so i've been working through lots of these ideas for musical places to go that we discussed a few weeks ago. i greatly like the idea of really (like, really because, well we already do a lot anyway, so we'd need to 'really' do it to make it any different!) pushing the mix of electronics and organic. another thing i've been trying to follow is using very random sound generation techniques (the ipad i was given at school has opened up lots of really great possibilities in that regard). and the other thing i've been following is a real minimalism, which goes very contrary to what i normally do, which is pile sound upon sound upon sound. so some of those things you can hear in the remix of karoshi's 'walking in fields' (which i really need to post here - maybe tomorrow) that's just come out.
anyway, today i cam across this track from sinead o'connor. she's been in and out of my consciousness for over 20 years now, and i know marcella has used her as a big inspiration at times in the past. so, i've heard this track in passing before, but today heard it through my stereo with booming bass for the first time, and it feels like a really tangible path to follow. minimal, groove-based and with the voice really holding the whole thing. the fiddle is nice, though i probably wouldn't go for that sound myself, but as an idea of acoustic over electronics, it's good.
for full impact (actually, the only way to impact, really, there's not much to it without bottom end) you need to hear it with some solid bass...
Showing posts with label inspiration. Show all posts
Showing posts with label inspiration. Show all posts
23/02/2012
27/05/2009
mixtapes
i've been meaning to put these up for months but have never got around to it - david asked if they were anywhere downloadable online? so here they are, the 2 mixtapes that blake and i made just before christmas. the idea was that they'd be an indication of the kind of sounds we were keen to explore with our new recordings. listening back to them now, with many of those recordings nearing completion, i'm impressed at how much they do actually reflect these particular mixes.
anyway, blake's mix can be downloaded here. the tracklisting and blake's explanations can be found here.
my mix can be downloaded here and the tracklisting/explanation can be found here.
i'll also add the links to the original posts and maybe create a new category somewhere down one of the sidebars so they're always around.
anyway, blake's mix can be downloaded here. the tracklisting and blake's explanations can be found here.
my mix can be downloaded here and the tracklisting/explanation can be found here.
i'll also add the links to the original posts and maybe create a new category somewhere down one of the sidebars so they're always around.
12/01/2009
My Mixtape Summary.
1-feather-Whitewash
This song exhibits a really explicit and strong development of one melody. I am automatically attracted to a composition of any artistic type that is merely the stretching of one idea… stretched so far and so intentionally that it will soon snap if stretched any farther. Practically, for Telafonica, I think that this idea of intentional melody movement and development is something that would greatly benefit our ‘free-er’ moments in songs… I am not sure about adrian, ellie and bec, but I find myself leaning on making nice noise too much. While this type of musical floundering has its place, we have many opportunities to deliberately focus on how to aid and/or develop the melody/ies. AND! I like the crescendo.
2-a surprise-Balun
This song is beautifully textured as a whole, and also in terms of the individual textures of respective ‘instruments’. There are several very simple core parts in this piece and they work so as to build the foundation for a lovely melody.
These first two songs also have no ‘singing melody’. I think, part of what can make a band really special is how versatile they are with their respective instruments, abilities etc. A proposition: We should play more melodies with instruments and sing more accompanying choral and counter-melodic parts.
3-swimming pool- Ghoul
This song is very simple and concise. A little music, a simple yet lovely melody is added. And then the necessary crescendo! It has it all.
4-emotional champ- New Buffalo
New Buffalo (AKA Sally Seltmann) is just so lovely. She has to influence Telafonica in some way. Her beautiful piano and voice arrangements are worthy of consideration and medals.
5-we’re always waiting- Yacht
This is a really fun song. And I think that is the main reason I included it. Cheeky electronics and big choral chants; it has a great mix of the artificial and natural and thus shows similarities to Telafonica’s musical capabilities AND potential character.
6-you win- Slareffenklang
I like the basic rhythms that are dictated by instruments and voices in unison. I like how the group of voices are a little messy but still work in unison with each other (a little like one of Underlapper’s new songs) and also how the guitar works with the drums rhythmically. The fragility of the closing section/s of the piece appeals to me and is something that could add a certain depth to Telafonica’s music, especially the live sets.
