I really like the work of The Antlers so the announcement of their new album comes with great anticipation for me. The first track released shows a slight change to their sound with focus on brass instrumentation that apparently carries through the whole album. Mix that with the bitter sweet sound the antlers are known for and you’re on to a winner.
Palace is the Teaser Track and is well worth a listen:
I have been interested in the idea of prepared pianos for a few years now. The basic idea of a prepared piano is to add/alter parts of the piano to crate new textures during its playing. Hauschka is known for his works on prepared piano and demonstrates the ideas perfectly in this Live Performance on NPR:
The Past two weeks tracks made for weekly beats work together as a pair so I thought I would include them both together. Week 15 entitled Otdel Mokrykh Del is one big and dark swell of electronica before the guitar driven track Bloodlines kicks in on week 16.
Have a listen below:
Week 15:
Week 16:
When I first heard Crystal Castles I was amazed by their sound. Abrasive in almost every way with its harsh production and vocals mixed with raw synth sounds they created something fresh and exiting.
Ten years and three albums later and they are still developing this unique sound and make it all worth listening to. Magic Spells is one of their more relaxed tracks from the first album, a favourite of mine and can be heard below:
I’ve been listening to a fair bit of squarepusher over the past few weeks and his new project with Z-Machines seems a rather interesting one. Namely composing music for a completely robotic band. In this video we get to see some of the music generated from this work. If you like what you hear the full EP was released this week:
My new years resolution, to make and release a track each week for the year is going well. I thought it was time to compile the first 12 into a winter collection album available to anyone through bandcamp. It’s a pay what you like policy so feel free to download it and tell me what you think of the tracks. You can listen to them all below or click on the link to download them through bandcamp:
This week I went a little more experimental. The original idea was to have two melodies, one on piano and one on an electric piano which over every 12 bars increased and decreased an octave so by the middle of the piece the interweaving melody were in the same octave before drifting apart. It also means that the bass melody and lead melody switch between the beginning and end of the piece.
I then added drone elements with guitar and synth to create an otherworldly sound, I have focused heavily on panning the instruments so they all have some space to breathe which may mean if listened to in mono it may not come out as planned.
Due to the songs circular repeating nature I thought I would dedicate it to Vera Rubin, American female scientist who pioneered work on how galaxies rotate and gathered evidence towards the theory of dark matter. A legendary Figure who needs more recognition.
Listen to the track by following the link below:
After hearing the Patterson Hood of The Drive-by Truckers state Vic Chesnutt as a major influcne when being interviewd on the WTF podcast, I felt like i had to go out and listen to him and was blown away by his fragile voice mixed with powerfull, articulate and well constructed lyrics.
Flirted With You All My Life focuses on his struggle with death and suicide which unfortunately ultimately consumed him. I don’t want to talk more about the track then to say you need to listen to it and more of his work:
This Week I make a track starting with a mistake in recording from the previous one. The intinal drum hit is a sample taken from the acousitc guitar recording on Camberweel beauty but I liked the way the slap of the guitar sounded more percussive and decided to lay it out for this work.
Pad’s and sounds created on the OP1 become less of the mainstay and more suplimental as the aim is to add more traditional instruments fore the next few weeks even if they are heavily processed.
Listen to the track here:
After watching the most recent Wes Anderson film I was reminded of Coconut Records the pseudonym of Jason Schwartzman and one of Andersons regular cast members. With Coconut Records, Jason Schwartzman manages to craft novel pop rooted in nostalgia. West Coast is my favourite track from his first album nighttiming and is available below: