Live Music Saves the Day (yet again)

On Monday last I made my way to Alliance Française de Madras after a rather trying day. The reason I braved the awfully crowded Chennai city buses during peak hour traffic time was a concert, as is usually the case with me. I'd seen a listing on AFM's events page for a very intriguing concert - Indo-Creole Project - sometime ago and had made a note of it on my calendar.

At that point, I was still on my sabbatical and thought I'd easily be able to make it. Things changed, however, and from completely jobless and vetti, I went to super busy a little too quickly. Still, I was determined to not miss this show, and boy, was I glad I made that choice!

I walked in a little later than the 7pm start time cursing the slow service at the worst fast food place ever (ChicKing on Nungambakkam High Road) that was to blame. I say walked in, but it was more like dashed in - climbed the four flights of stairs to the Edouard Michelin Auditorium two steps at a time - more or less completely out of breath only to find the show hadn't started yet after all. For about 10 minutes I was glad that they always seem to keep this auditorium at about 15 degrees for whatever reason. After that, I was glad that I remembered to bring my shawl with me. Wrapped up in said shawl, I waited for the concert to begin.

The father-son duo of René and Marc Lacaille took the stage first. While I don't have too much experience with Creole music, I have some rather strong ties to music from the Caribbean having spent some time during my formative years in the West Indies. My earliest memories of music are listening to my mom's mixtapes filled with Calypso music. So I was thrilled when they played some of those tunes. Their set was quite fun and upbeat like the music. They did explain that the happy music was often juxtaposed with melancholic lyrics, but my French isn't good enough to follow singing, so I only got the happy part of it.

Next up were Debashish and Subashish Battacharya (not related unless I'm mistaken) who took the place by storm with some jaw-droppingly good Indian music (Hindustani, I believe). This was my first time listening to the Indian slide guitar played live and I was instantly a fan. But, it was Subashish's percussion that really blew me away. The way he played both the tabla and the other percussion instrument he had on his lap (the Dhol?) was unbelievable! Rather than take my word for it, here, see for yourselves:

After this spell-binding set, the Lacailles joined the Battacharyas on stage for the final joint set. It was wonderful to hear and see how these two at-first-glance completely disparate forms of music and musicians came together cohesively. It was to repress the smiles, both inward and outward. Nothing as delightful as being at a show where the musicians themselves are having such an obviously grand time playing together!

By the time the concert ended all my annoyances of the day were long forgotten! Huge thank you to the musicians and to AFM for hosting this great event. I'm already a regular at all events you guys host, but now I'll make doubly sure to not miss any such shows in the future. :)

Oh, and here's the full playlist for anyone who's interested. Apologies for the poor quality video. On the bright side, the audio is pretty decent. So listen without watching and you'll get a sense of what it was like to be there.

P.S.: If anyone knows what the tune in that last video I linked above is, please let me know. It sounds awfully familiar, but I can't quite place it. Some folk tune perhaps?

I want to believe

If travel is searching
And home what's been found
I'm not stopping
I'm going hunting
I'm the hunter

Heard these words last night whilst trying to find the right music to lull me to sleep. The opening lines to Hunter by Bjork. I've listened to the album and this particular song countless times but never really paid attention to the lyrics all that much. It was striking to hear this on the eve of my departure on my first (of hopefully many) travel adventures at home.

Coincidences abound this past week. And this just continued that trend. What does it all mean? Is it all some cosmic conspiracy trying to point me in a certain direction? Or the overactive imagination of a sleep deprived excitable mind?

The Scully in me thinks it's the latter. But the Mulder wants to believe.

P.S.: Forgot that the very next song on the album starts off with the lines

All these accidents
That happen
Follow the dots
Coincidence makes sense
Only with you

Spooky!

So long, and thanks for all the notes

If there's one thing I'll most definitely miss when I move back home, it's the live music. I guess I'll find some even there, but I doubt it'll be anywhere near what I've had the chance to experience here in the U.S. The sheer variety and quantity astounds me when I think back. Even living in middle of nowhere America, I managed to average about 20-30 shows a year, from genres ranging the entire spectrum pretty much. And I've only ever been disappointed once or twice in all that time.

I really wish I could've squeezed in more shows these final few months. But sadly, winter slows things down and there's been a dearth of live music. I did make it a point to visit New Orleans last week though, as one final trip inside this country before I bid it adieu. Went to no less than 9 shows in 4 days, and 4 weekdays at that! So much music. Highlights were Mike Dillon going wild, Helen Gillet being reliably awesome, and the Preservation Hall band's jaw-dropping jazz.

