing, so we'll see what happens...

You've reviewed a wide variety of music, how do you keep up with new music, where do you find it? What bands are you enthusiastic about right now?

I mostly find out about new music through friends, reading blogs, or records that are sent for review. Some of my favourite new-ish music at the moment is: Nalle, James Blackshaw, Disappears, Awesome Color, Hauschka, Anni Rossi, Birthmark, Entrance, No Age, No Blue, Head Of Skulls, Tiny Vipers.

How would you characterize the style of your new band? Who's in it and what do they play? Does the band have a name yet?

Well, it's early days, and we are still in the process of working on songs (no name yet, either). The material so far is pretty heavy; it's been great to let go a bit more and also have the challenge of playing with different people. The band is myself, Tony Lazzara (ex-Atombombpocketknife, Sterling) on drums, Colin DeKuiper (ex-Russian Circles) on bass, and Eric Chaleff (also of Sterling) on guitar. A friend of ours recently commented that this new band sounds like a conglomeration of all our previous bands, which is accurate and makes sense.

How do you find Chicago as a city for Indie music? What are some of the good places to hear music there?

Chicago is an excellent city to play music in. First off, it's relatively inexpensive, so it's possible to find a place to rent and a decent practice space for not too much money. Secondly, people involved in the music scene are just so supportive of their community, which is not something I experienced while growing up in Brighton, which was a much more dog-eat-dog environment. It was so refreshing when I first started spending time in Chicago, seeing how much bands are willing to help each other out and be supportive when others do well. It's very positive.

As for venues, well, there's a basement space called Mr. City, which often puts on really great shows, as well as lots of punk rock lofts on the Southside. And there are good regular venues such as AV-Aerie, Schubas, and The Empty Bottle...

Did you ever meet Sarah Cracknell of Saint Etienne? She has mentioned she's a fan of Electrelane, and even says "I believe in Electrelane" in the song "Finisterre."

Yeah, I know that song! We were really touched when we heard it. I haven't met Sarah Cracknell, but we were once interviewed by Bob Stanley for a piece in Mojo magazine a few years back.

I know Verity jumped into another music project already, what are Ros and Emma up to?

Ros does a solo project, called Ray Rumours, and plays in quite a few other bands as well, such as SiSiSi SiSiSi SiSi, which is so great. I don't know what Emma is doing, but I think she plans to keep playing music too.

You've been in a critically acclaimed band and toured the world, what goals do you have now?

I definitely want to keep playing music. I actually just got back from Amsterdam, where I recorded a guitar improvisation (or 'guitargument' as we were calling it) with Andy Moor of The Ex. That was great, and I'd really like to collaborate more with other people as well as working on this new project. Music aside, I am hoping to go back to school next year, but in the meantime plan to keep writing. I also co-edited and compiled (with Sara Jaffe, formerly of Erase Errata) a book of photography, artwork, and writing done by musicians while on tour/inspired by touring, which is going to be published by Yeti this autumn. We've been working on it for a while, so it will be very exciting when it finally comes out!

Thank you so much Mia!

Goldfrapp

2008-04-08T08:20:00.000-07:00

Goldfrapp's second album, Black Cherry (2003), seemed a jarring departure from their debut, Felt Mountain (2000). When the duo's third effort, Supernature, emerged in 2006, it continued in the same the disco-glam electro stylings, which seemed to render the eerie uniqueness of their premier disc as an anomaly in their output.

Black Cherry and Supernature were accomplished and successful, yet Felt Mountain remained as a creation of singular majesty and originality. On it, they created a magical world of beauty, ranging from creepy darkness to Alpine coolness, all infused with a sense of impending menace. The lyrics, instead of telling stories, or even painting scenes, dropped queasy, half-lit images, hinting at unsettling enigmas. The music didn't sound like much of anything else in pop music, drawing mostly on folk and classical genres, which speaks to both the absorbency, and meaninglessness, of the umbrella terms, "pop," or "rock." Ethnic sounding instruments mixed with lush string orchestras and, in one disturbing track, Alison's voice was fed through something like a gated filter which, when active, sounds as if her larynx is turning to melted rubber. Listening to the album from beginning to end left one with the impression of having journeyed through an enchanted fairyland, managing somehow to have just eluded the wicked witch.

A Trip To Felt Mountain:

One of the most memorable tracks, Paper Bag, with the bizarre refrain: "When the world stops for snow, When you laugh, I'm inside, Your mouth," has the recurring chord progression: i, vii7, iii7. A sequence of minor chords, the second and third of which introduces an unexpected flattened note from outside the scale, is a little trick of harmony epitomizing much of what makes Felt Mountain breathtaking: subverted presumptions turning corners on surprising loveliness.

Paper Bag:

The new album, Seventh Tree, has almost not a trace of the previous three. It's a relaxed and personal affair. The lyrics are reflective of interior observations, and the instrumentation is folksy, even when its electronic. It's hard to imagine "selling" these tracks in the arenas that Goldfrapp has become accustomed to performing in. These songs seem more suited to small theaters or intimate spaces. Some tracks, such as Caravan Girl, are more straightforward than we've ever heard from this duo. However, it's all very lovely and suggests a welcome retreat to more introverted spaces than they've explored in a while.

A&E:

Musicians of Ma'alwyck. "Moonstruck," Union College. March 1, 2008.

2008-03-11T12:31:00.000-07:00

Anne Marie Barker Schwartz conceived an inspired program for an expanded edition of the Musicians of Ma'alwyck ensemble, combining two demanding works from the 20th century, and a new work by Hilary Tan.

Pierrot Lunaire, by Arnold Schoenberg, looks both backwards and forwards. Schoenberg accepted the offer to create a melodrama for the actress Albertine Zehme, and it was premiered in 1912. The work sets 21 poems by the Belgian Albert Giraud for recitation and a small chamber ensemble. The poems themselves are ridiculously decadent and profane, filled with macabre images and gallows humor, and are axiomatic examples of Symbolism, written in the midst of that movement's heyday in the 1880's. For 1912, the poems would have been long out of fashion. Schoenberg's atonal musical treatment, colorfully inspired by Pierrot's nightmarish escapades was, however, on the cutting edge, although it predates his dodecaphonic basis of composition. Schoenberg's conception of a small chamber ensemble with vocal soloist would be influential for decades to come, notably in the work of Stravinsky (who, never to be outdone, used three narrators in A Soldier's Tale), Boulez and Crumb, among others. The prickly pointillism prefigures a style that would be further developed by Webern, and a host of post-WWII composers decades later.

Soprano Jean Marie Callahan Kern, was dressed in black and white, emulating the costume of Pierrot, and used minimal props to emphasize the theatrical aspects. The recitation is notated in the score as sprechstimme, where the performer is asked to approximate intonations somewhere between speech and song. Kern's performance vigorously addressed the dramatic content as her powerful voice, swooping and diving, delivered an appropriately exaggerated embodiment of the melodrama. This was, as far as anyone knows, the first and only performance of Pierrot Lunaire in this region. Kern only rested her voice for about 10 minutes before launching into the Strauss songs.

Put in perspective, Webern was already dead three years, and John Cage had completed his Sonatas and Interludes for prepared piano, when Richard Strauss finished the Four Last Songs in 1948. Filled with images of sunset, autumn, rest, and the soul in flight, they are explicitly about the patient anticipation of death, and they were in fact completed close to Strauss's own. The vocal melodies soar on harmonies functional yet dizzying in their shifting of a perceived tonal center. These songs were written in such a highly evolved rhetoric of late-late Romanticism that it exists on a plane above "style." Although the Four Last Songs are well known, Strauss is most renown for his extended (overblown, perhaps?) programmatic tone poems. Here, Strauss gets to the point, immediately delving into the sublime, crystallizing his ideas, instead of dragging them around for 40 minutes. The effect is overwhelming, not overpowering. Beauty is not always pretty, but these songs are pretty on the surface and deeply beautiful as well. Originally written for a large orchestra and voice, this chamber arrangement by William Carragan, for piano and half a dozen instrumentalists, amazingly loses none of the impact of the original. To the ear, everything remains intact, but is now more transparent and intimate in this new setting and, in some ways, even more appropriate to the subject matter.

