Reviews by kuvien

Retro-euro cinematic charm.

Featuring Chick Corea and John Gilmore, an underrated classic. Meant to be relaxed to and not over-analyzed.

You know those cartoons where the character catches a whiff of an aroma so delectable that the smell lifts him by the nose and floats him toward the source? That's what this album does to me. Except by the ears. Joe Henderson on tenor sax, not to be missed.

A lot of Irish music is too much "incestuous drunk leprechauns dancing and murdering" silliness for me to fully get into, but this album is a more subdued affair with an underlying drone atmosphere, making it much more my speed. I love when somebody just blows forever on uillean pipes or draws his bow slowly across a fiddle, creating a sustained mournfulness. This album turns slowly like a wind chime at dusk, when there is almost no breeze. Also, their rendition of "Katie Cruel" is the best I've ever heard, and I've heard many excellent renditions that I still love. But this version... I could live inside that song. And their version of "The Dark Eyed Gypsy" is so revolutionary it's basically a different song. This is one of the most mindblowing folk albums I've ever heard, and I've heard a few.

He must have a high opinion of himself, thinking people want to hear him wheezing and guffawing on an album.

Halfway between Nick Drake and Simon & Garfunkel, but without overdoing the sickly-sweet harmonies of the latter or the melancholy of the former. Very rooted in the pastoral. These guys have a real thing for birds. Symbols of nature, of freedom, etc.

Damn. Won't somebody love this desperate woman?

According to Lafourcade's own press, this album "is a musical diary inspired by different life experiences. It is a piece that honors vulnerability, life and death, femininity, nature, the mystical, love, and heartbreak." Sounds like all the best themes of folk explored in one album. Musically, this whole album is a groove, with swanky piano, understated brass, confident guitar work (both acoustic and electric), and, of course, Natalia's own smoky vocals. Listen to this one loud and feel the bass in every corner of your skull.

Is the singing of songs tantamount to the casting of spells? Is music more than the mere combination of sound vibrations, tones, and textures? Is it something that is greater than the sum of its parts? There is in literature and mythology songs of power and enchantment, and then there is even an ancient religious concept that 'he who sings prays twice'. Was ex nihilo spoken or sung? Where does the creative act cease to be merely expression and become something more... something magical? Re-imagination, mysticism, connection. Is the cancionera a bruja?

That’s right. Ragtime in the 21st century. Charming, fun, old-school false-nostalgia goodness! "Two-Faced Tom" is the highlight for me. It’s all right to be jealous, folks.

I always approve of singing of the Mississippi, that lazy lifeline backbone of a river. This kind of music rocks me awake. I can almost hear the muddy water lapping against the side of my daddy’s boat.

Good stuff here, just the promise of what he'll deliver later in his career, when he rolls out the gem that is Riverboat Soul. But if you like old-time music stripped down with just plaintive male vocals and an acoustic guitar, then this is for you. This music is "cigarettes and whiskey at dawn"...interpret that how you will.

Somebody call the air traffic control tower. There's been a terrible accident.

This is an amazing electropop album chock full of bangers.

Like TayTay, Gaga has gone through "eras", and so it's no surprise 17 years into Gaga's career that she would start to think about revisiting and blending together those past forays into sounds and genres. This is one of those albums that starts with a clear statement. Oh, this is what I'm gonna hear, is what the listener realizes as he's blasted with Gaga in his face, wind in her hair. You come for the bold pop gibberish but stay for the anthems where you sing your heart out. Or not. Be a hater if you want. The rest of us will be over here having a dance party.

What in the everloving fuck is “Komunikazio-inkomunikazio”? It’s a glorious, avant-garde meandering between snatches of song and bits of recitation—sometimes in English, sometimes in … backwards language? Don’t listen to this while smoking weed, my brothers. Anyway, what about the genre? RYM: “At a time when the Basque culture was oppressed, traditional songs were disguised in new musical forms, and political and social issues were subtly introduced to ‘wake up’ the Basque people.” I need to study more history.

Apparently this one some kind of experimental take on Basque music, and thus the second disc of this three-disc work was banned. Hence the name Bat-Hiru, meaning “one-three”, because the second disc was missing for a while. I really like the instrumentation—or rather lack thereof—on this album. There’s a bit here and there, like a lazy accordion, but mostly it’s just a single voice and a delicate acoustic guitar, not necessarily aiming for a strong melody but rather going for a more evocative expression. There are some avant-garde moments, however, not only with the manipulation of the electric guitar sounds but also the crazy vocals on the last track, a 12-minute meandering. About the genre: “Euskal Kantagintza Berria was a cultural movement born in the Basque Country during the 1960s inspired by Nova cançó and Chanson. At a time when the Basque culture was oppressed, traditional songs were disguised in new musical forms, and political and social issues were subtly introduced to wake up the Basque people” (RYM).

Mande music is intrinsically wonderful, and this recording is no exception. Every genre has its golden age(s), and Mande music's was definitely the 1970s, though there's been a resurgence of it in the 21st-century, if you know where to look. This album is steeped in culture, from the rites of marriage to the masked dances of Ramadan, and it celebrates all walks of traditional life, such as cloth weaving.

Strug's voice is as mysterious as it is compelling. It's as if he is a bard chanting, reciting, and singing in mantra-like vocals some ancient religious text, a theme he returns to three times on the album, once at the beginning, once in the middle, and once at the end. Other than that main mystical theme, recited poetry with the help of a frightening chorus of crazed children and a cacophony of percussion and piano are peppered here and there for spice.

He (and they) shuffered, and I just get to shmile. Seems unfair, but this kind of music demonstrates to me that there is at least some justice in this world. Long after it's forgotten that Fela's house was burned down in political retaliation, his music will live on. Art outlasts oppression.