Joyful Sounds From Congo

Sometimes the only music happy enough is African music, and before I'm accused of speaking of the continent like I think it has a monoculture, today I'm referring in particular of the music of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

After dismissing my entire music collection as unfit for listening, I turned to the internet. I was pleased to discover that there is finally a new post at No Condition Is Permanent (this blog is highly recommended - take a moment to look through his archive). Count Reeshard was nice enough to share the music of Pamela M'ounka. It's a foot-tapping kind of music that evokes warm weather, good times, and a kind of smile in the face misfortune. His songs speak of love and its victims, and offer sly commentary on his country's economic and sociological conditions. Check out this description:

Pamelo's songs follow the traditional soukous pattern of creeping forward in a slow burn of almost ballad-like quality, and then gradually building up heat until they burst into flame with infectious guitar-driven rhythms that are impossible to ignore. While almost all artists of the era respected this musical structure, many singers seemed to be anxious to put the slow stuff behind them and get on with the guitar attack. Franco's songs, for example, often sound raw and under-produced as they build to the climactic rush of the "main" part. In contrast, Pamelo's great strength is that he complemented his irresistible melodies with controlled, almost delicate, vocals and superior production throughout. He convincingly conveys a wide range of emotion in each song-- his lush, unhurried introductory phrases are as carefully crafted as the feverish, extended ecstasies of the main body of the song.

There's an informative article about the music of Congo in The Economist, of all places. To help put it all in context I'll need to find recordings from some other important (and better remembered) artists of M'Ounka's day, such as Sam Mangwana, Tabu Ley Rochereau, and Franco Luambo.

For the moment, anyone interested can grab more of M'Ounka's songs here.

Album Review: Medl - Medly

Just in time for spring, our friends Medl have put out their first release, available as a free download from their spankin' new Vocoid netlabel. It's an airy and melodic set of songs, and it's making me pine for the warmer, sunnier days that are (hopefully) just around the corner. I'm not going to try to pin it down to a genre, but I hear hints of Plaid, dashes of Mouse on Mars, some Solvent, ISAN, maybe even a little To Rococo Rot, and all tied together with an indie-sensibility reminiscent of The Postal Service without the vocals (or maybe Dntel would be a more apt comparison).

Medl - Medly (or click here to download a zip of complete album).

There are a number of different styles at work on this album, so a review of a few individual tracks seems in order.

Nother Rainy Day

This is the last track on the album, and the one that I had to listen to three times in a row this morning during my train ride into the city. A brisk, simple 4x4 beat drives a playfully interlocking set of quizzical, wistful, happy-yet-sad melodies. The track is uncluttered and well-crafted, with everything in the right place and nothing hanging around for long enough to dominate. This rainy day lets in a lot of sunshine.

Feliz Naviblah

This song is centered around a soaring, sustained cluster of synth notes that twist around, expand and contract, recede and then burst into the foreground, and playfully converse with the beat that merrily chugs along underneath. The vocal sample that sneaks in midway through compliments all of this perfectly, and cracks me up every time I hear it.

Stuff Goes Back

A frantic, angular, crunchy melody screams over most of this track, and a mightily obscured vocal provides emphasis and and a sense of mystery. If you like Plaid, grab this one and you won't be disappointed.

Soft On The Tarmac

Another wistful, sunny song for lazy afternoons, sitting by the pool, and maybe remembering your childhood in the 80s. This one taps into some instrinsic sense I have of what makes a song emotional for me -- certain chord changes, certain timbres, certain melodic devices that were popular in the 80s -- that and filters opening up. In particular, anything that remotely resembles a relatively obscure New Order track called Your Silent Face that for whatever reason packs more emotional punch for me than almost any other song. Soft On The Tarmac showcases Medl's talent for achieving this kind of feeling.

Summer Came Late This Year

This track kicks off Medly with a bubbly, straight ahead "melodic IDM" sensibility. It bookends the album nicely with Nother Rainy Day at the other end, each track coming at you with some of the same sensibilities but carried out in a different way. Whereas Nother Rainy Day's parts intertwine in a pretty egalitarian fashion, Summer Came Late This Year has one melody that is clearly in the lead -- and it will probably get stuck in your head. You'll be humming the bassline on this one too.

The rest of the album ain't bad either... We're looking forward to more from Medl.

The People of Country Persuasion

To break the mood here, I'm going to talk about country.