The writing in Hilary Tann's piano trio, Nothing Forgotten, itself resembled the gnarled trunks of trees depicted in the accompanying photographs by Lawrence White. The trio is modal, organic, with bumpy rhythms, and chromatic notes adding irregularities to the expectations of the emerging motifs. The views of the Adirondacks showed macro and micro views of natural scenes, eventually revolving around images of trees that appear to have grown their roots around and above enormous boulders.

The musicians, led by conductor Lanfranco Marcelletti, appeared remarkably at ease with this program of the new, relatively unheard or, in the instance of the new Strauss arrangement, the unfamiliar. The capacity audience had an obvious appreciation for their effort. Here's hoping our ears will be treated to more fascinating and unusual repertoire by this masterful group.

Bodyrox featuring Luciana. Yeah Yeah (2006).

2008-02-27T08:16:00.000-08:00

Neither the duo Bodyrox nor musician/actor/artist Luciana Caporaso have an album out yet, and they have only collaborated on two singles, but the outcome has been startling.

Yeah Yeah consists only of a few tightly detailed elements: a single synthesizer line which functions as the bass, hook, and harmonic content, with a little vocorder fill, and a drum track that pounds out simple quarter notes. The synth line is a tricky, off-center riff comprised of mostly dotted eighths and some quarter notes, and it's as taut and steely as a cable on a suspension bridge. At the heart of it all is an extraordinary vocal performance by Luciana. At first listen, her vocal seems like a tossed-off, mindless string of cliches. A closer listen reveals how the nimble flawlessness of her vocal line fits as an exquisitely independent counterpoint to that oddly subdivided synth part. Luciana's artistry is evident in how she was able to integrate a strongly grounded part into an existing grid which is continually challenging the natural feeling of the downbeat. The subtle offset of syncopation hints at a mix of 3 against 4, but with a pop/house swing. Luciana's warm and sensual sprechstimme is the beating heart in this music box of chrome and glass. At first impression, her performance appears to be elastic and free, but underneath there is a talented and conscious composer in complete control.

April March

2008-01-18T07:14:00.001-08:00

Despite having her 1999 CD, Chrominance Decoder, named one of the best 10 CDs of the year by the New Yorker magazine, I doubt April March is suffering from overexposure. That might change as her 10 year old song, Chick Habit, has been resurrected for the Death Trip soundtrack. She released about 12 albums or EPs previous to Chrominance Decoder during the 90's, ranging from punky outbursts, and garage rock, to authentic replications of early 60's French pop music, while having a "real" job, as Elinor Blake (real name), doing animation for the Ren and Stimpy show and Pee Wee's Playhouse.

With Chrominance Decoder and the follow-up, Triggers (2003), Blake achieved a more mature style working with futuristic/retro French producer Bertrand Burgalat. He polished her newer songs with a subtle, intricate and sophisticated veneer of electronica, tinted by out of fashion styles of pop, as well as the discernible influences of jazz and classical music. April March's songs had always been wry and witty, but on these two albums she delved into deep territory, dealing with dysfunctional family systems, alcoholism, madness, rape, higher powers, and the social impact of television. If it sounds heavy going, it isn't. The music, arrangements, and Blake's vocal style, are all so captivating, quirky, and light that one can listen again and again, charmed by the experience as a whole, without actually listening to the words for meaning. Almost half the time she's singing in French, anyway. If you tune out all the ear-tingling details, and the sound of Blake's tiny, bird-like voice, and listen closely to the lyrics, it finally hits you that she's singing about some very dense and dark stuff. It adds up to a prismatic, funhouse version of pop music, where we recognize the structure but the details are askew.

I've admired April March's sense of style, which is that of a Seventeen Magazine co-ed, circa 1961:
(If that doesn't give you chills from the sheer delight of it, how long have you been dead?)

She has a new project out now with Steve Hanft, which is available to download from her Myspace site. April March is performing tonight at the Bowery Ballroom with Au Revoir Simone, a dreamy double bill of girly pop that was surely conceived in heaven, but sadly, I have to miss it :(
Que c'est triste.

Dusty Springfield. Nothing Has Been Proved (1990).

2007-12-13T12:00:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, certainly not often enough, a song is discovered by accident that just completely floors you from the very first hearing. I came across Nothing Has Been Proved by Dusty Springfield on YouTube:

I am a big fan of Dusty however, the song she is most known for in the States, Son of the Preacher Man, has always made me cringe. Otherwise, the album Dusty in Memphis is deservedly considered by critics as one of the greatest albums of all time.

Nothing Has Been Proved is from her 1990 UK release, Reputation, re-released in the US with bonus tracks (and inferior cover art) in 1997 as Reputation and Rarities. Four of the tracks were written and produced by the Pet Shop Boys, and this track, the best on the disc, was used in the film Scandal. The Pet Shop Boys loved Dusty's legacy and they made an effort to create works worthy of her. I can't think of a more fortuitous partnering than Dusty and the team of Lowe and Tennant. This stunning tune highlights the gold-dusted upper register of Dusty's voice. Combined with the sophisticated and understated arrangement, and Neil Tennant's urbane lyrics, you have a recording that seduces with its subtle glamour and luxurious sheen. Dusty's vocal enhances the atmosphere of privilege and guilt that links the song to the movie, and lends a tint of regret to its unfolding.

Neil Rolnick - 60! RPI, November 17, 2007.

2007-12-12T07:46:00.000-08:00

Composer Neil Rolnick was celebrated on his 60th birthday at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, with a retrospective concert of works going back 30 years. His work is known for successfully linking technology to conventional instrumentation. He was born in Dallas, but studied at Harvard, Aspen, San Francisco, and Berkeley, Stanford and IRCAM, eventually landing a teaching post at RPI. His works have been increasingly performed in New York and the world over the last 5 or 6 years. His work is characterized by infectious rhythms, and melodies that are a pleasure to follow. All of the works performed this evening except one had an electronic ingredient.

Requiem Songs - for the Victims of Nationalism (1993), is a set of highly focused songs written while the composer was in Yugoslavia. The songs were influenced by the indigenous Central European musical idiom. The vocal parts, provided by silvery tones of Amy Fradon and Leslie Ritter, explored rustic counterpoint. The lyrics by Rolnick and Ed Sanders, based on folk songs, addressed the political turmoil of that part of Europe. Gently rocking meters like 4+3 contrasted with vigorous playing in the tragedy of ethnic cleansing and its victims. One piece addressed the role of the artist in war - the cellist who plays in the street despite the shells that fall around him.

Hammer and Hair (premiere) - During this piano and violin duo the pianist's hands muted strings emulating the pizzicato of the violinist. The 20 minute work shifted between brusque and percussive interplay with some lovely jazz inflected passages by violinist.

Ever-livin' Rhythm (1977). One percussionist with an arsenal of instruments played along with what would have been a taped part in 1977. The somewhat dated synthesizer sounds were not the composer's fault, the piece is 30 years old, after all. As a "student" work, it was quite impressive. It had a "modernist" tint (in other words, "old fashioned"), but hints at the infectious African rhythms that inspired the piece.

Shadow Quartet (2003). Cast in a more or less traditional form, and despite the influence of the death of his father, this quartet for strings rocked with a bluesy grittiness the players convincingly dug into.

Digits (2005), written for and performed by Kathleen Supove, was truly unreal as she interacted with a computer part generated in real time along with her playing. R. Luke DuBois's video, captured with cameras perched on either end of the keyboard, played with the building and disassembling of grid forms taken from images of Supove's performance. The video, while accomplished, seemed extraneous to Supove's unearthly command of this demanding work.

It was exciting to see every seat in the hall taken for this event. Rolnick's work deserves the attention it now receives. He has developed a style that comfortably integrates conventional instrumentation with electronics, and has fashioned a language that is both contemporary and accessible.

