Uninspired by it all.....

Well faithful reader, it's been a while. In fact too long. How have you been? Things going okay? I hope so.  I'm sorry i've been out of touch for a while but to be honest with you, nothing was inspiring me or getting me going about music.  I literally sat in front of my CD collection a few weeks ago and stared into space, nothing was calling to me. Turned the iPod on and......nothing.  Seriously, it was like watching TV from April to September, a million choices, but nothing worth while on.

Not to worry though, i'm back on the wagon again, thanks to our man Neil Finn! (I will write about my odd unconditional love for anything Neil Finn soon). But I think this is slightly indicative of mainstream music now. Nothing or no one is separating themselves from the pack very much, or more importantly, no one seems to be creating any great interest, at least for me. Of course there are a few... Adele, great album, but not one i'm going to put on in the car on the way to work at 6:30 am.  That Gotye album a while back, that got me going, but like a hungry zombie, I need more to fuel my fire! However I do feel that most of the stuff out there is just too produced and lacking heart. It sounds like these artists are just dialling in performances, then letting the producers and the engineers in the recording studios  work their magic to pop out a single that will get massive airplay for a few months then fester at the bottom of the trash heap once the next big single hits by the very same artists that keep perpetuating this obscene cycle.

As I said, don't get me wrong, there are lots of good groups out there, just none that are currently doing anything to make any waves for my tastes.  What I think it comes down to is value of real skills, or more importantly, value of real humanity and real life in music. Recently Dave Grohl made a few choice comments while accepting the award for best Rock Performance at this year's Grammys

If you missed the important parts he said :

"This is a great honour, because this record was a special record for our band. Rather than go to the best studio in the world down the street in Hollywood and rather than use all of the fanciest computers that money can buy, we made this one in my garage with some microphones and a tape machine...

"To me this award means a lot because it shows that the human element of music is what's important. Singing into a microphone and learning to play an instrument and learning to do your craft, that's the most important thing for people to do.

"It's not about being perfect, it's not about sounding absolutely correct, it's not about what goes on in a computer. It's about what goes on in here [your heart] and what goes on in here [your head]."

Right on Dave!!! That is exactly how I am feeling right now about music in general. Can't sing? No problem, just put some Auto-Tune on it! The kids all love that effect. By the way, here is a great video explaining the fad of Auto-Tune using just the right amount of humour!

Now back to Dave, like anything in this era, when someone says something that resembles an opinion, faceless people on the internet throw their collective hands up in the air and do the best thing they know how......post negative comments on message boards or Twitter!!!!! So subsequently Dave clarified things:

"That’s exactly what I was referring to. The “human element”. That thing that happens when a song speeds up slightly, or a vocal goes a little sharp. That thing that makes people sound like PEOPLE. Somewhere along the line those things became “bad” things, and with the great advances in digital recording technology over the years they became easily “fixed”. The end result? I my humble opinion…..a lot of music that sounds perfect, but lacks personality. The one thing that makes music so exciting in the first place.
And, unfortunately, some of these great advances have taken the focus off of the actual craft of performance."


Yes!!! I think I like you even more now Dave Grohl. Not only did you clarify but you did not completely back down to the haters.

So what it comes down to is this, most top 40 songs right now lack that "human element". Sure they are singing about relationships or whatever, but the actual performance of it lacks any sort of heart and this is what is missing from the mainstream music we hear. Most live performances are to tape. This is what is leaving me uninspired!  I'm certainly not saying that music made on computers or techno music are invalid. They certainly are, in fact some music in that vein can produce the greatest textures and sonic innovations, all stemming from the human element of experimentation.  Even live techno performances rely on the artist triggering sequences and samples how they see fit. Chris Brown just dances and half assed sings along with the prerecorded over produced track coming through his monitor, and even then, lip syncs the chorus because he is more or a dancer than an actual musician. When a song or performance is just so over produced and corrected and tweaked, that is what takes away the raw human element. 

