Today I read this in one of those excellent 33 1/3 album books. This from author Alan Warner writing on Can's Tago Mago album:
It is inevitable for writers writing about music that we must resort to image, simile, and metaphor. So you are going to get guitars playing on balconies across a mountain valley, and you are going to get keyboard solos compared to a killer whale rodeo. It is not something I am proud of, it is a tradition, a trope, a linguistic attempt to seize the myriad impressions and sensations which affecting music can throw at us. We resort to common poetry to describe the impossible, the same way scientists and physicists must when attempting to explain their most recondite flights. These images are variations of the pathetic fallacy but there is a tradition to it and sometimes the metaphors are apt. I like to avoid this plump fancifying but I cannot.
Musicians (and artists of all kinds in the public eye) are understandably dismissive of music writers generally and especially critics. Frank Zappa described music journalists as:
People who can’t write, interviewing people who can’t talk, for people who can’t read.
Perhaps Neil Young summed it up best with these cutting words from Ambulance Blues:
So all you critics sit alone
You're no better than me
for what you've shown
I'm not sure about killer whale rodeo keyboard solos but Alan Warner is right - writing about music is very flawed. Is there a point at all? Are one's views so personal it renders any opinion irrelevant? Surely it is just better to hear for yourselves without any pre-judgment inflicted by a writer?
Do writers have any right to pass judgement on artists?
But there remains so much of it about. Even more so these days with the internet and the prevalence of review sites like Amazon where anyone can leave their opinion. And I use those opinions when deciding on a purchase - the wisdom of the crowd is often correct even though all public review sites tend towards the positive.
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| Most of my 33 1/3 collection |
So I'll continue, but not without a feeling that my writing might be arrogant or self-important, or read by no-one and meaningless. Where I think the 33 1/3 books succeed is that they are for the most part written by fans describing their own personal feelings about a record - what it meant to them when they heard it growing up - rather than an opinionated critique. That's the approach I should stick to.
On to my personal selection this week then. I've gone for some reggae which was inspired by my daughter actually, who showed me some clips of new new kid on the block Protoje from a festival. I misheard this as Prodigy at first of course! My go to reggae album Catch A Fire follows and then a CD from one of the excellent Trojan box set series, which moves us, by way of Austrian DJs Kruder and Dorfmeister, into "dub". Dub I understand as meaning deep bass, not necessarily reggae although the two are often synonymous. We have a leftover from the Bob Dylan weeks with his beautiful Blood On The Tracks album and then bringing up the rear a set from the prolific Cornwall DJ (no, not Aphex Twin - the other one) Luke Vibert.
Protoje - A Matter Of Time
Bob Marley - Catch A Fire
Trojan Dub Box Set - CD 2
Kruder and Dorfmeister - Sessions
Bob Dylan - Blood On The Tracks
Luke Vibert - Musipal
What strikes me about the Bob Marley is the lack of what I'd call reggae in it! It's actually just great pop/rock music with great rhythms and some beautiful guitar playing (I don't know if this is Bob himself - I suspect not - from the films I've seen of him he seems to be the one either just singing with his guitar slung over his shoulder or he's doing the reggae chug chug chug strum strum). Who is on lead guitar? Is it Peter Tosh?
That reggae chug chug chug strum strum.
Lots of reggae chug chug on the Protoje album. It's much faster and poppier and the singer sings in a rap style. There are some great pop singles on here. It's immediately accessible to almost anyone which does worry me a little as I wonder if it has much staying power - that is one of the most fascinating things about discovering new music - how your opinion changes over the coming weeks, months, and even years (one of the original reasons I started this log actually).
Who is he anyway? Well from Wiki I learn that he is a contemporary reggae artist from Jamaica. That's an obvious description but an important distinction as I still think of most reggae (probably solely due to Bob Marley) as 70s music. Furthermore most the Dub stuff from Trojan is from even earlier.
Real name Oje Ken Ollivierre, Protoje started recording proper albums in 2011 and this one A Matter Of Time is his fifth.
One of my favourite tracks is No Guarantee which has this slickly produced video below (and also a catchy downward guitar riff):
Protoje himself has commented on the video:
This video is shot exclusively in Port Royal and shows bits and pieces of everyday life. Moments that often go unappreciated even unnoticed but are essentially all that we have.
Tell me are there things you take for granted too often?
I've never visited Jamaica. I'm sure there's lots of what we would describe as poverty but that sea (and dare I say the way of life?) looks beautiful. Port Royal is a suburb of Kingston.
The Kruder and Dorfmeister double CD Sessions is a superb piece of music. For a brief moment in time it was actually my favourite album. The album consists of heavily dubbed out remixes of tunes by artists like David Holmes, Depeche Mode, Roni Size, Lamb, Count Basic and Bomb The Bass. CD number 1 is slightly more upbeat with CD 2 a touch more chilled. Sometimes this blissed out down tempo trip hop type music can become a bit too much like elevator music - a criticism K & D masterfully avoid (although you would have almost certainly heard some of their tracks before, even unknowingly, via TV background music). The other thing about this duo is they actually really do improve the originals - a case in point with the Depeche Mode remix below:
I had a look for the Luke Vibert album on Spotify and it wasn't listed. I then realised Luke goes under the name of Wagon Christ for this 2001 release. That's not his only pseudonym. He can also be found under the following names: Plug, Kerrier District, Amen Andrews, and the Ace of Clubs, although his own name plus Wagon Christ are the ones he uses most often. I believe each nomenclature indicates a different style of music whether it be trip hop, acid or drum 'n' bass, but I'm not enough of an expert to distinguish. What I can tell though is Vibert has a unique sound in the IDM (intelligent dance music) field identifiable across all his releases. This one starts off with the following sample and Luke always delivers.
The premise of this album is very very simple - to listen to messages of soul with a solid beat.
For new listeners I'd also recommend Stop The Panic as a good starting point - available super cheap from amazon at the moment. This album expertly melds Luke's solid beats with slide guitar by BJ Cole creating a unique experience:
All for now, have a good week of musipal discovery!