The Pipettes. We Are The Pipettes (2007).

2007-11-20T13:25:00.000-08:00

Gwenno, Riotbecki, and Rosay, are from Brighton, just like Electrelane, and they are signed to the UK label, Memphis Industries, as is The Go! Team, so they should feel right at home here at the Bunny Ears HQ. To make this bubbly cocktail you need a jigger of Ronettes , a dash of Shampoo , a pinch of B52s and just a sprinkle of Spice Girls.

When The Pipettes take the stage, they're brash and vivacious, flaunting a sense of humor, abundant polka dots, and sassy synchronized dance moves. They spiritually channel 60's girl-groups, exude an edgy punkishness, and they're not afraid to yell at boys and tell them to go stuff it...

Your Kisses Are Wasted On Me:

After a number of listens, it's evident that The Pipettes are not some novelty act, despite their calculated emphasis on presentation. Their songs are simply good pop, even classic pop, framed in girl-group stylings. The makeup is retro but the face has classic bone structure. Some of the tunes are quite simply superb indie pop dressed up in a nostalgic frame of reference. A great song like Tell Me What You Want could have been done by Saint Etienne, or Birdie. When they're not shouting like the B52's they can sing in bright harmony, as in A Winter's Sky, which would be a great tune done in any style.

There seems to be a trend in the UK for recycling vintage sounds (Lily Allen, Amy Winehouse), and there is an audience for that when it's done well. As with the others mentioned, there is the wink of nostalgia with an underlying heart and an earnest love for the sublime, yet succinct, pop moment musicale. For that authentic production sound, the guitars are set on the bridge pickup, there's a string section (a real one!), horns, as well as the occasional glockenspiel and Farfisa organ, and plenty of reverb on the drums. If these tunes were actually released in the 60's they couldn't help but be AM radio hits. The Pipettes were planning to come to a town near you, but their work visas got messed up and sadly, they had to cancel the first 18 of 24 dates on their US tour - que c'est tragique!! Buy the CD on Amazon for only $9.98 - at 16 tracks that's only 62 cents per track, a much better deal than downloading them on iTunes. Plus you'll be able to hold The Pipettes close to your heart, or put them under your pillow, as needed.

Au Revoir Simone. The Bird of Music (2007).

2007-11-07T09:54:00.000-08:00

Remember Julee Cruise? David Lynch elevated Cruise to star status after using her as a singer on the soundtrack of Blue Velvet, then as a recurring lounge singer on TV series, Twin Peaks. He literally elevated her before that in his performance piece, Industrial Symphony No. 1, where she sang suspended from a harness, dozens of feet in the air. Music is very important to Lynch. He gave a big break to composer Angelo Badalamenti when he used him for Twin Peaks and several films, even casting him as a piano player in Blue Velvet, and collaborating with him as a co-songwriter. Few people other than Lynch fanatics are probably aware that he released a recording of his own music co-written with John Neff, called BlueBob, on which he plays guitar and effects.

David Lynch is now an enthusiastic fan of a trio of young women from Brooklyn, called Au Revoir Simone.

They even shared a stage with Lynch at the Barnes and Noble at Union Square last January for the "Upstairs At The Square" writers and artists series. They've played at fashion shows, had their songs placed on TV, and they're currently on tour with Air.

The girls all sing and play keyboards, but their new CD is filled out with 'cello, violin, trumpet and trombone. Wistful but not wimpy, their music is sweet and enchanting. Fallen Snow has a staccato organ part reminiscent of The Beach Boys, and the synths in I Couldn't Sleep interlock like medieval counterpoint. Even in tunes with titles as sombre as Sad Song, Dark Halls, and Night Majestic, the beats are bouncy and percolating.

They have a deft hand with harmony. The keyboard parts are composed with subtlety and they are able to shift time signatures with undistracting ease. The lyrics are personal, reflective and intimate. They sing in a straight, unemotive style.

Let's join the girls as they prepare for a fabulous dance party.
Sad Song:

Even though their their music is a bit synthetic and chilly, their visual presentations emphasize a fragile, warm and organic quality.

Fallen Snow is actually about the cold of winter, but here the girls are meeting a friend to fish for some peculiar objects on a warm summer's day.
Fallen Snow:

I can see how David Lynch would appreciate Au Revoir Simone. They present an innocence that is not simplistically naive but seems to be a premeditated construct, purposefully chosen to explore an angle of popular music that is personal and has nothing whatsoever to do with what is trendy or commercial. It's remarkable that the three individuals have worked together as a unit in creating this integrated, introspective world of delicate charm.

When is a Pop Band like a Chandelier?

2007-10-12T14:21:00.000-07:00

In August of this year, Alice Rawsthorn, the design critic of the International Herald Tribune, reviewed the "Nebula" chandelier, designed by Joris Laarman. The piece is a blown glass replica of a cluster of old lampshades that he found when browsing in local flea markets. Rawsthorn feels this chandelier expresses what is happening in design today. She goes on to delineate its defining qualities and how they are indicative of contemporary design trends.

**************************************

The Go! Team. Thunder, Lightning, Strike (2005).

The Go! Team was originally a one-man, kitchen table electronica project by Ian Parton, which became a six-person collective of mixed race/gender for performing. The first time through this disc, the words that came to mind were "marginal," and "unlistenable." The nostalgic appeal of retro elements was not lost on me, but I thought it existed within too finite and narrow a niche to withstand anything other than novelty status. However, something undefinable about it continued to haunt my memory, making me want to revisit it again.

When I came across the article by Rawsthorn I tried to think of any music I had heard recently that fell in line with the qualities she discerned as definitive of cutting edge design. So, here is my side-by-side comparison of a chandelier and a pop band. Excerpts from Alice Rawsthorn's original article are in italics, my adaptation follows.

1. It looks familiar.

All of Laarman's designs are intended to forge an emotional bond between us and the object itself. By creating a new object from old ones Laarman triggers memories of things we remember from the past.

1. It sounds familiar.

The Go! Team does exactly this by sampling fragments of what appears to be soundtracks from tacky 1970's made-for-TV movies.

2. It looks cheap.

An equally important factor in the Nebula's fashionability is Laarman's choice of a coolly anonymous object - a cheap lampshade - as his starting point, rather than an expensive, "designerly" one. By doing so, he has created product design's equivalent of Miuccia Prada's fluffy take on the Crombie-style coats once beloved of skinheads, the 1970s British street gangs.

2. It sounds cheap.

Thunder, Lightning, Strike sounds like a mixtape salvaged from a landfill.

3. It looks like a mistake.

Asymmetrical, but harmonious though the result may be, it also looks fashionably haphazard.

3. It sounds like a mistake.

The impression is that it is an amateur's work, recorded in the red, compressed to the wall, and eq'd for the car radio of a 1971 Gremlin.

4. . . . but it isn't really.

The Nebula's idiosyncrasies give an initial impression of a naïve, almost accidental object, but if you look again, it's impossible not to notice the precision of the blown glass from which it is constructed.

4. . . . but it isn't really.

Ian Parton intended for his work to sound "dirty." When the record company said it wasn't dirty enough, he went back and made it even more corroded.

5. It looks surreal.

Surrealism is huge in design today, partly because we're bored by seeing so many things that seem neatly nice, and partly because technology is enabling designers to replicate the weird images they see spiraling across their computers in three-dimensional objects.

5. It sounds surreal.

It's not just the melange of what might be background music from children's TV shows, afterschool specials, game shows, toy commercials, and radio ads. It's the, "is it supposed to sound like this?" factor. The sound is crappy, and the vocals sound like bratty cheerleaders recorded from a distance on a portable cassette player.

6. And it looks as if it will last.

Timely though the memories, everyday references, endearing details, edgy technology and surreal styling of the Nebula may be, Laarman hopes it will also be something that we will grow to love and choose to use for many years.

