...from the point of view of the British working class.
God bless Billy Bragg. He really deserves a knighthood. I offer no judgement or view on the passing of former British prime minister, the late Baroness Margaret Thatcher. It is neither my place nor am I qualified by virtue of my age to comment. If nothing else however, she inspired some of contemporary music's best to write some poignant music, of which this is one example.
Enjoy!
Tuesday, 9 April 2013
Monday, 8 April 2013
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:
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:
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!
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!
Sunday, 7 April 2013
Little Hornet!!!
Little Hornet!!! Where the hell have you been? I've been looking for you for ages!
Here's a great guitar-pop band that sprung up from Newcastle in the mid 1990s and then seemingly disappeared into oblivion almost as quickly, never to be heard from again.
They burst out of the gate with a cracking tune called "C'Mon Mrs Jones" which charted high in the alternative top 20 in Australia, and scored itself heaps of airplay around the place, but unfortunately not too many copies flew off the shelves.
Second single "Mr Lazy", while not quite as immediate, didn't do as well, and third single "Don't Cry Mother" sank without a trace, to my knowledge. They also released two albums according to my cursory research, but they hardly ever turn up second hand and as such I deem them to be quite rare. So here's hoping Tyrone Penshorn (the singer/guitarist from the band who uploaded the clips below) sees fit to reissue the entire back catalog again, possibly on iTunes and streaming.
Like Header, as featured last week, Little Hornet demonstrated that Australian pub-rock bands with strong Anglophile leanings just didn't capture the local public's imagination, no matter how great they were. It's truly a great shame. However, it is my pleasure to give the band some due credit. And also to celebrate the fact that I've finally found a recording of the song to listen to after all these years, on YouTube!!!
Fellow readers and internet citizens, I give you
LITTLE HORNET!!!
Enjoy!
Here's a great guitar-pop band that sprung up from Newcastle in the mid 1990s and then seemingly disappeared into oblivion almost as quickly, never to be heard from again.
They burst out of the gate with a cracking tune called "C'Mon Mrs Jones" which charted high in the alternative top 20 in Australia, and scored itself heaps of airplay around the place, but unfortunately not too many copies flew off the shelves.
Second single "Mr Lazy", while not quite as immediate, didn't do as well, and third single "Don't Cry Mother" sank without a trace, to my knowledge. They also released two albums according to my cursory research, but they hardly ever turn up second hand and as such I deem them to be quite rare. So here's hoping Tyrone Penshorn (the singer/guitarist from the band who uploaded the clips below) sees fit to reissue the entire back catalog again, possibly on iTunes and streaming.
Like Header, as featured last week, Little Hornet demonstrated that Australian pub-rock bands with strong Anglophile leanings just didn't capture the local public's imagination, no matter how great they were. It's truly a great shame. However, it is my pleasure to give the band some due credit. And also to celebrate the fact that I've finally found a recording of the song to listen to after all these years, on YouTube!!!
Fellow readers and internet citizens, I give you
LITTLE HORNET!!!
Enjoy!
Saturday, 6 April 2013
R.I.P Chris Bailey
Australia's music world lost two of the best this week, in the form of expert musical director and arranger Tommy Tycho, and bass player Chris Bailey.
There's been a bit of confusion around the interwebs regarding Chris Bailey and I seek to lay this one to rest. This is NOT the Chris Bailey who formed The Saints in Brisbane in 1974. It is Chris Bailey that played with the Angels from 1977 to 1982.
He originally joined the band in 1977, before the recording of The Angel's first record, in order to free up Doc Neeson to forge his place in Australian Rock folklore as the mad Irishman.
Chris left the band before the recording of 1983's "Watch The Red" LP. He later joined (and then managed) GANGgajang. He rejoined one of the many reincarnations of the Angels doing the rounds (that mess is worthy of a novel in itself) before succumbing to throat cancer on April 4, 2013. He will be missed.
Here'a a clip of the Angels, with Chris on bass, at the Concert of the Decade, 1979 on the steps of the Sydney Opera House. They're performing the track "I Ain't The One" from the essential "Face To Face" LP. Apologies for the audio which has Doc's voice dropping in and out all over the shop.
Vale Chris (and Tommy - I'll write about you soon.)
Enjoy.
