Archive for the 'podcast' Category
This podcast is a collection of simple pleasures, some old and some still with that new car smell. Thick, sticky electronic taffy, creamy, dripping indiefolks, and garage-brew cotton candy make (I hope) for a well-timed wintertime treat.
My Career in Radio
by Garrison KeillorI’m a radio man for thirty-some years
In St. Paul, an old variety show
Like those I used to hear, my dears,
When I was a child long ago.
To critics, my show is peppered
With little bits of Bob & Ray,
Jack Benny, and Jean Shepherd,
But those critics are dying (Hooray!)
And to twenty-year-olds who were born
Too late to hear the great Fred Allen
I am the master of the form,
Sailing the airwaves like Magellan.
If a thief escapes and is not hung
He may be honored by the young.(Garrison Keillor’s new collection, Sonnets, 1983-2008, was just published by Common Good Books.)
image: Josie’s Coney Island Nightmare (cinema 1914) (Flickr Commons, NYPL)
Slightly belated, but I’ve finally thrown together the second podcast of my top 2008 albums, this episode featuring selections from the middle bit, albums 11-35. In case you missed the countdown itself, go ahead and click through to peruse my insightful reviews and precise rankings. As usual, tracks are presented in no particular order.
Knocking off the whole middle bit here with this second post, in hopes of moving this along to my top 10 albums ahead of the actual new year. Again, the actual numerical ranking is pretty meaningless. I loved all these albums. Novelty plays a big part here, groups who reimagined their sound, and alltogether new sounds tend to stick in my ears.
Podcast for the middle bit to come shortly, as soon as I’m back within reach of my music collection.
37. Ignatz – III [KRAAK]
Crackling, whispered songwriting — III is an album of prematurely aged, over-treated, dusty recordings exposed to electromagnetic waves and solar radiation. Its interference completements the neurotic electric guitar and whispered vocal folk textures at this album’s heart.
36. Lau Nau – Nukkuu [Locust]
Plucky, atonal incantations from Helsinki’s Laura Naukkarinen. Like Islaja, Lau Nau’s acid folk is an easy listen, despite its dissonance. Nukuu’s frosty acoustic melodies, carefree vocals, and electric guitar whiteouts, put together, epitomizes the best of Finland’s bizarre, woolen folk community.
35. Mark McGuire – The Garden of Eternal Life [Arbor]
As a group, and individually in numerous side/solo projects, Cleveland, Ohio’s Emeralds are a three man kraut revival. McGuire’s own solo work is thoroughly cerebral, easily comparable to Terry Riley’s psychedelic minimalism. The Garden of Eternal Life stands out among his numerous releases this year, a cool nebula of warm guitar wanderings ona too-limited Arbor cassette.
34. Xela – In Bocca al Lupo [Type]
Xela has undergone quite the transition in the last several years, from the rubbery electro-idm of 2003’s Frosty Mornings, to his latest experiments with barren field recordings, drone, and noise. Part of me misses the sweetness of Tangled Wool, or 2006 Dead Sea Xela — a middle ground between his warm electronic music and recent nightmare dungeon drone. Mostly I’m just enjoying In Bocca al Lupo’s haunting, bleached-bone ambient. ’Beatae Immortalitatis’ — specifically its clattering percussion and glistening synths — is the album’s clear highlight.
33. Richard Skelton – Marking Time [Preservation]
At long last, Sustain Release ringleader and ambient musician Richard Skelton receives the full label release his work deserves. The album itself is a cool, echoing ambient — Skelton’s wailing bowed instruments, clattering field loops and pinprick piano notes slither straight down my spinal cord. The music feels deeply personal, a layered patchwork of heart wreching performances.
32. Aidan Baker & Tim Hecker – Fantasma-Paratasie [Alien8]
Collaborations don’t always lead to a sum of its parts. The Mick Jagger, David Bowie duo is a horrifying testament to this fact. While Baker and Hecker’s Fatasma-Paratasie isn’t quite a sum of its parts either, the album is still a treat for fans of either musician. I was hoping for something more enduring, but the collaboration is ultimately a wonderful spectacle. The duo’s tracks blend together into an imposing wash of warm, melodic electronic-drone.
