jeremyfingertips

Free and legal MP3: Find the Others (powerful electronic-acoustic amalgam)

“We Stared at the World” begins as a gentle song oscillating mysteriously between the electronic and acoustic.

“We Stared at the World” – Find the Others

“We Stared at the World” begins as a gentle song oscillating mysteriously between the electronic and acoustic. Front man Andy Sheppard fills our head with his conversational tenor. Listen attentively and you may begin to hear a variety of openings in the muted landscape, soft sounds implying larger worlds. Urgency arrives un-urgently: halfway through the song all sorts of things start happening, and the layers of instrumentation become more overtly fascinating and gratifying–guitar sounds, string sounds, a determined parade of clicking-clopping percussion sounds.

And, actual drum sounds. It took me a while for it to register but this halfway point is where we begin to hear what sound like real drums being smacked with real sticks. It’s a sound that I think gives the song such a satisfying climax, during the final iteration of the chorus, beginning around 2:47. There’s something about the various juxtapositions on display right here (the organic vs. the electronic, the gentle vocal vs. the percussive accompaniment, the melodic vs. the beat-driven) that together strike me as both powerful and poignant, but also fleeting: in 12 or 13 seconds everything’s gone, replaced by 30-plus seconds of ambient tinkling and droning, a kind of sonic after-image, rendering everything previously heard abruptly dreamlike. I like that a song ostensibly about staring turns out to be so indirect, even inscrutable.

Given the band’s name, Find The Others is an ironically elusive project. It appears to be a one-man operation (the album credits Sheppard as the only performer), even as the press photo features two people (and a blank third). Web resources identify Sheppard’s location alternately as either Toronto or British Columbia, so let’s at least assume he’s Canadian—even as he shipped himself off to Iceland to work with Valgeir Sigurðsson (Sigur Rós, Björk, Feist, Nico Muhly, and then some). The end result was the album Empire of Time, on which you’ll find this song. The album was released back in April 2015; I heard it much later in the year via Insomnia Radio.

Close your eyes and hear the call

Eclectic Playlist Series 2.09 – Dec. 2015

I picked up the song “How or Why” from Jennifer Castle after hearing it for the first time via the Said the Gramophone year-end best-of list in 2014. It’s already a year later, that venerable and eclectic blog has just posted its latest year-end best-of list, and in and around the bracing mix of obscurities and pop smashes I will no doubt find a few more gems that float the Fingertips boat, as it were. Not everyone’s idea of eclectic listening is the same, to be sure; I don’t usually love all 100 songs on the list but I do love being given the opportunity to hear them. And most of all I love the care and attention given both to music and ideas there; if I were more whimsical and/or poetic, more of my posts would read like more of Said the Gramophone’s.

But I digress. We have come to the last EPS mix of 2015, which means that the artist list will re-set again next month and you will in 2016 begin to hear some of the same artists you may have heard either in 2014 or 2015 (or, in the case of particular favorites, both). And still there are plenty of as-yet unheard bands and musicians, both current and of past eras, who will show up on playlists here in the new year. Because that’s what I do. As for this particular mix, first of all, how on earth was that Marvin Gaye song unreleased? And if I must listen to 16-year-olds, give me 16-year-old Rachel Sweet in 1978, please. And yes, Genesis made some excellent music back in the day, extending at least all the way to 1981’s Abacab, which in retrospect straddled an admirable line between the complex, proggy stuff of their youth and the top-40 fodder they were getting ready to make. “No Reply At All”—featuring the Earth, Wind & Fire horns, no less—flummoxed older fans and yet with the benefit of years seems an almost unprecedented blend of the catchy (it reached the top 30 in the U.S.) and the intricate; the bass line alone is worth the price of admission.