I thought that was the last of it for me since I leave in 3 weeks. But I just found out, to my uncontrollable excitement (hence this post after the long hiatus), that one of the best bands I discovered last year is playing in Chicago mere days before I fly out from there! I refer to Good Willsmith, of course. As it turned out, there was much more awesome music left for me to uncover last year after that discovery. Yet, if I had to pick one defining record that captured my imagination and, in a sense was the theme for my 2014 musically, it would have to be The Honeymoon Workbook. It was the record that reignited my passion for music and got me drinking in all I could. I really wanted to try and see them last year, but couldn't make it happen (I even passed through the same city they were playing in, only a few hours too soon). So I'm extremely thrilled to have this chance to see them again. And they're not just playing on their own. It looks like there will be other artists from and/or related to their Hausu Mountain label. This is going to be so awesome. I can't fucking wait.

It will be the perfect note to say farewell for the present to a country that has amply fed my appetite for that very special experience of live music. So long, and thanks for all the notes.

Sort of unrelated (or only obliquely related, since I just noticed that the post I linked to above about GWS also has an eerily similar unrelated note) - AMT just started following me on twitter. Like just now, right before I started writing this post. How weird is that. Also, whoa! I mean, AMT is THE live music band, and here I am thinking about writing about live music, and BAM! I have a new follower and it's them! Freaky. o_O

Panacea

As usual I found out about an awesome show at very short notice. The description on the facebook event page was very intriguing/tempting indeed -

"An evening on the cusp of oblivion. Why-Trance and Virtual Horns."

"Tarot influenced Ritualistic Unprotected Saxscapes:
Devil card has been selected for tonight."

"Zoned out psychedelic keyboard and "super-strong primitive percussion" for the haunted tropics of Beguiling Isles film collage."

"AUROGRAPH" - See here for why the name was enough to get my attention in this instance

"ALL MUSICIANS WILL COMBINE FOR A FINAL FALLOUT."

-- only catch was that it was all happening tonight and I wasn't sure if I could handle another late night out. I'd already driven to the city three times in the last week, twice for music - two incredible shows which both deserve a few words in due course - and once to see The Shining in 35mm - one of the very few movies to have ever really fucked with my head. Even on the nights when I stayed in this week, I was up really late either spinning newly acquired records or reading old favourites. So I was quite beat. And yet I couldn't pass on this potentially awesome show either. I decided to try and take a quick nap after work and head over come what may.

As it turned out, I couldn't take my nap, but I didn't have to. My week/month/life suddenly opened up wide. I teetered on the edge for a while, but recovered my footing. One of the immediate positive effects of what at first came as a rude and awful shock was that I could stay up as late as I wanted tonight. I determined to go to the show and put everything else out of my mind for a bit.

Music, live music, has always been my go-to panacea. The most life-affirming experiences I've ever had were at concerts. Nothing can match a really great concert.

The show tonight was such a one.

I missed the first act, Quazar Bran - I really wished I hadn't when they joined in for the "final fallout" and I saw one of them playing a didgeridoo(!) and another playing an instrument I've never seen before (a flute shaped like a ghatam??). I bet their set was really good. I blame google maps for sending me around KC in circles.

I finally found the venue and walked in partway through Corum's set. "Zoned out pychedelic keyboard and super-strong primitive percussion" was right on the mark. There was also much incense and a flute(?) and some visuals projected behind him. I couldn't see much though because the smoke was blowing right into my eyes due to where I was standing. Not that I minded that too much. I end up closing my eyes involuntarily when the music is good anyway. And this sure was good. Could've listened to it for much much longer. I'd already been quite taken with the music on his bandcamp page and would have ordered it by now if not for..but nevermind that. Back to the show..

Next up was his co-conspirator from Million Brazilians - Suzanne Stone a.k.a White Gourd. She who drew the devil card (or Le Diable) and summoned him up with her eerie vocal loops and keys and sax. I particularly loved the note she ended on, with a loop that really stirred something up in me.

Aurograph went on last. Needless to say, they rocked. And grooved. And droned. And just tore shit up in general. My eyes were closed within 5 minutes and stayed that way until at some point I realized I was hearing more than one wind instrument, and it didn't seem like a loop either. I peeked to see what was going on, and lo and behold, the trio had turned into a quintet. Corum and Stone had joined them on stage and things got almost unbearably good. Nothing else existed outside of right there and right then.

