Here’s what you have to know about Columbus, Ohio: it’s small. There’s a handful of bars everyone goes to, a handful of shows where you literally see everyone you know, and very few people stick around for more than a year or two after they graduate from CCAD or OSU (or any one of the zillions of other colleges that call Columbus home). But because there’s an influx of creative, youthful innovators, Columbus is on top of its shit, in a way. It’s got a thriving arts district, foodie scene, and there have always been great bands (especially those with a lo-fi bent) based out of the heart-shaped state’s capital.
Recently, there’s been buzz about All Dogs, Sex Tide, Nervosas* and Connections. That last band features members of Times New Viking, who was the band with the buzz in “my time” – specifically, 2001-2008, when I lived in that humble Midwestern City. The fuzz rockers released a handful of purposely ill-recorded LPs, becoming progenitors of so-called “shit-gaze” alongside Psychedelic Horseshit, another band I saw in Columbus dives too many times to count. For whatever reason, I found myself thinking about TNV’s first record, Dig Yourself, and was shocked to realize that almost a decade had passed since its release. But that glorious distortion takes me back like it was yesterday.
[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]the classic Times New Viking set-up at Bourbon Street
The only local bands I saw more often than TNV were Sweetheart (the Unwound love-letter featuring Ahmed Gallab, aka Sinkane, on drums) and Sword Heaven (a terrifying noise/performance project fronted by the guy who holds the world’s record for most hours hula-hooped). And maybe Lambsbread by default since Lambsbread opened for damn near everybody. I went to art school with TNV’s co-vocalists, Adam Elliott and Beth Murphy, but only knew them tangentially, through friends of friends. A mutual acquaintance of mine and Murphy’s for instance, is the reason I’ll never do Adderall again. And Elliott served me too-large shots every Sunday at Bourbon Street’s karaoke (I will never again come across a catalogue that encyclopedic). Once, at a DJ event in that same bar, he gave me a dream catcher made by a bum. And we both attended this Blue Cheer show in some weird office space in Grandview; he was making out with his then-girlfriend in the closet most of the time. When they broke up she’d go on to say that he’d been physically abusive toward her, but she lied about hooking up with my roommate years later and dated a guy** I had two weeks after we broke up, not to mention having a penchant, in general, for my sloppy seconds. I used to call her my nemesis (as opposed to my archenemy) for that reason, but now she’s married so I stopped caring. Plus I lived with her cousin for three years after I moved to NYC, when any remaining grudge I harbored was long past ridiculous.
Girls like her, as well as rumors and the like, are one of the main reasons I moved away; Columbus’s smallness got to me after a while. I always said I’d never sleep with more than one dude in a single band, and then three dudes I had slept with formed a band afterward (not based on the fact that they’d all fucked me, but still). Listening to Dig Yourself after I had not in a while, though, was a welcome vacation through time and distance. In particular, “Dance Walhalla” caught me in a web of awkward memory. Most everyone I knew lived in this shitty part of town East of campus that we referred to as “Washington Beach” for some reason, or no real reason at all. Just to the North, you had Clintonville, where I think we all wanted to live (most of us eventually moved there). It was stereotypically crunchy – as in, home to the only co-op, populated by lesbians – but also really elegant in a certain fairy-tale sort of way. While most of Columbus is flat, Clintonville is woodsy and has houses built into hillsides, most dramatically along Walhalla Street. My friends and I liked to cruise around down there after dark, exploring train tracks and drain pipes and supposedly haunted houses because we had nothing better to do. It’s not just the name-checking a location in the song’s title, but the restlessness of it in the shouted vocals, the dissatisfied crash of drums, and that line “They couldn’t talk about nothing / So they spoke of too tall buildings”. It feels as aimless as living in that place felt to me then, but it also romanticizes such mundane uncertainty. I’m not even, and never have been, sure if those are the actual words to the song. Follow that with the nostalgic one-two punch of “Indian Winter”‘s lackadaisical lyrics: “We were married to…. not a goddamn thing” and you don’t have to have lived anywhere near there to know what the sticky, confusingly incestuous scene felt like.
TNV’s ability to translate the devil-may-care, jaded experiences of youth – I mean, they didn’t even try to make the recording sound good – is a big part of why people latched onto Dig Yourself and that band in general. They put the record out on Siltbreeze, which felt like sort of a big deal, and followed it up with Present the Paisley Reich on that same label before signing to Matador, which really felt like a big deal. Two summers ago, I saw them play live for the last time. A guy I’d just started dating (who wasn’t even from Ohio!) invited me to see them open for The Clean at (le)Poisson Rouge. It felt almost like a weird joke that he had asked, and it was even weirder when I bumped into old Columbus friends I hadn’t expected to see at the show because they still live there and I don’t anymore. I only know a handful of people that do, these days. But when listening to Dig Yourself, that history is never far behind me – whether it’s the memory of famed toothless savant Don B (a local fixture) belting out Batman with every band who ever played a show in Columbus, or reminiscing on something as simple as a pointless night drive down a darkened street.
* an ex-boyfriend of mine fronts this band, which is a lot better than the trying-too-hard psych outfit he was in when we dated
** that ex-boyfriend[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
Every Thursday, AF profiles a style icon from the music world. This week, check out Kim Gordon’s inspiring trajectory as prolific noise musician, visual artist, and fashion designer, peruse the looks she’s had over her incredible thirty-year career, and check out the looks she’s helped create.
As a founding member of Sonic Youth, Kim Gordon’s been a style icon for over three decades now. She attended Otis Art Institute and moved to NYC in 1979, where she had planned to pursue making visual art, but all that changed when she heard noise acts like DNA and Mars, making sound her main medium. But she’s always retained a chic, artistic eye when it comes to her wardrobe, which takes a DIY aesthetic to bold new levels.
Gordon’s always been seen as unassailably cool, whether clad in grunge-era staples like plaid jackets, black chokers, vintage tees, shredded jeans (and her signature striped dress!) or designing high-end lines for Mirror/Dash and Surface to Air. Her turn as fashion designer stretches back to the 90’s, when she created X-Girl with Daisy von Furth, a skater inspired line geared toward the Sassy-reading crowd. These days, she’s doing noise improvisations with Bill Nace as Body/Head, playing in sculptural platforms, sequined minis, and billowing tops. She’s also been focusing on creating visual art and writing a memoir with the working title Girl In A Band. There is pretty much nothing she can’t do, and the grace and wit that’s carried her through intense life changes is reflected in her clothing choices.
To get Kim’s look, the key is DIY. Think hand-painted shirts with loaded phrases, ironic cat tees, and letting your roots grow out just so. At the same time, know when and how to do elegance with silky, structured pieces in bold colors and classic patterns. Check out our style board on Pinterest for more ideas!
Skaters have spent the last year building up a dedicated fan base who have been practically salivating in anticipation of the band’s debut full-length, Manhattan, so it was about time for this album release show to come around. The Bowery Ballroom slowly filled up with girls all clad in Skaters’ merchandise, leaning patiently on the edges of the stage in anticipation of the main act.
But first up were femmes fatales, Bad Girlfriend, who appeared on stage giggling casually. The foursome’s cool and sweet demeanors put Skaters in danger of not being the heartthrobs of the night. Their sound held a lot of surfy guitar licks and captivating hooks, and the vocals—alternating between deep, Nico-esque tones and more high-pitched, sugary ones—reinforced their ’60s femme image. They were a good choice for opener, acting as foils to the main show by oozing girly, west coast cool.
The So So Glos were on next, their entrance accompanied by the Wu Tang Clan’s “Bring Da Ruckus”—an ideal choice. They said a simple hello with “Yo, it’s good to be in the city,” and dove right into their raucous set. The Bowery Ballroom’s acoustics lent themselves perfectly to lead singer Alex Levine’s raking vocals, and the band’s general attitude on stage reeked of classic rock ‘n roll. They were absolutely thrashing, conjuring images of The Clash shows-that-once-were, and it seemed the crowd simply couldn’t keep up with their raw energy. “We’ve been all around the world preaching about how New York dances so much,” commented Levine at one point, “…we were just lying.” But within a couple of songs, and particularly when the band broke out the song “Black and Blue” from their eponymous 2013 album, onlookers became moshers. They certainly did an admirable job of warming up the audience.
By the time Skaters appeared on stage (they came on to the Ghostbusters’ theme song, obviously), the room was packed with the band’s supporters and friends. The crowd was strictly Manhattanite—a perfect setting for the album being celebrated—and the atmosphere was comfortable and intimate. The band opened with “Symptomatic,” the seventh track off their new record, and this time the crowd didn’t need to be coaxed into dancing.
About halfway through the set, the quintet broke into their popular single, “I Wanna Dance (But I Don’t Know How),” which was clearly the crowd favorite and instantly recognizable from its raunchy bassline. Skaters played at their leisure, even wishing a friend in the front row a happy birthday at one point, proving that the night was truly a family affair. Another highlight of the show was the band’s fairly true to form rendition of The Smiths’ “This Charming Man,” which was dedicated to another friend in the audience.
It was the best possible way to celebrate Skaters’ highly anticipated debut—a night as energetic and quintessentially New York City as the album itself.
Highasakite are a Norwegian indie pop quintet that came on the scene with a pretty big bang. They received high praise for their breakout performance at Norway’s Øya Festival in 2012 and their debut EP, “In and Out Of Weeks,” was also critically acclaimed. So it comes as no surprise that their first full-length album, Silent Treatment, due out March 4th via Propeller Records, is a quietly confident and engaging record that further proves they’re no rookies.
The band’s got quite the lineup of instruments and talent at their disposal, with Trond Bersu on drums,Øystein Skar and Marte Eberso on synths, Kristoffer Lo on guitar, and the formidable Ingrid Helene Håvik singing and playing zither and steel drum. But it’s clear from the very beginning of Silent Treatment that they have a delicate touch, blending their skills with an expertise that allows their music to go from sweeping and spacious to very dense and back again. The opener, “Love, Where Do You Live?,” is a piano-driven, dramatic ballad that steadily builds momentum and leaves you feeling like you’re standing at the edge of a cliff, wind blowing your hair back, in some kind of majestic movie scene.
In fact, Highasakite’s best work are the slow burners, which demonstrate the band’s knack for cinematic and atmospheric music that prompts a sort of catharsis. The subdued and scintillating “My Only Crime” is a lovely highlight, and on the other hand so is “The Man On The Ferry,” which utilizes rolling drums and instrumental distortions to make the tune sound slightly dark and powerful. “I, The Hand Grenade” is another stand out that unravels quite beautifully, layering electronic elements, piano, clattering percussion, and passionate vocal harmonies singing “I, the hand grenade / I bash into the table and burst and you bring out your worst.”
