My last post discussed a compilation I made of my favourite new tunes of 2024. I also made a compilation of tracks from before 2024 that I heard for the first time last year. Join me as I talk you through the tracks. Many of them are from 2023, illustrating yet again how I am often slightly behind the curve. I have also made a Spotify playlist of these tracks, but it is missing one key tune.
Peter Gabriel "No Self Control" (1980) (from the Ace Records compilation Fantastic Voyage - New Sounds For The European Canon 1977-1981)
So yeah, Peter Gabriel, he's very famous. I know some of his Genesis stuff and I remember when he had big hits with songs like "Sledgehammer" from the So album but I am not really familiar with his earlier solo material, for all that I know people like it. This track is from a compilation of music supposedly influenced by David Bowie's Berlin records. I like how edgy it sounds, with the recurring line "I don't know how to stop, I don't know how to stop" becoming quite disturbing when coupled with "You know I hate to hurt you, I hate to see your pain". Also there is the savage Phil Collins drumming.
Decisive Pink "What Where (2023)" (from Ticket To Fame)
Decisive Pink are a weirdo pop duo comprising Angel Deradoorian and Kate NV. Deradoorian was previously in Dirty Projectors and NV wasn't. They played at Le Guess Who in 2023 and I thought they might be worth seeing but couldn't get to them. That's probably all you need to know.
Broadcast "Roses Red" (from Spell Blanket - Collected Demos 2006-2009)
This collection of demos was released last year but I'm including this track in my collection of not-2024 songs on the basis that it was recorded a long time ago. I still feel sad thinking about Trish Keenans' passing.
Orion Rigel Dommisse "Hewn" (2014) (from Omicron)
This track appears on an album released by that Italians Do It Better record label of that guy from Chromatics. Now, the typical non-Chromatics IDIB record is released by a female artist singing in a Europorn accent to a heavily electronic accompaniment, but this one appears to be by someone for whom English is their first language making music a bit less electronically focussed than that of her IDIB stablemates. She doesn't seem to have released very much since the album this came from but investigation reveals that she is playing gigs supporting other IDIB artists so maybe she will release something new soon.
Miles Davis "One And One" (1972) (from On the Corner)
Some years ago I spent all day in the Irish Museum of Modern Art watching the Stan Douglas video art exhibit Luanda-Kinshasa, which aimed to replicate the feel of mid-1970s Miles Davis recording some fusion record in a studio. The music in it was so great that I became keen to listen to more of the Miles Davis tunes that had inspired it so I initially picked up a copy of Bitches Brew, but it wasn't quite the same (plus my cat actively hated it). Someone mentioned however that his album On the Corner is more like what I had described Luanda-Kinshasa as sounding like, so I picked up a copy and yes it is. It is also a pretty crazy record and you can imagine all the oldschool jazzers being all "I may be broadminded but FUCK THIS SHIT".
Grauzone "Eisbär" (1981) (from the Ace Records compilation Fantastic Voyage - New Sounds For The European Canon 1977-1981)
Another track from that compilation of Berlin Bowie influenced sounds. Who among us has not wished they were a polar bear?
Model/Actriz "Slate" (2023) (from Dogsbody)
Another act I missed at Le Guess Who 2023. Someone bigged them up to me and I bought the album because I am impressionable.
Meljoann "O Supervisor" (2021) (from H.R.)
Another home-made R&B classic from the massively successful alternate universe pop star. It also has a typically bonkers home-made video that I encourage readers to check out.
The Crystal Teardrop "Nine Times Nine" (2023)
The Crystal Teardrop, neo-psych sensations and cat fanciers.
Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. "Crystal Sun and Silver Moon" (2023) (from Shall We Return to Outer Space?)
Everyone loves Acid Mothers Temple apart from a number of people whose unsound opinions have been registered with the proper authorities.
Not on Spotify, so follow the link to Bandcamp to hear the track.
Valentina Goncharova (feat. Alexander Aksenov) "Reincarnation II" (from Recordings 1987-1991, Vol. 2 )
An odd piece of contemporary classical adjacent music from the interesting Ukrainian label Muscut.
Natalia Beylis "Afloat In Fog And Feathers" (2023) (from Mermaids)
Natalia Beylis has become a powerhouse figure in Irish experimental music. I came into her orbit through the Hunters Moon festival, which she was involved in organising, but it is only in more recent years that I have come to appreciate what an astonishingly impressive artist she is.
Jrpjej "Quedzoque Tole Tsık’u (Altıdoquehe Dolet tsık’u yi wored)" (2023) (from Şefitse: Circassian Songs of XX Century)
Jrpjej are ethnic Circassian musicians from Russia, although I think they skipped out of there following the commencement of the unpleasantness. The album this track comes from was released on 21 May 2023, the day on which Circassians commemorate the massacres and ethnic cleansing inflicted on their kinfolk in the late 19th century, an event sometimes characterised as the Circassian Genocide.
Alasdair Roberts, Amble Skuse & David McGuinness "The Fair Flower Of Northumberland" (2018) (from What News)
"The Fair Flower of Northumberland" is one of those well known folk tunes and I have heard a good few different versions of it (including one by the Unthanks). This sees Roberts singing while McGuinness plays piano and Skuse provides mysterious electronic treatments.
Rachel Unthank & The Winterset "I Wish" (2007) (from The Bairns)
This is another olde folk tune from the early Unthanks album I mentioned in the last mailing. I think this is another song a lot of people have sung.
ØXN "The Trees They Do Grow High" (2023) (from Cyrm)
And finally we have this widely performed traditional tune, here by weird folk supergroup ØXN, with Katie Kim on lead vocals.
No comments:
Post a Comment