This post has been at the back of my mind for a long time. I wanted to write something about psychedelic music from South America from different eras (because there's just plenty of it for some reason), make it well-documented, complete, insightful, and of course what it meant is that I kept postponing it and not doing anything about it. It felt like work.
So screw that! Let's just pretty much dump the videos in here for now, just to give you an idea of the amount of obscure gems waiting to be discovered.
Let's start with what gave me the idea for the post in the first place: Chicha! Originally the name of some fermented beverage made in various regions of South America, it also became the name of a weird Peruvian musical genre that combines cumbia with... wait for it... surf music! Here's a typical example, by one of the early bands that played the genre, Los Destellos:
A recent compilation, aptly named The Roots of Chicha, gives us some of the best the genre has to offer. Here's one that you just gotta love:
A recent group called Chicha Libre (ahem), with participation from some French musicians, gives us a more modern (and maybe less interesting?) interpretation of the genre. Here's a Chicha version of Joe Dassin's "L'ete indien" :
But let's move on from Peru... My favorite discovery of the year, Meridian Brothers, comes from Colombia! Despite the name, it's a one man affair. Eblis Alvarez is possible the John Frusciante of the Latin American world, and is very much active. Here's one of his recent songs:
(WE ARE NOT ALONE!)
But, the diligent EasyTV viewer is bound to ask: what about Brazil? Don't expect me to talk about Os Mutantes and the whole Tropicalia movement, I've mentioned it here before, and frankly it's not all that obscure, is it? So let me tell you instead about Tim Maia, apparently a God of Funk at home but at least unknown to me until very recently. So let's transport ourselves to the mid 70s, and let's make sweeeeeeet looooove to this music:
(apparently the song can be heard on the City of God soundtrack. Haven't seen the movie.)
To finish things off, let's go to Venezuela. OK, not quite: this is a London-based band, but the singer, Luzmira Zerpa, is from there. In any case, it looks pretty cool live:
I also had something from Chile, but I can't find it right now, and there was a band from Argentina that had an awesome album cover but the music turned out to be pretty lame, and their name is Catupecu Machu.
I haven't been following the current music scene as closely as I used to, but it just seems to me that there's been a lot of great music in 2012, so much so that even I've heard some of it! I've been meaning to categorize, rationalize, synthesize it all, but "le mieux est l'ennemi du bien", so all you're going to get is a basic list in no particular order and without much commentary (not that I know much about these musicians anyway).
Let's start with some dancey stuff to get things going. I love this video and I can't sit still watching it:
You know what else I like? Dance music with a slow rhythm! But check out the (possibly NSFW if you live in an uptight country like I do) vintage porn excerpts!
Weirder and more disconcerting, this piece of electronica comes with a spooky video that matches the mood perfectly:
So you think Syd Barrett's dead, huh? In reality, he's been in Australia all this time, along with his buddies from Pink Floyd, playing good old Piper-era music under a fake band name that only he could come up with:
You know who was a pleasant surprise this year? Cat Power! I don't like the whole album, but there's definitely a few great tracks, including this one: (but the video, which she directed herself, is pretty terrible in my opinion. Well, you be the judge...)
But Chan Marshall 2.0 is undeniably Sharon van Etten, and it so happens she had a new album too! It's not as catchy as her previous one, but there's still plenty of good songs in there too:
More obscure? You want more obscure? Julianna Barwick comes from the same scene as Sharon van Etten, and OMBRE is her latest collaboration. That this fantastic gem didn't make a single best of 2012 list is a crime:
And you might think this comes from a 60's folk compilation from Elektra (that would be a great blog post idea, actually...), but no, this really is from 2012, and it's fantastic:
Happy new year, full of laughter, fulfillment and great music!
I'm baaaack! Hope you didn't miss me too much. Today's post is inspired by Juliet, Naked, who is not an "easy" girlfriend of mine but a Nick Hornby novel. It was an ok read, mostly the first half, but what really got me interested was its mention of Northern Soul. Northern Soul is something that often pops up in reviews or interviews of British pop bands, often those associated with the Mod scene such as The Jam or Dexy's Midnight Runners. So I finally decided to find out more about this scene.
According to the wikipedia entry, Northern Soul is basically old American soul music from the 60s that happened to be favored by residents of Northern England. And the more obscure, the better. Now that's something EasyTV can get behind! So we're not talking about Motown big names such as the Supremes, but artists from lesser-known labels. So here's a little selection to give you an idea:
First, to get you interested, here's a song I'm sure you know, and that you probably thought (as I did) that it was an original: Tainted Love. Well, here's the original:
It's not as sleazy sounding as the Soft Cell version, but it's very danceable with its fast rhythm. Mark Almond must have heard this at a Northern Soul dance party, maybe in Wigan, maybe in Blackpool, maybe in Manchester, who knows.
