Pathways into Classical Music Appreciation

or

How a awkward kid from an Australian semi-rural cultural back-water became all musically literate and edificated...

... or some crap like that...

People ask me frequently how I manage to listen to all kinds of varied music. I listen to everything from Renaissance-era Lute music through to hardcore punk, and all points in between. For some people, that's too broad a scope and it is beyond comprehension for them. I guess it all depends on the way it is introduced to you and the way you approach it in the first place.

For most people, and I was no different, they are introduced to this stuff in junior high school music. "This is what classical music is, now sit there and appreciate it." Others learn instruments and learn to play classical-era pieces at the expense of anything modern. This could go part of the way to explaining why we tend to hate it so much - we didn't come to the music on our own terms.

My psych lecturer at university explained a method of learning new information:

• take in new information,
• how does this new information relate to information I already know?
• how can I use this information in the future?

This explains how I managed to get into classical music: some of the bands I knew and loved as a kid were trying out new things that just happened to be classical ideas.

For example:

• "Jesus Christ Superstar" and The Who's "Tommy" were operas, albeit with rock instruments.
• The Beatles used 19th-century chamber quartet-style arrangements on songs like "Yesterday" and "Eleanor Rigby".
• They also cribbed a short burst of melody from one of Bach's "Brandenburg" concertos for the trumpet solo in "Penny Lane".
• My dad played a lot of Neil Diamond around the house, so I was unwittingly exposed to Mozart via "Song Sung Blue".

Other initial contacts with classical music include the Warner Brothers classic cartoons where Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd parodied Rossini's "The Barber of Seville", and where they condensed 19 hours of Wagner's "The Ring of the Nebelung" down to just seven minutes.



Of course, some of the musicians I loved also happened to be classically trained: Yngwie Malmsteen and Randy Rhoads (who played on Ozzy Osbourne's first two solo albums) for instance.

It wasn't until I heard a piece of music by a person named Walter Carlos (now Wendy Carlos) entitled "Country Lane" that blew my mind. "Country Lane" was part of the soundtrack of "A Clockwork Orange" and it was a very early synthesizer work. Its ever-changing key signatures, complex chords and brooding dark atmosphere just hit the spot as a precocious 15 year old.



In high school I found a pivotal record among the music resources in the form of Carlos' "Switched On Bach", which contained famous Bach pieces played exclusively on some very embryonic Moog Synthesizers. By the time I'd heard it for the first time (circa 1993), synth technology had advanced considerably, so the sounds were quite archaic. However, the beauty of the music was evident, and I heard enough of it in "Switched On Bach" to know that this was impeccably crafted music, overflowing with melody and supported by a rich tapestry of ornamentation.

 The next step was to try some classical guitar albums. As a young guitarist at the time, this caught my imagination. I also listened to the Andre Segovia records that were also in the resource room and they were also fascinating. The musicianship, the complex chords, the lightening fast runs of notes; these players possessed a discipline and dedication to their instrument that far outstripped anything I was capable of.

 From there I found John Williams, the Melbourne born classical guitarist, student of Segovia, who was probably the first classical guitarist to risk his career and reputation by picking up that most dreaded instrument in the eyes of classical purists: the electric guitar. Mind you, his band Sky performed a rocked up version of Bach's "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor" that I consider to be the definitive performance of the piece.

 For a while it seemed almost everywhere I looked, classical influences were being integrated everywhere. The sportman's favourite theme music "Fanfare for the Common Man" was a trumpet fanfare written by composer Aaron Copeland, rocked up by Emerson Lake and Palmer. Electric Light Orchestra grafted a chamber string quartet onto a traditionally-configured rock band. Frank Zappa idolised Igor Stravinsky and Edgard Varese, and Frank was always incorporating some of the stranger, more avant garde aspects of their work into his own increasingly complex compositions.

