**Music for people who read**

SnakClub Read 2011

Bliv bruger af LibraryThing, hvis du vil skrive et indlæg

**Music for people who read**

Dette emne er markeret som "i hvile"—det seneste indlæg er mere end 90 dage gammel. Du kan vække emnet til live ved at poste et indlæg.

1baswood
apr 5, 2011, 7:06 pm

A thread for all of us readers that also have a passion for music and enjoy sharing and writing about it.

I remember buying my first LP in 1964 (It was a Chuck Berry compilation) and I have been listening and collecting music ever since. I listen to Jazz, Rock, Classical and World music: heck I even flirt with heavy metal and grunge. We get pleasure from reading other club members thoughts about the books they read, perhaps we can also benefit from their thoughts on the music they listen to.

2baswood
apr 5, 2011, 7:39 pm



Bob Dylan - The Times They are A-Changin'
Released in 1964. I am so familiar with the songs on this record that I assume that most people are as well, but there are probably people out there who have never even heard it. This is Dylan's third official CD. He plays solo acoustic guitar and harmonica and sings on ten classic tracks. This followed on the heels of his Freewheelin' CD which many critics rate as his best of the early period. I disagree; from the iconoclastic first track "The Times They Are A-Changin' right through to "Restless Farewell" the quality of the songwriting does not let up.

Trying to listen to this tonight with a fresh ear was difficult, but what struck me was that after the first track the rest of the CD is drenched in the blues. The songs were pouring out of Dylan at this time with these on this CD bearing the touch of a master of the blues and the guy was only 23 years old. Dylan's lyrics have already matured to such an extent that lines and phrases in the songs pop out at you, just like reading a familiar poem.

rating 5 stars (of course)

3LolaWalser
apr 5, 2011, 7:42 pm

Look how pretty he looks! No wonder Joan loved him!

4kidzdoc
Redigeret: apr 6, 2011, 8:28 am

Thanks for creating this thread, baswood!

1964 was the best year for music, IMO. At least a dozen albums from that year are among my favorites, including:



Nina Simone in Concert

Taken from three Carnegie Hall performances in March and April 1964, Simone sings and plays piano with minimal support from her band. My favorites include "I Loves You, Porgy", "Plain Gold Ring", and these songs:

Pirate Jenny (a haunting and unforgettable version of the song from The Threepenny Opera)
Mississippi Goddam (a protest song written by Simone: "This is a show tune, but the show hasn't been written for it yet.")
Don't Smoke in Bed (a mournful song about a woman who leaves her husband)

This is an excellent introduction to Nina Simone, performing live in front of an appreciative audience at the height of her abilities. Five stars!

5avaland
Redigeret: apr 6, 2011, 9:02 am

My most recent world music discovery is Iceland's Árstíðir, which I came upon after my November trip to Iceland. It's acoustic music with some cool vocal harmonies. Some of the music is in English, some in Icelandic. Here's their MySpace page where you can listen to some of their music.



6Cait86
Redigeret: apr 6, 2011, 10:41 am

#2 - Ooooh, I love this album - particularly the title track. The rawness of Dylan's voice is just gorgeous.

This is my favourite album of all time:

The second half is pure genius, an amazing melding of Lennon's music and McCartney's music.

7baswood
apr 6, 2011, 5:31 pm

#3 That picture of Dylan on the cover of The Times They are a Changin' may well have floated Joan's boat, but it was also a smart move by the record company. Dylan had looked so young on the cover of his previous album Freewheelin' that his image needed to be updated. So here was a stark black and white photo making him appear like his hero Woody Guthrie a man who had done some real hard travellin'

8baswood
apr 6, 2011, 5:52 pm

#4 kidzdoc, I agree about 1964 being a great year for music. Would any of these make your top 12

A Love Supreme - John Coltrane (my most played album)
Four for Trane - Archie Shepp (I saw Shepp's group with the two trombonists live in London)
Getz/Gilberto
Ain't that Good News - Sam Cooke (what a voice)
Hard Days Night - Beatles
Supremes - where did our love go
Bo Diddley - 16 all time greatest hits
Out to Lunch - Eric Dolphy
A Girl Called Dusty - Dusty Springfield
Mary Wells sings My Guy - Mary Wells

I regret that I never got to see Nina Simone live. I have got "Legends" by her which has got many live cuts including a great version of Mississippi Goddam

9baswood
apr 6, 2011, 6:00 pm

#5 avaland, I have been listening to those tracks you linked to. They are excellent

10baswood
apr 6, 2011, 6:02 pm

Cait 86 #6 You said it all about Abbey Road one of my all time favourites.

11kidzdoc
apr 6, 2011, 7:02 pm

#8: After I posted that claim in message #4 I thought that I might be exaggerating, so I compiled a list of my favorite albums from 1964 with the help of Wikipedia and other web sites. I came up with 20 albums that would likely earn spots on my top 100 list:

Freddie Hubbard: Breaking Point!
Charles Mingus Sextet with Eric Dolphy: Cornell 1964
John Coltrane: Crescent
Herbie Hancock: Empyrean Isles
Archie Shepp: Four for Trane
Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers: Free for All
Stan Getz & Joao Gilberto: Getz/Gilberto
Charles Mingus: The Great Concert of Charles Mingus
Grant Green: Idle Moments
Joe Henderson: Inner Urge
Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers: Indestructible
Wayne Shorter: JuJu
John Coltrane: A Love Supreme
Grant Green: Matador
Nina Simone: Nina Simone in Concert
Eric Dolphy: Out to Lunch!
Lee Morgan: Search for the New Land
The Horace Silver Quintet: Song for My Father
Wayne Shorter: Speak No Evil
Lee Morgan: Tom Cat

There are maybe a dozen 1964 albums that I also like, including:

Cannonball Adderley: Fiddler on the Roof
Dexter Gordon: One Flight Up
McCoy Tyner: Today and Tomorrow
Bill Evans: Trio '64
Joe Henderson: In 'N Out
The Temptations: Meet the Temptations
Wayne Shorter: Night Dreamer (I love the title track (available here), but the rest of the album isn't as good as "JuJu" or "Speak No Evil")

1963 was also a great year for jazz recordings, IMO. I'll post some favorites from that year later this week.

12Jargoneer
Redigeret: apr 7, 2011, 9:22 am

Since this is getting a little predictable -


This isn't probably isn't HMHB's best album but it is their most approachable. They have never had any hits (Joy Division Oven Gloves did reach no. 56), have virtually no profile in the music press, and are without any doubt one of the best bands of the last thirty years. This release has all the hallmarks of an HMRB album: folk and country music mixed with a C-60 DIY sound with the occasional oddity (The Referee's Alphabet mixes acoustic guitar with bird whistling); and Nigel Blackwell's brilliant lyrics (funny, biting, full of cultural references).