They could've ended there, but they didn't. Oh no. They called up the Quazar Bran guys up as well and jammed on furiously. Eyes close again. Suddenly, I hear voices joining in the jam and they're coming from the audience direction, and then the stage, and back and forth.  Eyes open and what a sight. A lovely duet (is it still a duet if there are multiple voices harmonizing together on each end?) that goes on for some time that serves as the perfect end to a perfect evening.

I walk out grinning wide, ever so grateful to be alive.

Mindblowing psychedelia from Thailand

No words. Just a couple of links of awesomeness.

The blog post with the live video that started it all.

And the album that came/is coming out of it.

Mun Paniya

This song is a personal favourite of mine. A beautiful melody with lovely lyrics, sung brilliantly and picturized so wonderfully. All come together as the perfect depiction of my favouritest emotion - that feeling of falling in love.

So I wanted to share it with you. Pardon my crude attempt at translating the lyrics. Had to do this on my own without my lovely friend K's help since technically I know Tamil better than her. Or should anyway. But while my comprehension might be better than hers, my composition is miserably lacking. In spite of being acutely aware of this, I've tried to wax poetic instead of translating verbatim in keeping with the spirit of the song. I hope I haven't made too much of a mess of it in the process, and that at least the essence of it comes across.
 
Mun paniya mudhal mazhaiya
Is it the early mist or the first rain
En manathil etho vizhukirathe
That is falling gently in my heart
Vizhukirathe uyir nanaigirathe
Falling and drenching my soul 

Puriyaatha ooravil nindraen
In this confusing relationship
Ariyaatha sugangal kandaen
I find unknown pleasures
Maattram thanthaval neethaanae
And it's all because of you

Yen idhayathai
My heart
Yen idhayathai valiyil
Engaeyo maranthu tholaithuvittaen
I misplaced my heart somewhere along the way
Un viliyinil
Your eyes
Un viliyinil athanai
Ippodhu kandupidithu vittaen
I've found it now in your eyes
Idhu varai yenakkillae mugavarigal
Till now I had no place to call home (literally mugavarigal is addresses)
Athai naan kandaen un punnagaiyil
I've found it now in your sweet smile
Vaalgiraen naan un moochilae...
And I live in your breath... 

Yen paadhaigal
My paths
Yen paadhaigal unathu vali paarthu vanthu mudiyuthadi
My paths all lead to you
Yen iravugal
My nights
Yen iravugal unathu mugam paarthu vidiya yenguthadi
My nights long to dawn to the sight of your face
Iravaiyum pagalaiyum maattrivittaai
You've changed my nights and my days
Yenakkul onnai nee oottrivittaai
Poured yourself into me
Moolginaen naan un kannilae...
And I drown in your eyes...  

Taste

Taste, as they say, is subjective. So it's not terribly surprising to find that different people have different reactions to the same work of art. But still it shocked me to find that one piece of music got an overwhelmingly positive response among group of people and quite the opposite from another.

I'm talking about Nils Frahm's Says. I loved it on first listen. And so did quite a few others that I am very proud to have turned on to his music. But when, encouraged by this positive response on one forum, I shared the same song on another forum..ugh. "Boring", "Too long", "Too repetitive", "Strictly background music", "Is this even a song?"...

Listen to it and judge for yourselves. I think it's a beautiful song and one I can get lost in each time. But whatever you do, don't do what this one stupid person did and turn it off at the 4 minute mark.



P.S.: Gotta give a shout out to Taryn and Kelly over at Love Garden Sounds for introducing me to this wonderful music and many more. 

Validation

It's funny how important validation is to us. I fancy myself a fairly independent person. It's the only ambition I ever had. And yet, I find myself lapping up validation from the most unlikely of sources, with the best (worst?) of them. It annoys me. But I can't help it. I can see clearly that it's this very need that we silly humans have that all these social media things feed on and are built upon. The likes, the favourites, the retweets, the shares. Bah. Fuck it all. I wonder if it is time for another retreat into the old shell.

On the other hand, there is a tangible benefit to be had from participating in the circus. That's undeniable. I've already gone on in this blog about all the new music I've discovered, the out-of-the-way shows I've found out about, the movies, the books. That is worth staying for. Just have to find a way to not get too caught up in it all. Easier said than done with a personality like mine. Have always been one to obsess massively over something for a period, then get bored and move on. Hell, I can't even play spider solitaire without getting hooked. But that's the key. This too shall pass. Heh.

