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“Dael” - If I were seriously writing about my preconceptions about this album, I’d have spoken about how I guess I have a certain preconceived notion of IDM. By and large, it consists of odd rhythm structures cut loose from what we’d expect of, say, house or techno, with tons of weird synths. Well, the weird synths part is true but I wouldn’t say these rhythms are particularly odd or changing when compared to Aphex Twin in “Windowlicker”, for example. This seems to operate with a pretty standard breakbeat. It actually makes it seem more danceable than a lot of other IDM, lol.
“Clipper” - And we’ve got static! I love that kick here. A lot of the sounds here sound like they were sampled from a video game. I like the overall effect a lot.
“Leterel” - Okay, so we’re getting a lot of those distorted sounds? I guess I understand more why they recommend listening this on vinyl as to get more noise added on top of it. The relative lack of drums compared to the last two tracks is also a pretty interesting effect. If “Dael” was more danceable than other IDM tracks, this is certainly more in line with ambient music.
“Rotar” - Seems kind of like a cross between “Clipper” and “Leterel”, having a similar pulse and glitchy noises to the former even with more minimal drums like the latter. Without as much building as the other tracks, this is the first song I got a little bored with.
“Stud” - At about two minutes into this song, I thought my dog started barking lmao. I was worried the ending was going to be just two minutes of the same synth melody repeating over and over again, so I’m glad they took a different approach to it.
“Eutow” - After five long songs, I was curious to see what these guys would do with a shorter song. The build is less dramatic, but it’s hard to lose with a beat like that.
“C/Pach” - Ohhhh okay this is good. I was reading through Autechre’s Spotify bio which states their emphasis on “moody texture”, and I’d be hard pressed to think of a song on this album that exemplifies that better than this one. (Okay, maybe “Leterel”.)
“Gnit” - I can’t decide if I wish this song had a longer ending or not. It’s odd - compared to songs that have significantly longer endings (“Stud”), I thought this would have a bit more payoff after the build.
“Overand” - Maybe the most soothing track on here? This was really different from nearly every other song on this album, so I’m not sure how to feel about it.
“Rsdio” - Was kind of hoping that they’d go full out Blanck Mass on the finale and just make everything loud as hell. But maybe for this band a lot of build with a fake fadeout and a 90 second noise outro makes more sense.
Impressions: Well, this was an interesting one. If I had to summarize this, this sounded at a lot of times like it was skirting the lines between ambient and techno, with some results more interesting than others. Because I tend to like electronic music automatically, none of the tracks seemed overly long for me, but as with a lot of electronic music, it is super repetitive! And sometimes that repetition can be exhausting (see: "Stud"). So I'd get why other people wouldn't like this. But otherwise, this album has tons of great electronic textures that are super interesting to listen to and get lost in; it's the kind of album I'd want to listen to with a pair of nice headphones.
46. I Never Loved a Man the Way I Loved You by Aretha Franklin
Background on Aretha Franklin: Aretha Louise Franklin (born March 25, 1942) is an American singer and songwriter. Franklin began her career as a child singing gospel at New Bethel Baptist Church in Detroit, where her father, C. L. Franklin, was minister. In 1960, at the age of 18, she embarked on a secular career, recording for Columbia Records but only achieving modest success.
Following her signing to Atlantic Records in 1967, Franklin achieved commercial acclaim and success with songs such as "Respect", "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman", "Spanish Harlem" and "Think". By the end of the 1960s decade she had gained the title "The Queen of Soul". Franklin eventually recorded a total of 112 charted singles on Billboard, including 77 Hot 100 entries, 17 top ten pop singles, 100 R&B entries and twenty number-one R&B singles, becoming the most charted female artist in the chart's history. Franklin also recorded acclaimed albums such as I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You, Lady Soul, Young, Gifted and Black and Amazing Grace before experiencing problems with her record company by the mid-1970s.
After her father was shot in 1979, Franklin left Atlantic and signed with Arista Records, finding success with her part in the film The Blues Brothers and with the albums Jump to It and Who's Zoomin' Who?. In 1998, Franklin won international acclaim for singing the opera aria "Nessun dorma", at the Grammys of that year replacing Luciano Pavarotti. Later that same year, she scored her final Top 40 recording with "A Rose Is Still a Rose". Franklin's other popular and well known hits include "Rock Steady", "Jump to It", "Freeway of Love", "Who's Zoomin' Who", "Chain Of Fools", "I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)" (with George Michael), and a remake of The Rolling Stones song "Jumpin' Jack Flash".
Franklin has won a total of 18 Grammy Awards and is one of the best-selling musical artists of all time, having sold over 75 million records worldwide. Franklin has been honored throughout her career including a 1987 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, in which she became the first female performer to be inducted. She was inducted to the UK Music Hall of Fame in 2005. In August 2012, Franklin was inducted into the GMA Gospel Music Hall of Fame. Franklin is listed in at least two all-time lists on Rolling Stone magazine, including the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time; and the 100 Greatest Singers of All Time.
Background on I Never Loved a Man the Way I Loved You: I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You is the eleventh studio album by American singer Aretha Franklin. Released on March 10, 1967 by Atlantic Records, It went to number 2 on the Billboard album chart and number 1 on the magazine's Top R&B Selling chart. It was certified Gold by the RIAA in 1967. It received a number 83 ranking on Rolling Stone magazine's 2003 list of the 500 greatest albums of all time and inclusion in both the 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2005) and 1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die (2008). The album included two top-10 singles: "Respect" was a #1 single on Billboard's Hot 100 Pop singles chart, and "I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)" peaked at number 9. The album was rated the 10th best album of the 1960s by Pitchfork.
My preconceptions: The good news is that unlike some other albums listened to here, I am familiar with the massive hit on this one! The bad news is that outside of "Respect" and "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman", I'm not really familiar with Aretha Franklin at all. I'm expecting something polished along the lines of Modern Sounds in County and Western Music, with maybe more of a pop influence. I'm not expecting every other song to sound like "Respect" (or really, many of them to sound like it), so I'm excited to find out what other directions it goes in!
“Respect” - I mean, what is there to say about this song?
“Drown in My Own Tears” - I like the way there’s a sense of space at the beginning of this song between the piano, the bass, and Aretha Franklin’s voice. I think it nicely builds some tension before the drums come in. And when those backup vocals kick in, too!
“I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)” - Okay, so these songs are way more soul than pop, but who cares? I’m honestly a little transfixed with the way these songs build up - it’s similar structurally to the best dance music in a way.
“Soul Serenade” - Can’t help but feel like this one sort of abruptly ended (and it’s not a very long song!).
“Don’t Let Me Lose This Dream”/“Baby, Baby, Baby” - One thing that I love about both these songs is how Franklin throws her voice into its upper range to convey urgency behind the message. Of course, this isn’t a super novel thing, but she does it so well here.
“Dr. Feelgood (Love Is a Serious Business)” - Is it just me or does this have a very similar piano melody to “Baby, Baby, Baby”?
“Good Times” - This is the first upbeat track on this in a while, huh? I like the swing style of this one, though.
“Save Me” - It’s kind of weird to hear a more guitar-driven track on this album. The horns add what I guess you could call more “soul” sound to it, but this really comes across as more rock to me, which is kind of interesting!
“A Change Is Gonna Come” - I said to myself at the end of this song, “Wait, isn’t this the Sam Cooke song?” Glad I was right on that one. Otherwise, I love albums with good opening and closing tracks, and really, even if they’re not originals it’s hard to beat this and “Respect”.
Impressions: It’s easy to see why this album made Aretha Franklin such a star - her vocal performances on every track are obviously phenomenal. Musically, the album is a lot more ballad-focused than I anticipated it being, but unlike most albums that fall into a similar pattern, I never found myself particularly bored by it, though I think that’s because most of the songs are right around the 3 minute mark, with many being even shorter than that. While this may be an upside for me, trying to speak more objectively I would argue this is its only downside - I found myself wishing that some songs like “Soul Serenade” were longer. But if anything, “too short” is a more positive criticism than “too long”; I found myself wanting to listen to more songs, more of Aretha’s voice. And for any artist, that’s no easy feat.
Favorite tracks: “Respect”, “Drown in My Own Tears”, “I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Loved You)”
Background on The Streets: The Streets is an English alternative hip hop music group from Birmingham, England, led by the vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Mike Skinner. For The Streets' first album, Original Pirate Material, Skinner wanted to take UK garage in a new direction with material reflecting the lifestyle of clubbers in Britain. The track "Let's Push Things Forward" reflects the philosophy of the album. The album was successful both with critics and the general public. In the UK, the album was nominated for the Mercury Prize.
Skinner's second album, A Grand Don't Come for Free, which is a concept album about a short period in the protagonist's life. The events depicted include losing £1,000, the start of a new relationship, going on holiday, breaking up, and eventually finding the money again. The album entered the UK album charts at number two, but later reached number one. success of this album and its singles led to a re-kindling of interest in the first album, Original Pirate Material, which re-entered the UK album charts and beat its original chart peak of two years earlier. Skinner's third studio album under The Streets name, The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living, was released on 10 April 2006 in the United Kingdom and on 25 April 2006 in North America. In the UK it entered the album chart at number one. It was a change in direction from his first two albums, the lyrical theme moving away from the stories about working class Britain and instead focusing on the ups and downs of the fame that Skinner encountered after the success of his previous albums.
In September 2008, Skinner released his fourth studio album, Everything Is Borrowed. One song from the album was on Skinner's Myspace page for a while before being replaced by a cover of "Your Song". In a posting on his Myspace blog, Skinner noted that the group's upcoming LP would contain "peaceful, positive vibes" in comparison with 2006's The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living. The final Streets album, Computers and Blues, was released on 7 February 2011, the first single being "Going Through Hell". The Streets ended that year after their final show at The Big Reunion. On December 22nd 2017, The Streets released two new tracks: "Burn Bridges" and "Sometimes I Hate My Friends More Than My Enemies" on streaming services, marking the first new music release in six years.
Background on A Grand Don't Come for Free: A Grand Don't Come for Free is the second studio album from British garage and hip hop act The Streets. is a rap opera which follows the story of its protagonist's relationship with a girl named Simone, alongside the mysterious loss of £1,000 from his home (the eponymous "grand"). The album can be considered a concept album, since the tracks on the album together in the exact order form a larger scenario overall.
In his book The Story of the Streets, Skinner explained his decision to create a story that ran through the album: "The reason I decided to write A Grand Don't Come for Free as episodes from a single unfolding narrative was because I'd got so into my songwriting manuals and books by Hollywood screen-writing gurus – not just Robert McKee but Syd Field and John Truby as well – and I wanted to try and put what I'd learnt from them into practice. Every song needs a drama at the centre of it, and once you have the drama, the song writes itself – that's what I firmly believed, and still do believe. I'm not alone in this convicition, either. It's something pretty much all rappers seem to be sure about."
My preconceptions: Sort of like Frank, this is another album I was worried would be a bit divisive. Really, calling any album released after 2000 a "classic" seems a bit premature, especially if it's not a beloved underground album, like Apologies to the Queen Mary (which we'll get to...eventually). That, and if we're being honest it's also a rap album by a white guy, which automatically puts it in dicey cultural territory for many people. However, I've listened to "Blinded by the Lights" and "Fit But You Know It" before and liked both (especially "Blinded by the Lights") and I really wanted to hear what all the fuss was about with A) the story in the album and B) what The Streets supposedly did for UK garage. Guess we'll find out!
Okay! I'm not sure how much I'll be able to do this weekend and I'm still roughly 20 albums behind schedule, so I'm trying to go quickly here. Here's the Streets:
“It Was Supposed to Be So Easy” - Okay, props for the cinematic horn intro. And also a video store reference, which makes me wonder if the story here would have happened if streaming Netflix had been around in 2004. Is it just me or are the singing parts louder than the rapped parts? And some more dramatic strings at the end!
“Could Well Be In” - This song is cute.
“Not Addicted” - In my impressions, I talked about the Streets and UK garage and it’s kind of funny since none of these beats are really garage beats - this one comes closest, but I still don’t think it’s garage. The prechorus on this one is kind of grating but it’s almost certainly intentionally so and it’s also funny, so it’s kind of a wash.
“Blinded by the Lights” - I love the half-time house beat on this song. I think the part of the story told here is really helped by Skinner’s stream-of-consciousness delivery; he comes across pretty sympathetic on a song like this.