Take Adele, why is she so popular, the human element front and centre. The girl can sing and her tracks are not over produced and tinkered with. Take that Gotye single "Somebody that I used to Know" that is hitting pretty hard right now. Although most of that album he uses synthesizers, drum machines, and computers to make the sounds, you can tell that he sat there and toiled away to create something organic, original, and not completely perfect or produced. Not just a half assed performance then tweaked it with the computer software. 

You want to know what really took me out of my musical funk? Two things, Neil Finn, as noted and Bluegrass music. In both instances, the human element was ever present in the recordings I was listening to. The bluegrass album, well, if you want to hear and appreciate real musicians who know how to play, just listen to anything on the country side of the spectrum. When you get to Bluegrass, you can clearly see that these are some bad ass musicians who know their stuff. The Neil Finn tracks.......live recordings of just him doing a solo show. Full on human element in the music!

Cheers!

Music and Marketing

So after posting my recent thoughts about the Darkness and their Super Bowl commercial, I heard a great broadcast on CBC by Terry O'Rielly about this very same thing. Terry is the resident CBC personality who deals with marketing and advertising.  He has an extensive background in the advertising field and has his own company, Pirate Radio and Televison. He has had number of successful advertising shows on CBC, with his latest offering being entitled "Under the Influence". If you are at all intrigued by advertising, or like Mad Men for the advertising aspect, check out Terry's webpage. 

Yesterday the show was all about the use of music in advertising.  He highlights some very interesting cases and talks about the need for artists to license their music in the current market. Very interesting stuff. If you have 20mins or so, stream the audio, if not have a quick read through the article.

Check it out here!

Cheers

The Darkness Returns! For what reasons?

Okay, I will admit another dirty secret. Back in 2004 I got into "The Darkness". Some students on my practicum were listening to them on the bus to a music festival and I thought should check them out.  At that time their video for "I Believe in a Thing Called Love" was on pretty heavy rotation. Amazing that only 8 years ago Much Music actually played music videos on a regular basis. Anyway, bought the CD and enjoyed about 75% of the album, best as could be expected from a campy, over the top, hair/metal/rock band.  It is called "Permission to Land",  check it out for some fun. 

A year or so later they released another album,"One Way Ticket",  that was rubbish, way over produced.  Then you didn't really hear much from them. I believe there was some sort of solo album after that but I don't know. It appeared that after the colossal success of their fist disc, they seemed to just drop off the face of the music scene.

Well, last week this came across the pages at Alan Cross's website:

Needless to say I was a little excited. Come on now, you know you like campy over the top falsetto hair/rock! 

As I said I was a bit excited, then I saw this add from Super Bowl Sunday:

Interesting timing isn't it?

So Justin Hawkins and company are just cashing in. With a Super Bowl commercial featuring their biggest song, AND Justin himself must equal a big payday and a fairly large level of exposure of their music. Right off the bat I was screaming sell out!  

Now, not that I don't totally agree with selling out to some extent, you have to eat right? I remember a conversation two guitar players were having in our jazz theory class about this very subject. The one who had lofty ideas of art and the genius of playing guitar was adamant that he would never sell out (I think he even included the obligatory "Man!" at the end of his statement for added effect). The other guy just responded with "Hey, if someone paid me stupid money to play the polka, I'd play the polka!"  

Great album - get it!

Once my knee-jerk reaction faded I thought a bit more about this, and in the end, it actually seems like a good business move.  The music industry has changed big time since 2004. Even in the last two years that most effective method of marketing for a band has changed.   Licensing songs for advertising can be a lucrative source of revenue for a band. The first instance of this that I can remember in my musical journey was noticing that quite a few songs from Moby's "Play" album were being used in car and shoe ads. At the time he took a lot of flak for this. This was actually one of the first few albums to have EVERY TRACK licensed. Moby came out in defence of this decision and explained that it was one of the only ways he could get the music heard. Long story short, the album was a huge success for him, with a major part of that success due to his decision license the tunes. Take a listen to "Porcelain".  Great track! Take the time to check it out.  