31. Pumice – Quo [Soft Abuse]
I’m still waiting for the artist bold enough to really take the lo-fi aesthetic to the next level, recording their entire album from a treehouse, through a tin can and string, straight onto a home-cut phonographic cylinder. Until then, Pumice will have to do. Quo is mostly similar to Stefan Neville’s preceding work, but his songwriting continues to improve. More fun than previous albums, certain tracks sound like sunday morning cartoons themes broadcast from the corrosive planetary surface of Venus.
30. Grails – Take Refuge In Clean Living [Important]
Grails’ first of two incredible releases this year will be familiar to fans. The group still owes some patronage to the godfathers of post-rock, though it’s almost insulting to stick them with that tired genre tag, considering how far their sound has evolved. Psychedelics, eastern influences, and arena-scaled prog rock occupy the album’s five epic instrumentals. I only rank Take Refuge… below Doomsayer (#15) for its relative similarity to the band’s existing work.
29. Steve Hauschildt – Rapt for Liquid Minister [Arbor]
Like band-mate Mark McGuire, Steve Hauschildt is quickly making a name for himself outside of Emeralds. Hauschildt effortlessly parlays his experience behind the Moog into an album of swirling synthetic melodies. In my review, I noticed clear nods to Popol Vuh’s Aguirre, and I can’t imagine better source material for contemporary kraut adulation. I only wish I’d known about Emeralds last year, and gotten ahead of the trio’s group and solo release onslaught.
28. Paavoharju – Laulu Laakson Kukista [Fonal]
Laulu Laakson Kukista is as difficult to describe as its name is to pronounce — bizarro-pop-kitsch seems fitting. The group runs through a huge variety of instruments and noisemakers — piano, stringed instruments, field recordings, organs, accordions and possibly even kazoos. The vocals can be alternately dreamy and jubilant, songs throughout the album are mournful, fun, and curious. This one requires some patience, but can really astound if given the chance. (Kirkonväki @ youtube)
27. Emeralds / Quintana Roo – Bubble Quiet Complication / Beheaded Dynasty [Arbor]
Quintana Roo mossy sax and electric guitar muck-psych pairs nicely with Emeralds, on the top side. Quintana Roo’s music is deeply rooted, sounding thick, muddy and grounded. On the top side of this split lp, Emeralds soars high above the QR’s ceremonial-psych, streaking across the sky in lower earth orbit.
26. The Fun Years – Baby It’s Cold Inside [Barge]
Lofty guitars, bottomless loops, and soaring melodies, speckled with intereference make for a really stunning album out of left field. This crew reminds me, quite favorably, of my absolute favorite Aidan Baker release, The Sea Swells a Bit… (samples). Hadn’t heard of Barge Records until this year, the home of Baby It’s Cold Inside, but they’ve have an absolutely stunning year. (The Fun Years @ vimeo ‘The Surge Is Working,’ ‘My Lowville,’ and ‘Auto Show Day of the Dead‘)
25. Vikki Jackman – Whispering Pages [Faraway Press]
Melodies seem to glance off this recording, notes unable t0 take purchase. This creeping, breezy acoustic minimalism requires a great deal of patience, and a very quiet, safe listening place. Given the right circumstances, its delicate beauty really blossoms. Faraway Press has become the standard bearer, in my mind at least, for the barest of acoustronic minimalism. (Faraway Press’s Andrew Chalk @ youtube)
24. Fire on Fire – The Orchard [Young Gods]
Portland, Maine’s psych-folk supergroup follows their brilliant EP on Young Gods with a proper, full length debut album this year. Brimming with Cerberus Shoal and Big Blood alums, with further assistance from bluegrass folkster Micah Blue Smaldone, the group has managed to cram an incredible amount of talent into this exhilarating, raucous barnburner. Considering the group’s size, The Orchard’s cohesion is surprising, and lends the album an effortless, improvisational feel, like an inspired, late-night campfire jam session between close friends. (Fire on Fire @ youtube)
23. Tobacco – Fucked Up Friends [Anticon]
This Black Moth Super Rainbow solo project is analog-electronica at its trance inducing best. Fucked Up Friends is a bit out of my normal listening universe, but I still adore its creamy analog thickness, candied synth romps, and gritty glitch. (Tobacco @ youtube ‘Hawker Boat,’ ‘Berries That Burn,’ ‘Little Pink Riding Hood,‘ ‘Gross Magik‘)
22. Mark McGuire – Amethyst Waves [Wagon]
I’ve just about run out of things to say about McGuire and Emeralds. While I haven’t heard all of McGuire’s abundant 2008 releases, Amethyst Waves is far-and-away the most hypnotic Mark McGuire release to reach my my ears this year. Underwater explorations in krautrock that are quaking with energy, like an oven of molten rock churning and dragging the massive continental crust along on its endless looping, chaotic cycle.
