Gabriel’s Message — Black Walls
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Category Archives: choons
You’re Not Alone
Withered Hand is one of my favourite artists. Today, I found out that one of his first EPs was for Paul Carter, my childhood friend who died in 2006. Paul’s artwork is on the cover.
I’m not ashamed to say that I cried my eyes out when I heard Big Ten Four (Paul’s Song).
Going Nowhere Fast
Damn, this is a fine album. Credited as “Stampfel & Weber — The Original Holy Modal Rounders”, it’s a 1981 Rounder release that’ll probably never see the light as a digital release. And that’s a crying shame.
It packs a lot of tracks into one album. All of them fun, with the off-kilterness that happens so magically when these two play together.
Side 1:
- You’ve got the right String Baby, but the wrong Yo-yo — as briefly featured on Laugh-In.
- My Name is Morgan but it ain’t J. P. —Steve Weber really has that parlour fingerpicking style nailed down.
- Goin’ to Memphis — Cash, murdered. Outstanding skreeky fiddle from Peter.
- Goin’ to Memphis (reprise) —a little bit of caterwauling that was too good to throw out
- Jeanine’s Dream —this is a lovely take on La Danseuse, with words by Antonia. I know that Peter’s been obsessed with this tune for decades.
- When the Iceworms nest again —supposedly traditionally Canadian.
- If You’ll be my Girl —dropped from their 1965(ish) album because it was original, this shows that S&W write some beautiful bubblegum pop.
- Aeko
- Lovin’ Mad Tom —Shakespeare via Antonia. Centuries old, still haunting us.
Side 2:
- Sea of Love — Steve’s voice is great for this sappy love song.
- Come to the Mardi Gras —as usual, Peter finds an old tune and makes it crazed.
- Philadelphia Lawyer —a Woody Guthrie tune played almost straight.
- Are You from Dixie? —even if I were, I’d deny it if faced with someone proclaiming it as dementedly as this.
- Smokey Joe’s Café —a slurfy, sloppy cover.
- Goodbye to Booze —This, along with Coldest Woman, was one of the two tracks from this album on I Make A Wish For A Potato, which got me into this whole Holy Modal Rounder mess in the first place.
- Junker’s Blues —an unapologetic heroin user’s song.
- Red Rooster —play this to clear the house. It sets the demented level up against the stops.
- Coldest Woman —a daft little island tune with nicely swung guitar by Steve.
- Dance in Slow Motion —another sweet song with Peter singing.
- Unnamed Rag —The only words on this Weber tune are “Unnamed Rag” (if you don’t count the stalwart “vo-dee-oh-dee”-ing from Peter) because he hadn’t thought of a name for it.
It must be about time for a fifth duo album from S&W; there was 15 years between this and HMR2, and Too Much Fun came 19 years after. I guess since there’s only been 14 years since that last album, I’m being a bit premature …
JohannG, autotuned
Y Niwl: We’ll keep a twang in the hillside
If you don’t love this, you may be dead.
(via The world’s oldest record shop: on the vinyl frontier since 1894 | Music | The Observer)
Black Walls – Acedia pre-release
Black Walls’ new album Acedia is available for pre-release purchase.
I’ve had Ken’s artwork on my wall as a huge print for the last couple of years. I’m stoked that this is now out.
A bit too much Randy Bachman
Richard “Friendly Rich” Marsella noted that CBC Radio’s Vinyl Tap with Randy Bachman features a lot of music by … Randy Bachman. If you’ve got your own radio show “to play [your] favourite songs and tell stories from [your] life on the road and in the studio“, you might want to be a bunch heavier on your influences than your own actual work. It doesn’t seem that way with Randy Bachman, though.
In the 49 unique editions of Vinyl Tap broadcast in the last year, 27 of them feature his own music and/or performances. So in addition to his CBC pay for the show, he’s getting royalties, too. Rich puts it a little better, if a lot more invective filled:
Bring back quality broadcasting from people behind the scenes who are hard-working and informed…not merely has-been rock stars with egos larger than Winnipeg.
