Black Friday

While still an unconfirmed diagnosis, all signs point towards H1N1 as the reason for my being bed-ridden these past five days. It was the most peculiar flu I've ever had, bypassing the stomach almost entirely to attack my lungs. After days of near-delirium, abysmal body aches, and a roller coaster of sweats and chills, I felt I had just enough energy today to do something a little bit more challenging than drinking tepid water and walking to the bathroom.

So naturally I decided to go shopping.

If I didn't go shopping then I would be part of the very reason that my Roth IRA resembles the collection of change wedged between my couch cushions.

Now, don't be fooled, I didn't arise at 2am to get in line at a suburban box-store. In fact, Ariana and I didn't even bother to leave for the store until 6pm tonight so as to avoid any possibility of being trampled by raving-mad electronics bargain hunters. And the store we chose to patronize with our hard-earned cash: Goodwill.

While Goodwill might not be offering the same screaming deals as other places I'm pretty sure that giving them money also helps the economy: albeit in some leftist, bleeding-heart, capitalist-light sort of way. And at Goodwill we can be done with our Christmas shopping in one hour because it is truly one-stop shopping.

It was while at Goodwill that we fell prey to that most pitiful of Black Friday practices: buying things for ourselves. But, as happens from time to time, the donated CD selection was just too good to pass up. Check out these finds for $4.00 a pop:

Ralph Myerz and the Jack Herran Band— A Special EP

The Cinematic Orchestra— Ma Fleur

Caleb Klauder— sings out

Depeche Mode— Black Celebration

The Decemberists— The Crane Wife

Cat Stevens— Catch Bull at Four

Rip, Mix, Burn

Earlier this year, after completing my reading of Lawrence Lessig's Remix, I began to look more closely at the Creative Commons licenses, as well as some of the online creative collectives he used as case studies in Remix. In doing so, I stumbled upon a feature in Wired magazine from 2004 that investigated the idea of contemporary musical culture being absolutely complicit in the remix/file-sharing/sampling inclinations that the corporate music industry was fighting so vehemently to bury.

Like most Wired articles it was cautiously optimistic (seasoned pessimism does not tend to promote ad revenue) and more than a touch self-congratulatory. Along with the issue a CD featuring tracks from a number of formidable talents who were offering up a bit of their oeuvre was included. What made these tracks unique was that they were released under one of two Creative Commons licenses, thereby making them fair game for legal file sharing, mash-ups, and sampling into whatever prosaic Garage Band techno track you could muster in your off hours. There are some big names on this CD, and the tracks they've given over to the masses aren't just the pan drippings from a decade of better musical offerings— they are legitimate efforts.

Having said that, they aren't all good either. Below is the list of tracks that make my cut. If your cloth is cut with a similar cut as mine, then you might want to download these freebies and allow your iPod to give them a whirl:

Track 01— Beastie Boys/ Now Get Busy

Much more Hello Nasty than Paul's Boutique, but the sampled directive lends a refreshing pause to a pretty predictable back beat. Straight up middle-aged Beasties which means more fun than FRESSSHHHH.

Track 02— David Byrne/ My Fair Lady

No plains or rains or Spain, but a seriously cinematic sound to build up a modern reflection of the classic Pygmalion tale. I think that this is easily the best offering of the bunch and makes U2's similarly-themed Babyface (from Zooropa) sound simply insipid.

Track 03— Zap Mama/ Wadidyusay?

Hand claps. French. A cappella-esque world music syrup with a drum machine.

Track 04— My Morning Jacket/ One Big Holiday

Yeah indie rock! I don't own one of their albums so I can't be classified as anything like a fan, but there is something pure American rock about this in both sound (straight up drums and electric guitars) and sentiment (references to escaping dead end towns, California, and records). Serve with pick-up trucks and whatever indie brew is currently considered both hip and cheap.

Track 05— Spoon/Revenge!

This is a track by Spoon. It is catchy. It is smart. It is made in the USA but sounds like its imported from England. Extra points are awarded for painting analogies.

Track 09— Le Tigre/Fake French

"I've got. . . site specificity." I mean, come on, what is not to like about a band that has extensive bibliographies, flow disruption, and wildlife metaphors? Furthermore, their Fake French is way hotter than any real French I've heard lately.

* * * * *

And then there are the two tracks that I'm a bit torn over. Not jaw-dropping and not mediocre, but somewhere just this side of catchy, which is often all I require. And easy to rip (pun intended).

