#while most electric strings players come from a violin background

[srah-the-violist]

I'd love to hear about your music!!! :0 Can you tell me about the Walton Studio Version WIP?

Of course! This project is in the idea phase right now, do I don't have anything to show, but it's something I'm hoping to start working on soon!

The main project is a (home) studio recording of the classical Walton Viola Concerto on my electric viola with funky effects. (It was on my recent recital, but I didn't get the full concerto in the recording, which is a shame.) I think that having a polished recording of an electric rendition of a prestigious viola concerto that showcases the extended expressive capabilities of electric strings would be a pretty important scholarly step for electric strings, so it's an exciting project to work on!

[fuckheadwitha]

Listening to Rolling Stone's Top 500 Albums of All Time

Rolling Stone released an updated list of their top 500 albums of all time and being trapped in the purgatory of covid quarantine this seems like the perfect moment to tackle what an almost completely irrelevant former counter-culture institution has to say about music (we can’t actually blame Rolling Stone for this list, a huge number of musicians and critics voted to make it). I am going to listen to every single one of these, all the way through, with a level of attention that's not super intense but I'm definitely not having them on in the background as simple aural wallpaper. Two caveats though: I can make an executive decision to skip any album if I feel the experience is sufficiently miserable, and I'm also going to be skipping the compilation albums that I feel aren't really worth slots (best ofs, etc.). In addition, I will be ordering them as I go, creating a top 500 of the top 500 (it will be less than 500 since we've already established I'm skipping some of these).

Here are 500-490:

#500 Arcade Fire - Funeral

I can already tell I'm going to be at odds with this list if one of the most important albums of my high school years is at the bottom. That being said, I haven't actually given this whole thing a listen since probably the early 2010s, before Arcade Fire fatigue set in and the hipsterati appointed band of a generation just kinda seemed to fade from popular consciousness. I actually dreaded re-experiencing it, since the synthesis of anthemic rock and quirky folk instrumentation which Arcade Fire brought mainstream has now become the common shorthand of insufferable spotify friendly folk pop. Blessedly, the first half of the album easily holds up, largely propelled by dirty fast rhythm guitar, orchestration that's tuneful rather than obnoxious, and lyrics which come off as earnest rather than pretentious. The middle gets a little sappy and “Crown of Love”, a song I definitely used to like, really starts the grate. And then we get to “Wake Up”, whose cultural saturation spawned thousands of dorky indie rock outfits that confused layered strings and horns with power and meaning. This song definitely hasn't survived the film trailers and commercials which it so ubiquitously overlayed, but the line about "a million little gods causing rainstorms, turning every good thing to rust" still attacks the part of my brain capable of sincere emotion. This album is probably going to hold the top spot for a while, because although so many elements of Funeral that made it feel so meaningful, that made it stand out so much in 2004, have been seamlessly assimilated into an intellectually and emotionally bankrupt indie pop industrial complex, the album itself still has a genuine vulnerability and bangers that still manage to rip.

#499

Rufus, Chaka Khan - Ask Rufus

Before she became a name in her own right, Chaka Khan was the voice of the band Rufus, and it’s definitely her voice that shines amongst some spritely vibey funk. That’s not to say that these aren’t some jams on their own. “At Midnight” is a banging opener with a sprint to the finish, and although the explicitly named but kinda boring “Slow Screw Against the Wall” feels weak, this wasn’t really supposed to be an album of barn burners. This was something people put on their vinyl record players while they chilled on vinyl furniture after a night of doing cocaine. “Everlasting Love” is a bop with a bassline like a Sega Genesis game, and the twinkling piano on “Hollywood” adds a playful levity to lyrics that are supposed to be both tackily optimistic about making it big out in LA and subtly realistic about the kind of nightmare world showbiz can be. “Better Days” is another track that manages to be a bittersweet jam with a catchy sour saxophone and playful synths under Chaka Khan’s vamping. This album definitely belongs on a ‘chill funk to study and relax to’ playlist.

#498

Suicide - Suicide

We’ve hit the first album that could be rightly called a progenitor for multiple genres that followed it. Someone could say there’s a self-serving element of this being on a Rolling Stone list (the band was one of the first to adopt the label ‘Punk’ after seeing it in a Lester Bangs article) but the album’s legacy is basically indisputable. EBM, industrial, punk, post-punk, new wave, new whatever all have a genealogy that connects to Suicide, and it’s easy to hear the band in everything that followed. But what the band actually is is two guys, one with an electric organ and one with a spooky voice, doing spooky simple riffs and saying spooky simple things. Simplicity is definitely not a dis here. The opener “Ghost Rider” makes a banger out of four notes and one instrument, and the refrain ‘America America is killing its youth’ is really all the lyrical complexity you need to fucking get it. “Cheree” and “Girl” have almost identical lyrics (‘oh baby’ vs ‘oh girl’) but “Cheree” is more like a fairy tale and “Girl” is more like a sonic handjob. “Frankie Teardrop” has the audacity to tell a ten minute story with its lyrics, but of course there is intermittent, actually way too loud screaming breaking up the narrative of a guy who loses everything then kills his family and himself. The song is basically a novelty, and I think you can probably say the whole album is a novelty between its brevity and character. But for a bite sized snack this album casts a huge shadow.

#497

Various Artists - The Indestructible Beat of Soweto

The fact that this particular compilation always ends up in the canon has a lot to do with the cultural context it existed in, being America’s first encounter with South African contemporary music during the decline of apartheid (it wouldn’t end until a decade later in 1994 with the country’s first multi-racial elections). Music journos often bring up the fact Ladysmith Black Mambazo, the all male choir singing on the album ender “Nansi Imali”, sang on Paul Simon’s Graceland like their virtue is they helped Paul Simon get over his depression and not, like, the actual music. But also like, how is the actual music? Jams. Ubiquitous, hooky guitars propel the songs along with bright choruses over low lead vocals, but I didn’t expect the synthesizer on the bop “Qhude Manikiniki”, nor the discordant hoedown violin on “Sobabamba”. “Holotelani” is a groove to walk into the sunset to.