I've been searching for good country for a while now, and I'd like to share a few things I've learned. First off, I'm not talking about Garth Brooks or the Dixie Chicks or any of that nonsense. We all know that's some horrid shit. And I'm not talking about anything that's come along under the description of alt-country either. That was probably the biggest disappointment as far as new genres went. Like the rest of you, I checked out Wilco and Uncle Tupelo and was severely let down by the hype. No, this is a discussion of what I've seen described as "southern gothic" and also "gothic americana". Probably because anyone with a bit of sense doesn't want to be considered alt-country. Songs not so much about losing your truck and your dog, but rather about how your soul is in mortal peril because you've impregnated your sister. Music that follows in the footsteps of Johnny Cash and Nick Cave. Yes, I wear lots of black - you should have figured this out by now.

The term "southern gothic" apparently originated as a literary genre, much like the term "gothic". Ambrose Bierce -type stuff. And both genres are ridiculed for their excessive verbiage in regard to pale people doing miserable things.

Anyway, this here is a list of some bands I've come across that I feel deserve your attention, being as they're all really good, but stuck in a genre most of you probably wouldn't even look twice at.

Sixteen Horsepower
These are the big boys of the genre, so they're a good starting point. They're the ones who really brought this style of music back up and made it great again, which is especially important now that Johnny Cash is dead and Nick Cave is singing about his morning frappuccino. Most of their songs are heavily christian country, but in a very fire and brimstone way. The lead singer is a fellow named David Eugene Edwards, who has said that he is very into christianity, and in particular the specific sort of self-hatred that only christianity can deliver. The band is also well versed in the music of the Carter Family, and in fact their album "Folklore" consists largely of covers of old country greats. I realize that creepy covers of "wayfaring stranger" are a dime a dozen, but in my opinion these guys did it best. Oh yeah, dig around and you can find their version of Joy Division's "day of the lords", which is twangy brilliance.

Woven Hand
Having said all that, I must tell you now that Sixteen Horsepower is no more. But you can still find Mr. Edwards doing his melancholy "God hates me" thing in Woven Hand. On average a bit quieter and mellower than his previous work, but still worth checking out.

Slim Cessna's Auto Club
If you're going to check out any of the music I've listed here, it should be these guys. This is a truly great band, and I'm constantly amazed that no one seems to have heard of them. Also from Denver, and possibly Rhode Island. Listening to these guys is like going to a tent revival, or say the Church of John Coltrane, but more fun. Songs about getting drunk and beating up Satan, and rocking out with the founder of the baptist church. And for added weirdness, they're on Alternative Tentacles and Jello Biafra comes to all their shows. Must must listen.

Jay Munly
The "front sideman", whatever that means, of the Auto Club, he recently released an album titled "Munly and the Lee Lewis Harlots", which I haven't been able to go a day without listening to. Most every review I've found of the album uses the word "genius" at least once, and not in a painful Drukqs kind of way. Also, he managed to find the sexiest sounding backup singers I've ever heard. This is also on the must listen list.

Jim White
Probably the most mainstream country sound in this list, but he's good enough that I don't hold that against him. I don't know why, but I'm a sucker for lines like "I'm handcuffed to a fence in Mississippi" and happy songs about sexy serial killers. Look for his album called "no such place" and feel the melancholy joy.

Reverend Glasseye
The good reverend is just the thing for when you can't find your Rain Dogs cd. I can't really decide how much of a compliment or a complaint to make that, but really, it's a lot like Rain Dogs. Really really like Rain Dogs. If you're like me and can eventually work your way past that, you won't be disappointed, but I just thought I should warn you.

Hogscraper
These guys will always have a special place in my heart, even though they can't really be considered as good as most of the other bands here. This is satanic bluegrass straight from the wilds of Ohio, and good fun all around. Because there's nothing like necro-bestiality. I also felt I should mention them because some 8 years after their debut, they've released a digitally remastered version of their first album. So now you can hear the squealing of the pigs in hi-fi.

The The
Not really a country band by any stretch, but you should check out their album Hanky Panky, which consists entirely of covers of Hank Williams Sr. songs. And in case you don't already know, that Matt Johnson sure can sing.

I suppose I should provide a link to Smooch Records here, as they seem to be the record label of choice for most of these bands.

One final note. A disproportionate number of bands in this genre come from Denver, and there are several that I didn't list here. Which makes Denver the scene to watch if you're into this sort of thing. Not one of my favorite places, but I can't argue with all the good music coming out of there. And at least it's not something even sillier like say the Omaha music scene. Sorry to all you fans of The Faint out there, but come on, Omaha?