Here, have some music to make up for that too-boring-to-even-be-called-a-rant rant. Stumbled on this quite by accident (I mean to write up a proper post about said accident and this show before long), and fell in love with it - Free Music Archive: Le fruit vert - Live at Casa del Popolo

Free State Festival

I wasn't even aware of this festival before now. Apparently it used to be a film only festival but this year they made it more of a general arts festival, but still with a focus on films. The only film I really knew about and was interested in was the Nick Cave documentary feature - 20,000 Days on Earth. I also saw Manhattan listed as one of the films to be screened and assumed it was the famous Woody Allen film (turned out to be a film set in Manhattan, KS - which is ironic as anyone who knows me irl would know). So with two films I really wanted to see, and some others that sounded promising, I took the plunge and got myself a movie pass well in advance. Then I promptly fell sick the week before the fest.

Still, I wasn't going to waste my pass. Plus being cooped up at home all day only made me more eager to get out and do something fun in the evenings (probably not the wisest decision). So I managed to catch quite a few of the films, though far fewer than I meant and wanted to. Here, then, is a round up of the ones I did watch:

Johnny Winter: Down & Dirty - About the (apparently legendary) eponymous blues musician. I'd never even heard about this man before and my familiarity with blues music is very minimal, but this documentary held my interest all the same. And it made me resolve to get more into blues. A resolution that faded some the day after, but still. Really enjoyed the free concert that he and his band played right after too. The man is 70 years old but still plays incredibly and sings too. I was glad I got the chance to see him live.

Every Everything: The Music, Life & Times of Grant Hart - This one's about Grant Hart of Hüsker Dü fame. I had at least heard of the band, if not about the man himself. Punk is again not at the top of my list of favourite genres, so I'd never actually listened to anything by Hüsker Dü. Very good docu with an interesting structure, and really cool idea for bookends for the scenes. In the Q&A after it came out that Grant Hart himself came up with the idea for the sequence they used for the latter. He was a fascinating character, and still makes good music, some of which he played with some local musicians later that night.

American Interior - This probably doesn't count as music documentary per se. It's maybe more a musical documentary, in that it's a documentary with music used like in a musical film. It's made by Gruff Rhys, the Super Furry Animals dude, and it's about one his Welsh ancestors who came to the US back in the 18th century looking for a Welsh-speaking Native American tribe. It starts out as ridiculous as it sounds, but then the tone shifts halfway through. The wry sense of humour remained throughout and yet it highlighted some serious issues as well. Really enjoyed this one, and highly recommend it.

The Story of Children and Film - Quite possibly my favourite part of the whole fest. A documentary about children in film, with clips from a wide range of movies from around the world. I don't even like children, but I really enjoyed this film. The narrator/maker is apparently a well-known critic from Scotland. I loved his exposition and choice of scenes/movies. Made me want to watch every single movie that was featured. I mean to hunt down a list of these and do just that.

Trap Street - A Chinese film based in contemporary China. Really good movie. Eye-opening even though we all theoretically know what it's like over there. But that aside, it's just a really good movie, with great performances, absorbing plot and an interesting visual style. The producer was there for a Q&A after the screening and he wasn't sure if there would be a wide release. But, if it does happen to play near you, I highly recommend checking it out.

I Put a Hit on You - A dark comedy about a woman who has to team up with her ex to stop the hit she accidentally put on him after he dumped her. It could've easily turned into a "quirky" film, but thankfully didn't. I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. Was originally planning on slipping off halfway through because I really didn't want to miss even a little bit of 20,000 days, the one movie I really wanted see (it was playing at a different venue and the movies at this venue were running behind time due to technical issues). But, it drew me in, and though I walked to the door before the final act, I ended up watching until the very last frame (standing by the door).

20,000 Days on Earth - Semi-fictional account of Nick Cave's 20,000th day on earth. I'm a fan of the man and his band, so I was really looking forward to this one. It did not disappoint. The makers are visual artists making their film debut, and it showed. Not the debut part, the visual artistry part. Very different from the other documentaries (actually, they were all quite different from each other - kudos to the film selection team), but just as interesting as all the rest. Quite the perfect end for a lovely festival. One that I'll be sure not to miss from here on out.

Other (non-film) highlights were - An incredible double bass performance in the art gallery by James Ilgenfritz; a rocking performance by the KC band Monta At Odds, with some really cool visual projections by Barry Anderson; a screening of Wizard of Oz synced with The Dark Side of the Moon and Kid A, which was a wee bit half-assed with some parts that went completely quiet, including about 5-10 minutes of the climax (I tried to think of some song/piece that would work well with that part and play it on my phone. Only song I could come up with was Alisha's Attic - I am, I feel - because when Dorothy clicks her heels together that part of the song "Clicked my heels together three times.." started playing in my head - but the stupid youtube app on my phone took too long to load and then insisted on playing an ad first and by then the movie ended already :( - Oh well)

I also sneaked off to KC Saturday evening for an amazing collab performance of Helen Gillet's music choreographed by Owen/Cox Dance Group called Memory Palace. But that deserves its own post, if/when I can get to it.