#496

Shakira - Donde Estan los Ladrones

So this is the first head scratcher on the list. It’s not like it sucks. And I think I prefer this 90s guitar pop driven spanish language Shakira to modern superstar Shakira. But I mean, it’s an album of late nineties latin pop minivan music, with a thick syrupy middle that doesn’t do anything for me. The opener and closer stand out though.  ‘Ciega, Sordomuda’, one of the biggest pop songs of the 90s (it was #1 on the charts of literally every country in Latin America), has a galloping acoustic guitar and horn hits with Shakira’s vocals at their most percussive.

#495

Boyz II Men - II

So, if you were alive in the 90s you know Boyz II Men were fucking huge, and the worst song on the album is the second track “All Around the World”, basically a love song to their own success, and also the women they’ve banged. You can tell it was written specifically so that the crowd could go fucking wild when they heard their state/city/country mentioned in the song, and I’m not gonna double check but I’m sure they hit all fifty states. Once you’re over that hump though you basically have an hour of songs to fuck to. “U Know” keeps it catchy with propulsive midi guitar and synth horns, “Jezzebel” starts with a skit and ends with a richly layered jazz tune about falling in love on a train, and “On Bended Knee” has a Ragnarok Online type beat. Honestly this album can drag, but you’re not supposed to be listening to it alone in a state of analysis, you’re supposed to have it on during a date that’s going really, really well.

#494

The Ronettes - Presenting the Fabulous Ronettes

A singles compilation of the Ronettes, the only ones I immediately recognized were ‘Be My Baby’ and ‘Going to the Chapel of Love’, the latter of which I didn’t know existed since the version of the song I knew was by the Dixie Cups, which was apparently a source of drama since the Ronettes did it first but producer Phil Spector refused to release it. I feel like as a retro trip to sixties girl groups it’s full of enough songs about breaking up (for example “Breaking Up”) getting back together (for example “Breaking Up”) and wanting to get married but you can’t, because you’re a teenager (“So Young”).

#493

Marvin Gaye - Here, My Dear

This album only exists because Marvin was required by his divorce settlement to make it and provide all of the royalties to his ex-wife and motown executive Anna Gordy Gaye. It’s absolutely bizarre, phoned in mid tempo funk whose lyrics range from the passive aggressive (“This is what you wanted right?”) to the petulant (“Why do I have to pay attorney’s fees?”). There is a seething realness here that crosses well past the border of uncomfortable. I don’t think it’s an amazing album to listen to, but it’s an amazing album to exist: Marvin Gaye is legally obligated to throw his own divorce pity party, and everyone's invited.

#492

Bonnie Raitt - Nick of Time

I have never heard of Bonnie Raitt before but apparently this album won several grammys including album of the year in 1989 and sold 5 million copies, which I guess goes to show that no award provides less long term relevance than the grammys. The story around the album is pretty heartwarming, it was her first massive hit after a career of whiffs, and Bonnie Raitt herself is apparently a social activist and neat human being. I say all this because this sort of 80s country blues rock doesn't really connect with me, but the artist obviously deserves more than that. I unequivocally like the title track though, a hand-clap backed winding electric piano groove about literally finding love before your eggs dry up.

#491

Harry Styles - Fine Line

I do not think I have ever heard a one direction song because I am an adult who only listens to public radio. I’m totally open to pop bands or boy bands or boy band refugee solo artists, but I don’t like anything here. It’s like a mixtape of the worst pop trends of the decade, from glam rock that sounds like it belongs in a car commercial to folky bullshit that sounds like it belongs in a more family focused car commercial. This gets my first DNP (Does Not Place).

#490

Linda Ronstadt - Heart Like a Wheel

Another soft-rock blues and country album which just doesn’t land with me. But the opener “You’re No Good” is like a soul/country hybrid which still goes hard and the title track hits with the lyrics “And it's only love and it's only love / That can wreck a human being and turn him inside out”.

Current Ranking, which is weirdly almost like an inverse of the rolling stones list so far;

[contrabassconversations]

657: Diego Zecharies on launching new projects

Diego Zecharies is one of the most inspiring musicians I know. In addition to serving as principal bass of the Galicia Symphony, director of the Contrabajo de Montevideo festival, and director for the Orquesta Juvenil Sodre, he is in the process of releasing his latest album featuring a new concerto by Simón García, Diego’s arrangement for bass and strings of Le grand Tango by Astor Piazzolla, and 3 Tangos for string orchestra from Andrés Martín.

We talk about the inspiration for this new project, the power of taking charge and not waiting for permission, the beauty of bringing new works into the world, and much more.  Enjoy, and check out this episode with Diego from 2017 for more about his remarkable background and career.

A big shout-out to Remic Microphones and Opus Magnum by DMSD for sponsoring this new project from Diego!

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[dustedmagazine]

Dust: Volume 3, Number 12

Pessimist

In early fall, the pace of record releasing and reviewing picks up, and with the new chill in the air, we all realize that we are way behind on everything. So to clear the pipes and celebrate what we’ve been meaning to celebrate all along, here is a new back-to-school issue of Dust. This time, we had a really broad range of participants covering all manner of music -- Bill Meyer, Ian Mathers, Matt Wuethrich, Derek Taylor, Eric McDowell, Michael Rosenstein, Jennifer Kelly and Mason Jones.  