The band finds a way to draw a line between Sigur Ros and Of Monsters and Men with their particular brand of indie pop. Silent Treatment certainly lives up to the name Highasakite built for themselves and is a solid debut full length.
The first time I heard Asaf Avidan’s recordings I was blown away but also unsure of what to think. An arm’s length from the core of what I normally listen to, Avidan’s music exists in a bluesy folk realm that can sometimes feel derivative of those that came before. But I appreciated the boundaries that last year’s Different Pulses seemed to push against, and I couldn’t even begin to wrap my head around the impassioned, androgynous vocals. I had to see someone actually singing those sounds to believe they came from a human being, rather than, say, the witch-cursed oak trees in Wizard of Oz. The ones who threw apples at Dorothy.
Avidan is a wiry Israeli guy who worked for years as an animator before a difficult break-up with a longtime girlfriend caused him to pick up a guitar and begin writing songs. In one of several stories he shared with audiences attending his show at Irving Plaza on Friday, he described this love as “geological,” comparing it to the shifting of tectonic plates. Instead of mountain ranges, a rift grew between the two, spurring his career as a musician. He began it as leader of Asaf Avidan & the Mojos, releasing three albums over a period of seven years, before striking out solo. Different Pulses is his first proper solo album, following up a collection of live acoustic songs entitled Avidan in a Box. It couldn’t have dropped at a better time; an unauthorized EDM remix of “One Day (Reckoning Song)” by German DJ Wankelmut was making the rounds, expanding Avidan’s already healthy fanbase. It grew so popular that Avidan’s label eventually pursued its legal release, and though the track had been used without permission initially, it ended up being a boon for Avidan.
At Irving Plaza, he played selections spanning his entire catalogue, including “Hangwoman” “Your Anchor” “Out in the Cold” and a few that have yet to see release. While the acoustic numbers were a great backdrop for his powerhouse vocals, the most intriguing tunes in the set were built from loops, allowing Avidan to expand his acoustic sound with percussion, keys, and kazoos, among other instruments. These churning, sensuous offerings had a captivating effect on an otherwise restless crowd – plenty of folks in the audience saw fit to carry on conversations so loud that widespread “Shhhhing” occurred during an admittedly long-winded retelling of David and Bathsheba. Avidan, it seems, doesn’t believe in stage banter so much as sharing stories to introduce his songs, a move which started to feel a bit superfluous. Mentioning that he read the Bible as literature or that time is an arbitrary construct felt almost cheap alongside songs that are so verbose and grandly imagined; any impatience on the part of the audience was likely rooted in the fact that everyone just wanted to hear more music.
And truly, it’s a difficult thing to wait and see what Avidan’s next move will be. He’s proven his brilliance as a songwriter and performer, and indistinctly gendered vocals are having a bit of a moment (Rhye comes to mind; they played down the street at Webster Hall that same evening). Avidan stands out for his rawness, his intense delivery part and parcel to the artistry with which he composes his material. Avidan’s work is in every way driven by an exploration of the possibilities inherent in music making, while the timeless qualities of his music ensure that he’ll be making it for a long time to come.[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
By mid-February, NYC concertgoers have grown just about impervious to the slushy trek from subway to venue. Anyway, I wasn’t about to miss Nicole Atkins‘ set at the Bowery Ballroom on Thursday on account of what I’ll optimistically say was a “wintry mix.” It rained, it snowed, it rained again; puddles as deep as kiddie pools menaced every corner of every block, making street-crossing a kind of Choose Your Own Adventure where the worst case scenario always meant plunging calf-deep in ice bath (or falling in it, God forbid, which I haven’t yet seen somebody do, but I’ve heard stories). In the Lower East Side, I walked gingerly along the beams of some dismantled wooden packing crates an enterprising person had propped up as bridges over the teeming slush rivers. But all that would have been fine—standard, even—if the actual apocalypse hadn’t occurred on Thursday, about an hour and a half before Nicole Atkins was slotted to go on stage. For about ten minutes, the snowfall dipped into a theatrical, pummeling, rainstorm, with lightening that lit up the whole island and claps of thunder that brought one man flying at the door of his apartment building in a panic as I passed by. He thought we were being bombed.
I’m going to try my best to resist making puns about weird weather patterns and the absolutely killer set that was brewing over the Bowery—but jokes aside, Nicole Atkins’ performance was, uh, electrifying. In a seventies-inspired, color-saturated kimono, she took the stage before the (relatively) few but faithful to ecstatic applause, and launched promptly into the passionate, glamorous “Vultures.” It turned out to be one of the only songs of the night off Mondo Amore. The overwhelming majority of the set list came off Slow Phaser, the New Jersey singer/songwriter’s February 4th release. Next up came “Who Killed The Moonlight,” the opener off the new album, with all the vocal drama and tempo-pushing guitar work of the studio version. Atkins stuck to vocals for the length of the set, leaving instrumentation in the capable hands of her six-piece backing band, which featured a grand total of three Daves and two Zachs (!), as well as a rogue Sam. They kept in synch with each other—and Atkins—with the momentum of a single, powerful machine. Atkins brought back up vocalists into a track or two as well, adding to the playful surge of glam-rock power that has always lined Atkins’ work.
“Girl You Look Amazing” was a feel-good highlight of the night, as Atkins bounced around the stage and pointed flirtatiously at women in the front row as she sang the line from which the song takes its title. Atkins told NPR in an interview that she got the idea for that line– “Girl, you look amazing,” after half-singing her praises for a tasty-looking plate of sushi, and then had a dream in which the song had been turned into a dance hall glam hit. I imagine that might be typical of Atkins’ songwriting style—the numbers she performed on stage felt like kaleidoscopic collages of different snatches of imagery and turns of phrase, half experienced and half dreamt up. Slow Phaser comes across this way. It’s easy to submerge yourself in its powerful, sometimes otherworldly, orchestration, but at the same time, the focal point never drifts far from Atkins’ voice.
“It’s Only Chemistry,” followed by “The Tower” as an encore, closed out the night. As comfortable in the new material as she was in the old, Atkins made a virtual showcase out of Slow Phaser on Thursday. The endeavor was a little risky, but garnered enthusiastic response—the new album might be Atkins’ most ambitious, broad-spanning album to date, and the blazing vocal lines and catchy, powerful beats translated sparklingly to live performance.
Listen to “It’s Only Chemistry,” off Slow Phaser. This song made for a great finale on Thursday night, although I did miss the banjo line that only appears in the studio version:
Art pop group James Supercave don’t have any albums out yet, but they’ve been widely praised their live performances and incredibly danceable tunes. This LA quintet is likely going on tour with War Paint this Spring. “The Right Thing” is a rolling, confident break out song off of their first EP, which will be released in late March. Supercave combines mid-20th century rhythms with head-bobbing melody and dynamic vocals.
Nasal, oddly toned vocals introduce the album, which combined with a slower beat, feels like something out of a film from the late 50s or early 60s (“Love me like a memory is all you’re gonna get”, the singer croons, for example). From there, the music moves into a fast-paced, rhythm-heavy pop song. The vocals become falsetto at 30 seconds which is surprisingly endearing, reminiscent of Klaus Nomi, and threading back to the 50s-60s vibe. Guitar and heavy bass break in at the one minute mark, giving the listener just a taste of garage.
The track reverts quickly back to the opening motif, to which I found myself bobbing my head. The verse blends into a slow middle section where the singer repetitively despairs: “There’s no one left. . . there’s no one left to see our plot unfold.” While the band doesn’t necessarily traverse into novel territory sound wise, they do, in the spirit of art rock toss in some high pitched violin at the end, both unexpected and even a bit sentimental. The vocals could verge on irritating, but the singer follows the rhythm too well. This song makes a lot of moves, some a bit risky, but blends it all together surprisingly well.
Listen to “The Right Thing” below and look out for James Supercave’s EP:
Neneh Cherry is back with Blank Project, a collaboration with experimental electronic group RocketNumberNine and her first solo album in 16 years. Built on Cherry’s erudite life experience, this album weaves its way in and out of complex emotion with soul and aplomb. It’s everything you could want from a partnership between the weight of Cherry’s alt hip hop and Rocket’s minimal expressions. The songs range from sensual to spiritual to menacing, maintaining simple lyrics that deal with a more general language (“hate,””love,” movement, despair), while using sound in very unexpected ways, and making sure the listener is always invited into the space that is explored.
“Across the Water,” the first track on the album, may also be the best. It’s certainly the most striking emotionally – a song about fear and anger, a mother’s protest. A slow, hypnotizing beat follows Cherry’s soft, whispery Sprechgesang. The minimal quality to the music is so strong that Cherry’s words paint incredibly vivid pictures. “Dripping water,” she shows us, “Dripping down.” The rhythm is intoxicating and makes me want to sway and sing along. But there’s an attendant darkness that quickly worms its way in. Cherry begins to sing: “My hands across the water / My two feet in the sea / My fear is for my daughter / But will wash over me.” The lines rhyme and move together like a poetic chant or folk song. It stays minimalist through and through, without the rhythm intruding on the terrible, beautiful space that Cherry creates with her words. Her voice carries a menacing undertone during the more spoken-word verses. But there’s a great deal of fragility when she sings the chorus. I can’t imagine a more haunting song to open up this personal journey.
Cherry talks a lot about weakness in these tracks. “Blank Project”, the title track, is about a man she loves so much she “hates it.” It’s a concise song, hurriedly sung, with a beat that changes rhythm as often as her voice. She sings about being made to feel small, but opting to reject it. “I hate you.” She tells him, simply. But also, “I love you / I love it all.” Though these concepts are general, the complexity isn’t too difficult to grasp as a listener, especially placed alongside the music. All kinds of sounds are used through this track: dinging bells, vocalizers that drop Cherry’s voice super low, and a weird synthy, drone-like layer that makes the middle of the song uncomfortable. This is not about self-pity or even grief. There’s no sense that the woman behind the voice is not in control of her physical or mental self, even though she expresses weakness. The entire time she’s telling “[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”][her] man” that he’d “better change.”
“Everything” is also about weakness, but inverted from the way she speaks about it prior. In this more electronic, stripped-down track, Cherry explores the ups and downs of defensiveness. It opens with muffled, soft vocals before the beat kicks in. When her voice enters the fray, it tells us: “I can’t hear you / What I can’t hear can’t upset me.” However, this defense mechanism obviously isn’t working. We can still hear the muffled voice. Cherry herself also seems to be struggling with her own voice, reaching for high notes, stretching it to its maximum. The listener follows as she finds it tougher and tougher to defend herself. By the end of the song some of the most strange vocal stylings on the album emerge. Cherry moves between a shaky, animalistic laugh and hoarse shouting. The rhythm continues to roll, but there’s something desperate and heart-wrenching in the narrative.