There's been a bit of confusion around the interwebs regarding Chris Bailey and I seek to lay this one to rest. This is NOT the Chris Bailey who formed The Saints in Brisbane in 1974. It is Chris Bailey that played with the Angels from 1977 to 1982.
He originally joined the band in 1977, before the recording of The Angel's first record, in order to free up Doc Neeson to forge his place in Australian Rock folklore as the mad Irishman.
Chris left the band before the recording of 1983's "Watch The Red" LP. He later joined (and then managed) GANGgajang. He rejoined one of the many reincarnations of the Angels doing the rounds (that mess is worthy of a novel in itself) before succumbing to throat cancer on April 4, 2013. He will be missed.
Here'a a clip of the Angels, with Chris on bass, at the Concert of the Decade, 1979 on the steps of the Sydney Opera House. They're performing the track "I Ain't The One" from the essential "Face To Face" LP. Apologies for the audio which has Doc's voice dropping in and out all over the shop.
Vale Chris (and Tommy - I'll write about you soon.)
Enjoy.
Friday, 5 April 2013
The Real Thing???
Normally this is not the forum for political comment, but this was too good a piece not to share.
In this day and age, with information at our fingertips and news of current political events seemingly in our faces within minutes of them happening, the man who could very well be the next Australian prime minister has been strangely silent in the media.
If the current government keeps eating itself alive at the current rate, Tony Abbott could end up being PM by default. Given his lack of comment in the news, with no policies seemingly forthcoming, how do we know he's the real deal?
The animation below was posted by illustrator Rocco Fazzari on the Sydney Morning Herald's website. The soundtrack is a parody of "The Real Thing" written by Johnny Young and performed by Russell Morris. This version has new words written by Denis Carnahan. Enjoy.
In this day and age, with information at our fingertips and news of current political events seemingly in our faces within minutes of them happening, the man who could very well be the next Australian prime minister has been strangely silent in the media.
If the current government keeps eating itself alive at the current rate, Tony Abbott could end up being PM by default. Given his lack of comment in the news, with no policies seemingly forthcoming, how do we know he's the real deal?
The animation below was posted by illustrator Rocco Fazzari on the Sydney Morning Herald's website. The soundtrack is a parody of "The Real Thing" written by Johnny Young and performed by Russell Morris. This version has new words written by Denis Carnahan. Enjoy.
Thursday, 4 April 2013
Remake/Remodel #2: Counting Crows do Joni MItchell
Some covers are done as affectionate tributes. Some are a genuine effort to elevate a merely competent original into something extraordinary. Some are done with the purest of intentions, but fall short of the mark.
In 2003, Counting Crows released their version of a once-pleasant, environmentally conscious Joni Mitchell song called "Big Yellow Taxi".
Despite its serious message, "Big Yellow Taxi" is one of Joni's brightest songs, with a stunning clear guitar tone and with a sunny feel to it. You can't help but smile when listening to it.
The Counting Crows version, from the outset, is all kinds of wrong. Adam Duritz, with his Van-Morrison-on-Venice-Beach styled laconic drawl is plain awful, delivering a lifeless vocal performance that doesn't suit the song. Vanessa Carlton's guest appearance on the backing vocals are also all wrong - the chord she harmonises with her overdubbed vocal layers is far darker than the original and sticks another nail in the coffin of an already bad remake.
Add to that the producers pushing the auto-pilot button on every studio gadget available to them, and you have one stinker of a record. Apparently this was only the secret track on the band's "Hard Candy" LP. Hiding it at the end of an album is too good for a recording that should have been drowned at birth.
My verdict: Yuk. Search out the original.
In 2003, Counting Crows released their version of a once-pleasant, environmentally conscious Joni Mitchell song called "Big Yellow Taxi".
Despite its serious message, "Big Yellow Taxi" is one of Joni's brightest songs, with a stunning clear guitar tone and with a sunny feel to it. You can't help but smile when listening to it.
The Counting Crows version, from the outset, is all kinds of wrong. Adam Duritz, with his Van-Morrison-on-Venice-Beach styled laconic drawl is plain awful, delivering a lifeless vocal performance that doesn't suit the song. Vanessa Carlton's guest appearance on the backing vocals are also all wrong - the chord she harmonises with her overdubbed vocal layers is far darker than the original and sticks another nail in the coffin of an already bad remake.