176 — Music in Eight Octaves (Immediata)

IMM011: Music In Eight Octaves by 176

Ever wonder what Conlon Nancarrow’s music for player pianos would sound like stretched out over 50 minutes? If so, this is it. Pianist Anthony Pateras and fellow keyboardist Chris Abrahams of The Necks recorded this 50-minute performance in 2005, but are releasing it now as part of Pateras’ Immediata project, along with the series’ obligatory liner notes dialogue between Pateras and the other performer.  

The only formal structures the two seem to rely on are a stacking of temporal layers, timbral density, and surging intensities. There are no quiet or reflective moments here, the sound being continuous and mostly very fast, but neither is this uncontrolled cacophony. At times, there is so much activity the piece almost reaches stasis; at others, the sheer amount of pointillist notes is overwhelming. The tension between these poles creates, however, an engaging contradiction: hyperactive music that demands absolute concentration.

Matt Wuethrich

 1982 — Chromola (Hubro)

It makes sense that the trio 1982 is named for the band’s baby, drummer Øyvind Skarbø. He was nervy enough to get the project rolling when he asked Hardanger fiddle player Nils Økland, 20 years his senior, to play an improvised gig together after Økland gave him a lesson. Ten years on Skarbø, Økland, and harmonium/pipe organ player Sigbjørn Apeland are still at it, performing music that is simultaneously true to the sonic signatures of their instruments and the impulse to play things their own way. Which means that Apeland doesn’t shy from the churchy sounds his instruments were conceived to make, but he’s also willing to tangle some tone clusters up in Skarbø’s rustle and rumble. Likewise Økland, who also plays a conventional violin, lets his melodies unfold patiently, all the better to let the overtones radiate from his strings and form a halo of sympathetic vibrations. But he’s also right in there with his fellows, complicating the dissonances and accenting the rhythms. Skarbø moves fluidly between measured cadences, pulse-free surges, and patient silences, contributing most by contributing just what the music needs.

Bill Meyer

 Antoine Beuger — Ockeghem Octets (Another Timbre)

The title of Antoine Beuger’s latest for Another Timbre may mislead the uninitiated. Part of an additive series of homages to some of the Wandelweiser co-founder’s favorite artists and thinkers — Dedekind Duos, Cantor Quartets, Favery Tunings for Fourteen — Ockeghem Octets does reference the influential 15th-century Flemish composer of masses, motets and chansons, however obliquely. What Beuger distills from Ockeghem is the canon form: Each of the 25 pieces represented on this disc find the octet divided into two halves, each half playing a different line of four tones, entirely at each musician’s own pace. That playing through these micro-compositions takes nearly 70 minutes (over a single unbroken track) suggests the octet’s approach to the material — unhurried, to say the least. But when you consider that Beuger is the same composer who’s written a piece that asks audiences to listen to a solo musician “basically sitting in silence, very rarely playing one single very soft, rather short sound,” followed by anywhere from 20 to 80 minutes of complete silence, the Ockeghem Octets’ glacially shifting layers start to seem positively gaudy with harmonic and timbral colors. An exaggeration, of course, but phase one of the initiation into Beuger’s sound world is adjusting your perspective.

Eric McDowell

 Dungen — Häxan/Versions by Prins Thomas (Smalltown Supersound)

A couple of years ago, Dungen were asked to create a new soundtrack to Lotte Reiniger’s early 1926 animated film "The Adventures of Prince Achmed,” which led to the first instrumental album from Dungen, Häxan. Here, Prins Thomas takes that album's music and creates a new experience, over an hour of songs constructed using more or less of the originals. Some pieces are based on a few sounds, while others are primarily rearranged from the original tapes.  

When it comes to the recognizable pieces, Thomas mostly finds a way to accentuate the core. Just taking opener "Peri Banu vid sjön" as an example, the original is a slow, reverbed drum beat and floating synth tones, peaceful and vaguely pretty. The version here, stretched to five minutes, takes its time getting going, the warbly synth melody leading to the drums entering with a rather Floydian touch. In this version the reverb's gone, and everything's more immediate.  

Elsewhere, there's some good steady space rock, and plenty of kosmische stylings, with parts that have the head-nodding mekano beats of Neu! and their descendants, and "Kalifen" is one of the most Floydian songs that's come along in some time, harkening back strongly to Atom Heart Mother-era synth scapes. Others, though, come off as kind of soft-psych filler.  

Ultimately, although there's plenty of creative reconstruction here, nearly all of the songs carry on past the length they can support, not surprising given that a 40-minute album was rebuilt to 67 minutes. More aggressive editing could have honed this to a stronger core, but even so, if you're looking for a drawn-out hazy journey you could most definitely do worse.  

Mason Jones  

 The Elks — This Is Not the Ant (Mikroton)

This Is Not The Ant by The Elks

The great thing about the Berlin/Vienna Improv scene is the quirky collaborations that pop up between musicians of disparate backgrounds. The Elks is a perfect example, pulling together trumpet player Liz Allbee, clarinetist Kai Fagaschinski, tape manipulator Marta Zapparoli and audio-visual munger Billy Roisz. Across four cuts (two around five minutes long and two over twice that), the four pile together shredded tones, corroded timbres, arcing oscillations and hissing static into improvisations that buzz and thrum with an unstable energy. What’s particularly striking here is how the four eschew any sense of improv arc, instead diving in to a bucking collective flurry that can break into muted calm or vault to thundering stridency at any moment. One minute, Fagaschinski’s low-end clarinet tones hum and drone against a low-level thrumming electronic pulse. The next Allbee’s sibilant hiss kicks in against a whorl of electronic scree. Overtones meld with feedback, burred harmonics and glitched tapes are scumbled together. Braying trumpet, quavering chalumeau and sputtering electronics coalesce and then break open to dark, tolling low-end reverberations. The seamless mix of acoustic and electronic instruments makes for a rich palette which bares glints of detail within the constantly shifting field of sound.