Well, regardless what you think about selling out, a band has got to eat, and sometimes doing commercials and lending music to films can help them continue to exist as artists. Agree or disagree, musicians have to find ways to promote their tunes while not giving them away for free. I have to say, I agree with licensing songs, provided it is the original artist that is doing this, not just someone or some company that owns the rights to the songs (any old adds with Beatles music was not making a profit for Ringo and the boys, it was lining Michael Jackson's pockets, he owned most of the rights to their songs). 

So I say, welcome back The Darkness, I am looking forward to the zaniness that will ensue!

Cheers!

Time for a confession......

As someone who is interested in music and feels the need to talk about it and write about it I feel we need to address something. I am a little nervous about this. Here it is folks, I am going to admit to something that will either drive a wedge between us or bring us closer together as musical buddies;

I don't like Rush.

Division Bell Cover

Wow, I feel lighter, freer, more at peace with myself in the digital universe.  Why is this such a big deal anyway? But as far as I can tell there are two types of people in this world; those who love Geddy Lee's ear piercing vocals, and those if us that can't seem to stomach it. Sure, the members of Rush are very talented musicians, but I just can't get into the prog-rock thing.  To be fair, it's not just Rush, I don't really like any progressive rock. I tried to like Pink Floyd but I couldn't keep up the facade. I bought "The Wall", listened to "Dark Side of the Moon" and even bought "The Division Bell" but after a while I just felt like a sham. I don't truly appreciate or get the sounds and ideas coming from this vein of music.

Now I have to admit, as a proud Canadian, I do feel like a blasphemer when I say I don't enjoy Rush. Perhaps it's the underdog in all us Canadians to root for and support one of our own that I feel that I am betraying slightly,  but I really don't enjoy their sound.

This brings me to maybe the point I am trying to get at, what helps form our musical tastes and opinions? Obviously popular culture has a major part to play in this all. Picture the impressionability of a teenager watching Much Music back in the day when all that was on were music videos and you were able to create some in many teenagers a taste that would sell and promote the popular records of the time. Sure there was "The Wedge" which featured alternative music, but that was not on during prime viewing times. At least this is what I experienced. Today, I don't really know how teenagers get exposed to the music they listen to. I guess radio, Facebook, iTunes. Regardless of how it is conveyed to us, pop culture and the media have a part to play in the development of our musical tastes, for better or worse.

However, there is one other aspect of musical development that is truly fascinating about us as individuals; we all experience music in different ways.  It still floors me when I give out assignments in my music classes and ask my students to reflect on what they see or get out of a piece of music we are working on.  Even if the piece has a specific and descriptive title, each and every student will hand in a different description of what they see or get out of the music. I think this is pretty cool.  

Now I know what you are thinking, "Ethan, you are wasting my time, of course everyone has different tastes. I like brown, you like blue. Big deal".  But there still is a big deal. Simple tastes are one thing, musical preferences are another I think. Music is such a personal and emotional thing. It can take you back in your mind, it can make you feel different (notice how you react to things after listening to something slower and mellower - think Elliot Smith "Miss Misery", as opposed to say,  gangster rap). So not liking or liking music can have a very visceral response in people. Just today this happened during a conversation I was having with a couple of people. They were playing Rush in the band room, I said I didn't like Rush. What ensued was probably the strongest reaction to a distaste of mine that I have ever experienced. Crazy!

What it all boils down to is the passion we have for certain music and artists. Our emotional connection to it all.  This makes me think of a line from "Love Actually" when Emma Thompson's character explains why she likes Joni Mitchell - "She taught your cold English wife how to feel." What makes me so nuts for U2 and my buddy so crazy for Oasis? What makes Rush fans so adamant about their tastes? I don't know, but as I said, it is interesting. I think though that true artists, and yes I am going to put Rush in this catagory, create strong reactions, positive or negative. And after all, is that not the true goal of anything creative, to make us feel something?