21. Nico Muhly – Mothertongue [Bedroom Community/Brassland]
Nico Muhly’s deep admiration of and familiarity with the work of minimalism visionary Philip Glass shines through Mothertongue, his second release for Bedroom Community. I feel underqualified to say much about this album, but I can say Mothertongue is almost blinding in its beauty, imparting of sense of scale that leaves me in gaping in awe. I only wish the album didn’t sound like a Philip Glass covers record.
20. Max Richter – 24 Postcards in Full Colour [Fat Cat]
Richter’s 24 Postcards is a collection of contemporary classical vignettes, few running much longer than 1m. These unique recordings were composed as ringtones, and intended to be played in isolation and in reptition. I’m not entirely sure the concept itself really works; drama and emotional complexity doesn’t translate terribly well over a dime sized speaker. Still, you have to admire Richter for working to reimagine his music for the changing times. Fortunately, the catchy piano, bowed and electric guitar microcosms still work wonderfully packaged as an album.
19. John Baker – The John Baker Tapes [Trunk]
John Baker’s recordings have always stood out from the typical early electronic works, along with Delia Derbyshire’s contributions, on the various BBC Radiophonic Workshop collections. His jazz sensibility showed in his electronic work, a sort of guiding light in the uncharted territory of early electronic music and tape manipulation. Until 2008, only Delia Derbyshire’s Radiophonic Workshop recordings had received the individual attention her recordings deserved. Thanks to the heroic efforts of Trunk Record’s Jonny Trunk, John Baker’s work has now received the same treatment. The 2cd set includes previously unreleased home recordings, a slew of program themes, and the best of his work previously available on compilations. The John Baker Tapes is an indispensable cultural treasure.
18. Ulaan Khol – I [Soft Abuse]
Steven R. Smith’s heavy, grainy psychedelic alter-ego, Ulaan Khol, was an early highlight of the year. Already, he’s managed to record and release a follow up, appropriately titled II, again on Soft Abuse. Ulaan Khol’s lurid electric guitars — the record sounds carved entirely by electric guitars — will immolate any speakers they touch. Guitar virtuoso Steven R. Smith’s Ulaan Khol is an epic and filthy steampunk psych-rock.
17. Valet – Naked Acid [Kranky]
Valet’s Honey Owens major label debut is a more deliberate and polished effort than her previous diy cdr releases, and has lost some of its mystique in the translation. Despite its more careful sound, Jackie-O alum Honey Ownens’ latest is thoroughly spaced, droning, and heady. Despite its early release, Naked Acid was still finding its way into my rotation with the year’s latest.
16. Grails – Doomsdayer’s Holiday [Temporary Residence Limited]
Grails latest, Doomsdayer’s Holiday, opens with several seconds of distant, tortured screams, pursued by earth shattering drum footstomps, and flamethrower guitars. This blood curtling pursuit foreshadows the darker tones of this a pitch perfect instrumental thriller. Grails’ 2008 Take Refuge… was a spectacular album, but Doomsdayer is near transcendental — a collision of doom metal’s sinister composure, post-rock’s improvisational, freewheeling spirit, and krautrock’s cerebral experimentalism.
15. Lawrence English – Kiri No Oto [Touch]
Touch tells us Kiri No Oto translates as ’sound of fog.’ That sums up this minimal electroacoustic masterpiece nicely.
