10 ways MELOMANIA can help you be thoroughly entertained
in almost all genres and from so many different countries too! Bon voyage!
Phương Tâm - Magical Nights: Saigon Surf, Twist & Shout (1964-1966)[LP](Sublime Frequencies)
From 1964-1966, this Saigon teenager cut some 30 sides for three different labels. Tam was one of the first singers to perform nhạc kích động, or action music - not Rock N'Roll. While most of this music reflects the Americanization of Vietnam, the spacious harmonies ("Anh Đâu Em Đó (Wherever You Are, I Will Be There") are closer to the spiritual music of Vietnam and Southeast Asia. Tam's vocals typically add heft to what musically sounds very common for the period ("Vẫn Yêu Hoài (Still Loving You Always)" is a song of longing packed into a swinging surf anthem.) As the GI's poured into Saigon, Tam's love of both American music and singing in Vietnamese found its home in these singles. You will come for the swinging good time of "Có Nhớ Đêm Nào (Remember the Night)", then stay for the heartfelt songs. "Magical Nights" reveals this short window before the conflict escalated. Tam and her family fled in 1975 and have been American citizens since then.
MARCO BUSATO - Night Of My Times [LP](Bickerton ESP)
Power Pop is not generally associated with dampened spirits and dashed hopes. Marco Busato puts a sweet Emitt Rhodes-ian spin on these mellow Psychedelic Pop jams ("Watch Me Fall.") The title cut is a sweet blend of 80's Church jangle and a Power Pop chorus with an awesome guitar lead-out. (It is also smart how the same cocktail-style Ringo-esque beat carries into the more minor verse of "Around The Sun.") In addition, Busato bridges "Night of My Times" with a very cool Mitch Easter/Let's Active-esque instrumental "Tropical Downtime." The real gem and potential single is the sculpted Pop production of "Sunken Ships." Busato adorns his music with all the right touches, but never weighs down the indelible central hook. "Sunken Ships" is the perfect opener to reveal just how this "Night" bears repeating.
EL BUEN HIJO - Pasatiempo EP [LP](Sonido Muchacho ESP)
El Buen Hijo is a Pop band with a raw Punky edge. They are not New Wave (“Crucigrama” is crunchy but written with a lush, harmonious chorus.) They are not Pop Punk (“Las Azores” may have the adenoidal vocals and that “jump” common with this subgenre, but its chorus is pure Pop for all people.) They are simply great at writing hooks and then cramming them with thunderous drums, twangy guitars, and smart chord changes - “Rapido Y Brutal” is their best song yet and a single in any language.
ONYON - ONYON [CS](Trouble In Mind)
The best Post-Punk works as a shock to the system. The familiarity of it comes later - perhaps to aid your regaining recognition as you try to make sense of it all. Leipzig, Germany’s Onyon are minimalist and abrasive. Their best songs are an assault on your senses. “Kanal” opens with a siren-like organ and then descends into a Young Marble Giants-styled monotone bark tempered by jazzy cymbal taps. “Klick” is slightly more spritely conjoining lyrical minimalism with its organ/whirling guitar/drums center which actually welcomes singing a brief melody during the verses. “Fell Naturell” is Onyon stripped down to punch a very modern Punk/Post-Punk build (think Pinch Points from earlier in the summer.) While the band never really leaves their black-and-white basic chording, Onyon works at continuing to put the jumper cables to your temples on each short, striated jolt of song. A promising debut.
KESTON COBBLERS CLUB- Alchemy [LP](Tricolour UK)
It would be so easy for Keston Cobblers Club's crisp harmonies and zing on the heartstrings to translate to American audiences who fancy Lumineers and the rest of the AAA Top 20. "Alchemy" is some joyous Folk with added Belle & Sebastian-esque textures. KCC has a muscular backbone. Their best songs ("Anthem of the Alchemist" and the sparkling "Jupiter") actually get lost in the beat like sweeping EDM carries you away. With brother and sister Matthew and Julia Lowe as the main voices, KCC manages a lot of their stops with ease too. "Find My Way" benefits from accordion and trumpet, but would likely be a thrill with just acoustics strumming furiously. The Andrew Bird-ish "Rigmarole" has a catchy refrain from Matthew Lowe that could easily have crowds singing along with his indecisive emotions. Still, with their smart wordless choruses, KCC even manages to summon the same emotional pull as Arcade Fire. With Julia's voice being the sweet complement to Matthew's honeyed rasp, more tracks like the Kate Bush-ian "Strangers Now" could also work in their favor.
