Displaying characteristic social sensitivity, the Simpsons creator has added one of the most hotly tipped young bands of ‘09, The XX (aka Xerox Teens before they had to change their name following a lawsuit) to the line-up he’s curating for next May’s Minehead ATP.
The festival has reinvented the old holiday park venues, and has been regularly selling out, even in the currently depressed market, thanks to its coherent and eccentric schedule, and the attraction of having your own brick built loo to use rather than facing the horror of the festival dookie-pits.
On Tuesday, M.I.A. tweeted a link to a music video without explanation, and the press (don’t make me say Blogosphere) jumped on it, full of speculation about what it could possibly be. Oddly, it turned out to be a new song called “Space Odyssey” that’ll be on her forthcoming album.
No big surprises, really. Every album release seems to be preceded by more or less official leaks these days, so why was thins one paid so much attention? It came on the back of some controversial statements that MIA made against the New York Times’ recommendation of holidays in Sri Lanka (where she’s concerned about civil violence), and it had both the seal of official approval and the element of mystery to it, to encourage speculation and conversation.
Replicating this buildup of momentum is possible even on a smaller scale. Any glimmer of notoriety for your band that can be tied into a current issue and subverted to your own purposes. Try and tie these things in to the release of your own new bit of hot content and you should see interest snowballing; people love following links, and the more meat you can put around an issue, the deeper people will explore it.
According to Universal’s blog Lady Gaga today hit the top spot of Billboard’s Airplay chart today, becoming the first artist in the chart’s history to get the first five singles to top of the chart since the chart’s archives began in 1991, all 5 tracks having been released in one year. “Bad Romance” is Gaga’s first hit from her second album, The Fame Monster, all the others being from her imaginitively titled previous release, ‘The Fame’… Presumably the next will be something like ‘The Fame Monster Goes Fishing’.
The Knife, in collaboration with Berlin DJ/producer Mt. Sims and Boltondeutscher Planningtorock, have been collaborating on one of the more bizarre sounding projects of the past year – an Opera celebrating Charles Darwin’s origins of the species [perhaps hoping to replicate the anti-creationist success of the Jerry Springer Opera]. It’s been comissioned by the Danish performance group Hotel Pro Forma, who’ve created many other such pieces of quirky music and theatre together with other European artists.
The development of the project has drawn from a multitude of sources, and the list of influences on The Knife’s website seems like something from Hesse’s Glass Bead Game:
‘Tomorrow, In A Year’ is a unique musical project. Richard Dawkins’s gene trees have formed the basis of some of the musical composition, artificial sounds have been mixed with field recordings, with the music inspired by everything from the different stages of a bird learning its melody, to a song based on Darwin’s loving letters about his daughter Anne. These are compositions that challenge the conventional conception of opera music.
The collective are to release the studio version of the opera ‘Tomorrow, In A Year’, on the 1st March 2010. You can listen to the first track from the forthcoming album on Soundcloud by clicking here [a download is available if you subscribe to their mailing list]; atmospheric, cleanly produced, intricate and odd – like a sonic cross between a Kabuki play and a Rubix cube, with Fever Ray over the top of it. Whatever that means, it’s odd, and interesting.
You never think about it, but some kid in Beverley Hills must have Harrison Ford on their paper round. In fact, Han Solo himself got his first big acting break through building some shelves for George Lucas. As day-jobs go, being Tom Waits’ nanny has got to be pretty cool. You look after the kids for a while, watch a movie, and then get to hang out with one of the most fertile minds in modern music just as he comes back feeling all groovy from a few beers and a nice dinner with the wife. How much would people pay for an hour with Tom Waits in contemplative mood?
Jesca Hoop was the lucky young lady who got paid to do so – and there are places in her music where you can hear TW’s influence, the kind of beautiful musical mess that he stitched together on albums like Rain Dogs and Swordfish Trombones, where strange chord shifts drop out from under the music and odd dissonances suddenly fall in together and turn out to have been harmonies all along.
There are similarities to Feist and Cat Power in her music too, her sometimes sweet, sometimes piercing, sometimes sultry and seductive voice ties together simple acoustic guitar tracks with complicated, swaggering electronic ones, and there are nice little touches of production like whispers turned up to overpower the rest of the track. Definitely worth a listen if you like any of the artists used for comparison, and interesting enough to be worth investigating if you have any kind of indie sensibility. If the big man backs her she can’t be bad…
You’ve got a great band together, some great ideas, you’ve polished your performance, you’re happy with your sound and you’ve got the perfect 15 tracks to lay down on the debut album that’s going to be the major weapon in your assault on the charts. One problem. You haven’t got the ten grand you need to have it recorded and mastered in a professional recording studio. What’s the solution? Chicago based rockersI Fight Dragons had the rather brilliant idea of getting their fans to fund them, with a hundred dollar contribution to the recording fund buying a ‘membership’ including all the band’s previous recordings on a specially produced USB drive, “and they guarantee[d] the owner a free digital copy of anything we ever release, as well as free admission to any live show of ours now and forever. And there will only be 100 ever made.” They posted a link on their website, sent an email out to their mailing list, and the drive/membership combination sold out in 48 hrs. This is a great example of a band that’s connected with its fans, and has given a huge amount of added value to a small group of committed fans that will continue to support them throughout their career, cherish their relationship with the band, and recommend them to all their fans. Read Hypebot’s take on the matter here, and the rest of IFD Brian’s post here, on the WeAreListening blog.
