It is the end of the year. I like music. That can only mean one thing: a run-down of the music I have bought this year, arranged into vague order of how much I enjoyed them.
In this twentieth anniversary year of Warp Records, it has been a stonking year for the label in my view. After some pretty disappointing years, 2009 was the year they showed that there is life in the label yet.
This year I also reached further into the past, while continuing to buy contemporary releases. Old soundtracks and music inspired by the past are heavily featured in this list.
Here is part one of my list, spanning from number 20 to number 11.
I would not normally have made this purchase. But I decided to experiment with asking for recommendations using Twitter. Noble Beast was the first suggestion I received, and I’m glad I followed it because it is a rather pleasant album. I particularly enjoyed ‘Not a Robot, But a Ghost’.
I am not yet sure what I make of Butter. If the garish cover wasn’t enough to put you off, the music is in many ways equally garish. Yet there is something enticing about the sound of this album, which mixes out-there electronic sounds with the pop-funk sensibilities of OutKast. This track, ‘Rising 5‘, is available to download on the Warp Records website.
This should have been a fine album by a national treasure. Certainly, Jarvis Cocker’s first solo album was decent enough. As it transpires, though, “Further Complications.” is merely an okay album with some strangely messy-sounding production. It does, however, have a few great moments. I particularly love the closing track, ‘You’re In My Eyes (Discosong)‘.
17. Squarepusher — Solo Electric Bass 1
While Squarepusher is best known for being an electronic music maverick, he has become an increasingly notable bass guitar player. At last, this other side of his musical talents has been showcased on a full CD, Solo Electric Bass 1. While it may be a bit too noodly and self-indulgent for some, and there is no doubt that it is a pretty dense listening experience, there are plenty of moments to enjoy and savour. Such as this piece, ‘seb-1.03′.
16. Harmonic 313 — When Machines Exceed Human Intelligence
Mark Pritchard transmogrified from his similar-sounding Harmonic 33 to Harmonic 313 with When Machines Exceed Human Intelligence. The projects’ two sounds are radically different, although approached from the same perspective: creating a sound that is heavily influenced by electronic music of the past. Harmonic 33 brought library music to life. Harmonic 313 turns to the dystopian 1980s, with a worry that artificial intelligence will one day become too intelligent and usurp the human race. Here is the closing track, ‘Quadrant 3′.
15. Clark — Totems Flare
I am still not sure that Clark is fulfilling the potential he promised with the 2001 release of Clarence Park, which I still think is his best album. However, with Totems Flare he has taken yet another step in the right direction. While earlier material was too heavily indebted to other artists, Clark has really begun to carve out his own sound. The major innovation in Totems Flare is the increased use of vocals, as demonstrated on my favourite track on the album, ‘Rainbow Voodoo’.
14. Belbury Poly — From an Ancient Star
Jim Jupp is the celebrated co-founder of the Ghost Box record label, which specialises in releasing a particular type of music (sometimes known as ‘hauntology’) which is heavily influenced by psychedelic and folk music of the 1960s and 1970s, library music, public information films, programmes for schools… with a dark twist. Although I prefer some of the other artists on Ghost Box, Jim Jupp’s Belbury Poly project is still one to keep an eye on. From an Ancient Star represents a progression in the Belbury Poly sound. This is ‘Adventures in a Miniature Landscape’.
13. Edward Williams — Life on Earth
Anyone who has an interest in vintage soundtracks or music for television will adore the soundtrack to Life on Earth, the seminal 1979 nature documentary series. It is beautiful and haunting, with a gentle and entrancing use of electronics. It was released this year after a series of coincidences, beginning with one of the 100 privately-pressed records being found in a charity shop. The quality of the recording is not great, meaning that you have to peer a bit to hear it. But this just adds to its charm.
12. Roj — The Transactional Dharma of Roj
Former Broadcast keyboardist Roj Stevens this year released his début solo album, a masterful foray into the mysterious. Roj has created a curious and slightly creepy album — just as you would expect from a Ghost Box release. Imagine eastern spiritual vibes being interrupted by imaginary transmissions from fictitious Soviet stations.
Jonny Trunk, of the eponymous record label that specialises in “music, nostalgia and sex”, this year released a collection of snippets of music that he has worked on in his spare time. Purposefully, it has not been carefully packaged. It is called Scrapbook for that reason. The tracks retain their working titles, and are sequenced in alphabetical order. But despite the apparently slapdash nature of the release, there is something magical and charming about this album. Just as you would expect from Jonny Trunk, it is equal parts nostalgia, humour and brilliance. One highlight that encapsulates this is ‘Hawks‘.
According to this article on Digital Spy, Gnarls Barkley’s irrepresible record-breaking single, Crazy, has been deleted because they are fed up with it.
I can understand what they mean. There can’t be a single person in the country who hasn’t heard this song now. I guess when a single has been at number 1 for longer than any other single since ‘Love is All Around’, you really know it’s time to pull the plug. I saw them on Popworld* at the weekend playing quite a different version of it. It was a really groovy slow version, much better than the original. I would totally buy the album if that version was on it!
But when I first heard the song I was quite disappointed. The first time I ever heard of it was when a friend told me that Danger Mouse was going to become the first person to reach number 1 on the strength of downloads only. And my reaction was just, “QTF new Danger Mouse material?!?”
Prior to Gnarls Barkley, Danger Mouse was probably most famous for the absolutely immese ‘Grey Album‘. Having heard that it was hard to resist investigating his other releases.
