Log #157 - Another Indie Folk Rock Band - Eddy Hears The Decemberists For The First Time

Two exciting new entries this week in The Decemberists and The Felice Brothers, plus a return to two artists I tend to group together for some reason although their albums are not necessarily similar: Scott Matthews and James Morrison. Bringing up the rear we take a listen to John Legend's debut album and revisit a perennial favourite - Gram Parson's two on one solo collection GP/Grievous Angel.

The Decemberists Picaresque

 Scott Matthews Passing Stranger

Gram Parsons GP/Grievous Angel
John Legend Get Lifted

James Morrison Undisclosed

Felice Brothers Yonder Is The Clock

Very grateful for the introduction to the The Decemberists. A friend told me they were his favourite band. I asked which album was the best to get (there are 8) and he said "all of them". I don't get all of anybody these days (once in the past I would collect everything by one artist but nowadays, like reading books, there is only so much time so I try and limit myself to the best). 

Anyway after a little bit of perfunctory investigation I decided to go for the band's third album Picaresque and what a stonker it is - packed to the hilt with dramatic songs of cow punk and indie folk - a mash of Fairport Convention, The Waterboys, Belle and Sebastian, REM, Tom Waits, The Tiger Lillies and The Felice Brothers.

Hear The Decemberists at their most theatrical here:

I won't be getting all 8 but can see me investing in at least half of them.

It's a short leap from The Decemberists to the fantastic Felice Brothers. There are many similarities - lyrical story based songs, fiddles and accordions, ramshackle arrangements, and a charismatic front man with a voice of gravel. If I was pushed to highlight a difference I'd say The Felice Brothers are more roughly hewn diamonds.

Yonder Is The Clock (already their 6th as early as 2009) is another excellent album from the Felice Brothers' catalogue. There are plenty of down tempo ballads on this album but the brothers never fail to serve up a crowd pleasing stomp or two. Run Chicken Run fulfilling that role here:

Chickens get no life after death! Who knew?

Gram Parsons' two solo albums of melodic love songs and ballads are conveniently collected on this 2-CD set. Parsons almost invented country rock and the genre is amply demonstrated throughout these 20 tracks which maintain a remarkable standard throughout. For CD collectors this edition is essential for any rock fan, along with Capt. Beefheart's Spotlight Kid/Clear Spot 2-CD edition.

Great singers both, James Morrison and Scott Matthews. The former a bit more souly and the latter more rocky. Two excellent albums that I return to fairly frequently.

Lastly this week comes John Legend's 2004 debut album Get Lifted. As explained in Log #155 I was alerted to Legend through a track in the Tarrantino film Django Unchained, and purchased this record and the follow up Once Again. The latter record grew on me. This one not so much to date. It has a more gospel leaning. Neither records quite reach the peaks of the Django track Who Did That To You?

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Log #53 - Tangerine Dream were no Satsuma Nightmare

Firstly I offer a thank you to all my readers as my blog enters it's second year. I hope some of you have stumbled across something of interest and discovered some new music. In listening to my music and writing these pieces I have both discovered new things and rediscovered old too! The list below is an example of that - I had never heard any Kanye West before last week (apart from a car crash live appearance on some awards show a couple of years ago) and I only recently bought Bob Marley's classic Catch a Fire album although I was very familiar with the famous joint touting cover (the music was not what I had assumed it would be). Yet at the opposite end of the scale I've been a fan of Neil Young and Tangerine Dream for over 30 years.

1. Tangerine Dream - The Essential
2. Kanye West - Late Registration
3. James Morrison - Songs for You, Truths for Me
4. Eilen Jewell - Sea of Tears
5. Bob Marley - Catch a Fire
6. Neil Young - On the Beach

I've just got to admit it. I do really like Tangerine Dream. It's probably not that cool nowadays but they are really good at what they do. And they are original. Their music is instantly recognisable even amongst the plethora (that's a Tan Dream song title if I've ever heard one) of electronic experimental instrumental music out there. They don't sound like Kraftwerk, nor Brian Eno, nor Boards of Canada. Possibly their closest contemporary may have been Jean-Michel Jarre or possibly Philip Glass in places or Aphex Twin, but their mostly drumless yet pulsed and rhythmic sequencer music is ultimately unique.