Track 10— Paul Westerberg/ Looking Up in Heaven

Feeble drug references and buoyant melancholy— two of my least favorite popular music conventions. And yet, this is one of those tracks that I would never seek out but also would never skip through if it were to pop up in the Shuffle. There's something so unapologetic about Westerberg's delivery that a touch of gravitas manages to sneak in. As far as I can tell from this one data point, if Bob Dylan were margarine he'd be Paul Westerberg.

Track 12— The Rapture/ Sister Saviour (Blackstrobe Remix)

Hhmmmm. . . I think I'll put some KMFDM, Kraftwerk, and Depeche Mode in a blender with cheap red wine and squid-ink pasta. Whoa! How did I manage this smoothie of blips, bleeps, and laughably echoey lyrics about hobo dreams?

Decide for yourself. . .

The Caravel With Four Fine Masts and Lateen Sails

Caravel Chalkboard Drawing, October 2009

Click on image for larger view.

For weeks I've been adrift in the fears, follies, and dreams of the European age of exploration (roughly 1400-1600).* After tasking my 7th/8th grade class to develop a sailing vessel that could harness the wind** from multiple directions and carry 2000 grams of cargo on stormy seas I followed up our days of damp tests in a plastic wading pool with this chalkboard illustration. The class hardly needed explanations of the intent behind the keel, rudder, or lateen sail after all of the trial-and-error work that they'd poured into their own boats, but I felt it important to illustrate a caravel as it figured so prominently in many of the biographies I was sharing with them.

* * * * *

It is odd how your mind can drift away, even when you are called upon to be most present: this little song by Joanna Newsom*** has been in my head ever since I spent an hour embedding the above illustration on the 8' expanse of darkness that dominates my room.

Bridges and Balloons (excerpt) by Joanna Newsom

from Milk-Eyed Mender

We sailed away on a winter's day
with fate as malleable as clay;
but ships are fallible, I say,
and the nautical, like all things, fades

And I can recall our caravel:
a little wicker beetle shell
with four fine masts and lateen sails,
its bearings on Cair Paravel

O my love,
O it was a funny little thing
to be the ones to've seen.

*Unless, of course, you start with Marco Polo, as I do when beginning this course of study. In that case you can tack on another 150 years at the outset.

**conveniently produced with a box fan

***who I swore was a former Waldorf student after seeing this video for Sprout and the Bean

And for those of you who are up for a challenge: How many nautical puns are part of this post?

Olafur Arnalds and the Fall

Clinging, Slipping, 2009

acrylic, leafing, toner, graphite, and wax on panel

7.5" x 7.5"

This small work was created while listening to seven sublime tracks* by Olafur Arnalds that are available for free here. Arnalds' "Found Songs" are improbably beautiful for compositions that were put together one-a-day over the course of a week. I cannot imagine what he's capable of producing given a more gracious schedule. 

As I'm never quite sure just how long promotional giveaways are intended to last I would encourage anyone who has a modicum of love for sparsity, simplicity, and the melancholic to download them promptly.

* * * * *

Clinging, Slipping is a cropped variation of a much larger image of a waterfall that I've been working on in the studio. Both the large and small compositions have a ground of silver leaf that produces an elusive sheen beneath the black silhouettes of quivering vegetation and fallen logs. I found the original image in a flea market outside of Bend, Oregon and was immediately taken with the emptiness of the composition— it was so poorly exposed that all of the water in the fall had simply become a mass of white that consumed two-thirds of the composition. While I'm pleased that Clinging, Slipping turned out as well as it did, I'm not yet convinced that I'll be able to wrangle a successful work from the larger image. . . we'll see what a little rubbing alcohol and cold wax will do over the coming weekend.

*Recommended by Colorado artist Nathan Abels, who provides a weekly link on his blog to free music conducive to creative work. 

Got Goth?

May 22, 2005

Top Five Albums to Listen to While Watching Diaphanous Curtains* Blow in the Twilight Wind: Presented in No Particular Order

• black tape for a blue girl— remnants of a deeper purity
  
• This Mortal Coil— Filigree & Shadow
  
• Dead Can Dance— Toward the Within
  
• Sigur Ros— ( )
  
• Love Spirals Downwards— Flux

*Diaphanous curtains or plastic drop clothes, I can't rightly remember which. . .

Music of the Spheres

April 8, 2005

The shine of the stars makes the melody, Nature under the moon dances to the laws governing this melody.

Johannes Kepler, Harmonices Mundi, 1619

CNET R.I.P.

March 9, 2005

The lights are going out over at CNET music; my source for free legal music downloads for well over two years now. In the past I've tried to offer some thoughts about the tracks I suggested you download, but today I operate under a heightened sense of urgency, and present you just a linked list. For when CNET goes dark on Wednesday, March 11th they will send all of their site traffic to last.fm. From what little investigation I've been able to do, last.fm has little desire to provide free downloads— they are interested in running a social networking site centered around music. Yet another social networking site, just what the world needs. 

So get cracking people. You should know that any other tracks available by the musicians below are worth having as well; so don't just stop with my favorite, download them all.

The Best of CNET (R.I.P.)*

• Handsome Furs, What We Had
  
• Santogold, L.E.S. Artistes (XXXChange remix)
  
• The Helio Sequence, Keep Your Eyes Ahead
  
• Neko Case, Star Witness
  
• Billy Cote and Uniit Carruyo, I Don't Want To Fight Tonight
  
• Fleet Foxes, Winter Hymnal
  
• Calexico, Black Heart
  
• Robyn, Sensual Seduction (Snoop Remix)
  
• Grand Ole Party, Look Out Young Son
  
• Lykke Li, Dance, Dance, Dance
  
• The Decemberists, The Soldiering Life
  
• Peter Bjorn and John, Let's Call It Off
  
• The Hong Kong, Tongue Tied
• Jolie Ruelle, Forget
• Devendra Banhart, Be Kind
  
• Angels of Light, Song For My Father
  
• Brother Ali, Original King
  
• Antony and the Johnsons, Cripple and the Starfish
  
• Iron and Wine, Lions Mane
  
• CSS, Alala
  
• The Whitest Boy Alive, Burning
• Ferraby Lionheart, Tickets to Crickets
  
• Santogold & Diplo, Starstruck (Diplo Remix)
  
• TV On The Radio, Dry Drunk Emperor
  
• Voltaire, When You're Evil
  
• The Submarines, You Me and The Bourgeoisie
  
• Emiliana Torrini, Me And Armini (edit)
• Tilly and the Wall, The Freest Man (CSS Remix)
  
• Wolf Parade, Shine A Light

*You may discover at some point that CNET often suffers from glitches when certain pages load. Patience and persistence are the keys with this particular problem— hit the back button and try reloading the page a few times. Occasionally, it helps to load the page by clicking on the image or the "See all free tracks" button rather than by clicking on the musician/group name.

The Recession Mix

February 25, 2005

You see signs of the recession everywhere. Stores that have been part of the landscape for years are now closed. Friends and family are moving away as jobs disappear. Credit card interest rates go up just as everyone's ability to pay more goes down. The used CD selection at the local music shop offers more quality and selection than I've ever witnessed before, and for me, that might be the most dramatic evidence that we are all in for a very rough ride.

Recently, I picked up the following albums in one visit to the CD store:

Neutral Milk Hotel, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea

An indie album that's perhaps not quite as deserving of  the rapturous adjectives commonly employed to describe it. Like The Decemberists, but with slightly less lisping. Horns, check. Allusions to blind Christian adoration, check. Old-timey album art, check. 

The National, Boxer

I love this album and would happily employ all sorts of glowing adjectives to try and sell you on it. The strength of Boxer is in the words, or, more specifically, in the smokey and broken delivery of those words. Exceedingly careful production also deserves kudos for restraint when restraint is called for, such as the heart wrenching Racing Like a Pro or wistful Fake Empire.

Peter Bjorn and John, Peter Bjorn and John

The self-titled debut even beats out their fantastic Writer's Block album (which is a tough act to beat, as it contains the perennial ear-worm Young Folks).

Clinic, Walking With Thee

According to Amazon.com this album has been discontinued— so if the strength of my recommendation isn't enough, download a few free tracks from their most recent album Do It and decide for yourself.

M83, Saturdays=Youth

I won't rehash my thoughts about M83's development (you can read that here, if you missed it) but I will say that if you haven't downloaded the remixes from CNET yet you're missing out on the best bouncing-ping-pong-ball loop ever.

Yael Naim & David Donatien, Yael Naim & David Donatien

The only cd I've ever purchased on the recommendation of one of my students. With vocals in Hebrew, English, and French it also boasts the song New Soul, which was apparently featured on an Apple computer commercial. As I don't own a TV I can't attest to that fact, but I feel the song is catchy enough to fool you into spending a thousand dollars.