Now one fun aspect of Northern Soul is the dance moves. A nice combination of spins and kicks that might remind one of hip-hop at times. Here's an illustration, to the tune of one of the most popular Northern Soul songs (but still one that's under the radar, because otherwise it wouldn't qualify as Northern Soul anymore now, would it? Such is the curse of a music genre that is defined by its obscurity). The dancing starts at 0:15
Juliet, Naked name-drops a few other artists from that era. One of them, Dobie Gray (who passed away recently), is the author of a Northern Soul "classic" (according to a character in the book) called Out on the Floor:
I'll be honest with you, this music isn't exactly my cup of tea, but I'm glad I finally found out what it was all about. Now if you happened to like this, here's a top 500 Northern Soul list you could use as a starting point. Enjoy!
First of all: DON'T PANIC! I'm fine and there's nothing wrong with me (that I know of). This is just a fun (ok, macabre) exercise. After all, all my life I've come up with playlists in my head and fantasized about the perfect parties that I would DJ at, surrounded with beautiful people with perfect taste (i.e., mine, of course). So why not be the DJ at my own funeral? Yes, of course my funeral would have a DJ; wouldn't yours?
First of all, the no-brainer (heh): I'd start it all with some excerpts from my will for the female guests, wink, wink:
Next, keeping things relatively light, a song that would make my guests reminisce of my penchant for psychedelic music, but also to remind them that from now on, "you can't see me but I can you":
Now, with a smooth transition from early Pink Floyd to a beautiful cover by This Mortal Coil (who else in such an occasion?) of a Syd Barrett song, things get much more solemn:
The lyrics would be quite heart-breaking for such an occasion, and Carolyn Crawley's haunting vocals are just the right fit...
To finish off the proceedings, let's bring in the angels to take me away:
(infinite thanks to Steven Venn for introducing me to this amazing song)
Regular EasyTV viewers probably already know of my Kate Bush fetish. What was (and still is) so fresh about her was how she'd created a sonic and visual landscape that was unlike anybody else's, yet was so unmistakably feminine. You felt like you were given a free peek into the female psyche's most intimate and sometimes darkest recesses. You weren't sure you were welcome, but you couldn't look away either.
Many other female artists have since created their very own personal worlds. The 80s were particularly fertile: see Nina Hagen (already discussed in one of our early posts) or Laurie Anderson:
The late 80s brought us many talented singer-songwriters (Suzanne Vega, Heather Nova) but I'd argue that none of them (other than Bjork, of course) had that sonic + visual blend of femininity and strangeness that I'm talking about in this episode. There were however many great female-fronted bands (Sundays, Cranes, Lush, Shelleyan Orphan) but their music was the product of a collaborative creation and as such the songs weren't as indecently revealing. The 90's seemed to be about self-affirmation, but in a more defensive (Sinead O'Connor), aggressive (PJ Harvey, Hole) or openly insecure (Cat Power) way. Now flash forward to the 00's and the 10's, and there's suddenly again plenty more singular female territories to explore. Some I personally stay away (Coco Rosie, Joanna Newsom) but others are definitely my kind of thing, like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs or, digging a bit deeper, My Brightest Diamond:
The above is probably one of my favorite songs of the 00's. There's some Jeff Buckley influence in there, but it's still very original.
And nowadays it seems that Canada has become a breeding ground for highly original personalities. There's obviously some ancestry (Joni Mitchell, Mary Margaret O'Hara), but this ain't no folk rock:
Austra's weird videos (weirdios?) are a big part of the overall experience, and so I also strongly recommend you check out "Beat and the Pulse" and "Spellwork".
There's also Grimes, who conjures some Cocteau Twins:
Another very singular work is tUnE-yArDs, a blend of world music and hypnotic loops:
To finish off, something from Glasser to induce some psychedelic dreams:
Well, not every EasyTV show has to be tasteful or culturally interesting, does it? Take it as your opportunity to vote "Kitsch" or "Lame" on this post without feeling guilty. Today I reminisce about disco songs that I used to hear when I was a kid in the late 70s and that are mostly forgotten by now, usually for a good reason.
It all started when I heard Tina Turner's version of "I Can't Stand the Rain" on my 80's specialty channel, which prompted me to find out who it was who sang a disco version a few earlier (the original is a beautiful song by Ann Peebles). So it turns out it's a band called Eruption. Eruption was produced by Frank Farian, the same German guy who also produced Boney M, as well as, as EasyTV viewer Shasha points out, the infamous duo Milli Vanilli. The video is worth watching if only because the singer, Precious Wilson, has an amazing voice, and the outfits are... erm... unbelievable:
(there was a video where the synth player has an outfit with 6 arms, but just couldn't find it again. A challenge for EasyTV viewers!)
