Nick Castro: A Spy In The House of God

Here I am, back with the first Nick Castro's album. About his last -"Come into our house"- much has been said, but I do prefer his first: a bit more free-form, while the last dug too much into the great british folk-rock artists' repertoire, like Fairport Convention's (and Wendy Watson is no Sandy Denny). Which I love, but the fact is that he just can't keep up with them if he plays their same game. That's why I like this album so much: there's more non-british music (i.e. indian and psych stuff) and more room for trance-like tracks or atmospheric songs in general in it (like No sweeter thing, that reminds me more of Sid Barrett's Pink Floyd than Denny's FC). Listen also to the beninning of Winter's song: isn't it like a gamelan ensemble playing?

A spy in the house of god (320k)

Julie's Haircut On Streaming

Last week I've been at a Julie's Haircut's concert and, as always, it has been a hell of a gig: it is kind of hard for me to explain how great they are to people who have never seen them live, because when they are on the road they are the best at what they do (and what they do, by the way, is an extremely exciting live act, based mainly on loose versions of songs from their last album, "After dark, my sweet", which got recorded in only one week on a very improv mood, and with the help of ex Spacemen 3 Sonic Boom).
So my idea was introduce some people who may be curious about them (and if you aren't...well, you should, ok?) with a collection of 14 songs that I have picked from their whole career (i.e. 4 albums and some EPs), and that I have put in the sidebar on the right on streaming and so hope to push someone to go look for their records and maybe buy something.
One more thing: I took the picture over here, so you can blame me anytime you feel like...

More Info:
"After dark, my sweet" @ iTunes
"After dark, my sweet" @ SonicRocket
Julies' Haircut Press

Introducing Joss Stone

This is a bit of a strange upload (specially after Richard Thompson), but I love this girl and I don't really give a care if she is mainstream, because if you like Motown artists, old school Soul (and not many fake r'n'b plastic things like Shakira and such) you ought to like Joss. Her first LP, Soul sessions, all of it made of beautiful covers of great soul music, was a gem, while the second, Mind , body & soul, was someway a letdown, probably given to the fact that those were the first songs she had writted herself.
Introducing... on the other hand is a much more mature work, also thanks to a splendid production made by Raphael Saadiq, that is worth a grown-up audience, and not only teenagers. Why? Because imho things like "Bruised but not broken" could have been written by Prince (and that's not the only one that gave me this impression), and "Tell me 'bout it" is a great Supremes-like groovy thang, isn't it?
Hell, I don't want to, in no way, compare her to Janis Joplin, bit she deserves some credit. She may not be the soul-saviour, but still she is the best in what she does (among the living at least, and leaving out some great old men & women like, say, Solomon Burke or Bettye Lavette).
Though her new hair style sucks.
(And the upload is 192k, not the usual, lame 128)

Introducing Joss Stone

Richard Thompson: Grizzly Man Soundtrack

This is the soundtrack from one of the best films I have seen recently, and no matter it is a documentary, by legendary german director Werner Herzog. You probably already know the story: Tim Treadwell, a weird kind of eco-warrior (as he did like to call himself) lived 13 consecutive summers in an alaskian region in the wild with grizzly bears, and finally got eaten by one of them. But don't get frightened by this: Herzog's film is in no way supposed to harm you or move you with false sentimantalisms, no way; in fact what it does is show some beautiful footage filmed by Treadwell himself (see below the youtube video, where you don't see Treadwell with his loved bears, but with some foxes: I chose this bit simply because of the beauty of the images and because of Herzog's words) and some commentaries made by friends of Treadwell's, people who knew or had heard of him, and by Herzog too (and this is where lies the real importance, to me, of the whole movie, i.e. where it is possible to understand Herzog's weltanschauung and the relation betweeen this film and the rest of his works).
And the soundtrack? Well, the soundtrack is some kind of miracle: composed and played by Richard Thompson along with some fabulous musicians (betweens these there is also Jim O'Rourke, the former Gastr Del Sol member, and great producer -he produced, for instance, Wilco's masterpieces Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and A ghost is born). The music in here is maybe some of the best stuff for guitar I have heard: Thompson is playing at his best (which is definetly a lot). It is very hard to describe this music because there is so much in it: Jim O'Rourke's drones, some XX century classical music-influenced parts for cello, but mostly it is Richard Thompson playing brightly sounding guitar licks that can be considered country or british folk music (see the "Foxes" bit) or plain folk. The only non-original track by the way is the last:"Coyotes" performed by Don Edward.

More Info:
Richard Thompson's site
Grizzly Man search @ Youtube
Grzzly Man @ Metacritic

Grizzly Man Soundtrack

Randy Newman - Short People

Randy Newman: Songbook Vol. 1

Randy Newman is mostly known for being the man who wrote You can leave your hat on, later covered with huge success by Joe Cocker for that infamous movie. But Newman has a great
career in itself: he is an extremely talented piano player, singer and composer, who has been spending this last part of his career writing soundtracks (lots of Disney movies, like Toy Story for instance), and for which he has been at last awarded with an oscar in 2001. But the man is such a non-politically correct persona that he "thanked" the academy -that had nominated him 15 times before but in vain- for having humiliated him so many times...