Given that Mr. Bachman constantly plays his own music on this show, receives royalties for the theme song, and might also be receiving ACTRA payments for incessantly wanking on his guitar between songs, CBC should consider whether or not this is a conflict of interest, as a public broadcaster.
Richard’s started a petition: Let’s petition to remove Randy’s Vinyl Tap from the CBC: No more BTO on the CBC! I’ve signed it, and I hope you’ll consider signing it too.
I ran some stats on the show’s playlists (thanks, CBC!), and Richard sure has a point. Here’s a list of all the shows from the last year, showing just the first Bachman-item on the show:
| Broadcast | Song | Performer | Album/Concert | Randy Bachman credit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011/03/04 | Takin’ Care Of Business | Bachman-Turner Overdrive | Best Of Bachman-Turner Overdrive Live | Composer |
| 2011/03/05 | ||||
| 2011/03/12 | ||||
| 2011/03/19 | ||||
| 2011/03/26 | When Friends Fall Out | Guess Who | American Woman | Composer |
| 2011/04/02 | ||||
| 2011/04/09 | Undun | Kurt Elling | Nightmoves | Composer |
| 2011/04/16 | ||||
| 2011/04/23 | We Gotta Change | Playlist For The Planet | Composer | |
| 2011/04/30 | Repo Man | Repo Man | Composer | |
| 2011/05/07 | I’m Happy Just To Dance With You | Bachman Cummings | Jukebox | Guitar |
| 2011/05/14 | Who Do You Love | Bachman Cummings | Jukebox | Guitar |
| 2011/05/21 | ||||
| 2011/05/29 | ||||
| 2011/06/04 | Laughing | Guess Who: Anthology | Composer | |
| 2011/06/11 | ||||
| 2011/06/18 | ||||
| 2011/06/25 | Undun | Kurt Elling | Nightmoves | Composer |
| 2011/07/01 | Raise A Little Hell | Trooper | Hot Shots | Producer |
| 2011/07/09 | Takin Care Of Business | Randy’s Vinyl Tap – Guitarology 101 | Composer | |
| 2011/07/16 | Blue Collar | Bachman-Turner Overdrive | Anthology | Producer |
| 2011/07/23 | ||||
| 2011/07/30 | ||||
| 2011/08/06 | ||||
| 2011/08/13 | ||||
| 2011/08/20 | ||||
| 2011/09/10 | ||||
| 2011/09/17 | ||||
| 2011/09/24 | ||||
| 2011/10/01 | Closing Time | Closing Time | Composer | |
| 2011/10/08 | Lenny’s Warmup And Improvisation Of Autumn Leaves | Lenny Breau | Cabin Fever | Producer |
| 2011/10/15 | Suite Theam | Composer, Performer | ||
| 2011/10/22 | No Time | Guess Who | American Woman | Composer |
| 2011/11/05 | ||||
| 2011/11/12 | Undun | Kurt Elling | Nightmoves | Composer |
| 2011/11/19 | Shotgun Rider | Bachman-Turner Overdrive | Freeways | Producer |
| 2011/11/26 | Blue Sky Day | Lindsay Ell | Consider This | Composer |
| 2011/12/03 | Day Off | Michael Carey | Composer | |
| 2011/12/10 | ||||
| 2011/12/17 | Geh Zoag Ma Doch Die Ding | Spider Murphy Gang | Geh Zoag Ma Doch Die Ding | Composer |
| 2011/12/23 | Takin’ Care Of Christmas | Takin’ Care Of Christmas | Composer | |
| 2011/12/30 | You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet | Bachman-Turner Overdrive | Anthology | Composer |
| 2012/01/14 | ||||
| 2012/01/21 | Any Road | Randy Bachman | Any Road | Composer |
| 2012/01/28 | ||||
| 2012/02/11 | Walk | Bachman Cummings | Jukebox | Guitar |
| 2012/02/18 | Who Do You Love | Bachman Cummings | Jukebox | Guitar |
| 2012/02/25 | ||||
| 2012/03/03 |
Of course, when anyone mentions BTO, I can’t help but think of
… which is a whole heaping helping of morissettian irony unto itself. The whole Smashie and Nicey thing was supposedly a factor in Matthew Bannister’s decision to fire the ageing and irrelevant DJs from BBC Radio 1 in the 1990s. I wouldn’t dream of making any inference from that …
Generational loss in MP3 re-encoding
Okay, name this tune:
madplay / lame – 1000 iterations
(You’ll have to scroll about half way in before anything starts)
Didn’t get it? Try this:
madplay 24-bit / lame – 1000 iterations
(Again, you’ll have to scroll about half way in before anything starts)
Missed that one? Okay then, how about:
(no need to scroll here.)
