Category Archives: Music

11/01/2012

Beirut (band). For other uses, see Beirut (disambiguation).

By The Cultured Animal

No, I didn’t take any poor snapshots of the band on my smart phone. I was too far away – just far enough that they looked kind of like every other band at a gig of this size: glowing sunset-coloured people in front of booming blue lights. (Except when the sousaphone came out, then one of them was a glowing pink thing with a brassy halo.)

So here’s a proper photo made by someone who makes proper photos. Specifically, the very talented Olly Hearsey of Lion Works Studios:

Put a bird on it!

Live or Die

With everyone these days downloading or streaming music and video for free, musicians have so much riding on live performance. Bands can set themselves up for failure too, because while the tools for adding layers of complex, perfectly executed sounds to a recording are so readily available today, reproducing that same sound live can prove a challenge.

Take Neko Case, for example. Her last album, Middle Cyclone, is a superb work of poetry and art, full of vivid imagery and evocative, carefully placed soundscapes that transport you into her strange world. However, though Case is an impressive singer with a pleasing sense of humour, the relatively conventional arrangement of her live show when she last toured here failed to convey the same dreamy imaginings as her record.

Beirut, on the other hand, are just bloody fantastic musicians. You can tell because the decorative notes that shroud the melodies of each instrument – including Zach Condon’s warm vocals – vary subtly from those heard on the recordings. The feeling is all there, all improvised, not pre-packaged. (Also, when I saw Beirut at Meredith however many eons ago, the sound system was chucking a spazz but the band still managed to knock out an impressive performance.)

Last night’s set at the Forum in Melbourne was naturally weighted toward material from their latest album The Rip Tide, but they also played plenty of less familiar songs not lifted from any of their three albums. This showed the band has an impressive amount of material to choose from, despite having been around for only five years. Clocking in at less than an hour before their encore, however, the set did feel a bit short.

Neko Case: I SAID PUT A BIRD ON IT

Celebrate Good Times, Come On

Trumpets, horns, ukes and accordions are not the usual, and they are what give Beirut its unique and familiar sound. What other popular contemporary band casually throws a sousaphone solo into its live set, followed by a trumpet solo?

One tends to think of loud marching bands and out-of-tune school orchestras when the word ‘trumpet’ is mentioned (or perhaps ‘strumpet’ comes to mind, depends where your mind’s at exactly), but when you add Beirut into the sentence, the trumpet becomes beautiful, subtle, gentle, whimsical – and also yes, perhaps the thing it’s best at – majestic.

There are also moments watching Beirut when I feel like I’m at an old Eastern European relative’s 50th wedding anniversary. My Czech friend who was with me had a ball, and wondered why Australians don’t clap along to everything at concerts. But Beirut is a band you can sway to, rather than dance. The sizeable but placid crowd, gathered together in what is arguably Melbourne’s most beautiful music venue*, certainly lent an atmosphere of festivity, even if we weren’t exactly bouncing off the walls.

You Must be a Pop Singer in Disguise

Where Beirut also deliver is in their multiple-whammy harmonies: not just gorgeous vocal harmonies, but brass harmonies too. It’s like a delicious layer cake. Yet the band’s arrangements and chord progressions have an easy feel that never becomes overwrought, and Condon’s charming vocals – a perfect complement to the band’s warm, brassy sound – always carry the songs.

In the end, this is great pop music in disguise, even if it has a melancholic edge.

*Just don’t try and order anything weird, like a gin and soda, because the bar staff will look at you oddly and make bad jokes. Really. No-one’s ever ordered a gin and soda at the Forum before.

The cloak room at the Forum, by the way, is completely free of charge. There was also never a line at the bar or at any of the exquisite ‘ladies rooms’. Dear Forum. I love you.

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30/12/2011

Melancholy Horses

By The Cultured Animal

There’s far too much going in Lars Von Trier’s Melancholia for me to attempt a proper critique just now. All I really want to say are two things. Well, maybe three … or four …

(For those who haven’t seen the film or are unfamiliar with its plot, all you need to know is: Justine (Kirsten Dunst) is chronically depressed and comes to stay with her sister Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg) on an 18-hole golf course in the country; a planet, ‘Melancholia’, has come out from its hiding place behind the sun and is now hurtling towards earth; and her father (John Hurt) likes to steal teaspoons.)