Michael Rosenstein  

 Footings — Resolver (Don’t Live Like Me)

Resolver by Footings

Hey, a local band! Not living in anything remotely resembling a “scene,” this doesn’t happen to me often, but Thing in the Spring proprietor Eric Gagne slipped me a DL of his alt-country-ish, slacker rock Footings’ latest recording, and what do you know, it’s pretty good. I caught them a month or two ago opening for alt-Baptist-roots-revivalists House & Land, and the main problem then was that the guitar drowned out everything else. Here, with a proper mix, the slash of indie guitar (think Sebadoh or Jason Loewenstein solo) still dominates, but there’s enough space for Elizabeth Fuschia’s viola to seep through, whether in resonant bowed throbs (“Hopelessly”) or pizzicato plucking (“Vibrations, Too”). You can also hear the singing, which alternates from a rough but rueful rock howl a la Silver Jews or David Bazan in the louder songs to a sensitive country croon in the soft ones, which may put you in mind of Richard Buckner. As in the live set, “Pajo” stands out, with its circling, swirling, enveloping melancholy, but stick around for the very acoustic “Pollen” which tamps down the mayhem to minimum and finds a quiet revelation in picked acoustic, string tones, soft duet singing and the roll of cymbals.

Jennifer Kelly

  Joe Goddard — Electric Lines (Domino)

Goddard’s had plenty of side projects outside of his main gig at Hot Chip, but a listen to the accomplished, wide-ranging Electric Lines makes it clear why he calls this his solo debut. The warmth and dancefloor nous Goddard brings to Hot Chip are in evidence here too; the difference is more in sonic terms than emotional timbres. Here Goddard mostly takes the more traditional electronic producer's backseat to a rotating cast of singers (sampled and not) over an assorted but solid set of productions that range from the affectionate throwbacks of "Home" and "Lose Your Love" to the restrained digital ballardry of "Human Heart" and "Nothing Moves" to more purely banging "Lasers" and "Bumps.” The result is a kaleidoscopic but always endearingly humane tour through the various vistas of electronic music, culminating with the heart-rending, melancholy directness of his Hot Chip partner Alexis Taylor's vocals on the title track and singer SLO's joyful resolution on closer "Music is the Answer." That faith in his art form is one of the reasons that Goddard's work, in a band or here on his own, is so fulfilling.  

Ian Mathers

  Lo Tom— Lo Tom (Barsuk)

Lo Tom by Lo Tom

David Bazan first played with the guys in Lo Tom — that’s Trey Many, TW Walsh and Jason Martin — about the time they all started shaving, as part of a surprisingly fertile NW enclave of Christian-centered rock (that also included Damien Jurado, but forget him for the moment, he’s not in Lo Tom). All four of them have gone on to other bands, Bazan maybe the best known of the bunch for Pedro the Lion and his solo discs, but Many in Velour 100 and Starflyer 59, Walsh with Pedro, too, and Martin, also in Starflyer 59. Lo Tom is a kind of low-stakes, tossed off side project, performed mostly for the love of the game, but executed with a loose, comfortable, red-meat-rock brio that bends big guitar licks and rough poetry to the task of exploring mid-life issues. Bazan is in very fine form in these eight songs, exhibiting a trademark mordant directness, which is blunt enough to make you laugh, though you’re never sure whether he’s trying to be funny. The protagonist in “Bubblegum,” for instance, is mystified when he repeatedly wakes up with rubbery clumps of gum in his hair, “You blink your eyes and wonder how did it even get there/it’s not even the flavor of gum you chew/but either way your head’s stuck to your pillow, what’s wrong with you?’  You tell me, humorous or tragic? The lyrics, delivered in Bazan’s buzz cut baritone, are wrapped in a big-shouldered indie guitar racket, reminiscent of early aughts indies like Silkworm and Built to Spill. It’s loud and abrasive on the outside with a soft emotional center, the tough guy with a wry self-deprecating smile and a dog-eared copy of Seamus Heaney poems in his back pocket. What more could you want?

Jennifer Kelly

Milked — Death on Mars (Exploding in Sound)

Death on Mars by Milked

Chicago punk rocker Kelly Johnson has sweetened his sound since his Geronimo! days, kicking up a fizzy, rackety, ear-wormy sound that recalls the Rock A Teens, Red Kross and Exploding Hearts. “White Punks,” which bemoans the life-art balancing act of indie rock wage slavery, churns to a start with monster bass and a careening guitar vamp that owes a little to “Smells Like Teen Spirit.”  “Caledonia” is fizzier, more melodic, jangling like a particularly tuneful key ring in a working man’s pocket. And “Death on Mars,” the title track, is a punk romantic anthem, blaring in hearts-on-sleeve endearing-ness with slow, syrupy, overblown guitars with a plan for life partnership spanning the solar system. All nine tracks are irresistible hits of power pop aggression, rough on the edges and likely loud as fuck in the room, but bursting with a hand-drawn valentine’s worth of good feeling. Death on Mars came out early this summer as part of Exploding in Sounds’ tape series, and if you missed it, stay tuned for the next one. Johnson doesn’t sound like he’s anywhere near done with this exuberant project.

