A Long-lost Voice

Posted: February 21, 2012 in Music
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This past weekend I was reminiscing about music that I grew up listening to in school and college. And I couldn’t help but laugh. This was the ’80s, you see – Rick Astley, Taylor Dayne…enough said. Still, I thought even that decade had its moments of redemption. And as that thought possessed me, a question floated in. Whereabouts is Tanita Tikaram?

With her unusual and distinct husky voice and very personal albeit often obscure lyrics, Tanita Tikaram sneaked in with her superb debut ‘Ancient Heart’ on an unsuspecting world stultified and weary of the dross that was making up most of pop music. To listen to her sing

Look my eyes are just holograms
Look your love has drawn red from my hands
From my hands you know you’ll never be
More than twist in my sobriety

on ‘Twist In My Sobriety‘, one was hard put to be believe that this here was a 19-year-old making music of a depth and maturity that veterans struggle to create. That album was studded with such other gems as ‘World Outside Your Window‘, ‘Cathedral Song‘ and ‘Good Tradition‘. She continued her singer-songwriter ways for a few more years but despite producing good records, she never could quite live up to her debut. To the best of my knowledge, the last album she made came out in 2005. Which I find so sad when I think of her hypnotic version of ‘And I think Of You (E Penso A Te)‘ on her ‘Best Of’ compilation and how it makes my hair stand on end every single time I hear it. She still had so much magic, and yet…I can only hope and pray that she makes a comeback.

Talking of comebacks, I’m extremely happy to hear Sinead O’Connor return to scintillating form with a new album which is due for release this March 5th. And from my first listening of ‘How About I Be Me (And You Be You)’ on NPR, I believe this is set to be one of the albums of the year.

A Long-lost Voice.mp3

Shorty ‘n the Farm House

Posted: February 16, 2012 in Music
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Nope, this one’s not about hip-hop. Had it been, it would’ve been titled ‘Shorty ’n da Farm House’…something like that.

This is just a bit of jazz, and an excellent bit of it too. I had previously heard Trombone Shorty (Troy Andrews) and James Farm (a collective of four of the brightest modern jazz artistes, the first letters of whose names form most of the ‘James’ of this outfit) online and on podcasts. Read the rest of this entry »

Indians Out Of My Closet

Posted: February 9, 2012 in Music
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For a long time, I avoided – mostly – listening to Indian rock/pop bands because with a few exceptions, I thought all they produced was heavy metal. That is a notion (maybe it was based on reality, I don’t know) that has mercifully been given a sound thrashing in the last about year and a half. There was a time that (almost) every band here played only covers because that’s all the audience was interested in hearing from them. Original music was usually booed. That’s changing – and quite rapidly. A slew of bands that play diverse genres, some that even refuse to be slotted, has emerged. I’ve got around to going in for live performances by some of these acts and I can tell you that the studio doesn’t quite do them as much justice as when they get on stage. I’ve got a few of these songs on my playlist right now. They are not fully representative of what’s going on in the Indian independent music scene. Heck, these songs do not necessarily even capture the essence of the bands playing them. These are just a small sample. Read the rest of this entry »

Black and Bright

Posted: January 10, 2012 in Music
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‘El Camino’ by the Black Keys along with ‘Bad As Me’ by Tom Waits and Florence + The Machine’s ‘Ceremonials’, was one of the most anticipated album releases for me in some time. And all three released in the later part of last year and each one of them is delightful – a sort of Christmas feel-good (can’t call it a gift now, can I, seeing as I had to pay for these?). Read the rest of this entry »

On another note

Posted: December 21, 2011 in Floating Notes
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There are many blogs out there that shed a shining light on music and sound. Four of my favourites are on my Blog Roll. I’m picky, aren’t I? I’m also lazy. Doesn’t matter – these four I’ve found to be excellent. Do read these and you’ll see why!

Download Central
I first read this in print form in the Sunday magazine, Brunch, of the Hindustan Times. That it appears a day earlier in the Mint, the HT’s business daily, acted as a catalyst in my switching to that business publication (which I like for other reasons too). The online version of DC has its own conveniences – links, downloads…comments form. The author, Sanjoy Narayan, has led me through his blog on a discovery of artists that I had not heard before, some that I’m not sorry I hadn’t but many others that have been a joy. He also introduced me to the Contrast podcast.