“Wouldn’t Have It Any Other Way” - Another cute song. It’s kind of weird that a lot of the non-electronic samples get cut off randomly? Like the horns on “It Was Supposed to be So Easy” or the piano on this song.
“Get Out Of My House” - Oh, so Simone gets to be real and gets like one verse on the whole album? Okay.
“Fit But You Know It” - This is kind of like the Strokes, innit?
“Such a Twat” - ‘bovvered’ ‘Mac Donald’s’
“What Is He Thinking?” - Because this is an album, I’d like to think that roughly 25 minutes ago, the narrator started this relationship and then 12 minutes later things went band and then another 12 minutes later he found out that she’s cheating on him after he also cheated on her. Tough times! Nice touch with the strings on the big reveal that SOMEONE has been ‘shagging’ Simone.
“Dry Your Eyes” - This is kind of like Oasis, innit? Anyway, it is kind of wild that for an album supposedly about a bag of stolen money, it’s really a love story (kind of).
“Empty Cans” - The rewinding halfway through the album is a really neat trick, as is the use of the piano to indicate that things are going to be Different this time.
Impressions: So it’s not really a UK garage album, and it’s not really an album about losing a lot of money. It’s also not really an album you can listen to piece by piece, and it’s an album you’ve really got to pay attention to with a lyric sheet or it won’t make any sense. The coat thing in “What Is He Thinking” really confused me the first time and if I listen to this album again, it probably will continue to do so. As a whole, I’m not sure how I feel about the whole Mike/Simone story. The relationship stuff is probably more relatable overall, but the I can’t help but wonder what direction the album would’ve gone on if the relationship was more incidental to the plot. Musically, it’s all over the place so you can’t really say what’s unique about other than its choppy instrumental samples. Admittedly, most of the production at least suits the mood of the songs, even if I don’t like it (“Dry Your Eyes”). Lyrically speaking, some of the lines are pretty bad (“You’re so selfish, but what about us, as in pair?) and Mike Skinner’s singing leaves a lot to be desired, especially when it’s super loud for no reason. But his storytelling is pretty clever. Overall, I’m impressed with the technicality of it and I’m glad I just sat down and experienced the whole thing in one sitting. It’s hard to listen to individual songs on it, especially when either the protagonist’s attitude is intentionally off-putting or there are tons of tiny details that only make sense in the context of the album, so it’s hard to tell how much I’ll be listening to in the future.
Background on James Brown: James Brown was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, musician, record producer and bandleader. A progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century popular music and dance, he is often referred to as the "Godfather of Soul". In a career that lasted 50 years, he influenced the development of several music genres.
Brown began his career as a gospel singer in Toccoa, Georgia. He joined an R&B vocal group, the Gospel Starlighters (which later evolved into the Flames) founded by Bobby Byrd, in which he was the lead singer. First coming to national public attention in the late 1950s as a member of the singing group The Famous Flames with the hit ballads "Please, Please, Please" and "Try Me", Brown built a reputation as a tireless live performer with the Famous Flames and his backing band, sometimes known as the James Brown Band or the James Brown Orchestra. His success peaked in the 1960s with the live album Live at the Apollo and hit singles such as "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag", "I Got You (I Feel Good)" and "It's a Man's Man's Man's World".
During the late 1960s he moved from a continuum of blues and gospel-based forms and styles to a profoundly "Africanized" approach to music-making that influenced the development of funk music. By the early 1970s, Brown had fully established the funk sound after the formation of the J.B.s with records such as "Get Up (I Feel Like Being a) Sex Machine" and "The Payback". He also became noted for songs of social commentary, including the 1968 hit "Say It Loud – I'm Black and I'm Proud". Brown continued to perform and record until his death from pneumonia in 2006.
Brown recorded 17 singles that reached number one on the Billboard R&B charts. He also holds the record for the most singles listed on the Billboard Hot 100 chart which did not reach number one. Brown has received honors from many institutions, including inductions into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Songwriters Hall of Fame. In Joel Whitburn's analysis of the Billboard R&B charts from 1942 to 2010, James Brown is ranked as number one in The Top 500 Artists. He is ranked seventh on the music magazine Rolling Stone's list of its 100 greatest artists of all time. Rolling Stone has also cited Brown as the most sampled artist of all time.
Background on Live at the Apollo: Live at the Apollo is a live album by James Brown and the Famous Flames, recorded at the Apollo Theater in Harlem and released in 1963. It was recorded on the night of October 24, 1962 at Brown's own expense. Although not credited on the album cover or label, Brown's vocal group, The Famous Flames (Bobby Byrd, Bobby Bennett, and Lloyd Stallworth), played an important co-starring role in Live at the Apollo, and are included with Brown by M.C. Fats Gonder in the album's intro. Brown's record label, King Records, originally opposed releasing the album, believing that a live album featuring no new songs would not be profitable. The label finally relented under pressure from Brown and his manager Bud Hobgood.
To King's surprise, Live at the Apollo was an amazingly rapid seller. It spent 66 weeks on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart, peaking at #2. Many record stores, especially in the southeast US, found themselves unable to keep up with the demand for the product, eventually ordering several cases at a time. R&B disc jockeys often would play side 1 in its entirety, pausing (usually to insert commercials) only to return to play side 2 in full as well. The side break occurred in the middle of the long track "Lost Someone".
In 2003, the album was ranked number 25 (24 in 2012) on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. In 2004, it was one of 50 recordings chosen that year by the Library of Congress to be added to the National Recording Registry. In 1998, this album was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
My preconceptions: Halfway through the year, and we get our second career-defining live album. Like Johnny Cash, I also know little about James Brown save for a few songs like "I Got You (I Feel Good)" and "Say It Loud - I'm Black and I'm Proud". However, I do know the extent of his influence more. I remember the first time I saw Janelle Monáe live and she basically directly cribbed his cape draping at the end of her show. So I'm expecting something very high energy, and given that there's a 6 minute medley on this containing 8 unique songs, I don't think I'm going to be disappointed. What I'll be listening for will be the arrangements, which I'm kind of hoping are pretty extravagant, and to what extent Brown's personality shines through on the album.
“Introduction by Fats Gonder / Opening Fanfare” - There’s already the orchestral hits I was hoping for, so I’m already satisfied in some respect! (Though this bit always makes me think of Eric Andre’s “Hit me 100 times!” bit. The fanfare was more…rock and roll? than I was expecting.
“I’ll Go Crazy” - Maybe it’s just the way it was recorded, but it seems weird that there was no huge applause for James Brown when he came on stage? It almost seems the way the crowd noise is being used; it’s being manipulated - and I don’t mean that in a bad way! Certainly some live albums (like one of my favorites, Daft Punk’s Alive 2007) do it well. And this is one of those songs! The way the crowd noise heightens the anticipation of James Brown’s voice starting the song really sets the mood, sort of like the prisoners cheering on Johny Cash’s line about shooting a man in Reno just to watch him die. Anyway, I wrote so much about this that the next song has already started.
“Try Me” - Now let’s talk about the way the songs work in the context of a live set. I love it when songs are sped up during live sets. And while I’ve never listened to the original version of this song, if this is a ballad, it sure is a fast one! Naturally, I’m very into it. Also, I love these horns! It kind of makes me wish horns were used more often in contemporary popular music.
“Instrumental Bridge #1” / “Think” - These very short instrumental bridges strike me as a bit odd but if they highlight the band, I’m okay with it! As for “Think”, I’m reading a bit more about it (on Wikipedia) and according to the source (Wikipedia), this song “anticipated Brown’s later funk music”. This surprises me a bit because I’d expect it to be a bit more rhythmically syncopated, but it’s not really. All pseduo-technical musings aside, I’m at least very impressed with how much skill surely went into playing the horns on this song!
“Instrumental Bridge #2” / “I Don’t Mind” - I’ve talked about the horns, but there’s so much to listen to on this record - I’m thinking of how good the interplay between the bass and the lead guitar on this song is.
“Instrumental Bridge #3” / “Lost Someone” - Thinking about another instrument now: James Brown’s voice. I think he uses his alternating between his passionate upper register and his softer end here. And Speaking of crowd noise, Brown himself uses it to great effect here with the call and response of his “Ow”s! What a way to be a showman without any sort of visual support.
Medley: It’s a bit weird thinking about how, after a ten minute version of a single song, we get a whole lot of songs in more or less the same amount of time! Overall, though, it’s hard not to be impressed with the amount of songs
“Night Train” - “Are you ready for New York City?” “Yeah, yeah, yeah!” was way funnier than it needed to be. Anyway, to highlight another important instrument here: the keyboard playing on this album has also been phenomenal, including on this song! It seems to be more prominent here, but somehow on a song with tons of horns, it’s the instrument that adds the most flair. That being said, it does sound a bit baseball organ-y.
I love comparisons, but I hate to go for the obvious one. That being said, let's go for the obvious one here against At Folsom Prison. If that album was a demonstration of how well minimalist arrangement can work in a live setting, than this album gives the argument for why maximalist arrangement works better. In any given song, there's just so much to listen to - the horns, as I've mentioned a lot, but also the guitars, the keyboards, and of course, the voice! And for many of us, that's what we want in our live sets: exceptional musicianship, with plenty to listen or dance (or do drugs in a huge field) to with a lot of great songs to go along with it. Of course, I kind of cherry picked those qualities, but James Brown has all three in spades. As with Johnny Cash, I can see how this album functions both as a greatest hits compilation and a good introduction all in one; unlike Johnny Cash, I feel that my unfamiliarity with these songs helped the experience! I was able to focus a lot more on the musicianship and energy in the live album as opposed to thinking "Do I like this particular song or not?" All in all, this album was extremely good and that's about it!!
Background on Erykah Badu: Erica Abi Wright, known professionally as Erykah Badu), is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, disc jockey, activist, and actress. Badu's career began after opening a show for D'Angelo in 1994 in Fort Worth; record label executive Kedar Massenburg was highly impressed with her performance and signed her to Kedar Entertainment. Her first album, Baduizm, was released on February 11, 1997. It spawned three singles: "On & On", "Next Lifetime" and "Otherside of the Game". The album was certified triple Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Badu's first live album, Live, was released on November 18, 1997 and was certified double Platinum by the RIAA. Badu is hailed as the queen of neo soul.
Badu's second studio album, Mama's Gun, was released on October 31, 2000. It spawned three singles: "Bag Lady", which became her first top 10 single on the Billboard Hot 100 peaking at #6, "Didn't Cha Know?" and "Cleva". The album was certified Platinum by the RIAA. Badu's third album, Worldwide Underground, was released on September 16, 2003. It generated three singles: "Love of My Life (An Ode to Hip-Hop)", "Danger" and "Back in the Day (Puff)" with 'Love' becoming her second song to reach the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at #9. The album was certified Gold by the RIAA.p Badu's fourth album, New Amerykah Part One, was released on February 26, 2008. It spawned two singles: "Honey" and "Soldier". New Amerykah Part Two was released in 2010 and fared well both critically and commercially. It contained the album's lead single "Window Seat", which led to controversy.
Influenced by R&B, 1970s soul, and 1980s hip hop, Badu became associated with the neo soul subgenre in the 1990s along with artists like D'Angelo. Her work has often been compare to jazz great Billie Holiday. Early in her career, Badu was recognizable for her eccentric style, which often included wearing very large and colorful headwraps. She was a core member of the Soulquarians. As an actress, she has played a wide range of supporting roles in movies including Blues Brothers 2000, The Cider House Rules and House of D. She also speaks at length in the documentaries Before the Music Dies and The Black Power Mixtapes.
Background on Baduzm: Baduizm is the debut album by American R&B and neo soul singer-songwriter Erykah Badu, released on February 11, 1997 by Kedar Records. After leaving university in order to concentrate on music full-time, Badu then began touring with her cousin, Robert "Free" Bradford, where she recorded a 19-song demo, Country Cousins, which attracted the attention of Kedar Massenburg. He set Badu up to record a duet with D'Angelo, "Your Precious Love," and eventually signed her to a record deal with Universal Records. Recording sessions for the album took place during January to October 1996 at Battery Studios in New York City, Sigma Sounds & Ivory Studios in Philadelphia, and Dallas Sound Lab in Dallas.
