My quandary: heightened expectations.
These things are buggers to the senses, clouding common sense with the idiocy of “hope”, and bolstering one's own cynicism when they bear bitter fruit.
If the hype surrounding a new band intends to cause a stir half the size of 9-11, let's look at the list of influences as Ground Zero.
I suppose it speaks to the Velvet Underground's persistent influence over the decades that bands who so obviously take shreds of Reed's rags (conveniently ignoring Cale's idiosyncrasy so much of the time) can woo the NME's panties off like cheap wine Every. Damn. Time.
And who's not a culprit there? Bowie famously spun all of Lou's faggier tendencies into gold; the Jesus and Mary Chain and Sonic Youth cribbed White Light/White Heat's nails on chalkboard temperament and called it art (which is quite Warhol-esque in itself, ironically); and dare we not forget the Strokes, would be heirs to that New York Kingdom, and Bright Midnight's Golden Calf. Not to imply worship on their part, since after all, in Bizarro Land, Oasis were true originals.
And since I've brought up the Gallagher Brothers in my obtuse ramblings, “Infant Days” is to Strokes' “Last Nite” what Oasis's “Little James” was to “Hey Jude.”
To their credit, “Hotel In Saigon” at least doesn't sound like something Julian Casablancas opted out of the Room On Fire sessions.
Lyrics invoke the elements for poetic effect (more on this in a minute), a jazzy break after the second chorus a la Krieger, the bass-heavy, bluesy stomp – enough to appear as an attempt for the Doors' enigmatic sound, but the end result is more than a little reminiscent of latter-day Chili Peppers. Post-Californication-type shit. When the George Clinton-inspired jamming gave way to middle-aged Kiss FM tendencies.
Here, the post-punk-inspired staccato guitar lines give way to what sounds like an unsigned ska band trying to swagger like Page – melodic garage pop, I can dig, cos Bright Midnight may skirt on plagiarism, but they at least steal effectively. But they're about as convincing as R.E.M are with distortion.
I will give the rhythm section their due, though; the drummer makes a groove sound easy - he's a tad late with the cymbals on occasion, but he switches to double time at the drop of a hat, further shoving that loose, jamming aesthetic down the listeners' respective throats.
Fact is, the whole unit sounds fairly tight, and that's an element that makes or breaks four-on-the-floor moments like these.
Herein lies the issue: there's nothing deep or mysterious about the city. Morrison got a pass as a Kerouac/Ginsberg acolyte because he profited from the right imagery; he thumbed his way across the desert, dropped too much acid and made too much uncomfortable eye contact with the iguanas along the way. By the time he got to Venice, something as simple as wearing leather pants was an ironic metaphorical statement that made the Soho crowds cock their heads to the side thoughtfully; “How post modern,” they thought as he reaped the benefits of backstage trim and his copy of Aldous Huxley gathered dust.
I can tell the frontman, with his vague yet purposeful visuals and vocals-via-diaphragm, wants to be abstract, and, dare I say, shamanic in presentation. And there's nothing wrong with wanting hot chicks to think you're deep. But a lyricist and vocalist with an indirect approach requires a sound that is just as indirect. This sound is very much direct, even for its few left-field touches and grasp of dynamics.
And that said, it's still the little things that make the big differences. For example, ending with that jazz break at 3:37 instead of refraining the main riff was the choice you should have made (I know it crossed one of your minds)! That's one of those subtleties that separates the MOR, the overeager, and the just plain hip. The third ones play to strengths, and surprise every now and then. Everyone else... just kinda dashes heightened expectations. Like people who use the Velvets as a jump-off point... Strokes, for example. :
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Thursday, July 29, 2010
We Tryna Party, by AJG
As a guy that prides himself on being pretty learned in music, I'm not sure I know when the phenomenon of made up words for songs, albums, and subgenres began. Maybe it was those countercultural bands, using words that were anagrams of drug references to sneak the lingo in and get an inside joke out to share with their fans..
That would make the fact that I'm quite used to them somewhat telling, I suppose. I've tolerated them before; Crunk, for example. I liked the 808's and rawness of it. It used the simplest instruments to make booming distorted sounds. Not unlike Punk.
