Just after I wrote the last note I bought and read John Sellers' book Perfect From Now On, subtitled "how indie rock saved my life." It was a fun bit of synchronicity how his description of musical evolution from growing up in small town Michigan through university and beyond closely mirrored my own (not including going on to get drunk with Robert Pollard of Guided By Voices at his home in Dayton and following the band during their farewell tour). But he did start as a pre-teen classic rock/metal afficionado who discovered 80s "alternative rock" in the rat maze of dorm rooms.
Which leads me to my own "University Years" segment of the [more than] 25 albums [and things other than albums] note.
01. Supertramp/Gowan at the Aitken Centre, September 1985.
One element that definitely was absent due to geography during my growing up was live shows. Other than going to see Tommy Hunter with my parents the only rock band that played Campbellton during my teen years was April Wine. Twice. So coming to Fredericton and being given the opportunity to see bands was pretty magical at the time. I think this was technically the third show I went to at university, following on the heels of a free show by The Spoons during frosh week and a showcase concert that same week with headliners The Screaming Trees. Not the Mark Lanegan-led Seattle combo but the PEI band who later became the trees and were soon after clear cut, I assume. Supertramp was a big deal to people... though they had just parted company with Roger Hodgson who was their primary song writer for years. Still they put on a great show, but truth be told I probably enjoyed Gowan more. He was riding the wave of his first album and all the singles it spawned. I'm pretty sure I had the "Strange Animal" 45 if not the whole album, at least dubbed on cassette. Now Gowan plays cruise ship tours as the singer in Styx. That is one of those situations where it's unclear whether progress was made or not.
Other shows I attended in Fredericton the next few years: Helix/Headpins, Platinum Blonde, Spirit of the West (multiple times), Kim Mitchell, Alice Cooper, The Box, Thomas Trio and the Red Albino, The Pursuit of Happiness (canceled after a couple songs and more bottles thrown).
02. Joining CHSR-FM January 1986.
Access to stores like A&A and Sam's and The Magic Forest [r.i.p.] was making shopping for music a more plausible experience than the K-Mart/Woolworth possibilities I had been faced with previously. More access doesn't always translate to better choices though, and my first few months of spree-ing were just built on the shaky foundation of cheapness married to partly-Miami Vice influenced taste. How else explain buying bargain bin cassette versions of solo albums by both Don Henley and Glen Frey? Residence life did open some doors, but the loudest stereos also seem to be blaring dubious things like Dire Straits' "Money For Nothing" or "Bad Apple" by David Wilcox. But one night I discovered there was such a thing as campus radio. I turned my receiver to 97.9 FM and out blare Black Flag. Now this did not turn my world 180 degrees and turn me into a punk rocker, but it did alert me to the fact that a broader spectrum of music existed. Early in the second term another McLeod House resident, Shawn Jackson from Ottawa, and I applied for a show. [Sidebar: at the time when you joined CHSR your training consisted of then-PD Rick Thornley (maybe?) telling you this button does this, that knob does that, your show starts in about 6 minutes go pick your records.] So we threw ourselves into the Playbox and the Record Library and learned about hot new Canadian bands like 54.40, Grapes of Wrath (who had also played an excellent Hallowe'en show at the Sub), underground stuff like Deja Voodoo, Ray Condo, NoMeansNo and on and on. One of my favourite memories from a couple of years later when I had my own show was Peter Rowan flying into MCR with a new DTK records release Decade of Dreams - Parochial Zoo and demanding I play it.
03 The Cure - Head on the Door (1985)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:difwxqe5ldte
Unlike my previous rants about how it was a bad time to get into classic rock, this was a great time to get into The Cure. This is still my favourite album of theirs. It's got some of the doom and gloom of their early mopey days and some of the best pop stuff they ever did, from "In Between Days" to "Close to Me." Unlike their breakthrough album, Disintegration, I can still listen to Head on the Door without feeling too much time slippage.
04 The Smiths - The Queen is Dead (1986)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:w9fqxqu5ldke
I have to admit this wasn't love at first hear. The residual testosterone from my Sabbath years made it tough to get past Morrissey's woe-is-me lilting. But once I did. The Smiths seems to be one of those bands that makes fans in the unlikeliest places. People who have no time for anything remotely new wave somehow still "get" them. I guess great hooks are great hooks regardless of genre.
05 The Cult - Love (1985)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:kifpxqe5ldte
"She Sells Sanctuary" was ubiquitous that year. You couldn't have a room party, go to a bar, get in a cab without hearing it... yet somehow you couldn't get tired of it. I went after their previous albums, including the stuff when they were still calling themselves The Southern Death Cult, and some of those tracks still stand up great. When they went all "dumb(er) Zeppelin" on Electric I found it amusing, but the bloom was off the rose.
06 Skinny Puppy - Mind: The Perpetual Intercourse (1986)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:h9ftxqu5ldhe
The whole industrial thing really appealed to me in the mid-80s. I built up a section of my collection to include Ministry, Frontline Assembly, Tear Garden, Chris and Cosey, Severed Heads. It was a way to fill my "heavy" quotient and still branch out into the "weird" world I was bent on exploring. I thought I was really avant garde and badass, but then I was doing my radio show one day and noticed J. Hamilton rocking out to Nurse With Wound and Coil and realized that I might still be a few steps behind.
07 Kate Bush - Hounds of Love (1985/bought 1986)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:kifoxqq5ldte
I think most music nerds go through a female singer phase. Mine included Sarah McLachlan (I know!), Jane Siberry, Suzanne Vega and others Im probably forgetting. Kate Bush had the whole entracing package for a man in his late teens discovering things: hotness, weirdness, smarts and a video with Donald Sutherland playing her dad. It strangely fits the time very well, too. A little ahead of the curve, but using the technology that made a lot of more organic artists sound foolish in comparison. I wish the same could be said of her more recent work.
08 The Sex Pistols - Never Mind the Bollocks (1977/bought 1987)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:39fuxqrrldfe
Now, I never became a punk fan of note... and one good proof is that I discovered the Sex Pistols after watching Sid & Nancy. I remember bring that movie over to friends' places in Campbellton and then using it's philosophies to embrace bad behaviours. At our most punk moment we took all the knobs we could pull off our friend Russell's car (including the lighter) and threw them across the street while he was working his hot dog cart outside Ben's Tavern. He wasn't impressed, but couldn't leave his post. The true secret to Bollocks' status as a punk album is that it really isn't a punk album. In the same way that Nirvana's Nevermind isn't a punk album, or a grunge album. Both just feature the trappings of a genre to be named later but contain tons of elements borrowed from everywhere... which makes them stronger, and better, than most of their peers.
09 Public Image Ltd. - Album (1985/bought 1987)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:w9fpxqr5ldte
Do yourself a favour, listen to Never Mind the Bollocks... then listen to Public Image Ltd. self-titled debut. Now try to digest the fact that Johnny Lydon (Rotten) went from a freshly broken up punk cabaret to this all in the same year. Though it eventually played a few too many hands, early PIL was one of the most startling transmogrifications of punk rock into "other" possible. The Clash burst forth with a lot of ideas over their early albums, but PIL were artier, snottier and just plain weirder Album was packaged as a generic "no name" release, with the cassette version being called Cassette, the CD Compact Disc, etc. At this point co-founders Keith Levene and Jah Wobble weren't around. In their place was the bizarro combo of Bill Laswell, who produced alongside Steve Vai on guitar and Ginger Baker (you know, from Cream?) on drums. Weird? Weird.
10 Husker Du - New Day Rising (1985/bought 1988)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:hifoxq85ldse
In the winter of 1988 I lived up in Skyline Acres part of town. Every morning there was a trudge through the shortcut over the highway and out behind the Aitken Centre to get to school. There were certain cassettes that made wading through the snow possible... and the two most memorable were Ministry's Land of Rape and Honey and Husker Du's New Day Rising. It had the sheer adrenaline of their earliest work and some of the strangest tracks they'd record ("How to Skin a Cat" wtf?). But side one especially was just the boost I needed to grit my teeth against the cold.
11 Bauhaus - Burning from the Inside (1983/bought 1988)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:3ifixql5ldke
I think I'd heard their cover of "Ziggy Stardust" on MuchMusic's City Limits (remember?) and then found this album, which was one of the first CDs I ever bought after purchasing a portable CD player from Magic Forest. Panasonic... no antiskip necessary... weighed about two pounds... and it cost, I think, $320. Lasted until around 1992 though... and I put it through a lot. Anyway... Burning from the Inside was the last album Bauhaus did, and much of it was done with the group in neutral corners. You can hear what would become Tones on Tail and later Love and Rockets, and about as far out as Peter Murphy would get before going solo. Bauhaus remain an anomaly, though. Claimed by the Goths for their vampire chic fashion, but musically they had a rhythm section as attuned to dub as glam and a guitarist that played noise as much as melody... and a front man who like to sing while suspended from his feet above the mic. So much goddamned fun.
12 Sting - The Dream of the Blue Turtles (1985)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:w9ftxq85ldhe
Just so you know I didn't go all super-cool, I followed out my love of The Police (who I tumbled into backwards starting with Synchronicity) out into Sting's solo career. Believe or not it really didn't suck as much as present output would indicate. On paper the idea of a Brit hiring a bunch of shit-hot American jazz musicians to help him interpret his weighty thoughs sounds pretentious... and it it... but however you look at it the playing is tight and the songs are good and I didn't buy the lute album twenty years later so fuck y'all.
13 Jane's Addiction - Nothing's Shocking (1988)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:fbfoxqu5ldje
I clearly remember checking the recent arrivals in the library at CHSR and coming across this album. The cover demanded attention. And then putting it on... what the hell? It was heavy, it was metal, there were solos, but the drumming was funky and there were horns in places and hippie tracks like "Summertime Rolls" and songs from the p.o.v. of serial killer Ted Bundy and songs about pissing on yourself and "Pigs in Zen" and crossdressing. Ho-lee Shee-it. It and the follow-up, Ritual de lo Habitual remain incredible milemarkers in modern music... tarnished a little by substandard output by it's progenitors (Dave Navarro's solo album? ugh). As is sometimes the case with groundbreaking groups it is the least visible member of the band who was the most instrumental in elevating it... in this case bassist Eric Avery. Zen, indeed.
14 Cowboy Junkies - The Trinity Session (1988/bought 1989)
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:kifrxqe5ldse
This marked a sort of turning point... call it maturity if you must. Other than my femme singer fetishes most of the music I was drawn to still had a certain agressiveness at its root. Cowboys Junkies were about as far from aggressive as you could get. And though it had Margo Timmins breathy voice at its centre I can assure you that was not what hooked me. Rather it was just the easy and assuredness of all the other parts. How it seemed like no one was expending any energy, but when you listened closer you heard how complex it actually was. The Junkies never really maintained their profile in Canada. Other groups like Blue Rodeo and Tragically Hip stepped into the spotlight they had ignited... and that's ok too.
By the by:
Of the twelve albums listed I still have seven. Can you guess which one I don't currently have?
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Origin of the Species part 2 (interlude)
Before I launch into the second phase of this note (the University Years) I thought I’d pause for a brief musical interlude. One part of the equation for the development of most hardcore music fans is their relationship with a handful of classics. You’ll often hear some self-describe themselves as more Stones than Beatles and so-forth. Some find this pocket of approved rock geography and never stray from its firm boundaries, preferring to attend Classic Albums Live performances at The Playhouse rather than take a chance that a post-70s band might have something to offer.
For what it’s worth here is my Classic Band Life:
(1) Led Zeppelin
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:09ftxql5ld0e
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:h9fyxql5ld0e
This was probably the “big one” amongst my friends in senior high, or at least the one we all agreed on. We all bought a couple of the albums and shared our resources. The more motivated bought guitars and tried to perfect the riffs (as well as they could on $30 acoustics). I remember borrowing Chuck’s copy of II and somehow dropping my Beta VCR corner-first in the middle of “Ramble On.” Even now I can still listen to pretty much any of the albums (except In Through the Out Door) start to finish, despite my turbulent relation ship with the fourth album as outlined in another note.
Then and now I think my two favourites are III and Houses of the Holy. If nothing else Page and Plant were great students and synthesizers of music’s legacy from American blues to British arcane rural folk. Those two albums best combined the strum and stomp of the bands dialectic. Houses broke out of the mold even further, experimenting with funkiness and psychedelia that they’d take even further out, but in a more sprawling, unfocussed way on Physical Graffiti.
(2) Pink Floyd
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:h9frxqr5ldje
I think The Wall the album and the movie hit my consciousness at the same time. Because of that the two were wrapped together irreversibly as one document. As a teenager I was admittedly completely floored by the album’ ambition to be a lament for lost identity, a rail against cold and faceless institutions and rock’s power to both free and isolate its poets. Then I bought Ummagumma. That was an entirely different Pink Floyd. Ragged, experimental and unafraid to be pretty and rustic or weird and interstellar. It wasn’t until much later that I found out about Syd Barrett (didn’t have the internet in 1982 to instantly get a band biography) and the pieces began to fall together. These days I have to say that I much prefer Piper at the Gates of Dawn and the Barrett solo albums to the rest of the bands catalogue. I put my time in with Animals and Wish You Were Here but even as a young man found Atom Heart Mother and Meddle pretty bloated and boring. I followed Waters out through The Final Cut and his solo Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking, watching him disappear farther and farther up his own ass. Gilmour kept the band and turned it into a toothless soft-rock version of itself, allowing folks to keep going to see a touring band play “Money” and “Comfortably Numb.”