Upon release, Baduizm was met with universal acclaim from music critics who praised the album's musical style and Badu's "artistic vision"; other critics noted similarities between Badu and Billie Holiday. Baduizm was a commercial success debuting at number two on the Billboard charts and number one on the US Billboard Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums, the album was awarded with a variety of certifications, it was certified three times platinum by Recording Industry Association of America, Gold by British Phonographic Industry and Gold by the Canadian Recording Industry Association.
The album was promoted with the release of four singles: "On & On", "Next Lifetime", "Otherside of the Game", and "Apple Tree". The album won numerous accolades including winning awards for "On & On" and a Grammy Award for Best R&B Album at the 40th Grammy Awards in 1998. The album serves as a landmark album in the neo soul genre, Baduizm's success earned Erykah Badu popularity at the time and helped establish her as one of the emerging neo soul genre's leading artists. Along with fellow contemporaries such as D'Angelo's Brown Sugar (1995) and Maxwell's Urban Hang Suite (1996), the album has been recognized by music writers for beginning neo soul's popularity and helping the genre obtain commercial visibility at the time.
My preconceptions: A kind of funny story: My first real exposure to Erykah Badu is during a college tour in 2010; I'm hanging out with a guy who my host was friends with and he played New Amerykah Part Two on repeat after he left the room until he got back, at which point he realized he had left it on and apologized. But I liked it! However, in the intervening 8 years, I haven't really listened to Erykah Badu. I foolishly assumed But You Caint Use My Phone wasn't reaalllyy an album and without any other new material, I haven't felt inspired to go back. Nor is the legend around her legacy really as strong as someone like D'Angelo or Lauryn Hill's (perhaps incorrectly!). As such, I'm curious to explore that legacy a little more here.
“Rim Shot” - Ooh, that bass. That’s good. Also, kind of funny that this song gives so much attention to the drums when the beat here is much more simple than the one in, say…
…”On & On” - God, again, I really love the bass in this! Maybe it’s just mixed higher than what I’ve been used to compared to other music I’ve been listening to lately? I don’t know. But I kind of fixate on it when I listen to this song. But when it’s accompanied with a gentle keyboard melody like that, it kind of takes center stage all on its own. In terms of the lyrics, I guess I’m going to have to stop myself now before I go down a google rabbit hole learning more about the Nation of Gods and Earths. (That’s not a bad thing! It’s interesting.)
“Appletree” - Oh, okay, so it sounds like this whole album is going to be allegorical. This is the first song I’m trying to focus on Erykah’s voice, too - the word ‘restraint’ comes to mind. You can hear her get more powerful in some parts - on some of the “apple tree”s in the chorus, or on “do we, do weee” towards the end, or the “down”s at the end. But that’s an exception that’s incredibly satisfying to listen to.
“Otherside of the Game” - There’s a saxophone (?) sound that plays periodically throughout the beginning of the song and I don’t know why, but it screams “90s” to me. That’s entirely a free association though, so feel free to disregard it. I also suppose it’s a credit to the cohesion of the album so far that I never would’ve guessed any of the Roots were playing on this song. (I totally thought Questlove was playing on the intro track.) I’m surprised how much I enjoyed this overall for a six minute ballad. Kind of incredible this was a single.
“Sometimes (Mix #9)” - I was kind of feeling the groove here!
“Next Lifetime” - me, whispering quietly while listening to the opening of the song: nooooo don’t do it Erykah! Turns out she might anyway. The chorus on this song is really good.
“Afro” - I don’t know why, but my favorite part about this is the very audible reverb on Erykah’s vocals.
“Certainly” - Kind of cool that stylistically the the intro to this song flows was very similar to the skit. Also, BASS! Also, going along with the previous allegorical lyrics: some food for thought “Erykah Badu said that the main theme of the song is how Africans were brought to America and where controlled and forced to change.”
“4 Leaf Clover” - Okay, I love the piano(s) on this one. Generally speaking, musically this sounds way more dramatic than a lot of the other previous tracks, and I wonder if that’s in large part because it’s more uptempo.
“No Love” - Really, this whole album has seemed like it’s been on more of a poppier trajectory since the beginning. We’ve shifted from lengthy ballads to songs with bigger hooks and more intricate arrangements.
“Drama” - Well, maybe a brief trajectory. I was kind of hoping this would be a little bit more metaphorical, but I suppose you don’t always want to be super oblique either.
“Sometimes” - oh, here we go! Here’s the full version of this song! This one’s more melancholic than I was anticipating, though.
“Certainly (Flipped It)” - Kind of cool how certain ideas are taken and, well, flipped, both here and on “Sometimes”. I like the sudden stop/restart outro.
“Rimshot (Outro)” - This is more or less the same instrumentation again, right? On first listen, I’m having trouble remembering exactly what I heard before. Either way, interesting idea.
Impressions: There's a lot of different ways this album stands out to me when compared to a lot of previous ones I've listened to. To get the kind of jokey one out of the way, yes, I think the bass on this album is phenomenal. But more importantly, structurally this thing is wild - in a weird way, the album almost kinds of mirrors itself, with songs in the first half either being remixed or repeated in the second. Of course, it's not the only time it's been done (thinking of another great album from 1997, there's "Da Funk" and "Funk Ad"), but it's the only one I've listened to where the structure feels integral to the plot. After all, as Erykah Badu tells us herself on the second track, "my cypher keeps moving like a rolling stone." Beyond that, the first half of the album is drenched in reference and metaphor, from the sacred to the humorous, in a way that I definitely wasn't expecting. Throw on top of that a strong sonic signature, and you've got something great on your hands. Even wilder: how does something this fully formed pop out as a debut? Talk about standing out.
Favorite songs: “Otherside of the Game”, “Next Lifetime”, “Certainly”, “Sometimes”
Background on Orbital: Orbital are an English electronic dance music duo from Sevenoaks, Kent, England consisting of brothers Phil and Paul Hartnoll. The band's name is taken from Greater London's orbital motorway, the M25, which was central to the early rave scene and party network in the South East during the early days of acid house. In addition, the cover art on three of their albums shows stylised atomic orbitals. Orbital have been both critically and commercially successful and known particularly for their element of live improvisation during shows, a rarity among techno acts. They were initially influenced by early electro and punk rock.
In 1989 Orbital recorded "Chime" on their father's cassette deck, which they released on Oh Zone Records in December 1989 and then re-released on FFRR Records a few months later. The track became a rave anthem, reaching number 17 in the UK charts and earning them an appearance on Top of the Pops, during which they wore anti-Poll Tax T-shirts. A few singles and EPs followed, and their first self-titled album, a collection of tracks recorded at various times, was released in late 1991. In late 1992, the Radiccio EP barely reached the UK top 40, but it included one of their most popular songs, "Halcyon".
The duo's popularity grew rapidly with the release of their second self-titled album, in 1993, which included complex arrangements and textures. Orbital won an NME award for Vibes Best Dance Act early in 1994, but it was their headline appearance at the Glastonbury Festival on 25 June 1994 that brought them most attention. Q magazine classed it as one of the top 50 gigs of all time, and in 2002 included Orbital in their list of "50 Bands to See Before You Die".
The third album, Snivilisation, was released in August 1994. Alison Goldfrapp provided vocals on a couple of the tracks, including the single "Are We Here?".The single "The Box" was released in April 1996, reaching number 11 in the UK, and its parent album In Sides, released in May 1996, became their second Top Five album. In Sides has since come to be one of their most critically well-regarded works. As with the previous album, there was a vague theme of ecological disaster and dissatisfaction with society. The following year, the duo contributed to film soundtracks (The Saint, Event Horizon, Spawn) and enjoyed the biggest singles of their career, with a live version of "Satan" and their reworking of the aforementioned The Saint theme both reaching number three in the UK.
In 1998, they returned to the studio to work on their fifth album The Middle of Nowhere. This was released in 1999, becoming their third top five album, and was a return to a more upbeat style; with Alison Goldfrapp returning on vocals and the single "Style" using the stylophone. The Altogether, released in 2001, included guest vocals by the Hartnolls' brother-in-law David Gray, a sampled Ian Dury, and a version of the Doctor Who theme. Orbital split up in 2004. Paul Hartnoll continued to record music under his own name and later formed a new electronica duo, Long Range, with Nick Smith.
On 21 November 2008, Orbital announced they would be reforming to play a gig together called "20 years after Chime" at The Big Chill Festival 2009. On 26 January 2009, their official website Loopz announced confirmed dates for their 20th anniversary tour. On 21 October 2014, Orbital announced on their official website that they were "hanging up their iconic torch-glasses and parting ways for the final time" but in 2017 reunited again and announced tour dates in June and July, with a new album, Monsters Exist, due to be released on 14 September 2018 through their own ACP label.
Background on Orbital (Brown Album): Orbital is the second album by the British electronica duo Orbital. It was released in May 1993 and reached #28 on the UK album charts. On Orbital the duo aimed to make more atmospheric music than the dance raves of their first album. They used more complex rhythms and denser arrangements on the appropriately named pieces entitled "Lush" but still proving themselves capable of making quality pop music on "Halcyon + On + On", with vocals from Kirsty Hawkshaw of Opus III.
The album begins with "Time Becomes", which uses the same speech sample by the actor Michael Dorn in Star Trek: The Next Generation: "There is the theory of the Möbius. A twist in the fabric of space where time becomes a loop", which opened their first album. The piece uses phasing, a technique popularized by Steve Reich, in which two identical samples are repeated at slightly different speeds. The second song on the album, "Planet of the Shapes", contains a sample from the movie Withnail & I. "Remind" is based on Orbital's previously-released "Mind the Bend the Mind" remix of "Mindstream" by Meat Beat Manifesto;. It is effectively an instrumental version of that mix, with the last remaining elements of MBM's original track removed.
The brothers enjoy aural puns, and the use of the sample from Star Trek: The Next Generation (which appeared on the opening of their first album) was meant to play with listeners by making them believe for a few seconds that they had bought a mispressing. The muffled intro on "Planet of the Shapes" has the intentional addition of record static and crackles, followed by the sound of a needle skipping grooves then scratching across the record, also meant to trick fans who bought the vinyl edition, by making them think their copy was less than perfect.
This album is included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die alongside their 1994 LP Snivilisation. It (along with the In Sides album) was also included in Q magazine's "90 Best albums of the 1990s". In 1996, Mixmag ranked the album at number 9 in its list of the "50 Best Dance Albums of All Time". In 1999, Ned Raggett ranked the album at number 21 on his list of "The Top 136 or So Albums of the Nineties".
My preconceptions: As sort of mentioned elsewhere, I'm a fan of The Chemical Brothers and Underworld, but I've never really got into Orbital, so now is a good time to fix that. Unlike their other aforementioned counterparts in the British rave scene, I have a feeling this album is going to be way more inspired by acid music. It's also long as hell, so hopefully I'm not going to put off listening to it. We'll see!
“Time Becomes” - Okay, the sample usage is clever, I’ll give them that.
“Planet of the Shapes” - I do the like the scratches at the beginning, too. I’m also hearing that breakbeat at the beginning, which I wasn’t expecting. But then there’s that shift into the bass? Huh. And then a sitar? Maybe I had this album figured out wrong.
“Lush 3-1” - The shift to more of a house beat is kind of interesting. But I like it a lot! This is a bit more of what I was expecting. I do like the synth on this quite a bit, and the finger snap percussion, and the flute (?) sample, too!
“Lush 3-2” - At the beginning, I was half expecting this to be more of a downtempo counterpart to “Lush 3-1” but it’s something else entirely. I know it’s nowhere near the same genre, but this almost kind of reminds me of a deep house track for some reason. Maybe it’s the vocal that runs throughout it.
“Impact (The Earth Is Burning)” - Not sure how I feel about the synth carrying the song’s melody, but also this is the first time there’s been even a real hint of acid in any song, so I can’t complain much.
“Remind” - I am loving the transitions between the tracks here. Even in electronic music, I think that the continuous album structure is kind of underused, but Orbital have been pulling it off very well so far. (a tangent: I’m half reminded of an article I read earlier this year that I can’t find now about CDs vs vinyl that pointed out that mixed DJ sets wouldn’t work as well on vinyl as they would on a CD. It’s the reason I’m afraid to ever touch that Alive 2007/1997 vinyl box set even though I love Daft Punk and also why I’m hesitant to think this would be great on vinyl, too. But of course I don’t own a copy of it, so maybe I’m wrong.) Anyway, to get back to the song itself, the introduction of the guitar at the end gives the song more of a rock charge, which I like. (Also, more acid synths!)