In tracks like “Naked”, more industrial motifs are explored. Cherry manages to create mechanical sounds without forfeiting any of the track’s emotional grip: if anything, she and Rocket somehow make transform the industrial into inviting and warm. Immediately Cherry asks that someone strip her naked and put her outside. Then, she urges us to “run a little faster.” Her vocals are absolutely gorgeous–soaring and capturing the listener in an almost mystical melody. I think it’s a brilliant idea to mix melodic tropes we associate with the spiritual with a very sensual song. There’s also an intriguing double tone that jerked me out of my comfort zone during the verses, juxtaposed to the soothing chorus.
A bit of happiness is occasionally touched upon during Cherry’s journey. “Weightless” begins like the prelude to a house jam, though it quickly diverts into a grungy, meticulous rhythm. Cherry uses crooning vocals from the start with notes that reach fairly high. When the chorus kicked in I suddenly realized this, in fact, is a dancing song. Though Cherry “can’t find [her] right moves” she keeps on dancing and she’s “weightless.” There’s a soulfulness to it, channeled through the vocals. By the end of the song there’s a great sense of catharsis. “Weightless!” Cherry sings with joy – “Come on! Weightless!”
This album is worth listening to for the varied soundscapes, alone. But the narrative is also deeply moving, the rhythms unexpected, and Cherry’s voice unique and electric. The story of a powerful, but sensitive woman is unraveled. We’re invited into all of Cherry’s complexities and it’s an uncomfortable, but gorgeous space
Blank Project comes on on February 25th. In the meantime, watch Neneh Cherry sing “Blank Project” at Studio 360:
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Based out of Seattle, Blue Sky Black Death (BSBD) consists of Kingston (Kingston Maguire) and Young God (Ian Taggart). Both Kingston and Young God were beat makers and hip-hop artists throughout the early ‘00s. In 2005, they eventually met up with each other and collaborated on a double album, A Heap of Broken Images, and have since released a number of rap and instrumental hip-hop full lengths.
the duo released Glaciers in December, 2013, and have since coined the term glacial hip-hop to describe their music. After the release of Glaciers, It seems that the their music has taken a more experimental turn, in that it transitions seamlessly from ambient noise, to sugar sweet melodies, to chaotic dissonance, and back. I’m still not exactly sure what glacial hip-hop is, but the neologism seems somehow fitting.
On February 14th, BSBD celebrated their Valentine’s Day by releasing an unofficial remix of Frank Ocean’s “Pyramids.”
The first part of the remix isn’t much different from the original song. It isn’t altered lyrically, rhythmically or melodically, it is just rearranged. It begins about six minutes into the original version. Structurally, BSBD left the song alone. The remix follows the original word for word, beat for beat and note for note for about 1.5 minutes until the section loops back and repeats. The first part of the track ends on Frank Ocean’s chorus, just as it starts hinting at something new about to happen. Distorted hip-hop lines are introduced, which interact with Ocean’s vocals.
It then dissipates and the music pauses. BSBD completely shifts gears, introducing a song that is rhythmically and lyrically different from the previous track. “We all young ghetto boys, that’s why we act this way,” a line from the UGK (Underground Kingz) song, “Wood Wheel,” is repeated throughout the rest of the track. The song is slowed down to about ½ the tempo. New rhythmic sections interact over the lyrics, which are almost indistinguishable.
The dichotomy between the first half of the song, which is pretty much left alone, and the second half of the song, a UGK song that has been torn apart and made almost unrecognizable, is probably the most interesting part of this remix. I’m not exactly sure what Frank Ocean and UGK have to do with each other, but for some reason it works. Compositionally the track in it’s entirety is risky and unconventional, which is apparently the mantra of this glacial hip-hop duo.
Unfortunately for those of us in the northeast, BSBD is touring pretty much every other part of the country right now. Maybe you can’t see them live, but you can listen to Frank Ocean’s “Pyramids” remix here:
Your Friend is the moniker of Taryn Miller, a self-taught musician who mixes her jazz guitar training with hardcore and folk elements. She plays drums for Hush Machine and bass for Oils when she’s not working on her solo project. Her new EP Jekyll/Hyde, which attempts to channel Miller’s intimate live energy through recordings, was made in just a few months. It was originally self-released in August, but it’s not being re-released by Domino with added production (instrumentation that has not been involved in live performances). This EP combines atmospheric guitar and simple rhythms and melodies with Miller’s deeply personal lyrics, sung in a clean, youthful voice. I found myself a bit disappointed with it overall, but these soothing tracks are still worth a listen.
I really love the combination of sensory climate and evocative story telling. I find Taryn Miller’s vocals captivating, moving easily from soft to belting, from stand out to part of the atmosphere. But most of her music is only reaching towards one evocation, one feeling, one sound. It’s like one song that goes on for an entire album. This isn’t necessarily a negative, but I constantly found myself wishing for more. I can see how these tracks could make a gorgeous, touching love performance. There’s a great emotive quality. But there’s no roundedness or experimentation in terms of the actual narrative or setting. Yes, the songs cover different topics, but the melodies and rhythms are so similar that it feels like the same story.
There’s a simpleness to a lot of the songs, like “Bangs and “Pallet”. I was pleased by the simple structure of “Pallet,” though I could’t help but notice how similar the melody, rhythm, and even intonation was to “Bangs.” I wouldn’t notice they were different songs if it weren’t for the period of silence between them.
“Tame One” is the hit on this album. Immediately, Miller’s vocals vibrate in a refreshing way. The repetition in the lyrics creates a strong, unique melody, as compared to the other tracks. The background instruments really break in at a minute and a half. In a pleasantly surprising turn it picks up! A harsh drum rhythm is laid out, breaking the listener from the softness that has been driving the music so far. Miller cries: “Oh tame one / who are you holding your words for?” She has said that her songs usually come out of one line that she writes. I think that’s most evident on this track. There’s a sense of being lost, a listlessness, and confusion on the part of the narrator and whomever she is speaking to. “Oh, made one,” she croons, “Who are you?” A ton of reverb comes in at the middle of the song, alongside some cool guitar echoing that reflects the repetition of the words. The music and the words truly come together on this track, showing that Miller has the potential to thrill us. This is the track with the most hardcore and post-punk influence. Though that is not anything new, it is pretty exciting on this otherwise one-note adventure.
The track the EP is named after, “Jekyll/Hyde”, goes back to the folky quality of “Bangs”, bringing out Miller’s Kansas background. There’s an echo on the vocals which not only makes them stand out, but makes it sound as though many women are singing. That’s a very clever touch to a song that seems to revolve around femaleness. Miller delves into her position as a baby and child – the ricochet effect of her mere existence. “Ruining my mother’s figure,” she (and the imagined others) say softly, “Ruining my mother’s friend.” She talks about being taken care of, and the music becomes reminiscent of a Beach House song. There is something dreamy here, but also a strong sense of despair that shifts and twists throughout.
I have a fondness for titles with a slash in them, so I was pleased to see the last track was called “Expectation/Reality.” The reverb-y, atmospheric opening is beginning to get a little too familiar, as is the way Miller’s vocals enter the song. Her voice is powerful, but it’s working in the same ways – the voice itself is the ambience, but it’s perpetuating, only existing within, the same small space we’ve been in since the opening.
Though this album comes pretty close to being tedious and tiresome, there are stunning and electrifying moments now and then. I hope to see Your Friend maximize her potential in the future. Here she is with “Tame One”, my favorite track:
Helsinki-based Jaakko Eino Kalevi flaunts a sound as exotic as his name. Recently scooped up by Weird World, Kalevi has released his four-song EP entitled Dreamzone Remixes, much to the delight of myself and a supposed many others. The EP is split unequally when it comes to sonic consistency, the first quarter sounding nothing like the subsequent three, but this is an observation, not a criticism.
“Memories,” the EP’s introductory track, had me thinking Kalevi’s niche was electronic iterations of world music. The song opens with a throbbing tuba-esque melody that I would expect to find in the crevices of Tom Waits’ 1985 album Rain Dogs. In flood the whimpering tones of the keyboard, most likely on the organ setting, and gentle vocal harmonies reminiscent of Brazilian Tropicalia pioneers Os Mutantes. “Memories” eventually surrenders its lively horn to ticking drums, maracas, and receding voices. There is an element of folk music to “Memories” absent on the remainder of the release.
Despite the worldly references in “Memories,” the songs following suggest that Kalevi found nourishment in the film scores of the mid 80s. Each song is familiar to the point of becoming wordlessly narrative; each song summons vivid cinematic imagery. Track two, aptly titled “No End (Tom Noble’s Never-Ending Story Remix) ” introduces the evocative nature of the final three quarters of the EP.
Its soft, papery drums and faraway female vocals remind me of an ambient Flashdance…maybe the romantic rehearsal scene of some mid 80s dance dramedy. The steady snapping of disco, the eeriness of corporate muzak, and the grainy filter of dream pop all play a part in this track. I was pleased to hear a nod to French House as well, one that particularly brought to mind “Something About Us” by Daft Punk. This is without a doubt my favorite eight minutes of the EP, and a perfect song to end the night, a little drunk, dancing slack-limbed in a bath of blue light.
Track three, “ When You Walk Through Them All “ is no escape from the 80s, or my film references. Initially I’m hearing a somber Hall and Oates; the hooks are infectious, the vocals languid. The song omits a thumping walking pace of cosmopolitan, night time scenes-only after this impression did the title of the song register. Despite the vocals, the song’s bubbling keyboard effects bring back the scores of early video games as well as Tangerine Dream’s compositions for Risky Business.
Dreamzone Remixes concludes with No End (Vezurro Remix). This version of the song is punchier, and more synthetic sounding. The drums are more aggressively electronic, and the synths are at their sharpest. Since I’d assigned a movie scene to the preceding songs, my mind couldn’t help itself. This one would better suit a sex scene, maybe of the science-fiction genre, something along the lines of Tron getting down with Kate Bush. Need I say more?
I’d be willing to bet that the images conjured by this EP were perhaps only a reflection of my strange brain-scape, but the quality of this EP is less of a betting matter; it’s just really, really good.
Check out the video for Jaakko Eino Kalevi’s “No End” below, and make sure to catch Dreamzone Remixesfor some innovative versions of the track.
It’s mildly humorous that a production duo from Seattle would have a hit song by the name of “Sun Models.” Western Washington alumni Harrison Mills (aka Catacombkid) and partner Clayton Knight (BeachesBeaches) make up Odesza, the pair that’s accumulated almost five million SoundCloud streams in the two years they’ve existed. They’ve also been getting their fair share of radio play, and when I was visiting my native Washington State, I heard their latest single on the taste-making airwaves of KEXP.