Not really your typical american songwiter, eh?

Anyway, Newman's work is wonderful a mixture of ragtime, pop-rock, chamber music and old time balladry and all of this is usually served with a witty and caustic humour that makes you want to laugh while at the same time you may not be not so much confortable with it.

A very good example is on Rednecks, which is a song on racist rednecks told by rednecks.
But is this "Songbook Vol. 1" the usual best of? Not quite. It is in fact Newman re-playing -this time only for piano and voice, that is just as he has written them- his best songs from his early -and my favourite- career. And if you want to have a taste of his humour here are God's Song (That's Why I Love Mankind)'s words:

Cain slew Abel, Seth knew not why
For if the children of Israel were to multiply
Why must any of the children die?
So he asked the Lord
And the Lord said:

Man means nothing, he means less to me
Than the lowliest cactus flower
Or the humblest Yucca tree
He chases round this desert
'Cause he thinks that's where I'll be
That's why I love mankind

I recoil in horror from the foulness of thee
From the squalor and the filth and the misery
How we laugh up here in heaven at the prayers you offer me
That's why I love mankind

The Christians and the Jews were having a jamboree
The Buddhists and the Hindus joined on satellite TV
They picked their four greatest priests
And they began to speak
They said, "Lord, a plague is on the world
Lord, no man is free
The temples that we built to you
Have tumbled into the sea
Lord, if you won't take care of us
Won't you please, please let us be?"
And the Lord said
And the Lord said

I burn down your cities-how blind you must be
I take from you your children and you say how blessed are we
You all must be crazy to put your faith in me
That's why I love mankind
You really need me
That's why I love mankind

MORE INFO:
Randy Newman on Wiki.

Songbook Vol. 1

Studio 60 (Dolphin girl sketch)

I know this is -mainly- a music blog, bit I do want to give some support to Studio 60, this smart tv series. And this bit just makes me laugh and laugh (both because of the Dolphin girl's voice and Matthew Perry's expression). So, if you are american and you appreciate the show why don't you stop for a sec and sign the petition to NBC to save it?
Thanks.

Breathless: Three times and waving

Now another shoegazing band, Breathless, that probably not many people know of. Nevermind that "Three times and waving"is indeed a very good album, even better to me because its cons are its pros: in fact "Three times.." may sound like a bit of a blur, not completely on focus, but I'd state that this is its fascination, i.e. having so many things in it, unlike many other shoegazing bands that often looked like My Bloody Velentine cover bands Breathless may have less of an impact but more intriguing nuances. Moreover Dominic Appleton has a voice that I find slightly similar to Interpol's Paul Banks (which is good, me being a fan and all).
Anyway,"Three times..." has psychedelia, 60's pop, shoegazing guitars, and charming and hypnotic rythms (one of the best thing in this LP: the work on bass and drums and).

More info:
Review of three times.. @ Leonard's Lair
Review of Three times...@ Answers.com

Three times and waving

Slowdive - The Ballad of Sister Sue

Slowdive: Just For A Day

In these days I am probably going to post some shoegazing bands, and I'll start today with one of my favourite, Slowdive, and with their best effort, the debut album "Just for one day". The so-called shoegazing scene was a brief flame in the history of music (or UK music), that burned out at really fast pace mainly because not even its top band (My Bloody Valentine) achieved success, and partly because -or at least that's what I think- there were too many copycat versions in the biz. Unlike these, Slowdive showed some peculiarities, and de facto survived the fisrt 90's carnage of these bands, going on under another name (with 3/5 of Slowdive they chose the new name Mojave 3, and they are still alive and kicking, though they have been through varios shifts and changes: Neil Hamstead became the lead vocalist, and they started anew as an almost country-rock ensemble, only to return these days with their new LP "Puzzles like you" to a more pop-rock oriented thing).
Sure, still there are many resemblances between this album and MBV's ones, but it is also hard to think of Kevin Shields' band playing something like Ballad of sister blue, a dense and vaporous waltz, or Erik's song (a minimalist instrumental drone), an hommage to XI-XX century pianist and composer Erik Satie.

INFO:
Slowdive on Wiki.

Just For A Day

Julie's Haircut

Julie's Haircut - Satan Eats Seitan

I'm posting this because I really think Julie's Haircut are a hell of a band and not enogh people know them (plus this videoclip is great and in fact it has been also awarded). So watch the song and download these couple of songs from their last album "After dark my sweet", and if you feel like it, go see their site and spread the word, okay?

PS
The surprise link is for David Lynch fans this time (but he talks about the Web!)

Download:

Open Wound
Purple Jewel
Afterdark

Retribution Gospel Choir: Summer EP

A short record today: The Retribution Gospel Choir are Andy Sparhawk (Low's singer and composer) side project (he obvously plays guitar, while Eric Pollard is on drums and Eric Pollard is on bass, who also plays in Low) that he sometimes takes on tour with his main band.
This EP is one out of the two they have recorded and sold during their concerts, and includes two songs (Hatchet and Breaker) that will appear on Low's next album ("Drums and guns") as well.
What about this EP? The first track (El coro) is a great improvisation-noise piece, the two songs from Low's repertoire are one (Breaker) not very different from its "Drums and guns" version, whereas the other (Hatchet) is more stripped-down and acoustic, and the last song from this "Summer Ep" (Body electric) has the feel of some old Low songs, maybe something out of "Trust", but with a shimmering dissonant guitar solo at he end.