Initially I thought maybe that song was by Amii Stewart, who had a big hit at the time with Knock on Wood. You'll see why I wasn't entirely off-base with my guess. Watch the video just to be amazed at Amy's stage presence (and let's face it, she's pretty hot) :
Then of course I got sucked into YouTube surfing, looking for similar songs of that era. There was that one song I once saw, around 1980, with a woman singing and dancing surrounded by a circle of fans, in high heels and looking incredibly tall. The song went "S.O.S. to the rescue". MmeEasy didn't know the song, but the fine researcher that she is, she managed to find it for me. !!!UPDATE!!! I even found the video I saw at the time!
But then out of curiosity I looked at what other hits Dee D. Jackson had at the time, and I stumbled upon a song that I used to love as a 8-10 year old kid. I must admit that even now I don't find it all that bad. Judge for yourself:
You basically can't go wrong with a big fake robot on stage, can you?
EasyTV is back from a looooong sabbatical! Thanks to all who nagged me backed to it (in particular, I'm looking at you Pascalito!). So, what happened during that absence? All my old cool/lame/kitsch votes were lost to the Big Blogger Blackout of 2011. Also, we heard plenty of good new music: Jonathan Wilson, Lana Del Rey, Metronomy, Austra, and my little favorite obscure one: Glasser.
But today's post, as usual, will be about a pretty obscure topic: Rock in Iran! Sounds crazy, no? Obviously, most if not all of it is underground, illegal, banned, censored. The movie No One Knows About Persian Cats, presented at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, tells that story very well. Did you know you can watch the whole movie online (with English subtitles)? Free dissemination of the movie is even encouraged by Bahman Ghobadi, the director!
The main protagonists of the above movie have an indie band called Take It Easy Hospital (don't ask...). And they sing in English!
Kiosk is a band that I believe started in Iran but is now established in Los Angeles, like pretty much every musician who leaves the country. It borders on the spoken word genre and it's sung in Persian, so it's probably more enjoyable for those who understand the lyrics! The video gives a pretty good snapshot of life in Tehran, so it's worth watching just for that:
Finally, how about some hip hop? Shahin Najafi raps about the difficulty of life in Iran, especially for its youth (again, obviously it's more interesting if you understand the lyrics) :
Lots more of backed up blog post ideas to follow soon, I promise!
Back to my recent obsession with the mid-80s! This time I want to talk about a mini-wave of French pop bands who had some minor yet excellent hits around 1985-86 then disappeared. Let's start with the bigger of the three, Taxi Girl, who actually had a very big hit in 1980 with "Cherchez le Garcon":
But this blog is about obscure stuff and we're supposed to be talking about the mid-80s today, so I want to point to the band's last single released in 1985, "Aussi belle qu'une balle", that didn't have the same success as "Cherchez le garcon" yet is just as great (and bonus point if you can name the actresses in the background photos) :
What happened to them? Daniel Darc (the singer) went solo and has become somewhat of a cult pop figure in France, and Mirwais (the guitarist and co-composer) went on to become Madonna's hot-shot producer!
Another great band was Gamine, who managed a couple of hit singles and released a couple of albums. Amateurs of French pop probably remember "Voila les anges" which could even be heard on dance floors at the time, but I want to single out "Le Voyage", which is truly a little pop marvel.
Doesn't this song make you want to fall in love with some unattainable woman?
Gamine was a champion of good pop taste, but the mistake they probably made was to sing their second album in English. By trying to go global they lost their local support and were soon forgotten.
Let's finish off with the more obscure of the three, a band called Pijon. I think this song deserved much more success (despite its video):
Jerome Pigeon, the singer, tried a solo career, but wasn't successful either...
Other French pop one-hit wonders of the mid-80s: Les Innocents, Les Ablettes, Les Calamites, Luna Parker, etc. Check them out! These bands may not have had much staying power, but they probably planted the seeds of bigger things to come: Noir Desir, Mano Negra, Negresses Vertes, all bands with a harder edge and who persisted to sing in French and still managed to have some success beyond French borders.
(Editorial note: looks like we've more or less survived Blogger's Big Outage of 2011. I say more or less since the cool/lame/kitsch votes seem to have disappeared for the time being, or... or... maybe forever!)
In the late 60s, Vancouver's hippie scene was probably as buoyant as that of San Francisco. I can imagine that it attracted US kids who objected to the war in Vietnam. Also, the local winter weather was good and the weed potent... And, last but not least, the Afterthought on 4th Avenue hosted many great live acts such as Jefferson Airplane. Yet, I'd never heard of a corresponding local music scene. Of course it turns out that there was one, it's just that they never managed to have a commercial breakthrough like their Californian counterparts. So here's a few things I've managed to find.
I'll start with my favorite one. It's a song from a band called Mother Tucker (oh well). This song was included in a compilation that was made in 1970 in support of Cool-Aid House, which was some sort of hippie shelter in Kitsilano (these days some traces of counter-culture in that area can be found at the excellent Zulu Records). The original vinyl is extremely rare and could fetch you some decent amount of skunk. Luckily, it has been reissued by Regenerator Records, a cool bunch of music preservationists.
Another name from that scene is Seeds of Time. I don't know anything about them, but I just was lucky to find something on YouTube and I'm sharing... It's just cool that they performed on CBC at the time!