The Contrast Podcast
Tim Young’s podcast is sometimes bizarre, often delightful but always interesting. It puts together music from contributors based on a theme. Example of a contributor is yours truly, example of theme is ‘The Legs’ (ummm…one of my favourites) and example of contribution to said theme is Rod Stewart’s song ‘Hot Legs’. Example of bizarre theme is ‘Broccoli’ – yes, that did happen. However erratic (Tim’s working hard on that) the timing of the publication be, I find it something to look forward to and not just because I love the sound of my own voice. Do check the year-end Festive 50 podcast that will go up soon.

Troubled Souls Unite
This was for me a discovery through WordPress’s ‘Freshly Pressed’ section. The author writes well and has helped me along on relatively new paths that I’m treading. He introduced me to M83’s excellent electronic/indie/pop album ’Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming’ and Childish Gambino’s delightful rap effort ‘Camp’. I keep coming back (although it’s not been updated for a few days now – vacation?) to TSU because of its eclectic mix – Pearl Jam, The Black Keys, Jack White thrown in with Drake, M83, Gambino amidst the occasional note on American football. I also found about Wu-Tanging a name from this blog. Mine’s Action-packed Mentallist, what’s yours? ;-)

Sounding Out!
The Sounding Out! blog, as in the case of TSU above, came my way through WordPress’s ‘Freshly Pressed’ blender. As the name suggests, this is not specific to music and deals with the larger subject of sound. It tends to be heavier to read through than the blogs above but is always worth it because of the variety and amount of sound-related knowledge it carries. In it, you’ll find an essay on sound effects created from familiar objects as also an argument on the economic/social aspect of monetising music.

Draw your strings…Closing the loop

Posted: December 21, 2011 in Music
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For those of you interested in a nice little vicarious trip, here’s George Clinton’s smoking rant at the beginning of ‘Maggot Brain‘ :-)

GC’s Rant on Maggot Brain.mp3

Draw your strings…a little more

Posted: December 13, 2011 in Music
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Following up on my last post Draw Your Strings, here are a couple more pieces which I find interesting.

The first piece on the first CD of Western Classical music that I bought was Mozart’s ‘Rondo Alla Turka’ (or Turca). A search for something else (after hearing this I forgot about that original quest) led me to a beautiful example of the 8-finger technique in this short rendering by metal guitarist Chris Broderick. Listen and marvel :-)


Thanks to my friend Salil Bhasin, I found this piece by a Harvard student (at least at the time of this recording). Amidst the palaver and showboating, you will hear some wonderful guitar play.

Draw Your Strings

Posted: December 8, 2011 in Music
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When I was in school and college, my friends and I used to debate on end the relative merits of the big names of the guitar world as known to us then – Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler, Stevie Ray Vaughan…And for long, we swore by these and a few others. Every other guitarist was just a pale haze.

I cannot speak for my friends of back then – there’s no one of that group that I’m any longer in touch with – but fortunately for me, my ears and heart were opened to a reasonably wide spectrum of music and musicians from different parts of the world over these many years. There are so many greats out there that these ‘All-time Best’ lists that eminent members of the music/entertainment media produce are an exercise in silliness, even outright meanness. Read the rest of this entry »

Return To Roots

Posted: November 21, 2011 in Music
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I have been a little late with my posts the last 2-3 times for a variety of reasons, all unhappy. As usual, I prescribed myself an insane cocktail of the music drug to combat self-doubt and physical pain. There was Ali Farkah Toure and there was Jay-Z, Bach and Metallica, Pat Metheny and Zac Brown Band, Public Enemy and Deadmau5, Porcupine Tree and Don Williams, Bollywood and Wagner, Jagjit Singh and Dream Theater and after a near-eternity, a return to the music that I had a daily dose of as a child.

My grandfather – my mother’s father – was a musician; a practitioner of Carnatic music, which is one of the two main branches of Indian classical music (the other being the Hindustani form). Read the rest of this entry »

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