PS
The surprise link for all the West Wing fans out there.

Download:

01 - El Coro
02 - Breaker
03 - Hatchet
04 - Body Electric

By the way, the new band formed by Nick Cave on streaming here on the right is named Grinderman (and not Gingerman...which would be a bit of a laugh).

Lullatone: Plays pajama pop pour vous

Some time ago I had promised some jap electronic music, so here it comes: Lullatones' new album, "Plays pajama pop pour vous", a band that you may already know if you have been visiting this blog for a year or so: tender music-box-like music, with girlish tunes and glokenspiel filling in the elctronic soft beats. This last effort of Shawn James Seymour & Yoshimi Tomida is maybe the most pop-oriented of their catalogue, but also the richest with influences, from brazilian music (Bedroom bossa band) or light-hearted discotheque music (Floating away).
Anyway, Lullatones are an easy-going fun band that can help you relax, a nice example of what I'd like to call "bedroom music", not meaning something that gets you sleepy, but something that makes you feel like lying on your bed, stretch your arms and be still and warm as if nothing could bother you.



More info:
Lullatone @ Myspace

Plays pajama pop pour vous

The Pop Group: Y

The Pop Group was a great agit prop band, whose roots (if such term can be used for a new wave group) are in so many musical styles and approaches: jazz, world music, funk and (of course) punk. The quality of this album is a good reason to post it on my blog, but another good reason why is that The Pop Group had a strong bond with The Slits, with whom they were buddies and that they probably influenced (both their first LP's covers were overtly about their interest on primitivism, and moreover both were produced by Dennis Bowell, the biggest name in producing raggae at the end if the 70's in the UK).
Anyway, the "Y" LP is a new wave milestone, whose sound is still a smash in the face with its clanging guitars, great funky rhythm section ("Simon Underwood [bass] and Buce Smith [drums] were post-punk's Sly & Robbie", according to Dennis Bowell), and Mark Stewart's political angst. Imagine a Gang of Four flirting with dub/ethnic experimentalisms and you might get what they sound like. Or you could try and download this 1979 gem (it really is: the Amazon link over here will tell you that you can have it delivered for 42,99 USD, not really change money).

More on The Pop Group:
Here's what you are looking for: a very well done fansite with some live mp3's as well.

Y

Lydia Lunch: Queen Of Siam

Lydia Lunch was the singer of the short-lived no-wave NY band Teenage Jesus & The Jerks, and "Queen Of Siam"is her first solo LP, a strange thing for a new waver: compiled in it there are some covers and some self-penned songs and, most importantly, it features also a -sometime and somehow- 50's-like orchestra (as in Lady Scarface that, with its arrengement, sounds just like out of an old hollywood movie). There is probably some mockery intent in here (how weird is it listening to a perfectly jazzy double bass going up and down a scale while an electric guitar bursts distortions as in A cruise to the moon?), but there are also some more typically new wave pieces as well as Tie and twist with LL's voice sounding both sleepy and agressive.
Anyway, this LP is just an example of how unpredictable music could be in 1979: this woman is one of the many icons of a rock "genre", the so-called new wave, but unlike many more rock genres (say punk, grunge, hard-rock, whatever), with new wave you can never tell what kind of music it really is that you are talking about... it can have punk guitars, it can have great tunes, it can be incredible dissonant... It can be very serious. It can be a joke. That's the reason why I find this musical period and people like LL so amusing: with all their musical naiveté and approximation they showed everyone that thery were not simply "playing some music" but that they had a "meaning". That whatever it was that they were playing it was important, it was a statement (on art, on the world, and so on).
It's really great to think of someone who intended their work, their art, their music with such gravitas. And this is true for many more post punk stuff: Gang of four, Husker Du, Joy Division, The Pop Group, Devo, Talking Heads, Wire, Magazine, PIL...only to say a few names.
If any of you is interested in all of this just go buy Simon Reynold's Rip it up.

INFO:
Lydia Lunch on Wiki.

Queen Of Siam

The Raincoats: s/t

"The Raincoats - S/t" is The Raincoats' first album, published in 1979, by this bunch of women who made history as one of the best bands of the british new wave: their sound is raw but still pop, and their voices can be both similar to John Lydon's and sometimes, oddly, beautiful (as in the second track No side to fall in, a great example of how to make a post punk song out of...violins and sixties choirs).
So, you like the stop-and-go sound that is so typical of new wavers? You've got plenty of it, along with sax, violin, some trumpets here and there, and a not too fucked up version of The Kinks' Lola.

INFO:
The Raincoats on Wiki

The Raincoats
The Raincoats (new link - mediafire)

Re-Post: Karen Dalton

Since the link to "It's hard to tell.." has gone dead soon, here is another upload.