 I'd purchased Zappa's "We're Only In It For The Money" in the mid 1990s on the recommendation from one of those lists of "Greatest albums of all time". For years I hated it, until I studied 20th century music as part of my degree. Listening to some of the strangest music I'd ever heard in that class, and hearing works by his inspirations suddenly made Zappa's more esoteric work (such as this one) make sense.

 

 Hearing Scheonberg's serialist piano works can be quite painful at times, but after hearing them, I now know why David Bowie was inspired by them. For years I hated the piano solo in "Alladin Sane". However, the song is about his mentally-ill half brother, and by adding a bizarre atonal, arhythmic piano solo of this nature to the song was actually a stroke of genius. After all, the title "Alladin Sane" is a pun on "A Lad Insane"...

 

20th Century music was the greatest liberating factor for me as a composer, as it meant that one could take the traditional music rule book and torch it with a flame thrower. Rules, syntax, constructs didn't matter anymore. You could write your own rules. That's one of the reasons that some of the most ugly, difficult sounding music (as it sounds to most) is quite a thrilling listen to me, as I find it to be very free and unhinged, unbound by complex rules and traditions that may in fact hold a piece of music down or make it sound like something else.

In all of the cases cited above, all it takes is for a musician to incorporate something unusual or different into their work for one to gain exposure to a number of different styles of music, and as such, I could then go and approach this music as I felt I needed to - on it's own merits, in my own way. I didn't just believe what people told me was "good music".  I didn't just assume that "I had to like it" just because someone said I did. Indeed, I probably would not have found the pieces of music that a music teacher would recommend a student should listen to, but that's precisely the point: From the massively green field of classical music, I've managed to cultivate my own, if strangely manicured, patch within it.

Everyone has their own story to tell, and not everybody would follow the same path to discovering music as I have.  Tell me about yours in the comments below.

And as much as I love Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody", I still can't stand Romantic-period Opera!

100 LPs Shortlist #27: The Eagles - "Hotel California"

Growing up in the 1980s and 1990s, you couldn't escape the Eagles. Any radio station that claimed to play "Rock" music, even if their mantra was the latest music, always played The Eagles. In a lot of cases, unless they're pure Top 40 stations or alternative or specialist stations, they still do play them. As a collector of vinyl, both new and second hand, Eagles records are plentiful and usually you can get them in good condition very cheaply. All of them are expertly played with loads of great guitar work on them which makes them pleasant enough to listen to, but the experience can ring a little hollow sometimes. After all, they're no longer the coolest band on the block, and we're all a bit tired of the exposure to them, aren't we?

When the Eagles started in the 1970s, radio in Australia wouldn't touch them. The only station that would was 2JJ (later Triple J), as they were considered to be "alternative". They were too country for the rock stations, too rock for the country stations. Of course, by 1975 they'd developed a big enough following to be one of the biggest selling bands in the world with the release of their next record.

"Hotel California" is a record that is completely of its time. It stands as one of the signposts of the debauched post-hippie 1970s, along with "Rumours" (Fleetwood Mac) and "Running On Empty" (Jackson Browne). These were records that highlighted the excess and indulgence that apparently was the late 1970s. They are products by musicians at the height of fame, with stupidly insane amounts of money, loads of groupies and copious amounts of drugs, seeming all on tap. Considering the amount of drugs these bands were rumoured to be taking, it's a wonder any music was made at all, let along stuff this great.

This is a record that contains great songs, but it also has been polished with a studio sheen that makes the music sparkle, despite the woozy, almost hung-over atmosphere of tunes like "Wasted Time" and "Victim of Love". "The Last Resort", with it's plaintive piano figure throughout, is an 8 minute tour-de-force through the US frontier's economic and social history. But most of the songs deal with the fallout of the heady and debauched post-free love era that was starting to burn people out, as evidenced on "Life In The Fast Lane" and "Hotel California". All the hippy idealism of the 1960s had now evolved into grown-up life and clearly it wasn't working for some people.

