Already worth putting a PS on - I love Father John Misty and I love Jon Brooks and god the Destroyer album was great and what about the superb Tuxedomoon album - as always - too too much good stuff. xx
I did it with a twist (all old artists that I only discovered in last 2 years or so) - just shows you that music lovers should never fear running out of invigorating fuel.
Millie Jackson - (If loving you is wrong) I don’t wanna be right
I completely overlooked Millie Jackson when I was a young boy with a burgeoning appetite for musical explorations of all genres. She was so potty-mouthed and just plain raunchy - clearly a terrifying prospect for a wan indie lad such as I was then. So I stuck to Chic, Parliament and all the other NME-endorsed soul acts of the time. Absolutely nothing wrong there obviously, BUT … had I listened to this album ("Caught up") back then I’m certain I would have matured much much earlier and been way more successful with women throughout the 80s and 90s. Yes it’s that good!!
I should mention my brother Peter at this juncture because I remember him playing Joni Mitchell in our house (sometime around 1980 I guess) and I HATED it. I mean really, like it literally made me SQUIRM - sounding both insipid and ludicrously fiddly/jazzy at the same time. I think it was the album Blue. Well - 35 years on and something has changed (me) and I’m finally into my Joni Mitchell phase (the early stuff mind!). This track "Both Sides Now" isn’t from “Blue" (it’s from “Clouds") and admittedly I always liked the Glenn Campbell version - and it’s probably one of her most well known songs. Still, I’m here to say I now really like Joni and am the proud owner of 3 LPs (incl Blue!!) - so Pete - I was wrong!!
Short story here - this is one of the most beautiful songs you’ll ever hear. Long story: after doing my usual Google-surge on finding a new-to-me artist, it soon became apparent that I’m not alone in discovering Judee Sill late in the day (though admittedly I’m later than most). During that web trawl I turned up a great little Radio 4 documentary about one fan's "Judee moment" and subsequent voyage into the artist’s life and repertoire (a very troubled life - and early death - it turns out). A segment on that programme featured XTC’s Andy Partridge expressing his love for this song and simply breaking down listening to it - he wept and couldn’t carry on talking. It is that sort of song - a bit overwhelming - especially when considered to the narrative of Judee Sill’s pretty extraordinary and very tragic back-story. Aside from that it’s just lovely, and like a few things on my ‘#sevendays’ it’s hard to imagine it lay in relative obscurity for so long.
… and if you like it just watch this wonderful live version (you have to get past Whispering Bob Harris first or I’d have done the main link to this version)
No excuses for missing this when it came out in 1998. I was well into this kind of thing at the time but clearly not quite as ear-to-the ground as I supposed I was. Anyway thanks to the brilliant Type records which re-issued this collection of all Fluxion’s 12 inch singles (originally on Germany’s Chain Reaction - a legendary label) it came onto my radar in 2013. It’s quite simply amongst they very best in class of the kind of subtly undulating minimal techno honed in Germany in the 90s (although Fluxion is from Greece). Lots of people just can’t hear any musicality in this sort of thing (like a lot of people can’t ‘get’ abstract art). But to me the tiny nuances in tone and timbre, in what at first glance can seem monolithic walls of machine-sound, lend the music a really primal and nature-evoking feel. “Lark" is a fantastic track but to be honest EVERY track on the collection is special and it’s one of my most played albums of the last few years.
Here I offer my confession that the early works of Minnie Ripperton (in fact all the works except for the sublime hit “Lovin' you” - which EVERYONE knows) had never graced my ears before FEBRUARY this year, when, courtesy of the Gideon Coe show I copped this track as I was dosing off to sleep. Criminal I know! It’s a truly great - ambitious, sweeping - soul epic not a million miles from the vibe Marvin Gaye struck on his “What’s Going On” album. She didn’t release many albums (and sadly died very young) but this album (“Come to my garden”) and it’s follow-up “Perfect Angel” (which includes “Lovin’ you”) are full of gems and are both close to perfect.
