I want to introduce you all to Jakub Alexander, he helps me out with the day to day workings of ISO50/Tycho related stuff, is an A&R for Ghostly International Records, and runs his own imprint called Moodgadget Records. You may have guessed from his credentials that he’s well versed in all things music related so I’ve asked him to contribute some posts to the blog. He’ll be posting all sorts of stuff from now on, hopefully adding a little more variety to my own selections. So let’s give Jakub a warm welcome, this is his first post.
Hey everyone, i just wanted to start out with something i feel is really pretty on the melody end that is maybe the perfect balance of indie rock and electronic. Also, i wanted some warm saturated key work to share with all the people that come and visit here. I remember first hearing Mercury Program in 2005 from Benoit Pioulard and this song and Tequesta completely grabbed me because i have a thing for vibraphones which dominate Tequesta and keys on this track always relaxes me.
Apparently Super Bock is like the Budweiser of Portugal; it’s literally everywhere. Caught these kegs stacked up in the warehouse behind the OFFF festival at LX Factory. From the right angle the name reminds me of a nice album by a certain Scottish music duo.
Here’s an incredible video of Elliott Smith apparently recording Angeles live in a living room. Amazing that they’re getting such great sound from one mic picking up both the guitar and the vocals. I use 3 mics just to capture one acoustic guitar, which might be overkill. I have been experimenting with mic’ing drums using just one condenser room mic placed at a good distance and a dynamic on the bottom of the snare only with decent results. (thanks to Dusty Brown for that technique)
Chris clark, to me, is like Boards Of Canada, Aphex Twin, and a bit of Autechre thrown in for good measure (no wonder he’s on Warp, right?) His album Clarence Park is pretty much solid wall to wall. This track is a stand-out if not only for it’s Aphex slant. Sorry for the small cover art, couldn’t find a proper sized version. Also, I’m at Newark airport having some beers with my brother so not all that concerned with Jpeg resolutions at the moment.
70’s prog-rock band Yes are really hit and miss for me. I enjoy a lot of their earlier work but they shifted gears later on and started making the sort of music we now mock when lamenting the cultural shortcomings of that polarizing age known as The 80’s. That aside, they have contributed some amazing work over the years; their eponymous first album is largely considered to be the first Progressive Rock album and it’s certainly a classic. One of my all time favorite songs is the track Survival from that very same album. The production and musicianship on these earlier songs is, to me, perfection. It’s these sort of songs that really make me miss the hot summers of my home. It’s funny how the context of your first experience with a song colors your perception of it from that point forward. Although it is an incredibly beautiful song, hearing Survival usually gets me a little down, I start missing home and getting all nostalgic. The first minute is something altogether transcendent. Being an electronic musician who doesn’t use traditional vocals, the instrumental parts of songs like this are great reference points for building emotion into a song without the need for vocals.
Yes – Survival
[audio:survival.mp3]
Yes was also a visually interesting band. The top five images are paintings by Roger Dean, some of which were used as Yes album covers. The second image is some random shot I found on Flickr while searching for Yes covers. This guy came prepared for whatever he’s about to get into: Portable tape recorder, box of tapes, joint, football, paper towels and of course, a Yes T-Shirt. The final image is from a series of Yes logos also by Dean.