She stayed with me until she moved to Notting Hill
She said it was the place she needs to be
Where the cocaine is Fairtrade and frequently displayed
Is the Buena Vista Social Club CD

I thought she’d be back in three weeks and we’d go wandering the Peaks
Sojourn in my Uncle Joe’s ashram
For when you’re in Matlock Bath you don’t need Sylvia Plath
Not while they’ve got Mrs. Gibson’s Jam
(The Light at the End of the Tunnel (is the Light of an Oncoming Train)

I’m off to see the Bootleg Beatles
As the bootleg Mark Chapman
When the Evening Sun Goes Down

As Allmusic point out, Blackwell is "the most defiantly British songwriter in pop music history -- he makes Village Green Preservation Society-era Ray Davies look positively mid-Atlantic" so this may all be baffling to the non-UK listener. (It is interesting how it is always expected that US music and concerns will travel but not vice versa).

Note - HMHB's album titles are usually a parody: the next two they released were Achtung Bono and CSI: Ambleside.

13amandameale
apr 7, 2011, 9:31 am

I love most of the names mentioned so far except that my husband's passion for The Beatles means that I have heard their songs way too many times.

My standout singer so far, from this thread:
Nina Simone.

I like pretty much all types of music from classical to pop. Not keen on heavy metal, World music or country music, with some exceptions. Generally despise electric guitar solos (rock/pop).

14Jargoneer
apr 7, 2011, 9:56 am

>13 amandameale: - I think that's a problem with The Beatles in general - their songs are so ubiquitous that they have almost become aural wallpaper, something people live with but no longer pay any attention to. (Oh, and they are the most over-rated band in the history of rock music - I'm not saying they are bad but their albums are generally praised beyond their real substance).

15kidzdoc
Redigeret: apr 7, 2011, 10:06 am

I saw Esperanza Spalding, the winner of this year's Grammy Award for Best New Artist, perform last fall at the San Francisco Jazz Festival with her Chamber Music Society, to a packed house at Davies Symphony Hall. It was easily the best concert I attended all year, as she sang and played the bass within a chamber music quartet and within a standard jazz trio (piano, bass, drums), occasionally backed by another one or two singers.

This is a YouTube music video from "Little Fly", one of the songs on her latest album, "Chamber Music Society". It's set to the William Blake poem of the same name: Little Fly



Little Fly
By William Blake (1757-1827)

Little Fly,
Thy summer’s play
My thoughtless hand
Has brush’d away.

Am not I
A fly like thee?
Or art not thou
A man like me?

For I dance,
And Drink,& sing,
Till some blind hand
Shall brush my wing.

If thought is life
And strength & breath,
And the want
Of thought is death;

Then am I
A happy fly,
If I live
Or if I die.

16LolaWalser
apr 7, 2011, 1:02 pm

#15

Lovely, just lovely.

17janemarieprice
apr 7, 2011, 2:47 pm

Nice selections all.

Going to see one of my favorite New Orleans brass bands tonight - Rebirth - and dance the night away.

A taste: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3E1VBCcA76E

18baswood
apr 7, 2011, 5:34 pm

#15 Yeah kidzdoc Esperanza Spalding is really something else. I saw her at the Marciac Jazz festival last year. She did a few songs on her own; singing and playing the double bass.

#12 I have not heard the Half Man Half Biscuit CD but any song that mentions Matlock Bath and then manages to rhyme it with Sylvia Plath has got to be worth listening to.
Can't agree with you about the Beatles.

19baswood
apr 7, 2011, 6:06 pm

Reading that jane #17 is of to see some live music tonight made me a little envious, but it got me to thinking back to the most memorable live concerts I have experienced and I immediately came up with these:

The Miles Davis group and Archie Shepp group playing a double header at the Hammersmith Odeon circa 1965 or 66. Miles Davis was on first and I am still not sure whether it was Wayne Shorter or George Coleman on Tenor sax, because the sound balance was so bad all I could hear was Miles and the drummer. Miles didn't seem bothered, perhaps he had fallen out with the group.
Archie Shepp was on second and this was fortunate because by the time he had got to his third number, half the audience had walked out. Free jazz as played by Shepp at the time was just too much for many people. I suppose there was about a third of the audience left at the end of the set, but we were all standing on our chairs cheering. I have never been to a concert that divided people so much.

The Dammed circa 1977 at the Imperial College London. In a very low ceiling-ed hall dripping with sweat and the band were chaotic. The guitarist Brian James seemed demented and just as they launched into their sixth song he managed to lacerate Captain Sensibles' back with the head of his guitar. Total confusion , medical assistance needed and a riot ensued.

Last year at the Marciac Festival: Paco de Lucia's flamenco group put on one of the most exciting concerts I have seen for ages. The highlight was the flamenco dancer on a small stage placed at the front of the main stage. Dripping with sweat and gushing testosterone he danced himself into a frenzy.

20baswood
Redigeret: apr 7, 2011, 6:22 pm

#17 Four years ago a New Orlean's Band played at the Marciac Festival: Bonerama featured four trombonists and a guitarist who thought he was Jimi Hendrix. They were very loud and very good. Have you heard of them?

21charbutton
apr 7, 2011, 7:18 pm

>12 Jargoneer:, I'm very happy to see a mention for Half Man Half Biscuit. My personal favourites are 24 Hour Garage People, For What is Chatteris... (I applaud their knowledge of Cambridgeshire market towns) and CORGI Registered Friends ('in the kingdom of the bland, it’s nine o’clock on ITV'). They never fail to make me smile.

Other bands I've been listening to recently:

The Magnetic Fields - Stephin Merritt's voice is to die for. I'm not going to get married but if I did, 'A Chicken With It's Head Cut Off' would be the song for our first dance.
http://www.houseoftomorrow.com/tmf.php

Shrag - shouty UK girl-fronted indiepop. Great energy.
http://www.wiaiwya.com/index.php?id=58

Kid Canaveral - Scottish boy/girl indiepop band.
http://www.kidcanaveral.co.uk/home/

One Happy Island - US indiepop band that makes me happy and some of the nicest people you could ever hope to meet. And they have ukuleles. http://www.onehappyislandmusic.com/recs.html

22Jargoneer
apr 8, 2011, 4:38 am

>21 charbutton: - I almost fell off my seat when I saw Kid Canaveral mentioned - they are one of the superstars of independent music here in Edinburgh. I'm away to see them in a couple of weeks - they are headlining a SongByToad night. (For more on SongByToad here's a free sampler. Especially recommended are Meursault & Jesus H. Foxx).

23charbutton
apr 8, 2011, 4:47 am

>22 Jargoneer:, they were supposed to be playing a London gig that my other half is organising but have had to pull out :-(

24timjones
apr 8, 2011, 6:25 am

Great topic, baswood!