“How or Why” – Jennifer Castle (Pink City, 2014)
“Gone With the Wind is My Love” – Rita & the Tiaras (single, 1967)
“New Killer Star” – David Bowie (Reality, 2003)
“Everything’s Coming Our Way” – Santana (Santana III, 1971)
“White Knuckles” – Boh Doran (Boh Doran EP, 2015)
“No Reply At All” – Genesis (Abacab, 1981)
“Barracuda” – Miho Hatori (Ecdysis, 2005)
“In My Command” – Crowded House (Together Alone, 1993)
“Keep Your Head to the Sky” – Earth, Wind & Fire (Head to the Sky, 1973)
“Casablanca Nights” – Johan Agebjörn (Casablanca Nights, 2011)
“Via Con Me” – Paolo Conte (Paris Milonga, 1981)
“Who Does Lisa Like?” – Rachel Sweet (Fool Around, 1978)
“Milk of Human Kindness” – Procol Harum (A Salty Dog, 1969)
“Raising the Skate” – Speedy Ortiz (Foil Deer, 2015)
“Tell Me To My Face” – Dan Fogelberg & Tim Weisberg (Twin Sons of Different Mothers, 1978)
“Carried” – Ebba Forsberg (Been There, 1998)
“This Love Starved Heart of Mine (It’s Killing Me)” – Marvin Gaye (unreleased single, 1965; available via Love Starved Heart compilation, 1994)
“When Things Go Wrong” – Robin Lane & the Chartbusters (Robin Lane & The Chartbuster, 1980)
“Black Heart Today” – Amy Ray (Stag, 2001)
“Sweet Soul Dream” – World Party (Goodbye Jumbo, 1990)

Free and legal MP3: Winter (dream pop for the soul)

If the concept/sub-genre of dream pop didn’t already exist, you would invent it right now to describe “All the Things You Do.”

“All the Things You Do” – Winter

If the concept/sub-genre of dream pop didn’t already exist, you would invent it right now to describe “All the Things You Do,” by the Boston-born, Los Angeles-based band Winter. Front woman Samira Winter floats her cloudless voice over a languid, semi-blurry soundscape and it’s kind of immediately hard not to love this. The buoyant verse is infused with ever-appealing suspended chords; the chorus—forward and forceful—fills the ear with satisfying, wall-of-sound resolution, complete with an unexpected and extra-satisfying minor-chord detour.

And speaking of extra-satisfying detours, don’t miss the instrumental break-cum-coda, starting at 2:30, with its dreamy jazz-guitar-ish accents and splendid bass guitar lead, which kind of makes you go wow, what happened to bass guitar players anyway? And then the whole thing kind of makes you go wow, don’t we just want to be doing this, enhancing our lives with heartwarming sound, feeling the magic and power of this at once distant and intimate connection? It’s the opposite of living in fear, brutalized by not only the existence of barbaric death-mongers but by the fear-mongers who scurry around in their wake. And I don’t mean to pollute the beauty of our modest enterprise here with too much talk of tragedy but I do so to remind you that beauty is not negated by darkness, but becomes further concentrated. And important.

“All the Things You Do” is a single released this month on Burger Records. Support the band by buying it here, and if you want a reason to spend 99 cents versus having it for free, note that the hi-res, lossless version is also just 99 cents.

photo credit: Mariana Borau

Free and legal MP3: Cashavelly Morrison

Graceful, commanding gothic tale

“Long-Haired Mare” – Cashavelly Morrison

I am never quite sure when and how musical simplicity transmutes into timeless musical power. It is certainly true that most simple songs are neither timeless nor powerful and likewise true that many powerful songs are not especially simple. But Cashavelly Morrison’s graceful and commanding “Long-Haired Mare” not only serves as evidence of the eternal potential of folk-like music but functions as an aural balm for any ears that might be feeling overstuffed with 21st-century musical commotion just about now.

The particular beauty I hear in this song is grounded in the acoustic guitar, in particular the supple notes slipped in after the first four iterations of the traditional strumming pattern on which the song is based. At once fluid and discrete, this understated motif (first heard in the introduction starting at 0:11), recurs throughout the song, between verses, and each time it comes around it sounds like a would-be confidant, a repeatedly viewed stranger with kind eyes, and if it is partial illusion to sense that the song’s poised unfolding and subtle accumulation of textures (heartbreaking drums, outcast steel guitar) is built entirely on the foundation of this humble motif, it is also partial non-illusion. The ear knows what it knows. Add to the aural amalgam Morrison’s country-air voice and instinctive, subtly syncopated phrasing and from humble roots—gothic tale, guitars, percussion—I sense a growing majesty and am myself humbled before it.

And the payoff for waiting patiently for each return of the sad and deft guitar motif? A full-fledged guitar solo, beginning at 3:26, as gripping as a resolutely self-effacing acoustic solo can possibly be.