Esthero, Breath From Another

I haven't listened to this one yet but I suspect it's far more drum and bass then flapper swagger.

In years past the chances of my finding even two albums I fancied would have been astronomical. To walk in and find seven was equal parts exhilarating and sobering. Certainly some of the people who sold these albums must have felt as I do now; that the music collection would be the last thing to go, and then only under fear of utter destitution. Yet here is all this music, and my enjoyment of each album is somewhat colored by the fear that we may all soon face some exceedingly painful choices— choices that make my juvenile preoccupation with music seem as trivial as it happens to be.

Germs came out of your nose?

February 11, 2005

Ah, February. Ah, ah, ah-chooo, February! 

It seems that I also had a cold at the same time of the year four years ago. Whatever could chase these winter germs away? How about the healing power of song?

(to the tune of Row, Row, Row Your Boat)

Blow, blow, blow your nose

Gently on each side.

Use a soft, clean tissue,

And then wipe the outside.

I must confess, that the "Be Good to Your Nose" cd* by Puffs, is one of the prize holdings in my music collection. It never fails to educate and amuse. Thanks Procter and Gamble Company!

*Featuring tracks such as Sneezer Wheezer and Keep Germs Away.

Chicken!

February 4, 2005

Exceptional Chicken Related Things:

• "know your chicken" by Cibo Matto on VIVA! La Woman
  
• chicken fingers (Oh delicious contradiction!)
  
• Milla Jovovich's chicken-adoration scene in The Fifth Element
• home made chicken noodle soup
  
• "C-h-i-c-k-e-n Spells Chicken" by the McGee Bros (featured on the Ghost World Soundtrack)
  
• Eggs ("Come into my tummy, oh so very yummy")
  
• Taxidermy chicken on the dining room table (see below)

Horrible Chicken By-products:

• Nuggets
  
• Playing chicken
  
• Anemic yolks
  
• Debeaking
  
• Pacific Northwest hipster artist appropriation of chicken imagery
  
• Salmonella
  
• "The Chicken Dance"

Unforgettable

January 6, 2005

There are albums that wrap themselves into your life. You hear them, and they etch your consciousness with their notes and refrains. I won't presume to say that they give different moments in life meaning, but they can provide the spirit, and without them a great deal of emotional complexity would be absent from our biographies.

I look at the play of light vaguely illuminating the chunky pixellated black in the image above and remember being warmed by the plaintive tones of Dinah Washington's album of old standards. Sitting in a low-slung arm chair watching the reflected light swim across the wavy surface of the spinning LP I listened to This Bitter Earth:

And if my life is like the dust

that hides the glow of a rose,

what good am I?

Heaven only knows.

. . . and I thought that Dinah's voice was a comfort preserved. It was meant for me to find for a $1.00 at the local thrift store so that I could experience it while the January moon came out over the magnolia leaves.

Recap

You'd think that two weeks of inclement weather would have compelled me to blog more; after all, my car was under 26" of snow and my winter vacation was extended by four days, but alas I found myself with far too many seasonal commitments to take time to type. Furthermore, as the days progressed my back log of topics to blog about ballooned into a frustratingly insurmountable number. Paralysis set in. As did the mulled wine, and two weeks drifted past.

As I value you very much, dear reader, I will summarize some of the major tidbits of recent experience:

1. With thirty pounds of clipped cedar branches and four unexpected days off I refined my seasonal garland creation skills. Every lintel in the public area of the house was treated to fresh cut evergreen boughs, prickly holly, and many strands of white lights. They cast amazing shadows on the ceiling at night when the white lights were left on to cheer the hearts of pedestrians who might be peeping through our windows on their cold journey through the snow.

2. During numerous bouts of insomnia I uncovered a slew of websites devoted to free Photoshop tutorials, free PS brushes, and free vector art. These searches were driven by a recent need to create very specific vector art for a holiday gift project. More on vector art and its inherent awesomeness in some later post.

3. The aforementioned insomnia might have been slightly aided by a blossoming interest in hot spiced wine which, mysteriously, disappears at a far faster rate than the same wine served straight from the bottle. Now that I have a basic Gluhwein recipe under my belt I may devote next year to devising a mathematical equation that explains the rate of wine disappearance in relation to the temperature at which it is served.