My music to read (LibraryThing) to right now is the LA band Warpaint. As far as rock music goes, my tastes were formed in the 1970s, and Warpaint sounds to my middle-aged ears like a wonderful hybrid of the Shangri-Las, King Crimson and Public Image Ltd. My only regret is that I have yet to see them live, but here's some recent live video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Il5cHpsN1N8

I usually write a what-I'm-listening to blog post over the summer, when I have more time to chase up links, and here's my January 2011 roundup - covering rock (etc.) and classical:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.com/2011/01/what-i-listened-to-in-2010.html

25amandameale
apr 8, 2011, 9:07 am

#15 Yes, Esperanza Spalding is amzing.

26baswood
apr 8, 2011, 5:24 pm

#19 A link to a Paco de Lucia concert http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2RrIK9ePiE&feature=related last year passion and flamenco

27kidzdoc
Redigeret: apr 9, 2011, 2:08 pm

#17: Excellent video, Jane! How was the concert?

A surprise discovery for me from a couple of years ago was the TG Collective, a Birmingham (UK) based group that gave a free concert at the Café at Royal Albert Hall in London in the summer of 2007. The group played mainly Spanish flamenco, gypsy music, and a spirited rendition of Horace Silver's "¿Qué Pasa?".

This is a short YouTube video of the group playing "Entre dos Aguas" by Paco de Lucía in a forest in Devon:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOhPoCAhQwI

28baswood
apr 18, 2011, 10:52 am



Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks - Brian Eno
Hushed electronic keyboard soundscapes interspersed with musical guitar interventions. The music flows deliciously without the hint of any rhythm or pulse. Very atmospheric and could be effective as background music while reading sci-fi (although I have not tried this)

I find that Brian Eno travels precariously on a path between interesting musical soundscapes and Muzak, here he is firmly in musical territory. I played this last night and a test for me when listening is whether or not I fall asleep (I find falling asleep much easier than keeping awake) I don't think I fell asleep last night, but then again I usually wake up just as the last track is finishing and so I never really know.

29zenomax
apr 18, 2011, 12:14 pm

Barry - I'm very interested in Eno - musically and philosophically he is ahead of the game in my view.

Did you get to see the BBC documentary on him a year or two ago?

And getting to see Miles Davis in the 60s and the Damned in the 70s - whata life of constant highlights you must lead! (Not being sarcastic here - I mean it - would have loved to go to those 2 concerts).

30Jargoneer
apr 18, 2011, 12:44 pm

>28 baswood: - Eno travels precariously on a path between interesting musical soundscapes and Muzak - couldn't have put it better. It's interesting that most of his better albums for the last 25 years have been with strong collaborators (Byrne, Fripp, Cale) - when left to his own devices and not being pushed a lot of his work just sounds as if it were produced on auto-pilot.

31baswood
apr 18, 2011, 6:50 pm

#29 zeno, I didn't get to see the BBC documentary. I haven't got English TV down here in the Gers, but now you have told me about the programme I will search for it on the net.

#30 jargoneer, yes I would agree with that and I notice that on Apollo Daniel Lanois played the guitar and wrote half the material.

32msjohns615
Redigeret: apr 21, 2011, 3:59 pm

11: wow, kidzdoc, thanks for that list! It really took me back to my high school jazz band days. '64 was a formidable year! I remember one of my friends somehow managed to get a weekly show on the community radio station, and he annoyed everyone there by insisting on exclusively playing post-bop records from the 60s that (almost) nobody wanted to listen to. Those Grant Green and Wayne Shorter records are particular favorites of mine as well.

There are a couple of Brazilian singer-songwriter-guitarists whom I really love and I was wondering if any of y'all are into Brazilian music?

One is Jorge Ben. He wrote "Mas que nada," which Sergio Mendes later made famous. He went on to release a string of great, great albums in the 70s. His lyrics are often a little odd: he was never afraid to write a song about alchemists, or about the Taj Mahal (nor was Rod Stewart afraid of stealing the melody from Taj Mahal). I enjoy it, he seems very positive and good-natured. My favorite record of his is A Tábua de Esmeralda. Start to finish, it's beautiful.



And here's a good-quality youtube clip of a medley of his songs:

Jorge Ben ao vivo

And lately I've pulled out some Gilberto Gil records I haven't listened to for a while, and they really, really blew me away. I've been listening to Expresso 2222 nonstop for the past couple of weeks:



There are a few youtube clips of him in concert in the early 70s, fresh back from exile. I like this one:

Gilberto Gil--Expresso 2222

Hm. I'm learning how to put images into posts. Hopefully this doesn't end in disaster.

33baswood
apr 21, 2011, 5:35 pm

Hi Matt,

I saw Gilberto Gil at the Marciac festival three years ago and I was a bit disappointed. He played a fairly straight ahead rock music set.

I enjoyed your link to Jorge Ben excellent stuff. As well as an enormous TBR pile of books to read I also have a much bigger pile of TBP (to be played) pile of discs and a couple of Jorge Ben are in there. Have you heard Caetano Veloso he played the Marciac festival a couple of years ago and was sensational. He did a solo set accompanying himself on acoustic guitar and kept the audience enthralled for over two hours. In his set he did a short history of Brazilian contemporary music and demonstrated how Gilberto Gil and Jorge Ben would play a certain song. Here is a link to one of his songs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRawTjuRYd0&feature=related

34baswood
Redigeret: apr 21, 2011, 6:32 pm

More memorable concerts



!968 Ornette Coleman quartet with Yoko Ono at the Royal Albert Hall
The first thing I remember about the concert was that the Albert Hall was under half full and so Yoko Ono suggested that all of us sitting in the balcony should come down and sit in the stalls. We didn't need asking twice and the elderly security people (it was 1968) were taken completely by surprise as everyone rushed down to sit in the expensive seats. Yoko opened the concert backed by Ornette Coleman and did her Japaneses vocalising bit. I have to say it was a bit of a relief when she went off and left the stage to the quartet. Ornette played superb alto saxophone backed by two double bassists: David Izenzon and Charles Haden and the busy Ed Blackwell on drums. He then switched to trumpet which was OK and ended up scratching away on a violin which was not so good.

Terry Reid at the Marquee club in London 1973 I think. I have always been a big big fan of Terry Reid nobody has a voice quite like his, which he uses to slide all around a song. By 1973 he had settled in America and his show at the Marquee was to a packed hot and sweaty house full of his fans. He could have sung anything and we would have loved him. About halfway through his set it became obvious that there was a guy in the audience with a very powerful voice singing a sort of descant to Terry's vocals. Terry being Terry got him up on the stage to do some duets. Not altogether successfully but it was good fun. I often wonder who that mystery guy was.

35msjohns615
apr 21, 2011, 7:25 pm

baswood, I'm impressed! You've been to some pretty awesome concerts. Miles Davis in 1965/66? That's something a youngster like me can only dream about.

