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gallery about rss archive| Monday | March 8th | 2010 |
| Wednesday | March 3rd | 2010 |
“Murder of Birds” by Jesca Hoop. Hunting My Dress, 2009.
Cause, I’m not a bird / I’m a murder of birds
At the close of last year a little album dropped across the pond in the UK which sent out some very lovely ripples. Hunting My Dress is Jesca Hoop’s second major release, and proves that comparisons to Joanna Newsom and Bat for Lashes (whom she precedes) are entirely justified.
Combining a knack for lush, unique arrangements—often relying on music-box glissandos and bell-like vocal backings—with some gothically delicate lyrics, her work is unforgettable. Earlier songs ran the gamut from glimmery electro-pop to cocktail dress croons to haunting ballads of brittle ballerina bones.
“Murder of Birds,” the only track I have been able to get my ears on (the US release is yet to drop), is a quieter rumination than her usual stuff. Jesca’s clear, lilting voice intertwines beautifully with that of the more gravelly whisper of Elbow’s front man, Guy Garvey. Achingly sweet and spare, this track might fool you into thinking her work is all similarly quiet, but a listen to her first release—Kismet—will cure you of that notion very quickly.
Keep an eye on this California-raised/Manchester-located chanteuse, as she and her midnight music are exploring some wondrous places.
| Saturday | February 13th | 2010 |
What’s dropping in May? The New Pornographers’ new album is what! To quote Home Movies, “Weee-ow!”
| Tuesday | January 19th | 2010 |
Those that have been following Cloudherder for a while are no stranger to the fact that I am very much a fan of Bear McCreary as a composer. The sheer amount of thought and care that goes into his compositions really show in both the intricacy of the music itself, as well as the staggering attention to detail each cue reflects when tying in with the fiction it accompanies.
Thankfully for us, he is also very well-written and introduces the public to each work he’s involved with in a behind-the-sheet-music view that details everything from the themes and how they’re composed to the talented instrumentalists that play his work.
Bear’s latest blog entry goes into great detail about his most recent project, Dark Void. While it appears that the game may not be living up to the great ambitions of both the developers and his score, the music itself is—even divorced from the associated material—a perfect example of how to create and evolve effective themes, motifs, and associate them in an extended and nonlinear form while still accommodating for live instrumentalists in an inventive way. (That was, admittedly, a bit of a mouthful.)
Even if you don’t understand exactly all of the technical terms being thrown around, give it a look and listen. It’s a rare glimpse into the creative process of a very talented composer.
| Tuesday | January 5th | 2010 |
The anatomy of 90’s techno, starring The Prodigy’s “Smack My Bitch Up”
Having listened to this song a multitude of times, it’s really interesting to see someone go in with today’s modern tools and recreate it from the original sample sources upward. Ableton Live is really a fantastic piece of software, and I’m sure the actual process 13 years ago was vastly different.
Personally I’m more a fan of Firestarter, if only for the hilarious parody years later via Venture Bros. (I’ll change my pitch up all I want, but I don’t condone the titular smacking!)
| Monday | January 4th | 2010 |
“Con Toda Palabra” (With All Words) by Lhasa de Sela. The Living Road 2003.
The world will have to enter the next decade without the rough-edged voice and haunting lyrics of Lhasa de Sela, who passed away just hours before midnight on New Year’s Eve.
Lhasa, an internationally known singer and songwriter, was able to write deeply evocative, emotional lyrics equally in English, Spanish and French. This unusual pedigree stems from a childhood spent both in the US and in Mexico, which eventually gave way to an adulthood based in Montreal. However, her dark, lush music sounds like none of these places specifically, instead tracing its roots to some mysterious, secretive land in between. Switching from one language to another lends a spice and vibrancy that is matched by the power of her distinctive, often anguished, voice.
The video above illustrates the first track from her 2003 album, The Living Road, which garnered Lhasa the award for Best Artist of the Americas from the BBC 3 World Music Awards. Though fighting breast cancer for almost two years, Lhasa managed to record a final album—Lhasa—which dropped less than a month ago.