4. This Christmas brought an abundance of photography related swag to your truly, perhaps indicating that I have been a better behaved person this year than in others. My excitement knows no bounds, and as soon as I've geeked out on camera-specs I will be heading out for a day or two of experimental shooting in the PDX area. 

5. I can't seem to shake Blonde Redhead from my, um. . . head. If you aren't familiar with this band then today is your lucky day because you can both discover their music, and do so for free, by downloading a number of jaw-droppingly good tracks off CNET.

I hope the holiday has been a happy one for you and yours. Let's all turn our thoughts now to the year ahead and how, at this moment, it holds nothing but promise and glory. 

Winter Revels

Saint Lucy's Day (Lucia) procession. Sweden, 2007.

Photo courtesy Fredrik Magnusson under a Creative Commons License

When the stage is dark and everyone waits; that is my favorite moment of a theatrical show. Rarely does a production live up to my hopes for it in that hushed anticipation. 

Anything is possible before the beginning.

* * * * *

In the dark of the theater this past Friday night there are towering aspens backlit by an undulating field of soft "Northern" lights. The stage has the blue cast of moonlight and all cell phones have been set to vibrate. We wait for something to happen.

From the dark of the wings sounds a collection of human voices imitating the shrill calls of hungry animals. Their cries die down into a haunting harmonization that is then shattered by similar calls all around the theater. Behind and above me the answering calls settle down into a chilling harmony of tones and Portland's Christmas Revels begin.

If you're unfamiliar with the Revels let me share the briefest of explanations. Each year in cities around the US a group of musicians, dancers, and actors put on a stage show featuring a mash-up of Christian and pagan holiday customs from some European culture. The show is quite a production, with elaborate costumes and complex musical arrangements supporting a tenuous plot based upon winter solstice fears and the redemptive power of children and audience participation. Anachronisms abound, Morris dancing is a must, and there's always at least one person on stage whose smile seems cemented in a Botox-induced mockery of joy. Nevertheless, the music rarely disappoints and there are always some fascinating staging tricks employing different percussive sounds and lighting. 

* * * * *

This year the theme for the Revels was based around "A Visit to the Scandinavian Northlands." Much of the story was an amalgam of gnome lore and an epic poem of Finnish folklore penned in the 1800's entitled The Kalevala. It contained a very amusing mummer's play (an English/Irish tradition) and the audience favorite Lord of the Dance (lyrics written in 1963 to the tune of the Shaker song Simple Gifts) despite the fact that neither of these things have an origin in Scandinavia. Thankfully, the show contained a number of very quiet moments, such as the mysterious Abbots Bromley Horn Dance, which featured a dark procession of archetypal characters and the subdued rutting of antlered men. St. Lucia's procession was also depicted well although some of the magic is naturally lost when electronic candles are used for her crown.

Apart from the bracing opening the finest thing about the Revels this year was the music of the Karelian Folk Music Ensemble. This acoustic trio originates from an area that straddles the Finnish and Russian border. Every song they performed, be it for dancing or for crying, stirred up a deep resonance in me. These three men were the authentic heart of a show attempting to present a sense of yule in inhospitable Northern climes; they had no real need for artifice or costuming because they were of the place they presented. Without them I might have left entertained, but not moved. 

* * * * *

Upon returning home a rare snow began to fall accompanied by a bitter wind. I couldn't help but think that a few bars of music must have escaped the theater to call the winter out.

I Heart Analog

I miss my hi-fi. To be honest, the iPod* has been a woeful substitute despite its space-saving allure. I realized the depth of my regret at having relegated my audio components to the closet only after purchasing a few albums this month. I came home, used cds** in hand, flush with the excitement of shopping in the midst of financial catastrophe, ready to throw them on and bliss out. But life isn't that simple now.

First I must load the tracks into my computer and then I must plug my iPod into the computer and allow the songs to trickle onto the music player. Then the iPod demands more juice if it's to deliver a continual stream of music for longer than sixty minutes, which leaves me sitting about waiting for the battery to charge. 

It is at this point that my interest in listening to the albums begins to wane. I wash the dishes or sort the recycling. I add items to my TO DO list. I contemplate the exact date when JP Morgan will slap their branding on all of WAMU's printed collateral. I look up the word collateral and realize I'm not applying it correctly in the previous sentence. I check the iPod. Still charging. . .