And here's another one for the road. Apparently this one was quite successful at the time, but to be quite honest I don't see why. However, the vintage photos of Vancouver in the 60s make the video well worth watching:
If you're curious about Vancouver's hippie scene, there's an entire book dedicated to it. If you like psychedelic concert posters like the one I included at the top of this post, pay a visit to BC artist Bob Masse's web site.
Vancouver's indie music scene has come a long way since. Black Mountain or New Pornographers (and offshoots thereof) ring a bell?
So lately I've been reminiscing of the years 1985-86, trying to think of pop songs that I really liked back then and that still sound good to me now. It just seems to me that 1984 was a better year for pop. Anyway, one song that definitely makes the grade is Thought I'd Never See You Again by a British band called Working Week. It's just the perfect mix of wistful pop and jazz, with some wonderful female vocals:
It's actually quite interesting how many 80s pop bands used to include jazz influences in their music at the time. Remember Matt Bianco, Joe Jackson, Sade, Hong-Kong Syndikat? (Well, maybe you don't remember the latter, but then check them out, or maybe it's a topic for another blog post?) So after mentally sending a thousand thanks to YouTube (and whoever shared that song with the rest of us) for instantly playing that great yet relatively obscure song for me, I wanted to find out who Working Week were. According to their Wikipedia entry, they were formed by guitarist Simon Booth and saxophonist Larry Stabbins, with vocal contributions ranging from Julie Tippets (better known as 60s hippie Julie Driscoll) to good old Robert Wyatt and then up-and-coming singer Tracey Thorn (Everything But The Girl!). On the song above though, it is a certain Julie Roberts singing.
Still according to the Wikipedia article, Booth and Stabbins were previously in a band called Weekend, which had apparently had great critical acclaim. Naturally, I had to check them out. Here is one of the many gems I found (listen to the very end: the initial gentle bossa nova breaks out into full blown samba):
"But... but...", the diligent and knowledgeable EasyTV viewer interjects, "the vocals sound familiar!" Right you are. It turns out the singer is Allison Statton, mostly known as a the voice of Young Marble Giants, whose minimalist and spooky sound combined with the plain female vocals was really fresh when it came out in the early 80s, and it hasn't aged one bit to this day. I used to use one of their songs as the intro to my little radio show back in the day. Here's a little sample, a song called N.I.T.A., from their Colossal Youth album:
After a couple of albums, Young Marble Giants split. So now we know where Statton ended up (she had further musical adventures, including a partnership in the late 80s with guitarist Ian Devine, in a band aptly named Devine & Statton). As for Stuart Moxham, he formed the Gist, whose song 'Love At First Sight' is better known as "Cafe de Flore" as adapted in French by Etienne Daho. But here's the original version (and the superior one, in my opinion):
So a quick lookup of band Working Week yielded all these other interesting names and bands. Who knew?
I think from time to time I'll focus on an artist who just hasn't got the attention or success he or she deserves. Today we have the case of an 80s British songer-songwriter who was bigger in France than in England: Bill Pritchard. I'd say his influences include the Smiths and the Go-Betweens, i.e. the melodic romantic jangly kind of pop. He should probably thank Etienne Daho and Daniel Darc, French pop-stars with good taste who collaborated with him and promoted him in France. He often refers to his French affinities in his songs. I don't anything about him other than what his Wikipedia entry says, so I'll just leave you with these little gems:
The first one is Romance Sans Paroles, a song that Stephin Merritt probably has never heard but that he would approve of.
This one, Tommy and Co, was produced by Etienne Daho, and somehow I can almost hear his presence in the way Bill sings the "Tommy and co" line in the chorus.
In 1991 he released Jolie, an album produced by Ian Broudie (Big in Japan, Lightning Seeds). Again, the influence of the producer can clearly be heard:
And to finish, here's a more "experimental" one, more synthetic, from an obscure compilation entitled Future Tense. Haunting stuff.
Check out the YouTube comments if you can, you'll find that many remember him as their French high school teacher.
