#i have my music player on shuffle and it's not separated by genre or artists or anything

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

I'm back at it again with another question.

Feel free to tell me to stop sending questions 👍

In spirit of spotify wrapped coming out recently.

Favorite music genre/songs?

i'm afraid i'm the kind of fucker whose music taste is literally anything except what i dislike. y'know like- i can't tell you a specific genre or song bc i like a wide range of stuff, even from genres were the songs i do dislike are from. so uh- yeah lmao

if it counts for anything, i'm very partial to listening to game soundtracks, even when not as background music. like i have stuff from genshin in my music player, that's how bad it gets. i also did have my vocaloid phase but i don't think that's all that surprising. i never did have an emo/punk/alt/scene phase though. i don't think i've ever listened to a single thing by mitski and all the things i've heard from lana del rey have been against my will (like- someone else had the aux). same thing with mcr.

i was a 'the music we played in the car were my parent's cds and or prefered radio stations, which were stuff from the 80s' kind of kid, so

yeah, sorry i can't provide a definitive answer LMAO

[dustedmagazine]

Dusted Mid-Year Round-Up: Part 2, Dr. Pete Larson to  Young Slo-Be

James Brandon Lewis

The mid-year exchange continues with the second half of the alphabet and another round of Dusted writers reviewing other people’s favorite records.  Today’s selection runs the gamut from Afro-beat to hip hop to experimental music and includes some of this year’s best jazz records.  Check out part one if you missed it yesterday.  

Dr. Pete Larson and His Cytotoxic Nyatiti Band — Damballah (Dagoretti Records)

Damballah by Dr. Pete Larson and his Cytotoxic Nyatiti Band

Who Picked it? Mason Jones

Did we review it? No, but Jennifer Kelly said about his previous record, “It’s authentic not to some musicological conception of what nyatiti music should sound like, but to the instincts and proclivities of the musicians involved.”

Bryon Hayes’ take:

Judging from Jenny’s review, Dr. Pete Larson hasn’t really changed his modus operandi much since last year’s self-titled release. Well, he has appeared to have dropped vocalist Kat Steih and drummer Tom Hohman, who aren’t credited with an appearance on Damballah. Sonically, this album feels more polished than its predecessor. There’s a richness that was lacking before, a sense of clarity that Larson seems to have added here. He still hypnotizes with his nyatiti but doesn’t lose himself behind the other players. That sense of mesmerizing repetition of short passages on the resonant lute-like instrument is what sets the music of the Cytotoxic Nyatiti Band apart from other rock groups who play in the psychedelic vein. It’s easy to get lost in the intricate plucking patterns as the guitars and synths swirl about. The rhythms bounce cleverly against those created by the percussion, anchoring the songs to solid ground. Balancing the airy and the earthy, Dr. Peter Larson and His Cytotoxic Nyatiti Band create a cosmic commotion perfect for contemplation. 

 James Brandon Lewis / Red Lily Quintet — Jesup Wagon (TAO Forms)

Jesup Wagon by James Brandon Lewis / Red Lily Quintet

Who recommended it? Derek Taylor

Did we review it? Yes, Derek said, “’Fallen Flowers’ and ‘Seer’ contain sections of almost telepathic convergence, the former and the closing ‘Chemurgy’ culminating in Lewis’ spoken words inculcating the import of his subject.” 

Tim Clarke’s take:

Tenor saxophonist and composer James Brandon Lewis demonstrates his control of the instrument in the opening moments of Jesup Wagon’s title track. Before his Red Lily Quintet bandmates join the fray, he alternates between hushed ululations and full-blooded honks, inviting the listener to lean in conspiratorially. Once the rest of the band fire up, cornet player Kirk Knuffke, bassist William Parker, cellist Chris Hoffman and drummer Chad Taylor lock into a loose, muscular shuffle. Their collective chemistry is immediately evident, and each player has the opportunity to shine across this diverse set’s 50-minute runtime. I’m particularly drawn to the rapid-fire rhythmic runs on “Lowlands of Sorrow,” the gorgeous cello on “Arachis,” and the spacious, mbira-laced “Seer.” There’s something about the mournful horn melody of the final piece, “Chemurgy,” that sends me back to first hearing Ornette Coleman’s “Lonely Woman” — and, just like that, I’m excited about the prospect of exploring jazz again, for the first time in a long time. Great pick, Derek.

 Roscoe Mitchell & Mike Reed — The Ritual And The Dance (Astral Spirits) 

the Ritual and the Dance by Roscoe Mitchell & Mike Reed

Who recommended it? Derek Taylor

Did we review it? Yes, Derek wrote, “Roscoe Mitchell remains an improvisational force to be reckoned with.”