Firstly, this guy thought the cinematography sucked, but unlike Bonnie Prince Billy I’m not a cinematographer, so I’m not going to comment on that. Suffice to say, regardless of your stance on digital film vs … er … film film, Melancholia deserves to be watched in a proper cinema. Preferably a large one. I watched it in Le Grande.

Justine (Kirsten Dunst) floats down a river in her wedding gown, a reference to Shakespeare's Ophelia

John Everett Millais' famous depiction of Shakespeare's Ophelia

Melancholy Music

I will however comment on the breathtaking soundscape to the film – not the score, which was fittingly sparse, but the detailed projection of everyday noises that fill the spaces left inbetween.

I’m not sure I’ve heard a sex scene quite as real as when Justine and Michael (Alexander Skarsgard) get it on in the honeymoon suite on their wedding night. All those sloppy kiss noises and ruffling tulle … (It wasn’t even a sex scene, actually – they didn’t get very far before the melancholia butted in. Three’s a crowd.)

And I’ve never heard a galloping horse the way I heard it here, so vivid I could feel Abraham’s hooves contacting with the gravel as he moved, felt Kirsten’s heels in his ribs, felt … (I’d better not spoil this bit, it’s quite emotional.)

There are many more striking instances such as these – quiet noises made loud, little things made huge. In contrast, the sparse and mainly classical score becomes heightened in a few carefully peppered moments when it crescendos to theatrically loud levels, as in a dramatic Hollywood score of old. I have a feeling that the already much talked-about scene (in which Dunst basks naked on a river bank, under the glow of the fast-approaching planet Melancholia) will become canonised as a classic film reference. The scene is rendered all the more powerful by the careful placement here of loud, symphonic music – lasting no longer than a beat – which injects a knowing, almost comical element of meta-film into the movie.

"I already took a bath."

Also, mainstream Hollywood starlets rarely get their kit off these days, so the scene was always bound to make an impact.

These heightened musical moments, contrasted against the quieter moments – and combined with an increasingly eery, sci-fi plot development – add to a thriller-ish feel in the film’s second half. If Justine’s story (Part 1) depicts melancholia, her sister Claire’s story (Part 2) expresses anxiety. These are arguably two very ‘contemporary’ illnesses: Justine’s inability to be happy despite being swamped in buckets of money (and her wedding gown) can be read as an oblique critique of all that is wrong with the affluent West; while the impending Armageddon is a strong metaphor for contemporary fears about our climate crisis and the future of our planet. I also like the symbol of melancholia as a planet: depression is often described as a black dog that follows a person around everywhere, but this looming presence on the horizon is far more frightening, with its constant threat to obliterate all life.

Dunst drags herself through the stunning, slow-motion opening sequences

It would be wrong, however, to view Melancholia only in terms of these somewhat obvious motifs. I think there’s a lot more going on here, and it deserves at least a second viewing in order to begin to decipher its many layers.

Melancholy Muse

While Melancholia is in most respects a brilliant film, I do have just a couple of nits to pick:

If Claire and Justine are close enough sisters that one looks after the other as tenderly as she does, how is it that Claire has a British accent, while everyone else is American? I know Gainsbourg’s your muse, Lars, but you clearly don’t skimp on details much smaller than this.

Also, why doesn’t that little boy cry when he should? It was creepy. But perhaps that was intended.

Mistaken Musician

When the horses were stirring and Gainsbourg came down to calm them, I suddenly mistook her for Patti Smith, who, fittingly, prattles on about a baby sister in “Horses”. I’ve since discovered that Smith’s wonderful memoir Just Kids – one of my favourite books this year – is being rewritten for the screen, and plenty of people have already suggested Gainsbourg is ideal for the role.

Perhaps Von Trier has ambitions to direct it? Well, the book did make me cry, and there’s no denying Von Trier gets his kicks from emotional porn.

