Boompa | Reverie Sound Revue: After a decent hiatus, they’re back. This is very exciting for the state of our summer listening.
Check out the great new video as well.
(Via MBV.)
April 11, 2009 • 10:34 am 0
Audio Recording: Damien Jurado
When having tea at The Art of Tea, a great tea shop and bookstore in Didsbury, Manchester, UK, the song Everything Trying by Damien Jurado, off his latest album, Caught in the Trees, played over the stereo. It was a poignant moment and made our day. Have a listen and go there with us…
Filed under: Music, Travel , Caught in the Trees, Damien Jurado, Didsbury, England, Music, tea
February 22, 2009 • 3:48 pm 0
The Happiness Project
I’m still in the process of listening and reading all of this, but Carl Wilson (aka, Zoilus) has an article in The Globe and Mail about The Happiness Project, a solo album by Charles Spearin. He’s known for his other contributions to Do Make Say Think and Broken Social Scene.
This album uses the recorded conversations of his neighbors and turns them into the melodies and the music on the album. Carl traces the roots of this and similar techniques through an extensive and interesting post, complete with many links and clips. I’ll be spending some time tonight digging in and welcome you to do the same.
I love this kind of writing, by the way. It’s an interesting and beautiful thing when someone can take a new album and provide context and history for it, placing it within a dynamic chain of influences and inspirations. I love it. This is also why I love Nardwuar’s interviews with rappers. Rappers seem to have a conscious sense of their place within the history and development of rap. They respect their roots and can talk intelligently about them and provide great subjects for Nardwuar who’s always looking for those connections between influences. Watch all 4 parts of his interview with ?uestlove of The Roots as an excellent example.
Filed under: Music , History, Links, Music, reading, The Happiness Project, zoilus
February 12, 2009 • 10:12 pm 0
Currently Listening
Admittedly, I know nothing about the musician, Frank Zappa, but caught pieces of an interesting documentary on the CBC Radio 2 show, Inside The Music a couple of Saturdays ago called, I am all Day and Night: The Music of Frank Zappa. The stories shared by members of his band and family brought him and his music to life and the clips of songs played make me want to dig in and find out more about him. (It looks like his Wikipedia page is a good place to start.)
Tonight they played Part 1 of the documentary on the CJSW show, Noise. Head over to 90.9 FM in Calgary to give the show a listen and let them know if you want to hear the rest of the documentary on subsequent editions of the show.
It’s also online at the CBC website, available to listen to. Head over there now! Thank you Patti Schmidt and all the great people at CBC Radio!
Filed under: Music , CJSW, documentary, Frank Zappa, Music, radio
January 27, 2009 • 11:41 pm 0
Download of the Week – Bon Iver – Blood Bank EP
As it’s been said elsewhere, this new Bon Iver EP is really quite nice. He’s got a good thing going.
One thing I like about it is how the song Babys starts with repeating, alternating piano notes, adding additional notes that begin to clash with the first ones, creating an abstract chord that blends to dissonance, and then back again. It reminds me a lot of Music for 18 Musicians.
I also find the song Woods interesting with its use of Auto-Tune to change the vocals and make the song into something really different. Justin Vernon (the dude who is Bon Iver) described it simply as a recording technique and brushed off comparisons to other uses of Auto-Tune recently in pop culture (where it’s perceived to be used mostly to help vocalists hit those notes they couldn’t hit in the studio.)
It is an interesting technique though, and very cool that it can be used in such different ways. In the fall, there was an an episode of Mudd Up! where the host, and always informative guide, DJ Rupture, shared a crazy song featuring Auto-Tune. I’d suggesting giving this Real Audio clip a listen. It will mess you up.
He also shares a few other clips and background on the recent use of Auto-Tune over at Earplug.
January 25, 2009 • 12:02 am 0
New Music – The Appleseed Cast
Stephen had just mentioned that he was able to get in some older Appleseed Cast albums on vinyl at the record store he works at. I also found a few albums over at eMusic which I used to own but had stolen on that legendary roadtrip down the west coast.