Andrew Forell’s take:

For 17-plus minutes, Roscoe Mitchell solos on his soprano with barely a pause, the rush of notes powered by circular breathing, as drummer Mike Reed’s controlled clatter counterpoints Mitchell’s exploration of his instrument’s range and tonal qualities in what sounds like a summation of his long career at the outer edge of jazz. It‘s an extraordinary beginning to this performance, recorded live in 2015. On first listen it sounds chaotic, but shapes emerge in Mitchell’s sound, and Reed’s combination of density and silence complements, punctuates and supports in equal measure. After an incisive solo workout from Reed combining clanging metal and rolling toms, Mitchell swaps to tenor and the pace changes. Longer, slower notes, a rougher, reed heavy tone and a lighter touch from Reed. Having not closely followed Mitchell’s work since his days in The Art Ensemble Of Chicago, this performance was a revelation and will have me searching back through his catalog.     

The Notwist — Vertigo Days (Morr Music)

Vertigo Days by The Notwist

Who recommended it? Tim Clarke

Did we review it?  Yes, Tim said, “The Notwist really know how to structure a front-to-back listening experience, and this is emphatically a work of art best appreciated as a whole.”

Arthur Krumins’ take: 

In his review of Vertigo Days, Tim Clarke highlights the “multiple layers of drifting, shifting instrumentation.” It is an album that seems unbound by adherence to a set instrument lineup, and it moves quickly between moods both frenetic and contemplative. However, due to a careful mixing and an unforced approach to genre expectations, it is a surprising and varied listen that bears repeated scrutiny. The touchstones of the sound are at times the motorik beat of krautrock, at others the ethereal indie pop of their melodies and the quality of their singing. It feels like the perfect quirky coffee shop album, just out there enough to create a vibe, but tactful enough to take you along for the ride.

  Dorothea Paas — Anything Can’t Happen (Telephone Explosion)

Anything Can't Happen by Dorothea Paas

Who picked it? Arthur Krumins.

Did we review it? No. 

Eric McDowell’s take:

In one sense, it’s fair to say that Dorothea Paas’s debut album opens with a false start: A single note sounded and then retreated from, fingers sliding up and down the fretboard with the diffidence of a throat clearing. Yet what gesture could more perfectly introduce an album so marked by uncertainty, vulnerability, and naked self-assessment? 

If Anything Can’t Happen is an open wound, it’s a wound Paas willingly opens: “I’m not lonely now / Doing all the things I want to and working on my mind / Sorting through old thoughts.” That doesn’t make the pain any less real — though it does make it more complex. “It’s so hard to trust again / When you can’t even trust yourself,” Paas sings on the utterly compelling title track, her gaze aiming both inward and outward. Elsewhere she admits: “I long for a body closer to mine / But I don’t want to seek, I just want to find.” Instrumentally, Paas and her bandmates manage to temper an inclination toward static brooding with propulsive forward motion, a balance that suits the difficult truth — or better yet, difficult truce — the album arrives at in the climactic “Frozen Window”: “How can I open to love again, like a plant searches for light through a frozen window? / Can I be loved, or is it all about control? / I will never know until I start again.” In the spirit of starting again, Anything Can’t Happen ends with a doubling down on the opening prelude, reprising and extending it — no false start to be found. 

 Dominic Pifarely Quartet — Nocturnes (Clean Feed) 

Nocturnes by Dominique Pifarély Quartet

Who recommended it? Jason Bivins

Did we review it? No 

Derek Taylor’s take: 

Pifarely and I actually go way back in my listening life, specifically to Acoustic Quartet, an album the French violinist made for ECM as a co-leader with countryman clarinetist Louis Sclavis in 1994. Thirty-something at the time, his vehicle for that venture was an improvising chamber ensemble merging classical instrumentation and extended techniques with jazz and folk derived influences. The results, playful and often exhilaratingly acrobatic, benefited greatly from austere ECM house acoustics. Nearly three decades distant, Nocturnes is a different creature, delicate and darker hued in plumage and less enamored of melody, harmony and rhythm, at least along conventional measures. Drones and other textures are regular elements of the interplay between the leader’s strings, the piano of Antonin Rayon and the sparse braiding and shadings of bassist Bruno Chevillon and drummer Francois Merville. Duos also determine direction, particular on the series of titular miniatures that are as much about space as they are centered in sound. It’s delightful to get reacquainted after so much time apart.  