As a final note, I think I am going to give Geddy and the gang another chance. If there is anything I have realized as of late is that sometimes it is worth giving something a listen after some time, you just might come to appreciate it or find new energy in some music that you thought was lifeless to you.

Cheers!

Best dialed in songwriting goes to......

Okay, so I have to admit, this is my second crack at this blog post. I was working very enthusiastically during breaks of invigilating exams today at work, saving all the while. What I learned though is this: don't work on our blog on an iPad. It will save one time, and completely wipe out your work the next. Oh well, live and learn.

But I digress, onto the hot topic of today; the Oscar nominations! In particular, the nominations for best original song. Here is the mystifying part, only tow songs have been nominated.  Two songs! From all of the movies released in 2011, only two have cut the mustard. Please welcome the contestants:

"Man or Muppet" - from the Muppet movie by Bret McKenzie

Or

"Real in Rio" - from Rio by Sergio Mendes, Carlinhos Brown, and Siedah Garrett

There is a process to how the academy chooses the eligible entries. To boil it down, there is a set criteria of the type of song  that can be eligible (must be featured in the movie, not just in the credits, and be written specifically for the film),  then they view just the portions of the film with those songs, and then give them a rating out of 10. Who knows what the rating is based on, but they then only consider songs who have scored an average of 8.25 or higher for nominations. A more detailed account of this information can be found at Alan Cross's entry by clicking here.

All that considered, really only two songs? So many different questions come to mind.  Is the talent this year just that sub par? Or, are the academy out to lunch. It would be easy to judge and quickly pounce on the academy, even though I think they do seem out to lunch, but I think that some of fault rests with the artists. When you think about it, when was the last time a song from a movie was on heavy rotation on your iPod? Unless you listen to a lot of Disney music, movie songs are probably not on the top of anyone's list.  Now I am sure there are some fairly large confines in which an artist has to work within to write a song for a film, but it seems to me that most artists are just dialling it in and saving the good material for their own work. I can't really argue with that, but then what is the point of congratulating mediocrity? If we all know that sub par work and artistry are what is going to be put forth for a movie song, then just don't even acknowledge it. What other industry in the world other than the film industry can someone give bland performances and be congratulated for it regularly?  Really, when a song like "Blame Canada", although funny, can get a nomination for an academy award, what is wrong with the value of music in society?  Perhaps if we as a society started valuing decent music again, and I don't mean really loving the jams at the club, then we might see some really quality work coming from the music industry. 

All this considered, what do you like? Muppet fuzz or moulting feathers? I'll put a poll up on the page to see what my one reader likes. Personally, i'm a Muppetly Man, wocka, wocka!

The first time......

We all have our first. The thrill, the anticipation,  the nervousness, the awkward silence afterward....wait a minute, what are you thinking? I'm talking about the first album you purchase.  Man, get you minds out of the gutter, this is a family blog!

Remember these days? My kids will never know this I am afraid

A friend of mine recently posted on Facebook about her son magically picking out the same album she first bought on his recent trip to HMV. Amazing! This started me thinking about my first album purchase. Now to be fair, I think the first album I bought was my cousin Neil's used tape of Michael Jackson's Thriller. I really can't count this as I can't even remember listening to it, all I can remember is that it was in my room, so we'll just file that one away. Maybe I just thought it was a cool picture on the cover. Maybe I only liked "Thriller" or "Bille Jean". Regardless, I can't count this as the first album I really got into.

"In Red Hill Town, the lights go down on"

Your first album has to be something you listen to endlessly and really get into,  and for the most part understand.   This album has to live with you. I think, it will even mark a point in time for you and magically transport you back to that time. Maybe it is just me, but still to this day I can put on albums and still taste, smell, feel, and sometimes feel that time period or stage in life I was in when I listened to that album the most. To this day, when I hear U2's "Red Hill Mining Town" I am automatically taken back to my bed room in Nanaimo, age 13, sitting at the huge desk my Dad found for me at his office doing homework or playing the latest share-ware 8-bit computer game. I can picture the math homework!