6. And it looks as if it will last.

The Go! Team is only getting bigger. The album I originally thought was "unlistenable," has sold over a quarter million copies worldwide, and was nominated for the Mercury Prize in the UK. Their eventual deal with SONY allowed them to quit their day jobs and tour the world, even playing in China, as well as the major summer festivals like Lollapalooza, Glastonbury and Coachella. Their gig at the Bowery Ballroom at the end of this month is sold out. Catch them the following night in Brooklyn, before they move on to Paris, Milan, Dublin, Tokyo, and Australia.

Ian Parton can't be as old as the garbage heap LPs he samples. But, in spectacular fashion, he has channeled the sound of media as I remember it as a young teen in the early seventies. The forced optimism of commercialized teen culture, as produced and performed by studio musicians and arrangers, was full of these types of sounds. In advertisements selling everything from action toys and Barbies to bubble gum, we were bombarded by this brassy style of uptempo jingles on Saturday mornings. Parton hasn't just replicated this tinny junk, he has refashioned it as a messy, gritty version of a memory he is too young to ever actually have had, while mixing it up with early hip hop. But it brings me right back to those days like a time machine.

The conscious effort put into a project this idiosyncratic strikes me as the motivation of an artist compelled to pursue a personal vision, rather than fit into any hip, pre-formatted genre. I think it would be difficult to do this kind of work without falling into a satirical mode, but The Go! Team sound earnest and full of fun. They bring the uplifting zest and goofy ecstasy that will make you feel like you are living in a TV ad from 1972, running through a field of daisies in slow motion with your hands up in air, cheering about a new deodorant or soft drink.

Even their videos are in classic 70's, fast-food red, yellow and orange.

The Go! Team. Bottle Rocket (a song which may be in its own unique category, however it is a masterpiece of its kind):

Their new album, Proof of Youth, is, for better or worse, more professional. It's still scratchy as mohair, but they had to keep the samples to a reasonable limit due to the royalties needed for them. Parton's love of noisy guitars shows up right away and verge into, at times, his own kiddie version of Loveless. And he's become a better composer. But these songs seem created to showcase a band that must be able to put on a live show and play to a crowd, where the first album felt more of an outsider art project. It's brief at only about 36 minutes, but it comes with a bonus disc of 4 songs that are just as tacky as the others. I don't think it will be long before The Go! Team is asked to score a film, maybe the sequel to Napoleon Dynamite. Ian Parton will design T shirts to be sold exclusively at Colette, and he will eventually be asked to create a signature scent for Coty. I think it will smell like French fries and Twizzlers.

Sophie Ellis Bextor.

2007-10-01T11:11:00.000-07:00

If adults in the US had any appreciation for real pop music, Sophie Ellis Bextor would be heard and seen all over. She doesn't care that her CDs aren't even released in this country. She's content seeing herself as pretty much exclusively a UK artist, where she sells millions of albums, and is pleased with her dedicated following on the continent. That seems to be enough for her. She was brought up in a show business family and, at 19, she was performing and recording with theaudience, a well-dressed indie pop band that specialized in snarky social sarcasm, a la Black Box Recorder. They received eight offers of record deals after their first public gig.

theaudience. I Got The Wherewithal:

Sophie has a heart for causes, as well as a discerning head for marketing. She publicly pledged her celebrity support for "Lights Out London," a campaign to turn off appliances for an hour to raise awareness of global warming, and has also posed in a grisly ad for PETA ("Here's the rest of your fur coat"). She appeared nearly nude in an ad for the fashion chain Monsoon, but turned down a video ad for Agent Provocateur, deeming it too pornographic (Kylie ended up doing it instead). She also famously turned down an offer to tour with Robbie Williams when anyone else starting out would have jumped at the chance. She just felt he was too "Las Vegas cabaret."

Sophie is serious and sophisticated, stylish but not fussy, smart, full of exuberance, glamorous but not posh. Her voice does possess a certain snooty, blue blood, la-di-da quality, but that only adds another angle to her persona. And she's a hard worker. While being a full-time mom, she wrote about 80 songs in preparation for her third CD, Trip The Light Fantastic (truly a terrible title, but there it is). She specializes in simple, uplifting tunes that have a staying power past the first few listens. She has the talent for finding just the turn of phrase that feels comfortable but fresh, which is the trick behind every good pop song. Her most appealing work has a spunky energy that lifts it above and beyond the ordinary:

Although Sophie will occasionally veer into tragic or introspective territories, she is at her best when creating the equivalent of a romantic comedy in song. Charm is very difficult to manufacture. The audience will spot a fake as easily as a knockoff on Canal Street. Sophie is the real thing. This video for Take Me Home is a delightful pastiche of styles evoking Avedon-era Harper's Bazaar. Sophie looks like she was born to wear 1950's couture:

Sophie's new album debuted in the top 10 on the UK charts, reached the top 20 in Estonia, and the top 40 on the Swiss charts. It sparkles with energy - and only available as an import in the States.

From Between Trio. Sanctuary for Independent Media. September 15, 2007.

2007-09-18T12:03:00.000-07:00

The From Between Trio is a collaboration of three musicians from three continents: Michael Doneda (France), on soprano and sopranino sax, Tatsuya Nakatani (Japan) on percussion, and Jack Wright (US) on alto and soprano sax. The group demonstrates an extraordinary sense of three minds working as one.

Although I sat in the front row for the view, the moment they began their first set I lowered my eyes away from the performers. I diverted my gaze because I wanted to absorb only the sound and not get caught up in its production. What they do would inaccurately be described as "free jazz," from my experience of it. And I didn't get the sense either that they are playing to serve their own self expression. In the way that a field recordist can document small sounds and subsequently amplify the audio, magnifying the details beyond what is normally audible, the trio created a type of soundscape of layered events approximating a natural environment. They create an ambiance of hissing, fizzing, scraping and rattling. Appropriate to this immersive experience, no particular player is a featured soloist at any one time.

Their first set lasted an hour, although it felt half that long, and it was the one most resembling the forces of nature. The second short set, before the break was about 18 minutes, and was more celestial, leaving more space among the parts. The last set was only about 15 minutes and the only part of the evening when the playing was a bit more aggressive, and perhaps urban.

When I wanted to examine how it was all being done, they were fascinating to watch. Of course, drummers tend to dominate one's attention because of the variety of movement necessary just to make a noise. However, Nakatani is a different type of percussionist altogether. He specializes in resonating his instruments not always by striking, but often by bowing, rubbing and vibrating them. At one point, he placed a small cymbal on the surface of his snare and lowered his face to blow through the hole in its center, resulting in a rich alto sax-like tone. He even got more than one note from it. For Nakatani, a snare isn't just a drum, it's a resonating surface to place a cymbal, a wood block, and a small bowl - all at the same time. Nakatani has lots of bowls, at least a dozen, which he tapped with tiny metal sticks. As he performed, bowls, cymbals, and even his tom tom, fell over at one time or another, sounding not unlike the style of his playing, which seems to be a series of orchestrated wabi sabi accidents. Only rarely did he simply take a stick and strike a drum.

Nakatani solo:

Doneda and Wright, the two wind players, have a repertoire of personal approaches toward their instruments. Doneda coaxed animal rasps from his sopranino, as well as modulated wind noise, and sometimes the sound of a broken tape player in fast-forward. Wright sat with his mouthpiece turned on its side so he could mute the bell of his alto with his leg. His soprano, when muted, emulated a bassoon, shortwave radio, or the chanting of the Koran. It would seem destined that these three would meet and match their talents as a trio. Each of them has played with dozens of others over the years, but together they have an extraordinary way of orchestrating intuitive sound-making.

The Blue Nile. A Walk Across The Rooftops (1984).

2007-09-06T12:48:00.000-07:00

We have all had a moment alone, while looking out the window of a train, bus, or restaurant, caught in a state of in-between-ness, remembering the past, anticipating the future, but locked in a present where time has shut down, waiting, alone with one's memories, the only reality being the stagnant present.