Cashavelly Morrison is both the stage name taken on by the singer/songwriter Melissa MacLeod and the name of the musical project co-created and -peformed with her husband Ryan MacLeod; he is the masterly guitarist we’ve been hearing here. Cashavelly and Morrison are family names from Melissa’s side, lost in marriage. “Long-Haired Mare” is from the debut Cashavelly Morrison album, The Kingdom Belongs to a Child, self-released at the end of October. You can listen to the album via SoundCloud, and buy the album at the CM web site.

Free and legal MP3: Cousin Tony’s Brand New Firebird (evocative rocker w/ juxtaposed tempos)

Evocative rocker that manages to feel old-school and brand-new at the same time.

“Soothsayer” – Cousin Tony’s Brand New Firebird

Evocative rocker that manages to feel old-school and brand-new at the same time. While you are probably first going to notice the emotive and elastic vocals of front man Lachlan Rose, the song itself, upon examination, is a more than worthy vehicle for his talents.

To me, “Soothsayer”‘s charms are rooted in the way that, tempo-wise, it moves at a good clip on the one hand while not seeming to be in any hurry on the other. Interesting juxtapositions like this are often fun and rewarding in a pop song; this one in particular is accomplished, I think, by three different means. The first is the double-time accompaniment: while the song appears to be written in a moderately-paced 4/4 time, the rhythm guitars and some of the percussion are moving at twice that pace. Another element that reinforces the faster/slower sensation is how spread out and unrepetitive the verses are; the lyrics are given musical space, while the music comprises three separate sections, each picking up pace from the previous one. The overall effect is a 45-second, 16-measure melody that draws you in to a compelling but ambiguous story.

The third and perhaps most obvious thing creating this fast/slow tension down is the chorus, which feels like it slows the song down although doesn’t—all that happens is we lose the double-time backing: front man Lachlan Rose now sings with minimal assistance, but the song’s pace never actually changes. Most choruses in pop songs aim to burst forth with volume and energy, the better to come across as “catchy.” “Soothsayer” instead gives us a chorus that all but brings the song to a halt. “Catchy” seems suddenly besides the point when “arresting” is happening. (Such thinking might also underscore the recalcitrant fact that what might be the song’s most fetching moment, when the lyrics speed up with the phrase “thinking about yourself,” at 1:02, is never repeated.)

Cousin Tony’s Brand New Firebird is a trio from Melbourne. “Soothsayer,” their first single, has been out for a number of months, but their debut EP, Queen of Hearts, on which you’ll find this song, was released just last month in Australia. You can listen via SoundCloud. Thanks to Triple J Unearthed and the band for the MP3.

As you reach a certain age

Eclectic Playlist Series 2.08 – November 2015

Even within as curious and compelling a genre as Northern Soul (an odd, ex-post-facto, non-genre genre, truth be told; but a great one), “You Don’t Mean It” is a curiosity. Its origins are couched in contradictions if not outright mysteries, beginning with the simple fact that the singer, initially identified as Towanda Barnes, would later call herself Gloria, and pretty much disappear in any case. The recording itself, meanwhile, exudes such jittery energy as to sound warped and partially mistaken. The fact that it can lead us seamlessly into the acoustic stompiness of Carlene Carter’s Rockpile-fueled heyday tells us something about the profundity of what those Motown folks were up to for a blessed number of years (Northern Soul was founded upon nothing as much as an unmitigated worship of Motown castoffs). As for the seamless segue from Traffic’s self-titled semi-psychedelic 1968 album into a bravura reemergence in 2015 by the stately but beat-driven post-punk pioneers New Order, what that illustrates, clearly, is the aesthetic and emotional necessity of eclectic listening. (By the way, do yourself a monster favor and listen to the New Order song even if you don’t listen to the whole playlist. So good.) And yes: “October in the sky” I missed by a few days, but the closing song this month epitomizes the bittersweet joys of autumn with exquisite lyricism and melodicism, and on my Northern, soulful calendar it’s still autumn for a while yet, so drink it in and thanks for stopping by.