WITH ALL WORDS
WITH ALL SMILES
WITH ALL LOOKS
WITH ALL CARESSES
I DRAW NEAR THE WATER
DRINKING YOUR KISS
THE LIGHT OF YOUR FACE
THE LIGHT OF YOUR BODY
TO LOVE YOU IS A PRAYER
THE SONG OF THE MUTE
THE EYES OF THE BLIND
THE NAKED SECRET
I ENTRUST MYSELF TO YOUR ARMS
I'm AFRAID AND I'M CALM
A PRAYER IN MY MOUTH
AND A PRAYER IN MY SOUL
| Sunday | January 3rd | 2010 |
“Cross My Heart” The Senate
Those crazy Senate kids are at it again. This time around they have a beautifully produced music video to go with a new-ish song (which sounds a little different than their usual fare). If you’re in the Seattle area, you should try and catch a (now very rare) show by these three. They are incredibly talented and pretty nice guys to boot! Additionally, this song is offered for free download on their elegant site.
| Wednesday | December 23rd | 2009 |
This past spring, composer Bear McCreary posted an announcement about his involvement with the game Dark Void, including a snippet of the main theme. He also added an additional chiptune-style remix he created using samples of NES synths. At the time, it was simply an homage to his favorite game series, Mega Man. Later, Capcom’s Unity Blog used this remix to help fuel a hilarious April Fool’s joke about a complete re-tooling of Dark Void to make it an 8-bit NES style game.
Fast-forward most of the year later, and we come to Capcom’s holiday gift to us all: The 8-bit game is real, and in the works for DSiWare, PC and mobile phones. Due in January, the game Dark Void Zero is an amusingly nostalgic jump into the “long forgotten” franchise Dark Rift, later renamed Dark Void and revived to “create” the 360/PS3 title to be released next year. In its revisionist history, Capcom created Dark Void as an NES game that was forgotten due to the entrance of the Super NES and its overshadowing presence. Now, a re-creation of the original title has been salvaged for all to enjoy!
While the game itself looks to be a fun jetpack-fueled shooter ala a fusion of Contra and Mega Man, one thing caught my attention: The trailer used to announce the game contained that same 8-bit Dark Void theme! Sure enough, what used to be an homage is now being transformed into canon. And if that wasn’t enough, Bear is breaking out the chiptunes in full to create the soundtrack for the entire Zero game. Listening to the clips alone you can hear both his unique style fused with callbacks to classic Mega Man textures and drum fills. I’m sure this must have been a dream project for him, and it’s going to be great hearing the full end-result come January when the game releases for digital consumption!
| Friday | December 11th | 2009 |
“Horchata” by Vampire Weekend, Contra 2010.
The first track off of Vampire Weekend’s forthcoming album strikes me as an incredibly perfect winter song. (We’ll skip the preamble about whether Vampire Weekend are a bunch of self-involved ivy league dandies who make overly precious Wes Anderson music, or are a bunch of self-involved ivy league dandies who make really very good and catchy Wes Anderson music.) The use of the cascading vocals and the delicate, plinky marimba makes “Horchata” sound like a modernized Christmas carol: one that has to do with drinking hot milk and wearing a balaclava, rather than anything religious. Now that Seattle has become a frigid wonderland of permafrost, I thought it the perfect tune to put some bounce into the day.
| Sunday | November 22nd | 2009 |
Absolutely excellent list of super-modern, incredibly creative instruments that have come about in the last few years. Happily, there are also video demonstrations of most of them, so you can see what a hydraulophone looks like while being played. (Hint: wet.)
Song: Seeplymouth
Artist: Volcano Choir
Album: Unmap (2009)
There is a genre of music that is particularly good for passenger listening. That is, being listened to by a be-headphoned passenger in a moving car, bus or train. I call it microcosmic music: the kind of soundtrack that, song by song, builds its own dramatic and all-encompassing universe. These are thinking songs, they drown the listener in sound to inspire vivid images as the seconds tick by. It need not match the landscape blurring by outside your window: its tones might be sepuchral and bleak while the sun shines brilliant outside, or its melody riotously verdant during a winter pall. What matters is the build of an entire world within the rise and fall of one song, and Volcano Choir has made it a specialty.
