-Strong contender to become my Pick of the Week next week. The 17th is a huge day for new jazz releases, too. Lots of strong contenders, but the FCO might just be the best of the group.
Same guitarist from Bridges Trio. Nice, dreamy guitar trio album. Guitar/bass/drums not far away from an Acetone sound. Excellent cover of Nick Drake's "River Man" and a fun rendition of Neil Young's "Old Man."
Prompted by yesterdays events in Copenhagen: - "After nearly 30 years, The Flaming Lips couldn't be harder to predict or pin down. The Oklahoma band has nothing left to prove no lofty commercial standard to maintain, no gigantic hit of the variety anyone expects it to re-create, and no core sound whose boundaries and limitations must be pressed against with great care. Immortality is secure, thanks to both a left-field '90s novelty smash ("She Don't Use Jelly") and two albums viewed as unimpeachable classics (The Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots). Wayne Coyne and his co-conspirators have long been liberated and encouraged to indulge their whims, especially on their 13 studio records.
Looking over The Flaming Lips' career, those whims have already included some heady, bonkers trips down dark alleys and inaccessible side roads. As playful and crowd-pleasing as the group's live shows have become, its most experimental recordings as with the rambling indulgences of its early years are often fiercely uncompromising, even impenetrable. In effect, Coyne and company have come full-circle, because The Terror is, well, terrifying.
Sounding almost post-apocalyptic in its scabrous, searching bleakness Coyne himself describes the album as "disturbing" The Terror moans and scrapes ominously from its opening seconds onward. Scorched and frayed, with an almost industrial ugliness to it, "Look...The Sun Is Rising" gets the proceedings underway by capturing the sound of a world (and, it would seem, a band) in distress, even decay. But The Terror still finds a way to reward deeper exploration, as cracked loveliness seeps into moments that soar tentatively; by way of example, "Be Free, A Way" may not be sunny, but it lets light peek through its cracks in unexpected ways.
Still, the overall effect is intense and enveloping; The Terror demands study even as the band clangs and drifts through 13 minutes of menace in "The Lust," or pulsates formlessly in "Turning Violent" and the appropriately titled "You Are Alone." And so it goes throughout 55 loose, sprawling minutes: Alternately thorny and meandering, The Terror presents itself as difficult to love but then, as in "Try to Explain," doles out bits of bracing beauty as it sprawls into space."
- Npr.
Where did I get this Wayne Horvitz playlist? Prob via Jonah. Free sampler from somewhere...includes a few tracks from this album with Seattle Chamber Players. Anyway, it's lovely
It's possible it's from a post I made announcing that Horvitz was releasing a free playlist of the original songs performed by the Westerlies on their Horvitz tribute album, Wish the Children Would Come On Home.
- "Unless you've been living under a rock recently you'll have heard the news that Aphex Twin unexpectedly uploaded 155 of his old and unreleased tracks to Soundcloud and made them downloadable for free. Starting from his earliest demos through to known live tracks, later jungle experiments and beyond, this is the motherlode that his fans have always wanted. DJ Food, a long-time Aphex fan, has been through the entire collection with a fine-toothed comb and selected his favourites for the first half of the show this week. The hit rate was high but he's has managed to cram 31 tracks into 85 minutes to mark this unique occasion and peppered the mix with vintage interview clips of Richard James talking about his music."
Just excellent. Even better than their past collaborations. Releases this week. Putting me in a position where I'm gonna have to name co-Picks of the Week.
Finally got this one, and it's kind of cool. Makaya, a drummer, took hours of live recorded improv and cut it into tunes or hooks or beats or dubs or loops or call them what you will. At times a little frustrating, because you want to hear where they went next! But its a creative and different way to record a "jazz" album, and I like it. The presence of a large roster of local guys (prominently ubiquitous vibeist Jason Adasiewicz) makes it sound like Chicago jazz these days.
The always brilliant Volcano The Bear frontman Daniel Padden and: Shane Connolly - drums, percussion, accordion
Peter Nicholson - cello, accordion, voice
Daniel Padden - guitar, bass clarinet, voice
Alex South - bass clarinet, clarinet, accordion
- "Blending ancient folk, avant-garde chamber music and occasional dalliances with the kind of melodies that might have been lifted from some 1940s film soundtrack, Daniel Padden's The One Ensemble return in an expanded format, now with added players and voices. It's a move that's clearly paid off, and this new record is a unique and enigmatic thing, with tracks like 'The Dig' ranking among the more adventurous takes on the sort of pseudo-classical sounds you'd hear from the likes of Clogs, Balmorhea or 7 Hertz. When vocals crop up they knit nicely into the mix as if they were just another instrument, sounding rather surreal in their strained falsetto on the already rather strange 'The Beam' and adding to the general air of Hermann Nitsch-meets-Sun Ra evident on 'The Sun'." Boomkat - 2009 http://www.theoneensemble.co.uk
-Never fails to amaze me how profoundly affected I am by this album. It hits me very similarly to how Spiritualized "Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space" did back in the day. They both have an overflowing warmth that always seems to be just a little bit distant and hold just a little bit back, yet are so sweetly melodic as to make that okay. Obviously, this is one of those albums that renders me unable to adequately express how it affects me, so I just babble like a fanboy.