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, it’s a clip from Adele‘s Someone Like You. Sure, you can’t make out the words too well in the last one, but at least they don’t sound like some dire paen to Cthulhu, like the first two do.
All of the above samples are the same source file re-encoded 1000 times. I’d heard that there was some loss to encoding MP3s, but thought that if you kept about the same bitrate, there wouldn’t be too much loss. I wanted to test out my theory, so I took:
- LAME — a quality mp3 encoder (that can also decode to WAV)
- madplay — a decent mp3 decoder that uses fixed point for speed
- a shell script (see below) that encodes an MP3 1000 times, feeding the output of the last run as the input of the next.
- a sample clip; in this case, ganked from Amazon.com: 21: Adele: Music using Audio Hijack Pro.
The original sample looks pretty clean; it’s not the highest quality, but it’s clear:
The first thing that strikes about the multiply-reencoded file is that it’s much longer:
This is because LAME adds padding to the beginning and end of each song. All this padding adds up over 1000 runs.
I’d used madplay extensively before, so I knew it worked reliably. First, I tried it using an intermediate sample size of 16 bits (same as the source) and no dithering. Just after 100 runs, Ms Adkins’ plaintive voice becomes hard to understand:
madplay / lame – 100 iterations
I’d turned dithering off in the first test, as I thought it would overcome the signal. As the signal was pretty much gone, I didn’t think I had much to lose, so I tried it at madplay’s full capability of 24 bit internal processing. Again, 100 runs was where things started to go really sideways:
madplay 24-bit / lame – 100 iterations
LAME can also decode MP3s, and remarkably, the lyrics remained discernable after 1000 interations (so go and see the third sample up top). Sure, it sounds scratchy, but the piano sounds like a piano and not like some underwater harp. LAME is clearly able to recognize its own input, and decode it accordingly. madplay, on the other hand, just treats an MP3 as a generic MP3, hence the over-compression and extra silences.
So really, if you’re going to re-encode music, it matters more what you use to decode your MP3s. If you can use the same tool for both, all the better.
All Day Long In Bliss
Call me a twee-hugger, but I love Trixie’s Big Red Motorbike. They sound like a brother and sister making up silly sweet songs and recording them on a shoebox tape recorder — which is (pretty much) what they were. Siblings Mark and Melanie Litten, along with some occasional help on backing vocals and saxophone, caught the ear of John Peel, and for a while they were the soundtrack of everyone’s anorak life.
Mark recently scraped together everything of TBRM and so Lobby Lud Records lives again on Bandcamp. There’s not much else out there, except the John Peel Session. This is good.
Richard Harvey – A New Way of Seeing
A New Way of Seeing was created by Richard Harvey for ICL for the launch of a new series of computers in 1979. Since it was only released to ICL dealers and their clients, it’s not widely known. This is a shame, as it’s a delicious slice of electro-prog.
So here it is: A New Way of Seeing – Richard Harvey (mp3).