That's a bummer that Gilberto Gil was less than inspiring in concert. I think a lot of the Brazilian legends of the 60s and 70s have been pretty hit or miss from 1980 on (at least with respect to my own tastes). As for Caetano, yes, he's very dear to me. I generally maintain a Caetano mix on my mp3 player; as for favorite albums, here's two:

Domingo (with Gal Costa)--some of the most beautiful singing I've ever heard.



Bicho Baile Show (with Banda Black Rio)--just a solid live record...I went crazy when I found out that there was a recording of Caetano playing with Banda Black Rio in the late 70s. For the most part, I was pretty satisfied. Maybe this is more of a personal fave, because I think a lot of people would not put this on their list of favorite albums by him. I'm just a big fan of funk music, and it's cool to hear him perform with a top-notch funk band.

36janemarieprice
apr 22, 2011, 12:09 pm

20 - Yes, (on the Bonerama) they are quite popular these days, very funky. I see them playing in NYC every now and then but haven't made it to one of theirs yet.

27 - Concert was great! Those guys really rock out. Venue was a bit weird however, but I think contributed to the low ticket price.

Next up is Kermit Ruffins, whose making it up in early May:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-atDxmfnIrI

37baswood
apr 30, 2011, 2:36 pm



Joia (Jewel) - Caetano Veloso
Released in 1975 this features Veloso in an acoustic setting. The instrumentation has been pared down so that the voice and the guitar playing shine through. A brilliant set of songs not a duff one in the thirteen tracks presented here. The sparse arrangements leave plenty of room for Caetano to weave his magic voice around these songs.

This is my favourite Caetano Veloso album so far, (I have got another five to play.)

38rachbxl
apr 30, 2011, 2:58 pm

>12 Jargoneer: Over 20 posts later I'm still snorting with laughter at "CSI:Ambleside" (the name - I haven't even listened to any of it yet). Hadn't thought about HMHB for years, though I remember them well from when I was at college. Am off to look up CSI:Ambleside - thanks, jargoneer!

39Jargoneer
maj 4, 2011, 11:40 am

>22 Jargoneer: - saw Kid Canaveral. Very relaxed intimate gig, they tried out some new songs, chatted away to the crowd and everyone left happy.
The other two bands with them were a mixed bag : Monster Island were loud, brash and a little too like the Fall (it was the singer's technique, mirroring Mark E Smith) - great drumming though. (If anyone is interested you can download their albums, for free, from Bandcamp). Thee Single Spies have potential - liked the fact they used multiple voices and an accordion - reminded me of the Triffids in a good way.

Just returned from the Kilkenny Rhythm & Roots Festival. Despite nursing a cold over the weekend it was very enjoyable. Great seeing artists up close (and I mean up close, you couldn't stop bumping into them in the street).
First up was Kort (Kurt Wagner's, from Lambchop, new band) - a tribute to old country singles (although some were decidedly psychedelic). Despite wearing an impressive hat Kurt was outshone by his co-vocalist, Cortney Tidwell, who looks like one for the future. (Should have played longer though).
Little Miss Higgins - straight ahead blues, fun but not essential.
Hans Chew (from NY, not Germany) had the best band in the festival. Decent songs and good musicianship - worth investigating.
Frontier Ruckus - excellent Michigan band, file next to Willard Grant & Lambchop.
Sam Amidon played old style (and I mean old) folk music; music so gentle and sweet it could blow away in a light breeze.
The biggest surprise (for me) was Beth Orton - I thought she was OK before but live she was excellent (probably helped being in a room of less than 100 people). She was funny, the music was first rate (including the Big Star cover with Sam Amidon) but the new album will not be out until 2012 due to pregnancy.
One local band deserves a mention - David Hope and the Henchmen. Hope has a big powerful voice, the big are tight and have some good songs (the best of which was written & sung by David Murphy, the multi-instrumentalist in the band).

40baswood
maj 7, 2011, 6:56 pm

jargoneer, sounds like a good festival: Kurt never did have much of a voice, he is a sort of talking vocalist if you know what I mean. I liked the stuff Beth Orton did on her Central Reservation CD, but have not listened to much since then.

When I used to go to festivals back in the late 60's and early 70's I saw a lot of the Incredible String Band. Today their music would fit right in with the Roots music movement. This week I have been listening to their Earthspan CD


Earthspan - The Incredible String Band
This was released in 1972 and was not liked by the music critics at the time. The Incredibles had made their name in the late 60's as a sort of psychedelic folk group with multi instrumentalists Mike Heron and Robin Williamson playing an ever increasing variety of weird and wonderful instruments. For this 1972 release they had stripped down the instrumentation to guitars and keyboards and were moving away from their former acoustical stance. Really a release from a band like this is only as good as the songs it contains and on Earthspan they came up with some excellent material. My father was a lighthouse keeper and Banks of Sweet Italy were stand out tracks and they did a rollicking version of that old favourite Black Jack Davey.

Here is Banks of Sweet Italy from the CD http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAjXCSD0sB0

41Jargoneer
maj 8, 2011, 7:53 am

>40 baswood: - I don't what it is about the ISB but no matter how many times I listen to them I just don't get it. I've even seen Heron and Williamson live in an attempt to understand the appeal and I can't. Oddly I like a bunch of other folk-rock bands from the same era.

I recommend later Beth Orton, especially from a folk angle as her folk roots show through more and more on the later albums (Comfort of Strangers could be her best album).

Away to see Drive-By Truckers tomorrow night but it's the support act that is really interesting - Josh T. Pearson, breaking 10 years of silence.


Lift to Experience - The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads

There isn't really another album like this - a guitar based trio produced by the Cocteau Twins singing about angels and armageddon and redemption. Allmusic describes as a mixture of My Bloody Valentine, Kitchens of Distinction and Jeff Buckley but it really transcends any influences to something unique. I'll leave you with the last lines from AM's review:
It's a magnificent yet somehow subtle work of genius that delivers its strange message with incredible innovation and an inspiring feeling of a groundbreaking mission accomplished.

42baswood
Redigeret: maj 14, 2011, 7:07 pm



JIM Jazz in Marciac - Patricia Barber quartet
This was the last concert in the Salle de Fetes in Marciac because the new purpose built theatre opens later this month. The hall was packed to hear Patricia Barber's quartet who did not disappoint. American Jazz musicians feel at home in Marciac which Patricia called a special place for jazz.