When the earbuds are finally wedged into my ears I'm subjected to a very tinny sounding Cee-Lo. The Cure suffers from an aggressive treble and half the tracks on Bjork's Telegram are bogged down with mushy bass. I think back to the first time that I heard Massive Attack's Protection on something other than a boom-box and how the quality of the sound seemed so expansive and engulfing. Exactly how I managed to stray again from that experience I'll never know. I fell victim to the hype. I chuckled at those silly Mac and PC commercials and I lay my money down on the shiny counter of the Apple store. 

Now my ears often ache from the pressure of formed plastic and I can't remember what it was about the album art of OK Computer that affected me so much in my teens. My hi-fi collects dust in the closet, ashamed of its bulky cases and thick speaker cables. The CD collection has also entered the closet and is only briefly perused when a new album has been loaded onto the computer and needs to be stored out of sight. 

Meanwhile, the iPod travels about with me, delivering far more storage than sound. I watch everyone on the train nod their heads half-heartedly to the music being drowned out by the screech of the wheels on track and I think that we've all been fooled yet again. Now we own music; because experiencing it doesn't sell albums with the same frequency.

*I would put a TM symbol after every instance of the word iPod because I respect the Apple and do not wish to anger the Apple, but I cannot find this feature on Blogger, so let this serve as my disclaimer that iPod is a registered trademark of Apple. I understand that I have no rights to type the word iPod without a TM symbol but I respectfully submit that it is Blogger, not I, who has violated international intellectual property rights by not providing the appropriate typography to legally credit copyright and trademark holders.

**For those of you who care, the purchased cds in question were:

Gnarls Barkley- The Odd Couple

The Cure- Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me

Bjork- Telegram

Peter Gabriel- Peter Gabriel

MC Solaar- Paradisiaque

Massive Attack- Danny the Dog: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

Underworld- Pearl's Girl

We Want a Rock

My wife and I got to pondering the metaphorical underpinnings to They Might Be Giants' ninth track on Flood the other night. Admittedly, we were both weak from illness and consuming breakfast for dinner yet again. In that state such a quixotic task seemed reasonable.

"Everybody wants a rock to tie a piece of string around." The instrumentation is upbeat— a peppy accordion with a polka-meets-hoe-down feel— but there's a sinister undertone to the lyrics. Consider: everybody wants man's first weapon (a rock) to disguise with something soft (the string) and big prosthetic foreheads to cover up their 'real' heads which, I imagine, are under threat of being bashed in by rocks with strings around them. Furthermore, someone in town wants to burn down the playhouse belonging to those who want rocks to wind string around, and the playhouse owners are encouraged to crawl into a crib for safety. Since everyone wants a rock to wind string around it is safe to presume that the arsonist is merely jealous of those who've managed to purchase both rocks and strings. Needless to say, the world seems dark and inhospitable to everyone so long as they all desire the same destructive force.

The song is steeped with imagery from childhood: cribs, play houses, masks, and yes, the aforementioned rocks and strings. It's impossible to refute that rocks could have been the first toys to our earliest ancestors, and strings have a long history as play thing for children of many different ages. So perhaps We Want a Rock is simply an examination of the hurtful pranks and punishments that children can inflict on one another as they flesh out their own sense of right and wrong. Perhaps.

"Where was I? I forgot the point that I was making. . ." It strikes me that the wrapped rock could simply be a catalyst toward a greater understanding of the universe. Akin to drilling a hole in your forehead. I can't overlook that only a few songs later on Flood the following lines are sung during Whistling in the Dark:

A man came up to me and said/ "I'd like to change your mind/ by hitting it with a rock," he said,/ "though I am not unkind."/ We laughed at his little joke/ and then I happily walked away/ and hit my head on the wall of the jail/ where the two of us live today.

He should have opted for the bashing and freed himself when he had the opportunity.

Five More From CNET

Some time has passed since I decided to foist my musical sensibilities on you. Even Portishead came out of hiding since I last wrote about CNET’s repository of free music. The next five songs also drop from CNET’s completely legal server-trove of MP3 tracks. Apart from my subjective taste there’s not much that unifies them. The first two are more on the electronic spectrum whereas the last three eschew technology for good ol’ fashioned instruments. I don’t know if any of these songs make good on my promise last time to reveal “how I’m five years behind the times.” But don’t worry, I remain resoundingly behind the times.