At the center of every cherished moment is a kernel of failure. At the heart of every incidence of beauty is the reflection of death. Paul Buchanan is a master of recreating these liminal moments when submerged thoughts break the surface of consciousness. When he sings in "A Walk Across The Rooftops," "I am in love, I am in love with you," it's not banal, it's startling and uncomfortable.

These amazing tracks, now over 20 years old, still sound contemporary, with minimal drums, atmospheric field recordings, synthesizer, stark piano, and fretless bass. Although delicious, one should not overindulge on The Blue Nile. It's best to savor them when you have an interrupted span of time, and sink into their deep meditative spaces. You cannot immediately resume your normal pace after listening to this band. It will take a period of adjustment to come back. So, don't overdo it.

Here's an excerpt from Flags And Fences, a documentary featuring The Blue Nile's 1990 tour of the US. 1990 never looked so nostalgic. Don't miss the scenes of the WTC, and a billboard advertising "Goodfellas."

Annie. Anniemal (2005).

2007-08-17T07:01:00.000-07:00

Annie makes serious pop music. Serious on two levels. Serious in the sense that it's hardcore pop: brief, repetitive, insouciant, and ingratiating. But also serious in that some of the songs present a fragile vulnerability that is rather startling. Annie is from Norway, and although she seemed to come out of nowhere when Anniemal was released, she had already been a veteran musician, having been almost signed to a label by Bob Stanley of Saint Etienne when she was only 16, singing in a band called Suitcase. Later she DJ'd for a while before writing songs with Tore Andreas Kroknes. She had released one single, The Greatest Hit when, at age 23, Tore died from heart problems. This haunting loss is reflected in the song My Best Friend, one of the lyrically arresting tracks from her CD.

Annie has been compared to early Madonna, Bananarama, as well as both of the Minogue sisters. Her vibratoless voice is as thin and transparent as an icicle, barely breaking above a whisper, but the intonation and rhythmic subtlety of her singing is marked by razor-like precision and accuracy. Again, in the song My Best Friend, the melody of the verse is rhythmically broken into irregular divisions that would present a challenge to transcribe even for a graduate student of music theory. Another surprise in the same song is how the verse modulates from the tonic to the supertonic for the chorus. It's unconventional, but not jarring.

On a purely sonic level, the CD is peppered with all manner of brittle, clicky, percussive claptrap, squirrelly synth parts, and slippery bass. The tracks are intruded by strange sci fi hits and accents, vocorder, pitchshifted voices, and cartoonish sound effects. Not too mention Annie's deadpan, Norwegian accented, spoken word sections. Layers of this cheerful noisemaking rush by at brisk tempos. Repeated listening almost always reveals at least a few more details missed the last time through. Headphone listening is not usually a requirement for pop music, but in this case it would be recommended.

It's fizzy and cute, no doubt. Chewing Gum, which reduces boyfriend turnover to the level of chewing fresh sticks of gum, is utterly addictive, and can hold the attention of a 4-year old. Daily. For months. (I know this as a fact). It starts with an unusual arrangement of beat phrases, a group of 6 beats, followed by a group of 8, then a group of 2. The lyrics are straight out of the Shangri-las' songbook. The sound combines a big buzzy bass, a percussion part that sounds like cowbells being spun in a frontloading washing machine, and a sputtery gated synth line.

A track like Heartbeat has a propulsive throb and a cycle of chords that refreshes itself by modulating to the subdominant, but because the last chord in the verse is the dominant, and the first chord in the chorus is the VI chord in the new key, the intervallic gap between the two sections is a tritone, and that harmonic shift is a surprise every time. The lyric to Heartbeat is about going out for a drink at a party on a Friday night and dancing with a guy for whom the girl has a growing attraction, although she doesn't know his name. That's about it. However, the song has the pull of a vortex and achieves the aching ecstasy of a Mahler symphony, in just 3 minutes. Skeptical? Let's have a look:

One last thing about Heartbeat: the drum track is identical to the one in Milk Bottle Symphony by Saint Etienne on Tales From Turnpike House, released the same year. Coincidence? I think not. It's evidence of a vast, world-wide indie pop conspiracy.

Every track has something notable, and unusually creative. The gritty sounds are the perfect foil to Annie's colorless soprano. The more introspective tunes like No Easy Love are never sappy, but have a boppy, funky groove that offset the heartbreaking lyrics.

Annie told Prefix Magazine last year, she would like to be remembered "as a songwriter and hopefully a good songwriter and just a woman that's making good music. As long as they think that, I'm happy." We already do, so you can be a happy little poplette! Annie will have a new album out by the end of this year.

Tune (Out)))side 2007 - the Wave Farm, July 7, 2007, Acra, NY.

2007-08-09T14:57:00.000-07:00

I felt very lucky to be included in one of free103point9's tenth anniversary events, the Tune (Out)))side 2007, held at the Wave Farm in Acra, NY. On this absolutely radiant summer day, the Wave Farm hosted live performances by over 30 sound artists. This was a headphone festival broadcast on 4 different frequencies. Each attendee received their own little FM transmitter and a printed program which listed all the performers and performance times. Performance stages were set up at various locations. One could wander the fields and paths through the woods to visit various stages or just camp out and switch between channels.

I was in a group of sound artists that I've become acquainted with from previous performances associated with Phonography. Think of "phonography" as being analogous to "photography." We capture sounds from the world around us and present them back as they are, unedited and "unretouched." Taken out of their original context and reproduced without a visual component, the recordings reward the listener with a rich auditory experience. Being primarily a visually oriented culture, we tend to focus our attention foremost on what can be seen, often actually "tuning out" what can be heard, let alone what can be listened to with attention. Purely listening, without the "picture," as it were, is still to many an unfamiliar way to experience the world, but we're trying to change that.

Our stage was set up on a hillside in a pine forest, fairly removed from the action down on the field, reachable only by a 10 minute walk over a winding pathway. A generator humming in the distance provided us with the power for our laptops and mixers. The ten of us took turns keeping our channel live for 6 hours, as we played raw field recordings, digitally processed field recordings, and a final, "anything goes" set. We finished in the dark, up on our mountain base camp, surrounded by the flames of tiki torches that gave us our only illumination and helped somewhat keep the mosquitoes away.

Because I was pretty intently focused on what I was doing, along with the others in my group I didn't hear too much of what was playing on the other channels. However I did spend time listening to Elliot Sharp and Shou Wang's guitar duo, which was as pretty as diamonds dropping on a glass floor. I also enjoyed seeing Edmund Mooney, Jonny Farrow and Andrea Williams do their sound experiments in clean suits. They were the only artists who brought a theatrical element to a performance. They went about taking notes on each other and measuring things in the weeds. I think one of them even checked me for radiation. They let me go.

I set up a flickr page of some photos of the event. Please visit here to learn more details about this particular event. free103point9 is an amazing resource for artists and listeners. Galen Joseph-Hunter and Tom Roe have an ever expanding and far reaching program for the promotion of transmission arts - read more about them here in Chronogram magazine.

UNIQLOCK

2007-07-16T09:07:00.001-07:00

"WORLD.UNIQLOCK was launched as an online campaign, UNIQLOCK, for Uniqlo's summer line-up on the theme of "Dry". This UNIQLOCK is the 2nd series of UNIQLO MIXPLAY, which was launched last autumn, this was somewhat the talk of the town. The theme of this campaign is to spread the approach of Uniqlo globally through communication in fashion, music and dance beyond the language barrier.

The blog parts feature dance movies, and 4 female dancers, who were selected out of 16 in an audition, dance along with the time signal. Special dance sequences featuring a dance unit, core of woomin, are also shown at certain times. The music was composed by Tomoyuki Tanaka of the Fantastic Plastic Machine, specially for this campaign."

OK, so it's an ingenious form of advertising, however it's coolness factor cannot be denied, and it's a creative way to foster a sense of connectedness among people with similar interests and tastes. Plus you've got the musical participation of Tanaka - what's not to love?

Roisin Murphy. Ruby Blue (2005).