“Sun Models,” which is fresh off of Odesza’s 2014 album of the same name, is a beachy and blissful track that I assume will be played throughout the summer months. It opens with the warm crackling of a dust caked record, as well as a few chicken-pecked keys peppering in a dull, tinny drum effect. The vocals, provided by Michigan soul singer Madelyn Grant, register as a languid ripple through still water. They are nearly recognizable as words, but morph into liquefied croons thanks to the shrill frequency of the vocoder. I can’t help but notice the proximity to the vocal manipulations of Grimes mastermind Claire Boucher.
The song is danceable without a doubt, but not in an aggressive way. It’s a relaxed track that drifts somewhere between melancholic and bright. Smears of twinkling keys glide over a crescendo of strobe-worthy synths of the European House ilk, while eerie calls float in and out.
In response to their ever-growing exposure, Odesza has kicked off a massive U.S. tour that will go into May. The pair have added a couple of Canadian dates for our friends up north.
Check out “Sun Models” and dates below:
Wed. Feb. 12 – Pawtucket, RI @ The Met *
Thu. Feb. 13 – Philadelphia, PA @ Theatre of Living Arts *
Nick Waterhouse‘s R&B-inflected debut Time’s All Gone came out in 2012, and may seem like a non sequitur coming from a twenty-something white guy from California. The album borrowed substantially from the bluesier end of sixties rock, meshed interestingly with a soulful Motown slant. But so much of modern music mixes up decades and blends stylistic influences—especially those from the sixties—that it no longer seems fair to dock points for anachronism. Waterhouse’s particular musical blend, while not unique, is certainly endearing—Time’s All Gone radiates with the kind of garage rock that lets you notice each instrument individually, without them being much treated or blurred into each other.
Waterhouse doesn’t change that aesthetic in “It No. 3,” a Ty Segall cover just released off his upcoming sophomore album Holly, out March 4th. The minimal production on this track doesn’t matter a bit next to the sheer vocal personality. Maintaining the jumpy soul of Waterhouse’s first album, “It No. 3” indicates Waterhouse is gaining a greater comfort level in the music he makes, having more fun and paying less attention to the many—and formidable—influences that contribute to his work. His ownership of this song is especially impressive given that “It No. 3” is a cover, and though the rendition is a fairly faithful one in many respects, the personality behind it is all Waterhouse, no Segall imitation. Shrinking Segall’s original down from fifteen minutes to three, Waterhouse creates a concise, likeable sound that offers a lot for what it asks.
Go here to pre-order Nick Waterhouse’s new album, Holly, out March 4th. Listen to “It No. 3” below:
If I had gone to the Purity Ring show back in January ’13 at Webster Hall like I was supposed to (I had to work), then I would have seen the Brooklyn based experimental electronic duo, Young Magic, open up. Unfortunately I missed out on what was apparently a great show.
Although Young Magic is based in New York, their roots extend halfway around the world. Young Magic is comprised of Indonesian vocalist, Melati Malay and Australian producer, Isaac Emmanuel. Malay and Emmanuel joined forces back in 2010, and have been releasing music since 2011. In February, 2012, Young Magic released their first full length album, Melt. It’s been two years, so what have these guys been doing?
They’ve been doing a whole lot of touring, apparently. In 2012 and 2013, Young Magic traveled throughout North America, Europe, and Australia, picking up a great deal of new sounds along the way. The songwriting that occurred during their two year stint touring the world culminated in their sophomore album, Breathing Statues, out 5/6 on Carpark Records.
“Fall In,” the first single off of Breathing Statues, showcases Malay and Emmanuel’s experimentation with new sounds. With the inclusion of a sitar any track can sound trippy, but in “Fall In,” the duo subtly showcases the instrument with embellishments, flourishes and accents, managing to bring it out just enough to set the mood, but not too much that it overwhelms the track.
“Fall In” couples psychedelia with the ethereal vocals of Melati Malay, who’s breathy, relaxed and effortless styling melts with the keyboard section, rendering the two parts almost indistinguishable. As if that weren’t enough to produce a spacey vibe, Emmanuel’s repetitive and upbeat bass line pushes the song forward in a cyclical manner, allowing the listener to depart from reality, if only for a moment.
Surprisingly, there actually aren’t too many bells and whistles in this track. Occasional effects were added to layer, spread out and expand Malay’s vocals, but even that was minimal. Subtlety is key on “Fall In,” and both Emmanuel and Malay manage this masterfully.
With eclectic sounds, mesmerizing vocals, and impeccable production, Young Magic are definitely not just another run-of-the-mill hip Brooklyn electronic group, but are carving out a unique space for themselves in the electronic music scene.
Look out for upcoming spring and summer tour dates, and in the meantime check out “Fall In” below.
It can be a daunting thing to challenge stereotypes day in and day out, work for change as a social activist, and rep a town that most of the country writes off as an impoverished wasteland. But Flint, Michigan-based “Afrofuturist” Tunde Olaniran does all of these things as casually as the rest of us might walk to the nearest bodega for rolling papers and a deli sandwich. Born to a Nigerian father and American mother, spending part of his childhood in Germany and London, Olaniran often felt his otherness in acute ways but takes it all in stride while helping the marginalized tell their stories alongside his own.
He’s released two remarkable singles via soundcloud. The first, “Brown Boy” cleverly introduces Olaniran on the most basic terms – that of his skin color – while criticizing the trite narrative tropes that surround race in America. “I’m every single thing you think of me / I’m a sinner, killer, drug dealer, refugee / So keep your jaw locked and I’ll keep the peace / They act like they don’t wanna but man they know me.”
When you get to know Olaniran though, he’s far from a swaggering gangster. He’s driven by sharing the carefree joy he feels when it comes to performing his material, but it’s all propelled by a deeper sense of purpose. Case in point: the beat behind his latest, “The Highway,” hinges on a wonky parrot sample that burrows deep against the ear drum. Once it hooks you, Olaniran lets loose with an intelligent send-up of capitalist progress, gentrification, and cultural appropriation. His messages are never heavy-handed, just extremely astute and delivered with bright, sarcastic jabs packaged in party-ready rhythms. Operating within a genre beset by misogyny, violence, and homophobia, it’s refreshing to be able to simply dance to something you don’t have to compartmentalize to enjoy. Olaniran’s passionate vocals soar between fluid rap verses, underpinned with unique production work that he does (mostly) by himself, encompassing his DIY-gone-glam aesthetic. The single will appear on his forthcoming EP Yung Archetype, out tomorrow (2/25).
We talked with Olaniran over the phone, discussing his many projects as a musician, entertainer, activist, collaborator, and otherwise.
AF: Hi Tunde! Can you describe your sound in a few words for our readers?
TO: My name is Tunde Olaniran, I am originally from Flint, Michigan, where I live now. My sound is kind of that cut-and-paste that you see more and more of now with people having access to so many different sounds. There’s an experimental hip-hop, alternative club/dance feel with some of it. That’s kind of the range of the music.
AF: You’ve described your sound at times as “Afro-futurist.” What does that mean to you?
TO: It’s kind of a mixture of a few things. It bleeds into the performance as well, I think they kind of go hand-in-hand. The sound has influences from the diaspora – my father was a Nigerian immigrant, and my mother was American, so I have a blend of those things. But also, the futurist label is about being really forward thinking and also kind of optimistic in some ways in your capacity to change through the lens of your own identity, not the lens of the dominant cultural kind of thing.
AF:What specifically are you trying to change?
TO: For me, the thing that is most important is people’s ability to express their identities and to elevate alternate narratives. It’s all about the story of someone who is marginalized, for whatever identity – whether they’re a young person, an artist, whether they’re queer, a person of color, whether they’re DIY or funded by the big shiny foundations, whatever. When people say that they’re an ally, being an ally is really about getting out of the way, so that’s what I feel like I work towards in the different aspects of my professional life and my life as an entertainer.
AF:Well in terms of identity, I feel like “Brown Boy” is sort of a fitting intro to what you’re about, in that it’s a critique of stereotypes that surround marginalized cultures. What was your specific motivation behind writing it?
TO: This is gonna sound really ridiculous, but I don’t spend a lot of time coming up with lyrics. I’ve been in writing sessions with people who are, I would say, career songwriters. They live in Nashville, or they’re in L.A. and they write songs for their career. And my approach is so different from that. I don’t usually labor over the lyrics, they kind of just happen as they’re gonna happen. A lot of times, I’m going back and looking at them and saying “What is this? What does this mean or what could it mean?” I don’t wanna make myself out to have this really grand scheme, but I do feel like looking back at the lyrics [fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”][to “Brown Boy”] after writing them they do feel like a declaration in a way. I think I was singing it more to myself than necessarily trying to establish any kind of stance to external forces or norms or whatever. I think it was like an anthem just for myself living on the margins. And with the video, a lot of people in that video are activists and artists that live in Detroit. After the song was written, I wanted the visuals to really represent that diverse spectrum of people that I’ve gotten a chance to know that I’ve been really influenced by. Those are the people that I hope are gonna be dancing with the song. For me, that’s the most important thing – am I gonna enjoy performing it? Is my good friend gonna wanna dance to it? That’s the focus as much as any other political statement.
AF:So you’re essentially making music that a community of activists can enjoy. Are these people that you’ve come into contact with via your work as an educator? You’re involved with Planned Parenthood, specializing in gender identity, sexual equality, and health awareness.
TO: I actually got introduced to an artist named Invincible who is an MC from Detroit… their work is so intertwined with their political action in social justice movements so just even being at a show with them, I met a lot of really interesting folks in Detroit. I’d been doing social justice work but I feel like those actually were pretty separate. And now I see them converging more. I met someone at a show and it turned out they work at Ruth Ellis, which is a center in Detroit specifically for trans and homeless youth of color. He was like, “Let’s actually do a program, and let’s do some education” and kind of let those meld and for me that feels really good. Planned Parenthood is really good to work for because you can bring your whole self there, so I felt like they were separate but now they’re actually coming together more than they did at the beginning.
AF:Well I think it can be powerful to use artistic expression to forward social movements, and it’s important work. With Yung Archetype, you reference Carl Jung’s theories about universal patterns and images. Which archetypes did you draw on and which are you trying to tear down?
