The Answer Is In The Beat

Angel Olsen: Burn Your Fire For No Witness (Jagjaguwar, 2014)

January 31, 2014 at 9:41 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

I didn’t give much of a listen to Angel Olsen’s first album, but I remember it being more ethereal country/folk, and this album’s opener “Unfucktheworld” here starts that way, but then the next track (“Forgiven/Forgotten”) is full-band and produced and I was a little startled. But it’s good! It arrives at the lyric “I don’t know anything, but I love you”, and that gets to me. Then it ends abruptly after a shred of some scraping guitar noise. “Hi-Five” is also more rocking, with a bit of Roy Orbison inflection to her voice, but then “White Fire” goes back to the long droney ethereal folk thing, and it’s lovely as well. “High & Wild” is midtempo dusky rock, then “Lights Out” is a down-and-out country ballad. “Stars” is another somewhat cathartic, somewhat rocking track. “Iota” is soft and vaguely bossanova-esque. “Dance Slow Decades” is a nice ethereal slowdance, as the title suggests. “Enemy” is a softly swaying acoustic song, and then “Windows” ends the album with a big weepy finale, starting softly and then building up minimal drums and organ, with Olsen’s voice crying “why can’t you see? are you blind? are you dead? are you alive?”, then about-facing and asking “won’t you open a window sometime? what’s so wrong with the light?” Kind of dramatic, but also kind of devastating. Good stuff.

DTCV: Hilarious Heaven (Xemu, 2013)

January 31, 2014 at 9:07 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Vaguely GBV-related (Jim Greer was in GBV and is in this band, Bob Pollard did the artwork) indie rock, as sprawling and absurdist as that band, but with a twist: there’s male AND female lead vocalists. There’s also lots of interlude-y tracks, a lot of which are just answering machine messages or silly samples, but a few of which are brief song fragments (“Impostor Horse”, “Los Angeles Street”). There’s also 2 11-minute jams, which break into horn solos (“How Not To Be”) and gang vocal chants (“Hotspurs Of Micely Light”). The singer has a bigger and more serious voice than you might expect for an indie-pop band, coming close to Chrissie Hynde or Debbie Harry. “(CIS)X” is a little robot voice talking about synthesizers, and then “Gone 1 Quickly” is a nice little lo-fi synth-pop gem. Male vocals remind me of the guy from the Pastels (the male/female vocals remind me of this band too), or maybe Mark Robinson of Unrest/Air Miami/Flin Flon.

Robert Marcel Lepage: Canard Banchu & Le Lait Maternel (Ambiances Magnétiques, 2013)

January 28, 2014 at 9:14 pm | Posted in Reviews | 1 Comment

We received a huge package from Ambiances Magnétiques at the radio station recently, and these two titles by composer/woodwind player Lepage leaped out at me first. Canard Banchu features a gaggle of clarinets, along with some bass drums and organ. Mostly short tracks, only 3 are 4 or 5 minutes. The rest are little miniatures. Playful, concise, jovial, swinging, mysterious. I don’t speak French so I can’t read the liner notes or song titles, but this is accessible and fun, maybe not quite as ripe for cartoon soundtracks as Raymond Scott, but still kind of out there and kooky. But while some of it’s more light-hearted, there’s some serious haunted electro-acoustic manipulation on “Le Pelleteur de nuages”. “Rainettes a la brunante” is kind of a lazy New Orleans stroll, and has nice organ. “Fondation : d’ou venons-nous ?” has a sprightly little oompah to it. The other two “Fondation” pieces are also more kind of strolling tracks. Others are moodier, less rhythmic/upbeat tracks, with “Le Grand Heron et la demoiselle” being a sparse, atonal solo freakout. “Maringouins en escadron” ends on fun, upbeat, grooving note.

Le Lait Maternel is more of a jazz/rock/exotica fusion, with full, lush orchestration. Very fun and exciting. Traces of spy and surf music, bossa nova, smooth jazz, country (steel guitar on “L’Avenue Charles Ives”), Marc Ribot-esque guitar, backwards effects, electronics, and a bunch more that I’m just not processing right now. Eclectic and a little schizo, but not quite in a disconcerting John Zorn way. Songs shift mood and change tempo, and most of them are under 3 minutes, so it’s pretty ADD. Charles Ives and Buddy Rich are namechecked in the song titles, so that gives you a little insight to the inspiration here. “Le Rock du bungalow” and “Le Robert bougalou” are the most swingin’ ’60s-ish, while “Le Grand Canyon” is a solemn string passage. “Le Ketchack americain” has crazy vocal percussion and squonking horns. A few tracks are aided by ticking electronic beats, with closer “Le Mangeur de gazon” getting particularly IDM-ish. Very eclectic and fun, a worthy soundtrack to what could be a pretty bizarre and entertaining film.

Nicolas Bernier: Frequencies (A / Fragments) (Line, 2014)

January 28, 2014 at 7:13 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Half hour long piece utilizing tuning forks, which generate and manipulate sine waves. Starts with slow, subtle clanging and droning, but after 5 minutes starts to heat up, with slightly more rapidly fluttering tones, twitching and vibrating, getting closest to the type of glitchy sinewavecore 12k/Line/Raster-Noton are sometimes known for releasing. After that, it gets to a dog-whistle high pitch, punctuated by metallic thumps and clangs. It gets pretty engrossing. Eventually it smooths out a bit, eases off the higher pitches, and has more of a glassy texture. Later it starts to get more buzzy and scrapey, slowly crawling and icepicking towards warmth and melody. The last couple minutes sound like dry arctic tundra wind.

POW!: Hi-Tech Boom (Castle Face, 2014)

January 28, 2014 at 6:44 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

This week’s release on John Dwyer’s label Castle Face. With Thee Oh Sees on hiatus, the label’s putting out new (and reissued) records left and right. Bass synth/delay-heavy sci-fi-themed garage rock. “66” says “we love the ’60s”, but more than anything this reminds me of various ’90s sci-fi-inspired indie-rock groups, like maybe Man Or Astro-Man, Servotron, and a bunch more I’m just not remembering right now. But anyway, if that’s up your alley, this is worth checking out.

Dog Bite: Tranquilizers (Carpark, 2014)

January 28, 2014 at 6:41 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

The first Dog Bite album came out less than a year ago and I’ve already forgotten what it sounds like, but it’s filed under “shoegaze/dreampop” in my hard drive, so I guess I must have liked it enough to keep it around. But this one is a little different, and already more memorable. It’s a pretty simple formula: Cocteau Twins/A.R. Kane-era 4AD meets chillwave. Opener “There Was Time” instantly recalls those classic dreampop guitar sounds, then “We” hits you with chillwave beats, and then it just goes from there. “Lady Queen” is the most uptempo track here (you can almost even dance to it), the rest is more down-to-midtempo, with “Clarinets” being the slow, sad, pretty ballad, “Dream Feast” coming close to that, and “Royals” not being the Lorde song of the same name. Worth checking out.

Ray Sammartano: Brainwave Cathedral (self-released, 2013)

January 28, 2014 at 6:36 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

When I was a kid and I had field trips that went to planetariums, I kind of wondered what was up with the music they played there. Did someone actually sit down at a synthesizer and just make long spacey instrumental music just to be played at planetariums? Is this actual music? Now obviously I listen to this stuff all the time. Here’s some straight-up space planetarium music. Listen to this while in bed trying to sleep, it actually does produce some far-out imagery in your mind, and takes it to different places. “Valkyrie Descending” and “Galaxy Trigger” are maybe the most dramatic tracks here, the rest are more easy going. Really sweet space music.