Quality’s not great, ‘cos the audio’s ganked from this YouTube video. Seeing as ICL is long gone, this is probably the best we’ll have to live with.
mildly impressed by shazam (and soundhound)
I’m a late adopter of Shazam, which is a semi-magic music recognition service. I just gave it a ten song shuffle from my collection.
Shazam matched:
- LLL — Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter
- Puppet Master — Marissa Nadler
- He Woke Me Up Again — Sufjan Stevens
- At The Bottom Of Everything — Bright Eyes
- Derelict — Beck
Shazam found no match for:
- Religious Songs — Withered Hand
- Caney Fork River — Old Man Luedecke
- Appetite — Mount Eerie
- Setting Forth — Flashman
Shazam was completely wrong about:
- Reuben — Rafe Stefanini, which it thought was Sure The One You Need — Ron Wood.
So: 50% hit rate, 50% miss — and one false positive. Adequate.
Karl recommended I try SoundHound. It matched:
- LLL — Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter
- He Woke Me Up Again — Sufjan Stevens
- Religious Songs — Withered Hand
- Caney Fork River — Old Man Luedecke
- At The Bottom Of Everything — Bright Eyes
- Derelict — Beck
Soundhound didn’t match:
- Puppet Master — Marissa Nadler
- Reuben — Rafe Stefanini
- Appetite — Mount Eerie
- Setting Forth — Flashman
So it knew about Withered Hand and Old Man Luedecke, but didn’t know about Marissa. About the same; maybe slightly better.
MetaFilter 2012-1 Music Swap
It’s music swap time on MetaFilter. Here’s what I chose:
- Mobius Smurf — Nichol Robertson
- Unyoked Oxen Turn — Alasdair Roberts
- Is She Fiona — The Gerbils
- The Sloth — Flanders and Swann
- Morphine — Clifton Hicks
- Please Be Kind (demo) — Colleen and Paul
- Running on Fumes — King Creosote & Jon Hopkins
- Alcoholic Blues — Sheesham and Lotus
- Four Horses — Ken Reaume
- Hypernuit — Bertrand Belin
- Ran So Hard The Sun Went Down — Otis Taylor
- Freeing Song by Reindeer — The Music Tapes
- Wrapped In Grey — XTC
- Tengo La Voz — Bostich
- Singing to the Earth (to thank Her for You) — Apollo Sunshine
- Flop Eared Mule — Holy Modal Rounders
- The Speed of Things — Robyn Hitchcock
- Olivia — BGM
- Yawns — Frightened Rabbit
- No Cigarettes — Withered Hand
- Ficelles — Ingrid St-Pierre
It’s here on Spotify: MeFi Swap 2012-1.
new music from Ken Reaume
pity the lobster requirement
It appears that my musical choice has this effect on people, as this just happened on a collaborative jukebox I’m aware of:
Oh well.
you say homage, I say ripoff
Can you tell the difference?
- Exhibit A: Flesh #1 (Beatle Dennis) [mp3] by Robyn Hitchcock. This version recorded in April 2009 Live at Cat’s Cradle. Originally on the Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians album “Globe of Frogs”, released 1988.
- Exhibit B: Is it Cold in Silverlake? [mp3] by Buddy (original dodgy mp3 harvester link here). Seemingly recorded in 2009.
(awesome sleuthing by fegmaniax)
Music Tapes Lullabies Tour – Toronto Photos
goin’ up to eleven for twenty ten
This is the music that powered the year for me:
- Bertrand Belin — Hypernuit: heard this on the radio. He has an awesome voice. Seeing as it’s all in French, I have no idea what it’s about, but that’s okay.
- Calvin, don’t Jump! — Under Bridges: Kirk Pleasant’s first major outing from his Canadian location. Combines E6 ambient and skronk with some thoughtful songwriting.
- Colleen and Paul — Colleen and Paul: happy, sunny, folky, lovely. Enjoy it before it becomes car ads.