(3) The Beatles
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:gifwxql5ldae
I have to admit a large reason I never paid much attention to The Beatles in high school was that a clutch of “smart girls” (all of them lovely young ladies it turned out… and learned too late) were absolutely obsessed with them. Reason enough for me not to be. A little later I dabbled. I think I only ever owned the “White” album, the “Blue” two record set of later singles (1967-70) and a flea market copy of Hey Jude. I’ve heard all the albums over time, of course, but it’s still the White Album that resonates. It’s a band at the top of their pop game taking the triumph of their two 1967 studio classics and a whole bunch of drugs and wiggy philosophy and mulching them until a rainbow of noise flies out. It has a little bit, not only about each of the members of the band, but about everything they’ve done up until that point, and the elements both bleed together and create little fences. Such as John’s studio cut-up “Revolution #9” and Paul responding by going off by himself to record “Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey.” I think my only continued reticence to adopt The Beatles as a favourite has more to do with their legacy than the band themselves. British experimental pioneer Keith Rowe of AMM summed it up by accusing them of being responsible for some of the worst music since rock’s invention. By which he didn’t mean their own, only that they set the pop template in stone for the last forty years and countless bands have used that to create the most mediocre and unnecessary derivatives ever since. What these bands fail to appreciate is that what The Beatles made to look effortless was actually quite difficult… it was just a trick of fate that the first band to do it would ultimately always be the best at it.
(4) Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, The Who, The Rolling Stones
I have to come clean and say that I’ve yet to give these titans a fair and thorough listen. For one reason or another they just haven’t fallen across my path at just the right moment for me to want to put in the work. Now it’s not to say that I haven’t probably listened to hours and hours of any of their discographies, that’s unavoidable, but never with the chronological start to finish back and forth in depth detail gleaning attention I gave to KISS or Black Sabbath (I’m not particularly proud of that). In my defense, the years that I was doing my intensive introductory appreciation of rock The Who released It’s Hard, The Rolling Stones released Emotional Rescue (which I bought), Dylan released Shot of Love and Hendrix was dead. In case this isn’t immediately evident the above illustrates how badly these once and future kings suuuuuccked in the early 80s. I keep assuring myself that at some point I will dive headfirst into all four discographies. Hendrix is easy because there are only a couple of actual releases from his time on earth. The Rolling Stones are easy-ish because they haven’t put out anything worth listening to since the early 70s. The Who more or less likewise. Dylan is the hardest nut to crack. He’s had more highs, lows and outright balls-ups than most four bands combined… and for that reason he is the most intriguing.
(5) The Doors
I thought they were useless back then. Still do.
For what it’s worth here is my Classic Band Life:
(1) Led Zeppelin
http://www.allmusic.com/cg
http://www.allmusic.com/cg
This was probably the “big one” amongst my friends in senior high, or at least the one we all agreed on. We all bought a couple of the albums and shared our resources. The more motivated bought guitars and tried to perfect the riffs (as well as they could on $30 acoustics). I remember borrowing Chuck’s copy of II and somehow dropping my Beta VCR corner-first in the middle of “Ramble On.” Even now I can still listen to pretty much any of the albums (except In Through the Out Door) start to finish, despite my turbulent relation ship with the fourth album as outlined in another note.
Then and now I think my two favourites are III and Houses of the Holy. If nothing else Page and Plant were great students and synthesizers of music’s legacy from American blues to British arcane rural folk. Those two albums best combined the strum and stomp of the bands dialectic. Houses broke out of the mold even further, experimenting with funkiness and psychedelia that they’d take even further out, but in a more sprawling, unfocussed way on Physical Graffiti.
(2) Pink Floyd
http://www.allmusic.com/cg
I think The Wall the album and the movie hit my consciousness at the same time. Because of that the two were wrapped together irreversibly as one document. As a teenager I was admittedly completely floored by the album’ ambition to be a lament for lost identity, a rail against cold and faceless institutions and rock’s power to both free and isolate its poets. Then I bought Ummagumma. That was an entirely different Pink Floyd. Ragged, experimental and unafraid to be pretty and rustic or weird and interstellar. It wasn’t until much later that I found out about Syd Barrett (didn’t have the internet in 1982 to instantly get a band biography) and the pieces began to fall together. These days I have to say that I much prefer Piper at the Gates of Dawn and the Barrett solo albums to the rest of the bands catalogue. I put my time in with Animals and Wish You Were Here but even as a young man found Atom Heart Mother and Meddle pretty bloated and boring. I followed Waters out through The Final Cut and his solo Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking, watching him disappear farther and farther up his own ass. Gilmour kept the band and turned it into a toothless soft-rock version of itself, allowing folks to keep going to see a touring band play “Money” and “Comfortably Numb.”
(3) The Beatles
http://www.allmusic.com/cg
I have to admit a large reason I never paid much attention to The Beatles in high school was that a clutch of “smart girls” (all of them lovely young ladies it turned out… and learned too late) were absolutely obsessed with them. Reason enough for me not to be. A little later I dabbled. I think I only ever owned the “White” album, the “Blue” two record set of later singles (1967-70) and a flea market copy of Hey Jude. I’ve heard all the albums over time, of course, but it’s still the White Album that resonates. It’s a band at the top of their pop game taking the triumph of their two 1967 studio classics and a whole bunch of drugs and wiggy philosophy and mulching them until a rainbow of noise flies out. It has a little bit, not only about each of the members of the band, but about everything they’ve done up until that point, and the elements both bleed together and create little fences. Such as John’s studio cut-up “Revolution #9” and Paul responding by going off by himself to record “Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey.” I think my only continued reticence to adopt The Beatles as a favourite has more to do with their legacy than the band themselves. British experimental pioneer Keith Rowe of AMM summed it up by accusing them of being responsible for some of the worst music since rock’s invention. By which he didn’t mean their own, only that they set the pop template in stone for the last forty years and countless bands have used that to create the most mediocre and unnecessary derivatives ever since. What these bands fail to appreciate is that what The Beatles made to look effortless was actually quite difficult… it was just a trick of fate that the first band to do it would ultimately always be the best at it.