The easy/exotica/lounge revival in the late 90’s opened my ears to loads of things I might have previously ignored. One was Wendy/Walter Carlos - famous for not only being an early high-profile trans-gender person but also for hugely successful Moog-synth interpretations of classical music (“Switched on Bach”) and for incredible soundtrack contributions to films, especially “Clockwork Orange”. Ten years later this trail led me belatedly to Isao Tomita. Tomita was massively inspired by Carlos it turns out. And boy did that inspiration reap fruit. His interpretations of Debussy pieces on the album “Snowflakes dancing” cast them as future lullabies played out in the loneliness of outer-space. It’s truly haunting stuff. Like Carlos there is incredible expertise in both performance and sound-creation (and synthesiser music then didn’t use computers to ‘play’ the music and synths could only hold one sound at a time so every time you changed sound you had to move dozens of knobs). “Claire de lune” is such a beautiful piece anyway, but here it somehow reverberates like the trail of comets and evokes the glow of galaxies.
I’d never even heard of Sammi Smith before this year. But I like a bit of melancholic kitchen-sink country and this is that par-excellence, so ears pricked up when it wafted over the 6music airwaves back in January. Apparently afficianados of the genre rate Sammi very highly and reckon she deserves to be up there with Tammy Wynette, Dolly Parton etc. High praise indeed - and based on this track I’d say I agree.
day 7 #sevendayssevensongs with a twist (all old artistes that I only discovered in last 2 years):
Phil Ochs - Pleasures of the harbor
Finishing on something of an epic. An eight minute chamber-pop opus by 60s folkie, Phil Ochs. Something of an oddity on this list in so far as nothing much else I have heard by this artist has struck a chord with me. This though - this is a WOW - very ornate and VERY orchestrated.
This is a band that sounds like a discovery from the late 70s early 80s post-punk era, but were actually active in the 90s. The band released on various labels including Stereolab's DuoPhonic. You'd think they'd be highly regarded and collectable because some of their stuff, like this track is really magnificent. But weirdly they seem very unknown still (not much on Google). It reminds me of Sudden Sway a few years ago - you could buy their stuff dirt cheap everywhere but now it's like gold-dust. Maybe go on Discogs and buy some Dymaxion now!!
I asked on FB for people to suggest some cool 70s Asha Bhosle stuff or any similar old Bollywood songs along the lines of this classic Asha Bhosle one from 1971.
Well one friend suggested I cast an ear over some Pencilface mixes on Mixcloud. Here's one that caught my ear. Actually more disco-funki-fied than what I was after but actually a great little treasure trove all the same (though a bit frustrating that in the mix you get some frustratingly short fragments of a few songs):
I'm loving his new LP and this song in particular. But there's no getting away from the fact that this video is slightly sinister and creepy. Intenionally .. I don't know?!!
Me and my daughter (gratuitously used to engineer the shot) with Julia Holter after her great in-store show at Rise Records in Bristol. She did a fab mini-set with the full band before doing a sell-out show at the Cube later tonight.
Now this is something rather lovely from an old favourite Jimi Tenor. A entirely analogue collab with some NY folks and sounding like a latter-day Moondog.
Hey Kids.Welcome to my annual compilation (the online version for those I haven't been able to send a CD to). No write-ups this year (phew I hear you say). Just to say that as ever I had no trouble filling this comp with great tunes. The problem was more about what to leave out. My personal favourite of this list is Major Lazer's "Get Free" which is just about as perfect a pop song as I could ever wish to hear. If you think this mix starts slow and a little fiddley-dee please do persevere over the first minute and a half of the first track by Advisory Circle because when it kicks in IT REALLY KICKS IN. One artist I have really enjoyed this year which I forgot (uhm!!) to include is Die Antwoord the bizarre hip-hop act from South Africa. They have made me smile just about more than anyone else so it was daft to forget them but in a way it's better to watch their stuff on YooToob because they really do produce the most incredible videos. Have a look at this one here as a supplement to my mix ... http://youtu.be/8Uee_mcxvrw. Anyway, Happy Christmas to anyone popping over here to listen to this. Have a great 2013 and hope you find some stuff you like on this mix. Love from DJG xxxx
I know this is absolutely terrible in so many ways but...I dunno, that proto-acid bass synth line and robotic voices. I just can't help falling for it. I just want to put on a puffy blouse and groove. It's all very Blakes Seven. And the haircuts and the 'tash ... that was the future kids!