Still, the "Crunk" sound, championed and pioneered by Lil Jon and (to a much greater extent) Three 6 Mafia, has its downside too; e.g., when Jon wrote tracks for two r&b singers, with an almost "eh, what the hell?" level of nonchalance, and accidentally took a previously awesome sound commercial.
So, I was a bit pissed off, as a punk at heart - it was like the changeover from the acidic nihilism of '77 to the sometimes mind-numbing Post Punk that would follow years later.
I suppose that was why I always appreciated "Hyphy", yet another made up word for a musical subgenre. If Crunk was the underground Punk movement that lost its steam in the beginning of the 80's, Hyphy was the Alternative Underground that provided a decent chaser for those who enjoy simple rawness.
Hyphy, being 'dance music' in its most primal sense, tends to take a more minimalist approach, melodically, and sometimes overall. I've heard Keak Da Sneak shit that's so quiet, yet so tense and moody I got minor chills.
Granted, none of it is quite surpassing Eno-levels of subtlety and composition, but let's just be honest: beats aren't and never have been an auteur's game. They're mainly built on very short loops, and chord changes are things that, if brought up in conversation with many rap producers, would result in a puzzled expression not unlike a dog that has been told an anti-semitic joke.
sadly, (for the segue of the week), none of that aforementioned subtlety or minimalism is present here. just BITCHES. and lots of them apparently. no, I don't refer to islamic afterlife numbers, but the sheer amount of times the word BITCH is used, so clearly and perfectly enunciated that it suddenly didn't seem to be so far removed from the romantic poet's lexicon (if keats ever called a girl a BITCH, he'd say it lyrically like this). it just seems like those BITCHES were weighing heavily on his mind when he wrote this, or at least while recording it, because it stands out, as if it were the only word capitalized in a paragraph of entirely lower case letters.
This is the kind of hamfisted anthem I'd imagine if Soulja Boy wanted to help cross Aphex Twin over, if he did the entire track first on a Frootyloops 3 demo then sent it to England and told him to add the hihat, but "not to overdo it".
The clunky manner in which this is executed is further shown through the lyrics, or as we in Scheezyland prefer, the "Ain't Shakespeares". One of these Paul Banks-sized gems of erstwhile poetry is as follows:
Tell your girl that she can kick it like the b*** know karate
, hastily followed by zomgroflmao on the Youtube video for Drake's "Forever" instrumental, which is obviously the truth, as it explains the little stop/start couplet mid 2nd verse so perfectly that you couldn't feasibly make that up.
I admit I've taken some inflections over time, perhaps snarling a little bit more than I normally would because that's how so-and-so-personal-hero-in-back-of-my-head might do it, but I go further BACK for musicians to steal ideas from; so, while most rappers are trying to croak like Wayne, I take a little bit of Lou Reed's deadpan sneer thing, or Mark E. Smith's enunciation.
After all, you should always bear in mind, AJ, that most people reviewing hip hop are generally short on memory and even shorter on imagination. If you read the times, you can go back to the 70s or 80s and snatch something fairly unknown, make it brand new, and be called a flogging genius (now if only I had some witty way to add Molly to the end of this sentence).
AJ, and I insist on calling you AJ, cos AJG makes me think of MJG and 8Ball, and it's taking my all to refrain from another “Crunk is Punk” tangential menstruation, my critiques are misplaced, at best; Hyphy, much like it's forebear, Crunk, is very much a genre of music that succeeds on a subconscious level. It's psychosomatic. You hear, you're off the couch, more or less.
The thing that's probably keeping you from exceeding the Soundclick Circuit at this point is that at the end of the day, this song is a bit of a boorish creature, at the end of the night. It's a dullard, it's Buzz J. Killington, complete with the fascinating story about the bridge.
The synths aren't airy enough to have their desired effect of trance-esque halcyon. The punchlines aren't potent enough to warrant cutting the track out from under them. The voice itself has the sense and sensibility of self-satisfaction (4x fast), which strikes as an almost tangible reminder of the sub-par delivery and lyricism.
I imagine the rule of pop music that's truly reveling in its poppiness, like much of the Soulja Boy School of Choruses, is not to make the listener roll his eyes too quickly from a particularly clumsy lyric; my eyes glazed over the moment that alcoholic intoxication was compared in sensation to buckshot removing the back of my skull and the majority of my face... and that was the second line.
Of course, the last time a line turned me off so quickly was Ke$ha, or however you spell it, as she wasted perfectly good Jack Daniels to brush her teeth. So perhaps critical damnation is a good thing sometimes.
That would make the fact that I'm quite used to them somewhat telling, I suppose. I've tolerated them before; Crunk, for example. I liked the 808's and rawness of it. It used the simplest instruments to make booming distorted sounds. Not unlike Punk.
Still, the "Crunk" sound, championed and pioneered by Lil Jon and (to a much greater extent) Three 6 Mafia, has its downside too; e.g., when Jon wrote tracks for two r&b singers, with an almost "eh, what the hell?" level of nonchalance, and accidentally took a previously awesome sound commercial.
So, I was a bit pissed off, as a punk at heart - it was like the changeover from the acidic nihilism of '77 to the sometimes mind-numbing Post Punk that would follow years later.
I suppose that was why I always appreciated "Hyphy", yet another made up word for a musical subgenre. If Crunk was the underground Punk movement that lost its steam in the beginning of the 80's, Hyphy was the Alternative Underground that provided a decent chaser for those who enjoy simple rawness.
Hyphy, being 'dance music' in its most primal sense, tends to take a more minimalist approach, melodically, and sometimes overall. I've heard Keak Da Sneak shit that's so quiet, yet so tense and moody I got minor chills.
Granted, none of it is quite surpassing Eno-levels of subtlety and composition, but let's just be honest: beats aren't and never have been an auteur's game. They're mainly built on very short loops, and chord changes are things that, if brought up in conversation with many rap producers, would result in a puzzled expression not unlike a dog that has been told an anti-semitic joke.
sadly, (for the segue of the week), none of that aforementioned subtlety or minimalism is present here. just BITCHES. and lots of them apparently. no, I don't refer to islamic afterlife numbers, but the sheer amount of times the word BITCH is used, so clearly and perfectly enunciated that it suddenly didn't seem to be so far removed from the romantic poet's lexicon (if keats ever called a girl a BITCH, he'd say it lyrically like this). it just seems like those BITCHES were weighing heavily on his mind when he wrote this, or at least while recording it, because it stands out, as if it were the only word capitalized in a paragraph of entirely lower case letters.
This is the kind of hamfisted anthem I'd imagine if Soulja Boy wanted to help cross Aphex Twin over, if he did the entire track first on a Frootyloops 3 demo then sent it to England and told him to add the hihat, but "not to overdo it".
The clunky manner in which this is executed is further shown through the lyrics, or as we in Scheezyland prefer, the "Ain't Shakespeares". One of these Paul Banks-sized gems of erstwhile poetry is as follows:
Tell your girl that she can kick it like the b*** know karate
, hastily followed by zomgroflmao on the Youtube video for Drake's "Forever" instrumental, which is obviously the truth, as it explains the little stop/start couplet mid 2nd verse so perfectly that you couldn't feasibly make that up.
I admit I've taken some inflections over time, perhaps snarling a little bit more than I normally would because that's how so-and-so-personal-hero-in-back-of-my-head might do it, but I go further BACK for musicians to steal ideas from; so, while most rappers are trying to croak like Wayne, I take a little bit of Lou Reed's deadpan sneer thing, or Mark E. Smith's enunciation.
After all, you should always bear in mind, AJ, that most people reviewing hip hop are generally short on memory and even shorter on imagination. If you read the times, you can go back to the 70s or 80s and snatch something fairly unknown, make it brand new, and be called a flogging genius (now if only I had some witty way to add Molly to the end of this sentence).
AJ, and I insist on calling you AJ, cos AJG makes me think of MJG and 8Ball, and it's taking my all to refrain from another “Crunk is Punk” tangential menstruation, my critiques are misplaced, at best; Hyphy, much like it's forebear, Crunk, is very much a genre of music that succeeds on a subconscious level. It's psychosomatic. You hear, you're off the couch, more or less.
The thing that's probably keeping you from exceeding the Soundclick Circuit at this point is that at the end of the day, this song is a bit of a boorish creature, at the end of the night. It's a dullard, it's Buzz J. Killington, complete with the fascinating story about the bridge.
The synths aren't airy enough to have their desired effect of trance-esque halcyon. The punchlines aren't potent enough to warrant cutting the track out from under them. The voice itself has the sense and sensibility of self-satisfaction (4x fast), which strikes as an almost tangible reminder of the sub-par delivery and lyricism.