The bombastic percussion in “Seeplymouth” is reminiscent of the music of fellow microcosm-makers Explosions in the Sky, but where their music seems a great sturm und drang set in a lightless void, this song is carried on mincing, expectant steps to its climax. Before it can arrive, however, the eerie vocals of Justin Vernon seep into the cracks and begin to transform it into something epic, crashing and primal.
| Wednesday | November 11th | 2009 |
Song: “Ljósið” by Olafur Arnalds. Video by Esteban Diacono.
I have heard a couple of people comment that someone needs to make a visualizer application of this effect, and I agree: it’s hypnotic, it’s beautiful and mesmerizing. I could watch it all day. But if this effect could be used for any song you had lying around in your catalog, it would render this song and its unique video unremarkable. And that would be a utter shame.
| Sunday | November 8th | 2009 |
Becoming
©2009 Leif Chappelle
The performances this past weekend were really something spectacular, and I’m extremely grateful to everyone involved for making the concert come together so smoothly. Thank you so much to everyone that came!
For those that weren’t able to, here’s the full piece (at least, the audio portion of it) to check out.
The whole abstract concept for the dance and music started out with a visual analogy: A tree, viewed from one side: beautiful, lush; from the other side, hollowed out and rotting. The concept of turning around to discover hidden truths became key to evolving the melodic themes that run throughout the piece.
An example of this would be main melody itself and its repetitions. It begins as a simple celesta plucking out the notes casually. The next time it’s heard, a piano plays it in an ornamented fashion with various flourishes. As things begin to change, a guitar plays it out of time and begins adding in its own independent elements. The fourth time, a sine wave takes it up and begins sliding it around in a more artificial fashion. The final time, a human voice hums it casually; his own version.
Visually, the dancers wore green patterned dresses. Backs facing the audience, they appeared to be perfectly normal. As they began to turn around, tattered and ragged bits were revealed on the fronts of the dresses. Throughout the course of the piece, each dancer began removing the ragged bits in their own way. Some forcefully, some casually. Some removed the tattered pieces themselves, others obsessed over removing them from other people.
Hopefully this gives you a bit of a look into what the piece consists of and enhances the listening process! Please check it out, and of course feedback is always welcome.
| Thursday | October 29th | 2009 |
I’ve had three songs from Marina and the Diamonds’ album on heavy rotation for about two months now, and I have been trying to come up with an excuse to post this very song. Now, there is one: it’s got a video, and it uses some wacky body art based on the work of Lucy McRae.
All well and good. But, I have a beef with this video, and it is this: it isn’t weird enough. For any other poppy song, sure, this is weird. But this is a seriously off-the-wall song, full of odd sound effects and freaky interludes. I feel like the all-white wall should have been some wild jungle pattern, that things should have been popping in and out of frame with abandon (muppets! puppets!) and that titular lead singer Marina should have broken out of her dead-face expression at least once. I feel like she’s trying to give me sexy face, with her heavy-lidded pout -pout lips, but…you’re bouncing on puppet limbs and singing about spooks and silver spoons chasing you. Nothing in that is inherently sexy. (I…don’t think?)
But, there are accordion legs and arms, so I guess it’s enough. Hmph.
| Thursday | October 22nd | 2009 |
Seems like Dirty Projector’s album Bitte Orca (mentioned just this week on the blog) made quite the impression on the creator of fabulous webcomic Octopus Pie. Hanna is looking mischievous as always, and Eve a little worries (as always). When good music and good webcomickry collide!
Leif writes words, music, code and bug reports; somehow he's still sane.
Nickherder is a science and engineering kind of guy, but we forgive him for it.
SaRRa is using her fancy university degree to blog.
Legal Drug makes the coffee, eats the food and drinks the booze.
Layout & design by Leif Chappelle.
Logo by Sam Lewontin.
Unless otherwise expressly stated, all text in this blog and any related pages, including the blog's archives, is licensed by the authors of Cloudherder under a Creative Commons Attribution License.
Posted by SaRRa on Mon Mar 8th at 9:09PM
Posted by Leif on Tue Jan 19th at 12:29PM