If you are a Radiohead fan I am sure you have been awaiting this release, which is basically Thom Yorke’s second solo album. In addition to Yorke, the album features Red Hot Chili Peppers’ bassist Flea, longtime Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich, Joey Waronker of Beck and R.E.M. on drums and Mauro Refosco on percussion. The band has its origin in the touring band Yorke formed for his debut solo album The Eraser (2006 – oh my – has it been that long!). If you want to learn more on the back story – Google it – this album has gotten plenty of pre-release press.
After years of struggling with post OK Computer Radiohead I am finally getting this electronic music. I am absolutely loving this album – although who’s to say I wouldn’t have hated it in Y2K like I hated Kid A at the time. So either Yorke/Radiohead is perfecting this genre or I am finally waking up. My guess is I am waking up. I re-listened to The Eraser (which I thought I didn’t like) and it sounded great.
Despite being beat heavy electronic music, I find this album soulful and filled with hooks. Typically I find this kind of music lifeless and monotonous. The opening cut “Before Your Very Eyes…” is a minimalistic Eliminator-era ZZ Top song crossed with Afro-Beat (and Radiohead vocals). It is down right funky in a narcotic sort of way. You could choreograph a minuet to “Ingenue.” Most of the album has hyper caffeinated drumming, softened by atmospheric keyboards and Yorke’s falsetto which floats over the proceedings calming the beast into a purring kitty cat. “Stuck Together Pieces” could easily be a Fleetwood Mac song – there is a total pop song hiding under the electronic beats.
This album should be listened to on headphones or a stereo with good separation. The arrangements are fearless in their use of two channels and the minimalistic nature of the music allows you to grab an instrument and ride it solo. At first I was disappointed that Flea’s bass was not more prominent, but I have come to appreciate the subtly of it.
For my tired ears this is a very refreshing release. With every listen I am hearing something new. Highly recommended.
I participated in an another amazing Analog Audio of Minnesota event this past weekend. The event was a demo of Vivid’s G3 Giya. This is a $40K speaker and it sounds like it. I am complete noob when it comes to high-end audio, but I can say this is the best speaker I have ever heard and most spectacular looking too!
As a bonus Philip of On a Higher Note (these speakers come with an escort) used the demo to play us fascinating set of digital files – the latest in high bit/sample rate recordings that shame CDs and threaten the best vinyl. The most amazing to me was a progressive set of higher samples of Patricia Barber’s “You & The Night &The Music” from her gorgeously recorded 1998 Modern Cool. This is a sexy intimate song and when I closed my eyes Barber was whispering the lyrics into my ear. I am budget audiophile and listening to the Giya’s made me aware of how obvious it is that I am listening to recorded music with my entry-level system at home. The Giya’s were alive the made the music present and real – you could smell it, feel it, see it and taste it.
I will let other sites explain the Giya’s. I don’t understand or care about the science and engineering of theses speakers. All I can say is they sound fantastic. Typically when I experience something this expensive my conclusion is that it can’t be worth it. Unfortunately the Giya’s are worth it. I am just grateful to have had a chance to meet them in an ideal site and with a great set of digital and vinyl selections to exercise them. In the mean time I am going to do my best to forget these speakers so I can go back to enjoying my humble reality.
In 2010 jazz guitarist Metheny released the album Orchestrion and proceeded to tour on the concept. And what a concept it was. Metheny had always been fascinated by his grandfather’s player piano. Metheny had always been urged to tour solo and he figured that was a tired idea and when he eventually got around to it he wanted to do something special: compose ensemble style music and perform it solo – the ultimate player piano.
Metheny proceed to create a very elaborate one man band with acoustic and acoustic-electric instruments that would be controlled using solenoids and pneumatics that Metheny could trigger in a live setting. Voila a one man ensemble. I loved that album, but unfortunately had a conflict when he performed it locally. I did get a chance to get a small taste at his Dakota show in Minneapolis this last September – he brought a small piece of the Orchestrion along for that ride. It was breathtaking to see and hear live.