- Dum Dum Girls — I Will Be: Motown meets The Jesus & Mary Chain, with screamy lofi fuzz. Like Strawberry Switchblade (DDG are big fans) with maximal noise.
- Entertainment For The Braindead — Roadkill: Julia did a banjo album! It’s great — and free!
- Frightened Rabbit — The Winter of Mixed Drinks: juddery Scottish gloriousness with full miserability ahead.
- Jónsi — Go: this album’s so sunny it farts marigolds.
- Peter Stampfel & Baby Gramps — Outertainment: dementedly demented, with demented bits gleefully stuck to it. Gramps sings like Popeye’s ancestor, and Peter’s got the caterwauling yawp down pat. They’re having so much fun making this, they don’t care what you think.
- The Ruby Suns — Fight Softly: don’t you dare call them Animal Collective Lite. They can dance better, for one thing.
- Stereo Total — Baby Ouh!: “irritating” is not usually a word one associates with a favourite album, but Stereo Total are completely annoying. I love them for it.
- Sufjan Stevens — The Age of Adz: this is a hard album to like. I was about to completely give up on it when I played it on a long subway ride home. I’m sold. Charming, but difficult.
Here’s six not from 2010 that also helped make the year:
- Brett Dennen — Brett Dennen (2005): he’s got a weird little voice in his first album, but Don’t Forget is as catchy as anything.
- Charlotte Gainsbourg — IRM (2009): it’s a Beck album! Not sung by Beck!!
- Kyle Creed — Liberty (1977): this is the clawhammer album. Kyle played such a clean banjo; e-v-e-r-y note’s in the right place, the volume’s right, he doesn’t dominate (bluegrass pickers, take note). So brilliant, and finally available on something other than cassette.
- Major Organ And The Adding Machine — Major Organ and the Adding Machine (re-release): squee! An expanded version of 2001′s mad outing complete with the movie. Spot all your favourite E6 musicians!
- Raymond Scott — Soothing Sounds For Baby (1963): The first volume (designated for one to six months) is about my level. I’d have been tripping spheroids if this had been playing near my crib.
- The Turtles — The Turtles Present The Battle of the Bands (1968): a delightful confection of phenomenal songwriting and playing making a very silly concept album. You’d hardly believe it was all done by one band.
Podcast: scruss-best_of_2010 [mp3]
2010 contenders
Dammit, is it really December? Anyway, this is what I listened to this year:
- Albemarle Ramblers — Gentleman from Virginia
- Amanda Palmer — Amanda Palmer Performs The Popular Hits Of Radiohead On Her Magical Ukulele
- The Apples in stereo — Travellers in Space and Time
- Arcade Fire — The Suburbs
- Bart Veerman — Some o’ Mine and Some I Like (2003)
- Basia Bulat — Heart Of My Own
- Belle & Sebastian — Write About Love
- Ben Veneer — Ben Veneer
- Bertrand Belin — Hypernuit
- Bill Holt — Dreamies (1973)
- Brett Dennen — Brett Dennen (2005)
- Brian Wilson — Brian Wilson Reimagines Gershwin
- Broken Social Scene — Forgiveness Rock Record
- Calvin, Don’t Jump! — Under Bridges
- Caribou — Swim
- Carolina Chocolate Drops — Genuine Negro Jig
- Charlotte Gainsbourg — IRM (2009)
- Chris Coole & Ivan Rosenberg — Farewell Trion
- Colleen and Paul — Colleen and Paul
- The Corin Tucker Band — 1,000 Years
- Dan Jones — Dan Jones and The Squids:Live 09
- Dan Jones & Peter Wilde — My Name Is John Smith
- The Delgados — The Great Eastern (2000)
- Dum Dum Girls — I Will Be
- Eels — End Times
- Eels — Tomorrow Morning
- Elf Power — Elf Power