14. Country Teasers / Ezee Tiger – W.O.A.R / W.O.A. [Holy Mountain]
Country Teasers’ truly jarring garage rock is certifiably insane. Like the flaming pyre of an explosive highway pileup, W.O.A.R.’s cacaphonious, train-wreck guitars, lager-soaked pub vocals, meltdown percussion and psychopath lyrics make for a gruesome sight that’s impossible to ignore. Its not easy listening by any means, but like the highway bloodstains and torched vehicles of that high speed accident, this album’s overwhelming shock factor is inexplicably alluring. This band has been around for more than a decade, and I’m just happy Holy Mountain has seen fit to expose me to their ridiculous sound. (Country Teasers @ youtube)
13. The Alps – III [Type]
A huge range of instruments — piano, guitars, drums, bass, saxophone and more — are streamlined into an accessible, trippy psychedelic rock. Root Strata’s Jefre Cantu-Ledesma is best known for his heavy, impenetrable psychedelic with Tarentel, but he joins forces as The Alps with two other California musicians Alexis Georgopoulos (Arp, Tussle) and Scott Hewicker for a more refined effort. III is simply the warmest, most inviting psychedelic music I encountered this year.
12. Valerio Cosi – Heavy Electronic Pacific Rock [Digitalis]
Saxophone and electronics stir and erupt into a textural work of seafloor spreading. Electronic drones, layered, looping sax melodies and nimble dancing notes collide into an endless wall of sound. Cosi has a slew of saxophone improv, drone an ambient releases under his belt at this point, but Heavy Electronic Pacific Rock stands apart from the rest.
11. Scott Tuma – Not For Nobody [Digitalis Arts & Crafts]
Not For Nobody’s willfully quaint folk songs sounded pretty underwhelming, and even a little silly on first listen. With time though, Tuma’s lilliputian Americana turned out to be one of the year’s most dependable, bizarre folk delights. The album is fanatically delicate and introspective, to the point of sounding almost neurotic; patience and comfortable, quiet spaces are required to really appreciate Tuma’s songwriting and allow its tiny melodies to find some place to unfurl. Folk music’s narrow focus can quickly become tiresome for listeners with a broad musical palate, but Tuma’s miniature, music-box folk adds a genuinely new twist to the genre, freshening up the age-old genre.
December is the merriest time of year for music lovers, when all their favorite labels, bloggers and distros draft and publish their year-end lists. It seems little silly to rank albums at all — was that Grouper’s lo-fi folkdrone really irrefutably better than Valerio Cosi’s saxophone minimalism? Who knows. Still, year-end lists are conveniently reductive, and provide an incredible opportunity to catch up on the year’s best.
Last year I listed and shared my top ten. This year, I’m trying for 50. I’ll try to be brief.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
50. Growing – All the Way [The Social Registry]
Growing has been drifting slowly away from their minimal electric guitar drones, these days sounding something like a marauding, metallic sawtooth specter. All the Way, one of the group’s two releases for the year, is the best example of the Growing’s urgent, effects laden drone-rock.
49. Carlos Giffoni – Adult Life [No Fun]
Much of Giffoni’s back catalog can be a rough listen, even for calloused ears like my own. Adult Life has its own rough edges, but its inviting synth melodies recreate and re-imagine electronic music’s unique beginnings, when compositions were blossoming in academic research laboratories around the world. Giffoni’s latest is a sort of avant-Tomorrowland, an album of unashamed early-electronic futurism.
48. Suishou No Fune – Prayer For Chibi [Holy Mountain]
Prayer For Chibi is the sort of dependable space psych that occupies the endless, soul sucking monotony of the cubicle existence. The album sounds to owe as much to Doom/Sludge luminaries like Sunn 0))) as it does to Kraut/Psych godparents Cluster or Can. Left this album out of my podcast mix, because it just doesn’t fit well in the format.
47. Wooden Shjips – Volume 1 [Holy Mountain]
An album of reissues apparently, with these songs appearing previously on limited release 7, 10 or 12 inchers. Basically, it’s the sort of garage psyche that worked so perfectly on their full length with Holy Mountain. These songs are infinitely re-playable, and provide enough variety so they’re showing something new with every listen.
46. Pocahaunted – Peyote Road [Woodsist]
Pocahaunted is tribalism recomposed for the 21st century. These two must compose all their music around campfires in full warpaint to achieve such a jarring, spiritual sound. I probably spent too much time this year chasing down their many releases, but I kept coming back to Peyote Road.