The strength of "Bloom" is that it sounds exactly like its brilliant predecessor "Teen Dream". It feels warm, cosy and familiar. It's a wonderfully snug fit for existing fans but at the same time it's sure to bewitch many new ones who have an inclination for hazy dream-pop. Beach House's sonic recipe is undeniably magical. BUT .. and it's a very big but, all its strengths might also be this record's Achilles heel. I'm now on my 7th listen and it sounds lovely, really it does, but nothing is walking up to me and giving me a great big kiss. Nothing is as instantly intoxicating (or beautifully odd lyrically) as "Zebra", the song that ultimately sold me on "Teen Dream". True, I was sceptical about "Teen Dream" too when it came out, but that was more prejudice about the band's sudden tectonic shift from cult darlings to major players. Simply hearing "Zebra" shattered that silly resistance. This time, a few plays in, there is just the faintest whiff of a group which may be treading a little too much water.
I was interested to read this article in Wired about some very obscure 70s electronic music that underscored a sequence in the movie The Hunger Games.
It's an amazing 9 minute experimental drone piece by (to me at least) an unknown composer called Laurie Spiegel who produced it in her apartment in Manhattan. Unfortunately it is not on the soundtrack album to the movie (a whole other story!). I was curious and found a bit more on YouTube such as this (wonderfully entitled "Improvisations on a Concerto Generator").
I think that it'll be worth delving deeper. Incidentally her ancient-looking personal website contains a lot of conceptual stuff about her work AND this pretty great tribute from the rather better known experimental composer Terry Riley, who described music as - "Some pretty amazing heartfelt molecular inner-happening soundscape soul journeys" (molecular inner-happening soundscape soul journeys!!! wow - must remember that the next time someone asks me why I seem to enjoy listening to lengthy atonal noise pieces). It's always interesting coming across these female pioneers of experimental electronic music (especially because the genre in it's modern guise is a mainly male domain) and along with Laurie Spiegel I recently stumbled upon the work of another female artiste, Suzanne Ciani who is actually quite a successful composer for film and TV (she has been nominated for Grammys numerous times). Turns out a lot of her early work was quite "out there" and a decent compilation of her more experimental electronic compositions has just been issued on the ever-reliable Finders Keepers records. Here's a track by her off that album...and like the Spiegel track in the Hunger Games this is also a lengthy "tone" piece ... very hypnotic and beautifully textured.
It'd be stretching it to say that this hitherto obscure female aspect to early electronic music reveals a whole new layer to the genre but it certainly adds an interesting counterbalance to the "men-in-labs" narrative that usually springs to mind. I think it probably suggests that there is a whole lot more out there to discover in terms of artists and the styles of music they were writing and producing with the new sound technologies which were being invented throughout the 20th C. So good news for record crate-diggers everywhere. The gems are still out there (in all genres).
Seasonal joy ... here for your delectation is my very own pick of the pops for 2011. I will say right here that I forgot to include the rather brilliant Jens Lekman and Friends (I'm his girl) singles both of which just came out. Apart from that, this little lot are my special little musical pals for this year. Merry Christmas to you xxx David
1. Burial - Street Halo - Street Halo EP - UK
Burial has a "trademark sound", but like Boards of Canada before him, it is seminal, unique, much mimicked and never equalled. SONG OF THE YEAR.
2. Beirut - The Rip Tide - The Rip Tide - US
A welcome return for one of the truly great bands to emerge in the last decade. Hard to choose one track from the album, but this mournful title track edges it just. ALBUM OF THE YEAR.
3. Deerhoof - Super Duper Rescue Heads! - Deerhoof vs Evil - US
My daughter sings this - to my delight. Deerhoof continue to make skewed left-field pop with addictive hooks.
4. The Advisory Circle - As the Crow Flies - As the Crow Flies - UK
The prolific Jon Brooks in his AC guise on the ever-wonderful Ghost Box label (almost album of the year).
5. Zomby - Natalia's Song - Dedication - UK
Haunting standout from his first album on 4AD, featuring Zomby hallmarks like the wild time signature shifts but distilled down into a melodic tour de force.
6. Twin Sister - Kimmi in a Rice Field - In Heaven - US
Amongst the very very best of the recent crop of US bands filtering 80s influences into modern synthpop.
7. Connan Mockasin - Faking Jazz Together - Please Turn Me Into the Snat - NZ
Often called whimsical, this lovely fella from NZ via Elephant and Castle is just plain unique.