It's so hard to tell

Iggy Pop: The Idiot

Iggy Pop is, without any doubt, one of the most important and influential rock musicians (even though I could easily live these days without "musicians" as, say, Peaches...), and the reason why I have decided to upload "The Idiot"is...well, because it is a wonderful album, also thanks to David Bowie's production (he was in great shape back in 1977: he was just in the middle of his Berlin-period, i.e. the last, and maybe only, time he did something ahead of everybody else), and because I think I am going to post some weird stuff in the future days, probably new-wave or some electrinica, I'll see. That's why such a "classic"LP.
Anyway, here is one of my fav tracks Iggy did: Nightclubbing. The kind of sexy thing just perfect for decadent times: and I am quite sure it was a big influence on Ian Curtis.

More info:
Iggy Pop @ Wiki.
"The Idiot" @ Wiki.


The Idiot

Karen Dalton: It's so hard to tell who's going to love you the best

Karen Dalton had her fifteen minutes of (posthumous) fame in 2004 when Bob Dylan spent very fine words for her work in Chronicles Vol.1, but unfortunately she never was that lucky in life: after releasing this incredible first album in 1969 and another one in 1971 ("In my own time") she went through a lot of hard times, mostly drugs and alcohol issues, only to die -probably- as homeless in 1993.
It is very difficult to see how such a talented voice could not receive more from her career and life, and it is even more difficult to get it while listening to "It's so hard...", an LP that, or so the legend goes, was recorded by chance by her and by some other musicians/friends in just one night, and, moreover, that Karen Dalton was almost forced to sing these songs by some friends of her. Nonetheless the result is hell of a gem: an album rich where it is poor, with its simple and nightly arrengements, with her voice often so similar to Billy Holiday's, as many have noticed ever since then, and of course also thanks to a tracklist full of passionate songs (by Leadbelly, Tim Hardin, Jelly Roll Morton and traditionals).
Call it blues, call it jazz, call it folk, this anyway is a music so intense that it is very hard to find something comparable. Yeah, it's so hard to tell.

It's so hard to tell

Thom Yorke: Spitting Feathers

I am not even sure that I really like his solo so much..but nonetheless he is one of the most important musicians of the last 15 years (with his Radiohead), so here is this japanese EP, "Spitting Feathers", which is a more electronic counterpart to last year's "The Eraser".
If you are such big Radiohead fans as I am I have no doubt that you will find something interesting in it, though there are only 5 tracks (including an extended version of "The Eraser" 's Harrowdown Hill).

Spitting Feathers

Best of 2006

I know that I am no Pitchfork, but I still feel like doing my own List of the Best albums of 2006...What can I do? It's just a funny silly game we all want to play once in a while, and now is my turn.
So, these are the 15 album I have listened the most in these twelve months, there may be better ones, but these are the ones that have stayed in my head (and on my iPod and PC) the longest. If this list can make some people curious or someone else go back to something the y went past without noticing, then I'd be more than satiesfied.


1-Cat Power: The Greatest
I would just need the second voice that enters during the refrain to make this one of my fav
albums of the year. But also all the rest of it superb-quality songwriting.

2-Neko Case: Fox Confessor Brings The Floor
Even better than Blacklisted. Which is tough.

3-The Decemberists: The Crane Wife
A complex LP that makes you whistle, laugh, sing, and want to to listen to it again.

4-Julie's Haircut: After Dark, My Sweet

A great italian indie band that sounds like Pink Floyd-Live At Pompeii-era. Best live act I have seen this year, really awesome.

5-M. Ward: Post-War
A great Americana record.

6-Paul Simon: Surprise

Brian Eno's production does him a lot of good. And there is also this line in it: "You cannot walk with the holy if you're just a halfway decent man".

7-Sebastien Tellier: Sessions
I have loved this from the first second:his best songs played plain and simple with acoustic guitars, drums, and piano.

8-The Magic Numbers: Those The Brokes
Best voices around. Listen to Slow Down when the female chorus comes in: doesn't it sound like Bacharach? When Indierock meets 60's vocal pop.

9-Belle & Sebastian: The Life Pursuit
I know they are not the same band of If you're feeling sinister, so what? Bands do have to change. And B & S could not stay the same naive pop band forever. And all these pastiches are good for the heart (The blues are still blue is a great T-Rex-like song, funny as they only can be).

10- Arab Strap: The Last Romance
Incredible that this is their final work, but it is so good to end at the top: this is their best compromise with both pop and rock, but still an Arab Strap thing.

11-Jarvis Cocker: Jarvis
Jarvis Cocker in best shape, almost as good as on Pulp's Different Class. And Black Magic sounds like The Who that play a Lou Reed riff (Sweet Jane basically).

12-Mojave 3: Puzzles Like You
AKA Neil Halstead goes back to pop-rock. Not exactly the stuff they were doing as Slowdive (no shoegazer guitars in here), but not even the classic rock/c & w oriented music they have been playing in these last years. And Breaking the ice should have sold as Gnarls Barkley's Crazy.

13-Sparklehorse: Dreamt For Light Years In The Belly Of A Mountain
Mark Linkous will probably neverwrite hapy songs...but there is something in here that gets close to...Well, anyway, I find it their best album.