Fast forward a couple of years and Metheny has really mastered this “instrument.” I prefer this release over the original Orchestrion release. This album sonically sounds better that the and Metheny’s performance more at ease with the Orchestrion instrument – he is free to play. The original 5 compositions are still there – slightly revised and played more confidently. There are two new originals and the rest are drawn from Metheny’s vast repertoire – all the way back to his debut to more current tunes.
If you are a fan of Metheny you will find this a great treat. If you are unfamiliar with him, this would be a great introduction. This is folk-jazz and easy listening – but not compromised. Despite being one of the most financially successful jazz artist of his era, Metheny never rests on his laurels or sells out. He is highly accessible and popular because he is a great player and great composer – but mostly because he has an extraordinary gift for melody and arrangements. Orchestrion provides the ultimate canvas for Metheny to work.
For a sense of how this thing works – out this video:
I consider myself an audiophile, albeit on a budget. When it came to digital music files I was all about convenience. I was original driven to rip CDs to get them on my iPod. But over the last few years I have found myself more and more listening to digital music files on my Mac hooked to my “real” stereo. That quickly revealed the inadequacies of a 192 kbps MP3.
My first improvement step was to start ripping my CDs at 320 kbps in the MP3 format. That helped. Then I got an inexpensive DAC. That helped. Then I started to rip via the ALAC format. That helped. But I still preferred to listen to music via my turntable or my CD player. I concluded iTunes and my iPod are for convenience listening and not for serious listening through a real stereo.
Last fall I started to do some research on a new CD player – figuring that was the digital format for my real stereo. I ran into a guy from the Needle Doctor at the Electric Fetus on Black Friday/Record Store Day and told him about my situation. I asked him to recommend a CD player. His immediate response was “upgrade your DAC and get a legitimate audiophile digital music player.” Huh?
Fast forward to Oliver (Omas) Masciarotte’s recent talk at Analog Audio where he gave a high level road-map to how to do digital right. I then picked up the detailed road-map (his recently published book) to learn more.
To Serve & Groove is exactly the recipe book I needed. You can scan the book quickly to get the basic idea and then you can dive deeper into the instructional chapters that give you step-by-step instructions. There is plenty of background material if you want a deeper understanding – but you can gloss over that if you only need the basics (me). Omas is willing to meet you wherever you are – a non-technical noob like me or a full-fledged audio nerd. No matter what, the music always comes first. The book is easy to follow, has good illustrations, and Omas slips in humor at the right times.
The good news is I now have a reference document to explore doing digital music right. The bad news is that it is not easy and it is not cheap. For most people using iTunes and hooking their computer to home stereo is about all they are going to want to do (its cheap and nearly effortless). Unfortunately if you have a discriminating ear you won’t be happy for very long. You will need this book (a bargain at $4.99 – cheaper that most audio magazines) and some discretionary funds (e.g. to buy a DAC, an audiophile music player, a RAID unit, a dedicated Mac, etc.) and some hobby time (e.g., configure computer, re-rip music, set up a RAID, etc.). Warning – the books assumes you a will use a Mac as your computer. Hopefully in future posts I will be bragging about my digital music server!
I have been writing this blog for over a year now. For the most part my posts are album reviews. My goal is to share with readers why I like an album and why I think they should give it a listen. I don’t recall that I have written a bad review. Not because I am Pollyanna, but because I don’t want to waste my time on music I don’t like.
My biggest challenge is trying to figure out why I like an album. This Jim James is a great example – I absolutely love it and I can’t exactly explain why. But I will try.
First of all I like My Morning Jacket (MMJ) and I especially like how MMJ has evolved to a more pop and funky sound. Jim James voice is so distinctive it is hard not to think of MMJ when listening to this release. This album fits nicely and unobtrusively with the rest of the MMJ catalog.