8. Balam Acab - See Birds (Moon) - See Birds - US
Spacious electronica with a dubby feel, from US sample wunderkind.
9. Metronomy - The Look - The English Riviera -UK
Perfect synth-pop originating from the unlikely environs of Totnes Devon.
10. Jon Brooks - Wandur Weltzeit - Music for Deiter Rams - UK
A musical tribute to Deiter Rams, designer of the Braun AB-30 alarm clock, from which all the sounds on this track are drawn.
11. The Field - It's up there - Looping State of Mind - DE
I think the album title says it all. A perfect example of the art of repetition.
12. Panda Bear - Surfers Hymn - Tomboy - US
The solo spinoffs from Animal Collective continue to thrill.
13. Rustie - Globes - Glass Swords - UK
It's prog Jim but not as we know it. An album from a dubstep hero that has divided opinion.
14. Tennis - Marathon - Cape Dory - US
A song that makes me want to be in the song. Very evocative.
15. Walls - Heat Haze - Coracle - UK
Label-mates and soul-mates of The Field. More repetitive bliss.
16. The Mummers - Call Me a Rainbow - Mink Hollow Road - UK
Lavishly orchestrated but still plaintively-beautiful song-craft.
17. PJ Harvey - On Battleship Hill - Let England Shake - UK
I think...my favourite ever PJ Harvey song!
18. Washed Out - A Dedication - Within and Without - US
An artist fast out-growing the "chill-wave" (hypnagogic was such a better name for it) micro-genre which has informed a lot of US indie since 2008. Reckon he'll last.
"Now it's Christmas" is a "Christmas single" - if you click through on the link below you can buy it and all proceeds go to Oxfam so please please be so kind. It's only a quid. See it as my version of getting sponsorship for running a marathon!!
Inspired by Ze's brilliant Xmas album from 1981 this comes in at the more wide-eyed and bushy-tailed end of the Xmas spectrum. Just a plain ole sentimental "want you back" love song.
Written and produced by David Griffiths with substantial input from Bryn and Cat (Sonic Magpie) - to whom many thanks.
Perhaps it's best to start with the days immediately following this gig. Wild Swans’ songs flew around my head like flocking starlings and my Google search history was littered with Swans-related search terms. So it was good - really good. Let's make that clear from the start.
Now, back to the moments just before the show. As someone who tends to shy away from reformed bands from the distant past (especially ones I love, like this one) it was fair to say I was sceptical about going to see the Wild Swans, a legendary band that shone brightly (but briefly) in the famous Liverpool scene of the late 70s and 80s. Paul Simpson, the leader of the band, was central in that scene but like the Wild Swans is perhaps less well known than some of his contemporaries (Julian Cope, Ian McCulloch, Pete Wylie, Bill Drummond to name but a few). Maybe that's why Simpson is calling the reconvening of the band "unfinished business" rather than a reunion. He has a point. One brilliant release in 1982 (a single, "The Revolutionary Spirit") was scant evidence of their stature in that bygone Mersey melting pot. But then if you are only going to release one single, making a stone-cold classic and releasing it on one of the coolest labels of the day (Zoo) will do you no harm in achieving almost mythical status in subsequent years. To an extent that is the position the Wild Swans have occupied all these years, as stars that burned brightly and exploded before any reputation could be sullied. A quintessential cult band; this despite reforming once already in the late 80s when they released 2 albums, the excellent and ethereal "Bringing Home the Ashes" (1988) and "Space Flower" (1990). In between the two Swans incarnations, Simpson made some lovely music with Care (another overlooked band) along with Ian Broudie, later of the Lightning Seeds.
Now fast forward to 2011 and Simpson's "unfinished business" has yielded a rather fine new album ("The Coldest Winter for 100 Years") and a fine band to play it (and lots of the older stuff) at the Thekla, Bristol's famous venue-on-a-ship (one of a handful of dates on a UK tour). Thekla Thursday gigs mean an extremely early start (because the venue hosts a club night from 10pm) so support act Stealing Sheep duly convened on stage at precisely 7.30 to a slightly sparse audience. This three-girl act (also from Liverpool) were a really nice surprise with a sound best described as the Andrews Sisters singing Warpaint, or putting it more literally, the sweetest close harmonies hung around minimalist alt-rock atmospherics. Their melodies were never obvious and always engaging. One to keep an eye on.
By the time the Wild Swans took the stage the audience had filled out somewhat but it should be noted that there was fierce competition in town as the hugely in-vogue Pains of Being Pure at Heart and a reformed Erasure were both playing within a stone's throw of this venue on the same night. I was glad to see that it was not made up solely of "men of a certain age" - often the case at such reformations. Maybe this was a function of that hyper-cult status the band enjoyed; cudos certainly thrives in the thin upper-air where music obsessives of all ages choose and hang on to their heroes.
The first thing I noticed about the group was that Simpson himself was looking very debonair and well suited to front a band who had obviously been instructed to "look sharp". And look sharp they did. But more importantly it was clear from the first song onwards that they sounded sharp too. As a statement of future intent (as opposed to past glories) they opened with "Falling To Bits", a song from the new album, then quickly followed it with a great rendition of "Bible Dreams" from "Bringing Home the Ashes". There was always something swashbuckling and grandiose about the Wild Swans at their best and the fact that that opening song from the new album sat so joyously next to an "old classic" from the first album says a lot for a band that immediately seemed comfortable and confident in their own sound. This set the pattern for the rest of the show, a great mix of old and new songs, which hung together seamlessly. Simpson, slightly nervous at first (at least between songs), grew in stature and poise as the show proceeded and the performance was met with warm enthusiasm from the crowd. The stellar band - Les Pattinson (Echo and the Bunnymen), Mike Mooney (Spiritualised), Ricky Maymi (Brian Jonestown Massacre), Richard Turvey and Stuart Mann (drafted in at the last minute but still superb) - played brilliantly and despite the "names" there was no showboating. The stage was very much Simpson's, just as it should have been, and although Raymi made some amusing interjections once in a while, this seemed only to reinforce the sense of "groupness" about them rather than the opposite.
Of course they closed the set proper with "The Revolutionary Spirit". How could they not! It is one of those inherently climactic songs and, as if it was needed, it reminded everyone of why this band were so fondly remembered and why they deserved that "legend" status all those years. But more importantly, the rest of the set was validation of the Wild Swans as a force in the here and now. A chance for Paul Simpson to begin to realise something he started so long ago. Not so much mission accomplished as "game on".
Set list: Falling To Bits Bible Dreams Archangels Liquid Mercury Immaculate When Time Stood Still The Bluebell Wood In Secret Chloroform Underwater Now And Forever God Forbid No Bleeding Bringing Home The Ashes Revolutionary Spirit
I was absolutely desolate when I heard the shocking news yesterday (via a Facebook post) that Trish Keenan of Broadcast had died of pneumonia (possibly complicated by H1N1 influenza). Broadcast began in Birmingham in the mid nineties (where they remained until recently relocating to Hungerford). As a fringe member of the Brum scene of that era, our paths crossed and her death has certainly resonated more because of this "mutual friends" aspect (but also because she was a young healthy woman taken so early). But ultimately I just became a real admirer of the band, which over the years evolved into an essential "lynch-pin" in the cannon of experimental pop: one of those bands that defines a sound (or perhaps more an aesthetic in Broadcast's case). Their approach (and appeal) can almost be summarised in the title of their first full album, "The Noise Made by People". Broadcast were about more than just melody (though they had great melodies); noise, or sound of noise really, was essential too. The way they fused all that was their great strength. Trish was one of the two core members of the band (along with husband James Cargill) and her voice (icy and warm in equal measure) was its most defining characteristic. She sounded beautiful and looked beautiful (and very cool). Broadcast were the real thing. You only had to follow their extra-curricular activities to get a sense of how immersed in the exploration of sound and music they must have been. Various playlists and mixes were published on their website over the years, each of which was a route map to strange and exotic musical discoveries. In that sense the band name was so appropriate: Broadcast were ultimately like a TV channel; purveyors but also collators and curators: broadcasting fantastic stuff. They joined so many dots. It is to their absolute credit that their own releases (four proper albums and lots of singles which got gathered on two compilations) will surely be remembered as amongst the most essential and enduring releases on the left-field of pop. The link below is to the video of "Come on let's go" (from "The Noise Made by People"), one of my favourite songs. Trish you will be sorely missed - R.I.P. My deep sympathies and condolences to her husband, family and friends.