Here's a bit of the Monta At Odds performance

Shuffled Quartet, Aurograph and Cornelius Cardew

On Thursday or Friday last, I got an invite on facebook to an event that sounded really promising. The invite was from Shawn Hansen, whom I've seen play a few times before. He was also the one who organized the Mind Over Mirrors show that I (half-)wrote about sometime ago. So I knew it would be something good. Then I noticed Helen Gillet was one of the members of the New Orleans based Shuffled Quartet, who along with KC's Aurograph were going to interpret these "graphic scores". I had seen Helen play a most excellent improv set along with a couple of European musicians back in 2012. My interest was piqued even more now.

I still had no idea who Cornelius Cardew was, or what a graphic score was either, for that matter. Now this all happened when I was stuck at home sick, so I naturally went on a wiki/youtube binge. Read up all about this amazing avant-garde musician turned communist and his graphical scores. Watched scores of videos of his masterwork Treatise, all of which were unique and a lot of which were quite awesome. By the time I was done, I knew I was going to this show, cold and flu be damned!

I went, I saw, and I was conquered.

Rather than me going on about what I saw, why don't I shut up for once and let the music do the talking. Enjoy!

The first set of original works by Shuffled Quartet



Part of Shuffled Quartet and Aurograph's interpretation of Treatise (only part of because I ran out of space on my memory card, which I really should've thought to empty out before the show)



For the curious, the number of fingers they hold up after switching slides indicates the number of minutes that particular slide will be played for. I have a number of questions still about whether they decided this time per slide beforehand (I'm guessing not), if they had set rules among themselves on how the different graphical elements of the score would be interpreted (my guess is yes), if they rehearsed part or all of it before, and I could go on. Maybe someday I'll muster up the courage to actually go talk to musicians after a show and ask. Or maybe it's best to let the magic be.

Thank you to both bands, and the Artspace, and everyone who made this happen. And special thanks again to Shawn for the invite.

Push the Sky Away

I braved a rather nasty cold to go see Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds tonight. And boy did I make the right call. I'd seen them once before, about 7 years ago, in a smaller venue in a bigger city (which strikes me as quite unusual in retrospect). But somehow, despite the fact that I was way at the back of this fairly big music hall, I enjoyed this show much more. Even the constant distractions in the form people walking up and down the aisles and from their seats and back (I really wonder why people can't just sit in one place for an hour together) didn't take away too much from the awesomeness of this band. They really blew me away.

There were three definite highlights for me, aside from the really strong opening three tracks which I wasn't previously familiar with and consequently can't name until I find the setlist. But coming back to the highlights, the first was naturally my all-time favourite song of theirs - From Her To Eternity - the song that first made me take notice of them. That it is featured in one my all-time favourite films - Wings of Desire - helps, of course, but the song itself is so powerful that I would've been drawn to it regardless. I positively squealed out loud tonight when Nick Cave began it with the classic "I want to tell you about a girl". No one else seemed to know or care for it much, but I jumped up from my seat and spent the whole song on my feet, swaying along with Nick. The second time I was compelled to get back on my feet was when they started playing Stagger Lee. This is a song that I only very recently got acquainted with thanks to a live version from their last tour on youtube. I was really hoping they'd play it and was so glad they did. Another incredibly powerful song and a tour de force performance from the whole band. That bassline is to die for. Also, Nick Cave's baritone works so beautifully in it, I must say.

The final song that really struck a chord with me tonight is the one I really wanted this post to be about (hence the title, which I wrote down first) - Push the Sky Away. They finished their set and the show, not counting the encore, with this song. And I really don't want to count the encore either because this was the perfect note to end on. It's the title song, and the closing track, from their latest album that came out last year. I hadn't listened to it before. I was listening to the album on my drive over, but reached the venue before I got to it. The lyrics gave it away so I knew what to look for right as soon as I got back to my car. I've listened to it over and over again since then. I don't know if I can describe what it means to me. The lyrics speak to me on a very personal level. And the music is such a good match for those words in how subdued and yet insistent it is.

Also, by a strange coincidence, it fits in with my post from yesterday. This song so eloquently says everything I struggled to express there. And it does so with such exquisite economy of words and tones, too.

This is what I live for. For nights like this. For discovering songs like this. Thank you Nick Cave. Thank you Bad Seeds.