His collaboration with Jemini, ‘Ghetto Pop Life‘, is my personal favourite of his, while ‘The Mouse and the Mask‘ by Danger Doom is also excellent, despite the fact that so many references go straight over the head of somebody who’s never seen Adult Swim before (i.e. me). Apparently follow-up albums for both DM & Jemini and Danger Doom are both in the pipeline, which is good news.
‘Demon Days‘ wasn’t quite on the same level, but there were still some absolutely cracking tracks, and the last couple of tracks made a great ending to the album.
So given this good track record, I was excited to hear what Danger Mouse would come up with in this new project. But when I heard ‘Crazy’ I was pretty underwhelmed. My brother couldn’t believe it was Danger Mouse either. It just seemed so bland for Danger Mouse. I could hear that it was Danger Mouse — it wouldn’t have sounded out of place on the last Gorillaz album — but it just wasn’t a very interesting song.
Over time, though, it has grown on me, but I still haven’t opted to buy the album. I have heard some pretty mixed reviews for it. Some people say that ‘Crazy’ is boring but the rest of the album is quite good. Others say that ‘Crazy’ is great but the rest of the album is poor.
I wonder if there is a UK / America divide at work here. Maybe people in the UK think of it as a chart song first and foremost — and not the sort of thing that you even need to buy, because you hear it all over the place anyway. In the US, where ‘Crazy’ has not had anything like the impact it has in the UK, it is probably seen more as another Danger Mouse / Cee-Lo project, and the music is more likely to be judged on its merits alone.
I guess I will buy the album if the next singles (if there are any) are good. That’s what I did with ‘Speakerboxxx / The Love Below‘, which ended up being an excellent album.
I already wrote about this album on my Last.fm journal a while back, but I’m really getting into this album at the moment, so I thought I’d write a post about it here as well.
Do you, like me, get it when an album really reminds you of the summer just because of the time of year you bought it? ‘One Word Extinguisher‘ by Prefuse 73 is a very summery album to me, as is OutKast’s ‘Speakerboxxx / The Love Below‘. Even Tortoise’s ‘TNT‘ reminds me of summer, and the music isn’t particularly summery at all.
But some music is perfectly suited to a long summery evening, the sort warm evening where the sun is a deep orange and casts a long shadow, yet never threatens to set. Just right for this time of year then! Lit by Malcom Kipe is one of those summery albums, so it’s a shame it wasn’t released at this time of year.
Although I fear it may be too late for anybody who may be swung by this post to find any copies that still haven’t been sold, I am really enjoying this album at the moment, and it also gives me the perfect excuse to write about the Merck label.
Malcom Kipe is perhaps better known as Nautilis. His mum calls him Skyler McGlothlin. Frankly I’m not surprised that he resorts to using pseudonyms. Anyway, on his website he put up a ‘Locked in the cabin’ mix, which is along the same lines as Lit. He advised, “This mix is a good summer jam, so download it and play it in the ride – on the way to the bbq.”
Lit is chilled out, gently jazzy instrumental hip-hop with a slightly nostalgic tilt. There is nothing terribly groundbreaking or unusual about the album. It is an album of rather enjoyable, relaxed music that won’t tax your brain too much, but might well still get you tapping your foot. I agree with the review that Boomkat gave it: “As long as you’re not heading into ‘Lit’ expecting any blinding bouts of sonic innovation, then you’ll likely be cosily seduced…”
I had only bought one McGlothlin release before — ‘Are You An Axolotl‘ by Nautilis. Even though I really liked Axolotl, I never bought another of his releases until now. I need to catch up some more.
Lit is released on the rather good Merck label. When I was first getting heavily into IDM and that sort of thing about five years ago, I bought a good few Merck releases. The first was the cutesy ‘Pistachio Island‘ by Ilkae, an album of forty-odd short tracks designed to be played in ‘shuffle’ mode. Then there was the dark and crunchy ‘Negativ‘ by Proem. I also bought MD’s ‘Between Gaps‘. Later on I bought the excellent ‘Now You Know‘ by Machine Drum. That is numbers 5, 6, 7 and 8 in Merck’s catalogue — and I’ve bought nothing from that label since then. I can hardly believe it! What have I been doing for the past few years?
Well I guess I’d better hurry up and get round to buying whatever I want from their discography, because they’ve decided to call it a day towards the end of this year. Whatever the reasons, it is a shame. It’s never nice to hear rumours of a small record label closing, especially when it is as good as Merck.
Sometimes in the electronic music bubble it’s difficult to remember just how small demand for the music is. With a lot of these labels, releases are limited to maybe 1000, 2000 or 5000. Often that’s not because they want to keep their records rare — it’s because it’s what meets the market demand. Indeed, the Wikipedia article on Merck suggests that the label’s closure is due to financial constraints. But while labels may close, at least great music is never too far away.
That promised Brothomstates release for Merck never came! I heard that he prefers to enjoy life rather than making music though. Fair enough.
It is probably a bit much dedicating an entire post to ‘Lit’. It is not a great album. It is good and pleasent, but not really great. But I anticipate that I’ll be listening to it a fair bit over the summer. Unchallenging, unpretentious, enjoyable music.
Jim Jupp is the celebrated co-founder of the Ghost Box record label, which specialises in releasing a particular type of music (sometimes known as ‘hauntology’) which is heavily influenced by psychedelic and folk music of the 1960s and 1970s, library music, public information films, programmes for schools… with a dark twist. Although I prefer some of the other artists on Ghost Box, Jim Jupp’s Belbury Poly project is still one to keep an eye on. From an Ancient Star represents a progression in the Belbury Poly sound. This is ‘Adventures in a Miniature Landscape’.
Comments closed