I was in the midst of a techno & trance binge when Sasha’s “Airdrawndagger” came out and it hit the spot. It set the bar so high for me, it effectively ended my binge. The entire album is worth a listen as though it were one continuous song, because there are no breaks between songs (as is frequently the case with a trance album). Of all the tracks on the album, I always think of this one as my favorite. The resonating ethereal beats and pings have a mesmerizing quality, and the song has an intricacy often lacking in trance.
Or perhaps the hypnosis has finally worked and I am now telling you, “buy now, pay later” … *grunt* … “listen to trance, forget what I said about zombie rock” … *grunt* *take one step* *drool* … *grunt grunt* … *eat brains* … *grunt*
I just got Imogen Heap’s latest album, “Ellipse”, so I cannot speak to it yet, but I was thinking how awesome her song “Hide and Seek” from her previous album “Speak for Yourself” is. There are no instruments. It is just her voice digitally distorted. You would think it would be boring or flat. But the distortion is such that each note is like a chord.
The tone and pauses are perfect for the lyrics too. “Crop circles in the carpet.” I love that lyric because I’ve been there and done just that with my toe. Anyone who has been through a heavy break up in their life will relate to this song.
I know this song is stuck in my head because I had considered the possibility of Frou Frou’s only album, “Details”, being the album of the week. This song total captures my mood this morning too, including a series of questions and statements that seem to make no sense when all tied together or spoken aloud. (See the lyrics to know what I mean.) Perhaps some coffee is in order.
Time to show my true geekery by posting music from a video game. I use to play a ton of video games, and most video games have some music in them. In the early days of video game music the music was very electronic and frequently had only one part playing at a time. Usually such songs would not hold up to any soundtrack or classical music. I believe this song composed by Nobuo Uematsu from the game Final Fantasy might though. I should add that it has been reused for all 10+ Final Fantasy games and even covered by some actual bands, and orchestras (additional parts added to it, of course).
This song came to my mind because G and I were discussing ambient (and really dream pop and shoegazing) music’s value, including bands like Chairlift and M83. (I should’ve brought up Air as a counter argument because I’m certain she like them.) She questioned if their music really took much work or talent, and thus if anyone can do it then is it good? I think we will have to agree to disagree because clearly G does not like music where the melody is subtle to non-existent, as is the case frequently in those genres where the song does not necessarily focus on a melody. She clearly wants “the nugget” of the melody of the song that makes it good, and in ambient there tend to be no nuggets.
The discussion then led to game music which has to be repeated over and over, and thus you want ambiance generally. I had brought up the music from Tetris, but it was a poor example because I was thinking of Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker – Dance of the Sugur Plum Faries” (listen to it here). This bonus song from Final Fantasy I consider to be ambient and beautiful. Is it complicated at all? No. Does it have value? Yes it is beautiful to me. Should it matter that it came from a video game? No, I think not. Does it have a “nugget”, not really… you have to listen to it as a whole, same as with ambient.
Clearly ambient and its related genres are not for everyone.
I love the blend of the rhythms of all the different parts in this song. Individually they’re all so active, but together they blend into an ambient mesh. I’ve been listening to Air for years, but only just now did I learn “The name AIR is a backronym for Amour, Imagination, Rêve which translates to Love, Imagination, Dream.” I always thought “air” was descriptive enough!
Anyone who has paid even a little attention to music influences, especially in electronic, new wave, and post-punk genres over the past almost 40 years has seen Brian Eno’s name A LOT. He is a musician, singer, composer, producer, and musical theorist. He has worked with seemingly countless artists over the years including John Cage, David Bowie, Talking Heads, U2, Coldplay, James, Dido, and Sinéad O’Connor, to name a few. I’m serious. The list is huge.
ALSO “Ambient” music (and all related genres) would possibly not even exist as they do today without him. It was my understanding before reading his wiki page that he is basically the father of ambient music. He is a legend! (I feel like I owe him a favor, a thank you, a fruit basket, …something!)