And here’s a final bit of trivia: Smith was mad keen on Rimbaud. Rimbaud wrote a poem called Ophelia. Here’s some bits of it:

On the calm black water where the stars are sleeping
White Ophelia floats like a great lily;
Floats very slowly, lying in her long veils…
… 
For more than a thousand years sad Ophelia
Has passed, a white phantom, down the long black river.
… 
The wind kisses her breasts
…
The ruffled water-lilies are sighing around her …
 

And so we have come full circle. And a very cultured circle at that.

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15/12/2011

Review: Brous EP Launch

By The Cultured Animal

For those who haven’t yet heard of Brous (pronounced like Bruce – yes, I know, kind of takes the Frenchy chic out of it), this Melbourne singer is a formidable and rising talent. Having directed the Melbourne International Jazz Festival for the last three years, Sophia Brous exudes a presence and charisma on stage well beyond her 26 years. On Saturday November 12th she released her self-titled EP to a sold-out crowd at the newly opened Sydney Road venue, Phoenix Public House (formerly The Spot).

Physically slight, one could compare Brous to Amy Winehouse: they share a Jewish background, as well as a penchant for striking, cat-like eye make-up – although of course Brous is far from a train wreck on stage. Decked out in a bright blue vintage dress, impressively large beaded earrings, voluminously styled long hair, and black velvet heels that make her legs go on forever, Brous’ aesthetic style follows in the vintage chic of singers like Winehouse, Adele or Duffy – but the hole in her stockings adds a touch of quintessentially Melbourne grunge.

Vocally Brous has excellent control of her impressive range, and sounds something like Kate Bush mixed with the creative, unconventional song writing of French singer Camille. Rather than use a pedal for vocal reverb, she opts instead to switch between two mics – one with reverb and the other without – allowing not only a more organic control of the sound, but also a more visual representation of the musicianship at work. Brous flits expertly between her powerful lead lines and something a little more unexpected, using the reverb-laden mic to deliver esoteric, wordless melodies full of so much vibrato they sound like a theramin. It’s an eerie effect, used just enough to give her music a very distinctive sound without verging on being gimmicky. She also does a pretty amazing whistle solo.

Brous’ accompanying band on the night was a strong fit-out, delivering stripped back arrangements that complemented perfectly the main event of her vocals. Unfortunately the strings section could barely be heard during their first song, although this was corrected towards the end of the performance. Guest appearances from Conrad Standish (of UK band The Devastations) and La Voce Della Luna choir of Italian grandmothers (who also feature on the most recent single from her EP, “Little Ticket”) were welcome additions to the evening.

If there were any let-downs on the night they were not so much the fault of Brous and her ensemble as much as to teething problems at this new, but promising, venue. If you missed out this time, be sure to catch this captivating performer in future, or listen to her self-titled EP – a fine recording that does justice to her talent as both singer and composer.

This review first appeared in Beat Magazine

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07/11/2011

Music Round-Up 2011

By The Cultured Animal

I know we’ve still got several weeks to go, but soon everyone else is going to start putting out their best-of lists so, in the interest of being a competitive bitch and trying to get ahead of trends (as in, Easter eggs the week after Christmas, July sales in June, and so on), here’s my take on music releases from some of my favourite artists in 2011, and whether they delivered the goods.

Nay:

Kitty Daisy & Lewis, Beirut, Ryan Adams (ugh!), Wilco (still love youse, but) and Gillian Welch all managed to disappoint in one way or another, some more so than others. They’ve done better’s all I’m saying.

Yay:

Joan as Policewoman and Bonnie “Prince” Billy (what diction!), you most certainly did not. That is to say, didn’t disappoint, and I couldn’t say they’ve done better either. This is some damn fine stuff right here.

Why:

KDL: Well, I think with a title like Smoking in Heaven it’s safe to say the little tykes have probably discovered marijuana, which might go some way to explaining the ten-minute jam songs during which absolutely fuck-all interesting happens. There are some really catchy bits on the album, though. It’s kind of like op-shopping – you have to wade through a bunch of crap until you find some absolute gems. (An appropriate metaphor for their retro fetishism.)