1. Black Cat by Ladytron

There’s an early-90’s industrial earnestness to this track that I really dig. The synths and bells offset the faux-severity of the German— if you could pick the music for a club scene in an overly sincere indie vampire movie from fifteen years ago you’d be hard pressed to choose between this and those nice KMFDM fellows.

2. We Own the Sky (Maps Remix) by M83

When M83’s DeadCities, RedSeas, & LostGhosts was released in 2003 it showed plenty of promise but little restraint. Every track was a wall of sound extravaganza that even My Bloody Valentine would have found overwrought. While it did have moments of profound beauty there was no rhythm to the overall set; no resting points to break up the wash of sound.

Time seems to have remedied this tripping point. While I haven’t rushed out to purchase M83’s new Saturdays = Youth I’ve been encouraged to do so by the three fabulous tracks offered up on CNET. Here the aural bombardment is tempered with more employment of the human voice and well-considered movements within tracks. This remix hints at what Moby might have become if he’d pushed himself to continue exploring the stylings evident on Everything Is Wrong.

3. Fake Empire by The National

The voice. The melancholy. The adolescent triumph over the night. All your best summer evenings have been distilled into The National syrup.

4. Albert Hash by Hezekiah Jones

Sometimes I just want to listen to a simple duet with guitar. It should have a sweet hook and little pretense. I’ll allow a bit of navel-gazing but I don’t want ponderous sound scapes or drug-induced jam sessions. Albert Hash is just such a song. It tells a brief tale and demonstrates that a song can be layered without being “produced.” Its traditional sound is matched by a very traditional play time. I guess there was a day when it was possible to create an entire world in a little over two minutes.

5. Is a Woman by Lambchop

One of the hottest debates in high school was whether or not there were more strong female vocalists or male vocalists in modern music (for those of you interested in entertaining such an inane question we defined modern as the 1960’s to the year of said debate, around 1993). At that time I was firmly in the female camp but as my musical tastes change I find that the deeper notes of the male voice resonate better with my adult moods. Kurt Wagner’s voice is so adept (download the alternate version of The Distance From Her to There to get a sense of his range), so magical, that I believe he could craft an appealing song for nearly anyone’s ear.

And while I tend to think of music videos as a scourge to the music industry I must confess that the video for Is a Woman stands on its own as a wonderful work of animation. 



So ends the new five. I shall stop before I become the sorry embodiment of a Nick Hornby character.

Necks

I just completed a beginning graphic design course. I don’t offer that information as an excuse for why I haven’t posted so much as an explanation for what I’m about to write.

I’ve had to ask friends and family if they’d let me photograph their necks. This request has garnered a mixed response— from the wary “Ok.” to the flat-out “No.” The neck, after all, is a sensitive space, tucked away between chin and chest. It is a vulnerable spot that has earned at least two telling cliches over the years:

1. ...sticking your neck out...
2. ...going for the jugular...

I’m sure there are more.

Perhaps due to its vulnerability it is also a place of desire. Tender and recessed, it wraps around our power of speech, swaddling our vocal cords through a life-time of inspired and mundane words.

Considering that it allows food and water to travel to the stomach, messages to travel between brain and body, air to travel to the lungs, and words to travel into the world the neck can be viewed as a conduit. The sexiest conduit in existence, but a conduit none the less.

But I digress. . . these are the reasons why I chose to photograph necks but they do not explain the end product.

Our final project in the design class was to redesign the CD packaging for a favorite album. I’ve long since moved beyond attempting to clarify what my favorite album might be so I chose an album that I was exceedingly familiar with but hadn’t given much attention to over the past ten years— Tricky’s Maxinquaye.

Upon listening to it again I was struck by how raw it still seemed: Tricky’s vocals coercing Martina’s delivery with both of them indiscriminately singing atop one another. The album has a sexual bravado juxtaposed with a crippling vulnerability that makes it hard to describe to others. I had expected that I wouldn’t have to do much explaining to my classmates as they’d all be familiar with the album, but I was proven wrong. Apparently, Tricky was only an inspiration to me in the late nineties.

I proposed to create packaging that over-layed photographs of necks printed on vellum with lyrics from the songs. That way it would appear as if the words were stuck in the throat. Furthermore, there would be odd images of textures and locations placed alongside these combinations of necks and words. It was my hope that this might produce some approximation of both the alluring and disquieting qualities of the music. For the most part it succeeded. The vellum had a skin-like quality compared to the heavier paper stock used for the photos and lyrics. Some of the photos chosen were cropped in such a way that the compositions themselves were confrontational and confounding. When people picked up the packaging to examine it they rarely had smiles on their face which, while not always an indicator of success, somehow seemed appropriate.