I suppose most EasyTV viewers know Major Tom, the character David Bowie invented for one of his first hit singles, Space Oddity. The song tells the story of poor Major Tom, lost in space after leaving his capsule. It was influenced by Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey", and the song title can therefore be viewed as a pun on the movie title. Well, one odd thing about this song is that there's two official videos circulating for that song. The reason being that the song was initially included in an early album that wasn't very successful. Then the song was re-recorded (and that's the version we know) and played during the moon landing on English TV. That's when the song took off, if you pardon the pun. Americans didn't care much for the song initially, but a re-release a few years later also eventually broke through there (tedious details of releases and re-releases courtesy of Wikipedia). Anyway, first we have the recording we all know:
But there is an earlier video, recorded when the song was initially released as part of a promotional film called Love You Till Tuesday. The song reflects Bowie's earlier sound and folk influences. The video is pretty funny, in my opinion:
Major Tom resurfaces in 1980, in Ashes to Ashes, Bowie's fantastic hit single off his Scary Monsters album. This is where Bowie admits that "Major Tom's a junkie", and that his take off, floating and loss in Space Oddity were all a metaphor for heroin consumption. The video made a big impression on me at the time:
And then, something peculiar happens. Major Tom ditches heroin for something more conducive to dancing. Peter Schilling (who is indeed related to Curt Schilling the baseball pitcher, by the way), releases a electro-pop song called "Major Tom", and he tells us Major Tom, contrary to popular belief, is alive and coming home! It's a miracle, but based on the video I wonder if he landed ok:
Major Tom's resurrection and his new taste for dancing were regrettable. Bowie recycled him one more time for "Hallo Spaceboy", from his 1995 Outside album, and Pet Shop Boys took care of the dance remix (Neil Tennant can be heard on the chorus).
Here's the official video of the remix, in case you care:
If you're really curious, here's the original version (i.e. non remix) from the album:
But I want to leave you on a good note, so here's a haunting take on Space Oddity by a kid's choir, as part of the Langley Schools Music Project, recorded in 1976 but mostly known due to its re-release in 2001.
The Manchester scene in the late 80s and early 90s created perhaps the only kind of music that really makes me want to dance. Fuelled by acid and ecstasy, the blend of new beats with 60s influences and psychedelic guitar effects was just irresistible. Now I'm pretty sure most EasyTV viewers are familiar with names like Happy Mondays, Inspiral Carpets and Charlatans, so today we're going to take a look at some more minor bands who had some accordingly minor hits.
Intastella was an oddity of Madchester in that it had a female lead singer (I can only think of Saint Etienne as the other prominent example). It didn't hurt that the singer was quite attractive, and so maybe Intastella should have had bigger success than what they had. Truth be told though, I just don't think they had a good enough line-up of songs, and there just were too many better bands around at that time. Nevertheless, let's have a peek at one of their better singles, which I think is still pretty groovy:
Maybe the song that typified best the Madchester sound and spirit was this hit by Northside. If you don't dance to this, you must be dead:
It's songs like the above that made everyone wish they could "take a trip" to the Hacienda club and be part of the craziness of the nascent rave culture. Living outside of England, it was difficult to find similar scenes or at least hear the hits on the radio, as consolidation and extreme commercialization were taking care of the nice diversity of musical offerings that could once be enjoyed through "free" FM radio in the early to mid-80s.
Luckily we now have the internet and we can retroactively and nostalgically discover songs such as this one by World of Twist:
The guy sings very much like Bobby Gillespie from Primal Scream, I wonder who copied who?
I have made myself a nice little compilation of hit singles from that era, and we should one day throw a party somewhere and dance to this stuff. Who's in?
First post of 2011! Let's start with a bang, with one of my favorite film directors of all time, and his dealings with pop music. Michelangelo Antonioni's introspective, often quiet, sometimes impenetrable movies have moved me, challenged me, annoyed me. In 1996, Antonioni decides to finally get out of Italy to make his next movie, and goes to England to capture the spirit of the 60's. Blow Up became a cult movie for everyone nostalgic of that era. He had managed to capture the insouciance, the aesthetics, and the collective aspirations of the youth, which Antonioni likens to a hallucination, a mirage. But a mirage can be real if everyone can see it, and reality is worthless if no one perceives it... A great example of the theme is the scene during the Yarbirds concert:
Public, private and intrinsic value: a lesson in economy and game theory by the Maestro!
After the critical success of Blow Up, Antonioni gets more ambitious, obtains a big budget for a movie to be shot in the US. Again, his goal is to capture the ideals of the youth, this time in America, with their illusions and delusions. Of course he goes way over budget, and his perfectionism annoys the hell out of the producers, the actors and everyone else involved. In particular, he made Jerry Garcia play the theme to the Love Scene tens of times, while giving him very vague indications and reasons why he wasn't quite happy. I don't know if he was finally satisfied with the result or just took pity on Garcia, but the result plays an integral part in the most moving love scene in cinema history, if you ask me (ignore the initial dubbed dialogue, and forgive me that it's cut a bit too short at the end, but that's all I could find) :
(Daria Halprin, who I believe only ever made this one movie, just makes me melt)
There's another great scene in Zabriskie Point with music by Pink Floyd, but it would give away too much of the movie, and I just want you to go rent it now.