(4) Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, The Who, The Rolling Stones
I have to come clean and say that I’ve yet to give these titans a fair and thorough listen. For one reason or another they just haven’t fallen across my path at just the right moment for me to want to put in the work. Now it’s not to say that I haven’t probably listened to hours and hours of any of their discographies, that’s unavoidable, but never with the chronological start to finish back and forth in depth detail gleaning attention I gave to KISS or Black Sabbath (I’m not particularly proud of that). In my defense, the years that I was doing my intensive introductory appreciation of rock The Who released It’s Hard, The Rolling Stones released Emotional Rescue (which I bought), Dylan released Shot of Love and Hendrix was dead. In case this isn’t immediately evident the above illustrates how badly these once and future kings suuuuuccked in the early 80s. I keep assuring myself that at some point I will dive headfirst into all four discographies. Hendrix is easy because there are only a couple of actual releases from his time on earth. The Rolling Stones are easy-ish because they haven’t put out anything worth listening to since the early 70s. The Who more or less likewise. Dylan is the hardest nut to crack. He’s had more highs, lows and outright balls-ups than most four bands combined… and for that reason he is the most intriguing.
(5) The Doors
I thought they were useless back then. Still do.
Origin of the Species
I can be a little wordy about music. Occupational hazard. And I've gotten tagged in notes by some of you for the 25 Albums thread that's going around... so I thought I'd answer back with a chronological series that includes not only albums but concerts and other music-based events that made an impact. These first eleven are from the Start-through-High School period of music fandom. The one album I fail to mention below... and is influential in it's own way... would be Def Leppard's Pyromania (1983)... a huge success... and pretty much ruined metal, not just for me, but everyone. Part two... University is soon to follow.
01 Elvis Presley – Pure Gold (1975)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:h9fexqr5ldse
This is the first album in my parents’ collection I recall playing myself. My folks were mostly country pop/easy listening fans… artists like Jim Reeves, Perry Como, Roger Whitaker were the norm. Elvis looked like an entirely alien creature those other folks. This collection was released two years before he died. I remember that occurrence like many childhood things, overhearing it and processing it all over a much longer period of time. I still prefer Fat Vegas Elvis.
02 ABBA – The Album (1978)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:0ifexq95ld6e
The first album I bought with my own money. ABBA was a strong radio presence in the mid-to-late 70s and I had been buying 45s of my favourites for a while. “Take a Chance on Me” had that weird a cappella intro that looped through the whole song, and like most Swedish music through history it burrowed into your brain and never left. I also had a crush on the women in the band after seeing them on some TV variety show. Maybe Sonny and Cher or Donny and Marie.
03 KISS – Dynasty (1979)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:f9fyxql5ld6e
Probably the worst KISS album up until that point. I bought it again because the song “I Was Made for Lovin’ You” was all over the radio at that point. Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons were scraping the barrel at this point and most of their songs are co-written by hired guns to try and maintain relevance… which at the time meant adding a little disco to the mix. It did set me off on a KISS journey though and I collected all the albums that preceded it and unfortunately many that followed (I stopped [late] at 1985’s Asylum.
04 Blue Öyster Cult – Cultosaurus Erectus (1980)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:fzfuxq95ldte
I joined Columbia House through an ad in TV Guide (I think). I recall that my initial flurry of “Buy Eleven for a Penny” was an even split between the radio pop I was still wallowing in (like Rupert Holmes “Pina Colada Song” and Dan Hill “Sometimes When We Touch”) and hard rock I had been reading about through magazines that featured KISS (which I remember also included Ted Nugent’s Scream Dream and UFO’s No Place to Run). B.O.C were the single weirdest, and therefore favourite of the bunch. Five guys from NYC whose songs were steeped in SciFi/Fantasy and heavy guitars… with titles like “Black Blade” and “Lips in the Hills.” They’re playing in Halifax this May you know.
05 AC/DC – Back in Black (1980)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:gifixq95ld6e
And every thirteen year old since then.
06 Saga – S/T (1978/ bought 1982)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:w9ftxqy5ldje
The first stereo of my own I had in my bedroom was a bizarre cube with speakers built into the sides that had a cassette deck built like a car player and an 8-track player. 8-tracks were already on their last legs and so difficult to find except in bargain bins in places like Woolworth’s. I bought this one because of its cover (a robot moth floating through outer space) and ended up really liking it. They were a Canadian group with a weird blend of heavy guitars, pre-Europop synthesizers and an overly dramatic singer going off about a “Humble Stance.” They also had two songs on this debut album subtitled chapter four and chapter six… I had to find out what went on in the rest of the story.
07 Alice Cooper – From the Inside (1978/ bought 1982)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:diftxqe5ldae
I had an older cousin that was into Alice Cooper and went on about him so I thought I’d give it a listen. Again not the best AC to start with, but it had the added glamour of the vinyl cover opening along a split at the center to reveal a panorama of an asylum and it’s residents, all of whom were characters in this concept album. They made it into a comic book too.
08 Iron Maiden – Killers (1981/ bought 1983)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:wifpxq85ldte
Another one mainly bought for its cover… at a record store in Bathurst, I recall. It was still pre-Dickinson. It cemented my metal leanings for the next couple of years.
09 Black Sabbath – Mob Rules / Devo – New Traditionalists (both 1981/ bought 1983)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:aifpxqq5ld6e
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:jifpxqr5ldse
There was a record store that opened in the Sugarloaf Shopping Centre in Campbellton called Musik Dick. I know. They had a habit of selling off overstock vinyl half-price every six months or so. I bought both of these the same day, weird juxtaposition. The Black Sabbath one was another weird place to start with a band… their singer was Ronnie James Dio at this point… but the guitar/bass still had that fat groove and riff nirvana feel. I’d go so far to say that it’s better than the last two of the Ozzy-era albums. Devo was a weird blip at the time. I think the reason for both these albums was that a song from each of was also on the Heavy Metal movie soundrack: Sabbath’s “Mob Rules” and Devo’s “Working in the Coal Mine.”
10 Rush - Permanent Waves (1980/ bought 1984)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:d9fexqy5ldhe
I had a friend in grade eleven who loved Rush. It was the only band he EVER listened to. Because of that I hated Rush. What are friends for. Over the course of that year I ate lunch at his house every day and so heard every Rush album several hundreds of times. Eventually my brain gave up and gave in and I bought my first Rush album. In many ways I still think that Rush is the perfect Canadian band: literate, incredibly prolific on their instruments and just a little too nerdy for their own good. I also remember that year at the school’s variety show the best guitarist in our high school, a native from Restigouche named Geno, playing “The Spirit of Radio” as an instrumental.
11. Marillion – Misplaced Childhood (1985)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:gxfoxzlkldae
The same friend who brainwashed me into Rush and I were tipped off about Marillion around the same time. A Scottish group with a rotund frontman who called himself Fish that sang wordy songs about paranoia and harlequins and drinking too much. The year of 1985 was dominated by two activities: biking and drinking. Misplaced Childhood came out and it was a song cycle about lost love, childhood dreams and substance abuse. It was the soundtrack of that summer.