Add to that the producers pushing the auto-pilot button on every studio gadget available to them, and you have one stinker of a record. Apparently this was only the secret track on the band's "Hard Candy" LP. Hiding it at the end of an album is too good for a recording that should have been drowned at birth.
My verdict: Yuk. Search out the original.
Tuesday, 2 April 2013
Coldplay is BBC Radio2's favourite
The NME is reporting this morning that Coldplay's second LP "A Rush of Blood To The Head" is the most popular album of all time, according to a poll run by BBC Radio 2.
For Australian listeners who may not know, the BBC Radio 2 is a bit like ABC Local, such as 2BL 702 Sydney or 774 in Melbourne or 612 in Brisbane, but without the news analysis programs like "The World Today" and lots more music programming. It's filled with specialist music shows like a Country show, hits of the 60s and 70s, documentaries on musicians, plus Big Band music programs, devotional music on Sunday mornings and many other things. It suits a wide range of tastes and is widely regarded as the (British) nation's favourite station.
Traditionally, Radio 2 was called the "Light Programme" or light entertainment, generally to amuse housewives during the day. To a point, it still is light entertainment - it's not like you're going to hear the Ramones played during the breakfast show (if you want that, go to BBC 6Music). But for many years, young people or even people in their 30s wouldn't dare listen to Radio 2 - it just wasn't for them.
One thing's for sure is that BBC Radio 2 plays the most agreeable, yet varied selection of music from all time. You'll hear everything from Sinatra to Emilie Sande and all points in between, but very little of it is offensive. Sure there's the best of Indie and alternative played there, mixed in with northern Soul and rock classics, but it is extremely varied generally, and unlike any radio station - government, community or commercial - in Australia.
I'm not surprised by the result of the poll. After all, a poll run by digital music station BBC 6Music recently picked "Clocks" by Coldplay as the best song of the last 10 years. However, I think there is a lot that BBC Radio 2 programmers can take away from this result.
Whatever the result of the poll, the poll was flawed from the outset. Visitors to the Radio 2 website were given the list of 100 albums and then expected to vote for their favourite. It was a foregone conclusion that one of them would be the most popular. I would have supplied a longer list or changed the voting to a more ballot-styled system, where you could vote for 5 or 10 albums maybe, and then pick the ones most voted for. This could have allowed for some interesting data mining analysis, in terms of finding out what else listeners would have picked besides their one favourite.
Not only that, there was only one LP from each artist in the list - two at best. That both ensures diversity of choices but excludes many worthy candidates from the vote.
Following the live blog and the comments on it, it was clear that many people thought that key albums such as "Breakfast In America" or "Hotel California" were ranked too low. Surprise, surprise. Looking through the top 10 selections, it's interesting that most of the records are from a key period in music history, along with a scattering of classics.
My view? Generation X has spoken. This is the top 10 albums of many mid-30s to mid-40s people with young families doing the school/sports run on weekdays. There's albums from their primary school/teenage years (Duran Duran, U2 and Pet Shop Boys), classics from their festival/gig attending years (Dido, Coldplay, Keane) and classics that they grew up with from their parents record collection ("Sticky Fingers", "Dark Side of the Moon", "Sgt Pepper", "A Night at The Opera").
If you were to listen to Radio 2 from the time you wake up until the time you went to sleep at night, you would hear a wide range of music, so it is my belief that the listeners to the station are well versed in music of all types. I think the top 10 choices reflect the core age and demographic of the station. Radio 2 is no longer "the housewives choice" or the choice of the Baby Boomers and their parents, but the station that middle-aging, disaffected Radio 1 listeners of 20 years ago have turned to. There's a lot of programming direction to be gained from that.
The top 10: (courtesy of NME.co.uk and the BBC)
1. Coldplay 'A Rush Of Blood To The Head' (2002)
2. Keane 'Hopes and Fears' (2004)3. Duran Duran 'Rio' (1982)4. Pink Floyd 'The Dark Side Of The Moon' (1973)5. Dido 'No Angel' (1999)6. The Rolling Stones 'Sticky Fingers' (1971)7. The Pet Shop Boys 'Actually' (1987)8. The Beatles 'Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band' (1967)9. U2 'The Joshua Tree' (1987)10. Queen 'A Night At The Opera' (1975)
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