Now, word that they have a new album coming out soon called Sagarmatha. Head over to their Myspace page to have a listen to new tracks. They’re sprawling, melodic, building and are just what I always liked about The Appleseed Cast.
(via Rubin Recommends)
Filed under: Music , appleseed cast, Music
January 21, 2009 • 12:24 am 0
Download of the Week – Animal Collective
I’m going to point you over to Rubin Recommends for links and details regarding the new album from Animal Collective called Merriweather Post Pavilion.
I started listening to Animal Collective shortly after Feels came out, a couple years ago, and have been keeping tabs on them since. The thing you need to know is that on the surface, they are going to seem a bit noisy, chaotic and weird, but if you strip down all the samples and ambient layers and percussive elements they add to each song, you’re left with great melodies, really nice harmonies and very simple but memorable songs. The single, My Girls, was stuck in my head all night tonight, so I guess that’s a good sign of what this album is.
Have a glance over at the Delicious feed for other Animal Collective links I’ve found this week.
January 11, 2009 • 12:35 am 0
Download of the Week – Dungen – 4
Dungen was a band I had heard about a couple years ago, but never really gave a good listen. They’re older album, Ta Det Lugnt, was well regarded but described as Swedish folk psych-rock and didn’t warrant my interest at the time.
I read their new album described as “basically an instrumental jazz album“, and after hearing the violins, ride-heavy drums, piano and then that great sounding guitar tone in the first 30 seconds of Sätt att se, the first song of this album, I was smitten.
January 2, 2009 • 9:14 pm 0
Music Top 10 in 2008 (Part 2)
Here’s #6 through 10 of the top 10 artists that I listened to in 2008. Have a listen to the tracks I’ve posted here if you haven’t heard of some of these. Click here for the first half of the list.
- Steve Reich – A modern composer, whose piece, Music for 18 Musicians, as performed by the Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble, was discovered and appreciated this year. I heard a part of the piece first on CJSW, after learning a bit of Steve Reich from the book, The Rest is Noise (An excellent read and great resource on composers in the 20th century). When I stumbled onto this recording on eMusic, I downloaded it immediately.
- Matmos – I’ve mentioned Matmos in a previous post, but this was also a good discovery this year. A new album, Supreme Balloon, came out this year.
- Stars of the Lid – A two-piece who make music described as ambient, minimalist and classical. And Their Refinement of the Decline came out in 2007 and spent a lot of time in my headphones this last year.
- Fleet Foxes – If you ignore the rest of this list, this is the one band you should embrace, taking their songs everywhere with you this winter. They are well loved by some, and rightfully so.Also, the melody from Oliver James, from the same album, will haunt you.
- Dodos – This one squeaked on the list, but deserves to be here. Visiter was a solid album that was a good summer listen. I was also impressed by them when they played at Sled Island.
• 5:28 pm 1
Music Top 10 in 2008 (Part 1)
The last couple years I’ve been keeping track of the music I listen to using Last.fm. Here’s the top 10 artists that I listened to in 2008. Have a listen to the tracks I’ve posted here if you haven’t heard of some of these.
- Destroyer – This was in heavy rotation earlier in the year after the latest album came out, Trouble in Dreams. My listening wasn’t exclusive to this album though as This Night probably got more plays through the year.
- His Name Is Alive – Newly discovered this year and have really enjoyed, especially Sweet Earth Flower, a collection of live and studio tracks put together in tribute to jazz saxophonist, Marion Brown.
- Damien Jurado – I’ve kept track of him since immersing myself in his first full length, Waters Ave S., back around 1999. His new album, Caught in the Trees, has been excellent and one of my most listened albums in the last half of the year. He’s been blogging and taking pictures too.
- Boards of Canada – It’s been a couple years since they’ve had anything new out, but they’re still in regular rotation for me.
Listen to Dayvan Cowboy from the album, The Campfire Headphase. The video for this one is also spectacular.
- Mogwai – Another well loved band that has been in regular rotation through the years. They had a new album come out this year and I was privileged to see them play at the Sled Island Festival.
Listen to Thank You Space Expert from their new album, The Hawk is Howling.