POOL KIDS [LP](Skeletal Lightning)
Tallahassee, FL’s Pool Kids make their debut with a fascinating mixture of the content of a half-dozen Pop songs (the lovelorn anger fueling the opener ”Conscious Uncoupling”) filtered through a myriad of Math Rock-ish changes (“That’s Physics, Baby”) and then set to “freakout” beautifully (the whirling dervish of emotion that is “Almost Always Better (Almost Always Worse.)” When they insert dreamy textures and hang a song on Christine Goodwyne’s commanding presence (“I Hope You’re Right,”) and end with a quick, memorable chaotic flourish - they even reveal their single.
MAGNETIC GHOST ORCHESTRA [LP](Fun In The Church GER)
Like Stereolab with a neoclassical bent, or a Jazzy, horn-driven Broadcast, Magnetic Ghost Orchestra creates Electronic music with mostly acoustic instruments. “Humn (Parts I and II)” is a strange opener, but it slowly opens the doors for their wealth of instrumental offerings. “Rain Is Pattering” and “Golden” are their singles. “Pattering” chases rhythms brilliantly with lots of rubbery bass, skittering acoustic drums, and horn charts that sound like chords quickly struck on a keyboard. “Golden” is positively cosmic with its jazzy guitar strums and synth lines, but the female vocals send it skyward. Elsewhere, those same voices dig into more open-voweled Jazz singing (and even a little Operatic power on the epic “Slowly.”) When they are there to lead the MGO, even for a moment, the giant panoply of sound comes together beautifully.
SON OF - Lo-Fi Dreams of Epilepsy [LP](Diggers Factory FRA)
Outside of his cult rock band Jack The Ripper (where the darkness comes in on this album,) Arnaud Mazurel writes songs where he purposely makes his voice sound like it was played back from a record (painstakingly committed to dub plates.) For comparison, “Mr. Jones” could be Al Stewart fronting The Cure. However, Mazurel’s voice crackles and makes its limitations part of the charm. “Dracula” is definitely Goth as Mazurel’s slightly distant voice makes you feel like you are being led down a pitch-black hallway. When he croons on the gloomy “See You Next Grave,” Mazurel sounds like Dan Bejar of Destroyer as a deathly taxi driver who just keeps telling you some other entity will be driving you home. Son Of’s songs are quite well composed and Mazurel’s unique vocals really make you want to listen to what the next turn will be. Then when he covers Nina Simone’s “Wild Is The Wind.” Mazurel does most of what David Bowie sings when he emotes it on “Station To Station.” With his raspy wisp of a voice distorting, peaking, and drifting in his analog style, Mazurel manages to capture that same emotion. Then, he brings in the music.
COIL - New Backwards [3LP](Infinite Fog/Light In The Attic)
Coil is everything. Yet their music can primarily be a collection of moods. How they traveled from drug-induced dance music (1986's "Horse Rotovator" and 1991's "Love's Secret Domain") to post-Industrial Ambient (the classic 1999 album "Musick To Play In The Dark") created a vast continuum for their music to exist within. 2008's "New Backwards" is at times a most uncomfortable journey (the elegiac "Paint Me As A Dead Soul") and at others like dancing to your nightmares ("AYOR.") As Peter Christopherson mourned his longtime partner John Balance over a stream of chaos, he reaches into the past - not for comfort, but for screams, barbaric noise, and minimalist Electro grooves. "Nature Is A Language" is as close as Coil ever gets to a "song." Balance's voice seems to come from the beyond. At once a repetitive mantra in your head like the same thought looping, while at others stretched digitally into ones and zeros that dissolve into glassy-eyed nothingness.
REVEREND BIZARRE - Slice of Doom [BOX](Svart FIN)
Having written about their later years (Melomania 10.28.21) “Slice of Doom” is the opening chapter of Finnish Doom masters Reverend Bizarre. The first few cuts on “Slice of Doom” are the demos they made in order to get signed. As they grow into searing cuts like “In The Rectory of the Bizarre Reverend,” you can hear their sound slowly taking shape. As “Slice of Doom” rolls on, it gains in confidence. Yet even in the beginning, Reverend Bizarre maintains such fantastic control. Ten minutes of the very Black Sabbath-ish “F@#king Wizard” (either version) works wonders as they dangle over the precipice of either finding their existentialist screaming inner demon or taking you under to never return again.
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The artist is the creator of beautiful things.
To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim.
The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.
Oscar Wilde - “The Portrait of Dorian Gray”
Please support all the critics and reviewers you can. Please support the artists who make music to share with us in hopes of making our lives a few degrees brighter.
In 1965, Duke Ellington was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his contributions to the Arts. Namely 3000 songs in his lifetime. This would mark the first time that both an African-American and a Jazz musician received this honor. The Pulitzer board instead decided to simply not give an award for that year. Two of three board members even resigned. The slot remains empty - and you can help fill it thanks to Ted Gioia.
Let's Give Duke Ellington the Pulitzer Prize