But it is a Jim James release – according to the album credits he wrote, arranged and played most of the instruments. It does have a slightly different flavor to it than an MMJ release. If MMJ is taking you coffee black, this release is with cream and sugar. The album is a bit more mellow and contemplative that MMJ. Real strings sweeten most tracks. When it rocks like on “A New Life” you can imagine Roy Orbison covering this song. At times the album evokes John Lennon solo ballads. The arrangements are complex, but support the songs – never overshadowing. When you look back at early MMJ, Jim James hid in the mix like Michael Stipe used to in early R.E.M. releases – like Stipe, James has come front and center as he has his career has progressed. James’ voice is fully featured on this release. There are some really cool sounds on this album, for example “All Is Forgiven” has Led Zeppelin/middle eastern feel.
I picked this album up this past Tuesday and I have listened to at least twice a day since then. With each hearing I like it more. This album has already reserved a spot on my 2013 top-ten list. My only complaint is that the album clocks in at about 38 minutes and every time it comes to an end, I wanting more.
First things first, a disclosure: my son pwelbs manages this band and I have been watching this album shake and bake for over a year now. The boys in the band have crashed at my house when on tour. Speaking of baked, my wife has a special cookie recipe in honor of the band.
With that out of the way – what about this album? It is a wonderful spicy gumbo of funk, blue-eyed soul, boogie, rock and hip hop.
My son asked me who do they remind me of and I said Queen. whysowhite doesn’t sound anything like Queen. But like Queen they have an ambitious sense of what pop music can be: serious musicianship, humor, complex harmonies, swagger and flamboyance. They sound like whysowhite.
This band could easily skid off the road toward jam band heaven, but they correct their steering toward complex taught arrangements.
If you get the chance to see these guys live grab the chance. They play great and they are entertaining as hell. Like a lot of great performing bands their album does not bottle their live lightning. The album is its own entity – its own performance – it does not try to duplicate the live performance, but is the band in another more thoughtful light. A well crafted cocktail vs. the beer bong that is the live show. Both have a proper place.
whysowhite is a music-head’s iPod on shuffle – one great song after another. Eclectic, yet cohesive.
For a nice profile of the band see this article from the Chicago Sun Times. The album is available both physically and digitally.
To Serve & Groove author Oliver Masciarotte was the featured speaker for this last Saturday’s Analog Audio of Minnesota informational seminar. This was real timely event for me because I have been trying to figure out how to deal with my digital music collection (both on CD and on files). I don’t have it figured out after this seminar, but I do feel better educated and prepared to do further research – prior to this seminar I was completely clueless.
Quick aside: Analog Audio of Minnesota, a dealer of high-end audio, does a great service to the Minnesota audiophile community with events like this. AAM’s Paul loves good music and he loves good equipment – he wants to sell it, but he has time for anyone who loves good music – to him they you may not be a customer today, but someday maybe. So even though I will not be buying a $40,000 pair of speakers anytime soon, I will go to AAM’s Vivid Audio Giya G3 event and I will feel completely welcome.
Oliver was a compelling speaker – he was knowledgeable, opinionated, entertaining and most of all understandable. I like good stereo equipment and I like good music, but I am not technical and when most audiophile geeks start explaining stuff to me I am quickly lost. Oliver explained jitter in a way I could understand (don’t ask me to explain it back).
This talk was a teaser for me – now I want to read Oliver’s book To Serve & Groove to really dig in on how to create a solid digital music system. I have a lot of vinyl, but I have more digital music (CD, SACD, DVD-A and music files). I have not been satisfied with my current set up:
- 6-year-old MacBook
- 3 TB external hard drive
- iTunes
- $100 DAC
- Pioneer DVD/CD/SACD player
So what did I learn? I need to find a high-end music player (a software to augment or replace iTunes), double my RAM, and upgrade my DAC. Despite being clueless, my recent decision to rip via ALAC (Apple Lossless) vs. 320 MP3 was accidentally brilliant.