2007-07-13T08:25:00.000-07:00

During her 10 year gig as half of the electronica duo Moloko, Roisin Murphy reached the UK top 40 four times, and the top 10 three times. The group hit the Billboard top 10 in the Hot Dance Music/Club Play charts a couple of times. Their spooky track, "Fun For Me," got some attention as part of the Batman soundtrack in 1997. When her solo release dropped I had no idea who she was but my musical life has been enormously enriched since finding out.

Moloko. Fun For Me:

For this record, Roisin collaborated with producer Matthew Herbert in fusing together house-inflected pop with jazz and experimental sampling. It's not confusing to listen to, but the continually evolving layers of fine details cannot be absorbed in a quick listen. Even a more stripped down tune like "Sow Into You" will have you wondering, "What was that?" before something else catches your ear, taking you in a different direction.

Roisin became noted through the 90's as an eccentric and wacky nutter, embodying quirky personas in outlandish costumes. The video for "Sow Into You" demonstrates she is still interested in offbeat visual representations. (Unfortunately, the video uses a less bristly edit of the audio track than the complete version on the CD, but you get the idea).

Moloko's songs could be humorous, but at times they were dark and eerily unhinged, or just bizarre, but always with a solidly swinging rhythmic underpinning. Ruby Blue is less cartoonish and more about the life of the heart. Roisin confessed that she didn't know how she could possibly do a record on her own. The songs she came up with by herself after the professional and personal heartache of Moloko's breakup are mature for someone under 30. Still, myth, metaphor and personal fantasy come into play on a number of tracks, as in "Night of the Dancing Flame."

Roisin's palette of voices make up a fair amount of the musical details. Vocals jump between the speakers, they seem right in front of your face, then they jump back into the distance. They're processed, pitch shifted and EQ'd in a variety of ways as they dovetail and provide counterpoint to the main melody. She sings backup to herself in a style reminiscent of Motown in Dear Diary, or The Andrews Sisters in "Ramalama."

The instrumentation is unusual, with what sounds like hammered dulcimer, harpsichord, alarm clocks, tupperware, cutlery, along with horn sections, electric piano, and a fuzzed out riff in the title track that sounds like a baritone rubber band. There is a definite jazz influence noticeable in the harmony and swing feel present throughout, which is fused with a house-pop beat. There are no programmed or acoustic drums on this CD. All percussion instruments are sampled from common household objects.

Whether she is aware of it or not, Roisin is essentially a jazz singer. She stretches the melodies across implied rhythms and bends notes like a sax player. She even reminds me of Anita O'Day. In fact, I can imagine the final track being covered by another singer such as Cassandra Wilson. Accompanied only by piano and occasional flugelhorn, "The Closing of the Doors" captures the desire to renew a relationship in trouble, while realizing it is already too late to do so. It includes the haunting refrain, "Don't you remind me of someone," delivered in degrees of distance and intimacy that it is extraordinarily chilling.

Obviously, Roisin's creative gifts are immense. What's wonderful about her is how inspired her vision is. Like Bjork, she is a lateral original, creating an oblique alternate world of her own, which is at once fractured and experimental while still being accessible, and "pop."

She has a new single out on iTunes, "Overpowered," and a new full length CD is on the way.

Bill Frisell Trio. Iron Horse, Northampton MA, June 20, 2007.

2007-06-23T08:43:00.000-07:00

On the night before the first day of this year's summer, Bill Frisell looked through the cracks of light coming from behind the stage at the Iron Horse Music Hall and commented, "It's still light out here, which is good because I'm afraid of the dark."

The Iron Horse, a rustic yet comfortable music venue, appeared to be sold out for this Wednesday night show with an enthusiastic crowd of diverse ages. "Tony just said this is a really nice place to play, and I have to agree," Bill said when the trio, completed by Tony Scherr (acoustic bass) and Kenny Wollesen (drums), took the stage for their encores. Their uninterrupted two hour set included free improvs, Frisell originals (Strange Meeting), and classics of American music such as Monk's Mysterioso, Surfer Girl, Just Like A Woman, and When You Wish Upon A Star. Guitarists looking for technical inspiration were, as usual, disappointed, as Frisell's stance on stage is always sideways, facing in toward his band.

Musical inspiration was, however, in no short supply. Frisell is, of course, a repeat winner many times over in Downbeat's critic's and reader's polls for best guitarist. Although he shares the conventional jazz player's love of remaking popular songs, what Frisell does with them is not simply riff over a sequence of clever chord substitutions. A typical jazz take on a standard may come across as a legitimizing effort on the part of the player to nobly elevate a pop song into the realm of "Art." Frisell's choice of songs may be outside normal conventions, but he treats them with great respect and without irony. What he brings to his repertoire is a filtering of the material through a style that renders his choices more "American," yet somewhat more alien at the same time. Frisell's musical sensibility is informed by an attitude that combines a cerebral cool with hickster quirk. His lines are a bit squirmy, and fractured in time, with sudden pauses and acidic dissonances. When he plays a longer run, which is infrequent, the notes are evenly rounded, with smooth attacks, only hinting at what a master he is. I have never heard him show off, live or on record. He seems to play only to serve the musical idea underway. Likewise, his bandmates rarely take a solo. They work at things together and, in the long run, this approach is probably more satisfying for the players as well as the audience.

Frisell has for a long time been a fan of digital devices that augment his sound. Years ago he was setting up long delay lines that added ghostly, shadowy background echoes. For quite a while now, he has been integrating digital delays to sample his own playing during performances, playing back tinkling, repitched fragments octaves above the original, or in reverse; sometimes calling up a stored repetitive figure to play against. He is getting really good at tweaking the little sampling box that sits on a stool in front of him, essentially adding another instrument to the trio.

Saint Etienne. An Appreciation.

2007-06-12T11:24:00.000-07:00

Back when the Cardigans mattered, their producer was Tore Johansson. Saint Etienne recorded Good Humor with him at Tambourine Studios in Malmo, Sweden. When this record was released in 1999, I was over 40 and the new millennium was approaching. I didn't give a rat's ass anymore what anyone thought of my musical tastes. I had always listened with pride to the most demanding music of whatever era I was existing in, because I enjoyed being challenged and I didn't want to left out of what was considered the cutting edge. But at this point in my life I was finally in the mood to relax and try something new, fun, and different. I had read a little bit about SE and thought, "I might enjoy this, and it might not kill me." At first I was struck by the sound of the instruments - crunchy, mid-rangey drums, thin, brittle piano, cheesy synths, rubbery bass, and guitars that sounded like they were purchased at a garage sale.

The songs and the stories started to seep into my unconscious, stimulating images and memories - Mrs. Emma Peel, Goddard, Antonioni, Pucci, Quant, the International Style, mods, foreign sports cars, Cannes, James Bond, and Austin Powers. The lyrics, when understandable, referenced films in split screen, a vixenish little sister, teen angst, Dutch hotel rooms, beauty queens from Idaho... I wasn't used to the subject matter - drum 'n' bass didn't have lyrics. The arrangements were fresh but retro, and "very groovy baby!" And there was Sarah Cracknell's voice - frosty, feathery, full of gold dust, but not at all innocent, and not without a certain adult glamour. These songs were short stories about people who might have been real, with ordinary problems, although they were still quite a bit cooler than me.

Who were these people? After eight years of research, I still have no idea how they come up with their tunes, and I don't know who's doing what, except Sarah is obviously singing. In 1990, Bob and Pete, boyhood friends and rugby enthusiasts, melded club beats, indie pop and girl group influences with Northern Soul. They covered a Neil Young song because they booked a studio and hadn't written anything yet. It was a hit. They worked with a couple of singers until they met the divine Sarah, and they were forevermore a trio. Pete is a complete mystery man, but we know he's married and has two small children. Bob has a more public presence because he writes music journalism, and DJ's in New York and London quite often. Sarah eventually got married after having a couple of kids, and produced two solo records of her own smart and estimable dance-pop. They seem like nice people, they're making films with a social conscience, and doing special cultural events at the London ICA. They even perform with orchestras now, all very mature and intellectual, but stimulating fun. Bob and Pete, now over 40 themselves, are still boyishly cute with floppy Beatles haircuts, and Sarah embodies the essence of, well...Sarah-ness, which can best be defined as a genial coolness so natural, that she would be sure to possess it whether she was worshipped by hordes of fans or was simply a stay-at-home mum.