TO: Again, that was another moment where it wasn’t super intentional. The goal wasn’t necessarily to work with one of Jung’s specific twelve archetypes but to really look at the idea of attacking classical or dominant perceptions and imagery. So I took that stance even with the photography and with myself. Starting out as an artist, sending your shit to people, when you’re black on the cover some blogs are like, “We don’t do hip-hop” – even though they haven’t heard the music. But we can’t really send it to rap blogs; clearly it’s not gonna work there, cause I don’t really see myself as a rapper in that way. I’ve always had to deal with those immediate perceptions just walking down the street or being in my body. I’m trying to embrace it but also kind of twist that idea with the imagery for the EP. The lace on the jacket is something that my grandmother sent me, from Nigeria. You get sent traditional lace, yards and yards and yards of stuff and you’re supposed to make a very traditional tunic and pants from it that you wear for ceremonies like weddings, whatever. I was like, well let’s make a Members Only jacket out of it, again taking the classic image of an immigrant’s son or a foreigner and get into touch with both ends of that. I still haven’t shown my grandmother, I don’t know how happy she would be.
AF:I think grandmothers have to sign a contract where they’re just automatically proud of whatever their grandkids make. I think you’re probably safe. I’m sure blending disparate ideas comes in handy when you’re working with other artists. You’ve collaborated with lots of musicians on remixes and various one-offs, including Dale Earnhart Jr. Jr. What goes into those collaborations? How is it different from working on your own material?
TO: I’m really into collaborations so I try to work with people a lot. I have a process for making songs where I produce the track and that really drives my writing and then I write really quickly and I just record it . Even when I had a band we would like write songs in like an hour. Not everyone works that way. Some people do their best work when they have a few days or weeks or whatever to marinate. The best stuff that has happened recently is when I’ve been able to sit down with folks. We live in an age where we do a lot over Dropbox, and you can work across continents, but I really love a chance to sit down. I wrote “The Internet”, a track on the EP, with James Link, who’s sick – he’s really, really amazing. I call him a hipster hermit – he’s really popular, but he doesn’t actually like being around people. I forced him to sit down with me and in ten minutes we had the best fucking hook. It was so great. I just really love being able to be in the same room if possible.
AF:Is there anybody in particular that you want to collaborate with that you haven’t had a chance to yet?
TO: I love Switch, I think Switch is the best. I met him once touring in France with Diplo. Diplo came in, asked us for weed, and we were like we don’t have any left. So then Switch came and sat down and I was super shocked and star struck, so I’m just standing there and we’re in Europe so he was like “Do you guys speak English? What is happening!?” We were just like “Yeah… kind of”. That could’ve been my chance to mess with this dude! But I love his take on pop and the way he mixes and slices things, so that would be the dream collaboration. There’s another band called Jamaican Queens out of Detroit. We’re friends, but we haven’t had a chance to really sit down. We only see each other at shows. I’d love to write with them, because their production is really interesting.
AF:We reviewed “Wellfleet Outro” on AudioFemme! They’re great. Is there anything else in particular that you’re listening to?
TO: Maipei. I saw her at SXSW in 2010, and I was obsessed with her Cocoa Butter Diaries EP. She disappeared for a while, just stopped posting, and then “Don’t Wait” came out and it was amazing. She’s like a Kelis to me, I’m really excited about whatever she’s gonna do after this. The Little Dragons single is really good. I’m into female artists a lot. I’m really waiting for Robyn’s stuff to drop.
AF:Do you wanna talk a little bit about Flint and how it’s shaped your music?
TO: Flint influenced me in that there is a really distinct culture here. Everyone knows everyone else. Word of mouth is kind of the best way to do any kind of communication and marketing. The scene is small and there are two sides of it, like even in Detroit. They’re still very disconnected from the idea of having music as a career, so you’re playing covers or you’re in the hood clubs rapping but the thing I respect is that Flint is just really supportive. I was in a rock band when I was pretty young and in any environment, people are like, into it, you know? There’s never really a demarcation as far as scenes. People aren’t sitting with their arms crossed just looking at you, it’s very very welcoming and open and that gave me some license to try to experiment with what I wanted to do. I knew it would be okay to do that.
AF:Did that feel different from the time you spent in Germany and London as a kid?
TO: In London, I lived with my dad’s family, and they were Nigerian and I didn’t interact with a lot of white British people. I even felt different with them, because I didn’t learn Yoruba like they did. A lot of them had been sent to boarding schools in Nigeria as children, I didn’t have that. Then in Germany I’d have little kids touching my skin ’cause they had never seen a black or brown person. Coming back to Flint, [living with] my mom who was not raised in black culture… when I was young and one of the kids in the neighborhood called me ‘dog’ – like, “yo, dawg”, whatever – I was like “Mom, that kid called me a dog! I dunno what happened!” and she went to the person’s mom saying, “You called my son an animal?” and his mom was like “Are you serious?” So even coming back to Flint, being very out of touch with black culture in the Midwest, just always feeling like that no matter where I am has had an influence on what I do. I think now I’ve finally figured out where I’m most comfortable, but living your life on the margins in one way or another – whether or not you’re oppressed, if it’s still knowing you’re on the margins – has influenced how I go about anything, whether it’s creative or not.
AF:You’ve talked about Flint being an example of the “grief that American ‘progress’ inflicts on poor people and people of color”. What do you feel is the solution to this, if there’s any? Where do you see the future of industrial cities like Flint?
TO: My mom is staunchly Socialist/Communist. I grew up with her kind of in my ear, [saying] only large scale economic change can make a difference, and she has a lot of validity to her views. But I’ve also just gotten to meet, especially in Detroit, people who have been influenced by folks like G.H. Lewes, who writes about emergence theory and the idea that a lot of different actions and activities create a web of change. I think it’s gonna come to a point where we have different small-scale solutions happening, and we reach a stage in technology that is gonna force us to look differently about how we distribute resources. I mean, we can automate and we can advance, but who are the consumers if no one’s working and able to sustain themselves? You’re seeing that happening around this planet right now. Obviously some of it’s really bloody, like in Kiev, but some of it’s really amazing. In Detroit, people are creating their own mesh wireless networks by neighborhood. They’re not using ComCast or Time Warner – they built their own internet network. I think it’s gonna be about people making solutions where they can and where they are the most impassioned, ingrained and connected.
TO: The AMC is the largest North American Convention of independent media makers that meets in Detroit every year. They are really, really focused and it’s cool because it’s very young – I think the average age is around 25. It’s basically a way for independent media makers, especially queer women, people of color, who work in technology and media to share best practices, heal themselves from dealing with fucking oppression all year. You wanna be able to be around people that understand what you’ve been going through, and talk about those instances so you get together to do that. The mesh wireless networks I was talking about came from work at the AMC, for example. I’m one of the track coordinators so we’re trying to look at how sound, in all of its incarnations, can change and affect states, can affect relationships, can change policy. Part of what we’re doing is accepting and soliciting proposals from people to talk about amazing stuff that’s happening all over the country. On the fun side we’re throwing a joint party in DC and New York happening on the same day at the same time. I’ll be in DC with DJ Underdog, Mother Sheister, DJ rAt… We’re gonna have a simulcast where the parties will be broadcast in each space and online to try to raise money to pay for the people that wanna do sessions so they can come to the AMC. That happens April 5th.
AF:That sounds amazing, we’ll have to check out the New York party. As far as your live shows go, they’ve got a reputation for being wild – you bring in dancers, wear elaborate costumes, and the like. Can you explain what goes into putting that together and what the goal is in doing that?
TO: I’m just trying to flail around and be sweaty and not fall over but I wanna enjoy myself and dance! I come from the band mentality where people pay their money, you gotta give ‘em show. So I really just try to incorporate choreography, movement, fun pop, really hard hitting beats. Every show we do someone comes up to me and is like “I love metal, and I’m really into metal but my friend told me come and I actually had a good time” or “I didn’t think I was gonna dance and I ended up dancing” so that’s the point of the show. With the tour dates on the East Coast this spring as well we’re making costumes, and we’ll try to have something a little unexpected in each set. I love playing. In Detroit it got to the point where people are doing the moves. They know the choreography so they’re doing the dances with you. It’s just so fun, to kind of have that momentum.
Olaniran opening a sold-out show with Dale Earnhart Jr. Jr. last April. Photo by Emily Korn for CMJ.
AF:How do you find time to gear up for the tour and promote the music with everything else you do? Even as much as your activism has come together with music making, you’ve got your hands in tons of projects; you’ve written some sci-fi stories, you’ve done art direction on music videos for other bands… how do you balance all that?
TO: I don’t have a life. Luckily I’m able to make friends with people I’m doing that stuff with! I have good authentic friendships through the work I do but all of my time and energy and money, everything, goes into that work outside of my day job at Planned Parenthood, and even that takes a lot out of me. So I’m tired a lot and I’m trying to take care of myself. It’s tiring, but at the same time, after a show or a really good workshop I just feel really good. I could drop dead tomorrow, so why not just do what I love and have a good time and be a little sleepy?[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
On Thursday the crew charged with clearing out the old Academy Records Annex location on N. 6th tossed a bunch of “unwanted” records into a dumpster, prompting Brooklyn’s vinyl enthusiasts to descend on the rejects. I jumped in, quickly found myself covered in hot pink paint, and dug until I found a vein of scratched up 45s. I also snagged a Miles Davis “Boplicity” 78 that is worth more than the cost of my cab ride home, helping me break even for the day. My driver, Anthony, told me he’d once picked up Mel Brooks when I mentioned my new Spaceballs laser disc, also unearthed from the mess.
What I’d really been after, though, were those 45s. Rather than dragging home whole LPs of what could both literally and figuratively be garbage, the 45s offered opportunities for quick listening and thus the discovery of unknown gems. I found plenty of well-known ones as well, from Fleetwood Mac to Manfred Mann to Hall & Oates, but I thought I’d detail some of the strangest and most noteworthy pieces of “trash” I brought home:
The Two Dollar Question – Auntie Matilda’s Double Yummy Blow Your Mind Out Brownies, Intrepid, 1969: This song is about exactly what you think it is. In mint condition the vinyl is worth one eighth its weight in “baking supplies”.
The Buckinghams – Susan, Columbia, 1967: Other than utilizing every possible English-language word that rhymes with Susan, the track starts off as pretty run-of-the mill British Invasion sunshine. These guys are from Chicago, though. And around 1:30, their producer added a bizarro dissonant orchestral break against the band’s wishes. After about thirty seconds of abrasive clanging, The Buckinghams chime back in with a melodic “La-la-la” and finish the song as if the whole thing never happened.
Eddie Jobson – Yesterday Boulevard, Island, 1976: You know the guy that’s always playing that crazy electric violin at Union Square? Imagine if that guy were in Roxy Music and played for Frank Zappa and he put out a solo 7″ that looks like a Chill Mega Chill release.