The bulk of "Hotel California" is still played on radio and in live sets by the band. The title track, "New Kid In Town", "Victim of Love", "Life In The Fast Lane" all get regular runs on classic hits radio even to this day, while on the 1994 comeback special "Hell Freezes Over" they played "Pretty Maids All In A Row", "Wasted Time" and "The Last Resort", as well as two of the aforementioned radio tracks. The only song on the record that gets short shrift is the Randy Meisener composition "Try and Love Again", not that there's anything wrong with it, but it really is the black sheep of the family in terms of appreciation - it's the hidden jewel tucked away at the back of the record. The other part of the record that, in my view, is superfluous, is the orchestral reprise of "Wasted Time" at the start of side 2 - what's the point of it?

The band peaked with this record. They couldn't follow it up quick enough and turned out the flaccid "The Long Run" in 1979. Listening to that record, it really sounded like the drugs had gotten the better of them. Nonetheless, "Hotel California" is the band's piece de resistance, and provided you listen to it on your own terms and not when oldies radio batters you constantly with it, it's still a great listen.

100 LPs Shortlist #24: The Kinks - "Lola vs Powerman and the Money-go-Round"

It's amazing the lasting impression some people leave on you. Oftentimes I remember people by their taste in music. Most of the albums in my 100 LPs shortlist I can remember not only time and place where I first heard them, but also who introduced me to it.

Once upon a time I had a high school girlfriend, whose father was Scottish. I've always believed you could learn a lot about a person from their music collection. With that criteria in mind, then ol' Jimmy must have been a nutter* - His taste ranged from Highland accordion sounds of Jimmy Shand through to the Sex Pistols!
* no disrespect intended.

He was an easy bloke to get along with. He loved his music, and that was half the battle won as far as I was concerned. He'd crack me up with his stinging critiques of my then-faves Pearl Jam and Guns n' Roses. He'd regale me with stories of the time he saw The Kinks in Glasgow at the height the "scream" years: when the noise of the hysterical screaming girls was so loud you couldn't hear the band.

Obviously, having seen the band live as a young working man, he'd probably have one or two Kinks records kicking about. Aside from a greatest hits compilation LP, "Lola vs Powerman..." was the one LP of the bands voluminous discography that he had. In the early 90s, Kinks LPs were available but they were not commonly stocked in stores. Even so, this album struck me as an odd and obscure choice. I'd never seen it before in a record shop (not that that means anything), nor had I heard anything from it aside from the two radio singles "Lola" and "Apeman". Looking at it, I thought the front cover looked like crap. Jimmy insisted, as he often did in his thick Glasgow brogue, that it was "brilliant".

It turns out that the man was an astute judge. Upon deeper listening and through further reading, this record really is brilliant. It is rich in sonic detail and scathing in its commentary on the reality of life in the music industry.

The songs, mind you, are also great. You could take a track out here and there and it will still be listenable, but it makes more sense within the concept of the record. A lot of the songs are hints of the stylistic direction the band was to take in the future. Songs like "The Contenders", "Denmark Street" and "A Long Way From Home" have country leanings which would take root in the albums that came immediately after this one, like "Muswell Hillbillies". "Powerman, "Top Of The Pops" and "Rats" are scorching rockers. "The Money-go-round" is a hilarious little music-hall styled track about who gets the spoils of royalties and the like. "Strangers" is a song so beautiful it may just be the best song the band has ever written.

Over time I played this album many, many times since then and even now I still find so much to gain from listening to it. And every time I play it, I still think about when and where I first heard it, who I was with and what we may, or may not, have been doing at the time...

Meanwhile, time goes on, the tape I recorded it on wore out and I bought the CD reissue with bonus tracks. People come and go. Relationships end. I haven't seen Jimmy (or his daughter for that matter) in well over 10 years, but I recently heard through the social media grapevine that he died last year - well before his time, in my view. I present the "Powerman..." LP for your listening pleasure below, in tribute to him.

Enjoy.