AND THIS IS WHAT WE MEAN BY RETRO:

Beirut: Actually, it’s probably not fair to say The Rip Tide is a disappointing album. It’s only that I noticed the searing melancholy so pertinent to their sound seems to have softened a little, and I guess I like a sad-faced crooner. Dammit, how dare these artistic fuck-ups get their shit together!

Ryan: This should have been no surprise – ever since he’s been a happily married invalid he writes sentimental pap. Oh wait, he’s always done that … but now it just doesn’t sound as good. Perhaps the tinnitus problem is interfering.*

Wilco: I swear, stable marriage is the great destroyer of all good art. I didn’t fancy the last album either, and yet still I donate to the ongoing cause that is Wilco. I guess a part of me wishes Jeff Tweedy were my Dad. Hats off to them also for disowning a big record company and going their own way. They trust in their fans to trust in them. The album is called The Whole Love. Still feelin’ the love, even if I only listened to it twice.

Gillian: I know many people disagree with me on this one. And maybe The Harrow and the Harvest really is a terrific album – I just can’t tell anymore. I think what happened is it was such a long wait between albums that when I finally got it I overplayed it just a tad (read: ten times a day for ten days straight), went through some incredibly mind-blowing existential transformation, thought that I might need to either commit suicide or take up a heroin habit, started to hate my obviously unhealthy dependency on the album – kind of like when a relationship turns sour – and now I can’t bear to be anywhere near its beautiful face. But I guess that’s the way the corn bread crumbles, that’s the way the whole thing ends.

Joan: Really, this woman is off the planet. Each album sounds completely alien and weird and, upon first listen, tends to make me think the previous one was better. Until of course I listen to it a bit more, and a bit more again, and then see this:

The best music is always the kind that grows on you.

The B-Boy: Even though he looks like a balding garden gnome who’s been stung by a jellyfish in the face, I would still marry this man. Fuck birds in the bushes, let’s take ‘em in hand.

A disclaimer: I’m terribly sorry Mr William Callahan, but I didn’t get around to listening to your latest. Is that wrong? Perhaps you should also count your blessings and be glad I didn’t download it illegally, robbing you of your hard-earned lunch money. Baked beans on toast, I imagine.

Another disclaimer: I’m sorry about all the swearing. Really. It’s poor form. I heard somewhere that controversial blogs get more hits. But if you think about it, swearing’s not really very controversial. Nor does this theory have anything to do with how rich my swear jar is. Spending too much time around my family is a much more likely theory. (Oh gosh, now I need to add yet another disclaimer, or apologia, or … how about you just watch that KDL clip again?)

…

*Dear Mr Adams. I have crossed over. I have become an arsehole who thinks it’s fine to write horrible things about celebrities, as if they are not real people, and will never read any of the things other people write about them, even though they surely browse the interwebs as much as everyone else. In fact, Mr YouTube whore, I think you do so more than some. Is my nasty detachment due in some part to me falling out of fandom with you? Perhaps. But you should count your blessings and be glad that this once wasn’t true. (Oh and by the way, I’m really sorry for being pissed off after watching you at The Palais a few years ago because it was really dark on stage and you were hiding behind your hair and I couldn’t see anything and I thought it was a bad concert and wrote you off as an Emo twat. It turns out you were probably really sick. You did make some pretty funny jokes about prescription drugs, though.)

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15/09/2011

Lady Singers, Where’s Your Soul?

By The Cultured Animal

It seems to be that in popular music these days, if you are a female singer your style will fall into one of two categories. The first is the kind made famous by the likes of Beyoncé and Fergie, and mimicked by hopefuls on Idol and the X-Factor. The wavering, see-how-many-notes-you-can-fit-into-one-second type of singing which dominates the top forty charts. I think Christina Aguilera does a pretty fine job of it.

Coco Rosie: dress like a man, sing like a toddler.

The second category is something quite different: populated by artists such as Joanna Newsom, CocoRosie and Sarah Blasko, this style of singing is sometimes barely singing at all. While the previous category might be easily dismissed as mechanically skilled but lacking in originality, if you employ this latter category you need not be a skilled soprano. All you have to do is shape your vowels into strange, affected and overly cutesy shapes, which make you sound a little bit like you’ve regressed into your grade two, “Mum-I-wanna-be-a-famous-singer” days.