14-Broken Social Scene: Broken Social Scene
It is hard not to put a BSC album in one of these lists. Mainly because they are one of the rare -and really- new things in rock music. We will see if and how relevant (and influential) they will get in the future years.

15-Grizzly Bear: Yellow House
One of those bands you must give some time. And then you will find yourself listenig to them everytime you go to bed. Out of seasons and time.

Feel free to tell me what you think about it...and why don't you write your own Top 15 in the comments? It would be great. Thanks to all those who have stopped by in this year.
Happy 2007, everyone.

You are wondering what the new song on streaming is? It's P.I.L.'s Public Image !

I have just re-uploaded the link.
Hope you like it.

Grizzly Bear: Yellow House

Big time for re-posts: this time is Grizzly Bear's second album. The fact is that last time around the tenth and final track was missing, so now I have re-uploaded the whole album.

Yellow house

The Go-Betweeens: Botany Sessions

Many people asked me to re-post it, so here it comes: The Go-Betweens' so-called Botany Sessions, i.e. what could have been their 7th album, if they had not split (but fortunately only to come back in great shape 10 years later).
The album was to be an acoustic work, their "Blood on the tracks", and afterwards these songs finally made it to the MacLennan and Forster's solo LPs.

Info:
The Go-Betweens on wiki.
Articles and intervies with GB @ The GB Archive

And now another link for this link for this post...hopint that it won't be dead in a day. Merry X-mas, everyone.

Botany sessions(X-mas link)

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club: Howl EP Sessions

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club shocked plenty of people who used to listen to them with the release of their last LP, Howl, choosing to give up their usual Jesus and Mary Chain-feel to a recording deeply influenced by blues, stomp, and beat literature (hence the title: clearly an Allen Ginsberg reference).
And hard as it may seem for those who have not listened to Howl yet, they did make it: they do not sound like a band trying to dance to the Americana-Neo-contry-Post war folk(or whatever people may call all of this)-hype but like someone that has found their roots, and made the best out of it (everytime I get back to that album I always find myself pleased with it).
So what's next? Well, I personally hope they keep up the good work, but in the meantime (i.e. last february) they released (it was available to buy online or on their tour) six more songs from the same sessions -this beautiful Howl Sessions EP. A brief yet valuable download for all you BRMC fans (but not only: tracks such as the mesmerising Mercy or Feel it now are worth more than a try).


Howl EP (Media Fire Download)
Howl EP (Megaupload Download)

Jens Lekman: Oh You're So Silent Jens

Jens Lekman comes from Sweden, a land that has given us many brilliant pop artists (one of my favourites is Sondre Lerche, last album apart) and Lekman is definetely one of them: Oh You're So Silent Jens is not a proper LP but a collection of EPs instead and, maybe also because of this, OYRSSL is such a heterogenic and fascinating record, being so rich, having so many influences in it...but let's say that the names of people as Stephin Merrit's Magnetic Fields or Belle and Sebastian (but with a certain Burt Bacharach feel) often come to mind listening to him: soft balladry (with some almost-kitsch arrangements here and there) with great tunes.

INFO:
Jens Lekman on Wiki.

Oh you're so silent Jens

Grant McLennan: Solo

Grant McLennan was the founder and co-writer of the great Go-Betweens, the australian rock band that I am so fond of (if you've already been on this blog you possibly know this already...and I promise I am going to re-post soon the Botany Sessions too), he died last May and I am not yet able to consider him gone. I'll never hear anything from him or from his band (I may sound selfish, but, well, I don't mean it, I simply got in love with their songs in the couple of years prior his death... and probably many of you know how it feels when you get attached to a band and, after a while you realise it is not just one more band that you happen to listen to, but it is your band. And that's it: you're a fan. And you want to know more, you want to have more from them, and you look forward for the next single, the next CD... That's what happened to me with The Go-Betweens: they became my band, but I was too late: I've never had the chance to wait for their new album to come out. I will never feel that expectation and that's bad (and yeah, here I may be sounding really selfish, I know), too bad. But at least I got the chance to see them live once -about an year ago these days- and everytime my mind goes back to that concert (or when I watch their That stiped sunlight sound DVD) I get very sentimental about it, and about what they have meant to me (and maybe about music in general: one of the cons of this internet-era is that it gets harder and harder to be so involved in ONE band, or ONE artist, or whatever...or am I simply getting old? Dunno).
So forgive all of this fuss and let me just say that Grant McLennan also wrote 4 solo albums, and if you like the GB you should go try listen to some of his solo releases, maybe starting with this collection of songs I have picked. I don't know if this is his "Best of", it may as well be only my "best of" his work, but I still hope you find something in it something that can be of some use to you.
(If any of you is interested, I have took a selection of the songs he wrote in the Go-Betweens: nothing new, just something out of the curiosity of listening to his songs with GB without their counterpart -the Robert Forster's ones).