Godfather of Hip-Hop, civil rights protester, black icon – Gil Scott-Heron was instrumental in shaping the culture of New York in the 1970’s, but disappeared during the 80’s, only to surface amidst allegations of cocaine use in the early 00’s. He seems to have put this behind him though, and has been coaxed back into the studio to produce another album:
“Gil Scott-Heron was doing rhyming and spoken word over a back-beat as long ago as 1970,” Russell explains. “The music that became hip hop and rap – that’s what he was doing. He is undisputedly one of the people who invented that type of music. And it’s gone on to be incredibly important, and affect the culture in an enormous way.”
Rumours of a “new” Gil Scott-Heron album, like the reunion of the Friends cast, have circulated for as long as anyone can remember.
But Russell has guided the poet into the studio at last, and a long-player waggishly entitled I’m New Here will be released in February – Scott-Heron’s first for 15 years.
‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised’ – this was recorded when Barbara Streisand was singing ‘The Way We Were’ on the radio.
Another new survey conducted in the EU argues that music sharers buy less music over the course of a year than those who are classified as online or physical only buyers.
Oddly iPod owners aren’t classified as digital music buyers, and it’s not clear how these categories have been delineated or how people have been divided into them, or whether they are mutually exclusive. I wish that when research like this is commissioned it was released in its entirety, to allow us to make our own decisions about it, rather than accepting the opinions of those who publish it based on limited information release. Wishful thinking, perhaps, but it might help us get to the truth if it happened.
Now here’s an amazing sounding musical collaboration project, showing how much can be achieved in a day if you combine a professional attitude, a strong concept and a day in a recording studio.
Record Club is an informal meeting of various musicians to record an album in a day. The album chosen to be reinterpreted is used as a framework. Nothing is rehearsed or arranged ahead of time. A track is put up here once a week. As you will hear, some of the songs are rough renditions, often first takes that document what happened over the course of a day as opposed to a polished rendering. There is no intention to ‘add to’ the original work or attempt to recreate the power of the original recording. Only to play music and document what happens. And those who aren’t familiar with the albums in question will hopefully look for the songs in their definitive versions.
The current project is the Alexander ‘Skip’ Spence (of Jefferson Airplane) album ‘OAR’ – an album that already has something of Beck’s sound about it, and there have been 2 previous albums from the Velvet Underground and Leonard Cohen covered in this hasty fashion, put together by Beck and a heterogeneous mix of artists including Wilco, Feist, Devandra Banhart and many others. You can stream the music for each album from his site.
Band Name: Polina Kourakina
Genre: Acoustic Alternative with a hint of Jazz and Blues.
[EDIT: 3rd person from a 1st person perspective usually makes my hackles rise, but Polina is really enthusiastic about her music, so give her a chance and check out her stuff ] When Polina Kourakina steps up on stage, there’s a small giggle and wink of a smile across her face. She then lightly hops up on the stool provided for all the show and tell individuals, and clears her throat. She then quickly makes the scene fill with a presence of calm serenity and young minded spirit by stating “here’s my soul in a bundle of 6 strings tightly wound on my guitar”. The song starts slowly, increasing in tempo, which makes your heart beat with the rhythm. Finally an astounding sound of a voice crawls out of that tiny little girl, proclaiming her love for the music. The reason I believe polina kourakina is so unique compared to other musicians is how she controls the scene, and draws people in with her choice of poetry, and chord progressions. Undeniably I cannot see her on the face of some poppy magazine cover, but yet on a tour bus heading to a strongly awaiting town of individuals waiting to hear the songs of life, love, pain, and hope. What does her music sound like? It’s soothing, original and calms the soul. Polina has played in many places, from café’s in D.C., to the dive in bar in San Diego. This shows to most that no matter what coast you’re on, you’ll love what you hear. She, will be the best, and greatest, but what this little young lady has, no other can match up to. Her love for the music, you
see through her soul when she is on stage. The riffs with her voice, the choice of jazz notations seep into your every crevice finding you inside. Inspired by her mom, and loved ones.
] When Polina Kourakina steps up on stage, there’s a small giggle and wink of a smile across her face. She then lightly hops up on the stool provided for all the show and tell individuals, and clears her throat. She then quickly makes the scene fill with a presence of calm serenity and young minded spirit by stating “here’s my soul in a bundle of 6 strings tightly wound on my guitar”. The song starts slowly, increasing in tempo, which makes your heart beat with the rhythm. Finally an astounding sound of a voice crawls out of that tiny little girl, proclaiming her love for the music. The reason I believe polina kourakina is so unique compared to other musicians is how she controls the scene, and draws people in with her choice of poetry, and chord progressions. Undeniably I cannot see her on the face of some poppy magazine cover, but yet on a tour bus heading to a strongly awaiting town of individuals waiting to hear the songs of life, love, pain, and hope. What does her music sound like? It’s soothing, original and calms the soul. Polina has played in many places, from café’s in D.C., to the dive in bar in San Diego. This shows to most that no matter what coast you’re on, you’ll love what you hear. She, will be the best, and greatest, but what this little young lady has, no other can match up to. Her love for the music, you
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