Now, I’m all for the power-to-the-people punk ethos of “Anyone can play guitar and start a band”, but that dictum can only ever go so far. People who don’t like punk will tell you something along the lines that it’s an anti-musical pile of rubble produced by untalented, obnoxious wastrels. Their opposition will argue that this view completely misses the political point, and fails to appreciate punk’s momentous innovativeness and continuing importance and influence on music to the present day. In other words, you can get away with being unskilled at your instruments (vocal cords included) if the sum of what you’re doing is breathtaking and groundbreaking. Case point: everybody knows Bob Dylan can’t sing.*

I don’t think this fashion for overly affected singing contributes anything innovative to our musical landscape. A particular affectation does not constitute a movement. (Or does it? As far as I know there isn’t a name for this trend, yet it could fall into cultural theories of cuteness.) If anything it is merely emblematic that many artists prefer to rehash what’s hip rather than develop their own meaningful style. But then, that’s no revelation.

Though this style has gone viral among “indie” bands and artists who write their own music, the very habit of defaulting into the mould of everyone else isn’t really so much better in terms of originality than, for example, Britney rehashing (or rather, just hashing) “I Love Rock’n'roll“. And apart from anything, to me – and I’m probably pissing off a helluva lot of Regina Spektor fans here – it just grates.

Imaginary Cities

Imaginary Cities (image from mp3download.com)

I was privileged enough to see Canadian band Imaginary Cities this week at Melbourne’s fabulous 3RRR FM. They were tight, and showed key signs of a Serious Hipster Pop Band: some great vocal harmonies (that’s all the rage at the mo, dude – think Fleet Foxes, Akron/Family, Grizzly Bear, insert other indie band here),  some cute keys, a lot of major chords and, yes, that unmistakable affectation to the vocal style. Only, that soft singing style usually goes with soft music, and somehow it didn’t all quite gel.

It’s unfortunate, because Singer Marti Sarbit, 25, has got a pretty damn good voice, and when she’s not busy trying to fit into that quaint little style, she’s reminiscent of gutsy singers like Beth Ditto, or dear Amy Winehouse (R.I.P.). Why hide behind affectation when you’ve got a decent voice on your shoulders?

I felt somehow let down by the experience, and that Sarbit was doing not only herself a disservice as a singer, but her band as well (a bunch of young men with glasses and nose rings, all power chords and loud snares). Not only does a cute, quaint lead vocal fail to carry a loud band, it reeks of submission. The band is busy making as much noise as they can, and you still wanna play the cute little girly?

It kind of reminded me of this:

Yes, that’s the woman who said, “I don’t mind living in a man’s world as long as I can be a woman in it.”

Dr Jekyll and Miss Hyde

In contrast, I was rapt when I discovered the inspirational Anna Calvi this week. Something like a cross between Siouxsie and P.J. Harvey, Calvi’s songs are straight from the heart. They’re moody, expressive, and evoke a touch of the gothic (and she’s damn good on that guitar, too).

Speaking to NME, Calvi revealed her love for singers like Edith Piaf and Nina Simone, “because they give so much in their singing and they’re so emotional, and that’s quite rare to find.” She says this “surrendering” oneself to music “seems like it’s almost gone out of fashion, but I personally really love it.” This is exactly the kind of ethos the music scene needs right now.

Calvi describes herself as a “quiet person”, but on stage transforms into a kind of all-powerful uber-femme. Though she has a large vocal range, she says she prefers to sing low because “I like the power.” In context, the demure, self-contained London girl seems all the more endearing, her musical vision all the more poignant and pure.

Anna Calvi. Official Cultured Animal Hero of the Week.

Where Did Our Love Go?

So girls, there are lessons to be learned: you are not second class citizens, so sing like you bloody well mean it.