Patricia Barber plays piano and sings in a low toned jazz style. There are no histrionics just thoughtful yet passionate singing. The groups sound is built around the timbre of the instruments they play. There is space and the music breathes. The group features Neal Alger on electric and acoustic guitar, Larry Kohut on bass and Eric Montzka on drums. They played original compositions by Barber as well as some standards. Barber becomes completely wrapped up in the sounds the group is making and her body movements and facial expressions give vent to her feelings when improvising on the piano. It was an enthralling performance. The group finished the evening by playing "Light My Fire" as an encore, which was played with the same quiet passion that had featured throughout the set. Music of excellence.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eheoQhb28_E

43baswood
maj 21, 2011, 5:57 pm



Macalla - Clannad
Released in 1985 after the popular success of their Magical Ring album this album has high production values and features Bono on one track. The songs are good and the CD kicks off with perhaps the best two. Cablean Oir is given the full mystical Celtic treatment with breathy male vocals over a sparse synthesiser backing; Marie Brennan's (Enya) vocals fill in the spaces with good effect. This sound segues into The Wild Cry a feature for Marie and some beautifully recorded string instruments. There is depth and space in the arrangement which makes this a standout track.

Clannad trod the line between being a Celtic folk group and a commercial pop group and Macalla captures them at their best. The CD has sentimental value for me as it always seemed to be on the disc player when I was round at a girlfriends flat and so the tunes are stuck in my memory. (along with a CD by Hall and Oates, which I have been trying to forget)

Fuaim - Clannad
Not such a good set of songs on this 1982 release. Some pleasant moments and excellent vocals but although there are plenty of Gaelic songs featured the music tends to slide into MOR land.

44Jargoneer
maj 23, 2011, 7:01 am

>43 baswood: - just a little clarification: Marie Brennan is not Enya, that is her sister. Enya was a member of the group but left before they started getting more widespread successful, not that it mattered, Enya has probably outsold Clannad 10 to 1. I have the same problem with both acts, the music can be beautiful but sometimes becomes a new age muzak that lacks any real character. Then again, Clannad did do the soundtrack to Robin of Sherwood and that's good enough for me.

45baswood
Redigeret: maj 31, 2011, 4:50 pm

Where Has All The Excitement Gone

Last Saturday I was sitting in the brand new 500 seater auditorium in Marciac listening to the Wynton Marsalis Group playing at the inaugural concert. It was a programme of arrangements from the Edith Piaf and Billie Holiday songbooks. The music was beautifully textured and superbly played, with short to medium length solos that were carefully crafted on the melody of the songs. It was gorgeous music and I enjoyed the concert. The music finished and we left the concert stepping out into the barmy night air and I thought "That was a pleasant evening, but oh where was the excitement where was the buzz that I used to feel after a concert" What was missing: was it me, no I thought it was the music, it had failed to ignite any passion in me.

As a callow youth of 17 years old heavily into the rock music of the late 1960's, I was fiddling with the transistor radio late at night and tuned into the most amazing sounding music. Sounds were coming from my radio that I had never heard before made even more mysterious by the fading in and fading out of the transmission from the radio station. The music came to an end and then a long slow drawl of a voice announced that "You are listening to the Voice of America and this is Willis Connover. You have been listening to the John Coltrane group playing a track from their new LP "Om". Wow I thought I must hear some more of that. In those days there was no computer or internet and so no instant gratification. I tuned in the next night and the nights after that and heard more amazing music. It was some weeks later before I could get to Dobells jazz record shop just off the Charring Cross Road in London. Om was not in stock and so it had to be ordered, however I did leave the shop clutching a copy of John Coltrane's "A Love Supreme".

When all my friends were freaking out to Jimi Hendrix, The Nice, Ten Years After and the Grateful Dead I Was getting whoopped up with; Coltrane, Albert Ayler, Archie Shepp, Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor. It was not that I didn't like Hendrix et al, but that I found the music from the avant garde jazz scene so much more exciting. In addition to the amazing records coming over from America there was a very hot jazz scene in London. Most of the free jazz players were coalescing around the pianist Mike Westbrook or were sitting in with the Spontaneous Music Ensemble. There were the saxophonists; Alan Skidmore, Mike Osborne, Trevor Watts and George Khan, the trombonists; Paul Rutherford and Malcolm Griffiths, sometimes the electric guitarists Chris Spedding or Gary Boyle and always it seemed John Marshall or John Stevens on drums. Groups of varying shapes and sizes were gigging all around London. The music was always adventurous often exciting and played with an intensity that you could almost feel.

Jazz seemed to lose its way in the late 1970's it took a large step back from the avant garde free jazz movement. The step back became a run for cover as the leading players turned back to hard bop and bebop, if they had gone back any further they would have been playing Dixieland. It must have felt a lot safer and I had a whole back catalogue to explore and seemed to be marching along in tandem with the jazz players.

Since those heady days of the late 1960's and early 1970's jazz has hardly come out of its shell. Sure there has been some great jazz music played and released and Miles Davis was in the vanguard of a move towards electronic jazz, but there has never been a time since those hay days where there has been such anticipation over new groups or new records. The excitement seems to have gone and today what usually jolts me out my seat is some heavy metal rock group from Scandanavia.

Coming home from the Wynton Marsalis concert I felt a craving for music that would give me that thrill again. I turned the volume up on the stereo dug out a copy of "Om" and let that Coltrane group from 1966 raise the rafters. Wow that did the trick.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyXFBohVmr8

After the clicks and percussion sounds there is an incantation and at 1min 20 the group let rip with some free blowing. At 3min.09 Coltane's solo emerges from the cacophony: one of the most sublime moments in music anywhere.

46dukedom_enough
maj 31, 2011, 7:50 pm

baswood,

I had a similar experience just a few years after yours. I was 20, listening to the radio while in college, and discovered modern jazz. I had been listening to the rock of my era really for only a couple of years, and liked it, but Coltrane and the others quickly became far more important to me.

As to the missing excitement: somewhere I read someone saying "jazz isn't dead, it's just over." I think there's something to that. Jazz has been a progressive music, in the sense of progression through a series of stages. The limits of the possible expanded steadily throughout the twentieth century, and every few years brought something new for listeners.

But once the free jazz of the 1970s and 1980s (I see the dates as a little later than yours) had developed, the musician had no constraints whatsoever. Maybe, at that point, there was nowhere further to progress. It seems to me that, since that era, there've been many fashions and revivals that have come and gone, and the musicianship of the younger players is astounding, but they don't seem to have musical barriers to push against, nor any moldy figs ready to push back.

Then again, maybe it's just that we're old. :-)

47baswood
jun 1, 2011, 2:19 pm

dukedom_enough, I had never heard that reference to Moldy figs before. I agree with your thoughts, especially on the astounding musicianship of the younger players.

When I was casting my eye around the auditorium at the Wynton concert I did not spot many/any young people in the audience. In fact most of us were a fair bit older than the musicians. What does that say I wonder?

Of course we are not too old - it's just that they don't make music like they used to.