The Reds Pinks & Purples — Uncommon Weather (Slumberland/Tough Love)

Uncommon Weather by The Reds, Pinks & Purples

Who picked it? Jennifer Kelly

Did we review it? Yes, Jennifer said, “Uncommon Weather is undoubtedly the best of the Reds, Pinks & Purples discs so far, an album that is damned near perfect without seeming to try very hard.”   

Bill Meyer’s take:

Sometimes a record hits you where you live. Glenn Donaldson’s too polite to do you any harm, but he not only knows where you live, he knows your twin homes away from home, the record store and the club where you measure your night by how many bands’ sets separate you from last call. He knows the gushing merch-table mooches and the old crushes that casually bring the regulars down, and he also knows how to make records just like the ones that these folks have been listening to since they started making dubious choices. Uncommon Weather sounds like a deeply skilled recreation of early, less chops-heavy Bats, and if that description makes sense to you, so will this record.

 claire rousay — A Softer Focus (American Dreams Records)

a softer focus by Claire Rousay

Who picked it? Bryon Hayes  

Did we review it? Yes, Bryon Hayes wrote, “These field recordings of the mundane, when coupled with the radiance of the musical elements, are magical.”  

Ian Mathers’ take:  

In a weird way (because they are very different works from very different artists), A Softer Focus reminds me a bit of Robert Ashley’s Private Parts (The Album). Both feel like the products of deep focus and concentration but wear their rigor loosely, and both feel like beautifully futile attempts to capture or convey the rich messiness of human experience. But although there is a musicality to Private Parts, Ashley is almost obsessed by language and language acts, and even though the human voice is more present than ever in rousay’s work (not just sampled or field recorded, but outright albeit technologically smeared singing on a few tracks) it feels like it reaches to a place in that experience beyond words. The first few times I played it I had moments where I was no longer sure exactly what part of what I was hearing were coming from my speakers versus from outside my apartment, and as beautiful as the more conventional ambient/drone aspects of A Softer Focus are (including the cello and violin heard throughout), it’s that kind of intoxicating disorientation, of almost feeling like I’m experiencing someone else’s memory, that’s going to stay with me the longest. 

 M. Sage — The Wind Of Things (Geographic North)

The Wind of Things by M. Sage

Who recommended it? Bryon Hayes

Did we review it? No

Bill Meyer’s take:

Matthew Sage’s hybrid music gets labeled as ambient by default. Sure, it’s gentle enough to be ignorable, but Sage’s combination of ruminative acoustic playing (mostly piano and guitar, with occasional seasoning from reeds, violin, banjo, and percussion) and memory-laden field recordings feels so personal that it’s hard to believe he’d really be satisfied with anyone treating this stuff as background music. But that combination of the placid and the personal may also be The Wind of Things’ undoing since it’s a bit too airy and undemonstrative to make an impression.

 Skee Mask — Pool (Ilian Tape)

ITLP09 Skee Mask - Pool by Skee Mask

Who picked it? Patrick Masterson

Did we review it? No 

Robert Ham’s take:

Pool is an appropriate title for the new album by Munich electronic artist Bryan Müller. The record is huge and deep, with its 18 tracks clocking in at around 103 minutes. And Müller has pointedly only released the digital version of Pool through Bandcamp, adding it a little hurdle to fans who just want to pick and choose from its wares for their playlists. Dipping one’s toes in is an option, but the only way to truly appreciate the full effect is to dive on in. 

Though Müller filled Pool up with around five years’ worth of material, the album plays like the result of great deliberation. It flows with the thoughtfulness and intention of an adventurous DJ set, with furious breakbeat explosions like “Breathing Method” making way for the languorous ambient track “Ozone” and the unbound “Rio Dub.” Then, without warning, the drum ‘n’ bass breaks kick in for a while. 

The full album delights in those quick shifts into new genres or wild seemingly disparate sonic connections happening within the span of a single song. But again, these decisions don’t sound like they were made carelessly. Müller took some time with this one to get the track list just right. But if there is one thread that runs along the entirety of Pool, it is the air of joy that cuts through even its downcast moments. The splashing playfulness is refreshing and inviting.

 Speaker Music — Soul-Making Theodicy (Planet Mu)

Soul-Making Theodicy by Speaker Music

Who picked it? Mason Jones

Did we review it? No 

Robert Ham’s take:

The process by which DeForrest Brown Jr., the artist known as Speaker Music, created his latest EP sounds almost as exciting as the finished music. If I understand it correctly — and I’m not entirely sure that I do — he created rhythm tracks using haptic synths, a Push sequencer, and a MIDI keyboard, that he sent through Ableton and performed essentially a live set of abstract beats informed by free jazz, trap and marching band. Or as Brown calls them “stereophonic paintings.” 

