October 18 2024
An avowedly romantic (in either sense) take on existence is Gorecki’s Third Symphony. That linked YouTube rip features soprano Dawn Upshaw, though all the recordings I’ve heard do the trick—I happen to be stuck on this one. This is movie-level sentimentality as well as pure, unchecked beauty. There is no one way to deal with the sort of hideous clarity each day brings and I have resorted to many different kinds of music to bring myself some kind of cortisol reduction and spiritual connectedness. None of them, ultimately, have worked, though Hamza El Din’s music does a good job of centering me. This Gorecki allows a certain kind of mourning to take place, or maybe something closer to an admission. The second movement is maybe my favorite, though I have never listened to this symphony except in full.
This Catriel and Paco Amoroso Tiny Desk has TikTok in a headlock (lol) for a good reason. Their standard live show leans on electronics and floating donut rings more than musicians. The Tiny Desk, though, has the duo working with a big band: horns, percussion, and vocalists. Both Catriel and Paco exhibit an incredibly casual sense of joy and flexibility. Both lead performers are astonishingly good at big gestures for stadium eyes and close-up camera work. Is progress real? There is a related case to be made that Tiny Desk has become so important not just because it renders the live experience for the digital viewer but because that alleged “at home YouTube and TikTok view” is much closer to what most people actually want from a live show: something that happens during daylight and is more interested in communication than overload and military bluster. I hate going to shows and avoid them when I can — this I would pay to see, often and without argument.
Damaged, by Ghost Dubs, is that post-Basic Channel album that people have been trying to make for years. Big old robot whales descending into an oil spill—fun for all.
White Poppy’s Ataraxia came with a promo sheet that tells its own story well, which is not often the case with one-sheets. I quote: “The concept for and palette of Crystal Dorval aka White Poppy’s ‘Paradise Gardens’ trilogy first germinated in 2016 as a notion of ‘paradise music’ combining new age, bedroom shoegaze, and bossa nova into ‘transcendental Tropicalia.’” That is exactly what this music sounds like. I’ve listened to it approximately thirty times. It makes me feel like I am sitting in a room filled with plastic orange flowers, which is a bit like sitting in Ariston (where we often go).
After Caterina Valente passed away on September 9th, my phone spied me posting that clip of Valente and Dean Martin performing “One Note Samba,” which is the most charming thing ever filmed. So I got served this free? bootleg? puzzling assemblage of Caterina Valente and Maria Dolores Pradera songs on SoundCloud, which might be a real album? I cannot tell. The third song, presented here as “Franqueza,” is actually Valente doing “Cucurrucucu Paloma,” and her version is as canonical as the later Caetano Veloso performance I hold so dear. Free, also.
The thing that has put my socks into a right twist is Able Noise’s High Tide. I am writing something about it for 4Columns but in the meantime, I leave you with what I texted a friend when I first heard the album:
fucking incredible bro
I had OTHER THINGS TO Do
and now Im like ahoy what is this shower of lil chickens and metal
what are they telling me
This Civilistjävel! mix from August of 2022 for Bleep is a coherent world pulled from a single piece of cloth. Tomas Bodén/Civilistjävel! is also responsible for a fantastic mix from February of 2021 where Perko (aka Fergus Jones) does the first hour and he does the second hour. On top of all that, there is a new Civilistjavel album, Brödföda, which extends his inquiry into the particular charcoal grey he found.
Doug at Hausu Mountain and Mina simultaneously put me on to Callahan and Witscher’s “Boiler Room.” If you simply want jokes about a pocket of culture, they have them. We discussed C&W in this episode of Busytown, speaking of which! Our time on East Village Radio is coming to a close; you can tune in to eastvillageradio.com at 2 PM EST on Tuesday, October 22nd and hear the last episode (for now) live as it happens. You can access the entire Busytown archive here.
Heidi and I went to see Still House Plants at Knockdown Center recently and it was fantastic. When we got home, we listened to the SHP cover of Sade’s “Kiss of Life,” from 2017. I texted via WhatsApp with singer Jessica Hickie-Kallenbach about the show and the cover.
Jess: im trying to clock my first memory of Sade, and i think it was finding my mums copy of Promise at home. ‘Is it a crime’ is the first track on that album and it was too big for me to really get, but the depth and clarity of her voice is what got me. the dynamic of her voice being the real tell-all about the breadth of this love, more so than the metaphors she gives with precision. maybe that’s what i love in every sade song that i know and adore - her capacity to show it all, it’s beyond the words. and this beauty unquestioned in the low notes, not whispers, quiet but louder than a shout.
Knockdown was fun to play - exhausted and loopy but i felt so real and full of gratitude. playing with friends makes the difference. Claire’s band were demons with their arrangements, doubling down. and then Mica being huge and brave and crushing everything with simplicity. u don’t get to be a part of something that’s so honest and reliant on feeling that often . deep man
all i can rly say is that i wld always say i wanted my vox to sound like sade was playing next door cos i was shy and then we just started playing with ‘kiss of life’ for a gig and then we recorded it.
i mean it was a joy cos it gave me a space to play in that was straight up romantic instead of like hidden behind words and intentions. she’s so straight up. i mean as i get braver and braver i think i appreciate some directness.
tbh i think what we do is straight up!!!!
There are four new Longform Editions releases and this one in particular, Love’s Temporary Occurrence, by Post Moves, really got me. You’re in a room or a house or a room in a house and everything keeps shaking and threatening to fall off the wall but nothing does.
I have been listening to the August 8th episode of Nile To Bank, this one featuring Nihal and Mohammed el-Kurd. Of this show, Nihal writes: “When Mohamed and I hang out, yes of course we often talk about politics, but we also share a lot of music with each other, talk about Arab culture, be it high brow or pop culture. I guess with this show I wanted people to know how intertwined Arab culture really is, and that we basically grew up on the same music/literature/films, to show how powerful Arab resistance music is, as well as to show a different side to Mohamed, how he likes rap and hip-hop and how varied his taste is.”