“Tayter County” – The Cavedogs (Joy Rides for Shut-Ins, 1990)
“Please Take Me Home” – The Bird and the Bee (Recreational Love, 2015)
“The Crook of My Good Arm” – Pale Young Gentlemen (Black Forest (Tra La La), 2008)
“The Story of a Rock and Roll Band” – Randy Newman (Born Again, 1979)
“When the Night Comes” – Jeff Lynne’s ELO (Alone in the Universe, 2015)
“You Don’t Mean It” – Towanda Barnes (single, 1967)
“Love is a 4-Letter Verb” – Carlene Carter (Blue Nun, 1980)
“Bothered” – Over the Rhine (Ohio, 2003)
“Don’t Change Your Plans” – Ben Folds Five (The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner, 1999)
“Forty Thousand Headmen” – Traffic (Traffic, 1968)
“Nothing But a Fool” – New Order (Music Complete, 2015)
“Watch Your Step” – Anita Baker (Rapture, 1986)
“Survivor” – Cindy Bullens (Desire Wire, 1978)
“Somewhere in Between” – Kate Bush (Aerial, 2005)
“Bankrobber” – The Clash (single, 1980)
“Bud” – Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass (Herb Alpert’s Ninth, 1967)
“Trouble” – Shawn Colvin (A Few Small Repairs, 1996)
“You Get What You Deserve” – Big Star (Radio City, 1974)
“Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)” – Arcade Fire (The Suburbs, 2010)
“The Birds Are Leaving” – Boo Hewerdine (Thanksgiving, 1999)

Free and legal MP3: The Whales

Short, enticing, well-crafted

“Marguerite” – The Whales

Short and enticing, “Marguerite” chugs along in a semi-garage-y world of droning sound with the enticing addition of some time signature complication: the song’s 4/4 momentum is given knowing little tugs by some well-placed 6/4 measures. A little of this goes a long way to my ears, as it indicates first and foremost that someone is paying attention, that there is some vivid musical creativity at work. No offense to groove-oriented music (maybe) but personally I am less convinced of musical artistry via what are essentially decorations (i.e., interesting sounds layered on top of a beat); I am more impressed with a creative intelligence that can work at the structural level. I mean, there’s choosing a paint color or two and there’s architecture, right? Not everyone operates at the same depth and that’s completely fine. I’m just saying…well, what am I saying? I seem to have digressed.

Oh and then there’s the subject matter, which is offbeat and refreshing, as “Marguerite” turns out to be about the French writer Marguerite Yourcenar, the first woman elected to the Académie française. (In the U.S. Yourcenar is probably best known for the 1951 novel Mémoires d’Hadrien.) As I sit with this song over repeated listens, I’m getting more and more of a Kinks vibe, but in the very best way—not a slavish homage but an intriguing contemporizing of the band’s mid-’60s drive, some elusive amalgam of horsepower and brainpower that gives, in my mind, the best rock’n’roll from any era its appeal and staying power.

The Whales are a six-piece band from the UK formed in 2013, about which not a lot of information is readily discoverable (blame in part the generic name). “Marguerite” is available via an admirable project: the British label Fat Cat Records has an ongoing SoundCloud page where it makes available as free downloads the best demos it receives, acknowledging that they simply don’t have the resources to sign every band that sends in a good song. You can visit the Fat Cat demo page here. Thanks to the Powerpopulist blog for the head’s up on the song.

Free and legal MP3: Thin Lear (conflicted nostalgia, tender urgency)

There is sweetness here, and pining, and a sense that it won’t end well because, well, nothing does in the long run.

“Second Nature” – Thin Lear

And speaking of the Kinks (of whom we really can’t speak enough), here we are treated to two fleeting lyrical references to the great British band, reinforcing a lovely song with a (now that I think about it) distinctly Daviesian brand of conflicted nostalgia. Even without being able to make too much of the lyrics here (and I can’t), there is sweetness, and pining, and a sense that it won’t end well because, well, nothing does in the long run.

Effortlessly melodic, “Second Nature” is propelled by a rhythmic, gently plucked electric guitars emphasizing the “on” beats (one and three) versus rock’n’roll’s classic backbeat (two and four) orientation (cf.: “It’s got a backbeat, you can’t lose it”). One clear lyrical feature here is the purposeful repetition of words and/or sounds in successive lines (e.g., “Sick to death/Sick in bed/Sic the dogs on us instead”), which may or may not be intended as a subtle augmentation of the title phrase but in any case adds to the song’s tender urgency. And I suggest you pay attention to the saxophone when it shows up (1:47, briefly; then, closing the song out from 2:31)—not just because you don’t hear a lot of saxophone in 2015 rock’n’roll but because there seems something inexplicably moving about hearing this instrument presented in such a straightforward way, something about the pure sound of it that captures the subtle heartache of the entire track. And throughout of course there’s the obvious contribution of Longo’s gentle, agile tenor, which lends memorable complexion to every upward sweep of melody.