“Walk Now…” - more real digieridoo than that Richard D. James track, apparently.
“Monday” - Kind of cool that this one has more of a traditional piano house vibe.
“Halcyon and On and On” - Not to make a dopey comparison or anything but god the beginning of this reminds me of “Born Slippy”. If there’s not a big emotional release in this song I’m going to be pissed. …I’m about halfway through now, and no big emotional release, but it did have a nice drop. And now I’m done and there really wasn’t anything, but this still was a good song. Maybe I’m overestimating the true power of Underworld, or vocal takes, or whatever.
“Input Out” - Speaking of albums having a mirrored structure…
Impressions: I think it’s a bit hard to talk about purely instrumental electronic albums like this. But I’ll give this album credit for that: it’s hard to talk about it because how do you really describe the mood music like this evokes? Of course, you want to dance to it, but it’s also hard to describe why I felt a certain melancholy during “Halcyon and On and On” or the more aggressive side of a track like “Remind”. And describing individual elements doesn’t make it easier: there’s certain sounds in here, like the flute, or guitar, or didgeridoo that make the music unique. I think what really makes this album is Orbital’s subtle gift for melody that serves this album well.I think it’s more obvious on tracks like “Monday”, but I think without it, all you have left is a pile of random bleep bloops. The Chemical Brothers may be more arena minded and Autechre may be headier, but this hits a super satisfactory middle ground. Beyond that, this album really did feel like a singular experience, especially since it’s all mixed together. That makes it harder to pick out individual tracks that stand out. But in spite of that, I enjoyed the experience overall!
Background on The Supremes: The Supremes were an American female singing group and the premier act of Motown Records during the 1960s. Founded as The Primettes in Detroit, Michigan, in 1959, the Supremes were the most commercially successful of Motown's acts and are, to date, America's most successful vocal group with 12 number one singles on the Billboard Hot 100. Most of these hits were written and produced by Motown's main songwriting and production team, Holland–Dozier–Holland. At their peak in the mid-1960s, the Supremes rivaled the Beatles in worldwide popularity, and it is said that their success made it possible for future African American R&B and soul musicians to find mainstream success.
Florence Ballard, Mary Wilson, Diana Ross, and Betty McGlown, the original group, are all from the Brewster-Douglass public housing project in Detroit. They formed the Primettes as the sister act to the Primes (with Paul Williams and Eddie Kendricks, who went on to form the Temptations). Barbara Martin replaced McGlown in 1960, and the group signed with Motown the following year as the Supremes. Martin left the act in early 1962, and Ross, Ballard, and Wilson carried on as a trio.
During the mid-1960s, the Supremes achieved mainstream success with Ross as lead singer and Holland-Dozier-Holland as its songwriting and production team. In 1967, Motown president Berry Gordy renamed the group Diana Ross & the Supremes, and replaced Ballard with Cindy Birdsong. Ross left to pursue a solo career in 1970 and was replaced by Jean Terrell, so the group's name reverted to The Supremes. During the mid-1970s, the lineup changed with Lynda Laurence, Scherrie Payne and Susaye Greene joining the group until, after 18 years, The Supremes disbanded in 1977.
Background on Live at the Apollo: Where Did Our Love Go is the second studio album by Motown singing group The Supremes, released in 1964. The album includes several of the group's singles and B-sides from 1963 and 1964. Included are the group's first Billboard Pop Singles number-one hits, "Where Did Our Love Go", "Baby Love", and "Come See About Me", as well as their first Top 40 hit, "When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes", and the singles "A Breathtaking Guy" and "Run, Run, Run".
With the release of this album, The Supremes became the first act in Billboard magazine history to have three number-one hits from the same album. It was the album that introduced "The Motown Sound" to the masses. It was also, at the time, the highest-ranking album by an all-female group. It remained in the #2 position for 4 consecutive weeks in January 1965, shut out of the top spot by the Beatles' blockbuster Beatles '65 album. Where Did Our Love Go remained on the Billboard album chart for an unprecedented 89 weeks. According to Motown data, the album ultimately sold over 3,000,000 copies. This album was also the first ever number one album on Billboard's R&B album chart in January 1965.
They filmed performances of four of the singles from the album including "Run, Run, Run", "When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes", "Where Did Our Love Go" and "Baby Love" for the concert film, The T.A.M.I. Show released on December 29, 1964. It was equivalent to Motown 25 or Live Aid as a pivotal music concert event. When it hit theaters nationwide, it undoubtedly raised and extended the visibility of the Where Did Our Love Go album.
My preconceptions: I thought my knowledge of The Supremes was going to begin and end with "Stop! In the Name of Love", but it turns out that it also extends to "Baby Love", too. So that's what I'm expecting: horns, nice vocal melodies, and simple but highly effective pop songwriting. Musically, I don't know how much more there is it to it then that!
“Where Did Our Love Go” - I love that panning stomp/clamp at the beginning - it both reminds me a bit of The Zombies’ “Time of the Season” and The Ronettes’ “Be My Baby”, at least in effect. I was waiting for the harmonizing to kick in, and when it does on the title lyrics…wow. And then a sax solo to top it off! I’m into this. As a fadeout hater, though, I’m going to guess that this will be the first of many times it appears on this album.
“Run, Run, Run” - Who’s doing the backing vocals on this song? I’ll be honest, I’m kind of struggling to figure out where Diana Ross’s parts end and begin. And even then, I’m not sure if I’m listening solely to Diana Ross.
“Baby Love” - I was thinking, “Wow, the claps really sound like the ones in ‘Where Did Our Love Go’”, and after some googling, sure enough: “At the insistence of Berry Gordy hoping for a follow-up chart-topper, Holland–Dozier–Holland produced "Baby Love" to sound like “Where Did Our Love Go“. This song’s got the catchier lyrics, but I think I may be more of a fan of the former’s build.
“When the Lovelight Starts Shining” - Wow, this really picked up the pace! This is the first song on the album I’ve really felt like moving to, so that’s cool. Also, just checked and yep, Diana Ross is really singing lead on all these songs. Glad that’s been cleared up.
“Come See About Me” - The sound is coming across as a bit formulaic by now, with the clapping and horns, but it’s hard to be mad at it considering that 1) it’s the early 60s, 2) considering the social/political climate at the time, if they’d already had success with a black group with “Where Did Our Love Go”, of course they’d want to replicate it, and 3) it’s the early 60s. It also makes sense that this, “Where Did Our Love Go”, and “Baby Love” were the big hits. At least he fade out at least makes sense on this track, too.
“Long Gone Lover” - So I was hankering for something a bit different, and I got it on this track, with the vocal harmonies arranged in a way that makes them sound more like a collective, some unique percussion, and more piano.
“I’m Giving You Your Freedom” - Okay, we’re continuing to be adventurous! I love the guitar, but on headphones, wow, that bass panned over to the left sounds weird. I kind of wonder what Aretha Franklin would do with this song. Or at least the lyrical conceit.
“A Breathtaking Guy” - “One night love-making”?? Genuine question: would a lyric like that not have been considering more scandalous or at least titillating at the time? Either way, this song is way too laconic imo.
“He Means the World to Mean” - Okay, I like the piano on this one, too.
“Standing at the Crossroads of Love” - idk, I think Diana Ross’s softer voice is better for a song like this than say, the last one, but at this point I feel like I am WAY overanalyzing trying to match singers to a song’s mood, largely because I know that’s not the point.
“Your Kiss of Fire” - I almost kind of missed the horns, so I’m glad they came back lol.
“Ask Any Girl” - Oh, and strings for the finale? I’ll take it.
My impressions: I don’t know why, but I think that there was going to be more belting on this album, or at least something closer to the power of “I’m Coming Out”. But what this album is instead is a bit more interesting - it’s crafted for the talent of The Supremes’ three vocalists, but with plenty of space to let the real star do most of the shining. It’s got three huge hits with a very similar sound in “Where Did Our Love Go”, “Baby Love”, and “Come and See Me”, a template which never really comes up again in favor of some more interesting sounds, especially on songs like “Long Gone Lover” and “I’m Giving You Your Freedom”. Holland-Dozier-Holland’s straightforward songwriting should also get some credit here, too: alongside Diana Ross’s voice, it’s the album’s most consistent quality of the album. And I don’t want “consistent” to be confused for “repetitive” or something negative here: at its core, it’s a good, quick, to the point pop album. Which, let’s be honest, is something we could maybe use a bit more of in the current pop landscape.
Background on Air: Air are a French music duo from Versailles, France, consisting of Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoît Dunckel. Nicolas Godin studied architecture at the École Nationale Supérieure d'Architecture de Versailles, and Jean-Benoît Dunckel studied mathematics, before forming a band in 1995. Before founding Air (erroneously considered as an acronym of Amour, Imagination, Rêve, which translates to Love, Imagination, Dream), Dunckel and Godin played together in the band Orange with others such as Alex Gopher, Xavier Jamaux and Jean de Reydellet. The former two subsequently contributed to remixes of tracks recorded by Air. Initially, Godin worked alone, recording a demo with members of Funkadelic as his backing band before releasing his first entirely solo effort, "Modular Mix", which featured production by Étienne de Crécy
After making several remixes for other acts in the first half of the 1990s, Air recorded their first EP, Premiers Symptômes, in 1995. They released their first album, Moon Safari, in 1998. The first single, "Sexy Boy", was heavily played on alternative radio stations. The album received universal acclaim and became an international success. In 2000, they composed the score The Virgin Suicides to Sofia Coppola's debut film of the same name. In the 2000s, they released four studio albums, including 10 000 Hz Legend (2001), Talkie Walkie (2004), Pocket Symphony (2007) and Love 2 (2009).
Background on Moon Safari: Moon Safari is the debut studio album by French electronic music duo Air, released on January 16, 1998. Moon Safari was acclaimed by critics and remains Air's most renowned release. Moon Safari is credited with setting the stage for the budding downtempo music style. As of 2012 it has sold 386,000 copies in United States according to Nielsen SoundScan.
Moon Safari was met with general acclaim upon its release. John Mulvey, writing for NME, praised Air's "sensitive but tenacious grasp of melody, a laid-back disposition and a reckless way with a Vocoder that makes them unafraid of sounding like a digital ELO," also noting similarities to Garbage on "Sexy Boy" and Beth Orton on "All I Need". Entertainment Weekly's Ethan Smith felt that though the album occasionally bears excessive resemblance to Everything but the Girl, "Air leaven it all with a welcome dash of Gallic irony." Pitchfork writer Brent DiCrescenzo remarked that the music would befit "minimalist architecture design, shagging up against a tree in a field of sunflowers, waiting in line for 'Space Mountain,' drinking gin upstairs in a 747 (circa 1974), and '60s Swedish industrial documentaries," adding that though the album is "too cheeky" for everyday listening, it is nonetheless romantic.
My preconceptions: As it turns out, the Wikipedia articles on both Air and Moon Safari are rather skimpy, which seems kind of sad. Anyway, some of my earliest musical obsessions were French electronic music (Daft Punk, the Ed Banger roster, etc.) and I'd always heard of Air and maybe listen to a few seconds of their tracks, but I could never get into them. And looking at reviews for the album, I think it's become clearer why: you usually see words like "cheese" and "lounge", which to be honest don't conjure up images of an album anyone needs to run out and listen to. Is that perspective worth challenging? Is that perspective true but irrelevant regardless? Or does it just suck? Time to find out.
Background on Air: Air are a French music duo from Versailles, France, consisting of Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoît Dunckel. Nicolas Godin studied architecture at the École Nationale Supérieure d'Architecture de Versailles, and Jean-Benoît Dunckel studied mathematics, before forming a band in 1995. Before founding Air (erroneously considered as an acronym of Amour, Imagination, Rêve, which translates to Love, Imagination, Dream), Dunckel and Godin played together in the band Orange with others such as Alex Gopher, Xavier Jamaux and Jean de Reydellet. The former two subsequently contributed to remixes of tracks recorded by Air. Initially, Godin worked alone, recording a demo with members of Funkadelic as his backing band before releasing his first entirely solo effort, "Modular Mix", which featured production by Étienne de Crécy
After making several remixes for other acts in the first half of the 1990s, Air recorded their first EP, Premiers Symptômes, in 1995. They released their first album, Moon Safari, in 1998. The first single, "Sexy Boy", was heavily played on alternative radio stations. The album received universal acclaim and became an international success. In 2000, they composed the score The Virgin Suicides to Sofia Coppola's debut film of the same name. In the 2000s, they released four studio albums, including 10 000 Hz Legend (2001), Talkie Walkie (2004), Pocket Symphony (2007) and Love 2 (2009).