I was originally going to link this recorded version of the song because it has the lyrics in the video. But I really love the live versions of this song so much more. They have an extra something. Immediacy perhaps. I also think I prefer the male backing vocals. And whatever instrument it is that Warren Ellis plays (if anyone knows what it is, do leave me a note below) sounds so much more fuller live.

Where did my Saturday go?

And I wasn't even sleeping all day. Oh well. Here's some cool music by a band playing at the Ende Tymes festival in NY this weekend. A festival I really wish I was attending. Maybe next year.

A very belated show report

I've been to some really great live shows these past 4 weeks or so. And I keep meaning to write about them but haven't been able to get around to it. I shall remedy this somewhat now. I scribbled part of the following on the back of a grocery store receipt while waiting for A Minor Forest to take the stage at one of the aforementioned awesome shows. I meant to copy it over and finish writing it that night (week before last?) but never got around to it.

Mind Over Mirrors, Shawn E. Hansen and ISAM

I found out about this show a couple of days before it was set to happen. It was at the same place as that Midday Veil/Expo '70 show I stumbled upon sometime ago. This place as I later found out happens to be where Justin Wright of Expo '70 lives, which explains how they're able to set up shows there at such short notice. It also explains why these shows are invariably really really good.

So anyway, once again I got there too early, even though I had taken the precaution this time of double-checking beforehand about when exactly the show would start. I was told in response to my enquiry on facebook that the music would start shortly after 8:30pm, and so I rushed over straight from work without even stopping to get dinner. I still only made it around 8:40, but fortunately, they hadn't started playing. I sat myself down in a corner of the room and waited. And waited, getting crankier by the minute.

Finally, just after I had broken down and posted a snarky tweet (which I later deleted), the first person (ISAM) began playing. This was an evening of 3 solo acts, you see. I quite enjoyed the first set once I got off the bench, whose shaking with every move of my neighbour was distracting me a tad too much, and sat myself down on the floor.

Next up was Mind Over Mirrors. From the first drone of his harmonium, I was hooked. This harmonium was nothing like the ones I was used to seeing my music teachers playing back in the day during my short stint at learning Carnatic music. Instead of having the bellows in front of the keys, this guy had a set up where the bellows were by his foot like pedals in a piano. See pics below..

                               To be continued... 

Atonement

As a peace offering for whoever had the misfortune to read the rant I posted earlier, here's some amazing music I just came across (Twitter ftw yet again - thank you, Brett Naucke!)



Looks like the whole album is up on youtube. It is so so very unfortunate that this man is no more. I'm going to try and listen to everything he ever created.

Earth and Expo '70

Saw this awesome double bill tonight. I've seen both bands before multiple times so I knew what to expect. And neither of them disappointed.

I missed a bit of Expo '70 since the movie I was at earlier in the evening (the widely acclaimed Queen which I will write about tomorrow) ran a little later than I expected. I think the song I missed half of was the promised new one too. But no sweat, I'll be setting them again twice later in the month.

Earth was just what I need to soothe my ruffled feathers. Ruffled because I got stood up. Sort of. This dude I'm friends with on last.fm said he'd look out for me and say hi. We go to a lot of the same shows but have never actually met up. His taste in music is so close to my own that I actually use his upcoming shows list to pick the ones I want to go to. Would've been nice to actually have a friend irl with similar interests. Oh well.

But going back to the show itself, Earth, as I said, was the perfect music to make peace with the world. They alternates between tracks from their upcoming album and older material. The new stuff held up great, so I'm liking forward to that album which comes out in July apparently.

I get a day of tomorrow (not from work sadly) and then it's back to plenty of live music again on Thursday, Friday and Saturday at a music fest. I should get some rest now. Early and busy day awaits tomorrow. Think I'll play my favorite Earth album to sleep to. Here's a song from said album:

Some conversations

can be so draining. You know you're not really getting through to the other person but you try anyway. In the end, you walk away frustrated and they aren't feeling any better either. Wish I could avoid these situations. Usually I'm in too deep before I know what's up and then it's too late to back out. Ugh.

In other news, I spent a ton of money on music today. Have a sweet bunch of records headed my way soon. I should start doing the Vinyl Weekend thing again. I haven't been listening to my records as much as I should ever since I moved. Need to set up my gear properly. Soon.

Here's a list of what I bought today. All good stuff that is well worth checking out, mainly of an electronic/noise/drone/ambient music persuasion.

Dino Spiluttini & Nils Quak - Modular Anxiety

Safiyya - Shareek Hayaat

Fennesz Daniell Buck - Knoxville

Robert A.A. Lowe & Rose Lazar - Eclipses

3 Derek Rogers albums on bandcamp


Also, gave the new self-titled St. Vincent album a listen and quite liked it. I think I'll try and go see her show tomorrow after all.