Whatever term you care to apply to these tracks and however they were made, the experience of listening to them is a dizzying one. A cosmic high that takes over the synapses and vibrates them until your vision becomes blurry and your word starts to smear together like fog on a windshield. Listening to this EP on headphones makes the experience more vertiginous if, like I did, you try to unearth the details and sounds buried within the centerpiece track “Rhythmatic Music For Speakers,” a 33-minute symphony of footwork stuttering and polyrhythms. Is that the sound of an audience responding to this sensory overload that I hear underneath it all? Or is that wishful imaginings coming from a mind hungry for the live music experience? 

 The Telescopes — Songs of Love And Revolution (Tapete) 

Songs Of Love And Revolution by the telescopes

Who recommended it? Robert Ham

Did we review it? No. 

Andrew Forell’s take:

Songs Of Love And Revolution glides along on murky subterranean rhythms that evoke Mo Tucker’s heartbeat toms backed with thick bowel-shaking bass lines. Somewhere in the murk Stephen Lawrie’s murmured vocals barely surface as he wrings squalls of noise from his guitar to create a dissonant turmoil to contrast the familiarity of what lies beneath. The effect is at once hypnotic and joltingly thrilling, similar to hearing Jesus And Mary Chain for the first time but played a at pace closer to Bedhead. A kind of slowcore shoegaze, its mystery enhanced by what seems deliberately monochrome production that forces and rewards close attention. When they really let go on “We See Magic And We Are Neutral, Unnecessary” it hits like The Birthday Party wrestling The Stooges. So yeah, pretty damn good.

 Leon Vynehall — Rare, Forever (Ninja Tune)

Rare, Forever by LEON VYNEHALL

Who recommended it? Patrick Masterson

Did we review it? No. 

Jason Bivins’ take: 

I was amused to see Leon Vynehall’s album tucked into the expansive “Unknown genre” non-category. This is, as is often the case with these mid-year exchanges, a bit far afield from the kind of music I usually spin. Much of it is, I suppose, rooted in house music. Throughout these tracks, there are indeed some slinky beats that’ll get you nodding your head while prepping the dinner or while studying in earnest. There’s plenty to appreciate on the level of grooves and patterns, but he closer you listen, the more subversive, sneaky details you notice. The opening “Ecce! Ego!” isn’t quite as brash as the title would suggest, featuring some playfully morphed voices, old school synth patches and snatches of instrumentalism. But after just a couple minutes, vast cosmic sounds start careening around your brainpan while a metal bar drops somewhere in the audial space. Did that just happen? you wonder as the groove continues. Moments of curiosity and even discomfort are plopped down, sometimes as transitions (like the closing vocal announcement on “In>Pin” — “like a moth” — that introduces the echo-canyon of “Mothra”) but usually as head-scrambling curveballs. Startled voices or flutes or subterranean sax bubble up from beneath deep house thrum, then are gone in ways that are arresting and deceptive. I still don’t know what to make of the lounge-y closing to “Snakeskin – Has-Been” or the unexpected drone monolith of “Farewell! Magnus Gabbro.” In its way, Vynehall’s music is almost like what you’d get if Graham Lambkin or Jason Lescalleet made a house record. Pretty rich stuff.

 Michael Winter — single track (Another Timbre)

single track by Michael Winter

Who recommended it? Eric McDowell 

Did we review it? Not yet! 

Mason Jones’ take: 

Over its 45 minutes, Michael Winter’s 2015 composition slowly accelerates and accumulates, starting from an isolated violin playing slightly arrhythmic, single fast strokes. The playing, centered around a single root note, seems almost random, but flashes of melodic clusters make it clear they're not. After nine minutes other players have joined in and there's a developing drone, as things sort of devolve, with atonal combinations building. By the one-third mark everything has slowed down significantly, and the players are blending together, with fewer melodies standing out. Instead, it's almost more drone than not; and at a half hour in, most of the strings have been reduced to slowly changing tones. As we near the end we’re hearing beautiful layers of string drones, descending into the final few minutes of nearly static notes. It's an intriguing and oddly listenable composition given its atonality. The early moments bring to mind Michael Nyman, and the later movements summon thoughts of Tony Conrad and La Monte Young, but it's clearly different from any of them, and more than the sum of those parts.

 Young Slo-Be — Red Mamba (KoldGreedy Entertainment / Thizzler On The Roof)

Who picked it? Ray Garraty 

Did we review it? No. 