01 Elvis Presley – Pure Gold (1975)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
This is the first album in my parents’ collection I recall playing myself. My folks were mostly country pop/easy listening fans… artists like Jim Reeves, Perry Como, Roger Whitaker were the norm. Elvis looked like an entirely alien creature those other folks. This collection was released two years before he died. I remember that occurrence like many childhood things, overhearing it and processing it all over a much longer period of time. I still prefer Fat Vegas Elvis.
02 ABBA – The Album (1978)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
The first album I bought with my own money. ABBA was a strong radio presence in the mid-to-late 70s and I had been buying 45s of my favourites for a while. “Take a Chance on Me” had that weird a cappella intro that looped through the whole song, and like most Swedish music through history it burrowed into your brain and never left. I also had a crush on the women in the band after seeing them on some TV variety show. Maybe Sonny and Cher or Donny and Marie.
03 KISS – Dynasty (1979)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
Probably the worst KISS album up until that point. I bought it again because the song “I Was Made for Lovin’ You” was all over the radio at that point. Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons were scraping the barrel at this point and most of their songs are co-written by hired guns to try and maintain relevance… which at the time meant adding a little disco to the mix. It did set me off on a KISS journey though and I collected all the albums that preceded it and unfortunately many that followed (I stopped [late] at 1985’s Asylum.
04 Blue Öyster Cult – Cultosaurus Erectus (1980)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
I joined Columbia House through an ad in TV Guide (I think). I recall that my initial flurry of “Buy Eleven for a Penny” was an even split between the radio pop I was still wallowing in (like Rupert Holmes “Pina Colada Song” and Dan Hill “Sometimes When We Touch”) and hard rock I had been reading about through magazines that featured KISS (which I remember also included Ted Nugent’s Scream Dream and UFO’s No Place to Run). B.O.C were the single weirdest, and therefore favourite of the bunch. Five guys from NYC whose songs were steeped in SciFi/Fantasy and heavy guitars… with titles like “Black Blade” and “Lips in the Hills.” They’re playing in Halifax this May you know.
05 AC/DC – Back in Black (1980)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
And every thirteen year old since then.
06 Saga – S/T (1978/ bought 1982)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
The first stereo of my own I had in my bedroom was a bizarre cube with speakers built into the sides that had a cassette deck built like a car player and an 8-track player. 8-tracks were already on their last legs and so difficult to find except in bargain bins in places like Woolworth’s. I bought this one because of its cover (a robot moth floating through outer space) and ended up really liking it. They were a Canadian group with a weird blend of heavy guitars, pre-Europop synthesizers and an overly dramatic singer going off about a “Humble Stance.” They also had two songs on this debut album subtitled chapter four and chapter six… I had to find out what went on in the rest of the story.
07 Alice Cooper – From the Inside (1978/ bought 1982)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
I had an older cousin that was into Alice Cooper and went on about him so I thought I’d give it a listen. Again not the best AC to start with, but it had the added glamour of the vinyl cover opening along a split at the center to reveal a panorama of an asylum and it’s residents, all of whom were characters in this concept album. They made it into a comic book too.
08 Iron Maiden – Killers (1981/ bought 1983)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
Another one mainly bought for its cover… at a record store in Bathurst, I recall. It was still pre-Dickinson. It cemented my metal leanings for the next couple of years.
09 Black Sabbath – Mob Rules / Devo – New Traditionalists (both 1981/ bought 1983)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
There was a record store that opened in the Sugarloaf Shopping Centre in Campbellton called Musik Dick. I know. They had a habit of selling off overstock vinyl half-price every six months or so. I bought both of these the same day, weird juxtaposition. The Black Sabbath one was another weird place to start with a band… their singer was Ronnie James Dio at this point… but the guitar/bass still had that fat groove and riff nirvana feel. I’d go so far to say that it’s better than the last two of the Ozzy-era albums. Devo was a weird blip at the time. I think the reason for both these albums was that a song from each of was also on the Heavy Metal movie soundrack: Sabbath’s “Mob Rules” and Devo’s “Working in the Coal Mine.”
10 Rush - Permanent Waves (1980/ bought 1984)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
I had a friend in grade eleven who loved Rush. It was the only band he EVER listened to. Because of that I hated Rush. What are friends for. Over the course of that year I ate lunch at his house every day and so heard every Rush album several hundreds of times. Eventually my brain gave up and gave in and I bought my first Rush album. In many ways I still think that Rush is the perfect Canadian band: literate, incredibly prolific on their instruments and just a little too nerdy for their own good. I also remember that year at the school’s variety show the best guitarist in our high school, a native from Restigouche named Geno, playing “The Spirit of Radio” as an instrumental.
11. Marillion – Misplaced Childhood (1985)
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg
The same friend who brainwashed me into Rush and I were tipped off about Marillion around the same time. A Scottish group with a rotund frontman who called himself Fish that sang wordy songs about paranoia and harlequins and drinking too much. The year of 1985 was dominated by two activities: biking and drinking. Misplaced Childhood came out and it was a song cycle about lost love, childhood dreams and substance abuse. It was the soundtrack of that summer.
Don't call it a comeback.
This long-dormant segment of my blog/brain was started to create a reason for me to listen through my CD collection once and comment on my findings. As some of you (mostly JD formerly Merrick, MacGregor) have noticed this experiment... erm... failed. Well not entirely... I did get a small fraction of the way through, but the exercise went from being fun, to pleasant, to something I dreaded having to keep up with. So, blam. Brick wall.
Rather than simply sweep it into the digital graveyard (where do all the zeroes and ones go?) I thought I'd merely turn it into a space to contain irregular updates on the original intent, and also expand it to include musings on music as they seem warranted.
The first new section will reprint a few notes I'd originally posted on Facebook in response to one of the ever circling memes that get us to volunteer more market research.
Thanks for stopping by.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
twenty
157-166
Asencio/Chenard - Ocean a vendre/for sale (Ambiances Magnetiques) 2002
A duo recording driven primarily by Sylvie Chenard, who is a multidisciplinary artist with several Ocean/Whale based sound works. Working in guitar and electronics she is joined by Jon Asencio on electric bass for free play that is in line with the Quebec label's aesthetic. Leans to the side of soundscape over melodic exlploration... may not be for people who like even their free jazz with a little structure.
++++++++++++++++++
Robert Ashley - In Sara (Lovely Music, Ltd.) 2002
Ashley reads a 128-stanza poem by John Barton Wolgamot wherein the same line introduces a sentence that constantly changes four elements, the names or lists of names and the active portion of the sentence. It blurs the line between Dada, concrete poetry, sound art... mostly because of it's effects that accrue slowly and through near-repetition. In that way it is also not unlike interesting minimalist music like Steve Reich's or Terry Riley's. It features underlying music by Paul DeMarinis on Moog synthesizer.