Background on Moon Safari: Moon Safari is the debut studio album by French electronic music duo Air, released on January 16, 1998. Moon Safari was acclaimed by critics and remains Air's most renowned release. Moon Safari is credited with setting the stage for the budding downtempo music style. As of 2012 it has sold 386,000 copies in United States according to Nielsen SoundScan.
Moon Safari was met with general acclaim upon its release. John Mulvey, writing for NME, praised Air's "sensitive but tenacious grasp of melody, a laid-back disposition and a reckless way with a Vocoder that makes them unafraid of sounding like a digital ELO," also noting similarities to Garbage on "Sexy Boy" and Beth Orton on "All I Need". Entertainment Weekly's Ethan Smith felt that though the album occasionally bears excessive resemblance to Everything but the Girl, "Air leaven it all with a welcome dash of Gallic irony." Pitchfork writer Brent DiCrescenzo remarked that the music would befit "minimalist architecture design, shagging up against a tree in a field of sunflowers, waiting in line for 'Space Mountain,' drinking gin upstairs in a 747 (circa 1974), and '60s Swedish industrial documentaries," adding that though the album is "too cheeky" for everyday listening, it is nonetheless romantic.
My preconceptions: As it turns out, the Wikipedia articles on both Air and Moon Safari are rather skimpy, which seems kind of sad. Anyway, some of my earliest musical obsessions were French electronic music (Daft Punk, the Ed Banger roster, etc.) and I'd always heard of Air and maybe listen to a few seconds of their tracks, but I could never get into them. And looking at reviews for the album, I think it's become clearer why: you usually see words like "cheese" and "lounge", which to be honest don't conjure up images of an album anyone needs to run out and listen to. Is that perspective worth challenging? Is that perspective true but irrelevant regardless? Or does it just suck? Time to find out.
My wife listens to at least something off Moon Safari once a week, if not the whole album.
This is also worth a watch/listen. Air wrote a soundtrack to an old French silent movie from the turn of the 20th century.
“La femme d’argent” - So right out of the gate, we’ve got waterfall noises and bongos into a string section with bass and…still the bongos. This kind of reminds me of Since I Left You in the sense that both Air and the Avalanches are clearly inspired by material that is decidedly not cool and are trying to make it cool. The difference is that the Avalanches turned up the tempo. It was maybe not a great idea to listen to this at 11PM on a Tuesday. But now it’s speeding up? Okay, so that was a bit of a tease. I still hate fadeouts.
“Sexy Boy” - Okay, so a song like this makes me understand why Air get lumped in a lot with French house acts. But the more I think about it, the more this track makes me think of contemporary Phoenix.
“All I Need” - Obviously this is not the most important thing about this track or album, but Beth Hirsch is American? Huh.
“Kelly Watch the Stars” - This is kind of cute. It sounds kind of like something that would soundtrack a children’s movie? I genuinely don’t mean that as an insult! It’s very pleasant with just enough distortion to make it interesting.
“Talisman” - I feel a bit cheated now. A while back I made a Spotify playlist for a family dinner party thing that had a bunch of mellow but kind of funky jazz/rock/R&B and this is the third song on this album that’s made me think “Wow, this would have fit really well on that playlist.”
“Remember” - But the transition to the vocoder stuff is so interesting. This album is really straddling the line between two worlds, and I don’t want to necessarily admit it but I think it’s doing it well.
“You Make It So Easy” - I do love those treated vocals in the background. Not a big fan of that xylophone/horn stuff at the end.
“Ce matin-là” - Spotify says this was actually on a movie soundtrack, which I believe. There’s been some flirting with horns and strings, but this is….maybe a bit too much? Maybe not. Who knows anymore.
“New Star in the Sky” - Oh, god, there’s more of it.
“Le voyage de Pénélope” - Kind of an interesting track to close on. I was expecting something more grandiose, but also this is one of my favorite instrumentals from this album.
My impressions: This is like if every song on Random Access Memories was like “Beyond”. This is like if Phoenix actually sounded like all the artists they cited as influences in their Ti Amo promo video. This is like if The Avalanches slowed everything down on Wildflower by at least 20 BPM. It’s not super dancey like French house, it doesn’t have memorable hooks of the best pop, and if someone played this at an airport in full I probably wouldn’t notice but I’d also probably enjoy it quite a bit. I honestly don’t know if I like it or not. I’d certainly pull a lot of songs from this and put them on a playlist to set a mood, but I have no real desire to, say, listen to any of these songs in the car. This isn’t ambient music, but it kind of had the same effect on me. But it’s punchier than ambient, and I have to give Air a lot of credit here for making something that seems to have pretty clear influences but also left me, to be honest, kind of confounded. Maybe I just don’t get it. But at least conceptually, I’ll still be thinking about it.
17. The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady by Charles Mingus
Background on Charles Mingus: Charles Mingus Jr. was an American jazz double bassist, pianist, composer and bandleader. A major proponent of collective improvisation, he is considered to be one of the greatest jazz musicians and composers in history, with a career spanning three decades and collaborations with other jazz legends such as Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Dannie Richmond, and Herbie Hancock. Mingus' compositions continue to be played by contemporary musicians ranging from the repertory bands Mingus Big Band, Mingus Dynasty, and Mingus Orchestra, to the high school students who play the charts and compete in the Charles Mingus High School Competition.
Charles Mingus was born in Nogales, Arizona. His father, Charles Mingus Sr., was a sergeant in the U.S. Army. Mingus was largely raised in the Watts area of Los Angeles. His maternal grandfather was a Chinese British subject from Hong Kong, and his maternal grandmother was an African-American from the southern United States. Mingus was the third great-grandson of the family's founding patriarch who was, by most accounts, a German immigrant. His ancestors included German American, African American, Native American. His mother allowed only church-related music in their home, but Mingus developed an early love for other music, especially Duke Ellington. He studied trombone, and later cello, although he was unable to follow the cello professionally because, at the time, it was nearly impossible for a black musician to make a career of classical music, and the cello was not yet accepted as a jazz instrument. Despite this, Mingus was still attached to the cello; as he studied bass with Red Callender in the late 1930s, Callender even commented that the cello was still Mingus's main instrument. In Beneath the Underdog, Mingus states that he did not actually start learning bass until Buddy Collette accepted him into his swing band under the stipulation that he be the band's bass player.
Due to a poor education, the young Mingus could not read musical notation quickly enough to join the local youth orchestra. This had a serious impact on his early musical experiences, leaving him feeling ostracized from the classical music world. These early experiences, in addition to his lifelong confrontations with racism, were reflected in his music, which often focused on themes of racism, discrimination and (in)justice.
In 1952 Mingus co-founded Debut Records with Max Roach so he could conduct his recording career as he saw fit. The name originated from his desire to document unrecorded young musicians. Despite this, the best-known recording the company issued was of the most prominent figures in bebop. On May 15, 1953, Mingus joined Dizzy Gillespie, Parker, Bud Powell, and Roach for a concert at Massey Hall in Toronto, which is the last recorded documentation of Gillespie and Parker playing together. Mingus often worked with a mid-sized ensemble (around 8–10 members) of rotating musicians known as the Jazz Workshop. Mingus broke new ground, constantly demanding that his musicians be able to explore and develop their perceptions on the spot. Those who joined the Workshop (or Sweatshops as they were colorfully dubbed by the musicians) included Pepper Adams, Jaki Byard, Booker Ervin, John Handy, Jimmy Knepper, Charles McPherson and Horace Parlan. Mingus shaped these musicians into a cohesive improvisational machine that in many ways anticipated free jazz. Some musicians dubbed the workshop a "university" for jazz. The decade that followed is generally regarded as Mingus's most productive and fertile period. Over a ten-year period, made 30 records for a number of labels (Atlantic, Candid, Columbia, Impulse and others).
Mingus witnessed Ornette Coleman's legendary—and controversial—1960 appearances at New York City's Five Spot jazz club. He initially expressed rather mixed feelings for Coleman's innovative music: "...if the free-form guys could play the same tune twice, then I would say they were playing something...Most of the time they use their fingers on the saxophone and they don't even know what's going to come out. They're experimenting." That same year, however, Mingus formed a quartet with Richmond, trumpeter Ted Curson and multi-instrumentalist Eric Dolphy. This ensemble featured the same instruments as Coleman's quartet, and is often regarded as Mingus rising to the challenging new standard established by Coleman. The quartet recorded on both Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus and Mingus. The former also features the version of "Fables of Faubus" with lyrics, aptly titled "Original Faubus Fables". In 1963, Mingus released The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady, a sprawling, multi-section masterpiece, described as "one of the greatest achievements in orchestration by any composer in jazz history." The album was also unique in that Mingus asked his psychotherapist, Dr. Edmund Pollock, to provide notes for the record.
Mingus's pace slowed somewhat in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In 1974, after his 1970 sextet with Charles McPherson, Eddie Preston and Bobby Jones disbanded, he formed a quintet with Richmond, pianist Don Pullen, trumpeter Jack Walrath and saxophonist George Adams. They recorded two well-received albums, Changes One and Changes Two. Mingus also played with Charles McPherson in many of his groups during this time. Cumbia and Jazz Fusion in 1976 sought to blend Colombian music (the "Cumbia" of the title) with more traditional jazz forms. In 1971, Mingus taught for a semester at the University at Buffalo, The State University of New York as the Slee Professor of Music.
By the mid-1970s, Mingus was suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). His once formidable bass technique declined until he could no longer play the instrument. He continued composing, however, and supervised a number of recordings before his death. At the time of his death, he was working with Joni Mitchell on an album eventually titled Mingus, which included lyrics added by Mitchell to his compositions, including "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat". The album featured the talents of Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, and another influential bassist and composer, Jaco Pastorius. Mingus died, aged 56, in Cuernavaca, Mexico, where he had traveled for treatment and convalescence. His ashes were scattered in the Ganges River.
Background on Black Saint and the Sinner Lady: The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady is a studio album by American jazz musician Charles Mingus, released on Impulse! Records in 1963. The album consists of a single continuous composition—partially written as a ballet—divided into four tracks and six movements. The album was recorded on January 20, 1963 by an eleven-piece band. Mingus has called the album's orchestral style "ethnic folk-dance music". Mingus's perfectionism led to extensive use of studio overdubbing techniques. The album features liner notes written by Mingus and his then-psychotherapist, Edmund Pollock. The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady is often characterized by jazz and music critics as one of Mingus's two major masterworks (the other being Mingus Ah Um) and has frequently ranked highly on lists of the best albums of all time.
My preconceptions: Aside from the fact that my uncle is a big Charles Mingus fan, I don't have any! There's only so much I can say about what I think about jazz and how I try and connect with it and blah blah blah. Anyone who has bothered reading all of this knows what the deal is. Honestly, at a bare minimum I know I'll come away from this appreciating its technicality, and if I end up enjoying it a lot, all the better!
“Solo Dancer” - The beginning of this track kind of reminds me of Kamasi Washington a little bit. I’m liking this trumpet solo a bit, too. I’ll be honest, I’m trying to not overintellectualize this stuff, or really, intellectualize it too much in any capacity. I’ll either try and feel an emotion or pick out a sound I like - kind of like the almost ‘wahwah’ (not really, but you know what I mean) horns at the end.
“Duete Solo Dancers” - I get the sense this is intended to be a bit more romantic, and I enjoy it! It reminds me of the jazz band I once saw at a wedding. Or at least that’s how it’s starting - then, around the halfway mark, its’ speeding up and almost becoming more…sensual, is I guess the word I want to use? The tempo changes throw me off. But then it decidedly settles more romantic.
“Group Dancers” - wow, I got a bit distracted and did not think of any comments other than “I liked it”
“Trio and Group Dancers/Single Solos and Group Dance/Group and Solo Dance” - One thing I’ve really liked about this album and briefly mentioned before this is its tempo changes. And the more that any one song goes on, the more details I notice - the xylophone around 10 minutes (not sure what mode this is) among them. I said I wouldn’t intellectualize but this album is almost over I will for a second: outside of highlighting his band’s skills (the drumming on this track!!), musically I’m curious what Mingus is trying to convey with all these dynamic changes. I kept feeling like each tempo change was signaling the end, and instead it ends with something of a trumpet flourish. I’m hardly complaining - it’s what makes it interesting - but I’m curious.