Nino Rota and The Simpsons Theme

I'd meant to do a piece today on Nino Rota and his soundtrack for Fellini's Juliet of the Spirits, but I couldn't find any clips of it online, and got sidetracked by another shiny musical info-nugget. I'll review Juliet of the Spirits tomorrow. Instead, here's a quote from Matt Groening about The Simpsons theme song (via Retrocrush, get an mp3 of The Simpsons theme here if for some reason you can't just play it in your head while you read this):

"The trend in TV themes for the previous 15 years had been this namby-pamby synthesizer schlock, modest in both ambition and execution. These noodly, ersatz-sentimental themes all seemed to whimper, "We can't offer you much, but please like our pathetic little show!" I wanted a big, fully orchestrated, obnoxious, arrogant theme that promised you the best time of your life.

We approached Danny Elfman, whose career I'd been following since I saw him perform as the leader of The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo (best described as an avant-garde Cab Calloway-on-Mars vaudeville ensemble) at the Whisky-a-Go-Go on the Sunset Strip in the late 70's. Elfman had recently composed the soundtrack to Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, and I knew he'd be perfect.

I gave Elfman what I called a "flavors" tape, featuring the kind of sound I wanted for The Simpsons theme. The tape included The Jetsons theme, selections from Nino Rota's Juliet of the Spirits, a Remington electric shaver jingle by Frank Zappa, some easy-listening music by Esquivel, and a teach-your-parrot-to-talk record.

Elfman gave it a listen and said, "I know exactly what you're looking for."

A month later we were recording the now-famous Simpsons theme on the 20th Century Fox lot with a huge orchestra. I think all the producers were a little nervous and fidgety about the untrendy audacity of the music. But then-executive producer James L. Brooks came in, listened a bit, then said, "My God! This is great! This is lemmings-marching-to-their-death music!"

As someone obsessed with musical pattern-recognition, I find the list of music on Groening's tape for Elfman particularly interesting. Elfman's score for Pee-Wee's Big Adventure was clearly influenced by the Juliet of the Spirits soundtrack, so it makes sense that Groening would turn to him if that was what he was looking for.

Album Review: Milieu - Songs We Found In The Sand (rsc002)

In the grand tradition of melodic downtempo IDM, Milieu has released a free album on the new Netlabel Rope Swing Cities:

Milieu - Songs We Found In The Sand

If Rope Swing Cities keeps releasing albums of this quality, the label will go far.

This album is richly atmospheric with plenty of great moody textural progression, but the real hook of these songs lies in their melodies and harmonies. What I mean to say is: these are "Songs" more than "Tracks".

Compositionally, there are few hard delineating lines between sections (intro, verse, chorus, bridge, outro). Instead, Milieu tends to build progressions that evolve and shift slowly over the length of the track. Without being dull, the music is definitely not foreground music, in large part because of this slow evolving compositional style. Put it on to relax or as you need to get some work done, and it will mostly stay out of your way, occasionally making you stop and listen to absorb the depth of the moment.

The beats are in the subtle glitch-hop vein, with just enough bounce and movement to keep your head bobbing. While this album is definitely derivative of Boards of Canada, at its best moments it can easily stand toe to toe with their latest effort. Overall, a very solid effort.

Standout tracks include (full track downloads):

Elep
As Summer Blooms
Poplar Drive 1967
Inpond

Download the whole record here (zip 120 meg).

If you like it, leave him some Feedback.

Album Review: Wayne&Wax's Boston Jerk

The first thought you may have when you throw on this record is "What is this slightly odd-sounding white-boy from Boston doing making Jamaican music? Is he some sort of cultural fetishist?" Dig a little deeper and you'll see you aren't the only one asking the question.

The whole project is sort of a meditation on this idea, complete with interludes of Wayne interviewing his Jamaican guest MC's. You have got to give him some respect for actually moving to Jamaica for 6 months to make this album. Most other outsiders who dabble with dub/ska/reggae/ragga stylings do it from the comfort of their own homes, their only exposure to the culture they worship being Red Stripe lager, jerk chicken, and piles of dub recordings.

Wayne&Wax, AKA Wayne Marshall is a DJ, Producer and Ethno-Musicologist living in Boston, hence the word play in the title of the album. Some of you in the faithfull PTR reading masses may recognize W&W's name from his blog, which several of us around here read obsessively. Definitely one of the most thoughtful music blogs around.

The album wanders stylistically between found sound, cut 'n' paste, hip hop, ragga and grime. More often than not, it works. Here are a couple standout tracks:

• Ready for the road: This track is an interesting blend of trip-hop creepiness with ragga energy and cool. I challenge you to not get the western-movie strings and whistling stuck in your head.


• A It Dat: This is clearly the big dancefloor single of the album. Wayne's rhymes are tight, and his guest MCs bring that ragga vocal stylee that we love so well. The beat really typifies what so great about this new generation of techno/dub/hip-hop stylistic mixings, its has all the smart punchiness of a good hip-hop track with a tight head-bobbin' ragga rhythm. Dear world: more music like this, please. Thanks!


• Taximan: This is a definite contender to be one of the best "found sound" tracks I've ever heard. At the start you hear Wayne step into a taxi, portable microphone recording as he tells the driver his destination. The you hear beats and melodies built up completely from bits of sound sampled from inside the cab: the squelch of the cabbies CB radio, the sound of horns blaring from cars passing by, random clicks and chunks from the street around them. But the real genius is how Wayne cuts'n'pastes the cab driver talking to his dispatcher over the CB into what amounts to a MC rapping over the beat. Why didn't I think of this?


• Bigger Than Biggie: This track definitely has his most mainstream hip-hop feel, which makes sense considering the lyrics are all about money, fame and the thug image in hip-hop -- how in order to be accepted in the biz you have to sell the mythic thug image, even if you are selling your thugness in a convenience pack with a bottle of sprite. (Mmm... That's tasty cultural whoring!) Not exactly a totally original rant, but it's done well and has some teeth, especially from a white, Jamaican-influenced underground MC.

You can buy the CD from CD Baby.

Hear Wayne talk about Mashups on NPR.

Hear Wayne talk about Reggaeton on PRI's The World.

Inna Di Flat Field

We saw Bauhaus play last night in San Francisco. I was going to do a normal concert review (Peter Murphy looks old, Daniel Ash looks like the evil Bono, the rhythm section is solid as always) but instead I'll take this opportunity to talk about the dubbiness of Bauhaus.

I wish more bands would play dub reggae for goths, but I suspect there is a good reason they do not. If the audience knew that's what was going on, they would probably be horrified. But the dub presence in the music of Bauhaus is undeniable. Sometimes it is right out in the open, as in their 1979 debut single, Bela Lugosi's Dead. This song is straight-up dub: the beat, the pacing, the spacialized delay effects. They did such a good job of making it their own sound that no one notices. Some of their songs feature an even more prominent reggae sound with skanking guitar offbeats, like the In Fear of Dub, Earwax, and Harry sequence off their 1981 Mask album. Their classic She's In Parties off 1983's Burning From The Inside is another fine example, starting off with the regular song, then dissolving in the second half in to a sinister dub version.

But last night, with the drums turned way up and the vocals a bit too quiet, I noticed that a subtle dub feel runs through a lot of their music, mainly due to Kevin Haskins' drumming. He seems to favor a very dub reggae approach, often employing a minimal 4x4 kick with a highly syncopated snare pattern. Maybe I'm mostly hearing this because my ears are attuned to it, but I would not be at all surprised to find a little King Tubby in Mr. Haskins' record collection. The jagged guitar and uber-goth vocals win out over the dub, but it is a constant undercurrent in their songs, shaping that unique Bauhaus sound.

The Mirrormask Soundtrack: Not Good

Normally I would not be inspired to review something I didn't like, unless I had a particularly original or amusing reason for disliking it. But saxophonist and composer Iain Ballamy's soundtrack for the Jim Henson Company/Neil Gaiman/Dave McKean film Mirrormask puzzles me. For the most part, it is not my cup of tea. Most of the cues center around a wailing, light-jazz saxophone sound, with a generous helping of artlessly programmed drum beats and what sounds like multisampled "ethnic" instruments. The variety of styles (tangos, waltzes, circus music, Arabic, breakbeat) and the small ensemble perfomance (a ten-piece band rather than full orchestra) should have been perfect for the film's fantasy theme, creating an auditory sense of removal from the everyday, like Angelo Badalamenti's masterful score for The City of Lost Children. Except the wailing saxophone and the new age production just turn the whole thing in to a block of cheddar.

What puzzles me is that the soundtrack has a moment of brilliance which I'm still hearing in my head several days later: a mechanical, otherworldly arrangement of Hal David and Burt Bacharach's song Close To You, with truly unique and surreal close-harmony singing, performed in eight multi-tracked parts by Swedish vocalist Josephine Cronholm. It works perfectly as an unexpected musical number in the film, with the unusual harmonies coming out of the mouths of singing robot-clock-women as they give the main character a kind of gothic makeover. How did this one piece of music on an otherwise unappealing soundtrack turn out so nicely? Perhaps someone should take away Mr. Ballamy's saxophone.