7-festival- Sigur Ros
The war-like trumpets and enduring chord cycles are matched beautifully with a song of the same fragile nature as previously mentioned. I like it one heck of a lot. Again, a certain depth and image of humanity is apparent in this presentation of song. While Telafonica is by very little means bound by electronic bases and cycles, there are more directions in which it can go to contrast the sometimes-binding stability provided by the electronics.
Any questions?
Forgive me if my ideas are hard to grasp; I have not been given a writing assignment for months!
download the mixtape here (44mb)
03/01/2009
the mixtape
thought i might make a track listing of the cd i made for everyone here, since i didn't give anyone an actual track listing with the disc and also to point out specifically what i think might be helpful to telafonica from each track. and if anyone else wants to make their own copy, soulseek is my preferred p2p platform. (blake, feel free to add your own collection in another post - eliza and bec, feel free to make your own collections to share with us all!)
1. bow wow wow - c30, c60, c90, go!
this is just so raw, but without any nihilistic punkness. and it bases a pop song squarely around the rhythm. the little jarring rhythms in the chorus just kill me every time. it's all such simplicity but orchestrated brilliantly. lyrics are nice too - especially from the point of view of anti-corporate d.i.y.ness (though malcolm maclaren was no doubt behind that, simply as a gimic)
2. the flying lizards - money
the rawness and lack of much in the music is what i like most here. i've already started attempting to get that with 'don't speak for me'. the noises that constitute the instrumental break are also great. don't look up any of their other songs, though, they're all exactly the same - horrid deadpan vocals on 50s and 60s cover songs. they were a one trick pony, but this track made the best of that one trick.
3. beem - rer
i came across beem when i discovered skwee and went looking around the net for it. beem put his whole album up for free download and i highly recommend the whole thing. i picked out this track because of it's jerky, yet eternally propulsive rhythm. i also like its minimalism. as everybody already realises, i have difficulty keeping production simple. i always admire simple production that can maintain interest and always aspire to it. i just never quite get there.
4. bjork - earth intruders (spank rock remix)
bjork at her poppiest and then twisted up by spank rock. i really love the very natural blend of acoustic and electronic sounds. the acoustic drums are great, and the tambourine, which sounds very raw, tops it all off perfectly. but the rest of the instrumentation is very electronic (and i would guess that the actual rhythms are programmed electronically). and, again, the rhythm is propulsive, just slightly jerky and therefore captivating.
5. clinic - the second line
two and a half minutes of brilliance. mouth percussion samples, simple drum machine, semi-giberish vocals. the way voices are used throughout are great, and the way it builds and builds towards the final release... nice guitar riffs - everything i could want in a short pop song.
6. miss mend - living city plan
i like this for the same reasons i like stereolab (who miss mend no doubt have rested most of their inspiration on) - just a propulsive drone in the music, nice catchy melody and instrumentation we can aspire to. again, simplicity deployed well.
7. parts & labor - satellites
i became a bit obsessed with this band for a while a couple of months back. this is the first track off their newest album. it deploys electronics as noise making then lays guitar as the harmonic carrier over that - kind of the inverse of what we've come to do a lot this year. i also like the tempo, which has the kind of energy we don't really generate with any of our music, but i like it and think we could aim for some of it a bit more. it's alos melodically and harmonically more complex than we generally get, without becoming baroque - it's still quite direct. the guitar sound is also great - very energetic without reliance on distortion.
8. lcd soundsystem - all my friends
i could have put any song from either of their albums (except maybe 'new york i love you' which is fine in its context but nothing i'd ever wish to emulate). i went with this one because it featured piano, so i thought it might hook eliza a bit easier. memorable melodies etc. as with all their great stuff, it starts out with great energy and yet somehow manages to build upwards from there. it shifts almost imperceptably throughout - dynamically i love it. and it also uses the mix of acoustic/electric/electronic sound brilliantly which you're probably noticing is a feature of everything in this collection.
download the mix here (49mb)
1. bow wow wow - c30, c60, c90, go!
this is just so raw, but without any nihilistic punkness. and it bases a pop song squarely around the rhythm. the little jarring rhythms in the chorus just kill me every time. it's all such simplicity but orchestrated brilliantly. lyrics are nice too - especially from the point of view of anti-corporate d.i.y.ness (though malcolm maclaren was no doubt behind that, simply as a gimic)
2. the flying lizards - money
the rawness and lack of much in the music is what i like most here. i've already started attempting to get that with 'don't speak for me'. the noises that constitute the instrumental break are also great. don't look up any of their other songs, though, they're all exactly the same - horrid deadpan vocals on 50s and 60s cover songs. they were a one trick pony, but this track made the best of that one trick.