45. Peter Broderick – Home [Bella Union/Type]
It’s hard to believe the same man behind Float’s pop-minded contemporary classical could write this jangly, comfort album. Bright, charming songs, sunshine guitar, and soaring vocals made perfect for snuggling. A little too sweet for my taste-buds, but ultimately impossible to resist.
44. Ilyas Ahmed – Arroyo (Arroyo Series) [Digitalis]
More of the same is still awesome. Psychedelic, distorted songwriting, with dabs of dissonance and noise. It’s a tragedy this album is more widely available (yet).
43. Head of Wantastiquet – Mortagne [Ecstatic Peace]
Sunburned Hand of the Man’s Paul Labrecque puts together an album of surprisingly lovely banjo/guitar pieces, worthy of the Fahey and Basho American Primitive tradition. This musical niche should get old, but it never does.
42. Excepter – Debt Department [Paw Tracks]
Animal Collective’s Paw Tracks proves freak-folk’s dying corpse can still take plenty of flogging. These genre stalwarts produce another album of warped, senseless hipster jams.
41. Barn Owl – Raft of Serpents [Root Strata]
Mechanized grasshoppers mating tones, in a the peaceful guitar forest would sound something like Barn Owl’s Raft of Serpents. I’m running out of ways to describe ambient psychedelics.
40. M Jarvis/A Jarvis – Jun [Ruralfaune]
Ruralfaune’s best release, by my estimation. Yet another album of psychedelic songwriting that leaves a vivid, soothing impression. Instrumental pieces and folk songs mix perfectly, with some eastern influences and electronic bobbles for good measure. Apparently I’m a fan of the genre.
39. Steve Gunn – Sundowner [Digitalis Arts & Crafts]
Steven Gunn is best known as a member of GHQ, but has been recently producing his own acoustic folk songwriting, and stepping away from his group’s hazier blend. “For the Horse, etc.” was a fixture in my playlist. Gunn’s Sundowner was released on the new Digitalis Arts & Crafts sublabel, setting a high standard for the new imprint.
38. Boduf Songs – How Shadows Chase The Balance [Kranky]
Nothing much has changed in the three years since Boduf Songs released his first album. How Shadows… again creates an epic sense of scale, his deep, hushed vocals sounding like some really incredible secret. If it aint broke…
Only 37 albums to go!! Yes, I realize this post only covers 13 albums, short of the promised 15. I got tired of writing, and wanted to publish something before Christmas week. I’ll try to shorten the remaining album reviews, save for my top 10.
Tracks are not presented in order in the podcast. See playlist above or click through for the show playlist.
Continue reading ‘Submersible’s best of 2008 podcast — the last 15 of 50′
This likewise I humbly pray, that things human may not interfere with things divine, and that from the opening of the ways of sense and the increase of natural light there may arise in our minds no incredulity or darkness with regard to the divine mysteries; but rather that the understanding being thereby purified and purged of fancies and vanity, and yet not the less subject and entirely submissive to the divine oracles, may give to faith that which is faith’s. Lastly, that knowledge being now discharged of that venom which the serpent infused into it, and which makes the mind of man to swell, we may not be wise above measure and sobriety, but cultivate truth in charity. — Instauratio Magna, Francis Bacon
feat. John Carpenter/Alan Howart, Robert Wyatt, Excepter, Kemialliset Ystävät, La Octracina, Deathprod, Ulaan Khol, The Velvet Underground, Sir Victor Uwaifo, and Mike Taylor
image: View of the CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid) experiment Tracker Outer Barrel (TOB) in the cleaning room. The CMS is one of two general-purpose LHC experiments designed to explore the physics of the Terascale, the energy region where physicists believe they will find answers to the central questions at the heart of 21st-century particle physics. (Maximilien Brice, © CERN) — Large Hadron Collider nearly ready
Blood is a hot, sweet, temperate, red humour, prepared in the meserais veins, and made of the most temperate parts of the chylus in the liver, whose office is to nourish the whole body, to give it strength and colour, being dispersed by the veins through every part of it. And from it spirits are first begotten in the heart, which afterwards by the arteries are communicated to the other parts.