Jack Blanchard & Misty Morgan – Tennessee Bird Walk, Wayside, 1970: This novelty song from the Floridian Country duo I mistakenly referred to as Misty & Whatshisface tries its hardest to make a guitar riff sound like a turkey. Misty seductively whispers “Chirp Chirp” while Jack sings about birds wearing underwear.
Jack Ross – Margarita, Dot Records, 1962: The next time there’s a drinking montage on Girls, we’d better see Hannah and crew knocking back shots to this b-side for Ross’s goofy “Cindarella” syllable mash-up.
Mickey Murray – Shout Bamalama, SSS International, 1967: It seems like “Shout Bamalama” might be a good campaigning song for the President. Upon listening though, you realize it’s about Alabama and eating fried chicken. Still a snappy soul jam, this one was best played at 33RPM.
The Peppers – Pepper Box, Event, 1973: Originally written as a commercial jingle but expanded with the hope that the single would become the next “Popcorn”, the sleeve of this record features five disembodied heads (presumably the “peppers”) floating in a box of, well, peppers. It’s really, really catchy.
Bernie Nee – Lend Me Your Comb, Columbia, 1958: Have you ever had to borrow your teen lover’s grooming gear so your parents wouldn’t notice your sex hair? This is your jam. It was first recorded by Carl Perkins and made famous by The Beatles, who were believed to have never even needed combs because their hairs were always perfect.
Cheech & Chong as The Bloaters – Bloat On, Epic, 1977: This is epic tribute to the munchies opens with a ghastly belch, continues with some yacht rock about hamburgers, adds on a pretty racist chow mein verse, and ends with a list of strangely unappetizing ice cream flavors (including but not limited to “licorice” and “boysenberry”).
The Happenings – I Believe In Nothing, B.T. Puppy Records, 1967: It’s much less bleak than it sounds. The smiling puppy on the label is juxtaposed with the sunnily sung but morose lyrics “I believe in nothing / Perhaps tomorrow I’ll believe in something / Because I’m searching for a certain feeling / To make the world around me more appealing.” The Happenings claim that making some lovelife improvements would do the trick, but may I also suggest some of Aunt Matilda’s Double Yummy Blow Your Mind Out Brownies?
Mark your calendars: on 2/28, Smashing Pumpkins’ frontman William Corgan (as he’s billed himself for this event) is improvising an 8 to 9 hour ambient musical interpretation of Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha at Madame ZuZu’s, a tea-shop he opened outside of Chicago last year. Your soul is the whole world, which is a vampire.[/box][/fusion_builder_column] [fusion_builder_column type=”1_2″_last][box type=”shadow”]
Fiona Apple will appear in a French Sci-Fi spoof called H-Man as Bio-Frau, an environmental activist held captive in a German power plant. It’s highbrow because it’s French.[/box][/one_half_last]
Bill Simpson, Mayor of the City of Aberdeen, has unveiled a controversial statue of Kurt Cobain in the grunge star’s hometown (a place he hated, BTW) and it’s so embarrassingly rendered that even the statue is weeping.[/box][/fusion_builder_column_inner] [/fusion_builder_column][fusion_builder_column type=”1_2″_last][box type=”shadow”]
After announcing the indefinite hiatus of Thee Oh Sees a few months ago, frontman John Dwyer is scheduled to re-unite his old band Coachwhips for some SXSW appearances. Can we get in line tomorrow?[/box][/one_half_last]
Identity can be a tricky thing. Sampda Sharma, who sings ultra catchy tunes as Samsaya, knows that better than most. On her debut album, Bombay Calling, out later this year on BMG, Samsaya revisits her heritage and reconciles her many identities while forging a completely new brand of pop.
As an Indian girl growing up in Norway, Samsaya struggled to find a place where she she fit. “My parents were like a generation behind because they had 70’s India in their mind when they came to Norway. So they were raising me with my friends’ grandparents’ morals. It was really weird,” she says of her multicultural childhood when we spoke over the phone. Caught between the conservative ideals her parents instilled in her and and the youthful ways of her Norwegian friends, she quickly tired of being told what to do and who to be.
“It was hard having all those cultures when I was a teenager because there were so many rules. There were rules at school, rules at home, and it didn’t match. And being a girl there was a different set of rules, especially in Indian culture” she says. “That added into a really weird scenario because I’ve always been a bit boyish. I almost decided to be because I was like nobody’s gonna tell me I can’t do stuff. That’s not gonna happen.” So she got comfortable with doing the exact opposite of what was expected of her. “It’s been like that my whole life. When somebody tries to make me do something I just don’t get into it. I just have to find things myself.”
Everything changed when Samsaya heard Dinah Washington’s “Mad About the Boy” in a Levi’s commercial. “I remember being really young and going ‘Ah! I want to sing like that!’ She had this trumpet voice and it was so sensual,” she reminisces. “For a kid who had never experienced anything similar to that emotion, I think it was my first real sensual moment. It was really when music just touched me.” That music provided a way for Samsaya to deal with the frustrations she felt as a child. “I had all these emotions, almost fits in a way. I needed to put that into something. I think that’s how music became a very important part of myself.”
That Dinah Washington’s song resonated with Samsaya in a way traditional and religious music had not is telling of her rebellious nature. “My parents knew that I was always singing but I guess they wanted me to do more classical stuff and be more proper with the music. I always knew that it was a passionate thing for me, and I couldn’t do it ‘proper’. I just wanted to do it the way it felt right.” Though she admits that spiritual music can have similar characteristics, hearing Washington’s song felt different. “I could see that it was forbidden. Maybe that’s why it was exciting. Her voice and the attitude, the sensualism. It felt dangerous.”
It’s fitting, then, that Samsaya’s first single is about bucking expectations and traditions. On “Stereotype”, she joyously proclaims “I’ll just dance to whatever I like / I don’t need it to be black or white / I’m not down with your stereotype” and invites the whole world to come dancing with her despite any perceived differences. It’s partly autobiographical, Samsaya explains. “Growing up looking not Norwegian, being Indian, not feeling Indian, kind of gives you awareness about that situation. You are very aware of the feeling that you don’t necessarily look like what you are supposed to be in other people’s eyes.” By putting these feelings to a pop song that is essentially about loving music, she’s made the emotions universal. “I just wanted to actually make it simple so people could just feel it in a movement, a dance move. I think it’s a feeling we all can feel. That’s where I think pop music is great – it can really simplify something enough to be inviting, not something you fear.“
The messages here feel extremely prescient in light of the controversy that surrounded artists like Miley Cyrus last year when she twerked in her infamous “We Can’t Stop” video and chose to use women of color as props, supposedly in an effort to re-brand her own sexuality. Miley’s nods to hip-hop felt like a cheap ploy, but Samsaya achieves a kind of carefree authenticity, and it’s not happening solely because of her experiences of feeling otherness. The beat for “Stereotype” recalls the buoyancy of OutKast’s “Hey-Ya”, a song that obliterated boundaries with it’s cross-genre popularity when it was released. Similarly, “Stereotype” points out that music can be a bridge between cultures, and that sometimes all it takes to unite us is a good dance beat.
When filming the video, Samsaya returned to India, and found that she wasn’t as removed from her heritage as she had assumed. “When I was alone in India with four people from my team and I was the only one who could speak Hindi, people were really impressed. I was so flattered by that. It helped build my self esteem.” In many ways, Bombay Calling is a record of finding identity, a document of a journey back to her roots. She titled the record as such because, in her words, “Bombay was calling me!” She vividly remembers family members half a world away calling in the middle of the night because of the time difference. “Picking up the phone, still thinking you are dreaming… India was a dream to me growing up. All the places and faces that I had seen in my parents’ photos or heard them talk about. I’ve felt the attraction just grow with the years. While writing the album I felt it even stronger, and I guess I just really realized it then, that these songs are all a journey to and from India, not only physically but mentally and spiritually as well.”
She was selective though, about including traditional Indian sounds and elements on the record. “I know some musicians here in Norway that have Indian backgrounds. I didn’t want to put them in just because I’m Indian, I wanted to make it come from me if that’s gonna come out in any way.” She included bansuri on album closer “My Mind” for its peaceful sound, one that she recalls from her childhood. “It’s like a bamboo flute that sounds so beautiful and it’s a very traditional instrument in India. I had an uncle who played it and I heard it a lot growing up. So it’s also like traveling back to that feeling of being a kid again.” When she was in the UK, she found a musician who could play what she heard in her mind on the flute. “I thought he was Indian because his name is Timor, but he was actually British. He’d lived twenty years in India and he’d learned how to play really well. And he also spoke amazing Hindi. It was so great to realize that the world really is a melting pot now, because I had this British guy speaking Hindi to me. We really kind of mixed it and mashed it up in a fun way.”
In the end, her carefully curated restraint with these well-placed flourishes keep the record from veering into pastiche or caricature. The thudding percussion on the title track is accented with slickly produced synths that give it a modern, almost video-game feel. The dancehall vibes of “Love Maze” give way to a sinuous hook; it’s easy to picture it blasting late-night in a smokey club. “First Time” is another highlight, channeling an almost eighties pop groove, the kind you’d hear in Blondie’s new-wave infused disco or Madonna’s classic dance gems. It’s followed by ecstatic love song “U & Me”, bursting with a hyper, infatuated energy. Vocally, Samsaya has achieved the very sound she envied as a kid, her voice soaring and bubbling, reminiscent of pop stars like Gwen Stefani, Solange, and Robyn, letting it loose over infectious beats. When asked to put the sound into words, Samsaya chooses one that’s highly appropriate: magma. “It’s a Greek word for ‘mixture’. And it’s actually the center of the world, inside the earth, like lava. So it’s like Magma pop. It’s a mixture, it’s a lot of emotion and it’s really warm, sometimes scorching hot.”
Bombay Calling is a fun record, to be sure. There are moments of uplifting bliss, like “Good With the Bad” in which Samsaya sings “Tomorrow is not today,” describing her hardships alongside her successes. It provides a clear portrait of her positivity and openness, something she represents visually by drawing a heart over her eye when she performs. “The heart ritual itself really helps me to see things with openness. I think it’s important to question and wonder instead of presuming or guessing, diffusing any feelings of fear through music. If I feel fear or anger I find music to be the perfect cure.”
Samsaya is looking forward, of course, to playing her songs for the world. “The emotions on the album, I really wanna share. I can travel the world and play it for everyone. I love to play live and I can’t wait to do that.” In the studio, she cranked up the tracks, often singing live over producer Fred Ball’s beats, writing as she went. “I wanted it really as live as it can be, just have that energy in the room, to be able to take trips like that in the studio. It was just fun, it was the way I think music should be.” She’ll make her live US debut at SXSW in Austin this March, followed by tour dates in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York City.
For now, she’s in Stockholm, having moved there from Oslo a few years ago. She says that “home” is “anywhere I can create music. I found out that it’s not like a place, it’s more what I surround myself with at that place, really. I feel ‘home’ very many places in the world. I’m lucky like that. I don’t have necessarily one spot that I feel is home except maybe when I’m sitting and creating something.” She does find an inspiring energy in NYC, saying of a recent trip here “I love the mixture of people. You wanna just tap into it and you wanna just start making something out of it immediately. I think it’s the greatest thing and it should be all around the world, it should be that multicultural. It’s very, very positive, it brings out the best in us. Our uniqueness is really what makes us strong. And makes it exciting and makes life worth living.”
Samsaya is nothing if not unique. For her, making music is about processing experiences and emotions, being open and breaking rules. Her outlook is as refreshing spiritually as it is sonically, ensuring that this very gifted gal will soon be taking the world by storm.
Here’s a band that can make The Strokes seem, once and for all, obsolete—which is saying something considering The Strokes were lauded as “vital” and “indispensable” back in their day. Consider Skaters the new “vital” rock band; in fact, there’s a lot of comparisons to be made between the two bands: The Strokes rode a wave of hype into the music scene; Skaters are now doing the same. The Strokes debuted with a critically hailed album featuring 11 solid tracks; Skaters are now doing the same. You get the point.
And the similarities don’t stop there. All the elements that made Is This It such a strong rock album are prevalent on Skaters’ debut full-length, Manhattan, due out Feb. 25th on Warner Bros. Records. Manhattan opens up with the dark-sounding “One Of Us,” a super straightforward rock song that builds around the repeating line “Fun and games.” But there’s no fuss or messing around on this album: you come to find that each minute of each of the Skaters’ 11 tracks is worthwhile. They are not wasting any time here. The album’s third track and lead single “Deadbolt” is a prowling, thumping number that breaks open during the chorus, when lead singer Michael Ian Cummings howls “Won’t you give me one more try?” in as close to a Julian Casablancas impression as anyone could get.
Much of the midsection of the record features much more optimistic sounding, effortlessly catchy tunes like ‘To Be Young” and “Symptomatic,” which feature fast-paced, driving rhythms by guitarist Josh Hubbard and drummer Noah Rubin that make you want to get up and dance. “Schemers” is particularly pop-tinged and one of the album’s major stand-outs, with the same kind of anthemic magic that The Strokes managed on Is This It’s “Last Nite.”
But here’s where the two bands differ, and what keeps things truly interesting on Manhattan: Skaters confidently and deftly incorporate a variety of influences to bring some unexpected songs to the table, beginning with “Band Breaker.” Anchored by bassist Dan Burke, the song is colored with a reggae sound that brings The Specials to mind—a sort of unpolished, gritty aesthetic that simultaneously has a modern sheen to it. “Fear of the Knife,” one of the album’s most dynamic songs, continues in a similar, reggae-influenced tone and features a listless Cummings singing morbid lyrics about an operation and doctors who “get paid when you’re six feet underground.” “Nice Hat,” on the other hand, punches up the punk, drawing from the hard-and-fast style of hardcore bands like Black Flag and Fear. And with snippets of the city’s sounds—overheard drivel, drunken conversations with taxi drivers, announcements in the subway—sprinkled in between songs, the record plays like a genuine homage to quotidian New York City.
The album closes with as much primal energy as its opening—the fuzzed out electric guitar still shredding, the drums still thrashing, and the bass still throbbing. Skaters are, through and through, a rock band, but with a lot more to offer than power chords and great melodies. Manhattan is familiar yet novel, packed with material that’s strong enough to carry Skaters from the basement to the Bowery Ballroom and beyond. Catch ‘em while you can.
Though his songwriting dwells in intimately confessional territory, Canadian singer/songwriter Barzin Hosseini himselfis a pretty enigmatic figure. Publicly, he appears as Barzin or Barzin H, with little biographical detail apart from what’s in in his songs. His presence as a songwriter, though, displays a poetics-heavy musical sensibility, with spotlight awarded to lyrical rhythms and manipulations. Instrumental lines—melancholic and cyclical—take their cues from the themes the words set in motion. “In this place, I’m loyal to memory,” Barzin sings in the fourth, and most urgent, track on his new album, To Live Alone In That Long Summer, “Stealing Beauty.” “You look inside houses to see how others live/ and you make the same mistakes, the knowledge comes too late.” Guitars dust pretty arpeggios over the track, always in support of the vocals.
If Barzin’s last release, 2009’s Notes To An Absent Lover, was a breakup album, To Live Alone deals with the reorganization of life after that breakup. The song collection plods through the process of re-learning how to live alone, and to that end, Barzin first envisioned an instrumentally minimalist album. That idea adapted, as his project took shape, to include input from a slew of musician friends. Bolstered by backup vocals from Tony Dekker, Daniela Gesundheit, and Tamara Lindeman, To Live Alone—while circling lyrical themes of isolation and loneliness—is Barzin’s most inclusive record.
Since its inception as Hosseini’s solo act in 1995, the project has regularly expanded to incorporate an array of musicians. Despite all those additions, alterations, and guest appearances, the group’s musical foundation hasn’t changed much. Although additional musicians make for a more filled-out record, you can hear the minimalist impulses behind Hosseini’s voice no matter how many people he’s playing alongside, and the melancholic lyrics and matching sad music that are the new record’s signature have been key to Barzin’s work from the beginning. It’s no surprise that, by now, Hosseini has mastered the turf. He’s able to more or less eschew over-sentimentality on this record, which is a feat considering how introspective and nostalgic the songs unfailingly are. That’s because, as much as To Live Alone becomes engrossed in remembrance, the album details an obsession with deliberate forward motion. Like stacking building blocks, the tracks take us through the work of building (or re-building) a life, and the anxiety of not being able to figure out how other people have successfully done so.
The record shows growth for Barzin in a few different categories—instrumentally, there’s a bit more dynamic range than on previous releases—but not as much as you might imagine, given that the outfit’s been around for almost twenty years, and that their last album came out way back in 2009. The guitar lines, though clean, are extremely repetitive—sometimes frustratingly so—and the songs’ build-ups come very subtly, with faint pay-off. The forward momentum of To Live Alone‘s moving-on idea is its most interesting component, and the biggest source of progression over the duration of the album.
To Live Alone In That Long Summer is out February 25th via Monotreme Records. Pre-order it here. Or, for a taste of the new album, listen to the first track “All The While” below via Soundcloud:
The feeling of getting lost in a show (not literally, because that sucks, especially when you’re 13 and at a punk show for the first time) is something that doesn’t happen often. However, when it does, it’s indescribable. You lose track of time and what life is like outside of that enclosed venue. That’s what it felt like at Jonathan Wilson’s show at Music Hall of Williamsburg on 2/14 (the sexiest day of the year).
The opener, which my boyfriend and I missed half of, was The Blank Tapes hailing from Los Angeles and capturing that hazy, washed out vibe SoCal is known for nowadays. From what I heard, most of their songs sounded quite similar, but were broken up with lead singer and guitarist Matt Adams’ searing guitar solos, every note hit with precision.
Then, Jonathan Wilson came on, unassumingly, in what I can only describe as a guitar wizard/alchemist’s garb. They got right down to it, opening with “Fanfare” off his sophomore release, aptly named, Fanfare. The song’s instrumental opening was about five-minutes, building up suspense and setting the standard for songs to come. Wilsons’ backing band was tight and took cues from him instantaneously.
The song that got me hooked on Jonathan Wilson over a year ago was “Desert Raven” off of his first record, Gentle Spirit. It was the one I had been waiting for the whole set, although when he finally played it–an 8-minute song originally–he condensed it to five, leaving us feeling rushed. However, the real showstopper, which came in the middle of the set, was “Can We Really Party Today?” a song that was, admittedly, not my favorite off of Gentle Spirit, but evokes a completely different atmosphere when played live.
Well over two hours later, Jonathan Wilson and Co. closed out with “La Isla Bonita”, a Madge cover. After all that time spent with him, he barely spoke a word, instead letting the music speak for him. I think that’s the way he wants it, and that’s OK with me.
Listen to the title track off Fanfare, here via Soundcloud:
On Valentine’s Day, I rushed from work to catch the early show at the Knitting Factory in Williamsburg. Yes, I went alone. On Valentine’s Day. Anyways… Although I don’t usually enjoy this venue, I was excited to see these two Burger bands for the first time. I arrived just as Mozes and The Firstborn took the stage. A four-piece from Holland, they were refreshingly enthusiastic. Mozes was one of those bands that actually wanted to be there and showcase their new album (that was released this past month, by the way). If you frequent shows in Brooklyn like I do, you know what it’s like to watch a band that is completely unamused and somewhere else. Mozes and The First born were the perfect, lighthearted, garage-pop band to kick off the show.
In between sets, the crowd tripled in size. A wave of twenty-somethings shoved their way to the front as Los Angeles-based Together Pangea jumped right into their set. They briefed the audience stating they would be playing eleven songs, and began with “Sick Shit”. With lyrics such as “My dick is soft, these things mean nothing to me,” one would think Together Pangea can’t be taken seriously. Don’t be fooled, they know exactly what they’re doing. As the set progressed, the crowd and band seemed to tease one another. The band called out girls for sitting, and they later retaliated with a pair of pink lace panties. The underwear was then draped on the bassist’s head, and his mic stand. As the stage dives became more frequent, and the crowd more rowdy, the set abruptly ended. The crowd, myself included, was not accepting this, so they returned for an encore. Closed out with two songs: an untitled track which seemed to be a crowd favorite, and Nirvana’s “Breed.” All in all, this was the perfect mental escape from the reality of Valentines Day; Great bands, and a great atmosphere.