Matt Longo is a gifted singer/songwriter, based in Queens, NY, whose work has been featured here twice previously, in 2011 and in 2013. He is performing with the name Thin Lear this time around, partially inspired by an absurd image from a dream he had one night. A six-song EP is due out later this fall; you’ll be able to buy it via Bandcamp, and can listen there in the meantime to his past recordings.

Free and legal MP3: Gramma’s Boyfriend (loose-limbed Daniel Johnston cover)

“I Live In My Broken Dreams” – Gramma’s Boyfriend

All music (and in fact all art of any kind) exists as an ongoing dynamic between existing form and free expression. The tighter a song adheres to a form, the more (in theory) a listener’s capacity to connect personally with it will depend upon the individual expressiveness of the performance. This is why (in theory, and honestly I’m just making this up as I go along) it’s so counterintuitively difficult to play the blues (or, at least, to play it effectively): the music is structurally rigid enough to require all sorts of expressiveness to have an impact, and yet adding expressiveness to something so inherently structured is a challenge indeed.

And here is “I Live My Broken Dreams”—a Daniel Johnston song that is not exactly blues (though not too far from it), but certainly a composition offering a lot of familiarity in terms of melody and chords; you’ve heard this basic form before. And here is Haley Bonar (rhymes with “honor”), the singer/songwriter (featured here back in 2008 and 2011 on her own) now fronting the peppy, intermittently frantic Minneapolis band Gramma’s Boyfriend. Not the same sound as when last we left her. But the character of voice required to command attention behind a mere guitar serves her well in this new, noisier context. More to the original point, Bonar’s expressive qualities (from tone to phrasing to just general cool-sounding-ness) shoot through the song’s somewhat homely form and help transmute it from a fractured, fragile oddity into a chewy but loose-limbed rave-up. Her four band mates deftly assist, laying down a groove at once dirty and bouncy, a semi-chaotic mix of synth squiggles and reverbed noise. With a very sudden ending.

“I Live My Broken a Dreams” is from the album PERM, released this week on Graveface Records. The band previously released an eight-song album called The Human Eye in 2013.

photo credit: Graham Tolbert Photography

Free and legal MP3:Fort Lean (strong & nuanced rock’n’roll)

A well-crafted, astutely-produced song that feels almost like an anachronism here in our compressed, blinky-boopy mid-’10s musical landscape.

“Cut to the Chase” – Fort Lean

Transcending the sing-song-y swing of its 12/8 rhythm, “Cut to the Chase” pays dividends with a chorus of unexpected heft and resolve. Although I’m not sure how, the chorus’s arresting, bottom-heavy power doubles back and sheds new light on a verse I might otherwise have heard as lightweight and vaguely generic; in its second iteration the verse, to my ears, now seems altered, deepened, without changing in any significant way. It’s almost like the aural equivalent of an optical illusion, effected by a band with an uncommon capacity for both strength and nuance.

The subtleties are what add up for me here. For one, there’s this appealing percussive sound that launches the song and weaves itself through the mix; I have no idea what it is but it has the sound of an electronic beat that someone is somehow playing acoustically. It’s very engaging. Then there’s the ever-so-slight instrumental addition in the verse the second time through, another elusive sound, this one landing on the ear halfway between a guitar and a keyboard. This addition is less obviously engaging but surely adds to the song’s developing allure. The best nuanced change of all, to my ears, is the bass line that gets added to the song’s opening guitar riff when it recurs at the end—a mysteriously fabulous supplement all the more fabulous because it was so theoretically unnecessary. The end result is a well-crafted, astutely-produced song that spreads out and breathes and feels almost like an anachronism here in our compressed, blinky-boopy mid-’10s musical landscape.

Fort Lean is a five-piece band from Brooklyn. “Cut to the Chase” has been floating around the internet for the better part of a year; the group’s debut LP, Quiet Day, was originally slated for a spring 2015 release, but just ended up coming out here in October, on the Brooklyn-based label Ooh La La Records. Thanks to the band for the MP3.