My impressions: So maybe all it took for me to get into a classic jazz album was a big band feel. Just kidding. Maybe. I really liked this album a lot and I don’t even want to think about why. I’m sort of thinking about when I tried to explain why I liked Orbital. Again, it’s hard to explain why you like instrumental music you’re not super well versed in music theory or at least know how to play an instrument well (or don’t know how to play one well anymore, at least.). So, once again, all that’s left is feeling. If the feelings on Orbital were more primal, this was something more complex. This album is…sweet. Its something I’d like to slow dance to (or at least parts of). But sort of like the burst of noise at the beginning of Mitski’s “Geyser”, there’s moments of uneasiness from time to time, too. And so in the end, that’s probably why I liked it more. Or the xylophone. Who knows?
Background on Kate Bush: Catherine Bush CBE (born 30 July 1958) is an English singer-songwriter, musician, dancer and record producer. Bush came to note in 1978 when, aged 19, she topped the UK Singles Chart for four weeks with her debut single "Wuthering Heights", becoming the first female artist to achieve a UK number one with a self-written song. She has since released twenty-five UK Top 40 singles, including the top-ten hits "The Man with the Child in His Eyes", "Babooshka", "Running Up That Hill", "Don't Give Up" (a duet with Peter Gabriel) and "King of the Mountain". She has released ten studio albums, all of which reached the UK Top 10, including the UK number-one albums Never for Ever (1980), Hounds of Love (1985), and the compilation The Whole Story (1986). She is the first British solo female artist to top the UK album charts and the first female artist to enter the album chart at number one.
Bush was born in Bexleyheath, Kent, to an English medical doctor, Robert Bush (1920–2008), and an Irish mother by the name of Hannah Daly (1918–1992). She was raised as a Roman Catholic in their farmhouse in East Wickham, an urban village in the neighbouring town of Welling, with her older brothers, John and Paddy. Bush came from an artistic background: her mother was an amateur traditional Irish dancer, her father was an amateur pianist, Paddy worked as a musical instrument maker, and John was a poet and photographer. Both brothers were involved in the local folk music scene. Her family's musical influence inspired Bush to teach herself the piano at the age of 11. She also played the organ in a barn behind her parents' house and studied the violin. She soon began composing songs, eventually adding her own lyrics.
During her time in school, her family produced a demo tape with over 50 of her compositions, which was turned down by record labels. David Gilmour of Pink Floyd received the demo from Ricky Hopper, a mutual friend of Gilmour and the Bush family. Impressed with what he heard, Gilmour helped the sixteen-year-old Bush get a more professional-sounding demo tape recorded that would be more saleable to the record companies. Three tracks in total were recorded and paid for by Gilmour. The tape was produced by Gilmour's friend Andrew Powell, who would go on to produce Bush's first two albums, and sound engineer Geoff Emerick, who had previously worked with the Beatles. The tape was sent to EMI executive Terry Slater. Slater was impressed by the tape and signed her. The British record industry was reaching a point of stagnation. Progressive rock was very popular and visually oriented rock performers were growing in popularity, thus record labels looking for the next big thing were considering experimental acts.
For her début album, The Kick Inside (1978), Bush was persuaded to use established session musicians instead of the KT Bush Band. Some of these she would retain even after she had brought her bandmates back on board. Bush released The Kick Inside when she was 19 years old, but some of the songs had been written when she was as young as 13. EMI originally wanted the more rock-oriented track "James and the Cold Gun" to be her debut single, but Bush insisted that it should be "Wuthering Heights". Even at this early stage of her career, she had gained a reputation for her determination to have a say in decisions affecting her work. "Wuthering Heights" topped the UK and Australian charts and became an international hit.
Bush was displeased with being rushed into making the second album. She set up her own publishing company, Kate Bush Music, and her own management company, Novercia, to maintain complete control over her work. Members of her family, along with Bush herself, comprised the company's board of directors. Released in September 1980, Never for Ever saw Bush's second foray into production. The range of styles on Never for Ever is much more diverse, veering from the straightforward rocker "Violin" to the wistful waltz of hit single "Army Dreamers". It was her first record to reach the top position in the UK album charts, also making her the first female British artist to achieve that status, and the first female artist ever to enter the album chart at the top. September 1982 saw the release of The Dreaming, the first album Bush produced by herself. With her new-found freedom, she experimented with production techniques, creating an album that features a diverse blend of musical styles and is known for its near-exhaustive use of the Fairlight CMI. The Dreaming received a mixed reception in the UK, and critics were baffled by the dense soundscapes Bush had created to become "less accessible".
Hounds of Love was released in 1985. Because of the high cost of hiring studio space for her previous album, she built a private studio near her home, where she could work at her own pace. It ultimately topped the charts in the UK, knocking Madonna's Like a Virgin from the number-one position. The increasingly personal tone of her writing continued on 1989's The Sensual World. One of the songs "Heads We're Dancing", touched by Bush's black humour; is about a woman who dances all night with a charming stranger only to discover in the morning that he is Adolf Hitler. The title track drew its inspiration from James Joyce's novel Ulysses. Bush's seventh studio album, The Red Shoes, was released in November 1993. The album features more high-profile cameo appearances than her previous efforts, including contributions from composer and conductor Michael Kamen, comedy actor Lenny Henry, Prince, Eric Clapton, Gary Brooker of Procol Harum, Trevor Whittaker, and Jeff Beck.This period had been a troubled time for Bush. She had suffered a series of bereavements, including the loss of guitarist Alan Murphy, who had started working with her on The Tour of Life in 1979, and her mother Hannah, to whom she was exceptionally close.
Kate Bush's eighth studio album, Aerial, was released on double CD and vinyl in November 2005. The first single from the album was "King of the Mountain", which was played for the first time on BBC Radio 2 on 21 September 2005. Bush herself carried out relatively little publicity for the album, only conducting a handful of magazine and radio interviews. Aerial earned Bush two nominations at the 2006 BRIT Awards, for Best British Female Solo Artist and Best British Album. Bush's next studio album, 50 Words for Snow, was released on November 21, 2011. It features high-profile cameo appearance of Elton John on the duet "Snowed in at Wheeler Street". The album contains seven new songs "set against a backdrop of falling snow", with a total running time of 65 minutes. 50 Words for Snow received general acclaim from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 88, based on 26 reviews, which indicates "universal acclaim".She was nominated for a Brit Award in the "Best Female Artist" category
A diverse range of artists have cited Bush as an influence. Her work has been described as eclectic, experimental, idiosyncratic and theatrical. She has been nominated 13 times for British Phonographic Industry accolades, winning for Best British Female Artist in 1987. She has also been nominated for three Grammy Awards. In 2002, she was recognised with an Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music. In October 2017 she was nominated for induction in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2018. Bush was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2013 New Year Honours for services to music.
Background on Hounds of Love: Hounds of Love is the fifth studio album by English singer-songwriter and musician Kate Bush, released by EMI Records on September 16, 1985. It was a commercial success and marked a return to the public eye for Bush after the relatively poor sales of her previous album, 1982's The Dreaming. The album's lead single, "Running Up That Hill", became one of Bush's biggest hits. The album's first side produced three further successful singles, "Cloudbusting", "Hounds of Love", and "The Big Sky". The second side, subtitled "The Ninth Wave", forms a conceptual suite about a person drifting alone in the sea at night.
Following the disappointing sales of Bush's fourth album, The Dreaming, her record company EMI was concerned about its sales and the long time period it had taken to produce. She told the Daily Mail, "I finished my last album, did the promotion, then found myself in a kind of limbo. It took me four or five months to be able even to write again. It's very difficult when you've been working for years, doing one album after another. You need fresh things to stimulate you. That's why I decided to take a bit of the summer out and spend time with my boyfriend and with my family and friends, just relaxing. Not being Kate Bush the singer; just being myself." In the summer of 1983, Bush built her own 48-track studio in the barn behind her family home which she could use at any time she liked.
Bush began recording demos for Hounds of Love in January 1984. Rather than re-record music, she took the demos and enhanced them during the recording sessions. After five months, she began overdubbing and mixing the album in a process that took a year. The recording sessions included use of the Fairlight CMI synthesiser, piano, traditional Irish instruments, and layered vocals. The chorale in "Hello Earth" is a segment from the traditional Georgian song "Tsintskaro", performed by the Richard Hickox Singers. The lines "It's in the trees! It's coming!" from the beginning of the title track are sampled from a seance scene from the 1957 British horror film Night of the Demon, spoken by actor Maurice Denham (although mouthed by Reginald Beckwith).
The album was produced as two suites – side one being "Hounds of Love" and side two a seven-track concept piece, "The Ninth Wave". Bush described it as being "about a person who is alone in the water for the night. It's about their past, present and future coming to keep them awake, to stop them drowning, to stop them going to sleep until the morning comes."
Hounds of Love received critical acclaim both on its release and in retrospective reviews. It is considered by many fans and music critics to be Bush's best album, and has been regularly voted one of the greatest albums of all time. It was Bush's second album to top the UK Albums Chart and her best-selling studio album, having been certified double platinum for 600,000 sales in the UK, and by 1998 it had sold 1.1 million copies worldwide. In the US, it reached the top 40 on the Billboard 200. The album was nominated at the 1986 BRIT Awards for Best Album, where Bush was also nominated for the awards for Best Producer, Best Female Artist, and for Best Single ("Running Up That Hill").
“Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)” - God, this is badass.
“Hounds of Love” - The drums at the beginning remind me of Lorde’s Melodrama. Now it’s harder not to see how every indie pop/art pop/whatever wunderkind of the the past decade has been influenced by Kate Bush.
“The Big Sky” - Kind of bold to call a song ‘big’ when everything sounds big. But somehow, this is bigger: a gospel choir and a guitar solo? This song feels cinematic: not in the sense that it has a full orchestra with swooping strings backing it, but that this could be playing over the opening titles to, say, Thelma & Louise.
“Mother Stands For Comfort” - I read some take on Twitter the other day that boiled down to the fact that the 80s were an interesting decade because across genres (I think Whitney Houston and Peter Gabriel were specifically mentioned), people were often using the same tools to create very different music. I hear a dash of Prince here on those drums (maybe almost like “Darling Nikki”?), but again, that’s the equipment, not the style: aside from the piano melody, it’s hard to imagine that bass or that theremin-like synth appearing on a Prince track.
“Cloudbusting” - I had no idea what this song was about. Now that I know a little bit more, I just think it’s crazy that this was a hit. But the “yeah yeah oh” cherry at the end make that fact make more sense.
“And Dream of Sheep” - And now we go minimal…
“Under Ice” - …but just for two minutes! God, I love the dramatics.
“Waking the Witch” - Wow, I was not expecting it to go in that direction. It’s almost kind of disturbing!
“Watching You Without Me” - I don’t know how to describe it, but the second half of this album really has a different vibe from the first.
“Jig of Life” - Case in point, we finally got what this album was missing: contemporary Irish dancing music.
“Hello Earth” - This is not really the point, but I kind of think male choirs like this are kind of underutilized in pop music? Most of the time it’s either all women or all mixed, but deeper voices really get at a deeper kind of haunting effect.
“The Morning Fog” - Not ending so much with a bang as a whisper. Respect.
Impressions: I was going to write about how the first half of this album was nonstop energy and theatrics and I loved it but the second have was more reserved than I would have liked and then I made a quick mental list and realized that that's not true and actually, this whole album kicks ass. So that's the review: this kicks ass.
Favorite tracks: "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)", "Hounds of Love", "Mother Stands For Comfort", "Jig of Life"
Background on Fela Kuti: Fela Anikulapo Kuti (15 October 1938 – 2 August 1997), also professionally known as Fela Kuti, or simply Fela, was a Nigerian multi-instrumentalist, musician, composer, pioneer of the Afrobeat music genre and human rights activist. He has been called "superstar, singer, musician, Panafricanist, polygamist, mystic, legend." At the height of his popularity, he was referred to as one of Africa's most "challenging and charismatic music performers.