Jennifer Kelly

  Shane Parish—Ballad of an Unarmed Man  (Self-released)

Ballad of an Unarmed Man by Shane Parish

Musicians rarely get to capture their epiphanies in a shareable form, but Shane Parish lucked out. The Asheville NC guitarist, who tours and records with Ahleuchatistas and keeps a variety of other duos with players such as Michael Libramento and Tashi Dorji, has cultivated a formidable variety of playing modes, which has also come in handy in his day job as a guitar teacher. One night in February 2016 he sat down with the charts to a few American folk tunes, an acoustic guitar and the digital recorder that he uses for study. He started playing and found himself in a psychic and musical zone that felt simultaneously new and familiar. He was, at least for the time, home. Parish went on to develop this material into Undertaker Please Drive Slow, a superb solo album that Tzadik released at the end of 2016, but has decided to put out the original flash of inspiration as a download-only release. What’s remarkable about these performances is how at home he already sounds with a fairly personal approach to traditional material. He doesn’t exactly play it straight, nor does he prioritize a particularly improvisational language and he certainly doesn’t hew to the raga-tinged fingerpicking contemporary of American Primitive practice. Instead familiar melodies slip in and out of focus in a matter that feels akin to memories being recovered, even though that’s not what Parish was doing. You could get all speculative and say that maybe he was locking into something unconscious, or that you’re hearing a lifetime of skill-building aligning with the music on some sheets of paper in ways that the player could not foresee. What is clear is that Parish was onto something that night, and that this release provides a timeline node we can look to as we consider what he’s doing now and what comes next.

Bill Meyer  

 Anthony Pateras & Erkki Veltheim—The Slow Creep of Convenience (Immediata)

IMM010: The Slow Creep Of Convenience by Anthony Pateras · Erkki Veltheim

The title does double duty here as aesthetic and social statement. Aesthetically, “slow creep” captures the duo’s formal strategy: Veltheim’s electric violin and Pateras’ pipe organ are deployed as generators of long, continuous sounds, which flow over and against each other in dense layers of overtones and beatings through all levels of the frequency spectrum. Despite the single-minded approach, the performance is full of tension, energy and variety, with the duo having ample time to probe each subtle shift in timbre over the piece’s 50-minute duration. Socially, the title encapsulates the duo’s dialogue in the liner notes, where they dissect current contemporary musical and cultural practices, the discourse surrounding them and the effect technology has on both. This “formless” piece, they suggest, is one effort to reclaim our most valuable commodity: time.

Matt Wuethrich

 Pessimist — Pessimist (Blackest Ever Black) 

Bristol's Kristian Jabs, aka Pessimist, has been releasing EPs for several years now, but this self-titled album is technically his first full-length. Blending bits of drum and bass, techno, dub step, and cold, chilly experimental sounds, it works best when dealing in the combination of complex beats and warehouse ambience. It's difficult to describe the songs here without resorting to words like "cavernous" and "murky", though often the mechanical beats pull things out of the mud and onto the dance floor.  

As the score for an end-times dance, the reverb-laden factory floor beats here will do the trick. But while you can let these songs flow past in the background, they too often resort to the same tricks if you focus more closely. The result is that the first few pieces -- "Bloom" with its skeletal warehouse rhythms, "Grit" blending shadowy tones with mechanical beats, and the murky, panned tick-tocks of "Spirals" -- start the album pretty strongly, but as it continues things get more predictable. The rhythms, while often intriguingly layered, tend to be unchanging, and the move from beats to quiet floating to the sudden return of the beats is an overused trick.  

Taken individually, though, and certainly in the clubs, these tracks mostly work, with the shifting, interlocking beats of "Peter Hitchens" and the aforementioned "Bloom" particular standouts. The mix of sounds and attitudes Pessimist brings has a lot of potential. It shows through here and there, and the future holds yet more promise.  

Mason Jones

Saltland — A Common Truth (Constellation)

A Common Truth by Saltland

Rebecca Foon is (or ought to be) well known to fans of various Constellation acts; in addition to cofounding Esmerine, she and her cello have played with Thee Silver Mt. Zion, Set Fire to Flames and others. With her almost entirely solo project Saltland (here aided subtly and well by the Dirty Three's Warren Ellis and producer/Besnard Lakes frontman Jace Lasek on some tracks), her voice and cello take center stage and prove more than capable of holding that ground. It's relatively rare for an album split between instrumentals and vocal pieces like A Common Truth to be equally strong on both sides of the equation, but whether it's the foreboding drone of the opening "To All Us All to Breathe" or the layered cello and voices of the darkly pulsing "Light of Mercy," Foon's work consistently displays a darkly-hued beauty coupled with an intense, almost liturgical focus that marries the sound of the record with these songs' concern with the perils and complex nuances of climate change. With the summer much of the world is currently having, those issues need to be addressed more than ever; few reminders of this fact will be as enthralling as A Common Truth is. 

Ian Mathers

  Triptych - Michael Thieke : Tim Daisy : Ken Vandermark (relay 019) by Tim Daisy Michael Thieke Ken Vandermark

Michael Thieke/Tim Daisy/Ken Vandermark — Triptych (Relay Recordings)

Triptych is the latest in a series of fleeting encounters that Tim Daisy has documented on his Relay label. The Chicago-based multi-instrumentalist (drums, percussion, radios) invited Ken Vandermark (tenor saxophone, bass clarinet) and Michael Thieke (clarinet) into the studio to play three compositions and a handful of improvisations by the constituent members. It takes a bit of digging to grasp the title’s implications. While Daisy’s pieces celebrate the three musical personalities involved, they all seem to be very much on the same page. While the music shifts between stated and implied swing time, it does so quite cohesively, and the melodies make a case for Daisy’s growing elegance as a composer. But when you factor in the improvisations, it makes more sense. There is a pair of duets, one between the drummer and Thieke and the other between two clarinets, which display more elbows-out jostling than the compositions. There are also three solos that let you into the relationship between instrumentalist and instrument. Three ways of working, connected but separate — there’s your triptych.

Bill Meyer

 W-2—Fanatics (Astral Spirits)

Fanatics by W-2

The notion of battles between instrumentalists is built into jazz. You’ve got Ben Webster and Dexter Gordon on Tenor Titans, Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane on Tenor Madness, and these guys on the New York subway, all battling away. But W-2 say screw that divide and conquer shit; they may be going into battle when they play, but they’re pointing their weapons in the same direction, not at each other. Tenor saxophonist Sam Weinberg sounds like he’s taken a few lessons from Roscoe Mitchell. He’s got a similar affection for his horn’s extremes and a corresponding commitment to occupying the outer edges of pitch. Chris Welcome has his jazz guitar chops down, but in W-2 he sticks to synthesizer, blasting out dirty sputters and catch me if you can squiggles. Surrender while you can; these guys had you in your sets from the second you walked in the door.