Ian Mathers’ take: 

The 12 tracks on Red Mamba fly by in a little over 27 minutes (not a one breaks the three-minute mark) but the result doesn’t feel slight so much as pared down to a sharpness you might cut yourself on. Stockon’s Young Slo-Be only seems to have one flow (or maybe it’d be more accurate to say he only seems interested in one) but he knows how to wield it with precision and force, and if the subject matter hews closely to the accepted canon of gangbanger concerns, Slo-Be delivers it all with vivid language and the studied, superior disdain of an older brother explaining the world to you and busting your chops at the same time. The tracks on Red Mamba all come from different producers, but Slo-Be consistently chooses spectral, eerie, foreboding backgrounds for these songs, even when adding piano and church bells (on “Asshole”), dog barks (“21 Thoughts”) or even Godfather-esque strings (the closing “Rico Swavo”). What’s the old line about the strength of street knowledge? These are different streets, and different knowledge.

[nostalgiaultrame]

A relative unknown at the time, Jon Hopkins emerged as an artist in his own right on his fourth full-length release with an album that broke down the significant wall dividing electronic/techno music from a mainstream audience. It feels difficult to comprehend the impression that Immunity left upon me when I first heard it back in the summer of 2013. That impact exists now as a collection of thoughts and emotions, linked to experiences from a personally tumultuous year. It became my long player of the year; not only my favourite release but the one that got the most consistent play as the months went on and winter approached. Despite dozens of other albums competing for my attention, Immunity continued to linger in the mind. I know I’m not alone in regard to that impact. Immunity is an album whose reputation precedes it, now even more so than it did during that long summer. At the time, you might’ve checked it out because a friend of a friend was singing its praises, or you’d glance over someone’s shoulder on the tube in morning rush hour to see them listening to it (my wandering eye spotted this on several occasions). Or better yet, how its slow-burner status was confirmed once it bagged a Mercury Music Prize nomination and the predictable spike in sales solidified a burgeoning love for an album that already had the formations of a stone cold contemporary classic. Immunity bulldozed virtually every other album released in 2013 in its ability to straddle that revered space where artistic vision and commercial success amalgamate without even so much as a whiff of compromise. That it resonated as much as it did was mostly a surprise, not least of all to Hopkins; it appeared seemingly out of nowhere and only built on its success as time went on. I can think of perhaps no other electronic release this decade that has achieved the same success without intentionally playing to the kind of audience the label might market it to. (Grimes’ Visions has arguably a more enduring legacy than Immunity, but not even the most hardcore Claire Boucher fan can say the superb Art Angels wasn’t conceived as more accessible in response to Visions’ breakthrough success.) Compare some of the other releases of 2013 with Immunity and it’s easy to see how it stands alone as a sort of outlier, hallmarked within strict perimeters of Hopkins’ fascination with sound design, a technique he employs throughout every track that can only be described as a ‘sensory overload.’ There are most likely two caveats when it comes to finding a worthy 2013 release to compare to Immunity’s reputation. In my experience (cross-referencing to jog my memory of a specific time, place and even an album’s cultural clout in 2013), all came up short. Firstly, there are those that no doubt matched the artistry of Hopkins’ larger than life ambitions, yet quite understandably, were too obtuse to make ripples beyond the pool of those within esoteric earshot (Amygdala, R Plus Seven, Tomorrow’s Harvest). Secondly, there are those albums that felt borne of the weight of commercial expectation and succeeded, managing to deliver healthy sales, news features and, by 2018, reverence as cult albums amongst a select group of devout diehards (The Bones Of What You Believe, Random Access Memories and, most notably, Settle). All of these releases were big news in some way in 2013, the final three managing to achieve particular acclaim for crossing over genres and blurring the distinction between indie, rock, dance and synth-pop. What can we learn from Immunity by comparing it with these other albums and Hopkins’ ability to communicate beyond the usual artist/audience relationship? Was it all pure luck? Usually a couple of the hits from Settle or Random Access Memories will find their way onto most people’s Spotify playlists; a Latch here or a Get Lucky there. It might be less common for those listeners to know the albums back to front, and almost certainly not in the case of R Plus Seven. Even Immunity falls into that trap, yet there are a number of clues as to its enduring appeal and why such a relatively large audience connected with an hour-long electronic album almost devoid of vocals. Hopkins is a classically-trained pianist and his piano playing comes to the fore on numerous tracks on Immunity, the most arresting of which is Abandon Window. Technically the album’s showstopper, it takes a heartbreaking piano motif to its core and fuses it with the sound of distant erupting fireworks in its second half. It’s difficult to know what kind of emotional reaction we’re meant to take from