Enter here, the fall of 1991.  I wanted a stereo system bad. I am sure, much like most big ticket items I wanted, I had been tasked with as many extra chores around the house as my Mom could think of to justify a couple dollar increase in my allowance for a number of months. I can remember saving all my birthday money as well to save for the stereo. For some reason the amount of $200 sticks in my mind, which, considering the time, was pretty expensive. Finally after months of saving I had enough to make the purchase.  I wish I could remember the make of it, but I can't. I do remember it had two tape decks, a CD player, a three band equalizer, and, wait for it, a REMOTE!! This was the icing on the cake!

The day finally came sometime in October or November when my Mom had time to take me to the store in the mall after school to make the big purchase.  I was so excited.  Everything went well, the stereo was still there and I had more than enough money to cover the cost. Now what happened next will forever be part of my musical upbringing. Somehow, I managed to persuade the store owner to throw in a new CD with the purchase of the stereo. Perhaps I paid a bit for it, but I can still see his face when he was pondering the idea that I had proposed.   Amazing! I had a brand new CD! I actually had no idea really what it was! My parents had a stereo but not a CD player, we didn't own any CDs. I as so excited to pick out a CD, the only problem was, I didn't know what I wanted. Up until that time I had listened to compilations of 50's and 60's music and the odd kids tape, but no major artist that I could think of (and yes, I did listen to Weird Al Yakovic, come on, what dorky boy didn't at that point in time, again, he does not count as a first album). I remember searching the store racks for something I recognized. Finally I found it:

You sing it Bryan!

Earlier that summer the lead off single "Everything I Do, I Do it for You" came out along with the movie "Robin Hood Prince of Thieves". Yes, I saw the movie, and to this day I can remember the music video for the song vividly. Watching music videos was my main past time at home.  What can I say I was/am a nerd.  Anyway, I picked up my brand new copy of "Waking up the Neighbours" and marched up to the till. I was so excited. I got home, struggled with the shrink wrap and popped the disc in. I was in heaven. It was so rockin'!  I am sure I cranked "Can't Stop this Thing We Started" every time it came on, much to my parent's chagrin (check out the link). Ah, the pure indulgence of early 90's mastering in rock music, the snare drum echo, the polish of the guitars, the presence of the vocals, it takes me back. Check out other early 90's rock albums and you will notice the same type of treatment of the sound, in particular Tom Cochrane's "Mad Mad World". Same sounds. Anyway, I digress. Where was I, needless to say, I am sure I played this disc constantly, as it was the only CD we had in the house. The constant rotation of this record in the player engrained these tunes in my head. "Don't drop the Bomb on Me", "House Arrest" were popular, along with "Not Guilty". Even typing the names of these tunes is bringing back more memories that I had not realized were still in my head. 

This is the thing that intrigues me. I probably could never get rid this disc. Too many memories attached. Have I listened to it in ages, no. But even to this day, just thinking about this record, I can feel what I was feeling back in the fall of 1991. I can feel my apprehension about moving to a different town. I can hear my friends and I playing games with the disc playing in the background, running around singing along badly to the lyrics. I can even smell the crisp cold air of northern Alberta in November as I walked home from school. Amazing what simple songs can do to someone's brain.  What this album marks for me is an unsettled time for in my life. We were in the process of possibly moving to a couple of different places. I was not happy about leaving my friends, but I understood why we had to move. Without too many details, my Dad's job was taking us to one of two places. This is probably why I got into the music so much. I guess I may have wanted someplace to escape to where I didn't have to worry about things. Perhaps, and this might be a stretch, this is even what got me into listening to music so much in the first place. That might be a stretch though as there are pretty well known stories of  me bouncing up and down in the back of our suburban at a very early age to the Oak Ridge Boys sing "Elvira". Oh, well, so much for the phycological insights into my life at 11, I think I just really dug the music. Good ol' Bryan Adams, you really know that everywhere you go, the kids wanna rock!