48Jargoneer
jun 1, 2011, 3:56 pm

Jazz is effectively a form of classical music now, and it is people like Wynton Marsalis to blame. They took jazz out of the clubs and into the concert halls. In some ways however that was the only option left, jazz had stopped being a 'popular' music by the late 1960s - the further the avant-garde expanded the music the smaller the audience. The general public didn't want Albert Ayler, they wanted Stan Getz - music they could hum along to. This was allied to the fact that rock/pop music was new and fresh and said more to the kids about their world. And going electric/electronic made no difference (there is a sense in which jazz is an acoustic music). Does anyone think Chick Corea or Weather Report sum up the desolation of the mid/late 1970s more than the Ramones or the Clash? Or sound like the future a la Kraftwerk?

Jazz is music for old people but it's been that way for years.

49baswood
jun 1, 2011, 5:43 pm

Interesting jargoneer. I don't think jazz has ever been a popular music. There have been times when artists have managed to crossover into popular music - Stan Getz being one of them. When I was excited by avant-garde jazz in the late 1960's I was very much in the minority with my contemporaries and even in the jazz clubs it was an older clientele that I mixed with(people in their 20's and 30's) I know in the music press there was much talk about the new jazz being the music of the ghetto's, but I never saw any evidence of it in London, it might have been a different scene in New York.

At the time of the punk/new wave revolution; say 1977, the pop music scene was moribund, there was still interesting things happening on the jazz scene but this was a different world, a world that was never going to appeal to the kids waiting for the punks to come along.

We are in agreement, I think that jazz has in the main always been a minority music. The majority of people won't listen to music that does not follow a regular tune and if the beats not regular as well then there is little chance of it being popular. There have been times when jazz has excited it's minority following and I was caught up in one of those times.

Poor old Wynton. Is he and his ilk to blame for taking jazz out of the clubs and into the concert hall, well I suppose he is. He has certainly made his style of jazz more acceptable and as a crossover artist he is more likely to crossover into classical music than rock, hip hop or pop. Me, I love Wynton, but only because through his patronage I can go and listen to top quality music just 5 miles down the road.

Jazz music is not music for kids and until recently it has not been music for old people, but it has always been a minority music.

What music scene today can give me that adrenaline rush, that excitement and intensity and the idea that I am hearing something newly created. Or am I just too old for that sort of thing?

50baswood
jun 1, 2011, 5:52 pm

For all you folks wondering what Albert Ayler sounds like here he is. I can never understand why he didn't top the pop charts, surely this is as good as Stranger on the Shore http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gE8cn_lVUbQ&feature=related

51Mr.Durick
jun 1, 2011, 6:06 pm

I used to play Albert Ayler at parties half an hour before the girls' dormitory curfew. It drove the people away in time not to get in trouble with the school authorities. Then I could turn it down, have a last drink, and enjoy the solitude.

Robert

52Jargoneer
jun 2, 2011, 4:38 am

>49 baswood: - I agree that jazz has rarely sold in the millions but I think there was a point in the late 50s-early 60s that it was the music at the centre of culture - in films, in influencing music - it was the cool sound. Then rock'n'roll replaced it - people tend to forget that rock'n'roll didn't become dominant until the 1963/4, before then it was seen as a novelty music that would fade.

I also agree that jazz will never be truly popular . I remember the big jazz push in the 1980s in the UK when musicians like Andy Sheppard and Courtney Pine were everywhere, and there were jazz influenced bands like Blue Rondo A La Turk and Pigbag. It worked for a year, albums charted well but then it was over, replaced by the next 'new' sound.

Age is an interesting question when it comes to music - is it there is no exciting music out there or is it that music doesn't create the same adrenaline rush as when young? Or possibly there is exciting music out there but when you are older you don't have the time or want to put in the effort to find it? I tend to think that there is exciting music out there but some of it is only exciting for the young (i.e., people rave about the Artic Monkeys and I reply that Gang of Four developed a similar sound 30 years ago) while at the same time being haunted by the possibility that I just don't know where to look anymore.

The one place I have been where jazz still flourishes is Eastern Europe - perhaps because pop music wasn't readily available for years. Whether that will remain the case is another matter.

53amandameale
jun 2, 2011, 9:10 am

*I'm a musican and a music teacher. I think that new music, in every genre, has become less exciting because the various forms have been explored to their utmost and therefore there are less good ideas to be had. The Classical period, for example, had its heyday, as did jazz and the original rock 'n' roll. But I do believe there is more excitement out there - it's the music that has already been created which you haven't yet discovered.

For teenagers, pop music is still exciting. It's fashion. It's like the clothes they wear and the words they use. All belongs to them and all is amazing.

And occasionally I find something new which excites me.

*(Doesn't mean I have all of the answers but it is an area I think about a lot.)

54msjohns615
jun 3, 2011, 10:21 am

I used to listen to a lot of jazz in high school. Music has a powerful effect on the teenage mind, but I think the special thing about listening to jazz at that age is, you can tell yourself: "this is the greatest music ever, the music that best expresses the genius of human intellect." Jazz musicians must learn a complex musical language, and they must spend years perfecting their ability to express themselves in this language through their chosen instrument, in unique and spontaneous improvisations. When I was a teenager, listening to jazz was like staring into the sun: it was so powerful, so incomprehensible how those musicians could express themselves so fluently through their instruments.

53: I think it's worth noting that, for a small yet sizeable group of teenagers, pop music is not particularly exciting; it's revolting. There are those who go with the greater crowd, who love the crowd and want to be a part of that common denominator, then there are those who find their own alternative crowd. I'm 27 now, so my high school days seem quite far behind me, but when I see my contemporaries go crazy for pop songs from the late 90s when they're played at the bar, it produces strange feelings in me. I didn't like those songs, I didn't want to listen to Third Eye Blind, and I don't share in their nostalgia and giddy euphoria when they hear that one stupid song that pop radio played nonstop for a solid four months a decade ago. You're absolutely right about all things belonging to teenagers and all things being amazing to them, but tying those feelings to pop only works for a portion of them, the portion that I never related to very well.

Sorry, didn't mean to turn this into a rant about teenagers' feelings toward pop music. I've really enjoyed y'all's thoughts about jazz.

On a different note, underground 90s hip-hop is popular again! Yay! There's one bar I go to, kind of hipster-ish, and on some nights all they play is Wu-Tang, Biggie, Souls of Mischief, album tracks from Illmatic...that's the stuff that makes me feel nostalgic! Rap music, I love it. And jazz has lived on in rap. True, a lot of attempts at jazz-rap fusion have been less than appealing, but when done right...