Grant McLennan Solo

Grizzly Bear: Yellow House

Grizzly bear is the alias for Edward Droste, a Brooklyn-born guy, who wrote and recorded his first album last year on his own in his bedroom and is now back, but he is now back with a full band and with an outstanding LP, this Yellow House, that has had all the best production it deserves.
It is hard to describe this muisic because there are plenty of influences in there butI don't think I'd be mistaken if I say that The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds is one of them (though this is in no way a happy-go-lucky kind of LP, it is more a matter of complexity of both writing and arrangements), along with something from the so-called freak folk...except that this the music's feeling is more subtle, and in saying so I mean that all the extravaganzas you can find in it are not mere divertissements but something meaningful to the idea and the building of the LP (as it was for Pet sounds).
Anyway, you'll listen to arcs, soft acoustic guitar (and banjo) arpeggios, woodwinds, accordion, and choirs modulating tunes from outer space...and it is quite as good as it can get with all this this stuff altogether.

Want to know more about it?

See their myspace page
Or Yellow House's review (8.7, by the way) @ Pitchfork
Or Wiki.

Yellow House

Music on streaming

Noticed the music on streaming on the right?
Hope you appreciate it!

Michael Nyman: Gattaca OST

Today's post is Michale Nyman's beautiful soundtrack to Gattaca, the 1997 movie by Andrew Niccol performed by Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman: a collection of lyric minimalistic pieces of music from one of the greatest living composers. Many know him because of his work on Jane Campion's The Piano but I find this just as good, and anyway a very heartfelt composition.
I hope you give it a try (and maybe go buy the CD if you can).

Gattaca

XTC: Skyrlarking

Skyrlarking is probably XTC's most famous LP, mostly because of the odd hit Dear god, but this is one of the casef where fame (I'd go with fame, and not success because XTC have never had much of this..) and artistic accomplishment meet. Stranger is that XTC have never really made it: they are a hell of a pop band (there are plenty of new and old bands that wouldi die to be half as good in writing songs as Andy Partridge is), and got very influential over the years: my mind goes to first Blur, but also these last Belle and Sebastian (or not? I would say so).
Anyway, Skylarking may be considered by some as their finest work also because of an over the top production by...Todd Rundgren (yeah, it's him), although Partridge did not really get along with him (meaning they must have had more than a fight during the recording, and over the decision on the tracklist as well), but still the collaboration gave birth to this beatiful child. You just need to listen to it: best british pop after The Beatles? Or something like it.
One more thing: Dear God was originally not included on the LP, but after its success it became part of every Skylarking reissue. And how many atheist hits do you know? See:

Dear God,
hope you got the letter, and...
I pray you can make it better down here.
I don't mean a big reduction in the price of beer
but all the people that you made in your image, see
them starving on their feet 'cause they don't get
enough to eat from God, I can't believe in you

Dear God, sorry to disturb you, but... I feel that I should be heard
loud and clear. We all need a big reduction in amount of tears
and all the people that you made in your image, see them fighting
in the street 'cause they can't make opinions meet about God,
I can't believe in you

Did you make disease, and the diamond blue? Did you make
mankind after we made you? And the devil too!

Dear God, don't know if you noticed, but... your name is on
a lot of quotes in this book, and us crazy humans wrote it, you
should take a look, and all the people that you made in your
image still believing that junk is true. Well I know it ain't, and
so do you, dear God, I can't believe in I don't believe in

I won't believe in heaven and hell. No saints, no sinners, no
devil as well. No pearly gates, no thorny crown. You're always
letting us humans down. The wars you bring, the babes you
drown. Those lost at sea and never found, and it's the same the
whole world 'round. The hurt I see helps to compound that
Father, Son and Holy Ghost is just somebody's unholy hoax,
and if you're up there you'd perceive that my heart's here upon
my sleeve. If there's one thing I don't believe in

it's you... Dear God.

For more:
XTC on Wiki
Fansite

Skylarking

Billy Bragg: Talking with the taxman about poetry

Today I am posting one of my fave albums ever: Billy Bragg's Talking with the taxman about poetry, an album I can't get off of my iPod, no matter how few space I have when I want to put new stuff in it..
Talking with...is Bragg's third effort, a more accomplished one after his first couple of LPs which were kind of raw, and it is so also (if not mostly) because of the splendid work on guitars by the five stars session man (and more importantly ex Smiths) Jonny Marr: listen to what he does in songs as Ideology or the opening track. I listen in awe every time (to me, he is one of the most underrated guitarists, and if he is so he probably is because he is not the typical guitar hero like, say, Jimmy Page or Eric Clapton; still he is by far one of the best rythm guitarist of the history of rock).
Anyway, on Talking with...Bragg gets the best out of his music tastes and inluences: The Clash on Help save the youth of america (it could be an outtake from Sandista!...but a very good one, indeed), and so with Bob Dylan on Ideology (doesn't the melody of the verse remind you of some Dylan songs? I can't remember which, but I am quite certain), but, all of these obvious references apart, what is important is the quality of the record:songs where both music and words are on the same level (and it was not so on his previous SO-much-agit prop songs), with beautiful lyrics full of wit and politics (though sometimes there is a little bit too much propaganda in it).
Moreover there are realy few people who are able to be as funny and at athe same time socially aware as Billy Bragg is on this LP. I haven't convinced you? Check this.