In his childhood, Kuti attended Abeokuta Grammar School. Later he was sent to London in 1958 to study medicine but decided to study music instead at the Trinity College of Music, the trumpet being his preferred instrument. While there, he formed the band Koola Lobitos, playing a fusion of jazz and highlife. In 1960, Fela married his first wife, Remilekun (Remi) Taylor, with whom he would have three children. In 1963, Fela moved back to the newly independent Federation of Nigeria, re-formed Koola Lobitos and trained as a radio producer for the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation. He played for some time with Victor Olaiya and his All Stars.
In 1967, he went to Ghana to think up a new musical direction. That was when Kuti first called his music Afrobeat. In 1969, Fela took the band to the United States where they spent 10 months in Los Angeles. While there, Fela discovered the Black Power movement through Sandra Smith (now Sandra Izsadore), a partisan of the Black Panther Party. The experience would heavily influence his music and political views. He renamed the band Nigeria '70. Soon afterwards, the Immigration and Naturalization Service was tipped off by a promoter that Fela and his band were in the US without work permits. The band immediately performed a quick recording session in Los Angeles that would later be released as The '69 Los Angeles Sessions.
After Fela and his band returned to Nigeria, the group was renamed The Afrika '70, as lyrical themes changed from love to social issues. He then formed the Kalakuta Republic, a commune, a recording studio, and a home for the many people connected to the band that he later declared independent from the Nigerian state. Fela set up a nightclub in the Empire Hotel, first named the Afro-Spot and then the Afrika Shrine, where he both performed regularly and officiated at personalized Yoruba traditional ceremonies in honour of his nation's ancestral faith. He also changed his name to Anikulapo (meaning "He who carries death in his pouch", with the interpretation: "I will be the master of my own destiny and will decide when it is time for death to take me"). He stopped using the hyphenated surname "Ransome" because it was a slave name.
Fela's music was popular among the Nigerian public and Africans in general. In fact, he made the decision to sing in Pidgin English so that his music could be enjoyed by individuals all over Africa, where the local languages spoken are very diverse and numerous. As popular as Fela's music had become in Nigeria and elsewhere, it was also very unpopular with the ruling government, and raids on the Kalakuta Republic were frequent. During 1972, Ginger Baker recorded Stratavarious with Fela appearing alongside Bobby Tench. Around this time, Kuti became even more involved in the Yoruba religion. In 1977, Fela and the Afrika '70 released the album Zombie, a scathing attack on Nigerian soldiers using the zombie metaphor to describe the methods of the Nigerian military. The album was a smash hit and infuriated the government, setting off a vicious attack against the Kalakuta Republic, during which one thousand soldiers attacked the commune.
Despite the massive setbacks, Fela was determined to come back. He formed his own political party, which he called Movement of the People (MOP), in order to "clean up society like a mop". Apart from being a mass political party, MOP preached "Nkrumahism" and "Africanism." In 1979, he put himself forward for President in Nigeria's first elections for more than a decade, but his candidature was refused. At this time, Fela created a new band called Egypt '80 reflecting the fact that Egyptian civilization, knowledge, philosophy, mathematics, and religious systems are African and must be claimed as such. Fela continued to record albums and tour the country.
1984, Muhammadu Buhari's government, of which Kuti was a vocal opponent, jailed him on a charge of currency smuggling which Amnesty International and others denounced as politically motivated. Amnesty designated him a prisoner of conscience, and his case was also taken up by other human rights groups. After 20 months, he was released from prison by General Ibrahim Babangida. On his release he divorced his 12 remaining wives, saying that "marriage brings jealousy and selfishness". Once again, Fela continued to release albums with Egypt '80, made a number of successful tours of the United States and Europe and also continued to be politically active. Fela's album output slowed in the 1990s, and eventually he stopped releasing albums altogether. In 1993, he and four members of the Afrika '70 organization were arrested for murder. The battle against military corruption in Nigeria was taking its toll, especially during the rise of Sani Abacha. Kuti passed away in 1997.
Background on Zombie: Zombie is a studio album by Nigerian Afrobeat musician Fela Kuti. It was released in Nigeria by Coconut Records in 1976, and in the United Kingdom by Creole Records in 1976. The album was a scathing attack on Nigerian soldiers using the zombie metaphor to describe the methods of the Nigerian military. The album was a smash hit with the people and infuriated the government, setting off a vicious attack against the Kalakuta Republic (a commune that Fela had established in Nigeria), during which one thousand soldiers attacked the commune. Kuti was severely beaten, and his elderly mother was thrown from a window, causing fatal injuries. The Kalakuta Republic was burned, and Kuti's studio, instruments, and master tapes were destroyed. Kuti claimed that he would have been killed if it were not for the intervention of a commanding officer as he was being beaten. Kuti's response to the attack was to deliver his mother's coffin to the main army barrack in Lagos and write two songs, "Coffin for Head of State" and "Unknown Soldier", referencing the official inquiry that claimed the commune had been destroyed by an unknown soldier.
Kuti and his band then took residence in Crossroads Hotel as the Shrine had been destroyed along with his commune. In 1978 Kuti married 27 women, many of whom were his dancers, composers, and singers to mark the anniversary of the attack on the Kalakuta Republic. Later, he was to adopt a rotation system of keeping only twelve simultaneous wives. The year was also marked by two notorious concerts, the first in Accra in which riots broke out during the song "Zombie," which led to Kuti being banned from entering Ghana. The second was at the Berlin Jazz Festival after which most of Kuti's musicians deserted him, due to rumors that Kuti was planning to use the entirety of the proceeds to fund his presidential campaign.
My preconceptions: I've seen Seun Kuti before and listened to Seun and Femi's music, so of course I'm expecting this to be a clear antecedent to that, as well as lots of other music I enjoy now (see also: Sinkane). I've been wanting to listen to this one for a long time and can't wait to dive in!
“Zombie” - One thing I’ve been thinking about lately is about Angélique Kidjo’s interpretation of Remain in Light. She’s talked about loving the original record, but it not quite resonating with her friends and family: “People there say, “Where’s the four on the floor? We can’t dance to this! It’s white people stuff.” They call me Mother Teresa because I’m always like, “You can’t talk like that. It’s not about white and black.”” And with the acknowledgment that Angélique Kidjo and Felt Kuti share different cultural backgrounds even if they may share some similar pan-African ideas, I can hear a bit of that four on the floor groove. And man, does this thing groove. I listen to the horn melodies and I love it, but in my mind it’s just the cherry on top of that bass & guitar. And then we get to the vocals: on top of the fairly blunt politics of a blue line like “Go and kill! Go and die!”, you get the great assonance of “joro, jaro, toro”. And then you get those keys at the end! And then the trumpet solo right at the end of that!
“Mr. Follow Follow”: And in a way, we get the sonic flipside right away: something slower. And a lot more emphasis on the horns (especially as a big portion of the rhythm section of this song!) And for the first part, there’s not a whole lot to write about other than some really good playing, and then we get to the lyrical portion. It’s interesting what seems tame now in our context in an age of “Fuck Donald Trump”: talking about people not wanting to listen to other ideas as a lyrical conceit outside of the zombie metaphor comes across as a bit basic, even if by no means it was basic in reality! But we also get cockroach imagery and another great keyboard line at the end.
Impressions: In some ways, it’s a bit hard to discuss this album. It feels wrong to talk about it completely divorced from its political context, and it feels wrong to talk about that context as a total outsider to Nigerian politics. So I won’t. But as with so many other records, we can at least talk about the sounds (sorry, Graceland): great use of horns, including as part of the rhythm on “Mr. Follow Follow”, great use of keyboards on both songs, and of course, those drums, guitars, and bass. As one of the cornerstones of Afrobeat, it doesn’t get much better than this, does it?
Background on Nico: Christa Päffgen, known by her stage name Nico, was a German singer, songwriter, musician, model, and actress. She had roles in several films, including Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita (1960) and Andy Warhol's Chelsea Girls (1966). With the insistence of Warhol, she recorded vocals for three songs of the Velvet Underground's debut album The Velvet Underground & Nico (1967). At the same time, she started a solo career and released Chelsea Girl. Nico's friend Jim Morrison suggested her to start writing her own material. She then composed songs on an harmonium, a non-traditional rock instrument: John Cale became her musical arranger and produced The Marble Index, Desertshore, The End... and other subsequent albums.
Nico's first performances as a singer took place in December 1963 at New York's Blue Angel nightclub, where she sang standards such as "My Funny Valentine". In 1965, Nico met the Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones and recorded her first single, "I'm Not Sayin'" with the B-side "The Last Mile", produced by Jimmy Page for Andrew Loog Oldham's Immediate label. Actor Ben Carruthers introduced her to Bob Dylan in Paris that summer. In 1967 Nico recorded his song "I'll Keep It with Mine" for her first album, Chelsea Girl. Dylan had written the tune for Judy Collins in 1964, according to her own liner notes from the Geffen Records' album (she was the first artist to release the song, in 1965).
After being introduced by Brian Jones, she began working in New York with Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey on their experimental films, including Chelsea Girls, The Closet, Sunset and Imitation of Christ. When Warhol began managing the Velvet Underground, a New York City quartet consisting of singer/songwriter/guitarist Lou Reed, violist/keyboardist/bassist John Cale, guitarist Sterling Morrison and drummer Maureen Tucker, he proposed that the group take on Nico as a "chanteuse", an idea to which they consented reluctantly, for both personal and musical reasons. The group became the centerpiece of Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable, a multimedia performance featuring music, lighting, film and dance. Nico sang lead vocals on three songs ("Femme Fatale", "All Tomorrow's Parties", "I'll Be Your Mirror"), and backing vocal on "Sunday Morning", on the band's debut album, The Velvet Underground & Nico (1967). Nico's tenure with the Velvet Underground was marked by personal and musical difficulties. Cale has written that Nico's long preparations in the dressing room and pre-performance good luck ritual (burning a candle) would often hold up a performance, which especially irritated Reed. Nico's partial deafness also would sometimes cause her to veer off key, for which she was ridiculed by other band members.
Immediately following her musical work with the Velvet Underground, Nico began work as a solo artist, performing regularly at The Dom in New York City. At these shows, she was accompanied by a revolving cast of guitarists, including members of the Velvet Underground, Tim Hardin, Tim Buckley, Ramblin' Jack Elliott and Jackson Browne. For her debut album, 1967's Chelsea Girl, she recorded songs by Bob Dylan, Tim Hardin, and Jackson Browne, among others. For The Marble Index, released in 1969, Nico wrote the lyrics and music. Nico's harmonium anchored the accompaniment, while John Cale added an array of folk and classical instruments, and arranged the album. The harmonium became her signature instrument for the rest of her career. The album has a classical-cum-European folk sound. Nico released two more solo albums in the 1970s, Desertshore (1970) and The End... (1974). She wrote the music, sang, and played the harmonium. Cale produced and played most of the other instruments on both albums. The End... featured Brian Eno on synthesizer and Phil Manzanera on guitar, both from Roxy Music. She recorded her final solo album, Camera Obscura, in 1985, with the Faction (James Young and Graham Dids). Produced by John Cale, it featured Nico's version of the Richard Rodgers/Lorenz Hart song "My Funny Valentine". The album's closing song was an updated version of "König", which she had previously recorded for La cicatrice interieure. This was the only song on the album to feature only Nico's voice and harmonium.
In the 1980s, she toured extensively in Europe, USA, Australia and Japan. After a last concert in Berlin in June 1988, she went on holiday in Ibiza to rest but died after having a stroke while bicycling.
Background on Chelsea Girl: Chelsea Girl is the debut solo album and second studio album by Nico. It was released in October 1967 by Verve Records, also home to the Velvet Underground. The name of the album is a reference to Andy Warhol's 1966 film Chelsea Girls, in which Nico starred. After collaborating as a singer with the Velvet Underground on their debut The Velvet Underground & Nico (recorded during 1966, released in March 1967), Warhol superstar Nico toured with the band in Andy Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable (EPI) multimedia roadshow. Before the EPI came to an end in 1967, Nico took up residence in a New York City coffeehouse as a solo folk chanteuse; accompanied in turn by acquainted guitarists, such as Tim Hardin, Jackson Browne and Leonard Cohen, and also her Velvet Underground bandmates Lou Reed, Sterling Morrison and John Cale.