Bill Meyer

  Judith Wegmann – Le Souffle du Temps (hat[now]ART)

Critic Brian Morton contributes a pithy and starkly simple piece of advice at the conclusion of his notes to Le Souffle du Temps. Make requisite time to listen to the music, as the musician made time to prepare for it. Play it again. Follow those simple instructions, and Morton confidently contends you’ll be playing it for years. The fourth dimension is a central aspect of pianist Judith Wegmann’s musical conception. Though she started playing at the age of six and studied jazz classical and improvised music earning two Master’s degrees along the way, this disc marks her debut as a leader. The training is evident, but what’s more striking is her mastery of pacing and placement. Preparing her instrument with an undisclosed array of objects and devices, the disc’s 10 pieces (delineated on paper by Roman numerals and temporal durations) transpire with a sustained air of both deliberateness and spontaneity, however incongruous that might sound. The clack of rocks or marbles, the brittle scraping of strings and the whistling creaks of metal on metal join sparely deployed keyboard notes and patterns to create a depth of field that becomes very easy to get lost in.

 Derek Taylor

[jessicakmatt]

The Effects of Frequencies: Guitarist Joel Shearer on Letting Your Body Guide the Music

The Effects of Frequencies: Guitarist Joel Shearer on Letting Your Body Guide the Music: via LANDR Blog

Guitarist and composer Joel Shearer on music and emotions, scoring hollywood films, effects pedals, and more.

Music affects our bodies.

You go to a festival and the whole place is kinetic energy—motion. It creates a hypnotic pulse. You let go of the head and get drawn into your body.

That’s how Joel Shearer thinks about music.

“I’ve always approached music in this way. I’m not an educated musician, I haven’t formally studied music. I know shapes, sound, tone. I’m fascinated with how sound works, and knowing how to stack sounds and arrange tones.”

Shearer has played on countless records with artists like Alanis Morissette, Goo Goo Dolls, Cher, Damien Rice, Joe Cocker, Dido, Nelly Furtado, and many others. More recently he started scoring films, including Janis: Little Girl Blue, 127 Hours and Sons of Anarchy.

But the topic that gets him most excited is the relationship between music and feelings.

“I’m fascinated with sound and how it contributes to emotions. If you’re composing a song and you have a crappy sound, it’s not going to feel good. Our nervous system is designed to navigate that. That’s what I’ve been learning subconsciously over the past 25 years.”

Joel is generous with words. Talking to him is a captivating drift, touching on everything from music and gear to philosophy, meditation and movies. He spoke about healing music, ambient guitar techniques, effects pedals, and what’s exciting about music production today.

What interests you about the relationship between sound and emotions?

I got into creating atmospheric spaces within pop music. In a pop song, I would always want to find an element that floats through everything. I developed this way of playing the guitar very softly—with very little attack so you don’t hear the plucking of the strings. It doesn’t even sound like a guitar anymore! Then I would create these ambient sound beds in the music. I started and ended songs with ambient sound beds in my own bands. I did long segues and had these long journeys when we played live.

Fast forward to the last couple of years. I deepened my fascination with frequency and vibration. I got interested in how frequencies affect us in positive and negative ways. I researched the effect of sound on the body.

At the same time, my spiritual practice started to get more defined in terms of mediation. I moved to Topanga Canyon in California up in the hills by the water—it’s quieter than LA. There, I started paying attention to my nervous system and how music was affecting me. How noise and volume, and the chaos of society were affecting me.

I started paying attention to my nervous system and how music was affecting me. How noise and volume, and the chaos of society were affecting me.

I explored the effect of different frequencies, like the tuning standard 440 Hertz versus 432 Hertz. Look it up online: they use a metal vibration plate and put sand on it. Then they send a frequency to vibrate the plate: 440 Hz then 432 Hz. This is called cymatics, it’s a way to make sound visible.

At 440 Hz you see the sand create a shape, but it’s a much sloppier shape than when you send it 432 Hz. 432 Hz is said to be mathematically consistent with things in nature and sacred geometries. We are all vibrations, all of us, everything in the world. It’s spirituality but it’s also science.

How are you exploring these concepts in your music?

I started a performance piece where there’s 8 speakers around a room. Everybody’s in the middle, they sit or they lie down. Shoes off, no cellphones, no cameras—just focused.

With my electric guitar I send different frequencies around the room. I started calling this my ambient guitar ‘sound baths.’ I tune my guitar down to 432 Hz and then improvise. No planning. Everyone comes in, I get a feel for the room and I start making sound. Then I just let my body tell me what to do.

It’s been unbelievable. I do them every month now. After touring with the band Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, the percussionist Orpheo McCord and I became close friends. He was doing something similar with the marimba, so now we’ve been collaborating.

There’s been a lot of interest in it this—people are curious and invite me to play. I feel like I’m actually contributing in some way other than just putting pop music into the world.

You spoke earlier about wanting to get away from the egocentric focus of the music industry. Tell me more about that.

It’s an amazing time in the world for the ego! Social media is a platform for the ego. Not that that’s a bad thing, we need our ego to survive.

I don’t want to shy away from social media because they’re actual tools to promote your work. If I’m doing a sound bath, I want people to come! I think it’s a valuable tool, but it feels like there’s no candidness anymore…

Everything is rehearsed—you take a selfie. “I don’t like it.” Take it again. We are losing our ability to be in the moment. The further we go into ego-based society, the further away we step from our natural world.