I have seen them play twice, and I'm still not sure what it is they're actually "doing," even when they're with a band. Sarah is the obvious focus, Pete is always very busy behind a synth, Bob is also behind a synth, but doesn't seem too busy, except for smiling and looking into the audience. Bob, to himself on stage: "It's bloody cool being in a band. Oh yeah, and this is MY band, that's even cooler! I wonder who's here tonight. Is that Scarlett Johansson? I think the B part of this song is coming up. What is it I'm supposed to play again? Ah well, Pete will cover for me if I forget." Pete, to himself on stage: "Here comes that B section, Bob is spacing out, I'm going to have to cover his ass again. Why do I have to do everything?? I need a pint." Sarah to herself on stage, oblivious that the upcoming B section is in jeopardy: "The fans here are lovely. I do so enjoy being worshipped." (The preceding is not meant to mock them, it's just my fanciful imaginings.)

Mention should be made, I suppose, of their eccentric production techniques. They indulge themselves in dotting their records with obscure dialogue and audio from British TV and movie soundtracks, and abuse effects such reverb in the tune Avenue, which is interrupted by a thunderclap for no apparent reason. People Get Real has some kind of rubbery engine roar coming and going through the whole song. Like the Beatles, one gets the impression that SE thoroughly enjoy embedding personal references into their work as clues hinting at something the meaning of which continues to evade us. You'll catch some of them, but never all of them, and I think it helps to have grown up in the the UK during the sixties. They dropped the obscure in-jokes for a while, until they released Finisterre. That record features the British actor Michael Jayston dropping non sequitors between tracks that truly choice.

It's hard to imagine that in 1992, while Grunge was raging in the States, Saint Etienne was concocting candy-coated delights such as Nothing Can Stop Us:

Each of their records has a particular sound within its own context. From their original indie-dance-pop beginnings, to 70's-ish soft rock, to organic brittleness, to minimal German synth bleeps, to pumping electro, to whatever it is they're doing next. Plus, each record has its own diversions beyond the style they're working in. Art disguised as simplistic pop. Saint Etienne's output is no challenge to your ears like, let's say Stockhausen, but, more subversively, it will pleasantly haunt your mind for years.

Khalil El’ Zabar and Hamiett Bluiett . Sanctuary for Independent Media, Troy NY, June 9, 2007.

2007-06-12T07:47:00.001-07:00

Truly, were they only a duo? Percussionist Khalil El’ Zabar alone was at times responsible for up to three simultaneously independent musical parts. When he stood to keep time with ankle bells, play the kalimba, and sing, he was a trio. Add baritone sax player, Hamiett Bluiett, and you have a quartet. If you paid attention to El' Zabar's right foot as he accented the second and fourth beats of the bar, then you had five parts.

Apart from a witty rendition of Take the A Train, and the encore, sung by El' Zabar a capella, all the tunes, although unannounced, I suspect were El' Zabar's own. They were modal, and slightly tinged with a Middle Eastern, or African flavor. As El Z played drums and sang, Blueiett would double the melody before taking solos. Mr. B's solos at times evoked a violin's raspy upper register. Coincidentally, he was filling in for violinist Billy Bang who was ill. His bari was cradled in a stand as he played, so he could just walk up, lay his fingers on the keys, and blow. When finished, he would just sit down in an swivel chair, smile and visibly enjoy El Z's emotive performance. Bluiett took one extended solo by himself, wherein he employed all kinds of extended techniques: multiphonics, circular breathing, percussive key tapping, and vocalizing into the mouth piece.

A master at anything in the percussion family, El' Zabar is a performer who practically turns himself inside out when he performs. His head swung from side to side as if it were on a hinge while he played the kalimba, or thumb piano. His kalimba was amplified, and although you can only use your thumbs to play it, he managed to have a melody with chordal accompaniment emerge simultaneously. He expresses himself not only musically, but vocally, with impulsive exclamations, and his entire body is involved in the projection of his interior being. He acts possessed, but not by devils. This is a man controlled by beneficent spirits of positive force. At times it felt as if El Z. was leading a revival meeting, and he did have a message to deliver. He would stand, clap his hands, sway and extemporize on staying positive in these bleak times. He reminded us that although there have always been warmongers in history, those of us who want peace are in the majority. It's easier to be pessimistic, we have to work on finding the positive. "You have a responsibility to dream!" he called to us.

El' Zabar offered an amusing anecdote about when he, Bluiett, and Billy Bang played the Apollo theater as a trio. Wynton Marsalis thought El' Zabar was trying to sneak into the theater for free until he was informed that El' Zabar was actually performing that night. Bill Cosby was the MC, and when he saw El' Zabar's trio, he asked, "Where's your band?" After their set, Cosby asked them, "What do you call that kind of music?"

Swing Out Sister. Somewhere Deep In The Night (2001).

2007-06-04T11:30:00.000-07:00

Swing Out Sister occupies a singular niche in the 21st century. Their somewhat outmoded style is reminiscent of the deliberate and carefully arranged pop songs of the early to mid 1960's taken from movie soundtracks of the time, songs that would have appealed to one's parents, who would have been otherwise annoyed by the clattery "noise" of the rock 'n' roll hits on the radio. SOS's experiments with odd meters and swing tempos, harpsichords, tympanies, string orchestras, and background choruses remind one of the work of composers such as Burt Bacharach, Henry Mancini, and John Barry, with the hipness of Quincy Jones.

They started out as a trio 22 years ago with two ex-members of A Certain Ratio and a fashion student with a most distinctive throaty voice. They had the hit with the endearing "Breakout" in the States in 1986, a bright, propulsive and spunky jewel of a tune.

Attention in the States and the UK began to decline, until they reached a low-profile cult status. But they became so big in Japan they were signed to the Japanese division of Mercury for years, so some of their records were not even released in North America. Over time, their music has begun to slow down, turn moody and veer into cinematic storytelling. Corinne and Andy became a duo of mature hipsters rather than young pop icons, the kind of couple that doesn't stay at the most expensive hotel, but the coolest, most secluded one.

Somewhere Deep In The Night, their superb cd from 2001, is perhaps the best of their work released in this century. Neither blues nor groove oriented, the melodies arch and spin, with leaps and colorful non-chord tones. They have not abandoned rhythmic interest, but their songs mostly seduce with a rich harmonic language, the chord progressions continually refreshing themselves with surprising twists, displaying almost a Wagnerian delay of resolution.

So, what's the problem with SOS? Way too jazzy for pop, too pop for jazz, and too complex for even "smooth jazz." Last year, Saint Etienne signed with Savoy Jazz as their North American label. SE is an indisputably brilliant group, but have not a shred of jazz in their work. Savoy would be wise to pick up Swing Out Sister and do them, and us, the same favor.

Puffy AmiYumi. World Financial Center, NYC, July 11, 2007.

2007-06-01T12:42:00.000-07:00

On a warm and sunny July evening last year, Puffy rocked the Hudson River waterfront on lower Manhattan. They were celebrating 10 years as a duo and touring for their new cd, Splurge. The audience was predominantly college-aged Asians, probably not the demographic that was necessarily familiar with their popular cartoon. When Puffy started out in 1996 they were more on the pop side of rock, wearing matching t-shirts and attempting coordinated dance moves. But on this night they were really trying to work on their indie rock cred. The backdrop on the stage was in black and gold and looked as if it were designed by a Hell's Angel, reading, "Puffy AmiYumi - Rock Show From Tokyo, Japan." They seemed to be distancing themselves from the seven year old fans of their cartoon show. They tried out some songs that showed their new direction, co-written with Jon Spencer (Blues Explosion), Dexter Holland (Offspring), and Butch Walker. Ami and Yumi prowled the stage wearing Boho dresses over jeans. Between songs, they opened their little spiral-bound notebooks and read prepared anecdotes about long train trips on Amtrack, minor health problems, musical flubs and leaving a fly unzipped on stage, all delivered in polite but giggly, little-girl voices. They have to be given credit for attempting to speak in English.