I think the excerpt above convinced you that Antonioni would have made a great music video director, and, well, it's not common knowledge that he indeed made one in the 80's! It's a song by Italian pop star Gianna Nannini, which, even though it has dated a bit, still packs an emotional punch in my opinion. Gianna is very cute with that boyish 80's look, the beret and the suspenders, and there's something in the lyrics that makes you want to sing the song out loud (borrowed from David Saul Rosenfeld's fantastic online book on l'Eclisse):
Questo amore è una camera a gas (This love is a gas chamber) è un palazzo che brucia in città (it’s a building that is burning in the city) Questo amore è una lama sottile (This love is a thin razor blade) è una scena al rallentatore (it’s a scene in slow motion) Questo amore è una (This love is a) bomba all’hotel (bomb in a hotel) Questo amore è una (This love is a) finta sul ring (fake move in the boxing ring) è una fiamma (it’s a flame that) che esplode nel cielo (explodes in the sky)
And here's the song:
It may look like any other video from that era, but Antonioni said that, unlike other videos of the time, he used his patented long shots, and that's because he wanted the video to tell a little story. Don't you dare vote "kitsch"! ;)
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young was a big supergroup during the 70s. Each musician already had an impressive resume when they got together: David Crosby was freshly fired from the Byrds (he's represented by a donkey on the cover of Notorious Byrd Brothers), Stephen Stills had released three albums with Buffalo Springfield, Graham Nash had had a few hits with the Hollies (remember Bus Stop?), and Neil Young had already been in a few bands and had had success in various forms, including as a member of the already mentioned Buffalo Springfield.
Despite their immediate success with Deja Vu, each member decided to release a solo album (that's what happens when you put together such big egos and overflowing creativity). Today, EasyTV will sample from each solo effort. Whose talent was the most instrumental to CSNY's success?
Stephen Stills probably had the biggest commercial success with his eponymous release, and the big hit, Love the One You're With:
Graham Nash's album, Songs for Beginners, was also very successful. Two singles were released, one that is pretty famous (Chicago), and another one that I only heard very recently (and was the reason for today's post, actually), called Military Madness:
(and that's my contribution to Nov 11!)
There's a very nice tribute to Song for Beginners by members of the Grassroots Records stable (Alela Diane, Mariee Sioux) and some quite prestigious guests (Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, the guy from Fleet Foxes, and fellow former Cat Power mailing-list member Greg Weeks). Check it out!
Next, Neil Young. Obviously he released bazillion solo albums, but the one that came out immediately after CSNY in 1970 was After the Gold Rush. That one charted very high too, and the song Only Love Can Break Your Heart even provided a fantastic dance hit for Saint-Etienne in 1990 (a show on the Madchester era maybe coming soon?). But let's hear the other single, When You Dance I Can Really Love, which is just as good:
For some reason, the song reminds me of Cat Power's Free (here comes a gratuitous opportunity to check out some pretty pictures of Chan Marshall):
I'm not saying the songs are similar, but there's something there... What do you think? Or is it only that they're both rhyming "dance" with "chance"?
Anyway... Last but not least, David Crosby released his fantastic If I Could Only Remember My Name that year. Here's one of many gems: now go light a joint, press play and relax. I'll leave you alone now.
I think from time to time I'm going to explore a few of those influential music labels you always hear about but don't really know what they were all about. One example is Postcard Records, who were responsible for launching the "careers" of bands such as Orange Juice, Go Betweens and Aztec Camera in the early 80s. Now with the magic of YouTube, we can listen to the singles that were released back then. So here we go.
So yeah, Go Betweens, huh! Well they only released one single with Postcard, called "I Need Two Heads". Now YouTube didn't have this song, but at EasyTV we care about the welfare and happiness of our viewers, and so thanks to good ol' Mr Vegas, it's now uploaded and available just for you! (EDIT: Breaking News! Mr Vegas went as far as creating an original video for the song! See for yourself below.)
It was worth it, no?
When Edwyn Collins had a relatively big hit in the 90s with "Girl Like U" (a relatively lame song, if you ask me), I thought I'd really hate Orange Juice once I finally got the opportunity to hear them. Boy was I wrong. His voice is perfect for the mix of pop and post-punk sound they had going:
Make sure you check out all the other "Dada with Juice" videos that are posted there.
Another band from Scotland that was promoted by Postcard was Josef K, a band I've mentioned here before, so let's just skip them, and go straight to Aztec Camera, and the single that turned out to be the last single released by Postcard, at least according to Wikipedia:
There were bigger and better things in store for Aztec Camera, including their lovely Spanish Horses. Oh what the heck here it is:
For whatever reason I found myself singing She Bop by Cyndi Lauper in the shower today (probably because it's yet another song from pivotal 1984), and I wondered what the song was all about (I don't usually pay much attention to pop song lyrics). Well, it turns out it's all about masturbation! The video is also full of funny innuendos. So, here it goes, a post on 80's songs about masturbation! Hope you enjoy—on your own, of course.
Much more obvious is the Divinyls' I Touch Myself. The evil executives at EMI have disabled embedding the YouTube video, so all I've got is a still picture, nothing to touch myself with.
OK, this was all a big ploy to get to this: a great video shot by Takashi Murakami, a contemporary artist who currently has an exhibit at Versailles. The exhibit drew a pretty big protest by right wingers, who didn't like his "smut" exposed in this palace, a symbol of French good taste. The video is a cover of Turning Japanese by Kirsten Dunst, dressed as a very cute manga character (the original is by The Vapors). The song is "believed to euphemistically refer to the face a male makes during the act of masturbation". Watch this, but beware: you might go blind.
(with apologies to my 1 or 2 English-speaking readers (and that's at least 50% of my readership!), this post is exceptionally in French. However, feel free to vote for "kitsch" anyway...)
Joe Dassin, une blogomedie musicale kitsch en trois actes
ACTE UN : Paris, fete de fin d'etude chez Ali
UN POTE : Alors, ca fait quoi d'etre docteur ? ALI : Sans plus, surtout un soulagement ! POTE : Et que reserve l'avenir, docteur ? Chercheur au CNRS ? Prof d'informatique ? Ingenieur dans une start-up ? ALI : Surement quelque chose dans le genre. Avoir un peu de sous, ca changerait un peu... NATHALIE (arrivee en cours de conversation) : Oui, mais mOssieur voit les choses en grand ! Dans un mois, le grand depart ! ALI : Eh oui, la France ne veut pas de moi, alors a nous l'Amerique !
=== ***Ali chante "L'Amerique"...
POTE : Comment ca, la France ne veut pas de toi ? ALI : Ben ouais, j'ai qu'un visa d'etudiant, et je suis alle aussi loin que possible dans les etudes ! Apres pres de 10 ans de vie en France, il va falloir changer a nouveau de vie... NATHALIE : Ma proposition indecente est toujours en vigueur, on peut toujours arranger un mariage blanc, si tu veux... ALI (sourire) : Un mariage gris, tu veux dire ? On n'est quand meme pas tout fait des inconnus (la prend dans les bras et l'embrasse) ! Merci encore, mais j'ai une fierte mal placee qui m'empeche de quemander une nationalite. Le Canada me veut, alors j'y vais ! En plus, il parait qu'on est bien paye la-bas... POTE : Mais bon, tu reviendras quand meme souvent, non ? ALI : Je ne crois pas, il vaut mieux couper net, sinon on ne peux pas avancer... AUTRE POTE : On ne te manquera pas ? ALI: Si surement, mais vous avez vos vies ici et vous m'oublierez vite de toute facon, alors autant que j'essaie d'en faire de meme...
=== ***"Salut les amoureux" (extrait a partir du premier refrain): le depart. Il ferme les valises, il serre Nathalie fort, ils "vont descendre ensemble", la patronne du cafe leur dit "salut les amoureux", ils montent dans un taxi.
=== ***"Les Daltons" en fond : a l'aeroport, surprise des copains, lui disent "bonne vie chez les cow-boys !", avion, arrivee a Toronto, passage dans les rues, les magasins, etc., arrivee dans la chambre d'hotel, solitude ...
ACTE DEUX : Un an plus tard...
Quebec, salle de conf. Ali, finit juste de presenter un papier en tant que prof d'informatique a l'universite de Toronto. Il repond a des questions, quand une jeune femme s'approche...
NATHALIE (blagueuse) : Mais c'est du plagiat tout ca, professeur ! ALI : Nathalie ! qu'est-ce que tu fais ici ! NATHALIE : Je presente aussi un papier, mais je ne suis encore qu'une petite doctorante, moi ! Alors que le keynote de l'estime professeur, ca ne passe pas inapercu ! Mais je te retourne la question : qu'est-ce que tu fais au Quebec, toi qui bosses chez les anglos ? ALI : Conferencier invite, ca ne se refuse pas, c'est la premiere fois que ca m'arrive ! Etre francophone, ca a du aider... mais ca se fete, ces retrouvailles, on dine ensemble ? NATHALIE (faux accent quebecois): Tabernacle, bien sur ! Il faudra tout me raconter de ta nouvelle vie !
=== Diner dans un restau classe, 2 bouteilles de vin vides sur la table...
ALI : ... voila, donc! Professionnellement ca baigne. Il va falloir maintenant me creer un nouveau cercle d'amis, mais c'est plus difficile, je ne suis plus etudiant... NATHALIE : et pas de copine ? ALI : non...
Ils se regardent, se font du pied, etc...
=== Le lendemain matin, chambre d'hotel...
NATHALIE : On se leve, paresseux !
***"Laisse-moi dormir", extrait marmonne par Ali (pas trouve sur YouTube)
ALI: Ouh la, quelle gueule de bois ! Et si on faisait peter la conf ? NATHALIE : Ouais, je ne presente que demain. Et si on allait se ballader un peu ? L'automne ici c'est magnifique parait-il ! ALI : Ca roule, j'ai ma voiture !
=== ***"L'ete indien" en fond : ils sont dans une barque sur un lac, se font des papouilles d'amoureux etc...
=== Aeroport de Quebec, Nathalie repart...
NATHALIE : Mais qu'est-ce qu'on a fait ? On est vraiment cons ! ALI (fixe le sol) : Je sais... NATHALIE (fachee) : Ca va, je connais la rengaine ! Tu veux pas regarder en arriere ! Et tu veux pas que je change ma vie aussi, que je me "sacrifie" pour toi ! ALI : Tu as une bonne vie la-bas... Tu as tes parents, tes amis, ta culture, ta langue... Et moi, je dois encore vivre ici quelques annees, pour obtenir la nationalite... NATHALIE : T'es un peureux ! Tu refuses le bonheur ! ALI : Tu ne sais pas ce que c'est que de tout abandonner, moi j'ai deja connu ca deux fois.. Je ne le souhaite a personne, et surtout pas a toi ! NATHALIE : C'est ca, casse-toi ! Subis ta vie !
Elle s'en va, et ne se retourne pas...
*** "Ca va pas changer le monde" (chante par Ali)
ACTE TROIS : Dix ans plus tard...
Un appart grand et luxueux, Ali est un peu grisonnant, finit de corriger une copie. il a l'air fatigue et se dirige vers un miroir...
*** "Si tu t'appelles melancolie" (chantee par Ali)
Pendant la chanson, on le voit reserver un vol pour paris, puis on le voit a l'aeroport, montrer son passeport Canadien a l'officier, puis embarquer, avion de nuit, puis descente, Paris...
Il descend de taxi, se dirige vers une maison (la meme qu'au debut?), frappe a la porte, Nathalie ouvre...
*** "Salut" (chantee par Ali)
"fais-moi un bon cafe" (elle le fait, mais a l'air triste et contrariee)
Pendant la chanson, on frappe a la porte, et un bambin arrive (une fille de 8-10 ans), rentre de l'ecole, saute dans les bras de Nathalie...
Ali et Nathalie se regardent. Ali a compris, "tu n'as plus rien a me dire, je ne suis qu'un souvenir". Il part en finissant la chanson et sans se retourner. (Saura-t-on si c'est son enfant ? Mystere !)
=== Ses pas le dirigent vers...
*** "Le Jardin du Luxembourg" (duo, chante par Ali et Nathalie qui apparait dans un coin de l'ecran chez elle avec la petite qui court autour).
Pendant la sequence disco de la chanson ("je voulais reussir dans la vie", (6:40)), tous les acteurs du film se mettent en danser en synchro derriere Ali.
No, this blog post isn't about the current depressing worldwide environmental or economic situation we're in! It's about late 60's-early 70's music that kicks some serious ass from some pretty exotic places!
Let's ease into it with something from Brasil. Gal Costa is a singer who was part of the Tropicalia movement circa '68 which featured people like Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil. Here's a funky song from the "Tropicália: ou Panis et Circencis" album that is pretty much the Tropicalia manifesto:
(She's easy on the eye too...)
Let's now move on to a different continent. Broken Flowers was a movie that introduced many of us to the fantastic charms of 70's Ethiopean Jazz, the kind featured on the Ethiopique label. Mulatu Astatke is probably the figurehead of that musical movement. If you haven't seen the movie (shame on you!), or want to hear what I'm talking about, here's a good one that was featured on that movie soundtrack and should work as a good starting point:
And now to a destination that is just as surprising, as far as funky or fusion arrangements are concerned: Iran. Kourosh Yaghmaei was a pop singer from the 70's who had a hit, Gole Yakh, that even crossed borders at the time. But the song I'm posting here was one I didn't know before and that was featured on the excellent Funk Archaeology series by Egon on NPR Music's web site, specifically the show dedicated to Persian Funk:
That moustache alone made it worth posting it, didn't it?
Here's some stuff from various musicians before they finally "made it" with another band. It's somewhat encouraging to see that not everyone started out as a genius, and that hard work sometimes really helps!
Let's start with Grace Slick. Jefferson Airplane only really took off (ahem) when she joined them and brought with her a couple of hit singles (you know what they are) that she had initially concocted with a band called the Great Society. So in case you're wondering what the Great Society sounded like, here's a sample:
The great vocals are of course already there (yet she never really influenced anyone except for the girl in Black Mountain, can EasyTV viewers think of anybody else?); as for the song... it's not bad but she did better later.
Moving on... Before Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal became the famous Tears for Fears duo, they were in a band called Graduate (pretty sure it's a reference to the movie, as Roland used to be in a Simon & Garfunkel tribute band; maybe they liked older women?). What did Graduate look and sound like? YouTube once again to the rescue!
Kind of punkish and catchy, but better things would come...
Now here's an exception to the rule: Big in Japan was a late-70s Liverpool band comprised of many members who went on to become famous with their respective bands: Echo and the Bunnymen, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, KLF, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Lightning Seeds, Pink Industry. Yet they weren't bad at all! Here's their subversive tribute to Valerie Solanas, the woman who notoriously shot Andy Warhol and authored the SCUM Manifesto, a.k.a the Society for Cutting Up Men (interesting video):
OK, this band is too good to not give them room for another song. Enjoy!
