Carl Sandburg Visits Me In A Dream

The throes of winter seem to be fading with a flurry of warm weather and rain. It’s fitting, I think, to reflect back on this past season and reminisce. With that, Fleet Foxes has us covered.

Listen to Fleet Foxes - “White Winter Hymnal“

Ian Anderson, leader of Jethro Tull, made the flute the most badass woodwind around. And this is why: a live version of Locomotive Breath.

Some discussion about Ian Anderson. He learned to play the electric guitar, but decided to pick up the flute and learn it one day. A few months later, he was rocking out on the flute as Jethro Tull. He’s also known for standing on one leg while playing the flute: a reporter once wrongly described him in an article as playing the flute on one leg (it was actually a harmonica). Inspired by it, he decided to do it anyway. And the rest is history!

Listen to Jethro Tull - “Locomotive Breath (live)”

Veteran folk-rock collective Gomez has always delicately walked the line between easily-digestible delicate folk songs to more bombastic rock numbers. And somehow they’ve always succeeded, without ever seeming the least bit to be pandering to a radio-friendly audience. In that sense, Gomez’s new album A New Tide is more of the same, but to stop there would be a disservice. Ian Ball and company have refined their style a bit more, inching closer and closer to what might be called their signature style.

It is becoming ever more clear that Gomez’s music is music that is made by friends. As the story goes, lead singer Ian Ball and drummer Olly Peacock have been friends since birth; they met their future bassist and guitarist at college, and their keyboardist lived near Olly. So, it shouldn’t take long to pick up on the fact that even though this is a tight and cohesive group, they come together to create music that is loose and comfortable. A New Tide is a combination of unbridled British music innovation and accessibility. The vocals of Ian Ball are always precise and piercing, creating an expansive layering to the lush instrumentation.

“Very Strange” and “Airstream Driving”are pulsing, jingly numbers that show Gomez’s penchant for great riffs and distorted powerpop.  “If I Ask You Nicely” bops with a double bass that accentuates  the electronic keyboard rhythms and the catchy claps and snaps.  The twangy anticipation of “Win Park Slope” is coated richly in layers and layers of strings that is as haunting as it is captivating in its pizzicato deliciousness.  “Mix” sounds as if The Postal Service began using real instruments, straight down to the vocals and the subtle angst.

There’s really nothing to wait for. Get A New Tide. Go!

Listen to “Win Park Slope”
Listen to “Airstream Driver“

Based on what I’ve seen, Tromso, Norway is a lovely and pleasant place. But if I were to hazard a guess as to what it looked like based on hometown act Royksopp’s music, I’d have to say it was an icy wonderland resembling the hideout of one Superman. Perhaps it’s time we look beyond the novelty of this insanely talented electronic duo being from Scandinavia and focus on the actual creativity and musical genius within the minds of Torbjorn Brundtland and Svein Berge.

But first things first. If you’re wondering how to pronounce Royksopp in their native Norsk (it’s actually just how it is spelled), then take care of that.

Now that that’s settled, it’s time to move on to talk about Royksopp’s new LP Junior. In what has become tradition for the duo, several female vocalists have been employed on Junior, including Robyn, Karen Dreijer (of The Knife), Lykke Li, and Anneli Drecker (which in itself is quite an accomplishment)!

Junior shows hints of the unabashed optimism and energy of The Understanding, while also recalling some of the more subtle and reserved nature of the tracks on their debut Melody AM.  No matter what the approach though, the focus for Royksopp is always in creating captivating rhythms that consist of multiple layers that need to be gradually pulled away with each listen. It’s not that familiarity makes Royksopp’s music more pleasing, just that it takes time to fully appreciate the craftsmanship that goes into this music. Though not instantaneously gratifying, subsequent listens reveal an endearing and affable quality to the music. “Royksopp Forever” is a slow-rolling track that bursts into an electronic symphony of arcing and tense strings. Lykke Li’s vocals on “Miss It So Much” seem out-of-place at first, but soon fits like a tight jigsaw with the incredibly catchy chorus of “Days turn to nights turn to weeks turn to paper into rocks into plastic / My material heart / How it keeps us apart”.

Karen Dreijer’s stylings on “Tricky Tricky” and “This Must Be It” are unmistakable, as her distinct expressive voice echoes over frantic beats. The downtempo “You Don’t Have a Clue” harkens back to Melody AM, trip-hoppy in its sentimental nighttime jumps and leaps. The syncopated backbeat on “It’s What I Want” carries promise, but redundant melodies make for a missed opportunity. But then again, Royksopp more than makes up for it with a splendid album.

And there’s more to come! Late 2009 will see another album from the Norwegian duo, an LP Senior that is supposed to be more downtempo and solemn in nature.

Check out Junior.

Listen to “Royksopp Forever”

Listen to “Miss It So Much“