Although they are both incredibly attractive, Ami and Yumi have never traded on their looks to achieve success. Their appeal lies more in their wacky senses of humor, their zany fashion style, their embodiment of whimsy, and buckets of charm. Puffy's career has been distinguished by their talented presentation of recycled forms of pop music, convincingly emulating the stylistic expressions of The Who, The Beatles, Elvis Costello, Abba, and ELO, as well as detailed pastiches of punk, country, jazz, and disco, and the varied niches of 1960's American bubblegum pop. On their latest cd they delve into ska and rockabilly. They combine a peculiar Japanese perfectionism along with a wide ranging approach to imitation while retaining a refreshing and idiosyncratic originality.

Kylie Minogue. Showgirl Homecoming Live (2007).

2007-05-27T21:59:00.000-07:00

It would seem cold-hearted and simply bad-spirited to be critical of Kylie's new cd after her year of cancer, chemo, and surgery. But there's really nothing to complain about on Kylie's live cd. Kylie's performances are theatrical extravaganzas, and she's always projected well on video. So, understandably, her live performances have been previously documented on dvd. This is her first live cd, a double, documenting the second of a two night stand in Sydney, having come back, "fashionably late," as she puts it, after postponing her Showgirl tour eighteen months before, in 2005. Kylie has a slightly nasal, reedy quality to her upper middle register, but she actually sounds better live than she does on her studio recordings.

If you are a fan of Kylie's well-known tunes, you will know most of these songs pretty well. But this is not a paint-by-numbers collage of greatest hits. Many of the familiar tunes are re-worked with new arrangements. Bono joins Kylie for "Kids," doing the Robbie Williams part, and he puts in a great performance. Kylie was to repay the favor and join Bono at a U2 gig the following night, but she was simply too fatigued after her own shows to perform with them. Her first hit, "The Locomotion," a bit of a novelty when it was released 20 years ago, has been rearranged as a campy, swinging big band tune. She has a go with a rendition of "Over The Rainbow," and does a fine job with it. There's a medley of Shocked, What Do I Have To Do?, and Spinning Around that's a nonstop disco delight (even if you absolutely hate disco, this is irresistibly uplifting).

The culturally significant hot pants that Kylie wore in this video were on exhibit at the V&A Museum this year:

Kylie doesn't register as much of a player in the US music scene, but to the rest of the world she is a mega superstar. When she was diagnosed, she never "cancelled" her tour, she insisted it was only "postponed," and she was true to her word. Besides being an irresistible, glittery pop star and stylish fashion icon, she is an inspiration, being a survivor of cancer, doomed relationships, and bouts of depression.

Over the decades of her non-stop career, she's earned the adulation of millions of fans, and she deserves it. She has just been named the first woman to ever win Britain's Music Industry Trust award. Kylie will attend a ceremony this October to accept it. David Munn, Chairman of the Awards Committee, said "Kylie deserves this award for her success over 20 years, staying at the top in one of the toughest professions and inspiring millions with her grace, dignity and humanity."

Sean Lennon. The Egg, Albany, April 10, 2007.

2007-05-24T10:44:00.001-07:00

Sean Lennon is clearly a gifted crafter of pop songs. He has his own voice, a deft hand at harmony, and is a talented guitarist. His band, decked out in suits and ties, was excellent. Yuka Honda, from the band Cibo Matto, was on keyboards, and is Sean's musical director and close friend. Sean focused on tracks from his newly released, "Friendly Fire" cd. There is a lingering tint of regret to his lyrics, inspired as they were by delicate relationship issues. He actually had a heckler, but he handled it with experienced aplomb. After one of several incoherent outbursts from the impaired audience member, Sean said "We're not really connecting here, but I love you anyway man." The atmosphere was a little tense until the guy was eventually escorted out. Sean's songs are considered compositions, and they bear the mark of deliberation and careful judgement. Here's hoping they bring him comfort, as much as they brought this audience to an appreciation of his abilities.

Jonatha Brooke. The Egg, Albany, April 12, 2007.

2007-05-23T08:05:00.000-07:00

In the early 90's my girlfriend played the tape, "The Angel In The House," by The Story in her car. I expressed my admiration, but she said I couldn't appreciate it because it was "women's music." I felt a bit awkward, as if I had stumbled by accident into some Mary Kay party and said, "hey that's a really cool lipstick," before realizing my comments were completely unwelcome.

Anyway, she was wrong. Fifteen years later, I am still a huge fan of Jonatha Brooke. All of her records with The Story and afterwards are on my iPod.

Jonatha played the Egg here once again without her band. Her records are filled out with the whole rock ensemble sound, drums, keys, electric guitars, backup vocals. I was thrilled to hear her again play solo, for two hours, no intermission. Solo, we can really focus on her vocal subtlety, especially the way she pushes and pulls the phrasing of songs we are familiar with from her recordings. Her guitar playing is especially fascinating to hear live. She uses different tunings for almost every song, so she interjects friendly and amusing patter between them, "you're so nice, can I take you to Madison?" Jonatha used two amplified acoustic guitars. She plugged them into a jam-packed effects pedal system that added distortion (so NOT folky!), and sometimes a rich chorus of delay signals that sounded like a synthesized string ensemble. Jonatha's guitar playing is filled with a variety of musical gestures, strumming, harmonics, little riffs, all in a vocabulary of open strings and acid tinged harmonies that Ravel would have admired. She has a new cd, Careful What You Wish For, but she played for the most part familiar favorites. Although her songs deal mostly with tragedy and disappointment, Jonatha smiles throughout her performances and flashes flirty looks into the audience, as if she really wants and needs to connect to us. She needn't worry about that.

Trashcan Sinatras. Mercury Lounge, NYC, April 23, 2005.

2007-05-21T06:54:00.000-07:00

I had no expectations of this triple bill, and I was pleasantly surprised by all three. By the end of the night I had found a new band to add to my list of favorites. Elizabeth Harper is a singer/songwriter with the acerbic wit of a Morrissey. She had an appealing and intriguingly quiet, yet edgy stage presence. The Silent League was anything but quiet. A large group, led by keyboardist Justin Russo, they blew through a set of impassioned and classic-sounding chamber pop compositions that were musically and lyrically exhilarating. There was much self-deprecating patter between songs, as when the guitarist said, "Soft rock is hard," at once putting a spin on the famous Barbie quote ("Math is hard!"), and satirizing the category they would most likely be lumped into by some default.

Headlining Scots, Trashcan Sinatras, had their merch being sold by a guy in a kilt up front near the door. The band looked like a bunch of ordinary guys that happened to walk out on stage by accident. After a few songs, I realized I was in the midst of a virtual fan club rally. It seemed most everyone in the room recognized each song from a single guitar strum, and they inevitably sang along to the choruses. I had never heard any of their music, but I was pulled in by the chiming, rolling and spiraling nature of their songcraft. They were in support of their new cd Weightlifting. The main focus of the band is Frank Reader (far left in the pic), a handsome poet in the sensitive/tragic style. If John Lennon and Bryan Ferry got married and had a baby boy, the little tyke would grow up to be Frank Reader - he's that compelling. What astonishes about the tunes on Weightlifting is how they begin with such cast-off nonchalance. After the first verse, you think, "it's not bad, should I fast-forward?" Following a couple of choruses, you think, "oh yeah, this is good." Then about three quarters into the song, you're completely swept away by the undertow of a swirling 3-minute masterpiece of songwriting. And this happens over and over on Weightlifting. By the end of their set I was a believer, and I walked up Broadway in the cold spring rain with a warm feeling for a new favorite.
Trashcan Sinatras. All The Dark Horses: