A curmudgeon writes.
Almost all music I play on my computer at work is automatically pushed to a statistics/music info site called last.fm. This is partially because I’ve been doing it so long (I’ve been a member since 2005) and partially because I’m a bit of a stats nerd. Though I have no statistical aptitude of my own – thanks, university stats – I enjoy seeing data and trends in a visual way. Continue reading “A year in the life…”
This is an older review of mine, presented here for archival purposes. The writing is undoubtedly different to the present, and the review style may differ between publications. Enjoy, if that’s the right word.
Take one NY-based sound artist (Hudak) and one New England-based composer (Lescalleet). Give them a load of recording equipment, an audience and place the whole shebang inside a Massachusetts chapel in the middle of a snowstorm. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, right? Thankfully, such preparations have resulted in a recording of such incredible beauty that it will make you believe that there are benevolent gods watching over those who explore what constitutes music. Continue reading “John Hudak & Jason Lescalleet: Figure 2 (2001)”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E34eT84FhVU
You’ll be listening to some Charles Mingus through this – the jazz giant and composer who’s easily as cool as Miles ‘Motherfucker’ Davis – because my dander’s up thanks to this Esquire list. (Also largely because when it comes to sick bass riffs, Mingus is the shit.)
The list – and I’m uncertain how old it is – purports to detail the 75 albums that every man should own. Which in itself is a bit of a shithouse premise, and leads me to assume there must be a list of the 75 albums that every woman should own, and they’re mostly going to be Kate Bush and Ricky Martin. Because you know, chicks like chick stuff and dudes like dude stuff and you should never cross the streams, as continually evidenced by lists like this other one, which claims that liking synth-pop ensures you’ll never get laid, and what’s wrong with you anyway? (It’s from 2009 but was in the recommended links section, so y’know.)
I suppose Esquire tries to shoot for the Like A Sir market, constructed upon What It Is To Be A Gentleman, closely related to the How To Dress Like You’re In Mad Men and How To Get A Six Pack In A Manner Totally Different To The One We Printed Last Month market, so the sort of scattershot commentary within is to be expected, but I’m pretty surprised at how some of these shake out. Continue reading “It’s a man’s world”
No matter where you live.
Today I’ve been listening to a fair bit of the Mountain Goats. Namely, The Sunset Tree, which is perhaps the most overtly autobiographical thing Goat chief John Darnielle has done. I guess you could argue that his life has provided grist for the lyrical mill all along – they are a deeply personal band (even when it’s just John) but The Sunset Tree was forthright in the handling of its author’s time as an abused kid. It’s also a more fulsome recording, benefiting from the expansions extra instrumentations introduce to a body of work more usually recorded on a boombox.
The first video in this post is what I’d pick as my go-to song on the album, though there’s really an embarrassment of lyrical riches on the bloody thing. Recently featured in an episode of The Walking Dead, the song ‘Up The Wolves’ is deeply sad and ebullient at the same time. It’s pugnacious sadness, and it gets me every time.
Continue reading “There’s bound to be a ghost at the back of your closet”
Partially related to yesterday’s post, which was supposed to be about album covers but drifted a little: this Flickr gallery of famous album covers as seen from behind is excellently playful.
The Kraftwerk one is a favourite – especially the tape holding things together – but the King Crimson one is pretty great too. Lots of knowing fun if you’re familiar with these discs, so I hope there’s more coming.
Today’s enthusiasm: a Guardian story where they’ve placed famous album covers on Google Maps’ Street View of the location the shot was taken.
It tickles my fancy somewhat, as it brings together two loves: maps and music. I was aware of the PopSpots site chronicling pop-culture locations in New York City (mostly), but it has always been presented as much more of a solid research, go-and-look-and-take-a-photo-of-the-place sort of endeavour. There’s also this piece, showing (amongst other things), how the site of the first Black Sabbath cover shoot looks today.
I suppose that it’s the ability to see something that we think is somehow mystical or not-quite-real – the album cover – in something as commonplace as a Google window. There’s certainly an interest in where these magical cover events take place – just check out this page about how to find where David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust album cover was shot (now the holder of one of those blue historical importance plaques) for an example. I suppose that now there’s an extra level to this nosey-parker stuff: with Street View we can see how things appear now. Or, if not now, then within spitting distance.
Continue reading “On the street where you live”
Living Dolls: A Magical History of the Quest for Mechanical Life by Gaby Wood
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Gaby Wood’s book seemed to have been the perfect tome for me: for years I’ve been entranced by its major topics – Jacques de Vaucanson’s writing automata and digesting duck and Wolfgang von Kempelen’s ‘The Turk’ chess playing robot. I suppose like any young boy, clockwork, robots and artificial humans had become an abiding interest.
Unfortunately, the book doesn’t live up to its title. It’s portraiture, not history. And it’s certainly not as rigorous as I’d have liked.
This is an older review of mine, presented here for archival purposes. The writing is undoubtedly different to the present, and the review style may differ between publications. Enjoy, if that’s the right word.
There have been few Australian films as hotly anticipated as The Proposition. The combination of director John Hillcoat and screenwriter Nick Cave (who have created film clips together, and were previously teamed on the thoroughly disturbing Ghosts… Of The Civil Dead) and a cast including Guy Pearce, Ray Winstone, John Hurt and David Wenham served to create quite an appetite. The good news is that the expectations created by such a gathering of talents are surpassed with this film. It’s a truculent, smouldering piece that, while managing to have a core story that’s straight out of a western, manages to address issues which still dog Australia today.
Forty-five minutes of Paul Stanley’s onstage banter because it’s always Friday night in KISS-land. And they said Doctor Rockzo wasn’t real, eh?
It’s worth listening to the end purely so you don’t miss the whole ‘uzi of ooze’ thing. File that one away for your next pick-up session.
I recently went to a shakuhachi ‘blow’ – a group playing event. I’d not played my shakuhachi – and trust me, I’m not very good – for almost a year, and so it was a little intimidating, especially as the only other attendees were accomplished players, including the first non-Japanese grandmaster, Riley Lee. We weren’t playing this piece, but playing with others reminded me how good it feels to share a musical experience with people, even if you’re not on the same level.
This video features the legendary Katsuya Yokayama playing ‘Tsuru no Sugomori’ or ‘Nesting of Cranes’, a sort of sound-portrait. Another performance of this piece (played by Goro Yamaguchi) was included on the golden disc that went into the universe on the Voyager probe. (You can hear that version here, should you wish to.)
I include this video today because it’s been a day of stress, and though I find it difficult (sometimes) to maintain focus through a shakuhachi piece, I really like this one. It’s a pretty popular piece, or at least there’s a lot of different takes on it.
The different versions show how much scope there is for interpretation, and give me the hope that someday I’d be able to play a version, however flawed, of it. Or, let’s face it, of any honkyoku.
Yeah nah. 