Comments
Signaldrift - Two Agents
Time to get ready for tonight.
Craig
Fresh Cut Orchestra - "From the Vine"
-Strong contender to become my Pick of the Week next week. The 17th is a huge day for new jazz releases, too. Lots of strong contenders, but the FCO might just be the best of the group.
Free Human Zoo - "A
Àrid - "Àrid"
Same guitarist from Bridges Trio. Nice, dreamy guitar trio album. Guitar/bass/drums not far away from an Acetone sound. Excellent cover of Nick Drake's "River Man" and a fun rendition of Neil Young's "Old Man."
On Bandcamp: http://aridmusic.bandcamp.com/
- "After nearly 30 years, The Flaming Lips couldn't be harder to predict or pin down. The Oklahoma band has nothing left to prove no lofty commercial standard to maintain, no gigantic hit of the variety anyone expects it to re-create, and no core sound whose boundaries and limitations must be pressed against with great care. Immortality is secure, thanks to both a left-field '90s novelty smash ("She Don't Use Jelly") and two albums viewed as unimpeachable classics (The Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots). Wayne Coyne and his co-conspirators have long been liberated and encouraged to indulge their whims, especially on their 13 studio records.
Looking over The Flaming Lips' career, those whims have already included some heady, bonkers trips down dark alleys and inaccessible side roads. As playful and crowd-pleasing as the group's live shows have become, its most experimental recordings as with the rambling indulgences of its early years are often fiercely uncompromising, even impenetrable. In effect, Coyne and company have come full-circle, because The Terror is, well, terrifying.
Sounding almost post-apocalyptic in its scabrous, searching bleakness Coyne himself describes the album as "disturbing" The Terror moans and scrapes ominously from its opening seconds onward. Scorched and frayed, with an almost industrial ugliness to it, "Look...The Sun Is Rising" gets the proceedings underway by capturing the sound of a world (and, it would seem, a band) in distress, even decay. But The Terror still finds a way to reward deeper exploration, as cracked loveliness seeps into moments that soar tentatively; by way of example, "Be Free, A Way" may not be sunny, but it lets light peek through its cracks in unexpected ways.
Still, the overall effect is intense and enveloping; The Terror demands study even as the band clangs and drifts through 13 minutes of menace in "The Lust," or pulsates formlessly in "Turning Violent" and the appropriately titled "You Are Alone." And so it goes throughout 55 loose, sprawling minutes: Alternately thorny and meandering, The Terror presents itself as difficult to love but then, as in "Try to Explain," doles out bits of bracing beauty as it sprawls into space."
- Npr.
Alban Darche - "L'Horloge"
Albatrosh - "Tree House"
- Brilliant !
Albatrosh & Trondheim Jazz Orchestra - "Tree House"
Then,
Ryuichi Sakamoto, Illuha and Taylor Deupree - Perpetual
Titus Andronicus - Local Business
Craig
Bram Weijters-Chad McCullough Quartet - "Abstract Quantities"
Just excellent. Even better than their past collaborations. Releases this week. Putting me in a position where I'm gonna have to name co-Picks of the Week.
On Bandcamp: http://bramweijters.bandcamp.com/album/abstract-quantities
offthesky - Light Loss
As the title and art may hint, this new release is darker than most of his previous stuff.
Sir Richard Bishop - Neither Fish, Nor Flesh, Nor Good Red Herring
http://www.sirrichardbishop.net/news[/align]
And following Sir Kargatron's every move on Bandcamp - (The A side is fantastic)
Finally got this one, and it's kind of cool. Makaya, a drummer, took hours of live recorded improv and cut it into tunes or hooks or beats or dubs or loops or call them what you will. At times a little frustrating, because you want to hear where they went next! But its a creative and different way to record a "jazz" album, and I like it. The presence of a large roster of local guys (prominently ubiquitous vibeist Jason Adasiewicz) makes it sound like Chicago jazz these days.
Shane Connolly - drums, percussion, accordion
Peter Nicholson - cello, accordion, voice
Daniel Padden - guitar, bass clarinet, voice
Alex South - bass clarinet, clarinet, accordion
- "Blending ancient folk, avant-garde chamber music and occasional dalliances with the kind of melodies that might have been lifted from some 1940s film soundtrack, Daniel Padden's The One Ensemble return in an expanded format, now with added players and voices. It's a move that's clearly paid off, and this new record is a unique and enigmatic thing, with tracks like 'The Dig' ranking among the more adventurous takes on the sort of pseudo-classical sounds you'd hear from the likes of Clogs, Balmorhea or 7 Hertz. When vocals crop up they knit nicely into the mix as if they were just another instrument, sounding rather surreal in their strained falsetto on the already rather strange 'The Beam' and adding to the general air of Hermann Nitsch-meets-Sun Ra evident on 'The Sun'."
Boomkat - 2009
http://www.theoneensemble.co.uk
- A masterpiece . . .
Chris Schlarb - "Psychic Temple"
-Never fails to amaze me how profoundly affected I am by this album. It hits me very similarly to how Spiritualized "Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space" did back in the day. They both have an overflowing warmth that always seems to be just a little bit distant and hold just a little bit back, yet are so sweetly melodic as to make that okay. Obviously, this is one of those albums that renders me unable to adequately express how it affects me, so I just babble like a fanboy.