+++++++++++++++++++
Ask - Formulary of Curses (Discus) 2004
Larger ensemble recording by Discus label boss Martin Archer. Ask features a primarily jazz mode, but one open to processing and manipulation of sound. For all of that though the core is much more rooted in individual participations than in group dynamics. Balanced and interesting play.
+++++++++++++++++
Wendy Atkinson - Trim (Smarten Up & Get to the Point) 2003
Atkinson is a Vancouver-based artist with ties to long-standing art-punk duo Mecca Normal. This solo album is an improbably ambient exploration using all manner of electric and acoustic bass as a starting point. She manages to discover interesting textures by flattening rhythms down to still points and layering them or pulling them apart to discover their warm hearts.
++++++++++++++++++++++
Aube - Cardiac Strain (Alien8) 1998
Aube/Knurl - Split (Alien8) 1997
Aube (pronounced Obey) is the alias of Japanese artist Akifumi Nakajima. His works are typically begun with a simple single sound source that is then given extremely radical processing in order to create gigantic soundscapes that belie their humble beginnings. For Cardiac Strain the sound of a heartbeat is turned into something urgent and enormous, which perhaps is really what the heart signifies ultimately. For the split release with Toronto's Alan Bloor whose alias is Knurl, Nakajima uses the sound of a telephone to create a gradually building alarm clarion. The other aspect of Aube's works is their usual very limited runs, making them quite collectable. For Bloor's side of the above split he is much more visceral and "hands on" using amplified sheet metal run through all manner of distortion. The result is more typical of what is conjured when the term "noise music" is mentioned.
++++++++++++++++
Melanie Auclair - Puce a l’oreille (Ambiances Magnetiques) 2004
Debut album for this excellent singer / cellist. She is joined by choice artists from the Ambiances Magnetiques roster including label head Joanne Hetu and guitarist Bernard Falaise. The results are eight medium length pieces that have a surprising attention to detail, but without sacrificing compelling musicality. Acoustics are given the foreground, with the smallest sounds of things standing tall and strong.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Autechre - Chiastic Slide (Warp) 1997
Autechre - LP5 (Nothing/Warp) 1998
Autechre - Gantz Graf (Warp) 2002
This duo are long-haul electronics wizards that have come up through the ranks shoulder to shoulder with Aphex Twin and Squarepusher. And also like those two they are fans of throwing endless curveballs just when critics come near to pegging them. Usually tagged with the much-derided IDM (Intelligent Dance Music) description, they often create abrasive sounds atop near-trance beats that have the tendency to suddenly shift or drop off just when the rhythm becomes comfortable. Unlike their labelmates Autechre seem to prefer sticking more closely within a purely electronic framework... though what they do there melts the selfsame framework down to slag at times. From Chiastic Slide there is a more regularized approach that hits the margins of Trance and Drum and Bass... but by Gantz Graf "playing nice" was something that came up less and less frequently, preference given to rapid eye cuts and crippled beats.
Asencio/Chenard - Ocean a vendre/for sale (Ambiances Magnetiques) 2002
A duo recording driven primarily by Sylvie Chenard, who is a multidisciplinary artist with several Ocean/Whale based sound works. Working in guitar and electronics she is joined by Jon Asencio on electric bass for free play that is in line with the Quebec label's aesthetic. Leans to the side of soundscape over melodic exlploration... may not be for people who like even their free jazz with a little structure.
++++++++++++++++++
Robert Ashley - In Sara (Lovely Music, Ltd.) 2002
Ashley reads a 128-stanza poem by John Barton Wolgamot wherein the same line introduces a sentence that constantly changes four elements, the names or lists of names and the active portion of the sentence. It blurs the line between Dada, concrete poetry, sound art... mostly because of it's effects that accrue slowly and through near-repetition. In that way it is also not unlike interesting minimalist music like Steve Reich's or Terry Riley's. It features underlying music by Paul DeMarinis on Moog synthesizer.
+++++++++++++++++++
Ask - Formulary of Curses (Discus) 2004
Larger ensemble recording by Discus label boss Martin Archer. Ask features a primarily jazz mode, but one open to processing and manipulation of sound. For all of that though the core is much more rooted in individual participations than in group dynamics. Balanced and interesting play.
+++++++++++++++++
Wendy Atkinson - Trim (Smarten Up & Get to the Point) 2003
Atkinson is a Vancouver-based artist with ties to long-standing art-punk duo Mecca Normal. This solo album is an improbably ambient exploration using all manner of electric and acoustic bass as a starting point. She manages to discover interesting textures by flattening rhythms down to still points and layering them or pulling them apart to discover their warm hearts.
++++++++++++++++++++++
Aube - Cardiac Strain (Alien8) 1998
Aube/Knurl - Split (Alien8) 1997
Aube (pronounced Obey) is the alias of Japanese artist Akifumi Nakajima. His works are typically begun with a simple single sound source that is then given extremely radical processing in order to create gigantic soundscapes that belie their humble beginnings. For Cardiac Strain the sound of a heartbeat is turned into something urgent and enormous, which perhaps is really what the heart signifies ultimately. For the split release with Toronto's Alan Bloor whose alias is Knurl, Nakajima uses the sound of a telephone to create a gradually building alarm clarion. The other aspect of Aube's works is their usual very limited runs, making them quite collectable. For Bloor's side of the above split he is much more visceral and "hands on" using amplified sheet metal run through all manner of distortion. The result is more typical of what is conjured when the term "noise music" is mentioned.
++++++++++++++++
Melanie Auclair - Puce a l’oreille (Ambiances Magnetiques) 2004
Debut album for this excellent singer / cellist. She is joined by choice artists from the Ambiances Magnetiques roster including label head Joanne Hetu and guitarist Bernard Falaise. The results are eight medium length pieces that have a surprising attention to detail, but without sacrificing compelling musicality. Acoustics are given the foreground, with the smallest sounds of things standing tall and strong.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Autechre - Chiastic Slide (Warp) 1997
Autechre - LP5 (Nothing/Warp) 1998
Autechre - Gantz Graf (Warp) 2002
This duo are long-haul electronics wizards that have come up through the ranks shoulder to shoulder with Aphex Twin and Squarepusher. And also like those two they are fans of throwing endless curveballs just when critics come near to pegging them. Usually tagged with the much-derided IDM (Intelligent Dance Music) description, they often create abrasive sounds atop near-trance beats that have the tendency to suddenly shift or drop off just when the rhythm becomes comfortable. Unlike their labelmates Autechre seem to prefer sticking more closely within a purely electronic framework... though what they do there melts the selfsame framework down to slag at times. From Chiastic Slide there is a more regularized approach that hits the margins of Trance and Drum and Bass... but by Gantz Graf "playing nice" was something that came up less and less frequently, preference given to rapid eye cuts and crippled beats.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
nineteen
147-156
Asa-Chang & Junray - Jun Ray Song Chang (Leaf) 2002
This made it to #4 in The Wire's 2002 top 50 list (if that sort of thing makes you respect things more). It's a weirdzo cross-ethnicity hybrid of live tabla (by Asa-Chang) and electronics with elaborate triggers (Junreitronics) developed by Hidehiko Urayama (who never appears in live performance). The tabla sound is present acoustically, but it also sets off samples of voice and other sounds that lock to the rhythm, creating a tight-knit yet disorienting soundscape. The album eludes classification, containing elments from but not conforming to techno, world music, abstract electronics. Not necessarily easy listening, but intriguing enough to easily absorb your attention.