Update: I took a photo of all that stuff I bought. Here it is.

Awake

Been awake for 36 hours now. Not really sure why. On the bright side, got a couple of chores done, listened to some new music (well, I've been doing a lot of that, but this time it was full albums instead of soundcloud / bandcamp track by track listens: Andy Stott - Luxury Problems, Death Grips - Exmilitary, and Alva Noto & Ryuichi Sakamoto - Insen), and finished catching up on Community Season 5.

I quite like this new season. A huge improvement over the gas leak year. Lots of laughs as usual, but what was surprising was how emotional Troy's departure was. Maybe it was because I was running on no sleep for so long, but I admit I teared up a couple of times (that Abed!).

Ok, now I go sleep. Probably going to sleep my Sunday away. Oh well. Next week is so full of happenings it will totally make up for a mostly uneventful weekend. St. Vincent on Monday (maybe), Earth on Tuesday (definitely) and the Middle of the Map fest from Thursday to Saturday. I mostly only got tickets to the latter because Wolf Eyes was on the lineup. Still not really sure who else I really want to see. Was hoping some of the local psych acts would play but looks like they aren't. Have a few days to figure out my schedule, I guess...Ok ok, really going this time. Night night!

Oh, before I go, a recent music find that I'm quite digging -

March is for Music

This month has been a wild ride. I haven't discovered this much new music in this short a time frame since sometime back in 2006 or 2007 when a certain bunch of people threw a lot of great music my way changing my life in a very fundamental way. That may sound like an exaggeration but it really isn't. It was pretty much the big bang of my musical universe. Or rather the inflation shortly after the bang (if I understand inflation theory correctly). So I'd like to say a big thank you to all those people whom I'm sadly not really in touch with anymore (internet, heh).

But coming back to the present, today's major discoveries were Good Willsmith and Nils Frahm. Never heard of either of them before today but one listen was all it took to compel me to buy their recent records. I haven't listened to Nils Frahm's Spaces in full yet, so I'll talk about that album another day. Good Willsmith's The Honeymoon Workbook, on the other hand, I listened to not once but twice. I listened the first time, LOVED IT, immediately bought the LP online (something I very rarely do, usually preferring to buy direct from artists on tour or at local record store), then listened again all the way through. I'm listening again as I write this, so make that three times.

Despite all these listens, I don't know if I can actually describe this album. A very vague description would be noisy ambient drone experimental electronic field recording and otherworldly sounding vocals filled yet rhythm oriented crazy dark yet compelling ride. It really is something you have to listen to and experience in its entirety, which you can do courtesy of tiny mix tapes here (scroll down to the soundcloud stream). The album is one cohesive piece with the tracks flowing right into each other. In fact, I found the little hiccup in the stream during track transitions a little off-putting tbh, so I'm all the more eager to get my LP with the download code. Here is the second track from the album, which is a good taste of it, and what drew my attention to it in the first place. But really, do listen to the whole thing if you like this. And buy it (they're even throwing in a free limited edition cassette of live recordings with the LP!)




In other unrelated news, Kronos Quartet started following me on Twitter this morning! I still half-think they must've accidentally clicked follow when looking at the multitude of tweets where I mentioned them yesterday. Which is partly why I didn't even give a shout out thanking them for the follow; I don't want them to realise their mistake and unfollow me right away. So instead, I'll say wtfwhee here instead. :)

Happy Birthday, Kronos Quartet!

I've gone on about them elsewhere but they deserve a post all to themselves, especially on their 40th birthday. Despite being someone who is not particularly knowledgeable or even uniformly appreciative of (western) classical music, I'm still strangely fond of Kronos Quartet. I think this has a lot to do with their very varied repertoire and collaborations with musicians from every imaginable genre and country pretty much.

I originally wrote a couple of paragraphs listing all the different works they've performed and tried to link one of each kind, but that's a hopelessly colossal task. So I'm going to content myself with writing about their live performance today to celebrate their fortieth - Kronos at 40 at the Greenespace in NY. As it happens, their set was well chosen to showcase their versatility, so it will serve my original aim perfectly.