Abandon Window, but maybe that’s the whole point? We can take what we want from an album that is more concerned with pushing the boundaries on sound content, leaving us to focus purely on our emotional response. The lack of vocals throughout the majority of the album feel in part responsible for creating this strong reaction in a large number of listeners. Devoid of that most instantaneous and human of responses to popular music, the listener is forced to have an internal reaction over an external one. We cannot sing along to Immunity; we may nod and hum or tap our feet, but its cerebral and hypnotic rhythms reflect a desire to solve one of its most common themes; the harmony that arises from the discord of its rhythmic melodies and archaic stop-start programming. Within it evolves a kind of beauty out of madness. It’s like solving a mathematical problem in our heads and slowly making sense of its garbled information overload, problems that become more familiar as we learn how to trapeze through Hopkins’ den of mystery and intrigue. Hopkins is fascinated with the pure essence of sound and how it can be manipulated. Immunity was recorded over a nine month period in his east London studio and the confident, jagged instrumentation of most of the album’s ‘upbeat’ tracks reflect not only a remarkable tactility but pure joy in the power of creation. Second track Open Eye Signal is arguably Hopkins’ most popular and enduring song. It captures perfectly the album’s technique of sustained delay and release, accruing tension ever so slowly with each passing wave of noise until it become so strong that everything building up behind it cascades forward, tumbling down in a glorious, shimmering mess of glitchy, fragmented distortion. Its melodies are distinct and minuscule, yet our brains are wired to group them together into larger blocks that click together like a Jenga tower. Working better as a motif, they function like small shards of glass reflecting light at an infinite number of angles, repeating and recurring with emphasis placed at key points to drive forth a particular mood or feeling. Hopkins manages to sew them together so intricately and so beautifully that they work just as well as modern pop music. It’s impossible to listen to Open Eye Signal (or its sister track Collider) without thinking about Hopkins’ intentions in the same way one might feel Kubrick or Scorsese lurking in their mind whilst watching Barry Lyndon or Taxi Driver; the director’s vision is so apparent that it affects every frame, even more so at intervals where a pinnacle thought or idea begins to crest. Immunity’s position as a landmark album this decade is thrown into even starker contrast when we consider its successor, Singularity. Released a few weeks ago, the weight of expectation surrounding Singularity was intense, so much so that it landed within the top ten of the official UK album charts (Immunity peaked at 63). Reaction has been strong with critical accolades aplenty (no doubt a Mercury Prize nomination will follow), yet Singularity feels like more of a shuffle than a stride forward. It’s a product of the reactionary effect of Immunity’s surprise word-of-mouth success. To be fair to Hopkins, Singularity contains many moments of awe, it’s just that they feel indebted to Immunity’s jackpot-hitting formula. As with Grimes, how could it not be? Immunity felt like it had the power to change your life, but no one’s life was changed more so by its success than Hopkins’. Even the titles have an uncanny similar...ity, along with the artwork, and the fact that the first half contains the heavier techno numbers before giving way to more ambient soundscapes. Over time we must come to view both albums as separate works and allow Singularity the distinction of its own merit. Would we be satisfied with anything less than what Hopkins has bestowed upon us? Would we be happier if Hopkins had taken an entirely left turn? Most of us have been waiting patiently for a follow-up to Immunity that captures that same lightning in a bottle, so it feels particularly unfair to criticise him for continuing its sound. His style is one that is hard to pick faults with and Hopkins has stated that Singularity actually contains many studio advancements. Whether you can spot them or even care doesn’t matter. We know that lightning never strikes twice in the same spot and if Singularity feels mildly underwhelming, it stems from the relationship I’ve built with Immunity over the years. Had Immunity never existed, Singularity could be taken of its own accord and we would be freer to make up our own minds about all the same things we did five years ago, but since it is indebted to its predecessor in style and content, we can never know what that might feel like. It will be interesting to see how time continues to shape Immunity and its reputation as a landmark electronic release. Singularity has thrown that into sharp relief this year. If we can deduce anything at this early stage, it’s that the sound Hopkins has carved out across these two albums hints at a bigger picture, something that could be blown wide apart on his next release, and that is definitely an exciting idea to mull over whilst we wait for the next chapter of his journey.

[popentertainmentconcertreviews]

Herb Alpert & Lani Hall – World Café Live – Philadelphia, PA – April 23, 2018

World Café Live took a Tijuana taxi south of the border the other night when legendary trumpeter Herb Alpert and his long-time wife Lani Hall (who used to be the lead singer of Sergio Mendes and Brazil ‘66) shared many of the swinging jazzy compositions from their 50-year plus careers.