Music a remedy.… Faventinus are almost immoderate in the commendation of it; a most forcible medicine Jacchinus calls it: Jason Pratensis, “a most admirable thing, and worthy of consideration, that can so mollify the mind, and stay those tempestuous affections of it.” Musica est mentis medicina mœstæ, a roaring-meg against melancholy, to rear and revive the languishing soul; “affecting not only the ears, but the very arteries, the vital and animal spirits, it erects the mind, and makes it nimble.” Lemnius, instit, cap. 44.
…besides that excellent power it hath to expel many other diseases, it is a sovereign remedy against despair and melancholy, and will drive away the devil himself… Many men are melancholy by hearing music, but it is a pleasing melancholy that it causeth; and therefore to such as are discontent, in woe, fear, sorrow, or dejected, it is a most present remedy: it expels cares, alters their grieved minds, and easeth in an instant. Otherwise, saith Plutarch, Musica magis dementat quam vinum; music makes some men mad as a tiger; like Astolphos’ horn in Ariosto; or Mercury’s golden wand in Homer, that made some wake, others sleep, it hath divers effects: and Theophrastus right well prophesied, that diseases were either procured by music, or mitigated.
The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621) — Robert Burton (1577-1640)
feat. Ilya E. Monosov, Valerio Cosi, James Blackshaw, Black Twig Pickers, Yo La Tengo, Burning Star Core, Steven R. Smith, & Tape
![FSA - T[enant] P[urchase] borrower? in her garden, Puerto Rico (LOC)](http://www.submersibledirigible.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/2178356997_ef2434886e_o.jpg "2178356997_ef2434886e_o")
THE PASSION caused by the great and sublime in nature, when those causes operate most powerfully, is astonishment; and astonishment is that state of the soul, in which all its motions are suspended, with some degree of horror. In this case the mind is so entirely filled with its object, that it cannot entertain any other, nor by consequence reason on that object which employs it. Hence arises the great power of the sublime, that, far from being produced by them, it anticipates our reasonings, and hurries us on by an irresistible force. Astonishment, as I have said, is the effect of the sublime in its highest degree; the inferior effects are admiration, reverence, and respect. — On the Sublime and Beautiful, Edmund Burke
edit: edited out the Gunn track; somehow, the audio was stretched 4x.
After a two month wait, Dutchman Wouter Van Veldhoven’s latest ambient release finally arrived on my doorstep. Considering the monumental delay, I have to assume the simple square six-inch cardboard package’s journey from Eat This Media’s Dutch offices to The Submersible Dirigible’s NYC-based corporate towers was a laborous one, apparently traveling over land by crab-walk, and over the Atlantic by paddleboat. Fortunately, Wouter’s latest record turned out to be a soothing remedy for injustice, allowing me to quickly forgive the collaborative failure of the Dutch and American mail-carriers.
wouter in context (bookmarked aac): Download (667)
wouter in context (mp3): Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1124)With only a handful of previous releases — I assume Wouter’s work hasn’t yet captured the eye of most ambient music fans. Considering Wouter’s Four Simple Songs alongside his earlier, far-too-limited Ruststukken (Slaapwell, 2007), it seems likely he’ll soon be to mentioned alongside the best established work from our era’s biggest contemporary-minimalist super-celebrities. Stylistically, Wouter’s brittle tape-fueled ambient arrangements feel inspired primarily by William Basinski’s own melancholy, high-altitude tape-glaciers. “Second Simple Song” (see podcast) makes the most convincing case for Basinski’s influence on the record; the track’s leaky organs and inky rythms are drenched in a shrill, pervasive electrostatic leaking from the track’s warmer, ailing melodies. Decay and crafted interference burden the more emotive instrumentation like a wet blanket, familiar from comparable Basinski releases like The Disintegration Loops (2062, 2002/2003) or Variations for Piano & Tape (2062, 2006).
Dong, sounds the brass in the east,
As if for a civic feast,
But I like that sound the best
Out of the fluttering west.
– Henry D. Thoreau, “The Echo of the Sabbath Bell Heard in the Woods”
philip glass, junior kimbrough, sun ra, young marble giants, pierre henry, jonny greenwood, nick cave & warren ellis
stratosphere (bookmarked aac): Download (595) stratosphere (mp3): Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1060)
Recent Comments