To top it off, he makes his own music and albums, averaging one about every two years. He has 25 by my count. And that excludes the 5,000,000 collaborative albums he has worked on or produced! (Maybe I should send flowers?)
“This” song impressed me in 2005, though frankly I only have a fraction of the music he himself has made. (Money. I think that’s what he really would appreciate. Nah he’s probably rolling in it by this point!)
Also, a bit of trivia for you, his full name is “Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno”. Crazy huh?
You may recognize the voice as that of “Poe”. Most people probably assume after her 2nd album, “Haunted”, she retired or something, but no. She has been active in a variety if pursuits, including several songs on two Conjure One albums, and probably the third one in the works. Conjure One is the “project” of Rhys Fulber known previously for Front Line Assembly and Delerium.
I think it is a brilliant and beautiful song. If I wasn’t so busy with my day job perhaps I’d learn how on earth they produce some of the sounds in songs like this.
Some of you may remember the song “Silence” featuring Sarah McLachlan, which received a lot of attention and even radio air time. For me though, “Euphoria (Firefly)” was the song that entranced me even more so off of the album “Karma”. I love the line “…go forward and walk under a brighter sky”. Jacqui Hunt (of the band Single Gun Theory)’s voice seem is the perfect blend of haunting and delicate for the song. Bill Leeb and Rhys Fulber are brilliant for incorporating singers from all over into their songs and albums and mixing it up so their vocal sound is ever changing.
There is a layer of snow outside where there wasn’t yesterday and it seems surreal, not unlike today’s song of the day by the Cocteau Twins. It is like a sort of sleepy unreal ethereal state of mind has fallen across the land. I long for spring and summer but I do love snow so I don’t know if this weather cause for dancing or sorrow, either way I think this song fits in the quiet early morning light.
Earlier this decade I was on a huge downtempo kick. I listened to a number of online radio stations at the time and many were only downtempo, ambient, trance electronic music. Zero 7 was played frequently and always stuck out to me. I finally bout “Simple Things” in 2002 or 2003 and listened to it incessantly at work. I’d have to say they are my favorite downtempo band, and “Simple Things” is my favorite album from the genre.
I know most people out there have probably never heard of downtempo. I get a lot of blank stares when I discuss the genre in public. I swear I am not making it up!
About musical genres found on MSotD…
I am not a huge fan of the way genres are usually used. A music genre is “a categorical and typological construct that identifies musical sounds as belonging to a particular category and type of music that can be distinguished from other types of music” as posted on Wikipedia. With that said, a single artist, or song may be classified into several genres at once, but the tendency for most people is to assign one category to each band and that is it. A single song even may have parts to it that sound like one genre, and other parts that sound like another. So it is not as simple as “Rock”, “Pop”, “Classical”, “Jazz”, etc. Many genres pull influences from multiple genres, especially today where we see artists pulling influences from all over the globe! Downtempo is a perfect example, pulling influence from “Jazz”, “Funk”, and “Ambient” genres.
Assigning genres can be very complex, and it is ALL SUBJECTIVE. Genres are just a web of opinions in an effort to classify music. Were I to notice similarities between artists A, B, and C, that no one has ever documented before I could recognize a new genre and write articles about it. If people started to use it then ta-da! New genre created. Alternatively if my (fictitious) band were to make a type of music different enough from everything else out there (and actually become popular enough that we get some name recognition and other bands to emulate our sound), we might create a new genre that way too. Or perhaps my band belongs in existing genres. Regardless it is subjective.
It is not black and white, but it is a useful tool for finding other music you may like otherwise I would ignore they exist entirely. For the purposes of this blog, I’ve been tagging each post with the musical genres related to the artist of the “song of the day” as posted on Wikipedia. Hopefully over time it will be a useful tool for finding other “song of the day” entries you may like if you hear a “song of the day” or bonus song that appeals to you and you want more by similar artists.
Listen on Blip.fm!