I imagine the rule of pop music that's truly reveling in its poppiness, like much of the Soulja Boy School of Choruses, is not to make the listener roll his eyes too quickly from a particularly clumsy lyric; my eyes glazed over the moment that alcoholic intoxication was compared in sensation to buckshot removing the back of my skull and the majority of my face... and that was the second line.
Of course, the last time a line turned me off so quickly was Ke$ha, or however you spell it, as she wasted perfectly good Jack Daniels to brush her teeth. So perhaps critical damnation is a good thing sometimes.
Snow, by Artificial Wonders
The Halo Soundtrack...
Think about the Halo Soundtrack for a second. That is the most epic, sweeping collection of orchestral works I've heard in contemporary time. Strings of liquid texture swell upwards, the overture like the tide, rippling over each other, messily and loudly, yet purporting a sense of grandeur and scope nonetheless. Those 15-20 second loops of melancholic chords are emotive and mournful tones, things that affect on an unconscious level.
Isn't that sad, in it's own way, though? That the only recent time one can recall hearing a piece arranged in the classic sense is to provide melodrama to compensate for Master Chief's lack of personality as he rampages across the universe with whatever two guns he can find? That Game Scores in general are the last bastion for a lot of instrumental work that the top 10 minded have grown too impatient to comprehend on its own merits? Maddening.
Still, the respect for the genre is there, as well as understanding for its origins; no one buys ambient music any more, but Konami would still like someone to provide some ambiguous background noise to make James Sunderland jump out of his boy panties while he's tripping over freaks in Silent Hill; I don't think instrumental music has been in the charts since Herbie Hancock did his Head Hunter thing, but that doesn't mean some voiceless drone and fanfare won't fit the thematic bill during a firefight in Alpha Centauri somewhere; Trip Hop hasn't seen real numbers in far longer than the genre deserves, but Hugh Laurie and the rest of the House cast mined and found a little golden nugget to remind us all what we forgot about.
So, while the musical snob in me might wince at the thought of the wayward auteur who cannot sell his wares any other way than to sneak them in through the muzak door, I breathe some minor relief knowing that talented fellas like Parker Files are the ones who have something to say in terms of the direction that muzak is headed.
I first reviewed something by Parker (preferably known as Artificial Wonders) called 3 Bottles, a piece that, in terms of subtlety, sounded equivocal to Trent Reznor remixing the Terminator Soundtrack. And the original one at that. So there were a few cheesy, misplaced synths making themselves known with largess and regrettable volume that took much away from the spirit of the animal itself, which was, at its heart, a very well arranged piece of progressive electronic music.
Skip ahead – me, throwing my chips in during the first week of the Critics Corner contest with a piece described as “obnoxious” at best; me and my finest attempt at the infectious hook.
My song was panned, and I'm glad for it, if truth were told, cos there were better offerings present at the contest, one of which being an Artificial Wonder in the flesh: a short, acoustic piano piece called Snow.
At 1:46, Snow is a startlingly stripped down affair; such makes it stand out in correlation with the other members of that contest as well as with his other work. It begins with higher keys played in staccato succession, a minor echo causing the notes to bleed into each other.
Then it stopped. A pause, and I recognized that familiar knack for drama and tension that truly makes a composer.
It begins again, albeit at a lower octave, with the aid of a single synth string, looming overhead, building ever so slightly in intensity as the two sounds feed off of each other in a swirl of ambient bliss.
It stops again, and that knack for composition hits me again, makes me think the guy's got that mystical “it” that people talk about before I realize that I'm a cynic at heart and I should know better.
The 1:00 mark, it starts again, the piano, even lower, but resonating all the more; the synth, joined by others like it to create harmonics; they sway like the winter winds the song suggests should accompany it.
These last three quarters of a minute are taken in as they must be, in accordance with the song's descriptor - “A Song about Dreams and Aspirations” - and thusly inspire my mind to wander. I picture fields, vast green ones; skies, endlessly blue; cherry blossom trees shedding confetti at their feet; silhouettes of men holding lone hands to crosses perched above them; other images follow and I find myself moved, and wonder aloud when exactly the last time it was that I heard a modern piece of music that MOVED me!
