Here’s a playlist of some new stuff.
Cameron Carpenter
Start with some Cameron Carpenter — he’s an immensely talented and immensely sequined organist. That previous link points to a Chopin etude that he jazzed up for organ, but here’s a more classical interpretation of Chopin’s Revolutionary Etude.
Alright — I’m mostly done with classical music now, though you can check out Rufus Wainwright’s “Oh What A World” for what eventually builds up to a clever riff on Ravel’s Bolero.
Definitely in the same vein of “music for musicians” we were talking about!
Goat Rodeo Sessions
Though keeping with the classical-ish vibe, check out Chris Thile’s (yes, the same) Goat Rodeo Sessions, with some Punch Brother names but also Yo-yo Ma, who you may recognize from some other awesome music — perhaps the recent “Playlist without Borders”, which takes some cues from all around the world and forms one cohesive album. Though that particular album has some pieces that get a little too contemporary for me, it still is proof that anyone who synonymizes Yo-yo Ma with Bach’s Cello Suite needs a Clockwork Orange-style forced-eye-opening.
Borders nonwithstanding, nothing in the Goat Rodeo Sessions is anything short of incredible:
Kishi Bashi
If Chris Thile is a mandolinist blend of jazz and classical, Kishi Bashi is the violinist complement. He has of course performed a Tiny Desk Concert, but the acoustics (as he mentions) are a little wonky, and I’d recommend formally recorded versions to get the full feel once you’ve seen how he composes in realtime.
“I Am The Antichrist To You” is a good example of his method, but I prefer pieces from his Sonderlust and Lighght albums, personally.
I get a feel much like Vampire Weekend if VW were just one dude. Hey, here’s a good mix of VW’s The Kids Don’t Stand A Chance by Miike Snow.
Ultrafaux
What I like so much about Kishi Bashi is that his music subverts the expectations of a conventional listener. We expect to hear chord progressions that never arrive, and while his timing is relatively vanilla (as it must be, since it’s all loops) the melodies are unexpected and novel.
That’s what I like so much about gypsy jazz — in particular, Ultrafaux is a Baltimore-local band with an absolutely fantastic sound. Michael Joseph Harris (lead guitar) is brilliant.
Speaking of Baltimore-local: I saw the Screaming J’s at last year’s Some-Festival-Or-Somesuch. They were playing out of the back of their van and it was entirely unclear if they were supposed to be there or not.
Note that the drummer is, naturally, playing with literal, actual, not-even-joking chopsticks.
Some Very Good Timing
It’s hard for me to categorize these bands together, but they conveniently all have Very Interesting Timing in common (though of course they’re all different interesting timing).
Here’s GoGo Penguin’s Hopopono, which is a clean 4/4, but really gives you a run for your money:
I discovered GGP while researching the Neil Cowley Trio, which has such gems as Gerald:
Even the 1-2-3-4 count-off lulls you into a false common-timing sense of security. Just you wait.
Or you can take a sound-bath in something like Meyer:
Some more fooling around with timing here, by The Bad Plus, which I always think is a great ride.
They developed an entire jazz album riffing on Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, which, though I won’t stand on the streets and protest, I can’t say I enjoyed particularly. Nonetheless, good showmanshop.
You can absolutely hear them having a good time, no matter the piece:
I found Neil Cowley (who recently got an enormous amount of press for “Grace”, which I wasn’t particularly impressed by) while looking for
Portico [Quartet]
The Portico Quartet plays with their sound without you even noticing it. Their later stuff has a great atmosphere:
Though I still love their earlier work which focused more on the Hang (the steel-drum-stapled-to-another-steel-drum instrument I mentioned). Good examples:
After they suddenly became the Portico Trio, they progresed to just “Portico”, and worked a collaboration album with some pretty great names, including Joe Newman from Alt-J. Here’s a song that is not that one:
To wit, their sound changed entirely for the Living Fields album, and while I like it, I still much prefer their older, less synthesized (but still highly modified) sound.
Here’s a bit of an interview with the once-quartet, leading up to some of their more experimental work, such as Line:
Caravan Palace
All of these should be listened to with headphones, but Aftermath in particular: Caravan Palace marries the swing-band with the electro-synth-pop, and does a tremendous job, in my opinion.
And here’s a good song for jamming while you drive your Prohibition-era hovercraft to the speakeasy:
In the same pump-up direction, you can just see the sound engineer messing with a slider in Yay:
Some more things
The new Leonard Cohen eponymous piece:
Spoooooky. (Fun fact: The mysterious not-English “heneini” in the chorus is the same Hebrew phrase for “I am here” that biblical fellas use in the Torah to greet The Powerful Sky Friend.)
Speaking of the dude: Here’s a good piece to make you feel bad at what seems like it should be a simple fingerpicking scheme:
On an entirely different note, Laura Mvula has a characteristic sound that catches my western ear by surprise:
Speaking of “unaccustomed to the sound”: If I knew my music theory better, I’d be able to tell you what mode this was written in:
(To wit: Radiohead’s Weird Fishes is, to the best of my knowledge, in Bm, without ever playing a Bm chord. So… That’s got a term for it also.)
To finish off somewhat close to where we started: Sufjan Stevens — yes, the same one who mopes through entire albums — wrote a pretty interesting “symphony” (someone else’s term, not mine) which is worth a listen.
And a bonus:
Watch Bill Shannon totally tear it up on crutches.