Gas may have called their ambient album of 2000 ‘Pop’, but it’s ‘Sakura’ which actually lives up to the billing, an ambient album that plays like a pop album: a set of relatively short, sharply delineated, instantly melodic (I’d go as far as hummable), variedly arranged pieces of music (to say they’re songs would be pushing it – it’s still ambient). I don’t want to go into the ideological tussle of how an ambient album can be memorable, but it’s a contradiction I can live with when the results are so lovely, calming and engaging as this album. It’s just very easy to listen to.
While clearly an electronic album, Susumu bypasses a lot of the developments in that field from the ‘90s or even ‘80s. He knows them and uses those influences sparingly. There’s a little Aphex Twin in something like ‘Tobiume’ or ‘Genshi’. But at the core of it, Susumu goes for a classic electronic analogue sound, where synthesizers and loops carefully intersect with flourishes of acoustic piano, percussive instruments, strings or guitar, sometimes voices speaking or singing. Some melodies sound almost classical, there’s a vague but definite Eastern melodic bent here and there. Flowing tracks where the pulse is implicit are leavened with music set to different types of percussion. Like I said, a definite strategy of variation is at work here.
That might end up as a series of gimmicks: the classically balanced and beautiful (‘Saku’), next to the menacing synthloops (‘Tobiume’), next to the Asian found sound speaking and analogue percussion of ‘Uchu Tanjyo’, next to Zen contemplation and what sounds like looped harp (‘Hagoromo’), next to a sub-aquatic house beat (‘Genshi’), next to the brooding tick tock of ‘Gekkoh’ and on to the dub with strings and electric piano sketch of ‘Häen’, the shapeless cloud of notes and singing that is ‘Azukiro No Kaori’, the sorrowful looped refrain ‘Song to aging children’ of ‘Kodomotachi’, the strident jazz piano run and swing beat of ‘Naminote’, the winding down piano lines of ‘Shinsen’ and finally the starry night Eastern reverie of ‘Kirakiraboshi’. But it’s no gimmick, you never feel taken in, it’s all part of the artist’s mastery. A very good album.
At its best: Saku, Uchu Tanjyo, Hagoromo, Häen, Kodomotachi, Naminote
134. EST: Good morning Susie Soho
To say Esbjörn Svensson’s trio brought ‘90s rock into the jazz world is misleading. Sure, this album is very much sequenced like a rock album instead of a jazz album (11 tracks, an insistence on variation instead of a continuous mood), and some of the tracks have subtle electronica touches (drumloops mostly). But Svensson is way more influenced by a European classical tradition than rock – that is his strength, and that is what the next generation of jazz pianists in Europe has picked up on. The themes and the improvisations all radiate thorough assimilation of that tradition. So the record stands in the tradition of ECM-jazz, more than any American school and certainly more than indierock. Anyway, not to disparage the first half of this album, which is very good, but if you want to know what it’s about, sit down for the final four tracks: ‘Pavane…’, a beautiful piece in which his classical influences are to the fore; ‘Spam-boo-limbo’, a driving electronica-meets-jazz creation that goes through several mood swings, ‘The face of love’, his cover of a wonderful Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan melody, and finally the 12-minute, two-part ‘Reminiscence of a soul’, sort of an attempt to bring together all these strands in one ‘head’ piece. Excellent.
At its best: Somewhere else before, Pavane (Thoughts of a septuagenarian), Spam-boo-limbo, The face of love, Reminiscence of a soul
133. Grandaddy: The sophtware slump
Sure, we liked this at the time. I was sure I’d hate it now though – bunch of contrived, faux-naïve indierockers singing about self-made robots writing poetry and committing suicide at the awful loneliness of automated life (an allegory for 21th century life with spelling mistakes, in case you hadn’t guessed). But you can’t outsmart your aural taste buds (how’s that for awful poetry in the age of blog music journalists?). These contrived, faux-naïve indierockers with their stupid allegory made a record filled with spelling mistakes And melodies I really like. Let’s face it, most of us didn’t listen further than the opening epic about a dumb pilot who may/may not be giving in/ giving in 2000. But there are tightly constructed multi-layered songs further on as well. That it sounds like it’s recorded on some really bad equipment, when you get down to it, does give it a certain out of time charm in this age where it seems impossible for even the most untalented laptop user to get a good bad recording sound. There is no fate more apt for Grandaddy than to be lingering forever at the edge of extinction – it was foretold on this record.
At its best: He’s simple he’s dumb he’s the pilot, The crystal lake, Underneath the weeping willow, Miner at the Dial-a-view
132. Phish: Farmhouse
Just checking if you’re still paying attention.
No really…
I’d never heard a note of music by Phish, just some jokes about being the heir to the Grateful Dead (and what’s wrong with that ?). But this record bears no resemblance to the ragged liquid sound of the Dead. About two years ago I scored a bunch of Chicago albums, which had me completely mystified for a good while but now I like ‘em like a thick woollen ‘70s carpet that you can get your toes lost in. To me, this record’s like a crystallisation of the more populist, comfy end of Chicago. Unfashionable, sure, but I like it while I’m eating my homemade croque monsieurs.
People who know me, know that the sound of ‘Crooked rain crooked rain’ is one of my touchstones. Imagine my surprise to find that Bryce Goggin, one of the architects of that sound is producing here. And while there’s little musically that connects Pavement and Phish, I can hear the echoes. For that alone –that’s what an electric guitar should sound like, that’s what a record should sound like- I get a kick out of it.
But hey, I dig the band too (there goes the last shred of my credibility). They don’t really have any classic songs (though ‘Farmhouse’’s cross of the ‘Everybody had a wet dream’ part of ‘I’ve got a feeling’ with the chords of ‘No woman no cry’ is pretty swell), but they coast by on easy going, almost surfer-esque charm. True, they may have the emotional depth of a slug, but even slugs like to lounge out in the sunshine and fritter away their time on leisure.
At its best: Farmhouse, Bug, Dirt, Piper
131. Gomez: Abandoned shopping trolley hotline
Some bands I’m just more fond of the b-sides than the albums. I’ve never gotten to know any Gomez albums, so I don’t know, but I feel they could be one of those bands. They should just embrace the spur of the moment inspiration and let it hang out. I mean, this is a mess, but it’s their mess. I dig their percussion, I dig how much too long ‘Buena vista’ is (at 8 minutes it’s plenty too long). Likewise, ‘Hit on the head’ is way too short, ‘The cowboy song’ is way too silly, ‘Shitbag 9’ is way too shit (all 30 seconds of it). It’s some kind of advanced statement. Forget about the ‘Getting better’ cover though. One bridge too far.
At its best: Hit on the head, We haven’t turned around (X-ray), Buena vista, Steve McCroski
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