Greetings To The New Brunette (Shirley)

Shirley,
it's quite exciting to be sleeping here in this new room
Shirley,
you're my reason to get out of bed before noon
Shirley,
you know when we sat out on the fire escape talking
Shirley,
what did you say about running before we were walking
Sometimes when we're as close as this
It's like we're in a dream
How can you lie there and think of England
When you don't even know who's in the team
Shirley,
your sexual politics have left me all of a muddle
Shirley,
we are joined in the ideological cuddle
I'm celebrating my love for you
With a pint of beer and a new tattoo
And if you haven't noticed yet
I'm more impressionable when my cement is wet
Politics and pregnancy
Are debated as we empty our glasses
And how I love those evening classes
Shirley,
you really know how to make a young man angry
Shirley,
can we get through the night without mentioning family
The people from your church agree
It's not much of a career
Trying the handles of parked cars
Whoops, there goes another year
Whoops, there goes another pint of beer
Here we are in our summer years
Living on icecream and chocolate kisses
Would the leaves fall from the trees
If I was your old man and you were my missus
Shirley,
give my greetings to the new brunette.

Talking with the taxman about poetry (320k)

VA: Rainy Day

Here I am, back after a while, with a very rare 1983 record: Rainy Day, a brief compilation with cover versions of alternative classics (and not) played by members of the Paisley Underground like: The Bangles' Susanna Hoffs, Game Theory's Michael Quercio, Dream Syndicate's Kendra Smith, and Rain Parade's David Roback.
I invite all of you who love this rock scene to get it, also because this disc is really hard to find (I do not know if someone has edited it after Rough Trade did in 1984..but I have serious doubts about it), and because...well, take a loot at the tracklist:

1. I'll Keep It With Mine (Dylan)
2. John Riley (Gibson/Neff/Belamonte)
3. Flying On The Ground Is Wrong (Young)
4. Sloop John B. (traditional)
5. Soon Be Home (Townshend)
6. Holocaust (Chilton)
7. On The Way Home (Young)
8. I'll Be Your Mirror (Reed)
9. Rainy Day, Dream Away (Hendrix)

Rainy Day

Tom Verlaine: First solo album

Tom Verlaine became the indie myth with the first legendary LP of his Television, Marquee Moon. After their second LP the band split and he went on for a solo career started off with this homonymous album: nine songs that did not differ much from his previous band's material, yet they are a good promise for his solo career (as some people might have wondered if he had been able to be such a good songwriter without his past comrades at his side).
And for those who love The Velvet Underground I recommend to listen to Breakin' my heart (in here you will also find the Kingdom come covered by David Bowie on Scary monsters).

More about Tom Verlaine:
See The Wonder
and Oldielyrics

Tom Verlaine

Arab Strap: Acoustic Request Show

Arab Strap just split and this is a post to remind everyone what a great band they have been, also on stage: 11 acoustic tracks from their last tour (and mind the last one...there is a peculiar ghost track hidden in there).
I really hope their future solo careers will be at this level (and for those who have't: go and listen to Malcolm Middleton's last LP, which really is one of my favourite musical work of these years).

Acoustic request show

Danny & Dusty: The lost weekend

Danny & Dusty were much more than the names could lead you to think: it was (on writing "team") Dream Syndicate's Steve Wynn and Green on red's Dan Stuart, plus Stuart's colleague on GOR Chris Cacavas, Long Ryders' Sid Griffin and Tom Steffen, and at last DS's drummer Dennis Duck.
The lost weekend was a collaboration of a couple days only, when all of these people met only "for the fun of it", delivering good-rocking pub songs for drunks and old timers (including a more than enjoyable version of Knockin' on heaven's door).
Many consider this some kind of a lost masterpiece (lost given the fact that it has not been re-released for a long time), and I do not completely agree with that because I still think that the Paisley Underground (the californian scene that included all the three of these musicians' bands) produced better than this (Days of wine and roses and State of our union come to mind...), but still The lost weekend does not deserve to be left in the drawer of some label forever because it is a collection of songs that many Paisley underground Fans could truly appeciate, along with Neil Young fans (I think of Ragged glory) or Dylan's (specially if you like some of his slack material).

The lost weekend

Cha VanGaalen: Skelliconnection

Chad VanGaalen is a young and talented canadian artist, involved both in painting and musicmaking. He has just released this Album -Skelliconnection- on which he played all the instruments and where he shows the many sides of his music: soft-baladeering, folk-pop (the opening Sing me to sleep), lots of 60's references (the beautiful, stunning, and yet with simple chord sequence Graveyard that reminds me of Harvest/After the gold rush-era Neil young and first Belle & Sebastian, though the lyrics are more reminiscent of Smog), indie-rock, and more (like the electronic folk of Red hot drops).
On the whole Skelliconnection is an album with a lot of naiveté (in a good way) and one that is also able to surprise you quite often with its music shifts. There are not so many out there (and this is how I have decided to uploaded, while I usually do not post brand new stuff).
...and check out the Surprise link all you West Wing fans (if there are any in here).