Everybody is in front of screens in their own worlds all the time, even with Virtual Reality—which is amazing technology. But we’re so in awe of technology that we forget it’s all irrelevant to a certain degree. If the power goes out, we don’t have any of that technology.

We need to look in each other’s eyes, we need to be able to have a conversation with one another, we need to touch each other. Intimacy is not something that’s rehearsed, it’s pure presence.

For me, the point of making music right now—especially with this ambient project���is to get people in a room to become present together.

For me, the point of making music right now—especially with this ambient project—is to get people in a room to become present together. You’re still having your own experience, but you’re sharing that experience in the company of others. I think that’s very important because we are communal creatures.

And with music, improvisation is like that—you are in the moment. You’re listening to the people you’re playing with. It’s a dance, it’s a language, it’s a conversation. I don’t know if technology is teaching us to be better conversationalists. I think it’s teaching us to be better isolationists.

Music is really a gift. It’s a language that we all understand without having to speak it.

On the other side, music has also become a thing that we take for granted. It’s often in the background, as background noise. Everywhere you go there’s music playing. While you’re working, shopping, eating. In some ways, that aspect of music is a sad loss of the gift of music. Music is really a gift. It’s a language that we all understand without having to speak it.

That reminds me of  Brian Eno’s ambient music manifesto, He talks about how ambient music is not meant to be a background layer—that’s called muzak. Ambient music is more of a “surrounding influence,” it’s meant to be noticed and have an effect on you.

To me, ambient music is something in the background that isn’t distracting you, but it’s affecting you. It’s not taking you away from your thoughts. If anything, it’ll bring you more into the place where you are.

Ambient music is not taking you away from your thoughts. If anything, it’ll bring you more into the place where you are.

I think of ambient music as something that isn’t linear—there are no chord progressions and no structure. It’s more something you experience. There’s not that much to listen to, sometimes it’s quite boring. But it feels so good.

That’s what I’m trying to accomplish with ambient music—not add to the background noise. It’s also very cinematic. After I play a sound bath, I have people telling me “man, I went on a journey” or “I had all these visions come to me.” That’s important for us, to have visions and to be taken on journeys. Because that’s where we learn and grow. That’s where we discover the next thing.

You mentioned the cinematic aspects of music. You’ve done some music for film—notably 127 Hours and Sons of Anarchy. How do you approach scoring a film?

That’s a new world for me. I’m fascinated by it for various reasons. It’s still open, there are literally no rules. For instance the score for Iñárritu’s Birdman is just drums, that’s amazing! Or There Will Be Blood is just dissonant violins.

A film score does its job when the composer’s sounds help tell the story the director is trying to tell. That can be anything from a huge classical opus to a sonic wash of noises that evolve.

That’s where we learn and grow. That’s where we discover the next thing.

I think film is an interesting place because it’s experimental. There’s a lot of experimental music going on in the film score world. When you hear a good film score it affects you in an emotional way. Nils Frahm and Jóhann Jóhannsson for instance are doing beautiful yet simple scores that are so gorgeous.

Your primary instrument is the guitar. How do you approach ambient music with guitar, and what does that mean technically?

The guitar is a very fluid instrument. There’s so many subtle things I can do with my hands with one sound. I can hit the strings harder. I can use different parts of my fingers. I can use my nails. I can use a pick. I can slide my fingers around. I can bend notes. I can add vibrato. There’s so much language at the tip of my fingers, I can change any sound.

The guitar is a very fluid instrument… There’s so much language at the tip of my fingers, I can change any sound.

I can give you one sound on the guitar and make it sound a million different ways. That’s why I think the guitar is a very special instrument—for me. There’s so many things people can do with violins and cellos. There’s amazing players that can touch a piano and get totally unique sounds out of it.

I’m also very much into effects. I’ve been playing with effects forever. When I was 15, the bass player from my band had to take away my delay pedal—I just had it on all the time! I loved how it sounded, how infinite it could be… I also put reverbs into other effects. I love exploring sonics.

What are some of the key boxes on your effects pedal board?

I always have a few ways to loop. I still love the Line 6 DL4 delay. I don’t even use the delay function, I just use it as a looper.

In terms of delays, I have an Empress Superdelay. I like the Strymon Timeline for some things—it’s digital so you can program it. I love Eventide, I think they make amazing effects. I have their Space pedal and an H9. Neunaber make this really beautiful reverb that I really enjoy. Those are some of the more ambient effects.

Then I have a lot other ones like the Memory Man pedal from Electro-Harmonix, and I have a SuperEgo synth engine I use a lot. I’ve also got this GoatKeeper gated tremolo that’s very unique sounding.

I’ve also got some weird pedals: the Count of Five, the Hologram Dream Sequence, some fuzzes, etc.

EQ is one of the most important pedals, so I have a BOSS parametric EQ that I use all the time to carve and shape my sound. Electro-harmonix is one of my favorite companies.

I don’t like pedals that emulate other things, I prefer those that are themselves.

I’m not so into the glitchy pedals, I’m into the musical pedals. I don’t care about a delay pedal sounding like a tape delay if I want it to sound warm—I have real tape delays. I don’t like pedals that emulate other things, I prefer those that are themselves.

How does LANDR fit in your process?

I’m very moved by the technology that LANDR has created for people. There are so many young musicians that are making music who don’t have money to get their songs mastered. And everything has to be competitive now—it needs to be hot and loud.

A platform that allows musicians to drop in their music and have it amplified in a way that’s presentable and competitive in the market—that’s amazing.

And then I started thinking, what about the professional musicians? I don’t always want to pay for mastering. Every time I make something I’ll throw a plugin on it. But I don’t know what I’m doing, I’m not an engineer! So LANDR is an amazing platform for the ambient music that I’m doing, or if I write a song with an artist. Instead of just putting an L2 limited on it and calling it a day, I’ll send it into LANDR and it’ll sound better.