I choose neither top forty cardboard cut-out A, nor  faux-alternative cardboard cut-out B. I choose Neko Case‘s powerful vocals over Eilen Jewell‘s lazy, just-got-out-of-bed drawl. I will listen to Linda Ronstadt ballads on repeat but can’t stand Snorah Jones. Joan As Policewoman over J-Lo. Any day.

But hey. When it boils down to it, it’s probably all just a matter of taste.

*jk

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23/05/2011

The Flipback: Revolutionising the Book Trade Some More

By The Cultured Animal

Yours Truly is a bit sick to death of all this talk on about The Death of the Book, The Death of the Bookshop, and The Death of Our Brains at the hands of Monsieur Internet. (Except, maybe she’s a woman. In fact, yes – let’s call her Señora Internet. Look, she’s even got a little hat!)

In his editorial for the latest issue of McSweeney’s, Dave Eggers puts paid to all that with some encouraging statistics about the current vitality of the book industry. And just to waggle it in our faces, the current issue is “a book designed to look like a book!”

Borders might have thrown in the towel, spat the dummy, or whatever other clichéd figures of speech you might want to attach to that Dodo-ified business; but all I can say is that our “local independent” seems to be doing rather well. As a direct result of said closure? Who knows. Probably not a bunch of puffed up, Internet-fearing catastrophists.

Bringing it Back

It was with some pleasure that I was introduced to an exciting new piece of technology this week. It’s called the Flipback, and if it sounds half like a Paperback, well, that’s because it is.

Printed on super-thin bible paper and bound with its spine unattached to the cover, the Flipback only requires one hand for reading and can lie open on its own (no more panicky searches for a bookmark). You read it sideways – or you would, if the writing wasn’t printed perpendicular to the usual way. This means it’s more similar visually to reading digital text, but the experience is altogether more tactile. The idea is to flip the pages with your thumb whilst holding it in one hand. Hey presto! (But perhaps it’s a little too tactile – I found myself needing to lick my thumb in order to turn the pages easily. Maybe it just takes practice. I hope they release a Flipbacks for Dummies for this difficult new technology). Meanwhile, you could be doing almost anything with The Other Hand. I’ll leave that one up to your imagination.


When that chock-full peak-hour train suddenly surges round a bend, and the geek sitting by the aisle flounders as his slippery iPad shoots off into a sea of high heels, who is triumphant? The old-fashioned book-lover, that’s who – one hand’s steady grip on the rail, nifty little Flipback wide open in the other. Additional perks include not having to hide it from thieves, and not having to experience that annoying moment when you realise the power point wasn’t switched on after all, and the batteries are still flat.

That’s because it’s still a book, albeit one that feeds into today’s obsession with multi-tasking and compactibility (it fits easily into your back pocket). Its size also makes it kind of pretty – from a distance, you might mistake one for a cassette (remember those?), and they’re just about as sturdy. They’d look rather cute all stacked up like Lego on a shop counter.

They’ve already sold over a million of these things in Holland, where they were conceived; it will be interesting to see how we take to them when they’re unleashed in Australia this August.

Rock Will Never Die

Well, it hasn’t yet. But speaking of cassettes … Okay, so the cassettes might not be a particularly good example. How about vinyl, then? I mean, if you’re looking for an antiquated technology from an industry that has been absolutely, positively, well and truly revolutionised by digital technology, then records are most definitely it. The music industry might not be making much dosh out of vinyl, yet still it prevails.

Once the musical medium of choice, vinyl has now been transposed to a niche market for nostalgic music-lovers, serial op-shoppers, professional (and un-professional) DJs, and smug rock’n'rollers who believe noise just sounds better on vinyl. Not only are all sorts of great bands still releasing versions of their new music on record, but audio manufacturers continue to produce turntables for your listening pleasure, replete with flash 21st century packaging and super-precise speakers. If the contemporary perks sound counter-intuitive, go get one of those old boxy things with the peeling brown faux-wood. People will think you’re cool just for having a turntable, especially all of your art snob friends.

Franc Kuzma’s Stabi XL turntable. Don’t confuse it with the coffee machine.
I Heart Art

Aside from the retro-nerd kicks you might get from owning a record collection, there’s also the crucial element of art and design appreciation. If you’re downloading music, especially from an unqualified source, you’re likely to not even see the original album artwork. If you do, you’re probably viewing it as a tiny little picture on a screen. Hardly the best medium for displaying a work of conceptual art.