What I suggest is, give this A Tribe Called Quest album a try:



The first track begins with a jazz sample (Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers' A Chant for Bu), then Tip's verse begins with these lines, which fit quite well with this conversation:

Back in the days when I was a teenager
Before I had status and before I had a pager
You could find the Abstract, listening to hip-hop
My pops used to say, it reminded him of be-bop
I said well daddy don't you know that things go in cycles
The way that Bobby Brown is just ampin' like Michael
It's all expected, things are for the lookin'
If you got the money, Quest is for the bookin'

Here's the Youtube link for Excursions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4poAOhrsvWE

Really, if you look at the songs they sample on this album, they're mostly jazz. Here's a Wikipedia page that documents the samples of The Low End Theory:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Low_End_Theory

Jack DeJohnette, Lonnie Liston Smith, Weather Report, Grant Green, Cannonball Adderly, Les McCann...I guess what I'm trying to say is, jazz did live on in rap music, people are still sampling old records (Kanye West flipped an old Hank Crawford song on Drive Slow, for example) and the music is living on. Maybe some people don't like the way it's living on, but I've always loved the way rap music dialogues with past music forms through sampling. For me, a guy who grew up listening to rap, it made the music from the 60s and the 70s so much more accessible and thrilling. Every Marvin Gaye album, every Isley Brothers album, every Roy Ayers album was a treasure trove of hidden samples and constant epiphanies as I discovered that, wow, Ice Cube sampled Footsteps in the Dark, Pharcyde sampled Quincy Jones, and so on. I got to see how wonderful the old music was, having already experienced it in rap.

And, Barry, I'd say that it's not that the excitement has gone; there's still exciting music being made all over the world. I think it's that, as we all grow older, it becomes harder and harder to recreate that excitement we felt when we were younger.

55Jargoneer
jun 3, 2011, 10:59 am

>54 msjohns615: - it's interesting you mention hip-hop - I can't think of a more moribund cliched genre around (there are exceptions, there are always exceptions) - and one that is also soaked with obnoxious messages: misogynistic, homophobic, glorifying violence and criminality.

At 27 you shouldn't be writing I think it's that, as we all grow older, it becomes harder and harder to recreate that excitement we felt when we were younger. You aren't old enough to make statements like that - legally I think the minimum age is 30 (in some places 35).

56msjohns615
jun 3, 2011, 11:50 am

55: Yeah, I guess so. But 27 already feels a lot older than 18. Maybe it's because I live in a college town surrounded by 19 year olds who, as I watch them walk by, look like children to me. I remember when I lived in the city I felt a lot younger in my mid-20s. Here, I'm constantly surrounded by these droves of little college kids entering into independent life.

But it sounds like you've listened to very little rap, and have some preconceptions that would make it different for you to see it as anything other than what you've just described it as. It doesn't matter the genre, there's tons of crap out there. Crappy rock, crappy jazz, music that's horrible and cliched and makes you want to vomit...why would rap be more moribund than rock, for instance? Rock's been around for a lot longer. How does a genre avoid becoming moribund? Actually, I think there's still plenty of interesting things going on in rap: an increasing desire to reach across the ocean and connect with European electronic musicians, for one. Rap is, almost by its sample-based nature, a genre that assimilates other genres constantly, and I think that's helped it stayed relatively fresh. I believe rap is the most influential American art form of the past thirty years, and you'd have a hard time convincing me otherwise. Everywhere I've gone, all over the world, people have loved rap music. Not all people, but a lot of people who have been inspired by the fashion, the music, the art (where don't you see graffiti), the dancing, and a lot of the positive things that sometimes get lost amidst the negatives that many people (like Fox News) focus on. Although some will say graffiti has no redeeming value as art, and that it's a scourge on our (often decaying) urban landscapes. Hip-hop music, and hip-hop culture, have their positives and negatives. But so do all other genres of music.

Anyway, tell me some albums, songs or musicians that you love; I'd be glad to suggest some rap music that, if listened to with an open mind, might cause you to realize that there are far more exceptions than you thought...

57Jargoneer
jun 3, 2011, 12:22 pm

>56 msjohns615: - Some rap music I own includes - Outkast, Roots Manuva, Dizzee Rascal, Public Enemy, us3, Grandmaster Flash &..., Eric b & Rakim, De la Soul, MC Solaar, Blackalicious, and Common.

58baswood
jun 3, 2011, 12:42 pm

Matt, it's great to hear somebody passionate about the music they like and the excitement that they get from it. Rap, hmmmm ..... It's music that I have probably heard only in the background. OK what do you suggest I listen to.

59msjohns615
jun 3, 2011, 1:32 pm

57: Well, we certainly have those artists in common, then. I'm especially fond of OutKast, I was actually just listening to their first album on my walk back from lunch. De la as well...really, all the artists you mention I've enjoyed at some point or another. That Us3 album, while it's a little, um, I think "incredibly corny" is the right word, I think that was the first CD I ever bought when I was in third or fourth grade. I used to love that CD.

Anyway, I tend to get a very "us versus them" attitude when people start dissin' on rap, even a little bit...sorry if I offended!

@58: Well, I'd say that De la Soul and A Tribe Called Quest are two great groups that most newcomers to hip-hop would appreciate for their sincerity, creativity and innovative sounds. De la's first two albums, Three Feet High and Rising and De la Soul is Dead, are great. They wrote thoughtful, funny rhymes, and in the late 80s they worked with a producer, Prince Paul, who'd been around New York's rap scene for a while and was really pushing the music in new directions, utilizing all kinds of samples from unlikely sources...They're just fun, exuberant albums. Here's a youtube clip of a press kit they released for their first album, it's a good introduction to them and their musical motivations:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mh2_GOPGKBs

A Tribe Called Quest's second and third albums, The Low End Theory and Midnight Marauders, are two of the better jazz-influenced rap albums. Q-Tip and Phife are maybe not as lyrically gifted as a Rakim or a Big Daddy Kane, but their rhymes are thoughtful and positive, and their beats still sound fresh, even fifteen years after I first started listening to them.

Also, The Digable Planets' second album, Blowout Comb, is probably my favorite jazz-influenced rap album.

60Jargoneer
jun 4, 2011, 5:23 am

>58 baswood: - I'd add the Dream Warriors And the Legacy Begins and Guru's Jazzamatazz series. What's interesting about the Guru albums is that he uses a live band, not just samples - the first volume is the best.
There is also Buckshot LeFonque, Branford Marsalis' side project about blending jazz, rap, reggae, etc, and Roy Hargrove's Hard Groove.

>57 Jargoneer: - I agree that the first us3 album is now seen as corny but part of that is that it was over-played everywhere.
There is a certain joy about not listening to an album for years and then re-finding it - remembering why you liked it the first place. (It doesn't always work, I listen to David Bowie's Never Let Me Down every 18 months or so thinking it can't be as bad as I remember - but it is).

61baswood
jun 4, 2011, 7:25 am

Careful jargoneer - with your comments about not listening to an album for years and then re-finding it. You will set me off on a nostalgia trip and I'll end up posting about them most nights.

Ah at last someone has mentioned a cd/artist that I know of. I really like Roy Hargrove's Hard Groove and I saw him last year at Marciac on a night of smooth jazz music. Oh how I dislike the term smooth jazz; it makes me think of dumbed down jazz. Anyway it was a good night of music with Marcus Miller being the headline act. No passion though. There were a few youngsters in the audience as well , probably some as young as 27.