Two of the defining lights in popularizing 60s jazz and giving it a Latin vibe, Alpert and Hall (separately, and yet together) mixed swinging jazz beats with traditional Mexican cantina rhythms, pretty much creating the smooth jazz genre (we’ll withhold our opinion on whether that is always a good thing). Alpert and his band The Tijuana Brass was best known for rollicking instrumentals like “Tijuana Taxi,” “The Spanish Flea,” “The Lonely Bull,” “Whipped Cream,” “Rise” and “A Taste of Honey.” (You may not recognize the slightly generic titles, but if you are over 30 undoubtedly you’d recognize each of the songs.) With Sergio Mendes and Brasil ‘66, Hall wrapped her distinctive jazzy vocals over such classics as “Mas Que Nada,” “Like a Lover,” “O Pato,” “The Look of Love” and the superlative cover of the Beatles’ “Fool on the Hill.”

Alpert is a renaissance man, beyond playing on, arranging and producing many albums over the years, he has worn many hats and had many interests. He was the “A” in the venerable record label A&M Records, which introduced the world to many huge artists, including Sergio Mendes, the Carpenters, Cat Stevens, Peter Frampton, Styx, Supertramp, Bryan Adams and Janet Jackson. He also founded another label, Almo Sounds, which is best known for breaking Garbage. Alpert has also been painting for over 50 years – several of his works of art were used as stage backdrops for this concert. (Between the paintings, old photos, vintages clips of their bands, current music videos, etc., this 83-year-old trumpeter schooled many much younger artists on video stage production.)

However, 44 years into their marriage, the couple can still put on one hell of a show.

The concert started with Alpert’s newest video, a commentary piece with a lovely, mostly instrumental take of the Louis Armstrong standard “What a Wonderful World.” Then the band started out with a series of terrific covers, everything from a sultry version of Michael Jackson’s “Human Nature,” to a nearly unrecognizable jazz re-up of Van Morrison’s “Moondance.”

Alpert was a terrific host, good naturedly cracking wise at himself – “There I am before I started dying my hair gray,” he said, pointing to a photo of himself in the 60s. When Alpert took lead vocals on one of the few songs he ever sang, “This Guy’s in Love with You,” he also openly acknowledged his vocal limitations. He also took questions from the audience about his long career. These included telling a story which was both funny and tragic at the same time, about one instance when Alpert loaned a trumpet to his good friend Chet Baker, who was going through some hard times and needed it to make a new recording. Baker (best known for “Let’s Get Lost” and “Almost Blue”) was a brilliant player whose career never reached the heights deserved because he was also an infamous drug addict. Within three days, Baker had pawned the instrument for money to get a fix.

The couple had so many hits that both smashed their biggest classics into medleys. First there was a wonderfully fun mashup of eight of his biggest hits (“Rise” [a 1979 Alpert solo hit], “Whipped Cream,” “The Spanish Flea,” “The Lonely Bull,” “Casino Royale,” “MC's Shuffle,” “Tijuana Taxi” and “A Taste of Honey”). A little later in the show, Hall took center stage for a Brazil ’66 medley (“The Look of Love,” “Upa, Neguinho,” “The Fool on the Hill,” “Never Say Never Again” [a Hall solo joint from the 80s], “Like a Lover” and “Mas que Nada”), with Alpert adding trumpet on some of her songs.

The band also did a wide-ranging and tasteful group of covers, everything from two Beatles songs (“Something” and “Michelle”) to a nice take on Jason Mraz’ new-millennial hit “I’m Yours,” which was accompanied by a charming video exposing men’s adoration and fidelity to the trumpet. There was also a swaying medley of hits by bossa nova legend Antonio Carlos Jobim (including “Aqua de Beber,” “The Waters of March,” “Corvocado,” “One Note Samba,” “The Girl from Ipanema” and more. Alpert and Hall also did show stopping versions of standards like “Bye Bye Blackbird,” “Fly Me to the Moon,” “Putting on the Ritz” and “I’ve Got You Under My Skin.”

It was a sweet and smart old-fashioned show, the kind of thing that you would see in Vegas back when Vegas was still cool. Late in their careers, Alpert and Hall have every right to slow down and maybe even retire, but if the licks are still this hot, why would they possibly want to do that?

Copyright ©2018 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: April 25, 2018.

Photos by Jim Rinaldi © 2018

[surveystodestressme]

102.

1.) in the past, i had a bad habit of leading people on. have you ever been lead on? have you ever lead someone on?[intentionally or not] what do you think of people who do lead others on?

i have been lead on and have also lead people on in the past.  it’s awful and makes the other person feel absolutely terrible about themself so i don’t suggest it.

2.)list all your favorite girl names.

i don’t really have one

3.)list all your favorite boy names.

^^^^

4.)in what ways has your life improved since this time last year? in what ways has your live gotten a little worse[if it has?]?

i mean my life hasn’t really changed significantly since last year. 