The first piece they performed was written by Nicole Lizée specifically for Kronos Quartet. Death to Kosmische was actually more like a celebration of Kosmische Musik. Or maybe it was named thus in the sense that people say "they killed it". Yeah, that must be it, because Kronos did just that. The facility with which they switched back and forth between their regular string instruments and some really fantastic looking instruments was a joy to behold. But the greater joy was in listening to the brilliant sounds they created with all of these. I really really need to look up the composer to whom an equal share of praise is definitely due. When the piece ended, I couldn't help breaking out into rapturous applause even though I was sitting at home watching the video stream and knew they couldn't hear me. Sometimes (or is it most times?) applause isn't about showing appreciation so much as an involuntary response to a moving experience. Much like tears - which almost fell by the end of today's performance. But more on that in due course.

After that impossible to top opening piece, they played an arrangement of an old blues song by Geeshie Wiley called Last Kind Words. While this was really good, it didn't quite measure up Death to Kosmische for me. Admittedly, part of the reason for this is that Krautrock/Kosmische Musik is a top favourite genre of mine. But I think more critically this piece suffered from the lack of vocals. What's a blues song without the singing, eh? I can imagine how good this song would be with the right vocals and lyrics (the host recited a few of the latter and they were quite promising), and I mean to look up the original soon.

The third piece was also one that wasn't written specifically for Kronos, but they nailed this one. It was a special arrangement of a Cuban song - Margarita Lecuona's Tabú. I loved it. Hank Dutt was bang on in his introduction when he called it a very sexy, seductive song that it would be hard not to move to.

The final work was specially commissioned by Kronos Quartet as part of their Under 30 Project. In her introduction, the composer Mary Kouyoumdjian said that her piece was influenced by Steve Reich's Different Trains - one of my very favourite compositions ever. Unfortunately, I missed the first minute or so of Bombs of Beirut thanks to a bit of a snag in the live stream and/or my wireless network. When the video came back, my brain immediately recognized the Reich influence, but it took me some time to truly get into the piece and feel it. By the time the part where Kronos's playing and the voices narrating faded away to be replaced by the sound of the bombings (actual field recordings from the Lebanese civil war) came on though, everything except the music and the atmosphere it created had faded away as well. The last movement/section was extremely moving and I simply had to close my eyes and listen with all my being. When the piece ended, it left me in a completely different place from when I began listening to it. This time there was no bursting into applause. Just a sense of awe and also of emptiness.

After giving myself some time to recover, my first impulse was to seek out another song which was brought to my mind by this one. Very different in style, but very similar in theme - Vidai Kodu Engal Naade from Kannathil Muthamittaal. It was hard not to feel a deep sense of frustration and almost hopelessness after listening to this song right after the other one. Hard to keep back the thoughts about how stupid and pointless war is and why on earth stupid humans keep fighting each other time after time, all over the goddamned world. But no, I won't go there again. I'll leave you instead with these videos from today's performance (skip to 11:30 in the first video if you want to get right to the show):





My heartfelt thanks once again to Kronos Quartet, The Greene Space, Q2 music, and every single other person behind this amazing show and its live webcast!

Glenn Kotche - Adventureland

I mentioned this album in my last post and how I was interrupted mid-listen. Well, I finally listened to the whole thing today, and it is really really good. Definitely picking this one up when it releases. What drew me to this album was the fact that it featured Kronos Quartet, who can do no wrong in my eyes. I love just about everything that they've been involved in that I have heard. Even got to see them live once and it was amazing. Side note here - Q2 music is hosting a 24 hour Kronos Quartet marathon on Monday in honour of their 40th anniversary, including a live video stream of their anniversary performance (squee!)

But, I digress. Given that I was listening for Kronos Quartet, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked some of the movements of the second piece, The Haunted, that they haven't performed on. The rhythmic interplay between the piano and percussion work really well in them and are quite delightful.

The album itself starts off with Anomaly, movement 1 (the piece written for Kronos Quartet), which is glitchy minimal goodness, but the album really gets going with the second track, the aptly named The Haunted, movement 5 - Dance. The momentum keeps up after that with Anomaly, movement 2, whose percussive elements really speak to me. There are also a couple of pieces not belonging to either The Haunted or Anomaly, which are also really good. The first of these, The Travelling Turtle, is a simple happy tinkle-y piece. The other, Triple Fantasy, is quite a bit more complex and will require at least a second listen before I can digest it.

I am always drawn to percussion, to the beats, the rhythm more than anything else in music. And with Glenn Kotche being a drummer, there is no dearth of that here. I really should check out more of his work. Maybe even give his band Wilco a listen. Always assumed they were your typical indie rock band and never bothered checking them out. But, given how good this album is, a band this man is associated is surely worth my while to at least give a chance to.

You can listen to the entire album (and read a much more coherent write up of it) here. If you don't want to commit to listening to the whole thing without a small taste first, try this first