There are still many details I’d like to tweak before I would feel completely satisfied, but that requires asking more people to offer up their neck, and those conversations have proven to be just disquieting enough to prevent me from exploring this project any further.

Five From CNET

I periodically binge on CNET. The lure of free, legal, music downloads preys upon my mind and I can lose hours to sifting through genres and recommendations. Usually this yields only a very few songs. Much of what I’m just discovering has been enjoyed by much cooler people for years now— Wolf Parade, The National, Devendra Banhart; these are acts that are relatively well known to those who didn’t spend most of their twenties trying to simply stay afloat in overwhelming jobs.

Realizing that I cannot profess to have a blog and not try to foist my musical tastes on others I submit to you just five artists that you can download and experience for yourself. My reasons for recommendation range from how emotional a track makes me to how perfectly derivative a band sounds. Regardless of the reasoning they’ve all been getting a lot of play around here.

1. Wikked Lil’ Girls by Esthero

This one might be a tad embarrassing to explain so I’ll skirt around the issue a bit. Apart from obvious props to Benny Goodman there’s an energy that rewinds life ten years. Whether you can live into the lyrics or not I think anyone can appreciate a little big band and high-sheen lip gloss.

2. End of Time by Beat Chemist

If you’re Fat Boy Slim then you beat a one-line sample into the ground and create a monotonous piece of radio triffle. But the Beat Chemist takes one short sample and fashions a sweet little rumination about seasons passing and the frailty of life. The beats are still phat, but they come from a heart.

3. Nothing Was Special by Lendi Vexer

Do you ever get tired of reading reviews for bands that reportedly sound like Portishead only to give them a listen and wonder how anyone could make such a comparison? No? Well, I’ve spent years lamenting the loss of Geoff and Beth so I fall for the old, “if you like Portishead” trick almost every time. This is the first group that, yes indeed, sounds like Portishead. The organ, the haunted female vocalist, the echoing chamber and languorous beats— it’s all here. Derivative? Sure. And that’s what makes it awesome.

4. To Build a Home by The Cinematic Orchestra

Sparse and a touch maudlin. This is the only free track offered by this group and I haven’t been out to purchase the album yet but, if this song is any indication, Coldplay’s lawyers are keeping a close watch. Did I just admit to knowing what Coldplay sounds like?

All my credibility just flew out the window.

5. By Your Side by CocoRosie

My wife dug this one up and it’s a nice counterpoint to Wikked Lil’ Girls. The inane simplicity of this track juxtaposes beautifully with the exceedingly nebulous intent of the lyrics. Ironic? Resigned? Love struck? Maybe just struck. If you’re down with the growing tendency towards haunted lo-fi folk then you’ll probably enjoy all the other free tracks by this group as well.

If you’ve got comments about this selection, or recommendations for other tracks, feel free to drop your line below. The next list of five will feature songs by bands that reveal how I’m five years behind the times.

2000 Music

Albums purchased in 2000:

• Priesner— Requiem for a Dream
• DJ Cam— The Beat Assassinated*
• Baby Fox— A Normal Family**
• Graeme Revell— Phoenix Soundtrack, Interview with a Vampire Soundtrack
• Everything But the Girl— Temperamental
• Queensryche— Empire
• Enigma— The Screen Behind the Mirror*
• Moby— Play
• Lisa Germano— Excerpts From the Love Circus
• Air— The Virgin Suicides Soundtrack
• Lycia— Cold
• Brendan Perry— Eye of the Hunter
• Dead Can Dance— The Serpent and the Egg
• The Innocence Mission— Birds of My Neighborhood
• Bowery Electric— Lushlife
• Nick Drake— Time of No Reply
• DJ Krush— Code 4109, Kakusei
• Moloko— Do You Like My Tight Sweater?**
• This Mortal Coil— It'll End in Tears
• Loveliescrushing— Xuvetyn
• Enigma— Sadness/Mea Culpa (single)
• Red House Painters— Down Colorful Hill
• Radiohead— Kid A
• Bjork— Selmasongs
• William Orbit— Pieces in a Modern Style
• Kruder & Dorfmeister— The K&D Sessions
• Sarah Brightman— La Luna**
• Songs of the Siren

*Regrettable decision. . .

**Woefully regrettable decision. . .