For more info about him:
See his Myspace page (if you want to have a taste of his songs)
or Newmusiccanada
or the Eye Weekly (there's a nice article with his bio)

Skelliconnection

Track 11

Here is track 11 for those who could not extract it

Track 11

Robert Wyatt: EPs

I'm not a great Robert Wyatt fan, but this collection of EPs just takes my breath away: specially the first three EPs (songs 1-14), which are loaded with wonderful cover versions, one of which is Elvis Costello's magnificent Shipbuilding, playedeven better by Wyatt, but also with a is-this-really-it?-version of Neil Diamond's I'm a believer, and then Peter Gabriel's Biko among others. The fourth EP is a whole different matter, with the eerie sounds from The Animals Film, and the fifth is a series of remixes of songs from Wyatt's Shleep album.

(And check out the surprise link because it is big fun, trust me!)

INFO:
See Robert Wyatt on Wiki.
Look in here if you are looking for his solo discography.


This is big, so it's split two parts.

Part 1
Part 2

Morrissey: You have killed me + Feist: One evening

Today a post with two cd singles: MORRISSEY's You have killed me (with 2 previously unreleased tracks) and FEIST's One evening (with a remix, a live -I think- version of Lover's spit with her and BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE, and a solo piano version of the title-track).



Link Removed

Tangerine Dream: Alpha Centauri

Today's album is Tangerine Dream's second LP, the cosmic Alpha Centauri, released in 1971 after first drummer (and further on succesful solo artist) Klaus Schultze left the band. Nonetheless Alpha is -like all of the first four TD first four LPs- a magnificent piece of work, one of the highest points reached by the so-called Krautrock. So forget about further-on progressive -and kind of boring- TD, because this is real cosmic music, not new age-y stuff good for waiting rooms or mid age hipsters (as most of the stuff they played from the late 70's and on).

INFO:
Web page on Krautrock with lots of links.
TD Fan site with interviews, articles, picture, etc.


Alpha Centauri

Sebastien Tellier: Sessions

Today I'd like to introduce Sébastien Tellier to those of you who do not know his music talent: he is a 25 years old parisian who has already released three albums, "L'incroyable verité", "Politics", and this one, the last, "Sessions". "Sessions" is something peculiar in Tellier's discography because it consists in a one-day session that pictures his playing some song from his back catalogue (including also "Fantino", featured on Sofia Coppola's "Lost in translation"), an unreleased track, "Classics", and a cover version of Cristophe's "La dolce vita", in a bare and extremely impassioned acoustic performance.
What makes the difference betweens this and the previous Tellier's LPs is that the french musician avoids here his typical and a-bit-of-kitsch arrengements, and in doing so his songs sound more sincere, unlike their versions on "Politics" and "L'incroyable verité" (beautiful "La ritournelle" apart) that sometimes seemed more a divertissement than proper songs.

If you want to give him a try you can also go listen to ST's songs on his Myspace page.

Sessions

The Go-Betweens: Before Hollywood (expanded disc)

Just as I said, here is The Go-Betweens' "Before Hollywood" expanded disc. And it is not a matter of half-formed demos (although they are, mostly, demos) or such: they are all well-played songs, starting with "Just a king in mirrors" or "This girl, black girl", and it includes also the single (from the "Send me a lullaby"-first LP-period) "Hammer the hammer".

Before Hollywood Expanded Disc

The Long Ryders: 10-5-60 (EP) + End of the trail (Live)

The LONG RYDERS are another Paisley Underground band: they were a cow-punk or -if you prefer a country-rock ensemble lead by singer Sid Griffin in the early 80's. These days with musicians as Ryan Adams or Neko Case being so hip LONG RYDERS are definetely a name to re-discover.
Today's download is LR's first EP (released 1983), "10-5-60", and a good-quality Bootleg called "End of the trail" from the final part of their career (presumably shortly after "Two-fisted tale", their last LP).

For more info see LR'S page @ Sid Griffin's website (a very-well made one, where you can also find some MP3 of live material), or Wiki.

Two links this time for the download:

Long Ryders (Megaupload)

or

Long Ryders (Sendspace)

The Go-Betweeens: Before Hollywood

Hello, and sorry if I have been away for a while (on vacation in Paris, by the way), but now I'm back and with a hell of an album...and I know I have already posted a lot of THE GO-BETWEENS' stuff, but in Paris I bought this one (I had not bought it before because it is not available in Italy, so I had only bad MP3s of it) and I am so satisfied with it that I have decided to make it my comeback-post.
So, I'm talking about GB's second LP: "Before Hollywood", IMHO their first masterpiece (cointaining the absolute gem of McLennan's "Cattle and cane"), and one of those record that sound both naive and stunning...their sound is so clearly stuck in the past but still fascinating and beautiful (in that it kind of reminds me of REM's first album, "Murmur": it is clearly an LP made in the ealry 80's with all that crystalline sound and fine-sounding guitars...in fact both LP's were released in 1983!).
Anyone interested also in the bonus disc?

The Go-Betyweens on Wiki
The Go-Betweens Archive

Before Hollywood

Re-post: Robert Forster - Radio showcase

This is for those who did not make it to download Fosrster's radio showcase.

Showcase