Which brings us back to vinyl, whose sleeves sport a large surface area, rather good for displaying album artwork. You can then sit in your velour, op-shop lounge suite and ponder it whilst soaking up the sounds of a new album. The record sleeve’s papery feel is also a bit nicer than a plastic CD case – an opinion affirmed by plenty of high-brow indie artists who prefer to package their CDs in paper (often recycled, just to underline the extent of their cultural envelope-pushing) rather than the usual plastic.

Andy Warhol’s famous cover art for The Rolling Stones’ Sticky Fingers, complete with real zip. Tactile.

The continued love for vinyl shows an appreciation for the album as a complete, conceptual piece of art and a fulfillment of a band’s artistic vision, from the choice of song order (none of this shuffle bullcrap, thank you), to the cover artwork and design, and liner notes. It’s a preference for quality versus convenience. It’s not that there’s no positive place for Internet-sourced music; rather, there is a place for the old-school to continue alongside the new. Radiohead had the right idea when they realised their die-hard fans would still pay money for the hard stuff, even if they could get the online version for free.

Bon Iver’s forthcoming self-titled album will look super pretty on vinyl.
Dear Sir or Madam, Will You Read My Book?

If vinyl can do it, is it really so far-fetched to suggest something that has existed for about 10 times as long in one form or another might also hang in there for a little bit longer? Unless, of course, they invent a solar powered eReader. Now that might really be something worth ditching your Flipback for.

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05/04/2011

Animalia: Putting the Fun Back into Rock Music

By The Cultured Animal

You might have noticed an invasion in art, design and music by the ridiculously cute. Every hip gift shop you walk into these days is flooded with cut-out deer necklaces, porcelain bunnies or vintage floral pinafores. You’re not allowed to be in a band any more unless it has an animal in the title, and images of innocence and youth – however distorted – flood contemporary art scenes. In a 2-part blog post, The Cultured Animal explores the significance of these trends.

The Animal Invasion

Grizzly Bear, Fleet Foxes, Animal Collective, Patrick Wolf, Wolf Parade, The Mountain Goats, Band of Horses, Deerhoof – oh god, I’m getting dizzy, and I’ve only listed a couple of the hip bands.

I like to think that the presence of animals in pop culture serves to remind us that we’re part of something bigger and that we should eat a slice of humble pie. Philosophical thought from Aristotle to Descartes and beyond has a history of separating humans from the rest of the animal kingdom on the basis of our superior rationality, and this is a concept we continue to struggle with today. Yet we are precocious creatures, and our brains have built our civilisation by taming a planet that, with climate change, is apparently coming back to bite us on the arse. We think we’re so clever, but we really do some stupid things. Just look at Fukushima.

A friend of mine once professed to worship monkeys. They’re smart enough, but not so smart as to get the better of themselves. The evolution of the ape went just one step too far, and now we are clocking over into self-destruction (that is, if you go down the common train of catastrophic thought that can’t seem to fathom a way out of this mess).

Now I’m thinking about the Pixies’ “Monkey Gone to Heaven” – okay, it’s not new, but it is great.

The Animal Passion of Neko Case

One of my favourite contemporary musicians, Neko Case, has progressed stylistically in her musical career from her hillbilly rock’n'roll roots to an obscure style all of her own, which is richly poetic in its lyricism, and non-linear and complexly layered in its music. Thematically, she is concerned with reinserting humans into nature’s hierarchy. The opening track of her last album Middle Cyclone, “This Tornado Loves You”, is on one level a love song, yet the narrator’s destructive passion is grafted onto the metaphor of a catastrophic tornado that tears up everything in its path. The theme is continued in “People Got a Lotta Nerve,” the third track and first single off the album. Its chorus (“I’m a man man man, man man man eater/But still you’re surprised when I eat yer”), delivered with Case’s strong but feminine vocals, might sound like a bit of old-fashioned femenism upon first listen. But in fact the man eater in question is not a femme fatale (although no doubt she is playing on this), but nature itself. The tone of the album as a whole is that of bereavement; the lyrical imagery paints a picture of an emptied world, all of which works on the double level of the real dangers presented by a dying planet, but also, on the personal level, of a dying love.

