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[ Comments Off ]Posted on April 21, 2009 by admin in Music
Tuesday, April 21st, 2009
They’d both go ape over the new Gorillaz documentary Bananaz
I’m sure there’s some deeper significance to the fact that in grade school, one of my favorite bands was the Monkees
, and that many years later, one of my favorite bands was Gorillaz. One thing is for certain: I didn’t grow up much in the interim. During the little growing up I did do, I was exposed to a lot of live music and production (my mom managed a music store, and had a lot of connections at live venues). From an early age, I had plans to be a failed pop star who would later have a successful career as a producer. I had some definite success with the former, the results aren’t fully in on the latter. In any case, as a result I’ve never been a big fan of conventional pop music acts; some of my favorite artists over the years were production teams or their projects. Zang Tumb Tuum, Chemical Brothers
, Brian Eno, and Thomas Dolby would be a few examples. Which is part of why I’ll never forget seeing the first Gorillaz video. I loved it from a creative point of view, but was almost ecstatic when I later found out that the cartoon characters were the band. Which should make the new “behind the music” documentary Bananaz that much more amusing. It’s going to be released on DVD in June 2009, and the trailer is featured at left, but you can view the whole thing on line now at Babelgum, Oo-oo!
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[ Comments Off ]Posted on April 9, 2009 by admin in Music
Thursday, April 9th, 2009
Heartfelt covers of everything from Jimmy Buffet to Radiohead, played by a string quartet.
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I’m usually not at all fond of “clever” covers of music that juxtapose genres like “Switched On Bach” or the “101 Strings Orchestra Play The Beatles”. Unless, of course, it’s the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain doing playing the Theme From Shaft, or almost anything by Nouvelle Vague
. I ran into another exception yesterday. It all began innocently enough; an acquaintence shared a link to a Delerium video with Nerina Pallot singing. I got curious about Nerina Pallot, ran across her tepid rendition (she’s otherwise really talented, don’t get me wrong!) of “Love Will Tear Us Apart Again”, and as so often happens on YouTube, I noticed the Vitamin String Quartet version in the sidebar. That led to another hour of checking out their stuff on YouTube before ending up on Amazon buying mp3 downloads
. The quartet covers everything from Jimmy Buffett
to Nine Inch Nails
, and you can tell the players they hire have a feel for the music in many cases, rather than just being washed up classical hacks who couldn’t get a real orchestra gig. But don’t trust me, compare Paramore’s Hallelujah with the Vitamin String Quartet’s version. They also do a great job with Creep (and interestingly, someone’s already remixed it as a 3-Part Canon) . The whole catalog’s probably easier to peruse on their site (but I don’t make any money that way!), and I imagine that as well as doing genuinely listenable covers, some of it would be excellent kitsch as well. I mean, somehow I can’t imagine a heartfelt rendition of Korn
or Marilyn Manson played by a string quartet.
[ 1 Comment ]Posted on April 2, 2009 by admin in Music
Thursday, April 2nd, 2009
So WTF is TNX and H!P ?
Great. Just when I thought I was safe from more hours of mind-numbing searches, downloads, and quick listens on YouTube, I have to go and discover Shibuya-kei. It all started with a relatively innocuous but upbeat video by Kahimi Karie that my photographer friend Terry Osterhout shared on Facebook, which led me to look up the artist, which led me to Wikipedia, which led me to rediscover some old favorites like Pizzicato Five
and Cibo Matto
, and before I knew it I had spent yet another hour of my life on YouTube, in 3-5 minute segments. You’ve probably at least seen Pizzicato Five’s Twiggy Twiggy at some point (if you haven’t, you’ll pick up some smooth dance moves from watching Brother Konishi doing the “Tighten Up”) or their whacked out rendition of Girl From Ipanema. You may have also heard some Cibo Matto because of their Beastie Boys connection. What you may have missed back in the early 90′s was stuff like Flipper’s Guitar, a band that, if they went back and dubbed the songs with a Norwegian accent, could easily pass for one of the slew of Northern Europop bands of the last few years. There’s so much fun stuff in this genre I’m not even going to try to point you in the right direction, but YouTube user PizzicatoMania has a ton of Flipper’s Guitar, Cornelius, and Pizzicato Five to get you rolling, and the Shibuya-kei page on Wikipedia has a good list to start with too. One band I just discovered that I hadn’t heard of is Buffalo Daughter. That linked video has the excellent tune “Daisy” for some reason playing over a slightly pervy Japanese schoolgirl video by Canario Club. Whatever. Can someone please tell me though, WTF is TNX and H!P ? Read the rest of this entry »
[ 2 Comments ]Posted on March 24, 2009 by admin in Music
Tuesday, March 24th, 2009
Or are they losing some listeners?
While I’m enthused about the new single by David Byrne and Brazilian Girls that’s being released exclusively on iTunes today, I’m a little bit frustrated by it’s exclusivity (more on that in a minute). I’ve been a fan of Brazilian Girls since their first release in 2005
; their unique amalgam of Latin dance music, hip club stylings, and jazz influences is irresistible, and singer Sabina Sciubba’s poly-lingual antics keep the tunes interesting on repeated listening. It was always a joy at parties when people failed to realize they were headnod-dancing to a tune in which the refrain was “Pussy Pussy Pussy Marijuana”. And David Byrne? Well, as the main mastermind and vocalist of Talking Heads and occasional collaborator with Brian Eno, like him or not, he holds a pretty unique place in contemporary pop. The new tune is pretty fun, it’s an English-language remix of Brazilian Girls’ 2008 tune Losing Myself
that’s been David Byrne-ified so it sounds a little like Talking Heads’ old classic “Life During Wartime”. So here’s my frustration: The new single is being released exclusively on iTunes. I am not (and may never be) an iTunes user, thanks to their shoddy history of DRM issues and insistence that you install a 70MB piece of software before they “allow” you to give them money for the music they’re selling. On top of that, the exclusive preview being offered was via the once-hip (but now a little self-indulgent and steampunk-prone) BoingBoing.net, which linked to a file that was in .wax format. It might as well be in .WTF format, as far as most people are concerned; the linked file might play in Windows Media Player , but most people have told me they couldn’t get it to play at all. I personally found a workaround using the Firefox plugin “FlashGot”. But enough bellyaching, check out the tune, if you can, and here’s the label’s press release. By the way: if you like David Byrne, you might also want to check out the tune Money
from the recent release by N.A.S.A.
[ 6 Comments ]Posted on March 13, 2009 by admin in Music
Friday, March 13th, 2009
Israeli remix artist Kutiman takes worst of YouTube and creates the best of mashups
I secretly hold dear a belief that there’s an incredible harmony at the core of the chaos that is contemporary user-generated media. Well, an Israeli artist named Kutiman proves it with his project ThruYOU. You know all those misanthropic, socially awkward musician types you might find playing music in videos on YouTube, as if they were stars in some imaginary band? Well, even they didn’t realize it, but they WERE. Kutiman did something absolutely INCREDIBLE – and I can only imagine to be mind-numbingly tedious – by sorting through an amazingly diverse collection of YouTube tutorial and demo clips, and then assembling them into mashups and grooves that are in my opinion imminently listenable. I hope this guy gets some kind of distribution deal or financial reward for this stuff. One of my faves, I M New, is featured here. The easiest way to watch them in order is at ThruYOU, but he also of course has a YouTube page. He seems like a very cool and mellow guy; just check out his version of an “about” page. He also apparently does original work; see his MySpace page. Kind of cool dubby jazzy funky grooves, but I personally think his gift is with the mashup. Read the rest of this entry »
