| 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!
| Tuesday | October 20th | 2009 |
Summer Sounds: September
“Blow Away” by A Fine Frenzy
Bomb In A Birdcage, Sept 2009
September was a funny little month, with sudden spikes and dips in temperature and temperament. One day it would creep to 90 degrees in summery style, and the next would be a blustery 60. Apt, then, was the release of A Fine Frenzy’s second album, which is full of little surprises and changes of mood.
Located in Seattle, too, Alison Sudol charmed audiences with her 2007 debut, One Cell in the Sea. While sometimes veering into eye-rolling doll-like fragility, the album was intriguing enough to garner some serious praise. Her second outing is stronger in tone and subject matter (though lyrics and phrasing stumble on occasion into cliche), and poppier on the sound front. A foray into 80s rock anthems, some unabashedly gleeful pop, and a couple of wounded bird coos are some of the components that make up this smorgasbord. Though her voice will never be as distinct as some of her peers’, A Fine Frenzy does her best with her pipes (including banishing most of the yearny whine from her timbre) and keeps us guessing with lyrics that grow increasingly mature.
Interestingly enough, her music has ceased to match her projected image: her press photos depict a retro-indie goddess on a picnic with her Victrola, or a softly lit chanteuse with a parasol. But, her music is unapologetically modern, pop-centric, and destined for a spot in the Top 20. Which sensibility will end up most prominent? That’s for album three to decide.
September was the final month of the summer, and here I end my summer sound rewind. What will come to define the months ahead remains to be seen!
| Sunday | October 18th | 2009 |
On Friday November 6th and Saturday Novembe
r 7th, I will be debuting new music accompanying an original piece by Amy Weaver in the dance performance Entitlement by Sapience Dance Collective.
It has been a wonderful opportunity collaborating with Amy, and once again writing new music for dance. Above is a preview of the piece, with three slices from the ~9.5 minute accompaniment cross-faded together.
After the performance’s debut, I’ll put up the full piece and article about its composition so that those who weren’t able to see it live can at least hear the aural element.
If you are in the Seattle area though, please come and see a wonderful evening/afternoon of new work! I guarantee it’ll be worth your while, as all the choreographers and dancers involved are amazingly talented individuals.
For more information about the show, check out the full poster here.
| Friday | October 16th | 2009 |
I’ll forgive Naoshi Mizuta for stealing my awesome idea just this once, because what he’s doing with it is really interesting. I kid, of course, because while I’ve always entertained the concept of mixing orchestral ‘tunes with chiptunes, I haven’t actually done anything with it yet. So, beating me to the punch, is the really fantastic (samples of the) soundtrack to Final Fantasy Gaiden: 4 Warriors of Light.
The entire concept of the game is going back and saying hey, what if the original Final Fantasy was being made today for the DS? Therefore everything, from the world design, gameplay systems and music, gets reborn and is both old again and new.
From the samples of the soundtrack released so far, there is a really fantastic assortment of sound samples that range from old NES synths to a more 16-bit oscillation style synthesis to modern instrument samples. By picking and choosing, it seems Mizuta was able to milk the best qualities each generation’s sound style had to offer—from the driving crunchy triangle wave basses to the gorgeous square and sine wave leads, as well as modern percussion and even live instruments such as the great trumpet solo found in the main theme.
I’m a big fan of this approach, and may begin to adapt to it myself going forward. There really isn’t much of a downside to utilizing every tool in a medium’s tool belt when all you have is the richness of music history to back you up.
Very much looking forward to hearing how the rest of the soundtrack shapes up as well as the full tracks themselves! We should find out in a little less than a month when the game and soundtrack launch in Japan.
Summer Sounds: August
(After attempting to post any Bat for Lashes songs for three days, I finally gave up and just posted a video instead. A video I don’t particularly like for a song I sort of half-like, but it’s better than nothing.)
“Sleep Alone” by Bat for Lashes
Two Suns
Evenings in August are the longest, the light lingering far into what should properly be night. Sunsets take a lifetime and stars don’t wink into sight til bedtime.
Therefore, August was the perfect time for Bat for Lashes to unleash her second album, Two Suns. A crazy amalgam where fantasy, prophecy and evil sirens can intermingle perfectly with cutting edge electronica and dancehall beats, Two Suns tells the story of alter-ego Pearl and her journey…somewhere. Lyrics that might as well hail from a new-Age dream journal somehow become transcendent when couched in tremendously creative arrangements, carried by Natasha Khan’s soaring voice.
In August’s crepuscular light, Bat for Lashes’ eerie vocals, battering electronics and ethereal washes melded in a whole that hinted at something greater than the sum of its parts.
| Sunday | October 11th | 2009 |
Summer Sounds: July
“French Navy” by Camera Obscura
My Maudlin Career
The heat was turned up high in July, with Seattle reaching record breaking temperatures, the likes of which the city had never seen. (The native East Coasters just slathered on some tanning butter and reminded everyone that “at least it isn’t humid.”)
As denizens scoured their neighborhoods looking for the lone air-conditioned business, I turned to Glaswegian band Camera Obscura for some sun-drenched songs. Star track “French Navy” kicks things into gear with an American 60s girl-group feel, lacing “oohs” in with some sparklingly clever lyrics. Sometimes nearly capsized under waves of powerful orchestral sound, Tracyanne Campbell’s rough-edged voice manages to stay afloat and carry each song to shore. The bouncier tracks made the sun shine a little brighter on the water as July rolled into August.
| Friday | October 9th | 2009 |
Summer Sounds: June
Autumn has—I think—finally settled upon the Northwest, bringing this long, swelteringly beautiful summer to a cool, crisp close. The summer of 2009 saw the release of some majorly impactful music all across the board. Each month of summer brought a new album which saw heavy rotation over my speakers, making the memory of that month indelibly twinned with its particular soundtrack.
“No Intention” by Dirty Projectors
Bitte Orca, 2009
Sometimes I’m a curmudgeonly stick in the mud when it comes to breaking out of my audio comfort zone: I pull my afghan over my head and grumble that I don’t like that newfangled whatever-it-is and leave me alone, dammit.
Happily, a friend of mine played her pre-release copy of Bitte Orca when I couldn’t help but listen, and I came out of my troglodytic lair, blinking in the light of such incredible sounds. One of the most audacious albums I have ever had the pleasure of hearing, the month of June reverberated with spiky harmonies and thrillingly weird arrangements.
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 various vapor, assembled. on Sun Jan 3rd at 10:17PM
Posted by Leif on Wed Dec 23rd at 1:27PM