Read our review of their newest album, Badillac, here, or if you’re feeling frisky, listen to “Badillac”, here via Soundcloud:
This month’s Band Of The Month is the Berlin quartet Fenster, whose new album we can’t quite get enough of. It comes out March 4th on Morr Music, and is garnering raves already. Be sure to catch these guys on one of their many tour stops (listed below) including a handful of SXSW shows. Here are our thoughts about the elusive German lo-fi group’s forthcoming album, The Pink Caves: International quartet Fensters sophomore collection, The Pink Cavescreates its own reality: self-contained, rich, surreal. Vocals and instrumentation feel entirely synched in their intent, and draw together a lush and layered aesthetic that’s as unspecifically visual as the soundtrack to a David Lynch film. That uniformity makes sense, considering the nuts and bolts of the way the album was put together: the group (Jonathan Jarzyna, JJ Weihl, Rémi Letournelle and Lucas Chantre) laid down the tracks on this album simultaneously, in an East Germany cabin with its wiring rigged to distribute different elements of the recording process over four rooms. So while the album retains all the polish of a studio recording—more polish than many studio recordings, actually—you do get the feeling of togetherness listening to The Pink Cavesas you might expect to find in an especially well-orchestrated live show. I wouldn’t call it spontaneity—on the contrary, every move the group makes in this album is palpably deliberate. However, the music maintains remarkable cohesion throughout.The Pink Caves‘ seamlessness makes it a little difficult to find a point of entry into the album. The world the group imagines is so self-sufficient, it’s hard to locate Fenster in any one era or style. The lyrics, while subtle, feel directed towards high philosophy, and a brief investigation will tell you that The Pink Caves seeks to grapple with an imaginary heaven that is at once both pointless and triumphant for the fact that it exists only in your mind. This idea weaves in and out of the music, but is often buried pretty deep: so closely do the instrumentals parallel this concept of spaciness and alienation that it’s often hard to grasp what the group’s aiming for. Without focus, the music becomes aimless and melts into a swirling, crushed-velvet panorama that’s mesmerizing, but leads to nowhere.The male-female call and response duets go a long way towards humanizing the album. In these sections, The Pink Caves takes on a sweetness that mellows out the stark, albeit beautiful, passages . Although I was too distracted by the gorgeously complex fabrications taking place in opening track “Better Days” and the suavely faraway vocals of “In The Walls” to crave more narrative, when the duet in “Mirrors” showed up, it occurred to me that having a more clearly delineated vocal line structure may be exactly what The Pink Caves is missing. There’s no danger of any listener mistaking Fenster’s musical landscape for ordinary, and there could never be, even if all of the album’s vocals were as accessible as they are on “Mirrors.” Using vocals as a foothold would strengthen the album’s philosophical bent, too: The Pink Caves’ message lies layers deep, like a shadow always turning around a corner before it’s fully in view. Though this contributes to the album’s dystopia, that aesthetic wouldn’t be lost if its foundation were more explicit. In fact, the experience of listening to the album would benefit from having a narrative guide through its dreamworld.Listen to “Mirrors,” off The Pink Caves, below via Bandcamp: We had the opportunity to chat with Fenster regarding life, love, inspiration and music, of course. Here’s what they had to tell us: AF: Bones is such a different sounding album than ThePink Caves. While the latter is difficult to assign to any genre, Bones seems to be more folk-pop influenced. What inspired digressing towards the abstract?
Bones was our first record, made in a state of pure naive bliss. We had never played a show before and it came from a world that was really all in our heads. I guess it was a record that really reflected that time, the influences we had gathered as individuals and the special chemistry between us and our producer. It was very much a winter record and very much a Berlin record for us. It was made in a basement and recorded with one old Russian ribbon microphone. We wanted to capture the simplicity and dark playfulness of morbid dreams, coupled with the sounds of the city and the sounds of objects we found that inspired us, like shovels and slamming doors. After that record came out and we started touring a lot, our world sort of exploded. Everything we thought we knew was kind of turned upside down, and we encountered so many extremes. We were exposed to so many new places and people and music and we just took it all in I guess, whether it was conscious or subconscious I think the world changed and shaped us both as people and as musicians. When we decided to take a break from touring and compose and record a new album, we found that the influences and instruments we had been inspired by simply changed and instead of trying to recapture that minimal innocence, we embraced this new world we felt emerging, following the different aesthetics we were drawn to, which were maybe more psychedelic and wobbly than before.
AF: You have New York and Berlin listed as places the band members hail from. What has been the most rewarding aspect of having those different perspectives? Do you find your sound changing in relation to the geography you inhabit?
JJ is a born and raised New Yorker, Jonathan is half Polish and from Berlin, Rémi and Lucas are from France and our producer Tadklimp is Greek. I guess the music has benefited from not really belonging to one place although Berlin is a sort of Never Never land at the moment where a lot of different people from different places seem to collide, so Fenster definitely owes its existence to what Berlin is right now. It’s hard to tell if that has really shaped our sound but I guess it always adds some kind of dimension when different cultural references and backgrounds meet.
AF: Your website is almost as dizzying as your music. What is the story behind some of that imagery? The bone-headed dinosaur, the man bent backwards, the religious icons…
The website was made by our friend and collaborator Florian Sänger who embodies a particular kind of understated genius that one rarely encounters. The inspiration for the imagery came out of long afternoons spent in junk shops trolling through crumbling children’s books, medical encyclopedias from the last century and religious propaganda pamphlets. We wanted the website to be an entrance into the world of the album which for us meant a creepy dream logic where Jesus is on street signs and men float through the air. After we handed over the piles of collected materials to Florian, along with some images from our own dreams, he basically channeled it all into that website. Word.
AF: What contemporary bands are you most interested in collaborating or playing with?
Ahhhh there is so much good music being made at the moment, but there are two artists that are particularly inspiring to us… Connan Mockasin and Sandro Perri.
AF: Your music exists in a space that is difficult to label; because of that it is difficult to imagine your songwriting process. How do you typically commence the creation of a song? Its kind of different every time…some ideas have been festering for years, some just appear out of the clear blue sky. But our process is that once we have collected enough little bits and pieces of ideas, we go somewhere and make little pre-recordings or sketches of each song with all of the arrangements mapped out. We write and re-write lyrics dozens of times, singing and reading them out loud to see if they stick. Its important for us not to judge the creation as its happening, that comes later in the recording process when things become more concrete.
AF: I attempted researching what Fenster meant. Aside from a last name it appears to refer to a tectonic window. Also, maybe some sort of tape? Where did you get the name? Yeah, Fenster means window in German. A window fell on JJ’s head when we were recording Bones, but other than that we just like that its kind of an empty word, an object you look through instead of at.
AF: I read in Morr Music that you are fans of post-apocalyptic novels. Any favorites?
The Drowned World by JG Ballard is a classic and as for post human novels, Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick.
AF: Given the change from your first album to your sophomore, where do you see your direction going in the future? Sonically speaking.
Sonically speaking, the next record will probably be completely different than the last two. We don’t like repeating ourselves, and at the same time we can’t force things…we like to sort of let them happen naturally and somehow be true to where we are in our lives at the time.
AF: What have you been listening to most recently?
Basically everything…Milton Nascimento’s 80s stuff, Fleetwood Mac (mostly Tusk), 70s Turkish disco, The Art of Noise, the new Japanther record, Caramel by Connan Mockasin, Impossible Spaces by Sandro Perri, sleazy french composer Francis Lai, Carol King!, Aphex Twin always, Kendrick Lamar, just discovered the album Trans by Neil Young, German krautrock legends Holger Czukaj and Irmin Schmidt…
AF: Do you find that what your listening to greatly effects your songwriting, or do you try to separate the two?
Everything that goes in has to come out somehow…The world and books and movies and music and stuff all play a part, but some things are more influential than others. Sometimes you hear, see or read something that unscrews something in your brain and you feel inspired instantly and other things leave you totally cold but maybe these things also contribute somehow. It’s mysterious and unpredictable and we like it like that.
AF: The Pink Caves is an interesting album because at on instant it is romantic, another mournful, and then the song changes and you want to dance. It also has so many digital and instrumental intricacies that it’d be a shame to miss them. Given the dynamism of the record what environment would you say is the best way to listen to it? Headphones? Live?
Wherever you listen to it, definitely listen to it loud! Maybe because we watch so many movies it feels like some weird soundtrack to a film, so listening to it while driving in a car or riding your bike or your horse around town could be cool. It’s definitely worth trying to listen to it as a whole album. That’s at least what we were going for because we personally really love records that take you on a trip.
AF: You mention finding interest in graveyards, and religious iconography. Surely being from Berlin and New York you must have some favorite cemeteries and cathedrals. Care to share for your fans with the same taste for the macabre?
There is a truly crazy and macabre cathedral in Portugal made of bones and skulls and decorated with a golden skeleton called Capela de Ossos and a church outside of Prague in Kutna Hora that is decorated with intricate sculptures made of human skeletons that were apparently designed by mad and blind monks. Paris is always a fun place for graveyards and Vienna has more dead inhabitants than living ones.
AF: Where does your fascination with the strange, morbid and mystical come from?
Its sort of engrained in everything…you just have to look for it. We like the autumn, its the time of year when everything dies. Dried flowers are just more beautiful, more timeless. We’ve always been really fascinated by cults, by movements of people that believe something so strongly they would die for it. The mystical is actually just another way of looking at the ordinary. Some people see a mirror and find it endlessly fascinating and mysterious and some people just look at themselves.
AF: I was watching your music video for “Oh Canyon.” It’s certainly proof of your sense of humor. I couldn’t help but be reminded of Wes Anderson’s imagery, but what did you guys have in mind while making it?
Our good pal and long time collaborator Bryn Chainey who has made three videos for us came up with the concept which was to make a sort of fake documentary about the “Amateur Cosmozoology Society” exploring questions like, “space, what is that?” and the history of animals being catapulted into the cosmos to try to figure out what’s out there. The found footage he incorporated of monkeys holding hands and cats freaking out in zero-gravity spaceships is absurd and fascinating. Science!
AF: You’ve been consistently lauded for your ability to render songs both sweet and eerie. Is there a band mate who contributes to one aspect of the sound more than the other? Basically, who is the creepy one in the band?
Maybe the band has a mind of its own that’s greater than the sum of its parts…we’re all huge Cronenberg fans and we like sci-fi a lot. Keep it sexy, keep it spooky and keep it real in 2014. Peace and love.
AF: WE SURE AS HELL WILL!! Thanks for speaking with us and congrats on being named AF’s band of the month. Much love to you, from NYC to Berlin.
The Pink Caves is out March 4th. Go here to read more on the band and listen to more of the new album! Below, watch the teaser for The Pink Caves.
After two years of sold out shows and festivals from here to Tokyo, Norwegian indie pop band Team Me are finally returning with some new music. The six-piece group just debuted their new single, “F is for Faker,” a lively track that brings Of Monsters and Men and Imagine Dragons to mind.
The song’s chorus features lead singer/songwriter Marius Drogsås Hagen passionately shouting the line, “You’re one of a kind,” over raucous instrumentals that fuse video game soundtracks with arena rock. Energetic hand claps, dramatic violins, and a backdrop of sparkling electronic effects pepper the rest of the song.
Team Me are currently working on their sophomore album, which is due out sometime this year, and they’ll be returning to the US for a few shows and a stop at SXSW. In the meantime, listen to “F is for Faker” below:
Ticket Giveaways
Each week Audiofemme gives away a set of tickets to our featured shows in NYC! Scroll down to enter for the following shindigs.