My next step is to test drive some music players (software). I will let you know what I discover. Thanks Oliver and Paul!
I have finally gotten around to seeing Searching for Sugar Man – it took being released on DVD and available at a Redbox to get me off my ass to see it. Ironically I have been keen on Rodriguez for a few years prior to this film.
Rodriguez was one of my first discoveries I made when I first joined emusic five or six years ago. I was unaware of the legend, I was just struck by his Dylanesque voice and lyrics and the ever so slight Motown arrangements.
Fast forward to this last year. My son raved about this movie he saw and then a friend of his arranged a private Rodriguez show in Minneapolis that I DJed at this past fall (see review of that show here).
The long and the short of it is that this documentary is so preposterous that is it almost seems like Spinal Tap – but it is not, it is a true story. For any fan of pop music this is a must hear and see story. The documentary is compelling and inspirational. Rodriguez the man comes of like some kind of zen shaman – and he is I have met him and know it is true.
I was reading a review of my new turntable and this album was mentioned. Hey I have that LP in my collection and I have not listened to it in years. I pulled it off the shelf and have been spinning it for a couple of days now.
When Kahn recorded this album he was a very LA successful studio musician (e.g. Steely Dan). I have not followed his career and this is the only album of his in my collection. I am not sure how I even decided to buy it. It was released in 1980 and my version is a cutout with a 1983 price tag – so I am guessing this was not a big hit.
This is all solo guitar – some songs have overdubs. The masterpiece for me is Kahn’s cover of Zawinul’s “In A Silent Way.” Rather than source from the more famous Miles Davis cover, Kahn goes to Zawinul’s 1971 solo album. Kahn makes the classic song his own overdubbing with half-dozen guitars. Kahn does not emphasize the obvious melody – but explores other parts of the song.
The rest of side one covers Wayne Shorter, Lee Morgan, Randy Brecker and Horace Silver. Side two is a Thelonious Monk medley.
The recording is so great – you feel like you are in the room with Kahn and his guitars. Today recorded guitars so often sound plugged into the board rather than miked. For me that looses a lot of ambiance – I want to hear a guitar in a space and time.
A very mellow and contemplative album.
Is there anything more rock and roll than a hot gal with a big voice slashing power chords on Flying-V? Last night my daughter and I saw Grace Potter and the Nocturnals at the legendary Minneapolis club First Avenue.
I saw her a couple of years ago at Lollapalooza and she was great, but this was a proper gig – two hours of rock and roll heaven. Grace puts on a high energy show – channeling Janis Joplin and Tina Turner, yet a singer songwriter too. 24 hours later my ears are still ringing.
I often forget how great rock and roll can be – you start to take it for granted. Then a performer like Grace Potter reminds you of how transcendent rock and roll can be: pure energy, sexual tension, joy, and raw aggression exploding on stage.
This was night two of a two-night stand and comparing set lists I feel blessed to have picked night number two (both shows sold out). She played all her hits and spiced it up with some great covers. Of particular note was a rocked-out version of Prince’s “Kiss” – a special gift for the Minneapolis crowd. For her first encore she mashed up her hit “Paris (Ooh La La)” with Joan Jett’s “I Love Rock and Roll.” There are too few great female rockers; this was a wonderful nod to one of the greats who paved the way for Potter.
I know it’s only rock ‘n roll but I like it, like it, yes, I do. This was as ROCK SHOW!
Set list:
The Lion The Beast The Beat
Ah Mary
Sweet Hands
Goodbye Kiss
Apologies
Parachute Heart
Roulette
Runaway Joey
Ragged Company
Stars
Nothing but the Water (I)
Nothing but the Water (II)
Kiss (Prince cover)
Stop The Bus
Paint It Black (The Rolling Stones cover)
Paris (Ooh La La)
I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll (Joan Jett cover)
Medicine
Axl's Catch Groove 