The Tigers Have Spoken: Neko Case uses animal symbolism in her music and design, poses frequently with dogs, deer or birds in publicity shots, campaigns to raise awareness and funding for animal rights groups, and has four pet greyhounds whom she rescued from the animal shelter where she volunteers.

Multifaceted Music for a Multifaceted World

Case’s progression from a simpler, twangy rock sound to something more complex is just one example, but rock music today seems to be getting increasingly complicated, and perhaps that’s fitting for a world which is also becoming more complicated. The trend is in no way surprising – after all, the musical influences are only getting more numerous, plus new technology means kids these days can not only access it like never before, but have an orgiastic array of choice when it comes to going about producing noise. This type of rock has a rhythmic pop sensibility, fused with the vocal gymnastics of a Motown hit, and glorious harmonies to boot – these kids aren’t afraid to sing. It’s clean but messy: well-produced with digital precision, but there’s so much going on it’s hard to contain the chaos (and why would you want to?).

Akron/Family. Fun.

Fleet Foxes wrote a self-titled concept album that’s basically entirely about a bunch of animals and people living in a forest. It’s got some beautifully poetic lyrical imagery, and the dreamy, folky guitars are accompanied by reverb-drenched vocal harmonies that are nothing short of heavenly. But much of the complicated layering going on in bands these days is about mixing this kind of lightness with darkness, bringing together the heavy with the high to illuminate the shadows of our world, and a possible path through them. Akron/Family’s “Silly Bears,” from their latest album, the obscurely titled Akron/Family II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT, is an onslaught of stampeding drums and distorted bass-notes mixed with the ridiculous fun of noisy-but-happy – anthemic, even – guitar riffs, celebratory harmonies and all sorts of other interesting noises (and, of course, silly lyrics). Grizzly Bear are also worth mentioning here – their stand-out single “Two Weeks,” off their 2009 release Veckatimest, starts with a rhythmic, trebly piano riff that’s quickly interrupted by what sounds like an elephant landing on its arse. But the elephant bounces – the song is infectious, brilliant, and carried by, yes, fantastic harmonies.

Circus fun with Patrick Wolf

Okay, so he may be more pop than rock (although I’m not going to delve into what does or does not define a genre here), but Patrick Wolf is also pretty good at juxtaposing heaviness with light. His poptastic 2006 single “Accident & Emergency” is joyously catchy, embellished with (distorted) chorusing children and cute, toylike sounds. It also has a heavy, club-influenced bass-line and catastrophic lyrics (“Accident and emergency/Terrorist catastrophe/Drop this agony and misery …”). The reference to serious issues, delivered with tongue-in-cheek humour, is playful and endearing, but the positive message is clear: “Accident and emergency keep bringing out the best in me.”

Serious Play

These trends are largely about putting the fun the back into rock. The references to dirtier influences are swept up in the technological chaos that defines the youth of today. There is a mood of optimism, even if it’s undercut by a lingering hint of darkness. The big scary Grizzly Bear just want to be your friend. Gone are the days when it’s cool to smash guitars and throw TV’s out the windows of opulent hotels. Being decadent and squandering the riches of an excessive lifestyle is no longer cool in a society that is potentially ruining things for its children by living the good life today. Being green has not usually been all that sexy, but if rock music can remind us where we belong in nature’s plan – and that it’s okay to just be nice – then I think maybe it’s starting to be.

Grizzly Bear: not to cool to make friends at school

Playfulness in music also serves as a sort of disclaimer that a band isn’t taking itself too seriously. Because can art really be that serious, when there are far more pressing issues in the world? (I’m opening a big can of worms here, and don’t I know it). Injecting a bit of humour also means that when someone does try a heart-wrenching ballad or a serious verse, it feels all that more poignant in contrast.

Stay tuned for part two on this topic when The Cultured Animal discusses childishness in contemporary art, fashion and design.

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