War: More Days LP (Posh Isolation, 2010/reissued Death Shadow, 2013)

January 28, 2014 at 6:30 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Vinyl reissue of a tape from 2010. This band changed their name to Vår when they released an album on America on Sacred Bones, probably to avoid confusion with the band that did “Low Rider”. But this is really great lo-fi noisy coldwave synth-pop. Very blown out and distorted, vocals are unintelligible/obscured, beats are rudimentary drum machine sounds, melodies are cheaply played and imperfect, and it all just sounds really dark and isolated and great. The members of this band are also in Iceage and Lust For Youth, and it’s similar to both bands, but definitely not as driving or rhythmic or melodic or polished, and that’s why I think I like it better. Really murky and foreboding. “Glass Ribbon” is an instrumental with a cool droning guitar sound towards the end. “Marble Hall Pigs” is slightly more punk-leaning. “Flesh Hierarchy” is REALLY blown out and has this great searing melody which doesn’t sound like it’s quite correctly played or timed, but it just works so well. Really a great album, loving this way more than anything else related to Iceage and that whole Danish post-punk scene.

Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra: Fuck Off Get Free We Pour Light On Everything (Constellation, 2014)

January 17, 2014 at 10:19 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Newest album from Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s most well-known offshoot. Much more concise and song-driven (but still sprawling and epic), not to mention psychedelic, than previous efforts. Tense, grinding, furious, but still ecstatic, even joyful, in its rage and world-weariness. “Fuck Off Get Free (For The Island Of Montreal)” starts with a short spoken sample of a child speaking about living in Montreal, then gets down to business, keeping up the intense pace until the last few minutes, when it comes to the arresting “hold me under” chorus. “Austerity Blues” starts with sparse guitar, adds in layers of noise guitar, drums, vocals, strings, etc, builds up then settles into a motorik rhythm around 5 minutes. Then keeps building more, vocals, etc, then calms down around 9 minutes. Soft vocals, then last few minutes goes to noise feedback. “Take Away These Early Grave Blues” starts with spoken words (“…they just got closed minds, that’s all”), gets right to it with anti-police lyrics and striking violin and guitars. “Little Ones Run” is a total change of pace, a quiet, fragile, childlike acoustic piano folk song. “What We Loved Was Not Enough” is a slow-burning lament about the destruction of the world, followed by uprising. “Rains Thru The Roof At Thee Grande Ball-Room (For Capital Steez)” begins with an excerpt from a radio interview (which is also translated into French), explaining about how music is an expression of one’s self, not just a part-time gig or hobby. Once the song comes in, it’s sort of a sad comedown, keeping a steady tom-tom rhythm, mellotron, piano, and lyrics about holding on. Almost sounds like recent Flaming Lips, actually. A strangely subdued and straightforward ending to such an electrifying album.

Débruit & Alsarah: Aljawal الجوال (Soundway, 2013)

January 17, 2014 at 7:06 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Beautiful cross-cultural collaboration between French producer Débruit and Sudanese singer Alsarah. Broken, left-field choppy hip-hop meets lovely vocals in Arabic. Sort of like a modern update on Ofra Haza, solo or as being sampled by Coldcut while remixing Eric B. & Rakim. Some traditional instruments and melodies, and lots of drum machines and off-kilter synth rhythms. Some uptempo juke-influenced crazy hi-hat moments, but overall pretty steady, forward-thinking and exciting. Definitely avoids a lot of the east-meets-west cliches that have made most ’90s “world music” sound completely dated today. If you’re more interested in this because of Alsarah’s vocals than Débruit’s production, check out “Jamilla X.0 ٣. X.0 جميلة”, which is mostly a capella except for some minimal bass and lots of spacey echo, and “Loulia لولية” , which is just vocals except for some minimal percussion. Alsarah sits “Khartoum خرطوم” out, however, instead letting Débruit chop up vocal samples over a frenetic juke beat. “Jibal Alnuba جبال النوبة” also has more of a relatively straightforward beat and gorgeous vocal performance from Alsarah, which is combined with some vocal effects towards the end. “Alsahra الصحراءة” is a less lyrical, more danceable track, revolving around a haunting distorted vocal loop. “Hawya هوية” ends the album on another minimal note, with fluttering vocals layered on top of gentle, chipper synths and strumming, doused with plenty of delay. The whole album is just a really creative, unforced, natural sounding blend of different sounds and cultures.