- Entertainment For The Braindead — Roadkill
- Final Fantasy — Heartland
- Forest City Lovers — Carriage
- Friendly Rich and the Lollipop People — The Sacred Prune Of Remembrance
- Frightened Rabbit — The Winter of Mixed Drinks
- Frontier Ruckus — Deadmalls and Nightfalls
- Germans — Elf Shot Lame Witch (2008)
- Goldfrapp — Head First
- Gonja Sufi — A Sufi And A Killer
- The Good Right Arm Stringband — The Good Right Arm Stringband
- High Places — High Places vs. Mankind
- Hold Your Horses! — 70 Million
- The Hungry Moment — Phantom 45
- Hurray for the Riff Raff — Young Blood Blues
- James Blackshaw — All Is Falling
- Joanna Newsom — Have One On Me
- Jónsi — Go
- Kyle Creed — Liberty (1977)
- Ladies of the Canyon — Haunted Woman
- M.I.A. — Maya
- Macy Gray — The Sellout
- Major Organ And The Adding Machine — Major Organ and the Adding Machine (re-release)
- MGMT — Congratulations
- Miles Kurosky — The Desert of Shallow Effects
- Mojave 3 — Ask Me Tomorrow (1995)
- Nana Grizol — “Ruth”
- Nesey Gallons — Southern Winter by Smouldering Porches
- The New Pornographers — Together
- of Montreal — False Priest
- Old Man Luedecke — My Hands Are On Fire and Other Love Songs
- The Open Letters — Bicycle EP
- Peter Stampfel & Baby Gramps — Outertainment
- Peter Stampfel & Zöe Stampfel — Ass in the Air
- Pocahaunted — Make It Real
- Princess Pangolin — Princess Pangolin
- Raymond Scott — Soothing Sounds For Baby (1963)
- Robyn Hitchcock — Propellor Time
- The Ruby Suns — Fight Softly
- Smoosh — Withershins
- Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin — Let It Sway
- Stereo Total — Baby Ouh!
- Suckers — Wild Smile
- Sufjan Stevens — All Delighted People EP
- Sufjan Stevens — The Age of Adz
- Sunbear — Moonbath
- The Superions — the Superions
- The Tallest Man On Earth — The Wild Hunt
- Tune-Yards — Bird-Brains (2009)
- The Turtles — The Turtles Present The Battle of the Bands (1968)
- Vampire Weekend — Contra
Must be getting old; two of the albums (Bertrand Belin and Brett Dennen) I bought because I heard tracks on the radio. Consequently, I predict Lawrence Welk in my best of 2011.
done with emusic – or trying to be
I knew that nothing good would come of emusic’s plan changes. I mean, dumping all your favourite indie labels and replacing them with mainstream crud; how’s that working out for you, yeah?
Just to show you how things have changed, here’s a list of the most recent artists I’d downloaded pre-plan changes. The ones in red are ones you can’t get any more:
- Barry Louis Polisar
- Belle and Sebastian
- Boards Of Canada — only one album available
- Dum Dum Girls
- Eels
- Elizabeth Cotten
- Elsinore
- Euros Childs
- Forest City Lovers
- Frontier Ruckus
- Gonja Sufi
- Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci
- Hold Your Horses!
- Macy Gray
- Michael Hurley
- Mount Eerie
- Pocahaunted
- Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin
- Sun Kil Moon
- The Delgados
- The Moldy Peaches
- The Tallest Man On Earth
- The Turtles
- The Whitlams
- Will Powers
And here was me on a major Delgados kick, and they’re gone.
So cancelled my plan on the weekend, and got this:
Yep, if you’re on an annual plan, you’ve got to sit it out. They don’t offer refunds. So now I have to remember to go in every thirty days for the next nine months to find something – anything! – to download. It’s extremely shabby that emusic are holding over $100 of my balance to ransom. I guess they’re just trying to fit in with the mainstream music industry …