Lou Reed and Metallica

"Are you seriously going to write about this album now? After all this time?" I hear you ask.

Yes, I say. Due to the almost universal howl of condemnation that greeted the album upon release, it would have been hard to be as objective as I would have liked to be.

Metallica and Lou Reed have both had a long history of testing the patience of their respective fanbases. But I don't think fans of either artist were expecting this - a record blending the two extremes together in an avant garde context, over 2 cds and over 90 minutes of music in only 10 songs (the last one, "Junior Dad" towers in at over 19 minutes - longer than either act has released on their own).

What you end up with is a very tough record to listen to. And while it's no "Metal Machine Music" (Lou Reed's polarising 1975 double LP of wall-to wall sonic noise), I doubt there's been a record since that has pissed people off so violently. Almost overnight, it became an Internet Meme and the online outrage and vitriol lasted for weeks.

Part of - well, most of the problem really - is context. The audience has a lot of research to do before this record even begins to make sense.

Lou was inspired by the "Lulu" trilogy by German playwright Frank Wederkind . The plays revolve around a young female dancer who falls into poverty, violence and prostitution and ultimately lives for encounters with rich men and deviant sexuality. Lou has made a career of singing about freaks, junkies, hookers, trannies and other ostracised fringe dwellers. These plays fit in well with his previous repertoire. But really, who, aside from PhD Literature students has ever read the works of an early 20th century German avant garde playwright? And how many Metallica fans do you think are going to read Wederkind's source material to make sense of this collaboration?

Sure, Metallica have been inspired by classic literature before on songs like "One". But you didn't need to have read the novel to get the message. With "Lulu", one probably should, but from what I hear it's almost as gruesome and painful as Lou's off key groaning.

Back onto the point about context. How many people are fans of both Metallica and Lou Reed? I highly doubt there are many people whose musical tastes overlap the two artists.

Musically, Metallica swoop, lurch, stagger and stumble woozily, like an inebriated Yeti who has just been hit on one eye with a champagne bottle, behind Lou Reed's obviously deranged and deeply emotive poetry. He reminds me of a street-corner rambler, standing on a milk crate warning of the impending demise of mankind. He rants along with a super heavy barrage of noise behind him. The two don't seem to ever line up in a purely musical sense - it almost feels as though the awkward juxtaposition of the two styles was as deliberate as it sounds accidental.

If nothing else, this project is ambitious. I, for one, do not begrudge either Metallica or Lou Reed their ambitions. In fact I applaud them, because without some ambition, art will not advance and it won't develop either. But there's a difference between ambition and execution. All the ambition in the world isn't going to make this album any more listenable.

Lou Reed has even gone on to say that this record is for "literate" people. Fair enough, I suppose. However, placing the premise and the concept of your artwork above and beyond the grasp of your core fan base is not a smart move either, as it smacks of arrogance. The minute you position yourselves above your audience or make them feel like lesser people is the moment you will be cut down to size. This may go a long way to explaining why there was much backlash. Music fans don't like being made to feel stupid.

Doing something different is part of every artists nature. The problem is when you have an audience that is not prepared to - or unable to, for some reason - follow you and to understand what you are trying to achieve. Also, with such ugly subject matter serving as inspiration, it would be very difficult to come out with something that wasn't off-putting or disagreeable with many people. It's hard to see this project as a winning situation for anyone except the artists themselves and their artistic inclinations.

My view? Good on them for having a go and trying something different, for "spreading their wings" as James Hetfield put it in an interview with Dmitri Erlich in Interview Magazine. But all in all, "Lulu" kind of ends up feeling like this Lynda Benglin abstract piece: You stand back, look at it and go "ok, now that we've done it, and it exists, what the hell is it and what are we supposed to do with it?"

R.I.P. INXS

image source Gold 104.3FM Melbourne.

This morning the news that INXS had broken up was everywhere - it was inescapable. Apparently it was announced during their performance on the last night of their tour supporting Matchbox 20 in Perth last night.

