Tag: music

Mark Lanegan Band: Bubblegum (2004)

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Click to visit his homepage.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. Again, it’s a long ‘un. A decade ago I obviously wasn’t into precision. 

Until now, most people who’ve been aware of Mark Lanegan’s solo career have been die-hard fans. His solo work – a brace of pared-back albums that provide distinctly uneasy listening – is more noted for its barely-restrained menace, rather than the volume-heavy terror of the singer’s turns with Screaming Trees or Queens Of The Stone Age. His work over albums like Field Songs and The Winding Sheet contained a starker, Continue reading “Mark Lanegan Band: Bubblegum (2004)” →

Write what you know and read what you like

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My university years.

A story on Slate has sparked a bit of commentary about reading and snobbery. I suppose it’s easy clickbait – nobody wants to feel inferior about their choice of pastime – but once you read the sell, there’s really not a lot more to it:

Read whatever you want. But you should feel embarrassed when what you’re reading was written for children.

Hm. Throughout there’s more of this looking-down-the-nose kind of thing, somehow suggesting that eye-rolling and enjoyment of what may be crap-lit are mutually exclusive. What I don’t understand is where speculation like this

These are the books that could plausibly be said to be replacing literary fiction in the lives of their adult readers. And that’s a shame.

or

But if they are substituting maudlin teen dramas for the complexity of great adult literature, then they are missing something.

comes from. I mean, aside from hanging the whole thing on what adults might be doing.

Continue reading “Write what you know and read what you like” →

This guy right here

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Lately I’ve been listening to Kirin J Callinan‘s album Embracism a lot. It’s a bizarre thing, all spiky and full of what could be joking but likely isn’t. The filmclip above should give a good overview. It’s very weird, kind of sweaty and sexual and puts me in mind of an electro Dave Graney in the way that nobody can really figure if it’s serious or not because it’s so honest. Or is it?

Regardless, it’s great. Particularly when you get to stuff like this:

I think the appeal is in that it rides the line between like and dislike so adroitly. There’s always a question in mind – do I like this? – while listening, which to me is a mark of an artist (if not good) then worth investigating at least. Doesn’t strike me as much preaching to the choir going on here.

Anyway, the reason for this post is that Kirin is currently seeking some funds to continue touring the album and making some more music. It’ll receive funding but he’ll still make a loss, so in the last twelve hours why don’t you go and help out? The list of rewards is worth a couple of bucks alone. Arm-wrestling anyone?

 

Robot songs of bookish love

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This article is great, because it details the process by which an algorithm – called TransProse, no less – can take the ’emotional temperature’ of literature and generate a piece of music on the results. Such as this, gleaned from A Clockwork Orange.

I’m kind of thrilled about this because I’ve always loved the way computers can take stuff we’ve created and make things from them. When I was younger, I used to play around with a DOS program called MARKV, which would eat any text you fed it – the longer the better – and then return output based on Markov Chains. It was random but it also relied on statistical examination of what pieces of data sat next to, so you’d receive something back which followed the kind of rules required for construction of lucid text… but in a very strange way.

I’ll wait. There’s an online version here. Go check it out. Or, better yet, feed album reviews or party political statements into it: the result is no more confusing than the real thing.  Continue reading “Robot songs of bookish love” →

Mikelangelo and the Black Sea Gentlemen: Journey Through the Land of Shadows (2005)

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Mikelangelo and the Black Sea Gentlemen: Journey Through the Land of ShadowsThis 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.

Additional note: Jesus, is this a long review. There’s some video throughout to ensure you don’t die before reaching the end. 

Since forming in 2000, Mikelangelo And The Black Sea Gentlemen have been gathering accolades for their superlative, part fairy-tale, part cabaret, part cautionary huckstering live performance. Playing a number of festivals worldwide – including the Edinburgh Fringe Festival – they’ve honed their approach and reeled in punters with an ear for the more curiously strait-laced (in a completely Victorian, bodices-and-waistcoats kind of way) side of the gypsy-folk spectrum. Continue reading “Mikelangelo and the Black Sea Gentlemen: Journey Through the Land of Shadows (2005)” →

What Is Music? @ Annandale Hotel, Sydney, 13/02/2004

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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. 

Experimental or avant-garde music is occasionally referred to as “difficult listening”. It’s probably a phrase that was coined by someone after they survived a Fushitsusha gig. Don’t get me wrong – there were many moments of crystalline brilliance – but this was a gig that was always going to require a bit of perseverance.

Fushitsusha are, is, essentially, Keiji Haino. He’s a gargantuan figure in the Japanese music world, though he’s probably got more in common with JD Salinger in terms of his willingness to meet the press or press the flesh. This band is basically his excuse to be the loudest man on earth. From behind wraparound sunglasses, dressed head to foot in black and sporting a haircut so severe that it suggests a goth Ramone pixie, Haino would spend most of this evening playing through a wall of amps pushed louder than any I’d ever heard. Continue reading “What Is Music? @ Annandale Hotel, Sydney, 13/02/2004” →

Alan Moore and Tim Perkins: Angel Passage (2002)

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Alan Moore and Tim Perkins: Angel Passage (re:)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.

Angel Passage is an odd disc. It’s a studio reworking of a performance Moore and Perkins presented as part of the Tygers of Wrath concert, presented at the end of Tate Britain’s William Blake exhibition. And as such, it sits in no-man’s land; it’s not a run-of-the-mill spoken-word album, nor is it a cast-recording album. It’s a weird hybrid, like reading Moore’s meditation on Blake’s life while ghostly music that’s not quite separate floats through the air. Occasionally, it’s problematic — I just want to hear what he’s saying, dammit — but for the most part, it adds a well-judged air of mystery. Continue reading “Alan Moore and Tim Perkins: Angel Passage (2002)” →

A year in the life…

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A year in the life...

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…” →

It’s a man’s world

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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” →