3. beem - rer
i came across beem when i discovered skwee and went looking around the net for it. beem put his whole album up for free download and i highly recommend the whole thing. i picked out this track because of it's jerky, yet eternally propulsive rhythm. i also like its minimalism. as everybody already realises, i have difficulty keeping production simple. i always admire simple production that can maintain interest and always aspire to it. i just never quite get there.
4. bjork - earth intruders (spank rock remix)
bjork at her poppiest and then twisted up by spank rock. i really love the very natural blend of acoustic and electronic sounds. the acoustic drums are great, and the tambourine, which sounds very raw, tops it all off perfectly. but the rest of the instrumentation is very electronic (and i would guess that the actual rhythms are programmed electronically). and, again, the rhythm is propulsive, just slightly jerky and therefore captivating.
5. clinic - the second line
two and a half minutes of brilliance. mouth percussion samples, simple drum machine, semi-giberish vocals. the way voices are used throughout are great, and the way it builds and builds towards the final release... nice guitar riffs - everything i could want in a short pop song.
6. miss mend - living city plan
i like this for the same reasons i like stereolab (who miss mend no doubt have rested most of their inspiration on) - just a propulsive drone in the music, nice catchy melody and instrumentation we can aspire to. again, simplicity deployed well.
7. parts & labor - satellites
i became a bit obsessed with this band for a while a couple of months back. this is the first track off their newest album. it deploys electronics as noise making then lays guitar as the harmonic carrier over that - kind of the inverse of what we've come to do a lot this year. i also like the tempo, which has the kind of energy we don't really generate with any of our music, but i like it and think we could aim for some of it a bit more. it's alos melodically and harmonically more complex than we generally get, without becoming baroque - it's still quite direct. the guitar sound is also great - very energetic without reliance on distortion.
8. lcd soundsystem - all my friends
i could have put any song from either of their albums (except maybe 'new york i love you' which is fine in its context but nothing i'd ever wish to emulate). i went with this one because it featured piano, so i thought it might hook eliza a bit easier. memorable melodies etc. as with all their great stuff, it starts out with great energy and yet somehow manages to build upwards from there. it shifts almost imperceptably throughout - dynamically i love it. and it also uses the mix of acoustic/electric/electronic sound brilliantly which you're probably noticing is a feature of everything in this collection.
download the mix here (49mb)
21/11/2008
the mixtape.
a few years back, david and i were thinking about what directions we might go musically. one of the things we did, which i really liked, was to make each other a compilation cd of the types of things each of us were thinking at the time. in the end, i'm not sure how useful it ended up being as we didn't do anything specifically straight after that, but i thought it was a great idea and i still listen to the cd david gave me.
if we are thinking of spending a block of time working on music in the summer holidays, i've been thinking that it might be nice to do a similar thing beforehand. so might i suggest to rebecca, eliza and blake that we each make a 30 minute compilation of music to give to each other in the next couple of weeks? i guess the idea is to make it of sounds that you think might be useful to blend into telafonica. so it might be just a bunch of stuff you like at the moment, but not necessarily so. it would obviously need to be within the reach of telafonica's sound, but telafonica's sound is very open to being pushed around. there might be things that are more to do with song structure than actual sound, or lyrical content etc etc. i figure between 4 30minute discs there would be an array of stuff, and possibly some suggestions of interesting combinations of sounds as well. that then would hopefully give us all an idea of the headspace we are entering in with.
if we are thinking of spending a block of time working on music in the summer holidays, i've been thinking that it might be nice to do a similar thing beforehand. so might i suggest to rebecca, eliza and blake that we each make a 30 minute compilation of music to give to each other in the next couple of weeks? i guess the idea is to make it of sounds that you think might be useful to blend into telafonica. so it might be just a bunch of stuff you like at the moment, but not necessarily so. it would obviously need to be within the reach of telafonica's sound, but telafonica's sound is very open to being pushed around. there might be things that are more to do with song structure than actual sound, or lyrical content etc etc. i figure between 4 30minute discs there would be an array of stuff, and possibly some suggestions of interesting combinations of sounds as well. that then would hopefully give us all an idea of the headspace we are entering in with.
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