From there on out I was hooked. The rush of listening to an album on my stereo was my drug. So, in essence, Bryan Adams was my gateway drug. Funny enough, the first one was free! Next came the excesses of more Michael Jackson (and yes the "Dangerous" album was a it excessive) and brilliant Peter Gabriel, and only a few short months later, the main artist of my adolescence, U2.

So, faithful readers, the one of you out there, what was your first? Where does it take you? How did it happen? The sordid details are always the most interesting...

Something New

By now most people have see this little gem that has been floating around for a while. This group "Walk off the Earth" are Canadian! Great work. Their other videos are pretty good to, but this one is particularly great, simply due to the genius of the gimmick they created. From here on out, anytime someone covers a tune and is playing multiple instruments, or multiple people are playing one instrument, they will probably be referred to. Great PR.

So being the nerd I am, I started listening to this and then looked for the original version. Here it is

After listening to this for a bit I then decided that more research was necessary on this dude "Gotye"  Turns out he is a Belgian/Australian recording artist how has a few albums our already. This track is from his latest offering entitled "Making Mirrors". You can check out his website just by searching for Gotye. That is not his real name by the by, real name is Wally De Backer, I think I would go with the stage name as well, no offence Wally. So after listening to all the previews for the songs on iTunes I decided to take the plunge with an unknown artist. After I hit the purchase button I thought to myself "What are you doing?  You don't even have the assurance that a least a few of the other tracks are great. Those 30 second clips where nothing to go off of!" I could make some analogy to a one night stand here, all about diving in without knowing much about the person, but we all know it will end up being awkward, both the situation and my intended joke. So when I put the disc into the player in my car for the drive work I waited with baited breath for Mr. De Backer to impress me. Well, I can safely say he did. Beyond the attraction to the haunting, by very real "Somebody I used to Know" (man had this come out in high school when I was dating, this would have been my go to song!) the rest of the disc is pretty good. A bit artsy at times (what can you expect from a solo european musician), but overall refreshing.

What does that mean? Refreshing! It is said so much in reviews or comments. Well, for me, not only were the songs crafted well enough to spend $9.99 on, but the musicality of it all was a nice change from what is around right now. The biggest aspect of the music that I noticed was the blatant use of dynamics. Amazing, something I harp on my high school band students to work on in their playing, is something, that I think, is so rare in regular pop music. Maybe that is why they have such a struggle with it. Back to Gotye, the first track and a half of the album are very soft tracks. Not just that he is signing softly, but the mix of the music is quiet. At first I thought it must just be the mastering of the CD, but then about half way through the second song on the disc, the guitars and synths kick in and the chorus to the tune is up at a louder level, then coming down again to this novel idea of a soft dynamic!
Amazing how much more engaging the music can be when the artist is inviting you to pay closer attention to their music, rather than just crank it up and shove it down you ear canal.

Using dynamics can evoke so much more in us a listeners. When you turn on the regular top 40 radio station, all the tracks sound the same and are at the same level. It's like eating the same thing for lunch every day; after a while you stop caring about it and see it just as a regular, unvalued, expereience. Maybe that is, albeit in a small part, why people seem to not value music as much any more.  Perhaps if artists and labels started actually treating the listeners as the mindful, intelligent people they are, and not catering to the music in the clubs, the music industry would not be going down the tubes right now.

Anyway, rant is over for now. Do yourself a favour and check this guy Gotye out and if you are further interested have a look at this link from Alan Cross's website about "The Loudness Wars." This pertains more to the mastering of CDs and tracks at a louder volume, but I think it all plays into what I was ranting about before.
More on the Loudness Wars