And going back to one of your earlier posts jargoneer, you mentioned the Gang of Four who were one of my favourite groups of the late 70's, required listening I think:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XatoHLQcrTY&feature=fvwrel

62Jargoneer
jun 4, 2011, 9:28 am

>61 baswood: - first two albums are certainly required listened - the later ones more hit and miss (was especially disappointed in last year's release, Content). I think the post-punk era was probably pop music's finest time period - record labels didn't know what to do so they signed everybody. So many great bands appeared in such a short time - Gang of Four, Wire, XTC, PIL, the Pop Group, etc. (Of course, this may just be a UK perspective).

Smooth jazz makes me think of coffee shops - a type of bland music designed not to grab anyone's attention. Some of it can be quite surreal. I was in a supermarket a few years ago and after a few minutes I realised the music playing was a smooth jazz version of Smells Like Teen Spirit.

63amandameale
jun 5, 2011, 9:50 am

msjohns - Yes, I agree on the teenage point.

I don't believe one can measure musical taste analytically. Like all of the arts, what moves one person will not necessarily move another.
I might disagree with the opinion that jazz is the best music one can ever hear. I might suggest that rap is not music but recitation. But I'm not going to argue about it because I believe that what one likes is entirely subjective.
I don't like Stockhausen, and here's one of my favourite music jokes:
Person A: Have you heard any Stockhausen lately?
Person B: No, but I believe I may have trodden in some.

(PS I love jazz.)

64baswood
jun 5, 2011, 7:49 pm

Glad you love Jazz Amanda



But here's something completely different, but it is based on sampling
Steve Reich - Different Trains
It is music for string quartet and tape and features the very excellent Kronos quartet Steve Reich explains how the track was made:
In order to combine the taped speech with the string instruments I selected small speech samples that are more or less clearly pitched and then noted them as accurately as possible in musical notation. The strings literally imitate that speech melody. The speech samples as well as the train sounds were transferred to tape with the use of sampling keyboards and a computer

The speech samples were taken from a recording of a retired Pullman porter reminiscing about his life and from Holocaust survivors. The train sounds come from recordings made in the 1930's and 1940's. I think the results are a fascinating piece of music once your ear has gotten tuned in to the unmusical sounds of the modern Kronos quartet. The violins set up an agitated background while the cello plays the melody of the speech patterns. The music is in 20-30 second sequences that vary in pace, but the train sounds link it together reasonably well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYnAQ-lK74A

65amandameale
jun 6, 2011, 9:24 am

This is how I am about a lot of music: I don't like the minimalists in general, but I do like a few of their works - one Reich piece, one Glass piece, something else (can't remember).

66wandering_star
jun 19, 2011, 7:46 am

Great thread. I am now listening to Esperanza Spalding, thanks to Spotify, and really enjoying it.

My current can't-stop-listening album is Florence + The Machine's album Lungs - especially Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up) which I would describe as the aural equivalent of Angela Carter...

67baswood
Redigeret: jul 5, 2011, 11:25 am

Music while Eating
We sort of have an unwritten rule in our house that we will turn any music off when we sit down to eat. It's always a surprise therefore when we eat at our friend Jamie's place to find him consciously selecting some music when we are all sat "a table". For my taste he always gets the volume just right, so that the music weaves itself in and out of the conversation, but its loud enough to allow you to take a break from the chatter sit back and listen. It never works for me if I try something like this at home: someone will always complain that "the musics a bit loud" or I will find that people have raised their voices to such an extent that the level of noise has become intolerable. It may be Jamie's musicianly ear that allows him to get it just right or perhaps it's the people around his table that are willing to let the music breathe around them. After the meal when the plates are stacked Jamie will pick up his guitar and play along to the music or dart off at a tangent when his memory is stirred into another tune or riff: " do you know this"he will say". Nice evenings.

The last time we were at Jamie's he was playing Thimar - Anouar Brahem


Brahem plays the oud and he is joined on this sumptuous record by John Surman playing soprano saxophone and bass clarinet and John Holland on bass. It's on the ECM label so you know you are going to get an excellent recording that has plenty of air and allows this music to breathe. Any percussion is provided by Holland's excellent bass and the tempos are on the slow side. Surman's soprano sax fits beautifully with Brahem's oud to give the whole affair a mysterious middle eastern feel. There is room for some virtuoso oud playing but the highlights for me are sections of the music where Surmans breathy bass clarinet playing underscores Brahems improvisations.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZNGbMnCbIg&feature=related

68baswood
jul 5, 2011, 5:00 pm

#66 I prefer the song and the video "Heavy in Your arms" that I kicked up from the web site from your link. Good songs

69Bridgey
okt 10, 2011, 11:22 am

sorry for being thick... but how do you load up pictures onto here? :)

70baswood
Redigeret: okt 10, 2011, 6:07 pm

Welcome Bridgey to club read.

Here is a link to another group site which may help

http://www.librarything.com/topic/112897.

However I shortcut this a little by not using photobucket as follows.:

Find an image on the net you want to copy- rt click on it and select porperties from the menu, now highlight the URL address and rt click and from the menu select copy. Open up a new window here and rt click and select paste. you should now have your URL address of the picture. Here is an example ( a pretty boring picture of Bruce Springsteen)

http://prettyboring.com/files/images/bruce_springsteen.jpg

add img src=" to the front end of the URL address and " to the back end like this:

img src="http://prettyboring.com/files/images/bruce_springsteen.jpg"

Finally enclose all this in angle brackets and you will have your picture

71Bridgey
okt 11, 2011, 6:27 am

That is brilliant :) just printed it out...

Many thanks!

72Bridgey
Redigeret: okt 11, 2011, 7:08 am

Probably my most listened to album at the moment is The Future by Leonard Cohen.

I first starting listening to him a few years ago and am still amazed at the depth of lyrics. Anyone who has seen the film Natural Born Killers will be familiar with a few of the tracks.



I have seen him perform live over the last few years and he's even better than his albums.

By the way, I'm seeing Bob Dylan this Thursday night in Cardiff... already seen him about ten times over the years, but still can't wait!!!

73Jargoneer
Redigeret: okt 11, 2011, 6:53 am

>72 Bridgey: - you need to put the link in brackets < & >

I do own The Future but it's not an album I listen too much despite liking some of the tracks ('Democracy' and 'Waiting for a Miracle', for example). It just disappointed me after I'm Your Man, too many overlook tracks that seem to drift along overstaying their welcome. But I will have another listen to it over the next few days....

74Bridgey
okt 11, 2011, 7:07 am

The title track is my favourite, may be worth trying the live version on the Live in London album...

75Bridgey
Redigeret: okt 11, 2011, 7:09 am

oops was using the wrong types...

:)