It remains to be seen if this is a complete retirement announcement or an announcement of the David Bowie, sleep deprived "last show we'll ever do" type at the end of the 1973 Ziggy Stardust tour. 

Either way, is it surprising?

Um...no, not really.

For any kid growing up and coming of age in the 1980s, INXS was a mainstay of your music library. They rocked hard, like all Aussie bands were required to do in those days, but had enough swing and groove to make the girls dance, thus boosting their profile enormously. It also helped that frontman Michael Hutchence carried himself with the swagger of an Adonis, but that's another story...

They conquered the world in the 1990s and became a truly global band, before their Michael descended into tabloid fodder, tawdry sex scandals with other peoples wives and, finally in 1997, his own untimely death in a bizarre accident gone wrong.

By the time they released "X" in 1990, I was over them. I'd moved on. They had a few great singles during that time, such as "Heaven Sent" and the unusual but highly inspired Ray Charles collaboration "Please (You Got That...)". When Michael died, commercial radio and TV in this country went nuts, having 24 hour coverage of the scene and a constant stream of teary tributes from female fans.

Since then, in my view, the band existed on its past glories and became a parody of itself. They tried a host of new singers. The first of which was ex-Noiseworks frontman Jon Stevens, probably the best fit for the band out of any of subsequent singers to fill Michael's shoes. They tried to plug the void Michael left with Terrance Trent D'Arby (which thankfully didn't last long), karaoke caricature JD Fortune and the new Irish chappy Ciaran Gribbin. Unfortunately, none have really matched up to the larger than life Michael Hutchence.

One of the special aspects of the band was lost in 1997 and the band never recovered. It wasn't that Michael was a great singer - he was no Caruso, but neither should he have been. Like Peter Garrett from Midnight Oil, he had a limited vocal range, but it was expressive. It was the perfect fit within the band's sound. He used it to the best of his advantage: for the group, the music and the song he was singing at the time. It suited what they were doing, and he had the charisma to carry it to the world.

Still, albums like "Underneath The Colours", "The Swing" and "Kick" deservedly belong in any collection of classic Australian music. Songs like "Don't Change" still sound as fresh as they day they were recorded.

Below is a link to a Grooveshark playlist of some of my selections from the long back catalog of INXS...in loving memory.

Enjoy.

100 LPs Shortlist #20: The Mermen - "Food For Other Fish"

Surf music, at least in the way that Dick Dale first envisioned it, is cool. It has since been co-opted and watered down by acts who had a far more tepid approach (The Beach Boys and The Ventures, I'm looking at you!), however the core approach to the music was a fiery, aggressive style of guitar-based instrumental music with some echo-y guitar effects applied.

For some reason, out of the blue, Surf music made a resurgence in the 1990s. Dick Dale made a successful comeback with a more fired up sound on albums like "Tribal Thunder" and "Calling Up Spirits". His playing on those records was more ferocious than a player half his age (he was in his 60s at the time). A number of other bands came along at the same time - The Aqua Velvets and The Mermen are among those that spring to mind.

The Mermen (the male equivalent of a Mermaid, it seems) had been around for a few years by the time "Food For Other Fish" was released in 1994. They had honed their style in and around various clubs in California, refining a sound that is equal parts Dick Dale, Pink Floyd and Sonic Youth.

The longer pieces are spacey and atmospheric a la Floyd, coupled with small amounts of extreme digitally-processed guitar noise a la Sonic Youth. The energy they create on songs like "Honeybomb" is white-hot. "Ocean Beach" and "Be My Noir" are both gorgeously atmospheric. "Ocean Beach" has to be one of the best songs ever to get you pumped up for summer.

If anything should be criticised about the album is that it's a long record - 70+ minutes. However, it doesn't always feel like it's long - it's that enjoyable. As we lead up to Summer here in Oz, kick back and enjoy the sounds of The Mermen.