++++++++++++++++
Masayo Asahara - Saint Agnes Fountain (Discus) 2003
Masayo Asahara - Saint Catherine Torment (Discus) 2005
This is an invented alter-ego of Discus label boss Martin Archer to try on another skin and create a slightly different version of his prog-rock inflected experimental jazz. Both releases are competent in the explorations, but neither significantly deviate or stand out from the Discus herd.
+++++++++
Koji Asano - Sunshine Filtering Through… (Solstice) 1999
Koji Asano - Monsoon (Solstice) 1999
Koji Asano - Giant Squid (Solstice) 2003
Koji Asano - Wind Gauge (Solstice) 2003
Koji Asano - Zoo Telepathy (Solstice) 2003
Koji Asano - Sanctuary on Reclaimed… (Solstice) 2005
Koji Asano - Takoyakikun (Solstice) 2005
If Koji Asano were a criminal he would provide a momentous task for investigators to profile... being incredibly prolific and equally eclectic. Releasing over 40 albums in the last decade (not necessarily unheard-of in experimental circles) he restlessly crosses genres from solo prepared piano, to electroacoustic compostion, to small ensemble chamber music, to progressive rock and traditional Japanese themes. Predictably not all the releases are equally engaging, but they all are approached with a level of dedication to the project. My favourite from the above is probably Monsoon, a four track exploration of sparse prepared piano.
Asa-Chang & Junray - Jun Ray Song Chang (Leaf) 2002
This made it to #4 in The Wire's 2002 top 50 list (if that sort of thing makes you respect things more). It's a weirdzo cross-ethnicity hybrid of live tabla (by Asa-Chang) and electronics with elaborate triggers (Junreitronics) developed by Hidehiko Urayama (who never appears in live performance). The tabla sound is present acoustically, but it also sets off samples of voice and other sounds that lock to the rhythm, creating a tight-knit yet disorienting soundscape. The album eludes classification, containing elments from but not conforming to techno, world music, abstract electronics. Not necessarily easy listening, but intriguing enough to easily absorb your attention.
++++++++++++++++
Masayo Asahara - Saint Agnes Fountain (Discus) 2003
Masayo Asahara - Saint Catherine Torment (Discus) 2005
This is an invented alter-ego of Discus label boss Martin Archer to try on another skin and create a slightly different version of his prog-rock inflected experimental jazz. Both releases are competent in the explorations, but neither significantly deviate or stand out from the Discus herd.
+++++++++
Koji Asano - Sunshine Filtering Through… (Solstice) 1999
Koji Asano - Monsoon (Solstice) 1999
Koji Asano - Giant Squid (Solstice) 2003
Koji Asano - Wind Gauge (Solstice) 2003
Koji Asano - Zoo Telepathy (Solstice) 2003
Koji Asano - Sanctuary on Reclaimed… (Solstice) 2005
Koji Asano - Takoyakikun (Solstice) 2005
If Koji Asano were a criminal he would provide a momentous task for investigators to profile... being incredibly prolific and equally eclectic. Releasing over 40 albums in the last decade (not necessarily unheard-of in experimental circles) he restlessly crosses genres from solo prepared piano, to electroacoustic compostion, to small ensemble chamber music, to progressive rock and traditional Japanese themes. Predictably not all the releases are equally engaging, but they all are approached with a level of dedication to the project. My favourite from the above is probably Monsoon, a four track exploration of sparse prepared piano.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
eighteen
139-146
Bees - Free the Bees (EMI) 2005
I'm usually pretty mistrustful (distrustful?) of current bands who draw this obviously from 70s sources... but The Bees are so fidgety with it, never settling on just groove music or psychedelic exploration or Beatles rip-offs. In a way they're a little like Beta Band (coming to them soon), but much more accessible, less idiosyncratic... except maybe for the song about chickens. There's only room for a few of them on planet Earth.
----------------------
Belle & Sebastian - Fold Your Hands Child… (Matador) 2000
There's an element... even in a collection this large and widespread... of cohesiveness that sometimes shuts off certain avenues of perfectly respectable music. I have nothing against B&S. I find their music pleasant, infectious... toe-tapping fun, really. The word most often used to describe them, and bands from the branch of their family tree, is twee. Twee means precious, delicate, gentle... lots of strings. And again, nothing against that stuff... it's just that there's a LOT of it, both currently and historically, and B&S are excellent at distilling this music down to it's most appealing elements. But I don't have shelf space for the wing it would open up should I delve into this sub-genre. Instead I'll hold onto this playcopy, not one of their better albums, because it has no cover... and save my cardigan for cold autumn nights.
____________________
Bellini - Snowing Sun (Monitor) 2001
In the 90s, with the rise of grunge, there was also the rise of angry girls with guitars... which supplanted then was supplanted again by sad girls with pianos. In that time bands like L7, Babes in Toyland, Bikini Kill et. al. roamed the land with varying agendas and levels of phlegm. Ten years later only a few are still (albeit barely and for the wrong reasons) making news: Courtney Love of Hole no so much for music and Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill who shifted gears, formed Le Tigre and proved that growth and change is possible. It's a side effect of the still-male-centric business of music that strong women who break these barriers are more quickly cast aside... or made to remodel themselves (I'm looking at you Alanis). Bellini is a band on a small label with a strong front woman and a sound like Steve Albini's wet dream who, if they had been fronted by Steve Albini or his non-union equivalent, might have generated a lot of buzz... but not so much in reality, though.
______________________________
Belly - Star (Sire ) 1993
Speaking of girls and guitars... Tanya Donnely is someone who's still hanging around and making music for a small group of fans (I'm not sure if I should include myself since I've not heard any new music in the last decade). Starting out as second banana to Kristin Hersh in Throwing Muses she moved on to second banana to Kim Deal in The Breeders (a side project to The Pixies that became full time after their collapse). Jumping off that bandwagon after The Pod, The Breeders first album, Donnely formed Belly... a group that embodied some of the best elements from her two previous bands. Now Star still sounds pretty good... a little dated, a little bland in places... but the standout tracks like "Feed the Tree" and "Star Dog" still kick ass.