Don't think of it as music, just put this album on, turn it up loud, and let the experience wash over you and take your brain to far off places!

Actually I feel a gnod music map coming on - let's see if my hunches are right?

Other maps are available from the brilliant gnod.com

This album is yet another collection. There are loads out there and I generally avoid non original albums. But I knew enough from the regular albums to spot that this was a particularly good selection from their peak Virgin label days of the mid to late 70s and contains at least 60% of music I have not got on CD elsewhere. Crucially the tracks are full length - to maintain that hypnotic atmosphere so characteristic of Tan Dream's music this is essential.

The original knob twiddlers, Froese, Franke, Baumann

Quoting from the sleeve notes - "With a mere six tracks from six different albums, but more than seventy minutes long, this compilation serves as a perfect portrait of the sheer vastness of Tangerine Dream's music. Enormously epic and otherworldly tracks were the artistic trademark of the most important and internationally most successful German instrumental band ever. If Kraftwerk were the pioneers of electronic beats, Tangerine Dream were most definitely the pioneers of electronic atmosphere, the forerunners of Ambient."

For the aficionados the track listing is -

1. Movements Of A Visionary 7:55 taken from the album Phaedra 1974
2. Rubycon (Part One) 17.18 taken from the album Rubycon 1975
3. Stratosfear 10:35 taken from the album Stratosfear 1976
4. Cloudburst Flight 7:26 taken from the album Force Majeure 1979
5. Tangram (Part One) 19:47 taken from the album Tangram 1980
6. Hyperborea 8:38 taken from the album Hyperborea 1983

This collection is an excellent Tan Dream sampler for the beginner. For those who want to delve deeper into this weird and wonderful world I would recommend the original albums Force Majeure and Phaedra. The former is more conventional prog rock fayre with real guitars and drums as on the brilliant Cloudburst Flight (also present in the above collection). The latter is an ambient classic which forms a bridge between their early ambient soundscape drones like Zeit and their more commercial rhythmic albums. I'm also very fond of Cyclone which splits the fans being the only album with vocals. [Personally recorded cassettes of mine with old school friend and Tangerine Dream authority Electric Ape under the name Satsuma Nightmare are of old curiosity interest only!]

Three great Tangerine Dream albums from the 70s, always great covers too, many painted by Edgar Froese

So once again thank you for listening and reading, and I look forward to another 52 weeks and another 312 albums in 2017/18!

A new day, a new dawn, and new beginnings - where will we go, what will we discover?

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Log #52 - So This Is, or Was, Kanye!

If you had told me I'd have a Kanye West album in my logs this year I wouldn't have believed you. But here I am at week #52 and courtesy of a bargain bucket charity purchase (along with the James Morrison one listed below) I find myself the proud owner of Late Registration. My daughter tells me it's an early one and consequently probably quite good, and she is right, it's quite good in a rappy, hip hoppy, and even an early grimey way (I've heard a bit of grime through Earl Sweatshirt, Wiley and Stormzy).

It's littered with samples and these do seem to be a bit crow-barred in in a less than subtle way, but the underlying beats are addictive. I'm not going to go out and buy any other of West's albums nor listen to this one that often once it leaves the magazine, but it's had a fair few plays and has maintained my interest - not least on an anthropological level if you know what I mean! No? Well I mean even if the music is of little interest I have heard so much about Mr West that I am interested to investigate. It's my duty as a music investigator!

1. Ryan Adams - Gold
2. Kanye West - Late Registration
3. James Morrison - Songs for You, Truths for Me
4. Eilen Jewell - Sea of Tears
5. Bob Marley - Catch a Fire
6. Neil Young - On the Beach

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