Some of her accompanists wrote songs for her to sing, and these form the backbone of Chelsea Girl. Browne and Hardin contributed some songs, "Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams" by Lou Reed was part of the earliest Velvet Underground repertoire, and Reed, Cale and Morrison in various combinations contributed four more songs. Additionally, Bob Dylan gave her one of his songs to record: "I'll Keep It with Mine". Musically, Chelsea Girl can be described as a cross between chamber folk and 1960s pop. The musical backing is relatively simple, consisting of one or two guitars or, alternatively, a keyboard instrument, played by either Browne or (a combination of) her Velvet Underground colleagues, but there are no drums or bass instruments, hence the absence of Velvets drummer Maureen Tucker, and adding to the chamber folk feel of the music are the string and flute overdubs added to the initial recordings by producer Tom Wilson and arranger Larry Fallon without involving or consulting Nico.
My preconceptions: I felt a little conflicted about originally adding in this album to the list for two reasons: number one, Nico herself had a pretty bad relationship to this album, and number two, Nico was definitely racist. However, the fact remains that this album is still widely acclaimed, and while I've listened to all of the Velvet Underground's releases, I've never really heard anything by Nico by herself, so in a way it only feels appropriate to give her music a fair shake.
So, it's obvious there's not a chance in hell I'm going to finish this project this year! I've been putting off writing this conciliatory post for weeks now (which, lol, of course), but I picked a really, really bad year to try a big completionist project like this one. The first half of this year, I had quite a few major life changes, and the second half of this year, there have been very few days when I've come home from work and wanted to write extensively about an album. And that's the hard part of this project: really, if it was just coming up with a list of 100 albums and listening to all of them, I likely would've been done with it for a while already. But writing about each song takes so much focus and requires me to be doing nothing else while listening to the music, so I can't just, like, put an album on my way to work in the morning or whatever. And whenever I listen to new music or another old album I've never listened to before, I feel guilty.
I think the discussions that have been generated on this thread are great, and I'm still going to listen to all these albums, but I'm not going to kid myself: in its current form, it would likely take at least another year (probably longer) for it to get finished. And the prospect is daunting. So what's going to happen? I don't know. Posting only about the background of each album feels silly when it's all basically just cobbled together Wikipedia bios, especially when most interested parties here are familiar with the albums already. I think my best idea was posting brief checkins or reviews about each album, but I'm not sure I'd do that for every album, and if that's the case, how much effort would I end up putting into each of them?
I don't have an easy answer. But to everyone who's contributed to the discussions here, especially early on: thanks. They've all been fun.
Some stray thoughts as I kind of snake through the list in semi-alphabetical order now:
Chelsea Girls // Nico: This is a half lame cop out but while I was listening to this I really couldn’t stop thinking about Nico’s Nazi sympathies; the title track was good but otherwise I wasn’t super into it.’
Blue // Joni Mitchell: On the other hand, I loved this?? Folk as a whole is a genre that’s always been hard for me to get into (I liked all of Bob Dylan’s albums when I listened to them but I’ve never had any real desire to listen to any of them again), but goddamn Joni Mitchell makes it seem so effortless.
CrazySexyCool // TLC: My friend who’s also been doing this project texted me and said “The interludes on this album are so weird”. I just happen to think it’s effective branding. “Waterfalls” is obviously the best TLC song ever (sorry “No Scrubs” fans) and while it’s not my favorite of theirs, I am now slightly more warmed up to “Creep” than I was before (sorry “Creep” fans). I kind of wish this 90s R&B sound was plundered more frequently these days. Or, like, imagine if new jack swing made a comeback.
Amor Prohibido // Selena: It’s kind of depressing thinking about just how much Selena’s life and talents were cut short - though she continued having success after listening to this, it’s hard not to imagine that she would’ve only gotten bigger as her career went on more. And the songs are really good! I was a big fan of both the obvious hits like “Bidi Bidi Bom” and the odder genre excursions like “Techno Cumbia” and “Ya No”, which really reminds me of Shania Twain.
Apologies to the Queen Mary // Wolf Parade: It’s kind of a shame I didn’t discover this years ago because if I was a bit angstier than I probably would’ve been into “I’ll Believe Anything”. Or “You’re a Runner and I’m My Father’s Son”, which, actually, I dug a lot. To be honest, I thought this album was very good but it’s hard not to see why it’s been kind of overshadowed by other titans of early aughts indie rock (though I guess you could say the same for a band like Bloc Party and I’d still argue that Silent Alarm is a classic so YMMV). Anyway, Cry Cry Cry was underrated.
so now that I’ve been to my two big fests of the year and I’ve mostly caught up with new music, I’m diving more into this, especially since three albums on this list happen to be by artists playing Riot Fest. So without any further ado, here are my one sentence reviews of a bunch of random albums on this list that I’ve listened to in the past month or so:
Reign in Blood: Discussed more over at the Riot Fest thread but while I liked South of Heaven better this is also good. Pussy Whipped: What the hell is Kathleen Hanna saying? Horses: The most shocking part of this album was reading more afterwards and learning that Bruce Springsteen wrote Patti Smith’s biggest song. Nightclubbing: Not every song slaps as hard as “Pull Up to the Bumper” but on the whole, the album slaps. Los Angeles: good news guys, I really liked this. The Dark Side of the Moon: sorry guys, I wasn’t really into this. Big City: Half of the songs on this are conceptual oddballs that aren’t that great and the other half are lovely ballads; I don’t get it. Journey in Satchidandnda: Actually my favorite jazz album out of all the ones on the list so far! Dusty in Springfield: uh hello I had no idea this album had so many bangers on it? Elvis Presley: I was actually enjoying the first part of this but then I got to that supremely lifeless cover of “Tutti Frutti” and it went downhill from there for me. Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain: My intense hatred of Pavement actually slipped while listening to this so I’ve chosen to actively hate this album.
hey, guys! I'm still not done with this nor have I forgotten about it since I last posted in this thread. I have no idea what it is about July 2019 and July 2020 that prompted me to listen to a bunch of the albums on this list I still haven't listened to yet considering they're happening under wildly different circumstances. I think, or at least hope, this time my commitment sticks a bit more since it's not like I have anything better going on.
Unlike last year when I popped in this thread and left very short reviews, I'm going to post some scattered thoughts on a few albums since those are mildly more interesting when I look back on this thread now:
-At my work, they play an adult contemporary station over the radio that plays the same 20-30 songs from the 80-00s constantly (related: Celine Dion's "That's The Way It Is" kind of goes off?). The most bizarre song they play on this largely lily-white and non-offensive-as-humanly-possible station is Marvin Gaye's "Sexual Healing". "Sexual Healing" came out in 1982. Sade's Diamond Life came out in 1984. When I first listened to Diamond Life I had to google these two facts while listening to the album since, in my mind, "Smooth Operator" came out in like 1992 and "Sexual Healing" came out in 1976. My overall opinion of Diamond Life is that it's a super luxurious, super elevated version of adult contemporary that's a joy to listen to. My overall opinion of "Sexual Healing" (and 99% of Marvin Gaye's songs) is that it's a banger. But the fact that these two were released just two years apart? And that Marvin Gaye died just 3 months before Diamond Life came out?? I literally cannot comprehend it.
-In undergrad, I took a History of Rock class. idk why this sticks out so much in my mind, but towards the end of the class we talked about why the lo-fi movement was an development in 90s music and how "Tractor Rape Chain" and Bee Thousand were super influential. I'd listened to "Tractor Rape Chain" as part of the class but I'd never listened to Bee Thousand all the way through. I've never been a big Guided by Voices fan and I don't think this album really changed my mind but I appreciate it all the same. I think a lot about how much our musical aesthetic preferences have been dictated by limitations in vinyl technology (e.g. the length of singles, the length of albums) so I automatically have a begrudging respect for anyone who fucks with it in either direction. GBV of course go in the "short" direction (though I prefer the Magnetic Fields, tbh), but I also have to respect artists that make long as shit music even if I feel no compelling reason to listen to it more than once (e.g. Waclaw Zimpel's latest album. an exception: "Impossible Soul").
-Recently, I've been fervently reading Tom Breihan of Stereogum's The Number Ones series where he reviews every single Billboard Hot 100 single. Inspired by this, I've been peeking around the singles that topped the charts in the 80s and 90s, and I've discovered two things: 1) I really love Paula Abdul?? and 2): it is bonkers to what extent Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston dominated the pop charts in the 90s. This is especially true of Mariah - I've always known that Mariah was successful but I think there's a lot of people my age who know her mostly from songs like "We Belong Together" or think of her mostly in terms of her personality, memeability, or the more sordid aspects of her personal life (Not to say that she hasn't greatsongs recently!). With that in mind, listening to Butterfly was kind of an odd experience - it is also bonkers to think about how many comebacks Mariah Carey has made in her career and how this was her first major one came with this album when she was 27 (sidebar: this stings in a way since I'm turning 27 in an hour but also I feel more disappointed by the fact that I'll never be as successful as Ariana Grande, who was born 3 weeks before me. In terms of feasibility and closeness in age, maybe I should aim for a 100 gecs-level of lifetime achievement.) Musically, Butterfly has a lot of hallmarks of late 90s R&B done very, very well, but maybe my favorite part was listening to "The Roof" for the first time and realizing 'oh shit, this is the same beat as Shook Ones!'. For all that she's been through and went through at this time, it's remarkable that she was able to take her favorite 90s trends and meld them into something unique. Mariah Carey's career trajectory and history is endlessly fascinating, but honestly? It's yielded some great results along the way, too.
Also, I'm listening to Supa Dupa Fly right now and goddamn this album has so many bangers.
"I think, or at least hope, this time my commitment sticks a bit more since it's not like I have anything better going on." Well, it turns out I did end up having two better things going on: number one, shortly after that brief period in July, my work started picking up like crazy, and number two, this ended up being the year I listened to more new albums than ever before. Who would've guessed!
Anyway, as the number of new releases has slowed down significantly by this time of the year, I'm adopting a strategy that proved wildly successful for listening to new music: as long as I add an album to my "To listen to" Spotify playlist, I will somehow eventually listen to it. Here are the five albums I've listened to in the past week since adopting that strategy:
Maxinquaye: This is really the only big 90s trip hop album I'd never listened to before. I've listened to a lot of Tricky's newer stuff but have never really super been into it, so I was hoping this was going to be the key that would unlock some deeper understanding of his work. Ultimately, I don't think I quite got there. There's some really good songs on here ("Overcome" was probably my favorite"), and Martina Topley-Bird's vocals are heavenly, but just like with Tricky's other work, in the end I didn't really connect with the songs. Also, I never realized that "Hell Is Round the Corner" and "Glory Box" shared a sample. What a weird coincidence.
Repeater: I have no idea why, but I thought this was going to be a straight up hardcore album and feel kind of let down it wasn't. Oh well. Anyway, I know the word "clever" kind of gets thrown around as an insult sometimes, but this album felt really clever to me in a way that felt enjoyable. For example: since I'd never listened to Fugazi before, I had no idea there were three singers in the band, and every time I'd hear a new vocal trick, I'd think, "Oh, that's clever". See? It already sounds a bit condescending. I think overall I enjoyed this.
Songs of Leonard Cohen: There's no way to say this without sounding like a naif, but that's the whole point of this project so I'm just going to go ahead and say it: this album really did change my perception of what '60s folk could sound like. I thought this was going to basically be a Bob Dylan album, so not only was I pleasantly surprised that it wasn't, but that it basically exists in a separate universe all on its own. Of course, the arrangements are quite simple, but the songwriting here is just top notch. While listening to this, I looked up every song on the album on Spotify and was blown away to find that just about every song has been covered a crazy amount of different times by different artists. Probably one of my favorite albums on this list I've listened to.
Violator: As a perpetual wannabe goth, I really liked this. Somehow, I've never listened to "Personal Jesus" before, so it was cool to discover that had more of a swing rhythm than I expected it to. However, "Policy of Truth" and "World in My Eyes" ended up being my favorite songs. I'd listened to OMD's Organisation not long before this one, and I guess it's interesting to sort of compare them as how synthpop as a genre developed over the span of 10 years. There's always been a couple of OMD songs I've really, really liked, but Organisation didn't really capture my imagination the same way this one did.
The Three E.P.'s: This is a Beck album. Actually, scratch that. This is a Beck album if every Beck song sucked and was 10 minutes long for some reason. (Though "Dry the Rain" kind of sounds like Primal Scream instead, which makes it ok in my book.)