______________________
Danny Ben-Israel - Kathmandu Sessions (Locust) 2004
Another realm I wouldn't normally part the beaded curtains and enter into is the world of "lost" 60s and 70s recordings, but it is a realm covered by Destination Out in Exclaim! and that means it is occasionally my duty to essay it. Locust records digs around in the dirt that hold everything from Garage Rock to Psychedelic Weirdness to Leftfield Folk. Danny Ben-Israel covers all three of these bases with a swirly mess that is simultaneously Hippie-like and still manages to call them all dirty bastards. This obviously scores points with me. If you can imagine The Doors where Jim Morrison was less self-constructed and more indebted to Nepal than Rimbaud... that would sound a little like this.
_______________________________
Benoit Pioulard - Precis (Kranky) 2006
Wünderkinds can be pretty annoying. Especially when you're a lazy dude approaching or past the cutoff point where most people would take a "debut" album seriously. Benoit Pioulard is the nom de plume of 20 year-old Michigan upstart Thomas Meluch. With this first official release on tres cool Kranky records he manages to infuse moody ambience (which would be enought to get him noticed on the label) with a melancholy tunefulness that resembles Elliott Smith at turns. That's just overdoing it if you ask me.
_________________________
Dan Bern - Fifty Eggs (Sony) 1998
Dan Bern - New American Language (Messenger) 2001
Fifty Eggs was sitting in the cheapie bin at Digital World and I noticed it was produced by Ani DiFranco so I took it home and gave it a shot. It reminded me a little of Hamell on Trial for it's irreverence and self-aggrandizing gusto. With songs about having very large testicles and about intergalacting procreation of the spaceman/monkey evolutionary nature it was easy to enjoy but hard to take seriously. Sometime between then and New American Language either Bern or someone around him decided to get a little more serious about things and the result is a more mature, less scatalogical album. Instead of Cartman and Kenny groin-level humour we instead have deeper meaning cut with a slightly more crass Freedy Johnston/Jonathan Richman wit.
Bees - Free the Bees (EMI) 2005
I'm usually pretty mistrustful (distrustful?) of current bands who draw this obviously from 70s sources... but The Bees are so fidgety with it, never settling on just groove music or psychedelic exploration or Beatles rip-offs. In a way they're a little like Beta Band (coming to them soon), but much more accessible, less idiosyncratic... except maybe for the song about chickens. There's only room for a few of them on planet Earth.
----------------------
Belle & Sebastian - Fold Your Hands Child… (Matador) 2000
There's an element... even in a collection this large and widespread... of cohesiveness that sometimes shuts off certain avenues of perfectly respectable music. I have nothing against B&S. I find their music pleasant, infectious... toe-tapping fun, really. The word most often used to describe them, and bands from the branch of their family tree, is twee. Twee means precious, delicate, gentle... lots of strings. And again, nothing against that stuff... it's just that there's a LOT of it, both currently and historically, and B&S are excellent at distilling this music down to it's most appealing elements. But I don't have shelf space for the wing it would open up should I delve into this sub-genre. Instead I'll hold onto this playcopy, not one of their better albums, because it has no cover... and save my cardigan for cold autumn nights.
____________________
Bellini - Snowing Sun (Monitor) 2001
In the 90s, with the rise of grunge, there was also the rise of angry girls with guitars... which supplanted then was supplanted again by sad girls with pianos. In that time bands like L7, Babes in Toyland, Bikini Kill et. al. roamed the land with varying agendas and levels of phlegm. Ten years later only a few are still (albeit barely and for the wrong reasons) making news: Courtney Love of Hole no so much for music and Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill who shifted gears, formed Le Tigre and proved that growth and change is possible. It's a side effect of the still-male-centric business of music that strong women who break these barriers are more quickly cast aside... or made to remodel themselves (I'm looking at you Alanis). Bellini is a band on a small label with a strong front woman and a sound like Steve Albini's wet dream who, if they had been fronted by Steve Albini or his non-union equivalent, might have generated a lot of buzz... but not so much in reality, though.
______________________________
Belly - Star (Sire ) 1993
Speaking of girls and guitars... Tanya Donnely is someone who's still hanging around and making music for a small group of fans (I'm not sure if I should include myself since I've not heard any new music in the last decade). Starting out as second banana to Kristin Hersh in Throwing Muses she moved on to second banana to Kim Deal in The Breeders (a side project to The Pixies that became full time after their collapse). Jumping off that bandwagon after The Pod, The Breeders first album, Donnely formed Belly... a group that embodied some of the best elements from her two previous bands. Now Star still sounds pretty good... a little dated, a little bland in places... but the standout tracks like "Feed the Tree" and "Star Dog" still kick ass.
______________________
Danny Ben-Israel - Kathmandu Sessions (Locust) 2004
Another realm I wouldn't normally part the beaded curtains and enter into is the world of "lost" 60s and 70s recordings, but it is a realm covered by Destination Out in Exclaim! and that means it is occasionally my duty to essay it. Locust records digs around in the dirt that hold everything from Garage Rock to Psychedelic Weirdness to Leftfield Folk. Danny Ben-Israel covers all three of these bases with a swirly mess that is simultaneously Hippie-like and still manages to call them all dirty bastards. This obviously scores points with me. If you can imagine The Doors where Jim Morrison was less self-constructed and more indebted to Nepal than Rimbaud... that would sound a little like this.
_______________________________
Benoit Pioulard - Precis (Kranky) 2006
Wünderkinds can be pretty annoying. Especially when you're a lazy dude approaching or past the cutoff point where most people would take a "debut" album seriously. Benoit Pioulard is the nom de plume of 20 year-old Michigan upstart Thomas Meluch. With this first official release on tres cool Kranky records he manages to infuse moody ambience (which would be enought to get him noticed on the label) with a melancholy tunefulness that resembles Elliott Smith at turns. That's just overdoing it if you ask me.
_________________________
Dan Bern - Fifty Eggs (Sony) 1998
Dan Bern - New American Language (Messenger) 2001
Fifty Eggs was sitting in the cheapie bin at Digital World and I noticed it was produced by Ani DiFranco so I took it home and gave it a shot. It reminded me a little of Hamell on Trial for it's irreverence and self-aggrandizing gusto. With songs about having very large testicles and about intergalacting procreation of the spaceman/monkey evolutionary nature it was easy to enjoy but hard to take seriously. Sometime between then and New American Language either Bern or someone around him decided to get a little more serious about things and the result is a more mature, less scatalogical album. Instead of Cartman and Kenny groin-level humour we instead have deeper meaning cut with a slightly more crass Freedy Johnston/Jonathan Richman wit.
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