Rather than segue into the diatribe I've been inspired to bark out loudly, I shall instead pat Mr. Wonders on the back. As the track ends with another short succession of high notes and fates into memory, I feel like it cleanses that memory of horrible tunes I've had to withstand, and leaves only things I like, things with a genuine emotional arc, and real chops to back it up. Things like Massive Attack, Brian Eno, and yes, the Halo Soundtrack.
Think about the Halo Soundtrack for a second. That is the most epic, sweeping collection of orchestral works I've heard in contemporary time. Strings of liquid texture swell upwards, the overture like the tide, rippling over each other, messily and loudly, yet purporting a sense of grandeur and scope nonetheless. Those 15-20 second loops of melancholic chords are emotive and mournful tones, things that affect on an unconscious level.
Isn't that sad, in it's own way, though? That the only recent time one can recall hearing a piece arranged in the classic sense is to provide melodrama to compensate for Master Chief's lack of personality as he rampages across the universe with whatever two guns he can find? That Game Scores in general are the last bastion for a lot of instrumental work that the top 10 minded have grown too impatient to comprehend on its own merits? Maddening.
Still, the respect for the genre is there, as well as understanding for its origins; no one buys ambient music any more, but Konami would still like someone to provide some ambiguous background noise to make James Sunderland jump out of his boy panties while he's tripping over freaks in Silent Hill; I don't think instrumental music has been in the charts since Herbie Hancock did his Head Hunter thing, but that doesn't mean some voiceless drone and fanfare won't fit the thematic bill during a firefight in Alpha Centauri somewhere; Trip Hop hasn't seen real numbers in far longer than the genre deserves, but Hugh Laurie and the rest of the House cast mined and found a little golden nugget to remind us all what we forgot about.
So, while the musical snob in me might wince at the thought of the wayward auteur who cannot sell his wares any other way than to sneak them in through the muzak door, I breathe some minor relief knowing that talented fellas like Parker Files are the ones who have something to say in terms of the direction that muzak is headed.
I first reviewed something by Parker (preferably known as Artificial Wonders) called 3 Bottles, a piece that, in terms of subtlety, sounded equivocal to Trent Reznor remixing the Terminator Soundtrack. And the original one at that. So there were a few cheesy, misplaced synths making themselves known with largess and regrettable volume that took much away from the spirit of the animal itself, which was, at its heart, a very well arranged piece of progressive electronic music.
Skip ahead – me, throwing my chips in during the first week of the Critics Corner contest with a piece described as “obnoxious” at best; me and my finest attempt at the infectious hook.
My song was panned, and I'm glad for it, if truth were told, cos there were better offerings present at the contest, one of which being an Artificial Wonder in the flesh: a short, acoustic piano piece called Snow.
At 1:46, Snow is a startlingly stripped down affair; such makes it stand out in correlation with the other members of that contest as well as with his other work. It begins with higher keys played in staccato succession, a minor echo causing the notes to bleed into each other.
Then it stopped. A pause, and I recognized that familiar knack for drama and tension that truly makes a composer.
It begins again, albeit at a lower octave, with the aid of a single synth string, looming overhead, building ever so slightly in intensity as the two sounds feed off of each other in a swirl of ambient bliss.
It stops again, and that knack for composition hits me again, makes me think the guy's got that mystical “it” that people talk about before I realize that I'm a cynic at heart and I should know better.
The 1:00 mark, it starts again, the piano, even lower, but resonating all the more; the synth, joined by others like it to create harmonics; they sway like the winter winds the song suggests should accompany it.
These last three quarters of a minute are taken in as they must be, in accordance with the song's descriptor - “A Song about Dreams and Aspirations” - and thusly inspire my mind to wander. I picture fields, vast green ones; skies, endlessly blue; cherry blossom trees shedding confetti at their feet; silhouettes of men holding lone hands to crosses perched above them; other images follow and I find myself moved, and wonder aloud when exactly the last time it was that I heard a modern piece of music that MOVED me!
Rather than segue into the diatribe I've been inspired to bark out loudly, I shall instead pat Mr. Wonders on the back. As the track ends with another short succession of high notes and fates into memory, I feel like it cleanses that memory of horrible tunes I've had to withstand, and leaves only things I like, things with a genuine emotional arc, and real chops to back it up. Things like Massive Attack, Brian Eno, and yes, the Halo Soundtrack.
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