5.)what are some of your favorite song lyrics at the moment?

I don’t really have any tbh

6.)have you ever been to college? if so, what for? & did you drop out or complete your major?

I am currently in college and I am going for veterinary technology.  I’m not done yet, i still have 2 years left.

7.)if you go to college or went to college, did you ever have issues with financial aid? what happened?

No issues right now.  Just trying to pay off my loans as quickly as i possibly can.

8.)do you have a job? if so where? & what are your job duties?

I work at a shoe store.  I’m just a sales associate so i just have pretty basic jobs, even though my managers say i’m one of the best employees there and they give me more complex tasks than just standard employees.

9.)if you’re unemployed, are you looking for work? if so, where have you applied to recently?

-

10.)name four favorite fast food restaurants & what you usually order at each one[or instead, favorite food items at each restaurant if you don’t always order the same thing].

steak n shake: a different type of burger and fries, hardees: something different every time, subway: (idek if that count as fast food but oh well) buffalo chicken 6 inch, little ceasars: large pepperoni

11.)name four favorite sit down restaurants & what you usually order at each one[or instead, favorite food items at each restaurant if you don’t always order the same thing].

wingstop: 10 mango habanero traditional wings with a basket of fries, noodles and company: pesto mac, avantis: something different every time, flattop: its a make your own stir fry restaurant so usually something different every time

12.)would you say you’re more close minded or open minded? is there anyone in your family or group of friends you’d consider close minded? if so, does it ever bother you?

i try to be more open minded.  i don’t really know many close minded people. 

13.)if any, what movie previews have you seen recently that looked really good?

A quiet place

14.)post two favorite pictures of you.

-

15.)put your iPod or itunes or music player on shuffle & list the first 15 songs.

Been to hell- Hollywood undead, No one- Alicia Keys, Drive by- Train, Separate Ways- Journey, Never stop- Safetysuit, Your Guardian angel- red jumpsuit aparatus, take a bow- rihanna, you don’t see me- safetysuit, vicious love- new found glory, ice cream paintjob- dorrough, before you start your day- twenty one pilots, knock you down- keri wilson, hear me now- hollywood undead, two is better than one- boys like girls, sleepwalking- this wild life

16.)of the above songs listed, which one(or ones) are your favorite?

this wild life and separate ways

17.)if you’ve ever been in a relationship, which one(assuming you’ve been in more than one) was the hardest breakup, & which relationship was the biggest learning experience? if you’ve never been in a relationship, do you like anyone right now? if so, do you think it’ll go anywhere with the person you like?

the hardest break up was the person i dated directly before the person i’m currently with.  basically, out relationship was really toxic and she was very controlling.  she would get mad anytime i did something that made me happy.  we fought all the time and even though i loved her very much, i could not continue to put myself through something like that

18.)what’s the meaning of your first name?

no idea

19.)what’s the meaning of your middle name?

no idea

20.) have you ever moved to a different state? if so, how many different states did you live in? & did you ever move back to your homestate for whatever reason?

still live in my  home state

21.)in your life, who have you made the most sacrifices for? in the end, would you say it was worth it?

probably my boyfriend.  and he is more than worth it

22.)the last movie you watched, what was it about?

oh idk i’ve been watching a bunch of horror movies on netflix and they’ve all been bad lol so it doesn’t matter

23.)who would you say is or was the meanest person in your family? & what about them exactly makes them the meanest?

my brother.  he likes to pick on people and then gets really mean and violent when they’re not okay with him being a dick

24.)post a picture of you from 3 years ago if you have one.

-

25.)what’s your opinion of todays modern music? do you prefer newer or older music?

i 100% prefer older music.

26.)how many of your favorite bands’ albums do you have on cd?

none

27.)what are some tattoos you want?(if any)

I have way too many ideas haha i want to cover my legs in animal tats

28.)what are some piercings you want?(if any)

I maybe want my nose double pierced and a bunch of ear piercings

29.)in your opinion, have you changed for the better?

definitely

30.)do you ever let your emotions get the best of you?

most of the time, honestly

31.)what is the most fucked up movie you’ve seen? what made it so fucked up?

I’ve heard cannibal Holocaust is fucked up

32.)if you like a variety of music, list 5 different bands or artists, each of a different genre & then name what genre of music they play. if you don’t, list your five favorites at the moment.

50 cent- rap, Alice in chains- old school rock?(maybe), avril lavgine- pop, blake shelton- country, five finger death punch- ????

33.)last person you got into an arguement with? who was the last person you fought with physically?

Jack is the last person i was in an argument with and i haven’t physically fought anyone since my sister was home from the military and it was her lol