Now you have the digital distribution, and it’s a one-stop shop. I find it inspiring, and I’m super grateful to be a part of the community. I don’t know if I’ll use LANDR mastering for everything I do, but I’ll definitely throw my tracks in there to see how they will sound. I can make creative decisions based on the master I get back.

It’s an amazing platform to further the creative process. It gets the quality of what you’re putting out into the world better. It’s easy for people to plug in a synth and play without knowing how sound and frequencies work. I’ve put a few songs through LANDR mastering and I’m very happy with the result.

How do you feel about our current moment in music production?

I think it’s an interesting time to be making music. Some say the music business is over. But I see it the opposite. The music business is more alive than it’s ever been! There’s more opportunities to get music into the world, and to do it independently.

Some say the music business is over. But I see it the opposite. There’s more opportunities to get music into the world, and to do it independently.

You don’t have to be a musician anymore to make music. You can be a creative person, get a computer, learn Ableton and make music. I know a lot of musicians that are frustrated by that, but I find it fascinating. As we evolve as a species, the kind of music we make is also evolving.

I’m more inspired than ever because I’m thinking so much further outside of the box than I did before. Whereas before it was just guitar, now I’m looking at all the different opportunities to make different types of music. The thing used to be: “I need a band, I need to find a singer.” Now it’s just: go make music!

These are crazy times, so I want to make a lot of gorgeous emotional music that inspires people to go inward to check out their shit.

Now more than any other time that I’ve been alive, we need to put good art into the world. Because art is the thing that leads people’s consciousness. We have to do it—there’s too many political things happening. There’s too many bloated white people ruining the world. Men need to chill the fuck out! These are crazy times, so I want to make a lot of gorgeous emotional music that inspires people to go inward to check out their shit.

Follow Joel Shearer on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and SoundCloud. Visit Joel’s website. All photos are a courtesy of Joel Shearer. 

The post The Effects of Frequencies: Guitarist Joel Shearer on Letting Your Body Guide the Music appeared first on LANDR Blog.

from LANDR Blog http://blog.landr.com/joel-shearer-interview/ via https://www.youtube.com/user/corporatethief/playlists from Steve Hart https://stevehartcom.tumblr.com/post/163799641879

[contrabassconversations]

645: Norman Ludwin on orchestration

I’ve been a fan of the music of Dr. Norman Ludwin for years. In fact, his bass ensemble The Love Story led to one of the most entertaining memories of my early years of teaching bass! Norman was in San Francisco doing a talk on orchestration for the American Federation of Musicians Local 6. I had a chance to attend his presentation and also sit down with him the next morning for an in-depth interview on: • his early training and musical background • his time performing in the Florida Symphony and co-principal bass in the Natal Philharmonic in Durban South Africa • getting into the LA studio recording world • making the pivot into the world of composition • building the world’s largest bass catalog with Ludwin Music • writing 11 books on orchestration • his current work as an orchestrator, clinician, and author Lots of funny stories and heartfelt moments in this one—enjoy! Listen to Contrabass Conversations with our free app for iOS, Android, and Kindle! Contrabass Conversations is sponsored by: D'Addario Strings This episode is brought to you by D’Addario Strings! Check out their Zyex strings, which are synthetic core strings that produce an extremely warm, rich sound. Get the sound and feel of gut strings with more evenness, projection and stability than real gut. Steve Swan String Bass Steve Swan String Bass features the West Coast’s largest selection of double basses between Los Angeles and Canada.  Located in Burlingame, just south of San Francisco, their large retail showroom holds about 70 basses on display. Their new basses all feature professional setups and come with a cover at no additional cost. Used and consignment instruments receive any needed repairs and upgrades before getting a display position on the sales floor. Upton Bass String Instrument Company Upton's Karr Model Upton Double Bass represents an evolution of our popular first Karr model, refined and enhanced with further input from Gary Karr. Since its introduction, the Karr Model with its combination of comfort and tone has gained a loyal following with jazz and roots players. The slim, long “Karr neck” has even become a favorite of crossover electric players. The Bass Violin Shop The Bass Violin Shop offers the Southeast’s largest inventory of laminate, hybrid and carved double basses. Whether you are in search of the best entry-level laminate, or a fine pedigree instrument, there is always a unique selection ready for you to try. Trade-ins and consignments welcome! Modacity Modacity is a practicing app that helps musicians be more effective at practice. They help you get the results you want, while keeping you encouraged and motivated to stick with it and reach those goals – however big, or small, they may be. Kolstein Music The Samuel Kolstein Violin Shop was founded by Samuel Kolstein in 1943 as a Violin and Bow making establishment in Brooklyn, New York. Now on Long Island, over 60 years later, Kolstein’s has built a proud reputation for quality, craftsmanship and expertise in both the manufacture and repair of a whole range of stringed instruments, and has expanded to a staff of twelve experts in restoration, marketing and production. A440 Violin Shop An institution in the Roscoe Village neighborhood for over 20 years, A440's commitment to fairness and value means that we have many satisfied customers from the local, national, and international string playing communities. Our clients include major symphony orchestras, professional orchestra and chamber music players, aspiring students, amateur adult players, all kinds of fiddlers, jazz and commercial musicians, university music departments, and public schools. nkoda nkoda is a sheet music app for iOS, Android, and many platforms. It includes music from over 100 of the major music publishers like Boosey & Hawkes and Barenreiter. Practice, play and perform your sheet music, and mark up your parts as needed. This subscription service has received praise from Sir Simon Rattle and Joyce DiDonato. Start your free trial at nkoda.com. Contrabass Conversations production team: • Jason Heath, host • Michael Cooper and Steve Hinchey, audio editing • Mitch Moehring, audio engineer • Trevor Jones, publication and promotion • Krista Kopper, archival and cataloging Subscribe to the podcast to get these interviews delivered to you automatically!

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