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SMC - 2 For 1 Week
Echoes
Posts: 1,279
Bear with me here, folks. The reason I picked 2 this week is twofold: One - they are both phenomenally good, and 2) They are 23 and 33 minutes respectively, so it pretty much adds up to one normal CD.
First off
Shugo Tokumaru - Night Piece
From pitchfork:
Christine Fellows - Paper Anniversary
First off
Shugo Tokumaru - Night Piece
From pitchfork:
There's not much information available about Shugo Tokumaru. Music Related, the small Japan-via-NYC label responsible for the release, says Shugo is from Tokyo and in his twenties and, perhaps inadvertently, suggests that the Beach Boys are his only influence. If anything, the two artists do share an affinity for bright, beautiful melodies: Shugo's hushed tenor and sparse acoustic guitar arrangements will also remind American indie-pop audiences of Sufjan Stevens, and the songs' unintrusive electronic embellishments recall Nobukazu Takemura and recent Fly Records releases from OMB and Tatsuya Yamada.
Beyond that, there's not much of a gimmick to the songs on his debut album, Night Piece. Shugo doesn't seem to fit into the glut of bedroom IDMers and their sound-alike electro-acoustic alchemy, and in addition to an obvious geographical contradiction, Shugo is just way too melodic for the stateside free-folk scene. Really, Night Piece is "just" a pop album, short but dense and infinitely considered: No note seems unnecessary, and everything is in its right place.
Fittingly, Night Piece starts at dusk. A million crickets drown out the night of "Such a Color" with sex-charged bug-buzz, when a sheepish Shugo begins to pluck out an equally fragile melody. The melody bursts. Shugo strums in resignation, and turns to a distant accordion for last-ditch support. The song congeals unexpectedly but beautifully, and Shugo quickly reclaims the melody for his voice, buttressing it with stringed confidence and, by the song's outro, a little bit of bravado.
Other songs on Night Piece bear the same high degree of craftsmanship, but as the album presses on, we learn that Shugo has aspirations much larger than a string of catchy ditties. Through his prudent use of electronics, he begins to develop a strikingly unified worldview that Night Piece ultimately wills upon its listener. On "Light Chair", Shugo's guitar plucking stomps to a contrasting, docile woodblock melody before losing itself in winding arpeggios. "Lantern on the Water" shimmers as broad cello strokes are fed through a lo-fi sampler and percussive bell sounds try their best to harness the spectacle's majesty with an incidental beat.
Shugo's sense of humor rears its head midway through Night Piece: The songs, which at times border on pastiche, somehow never undermine the album's cohesion. Taken together, these highly stylized compositions form something of a dream sequence: "Sleet" throws us into an 8-bit Dragon Warrior village, while the goofy "The Mop" drags our sudden spurs through the golden dust of the American West. Then, a chase scene: "Paparazzi" is Shugo's virtuosic take on the theme from "The Benny Hill Show", a cartoonish one-man mummer's parade that doesn't strut so much as run for its life, with an unexpected hammock-swaying break here and there between the ensuing fretted mischief.
After covering so much musical terrain in only 23 minutes, Shugo finishes slowly and quietly with his unadorned lullaby, "A Kite of Night". The song doesn't take part in the world of Night Piece so much as consider it in retrospect-- it's the least evocative track on the album, but its most tender for that very reason. From its nakedness we realize just how rich a world Shugo has designed with Night Piece, and just how subtle his musical gestures are. So Night Piece is "just" pop music, but it manages to point well beyond itself, and regardless of who didn't influence it or what scenes it doesn't fit into, albums like this are always relevant, and always welcome.
-Nick Sylvester
Christine Fellows - Paper Anniversary
Christine Fellows has never given us a gift.
But if she did, we imagine it wouldn't be something she went out and bought at a store. We like to think it would be something homemade. Probably something artsy.
And it would likely be assembled from odds 'n' ends she had around the house: Old family photos, pages out of a diary she found in the attic, a few feathers that drifted in the window one day, some leaves she had pressed inside a book. You know, the sort of stuff that -- if you tried to make something out of it -- would look like some pathetic summer-camp art project.
But somehow, Fellows would take all that whatnot and weave it together so artfully that you could not help but be struck by both the simple beauty and the tremendous skill on display.
At least, that's the feeling we get listening to her songs. Especially the songs on Paper Anniversary. It's the Winnipeg singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist's third full-length and easily her finest, with 14 tracks of sublimely natural elegance and inspired craftsmanship that are as intimate as love letters, as literate as short stories, as poised as poetry, as homespun and unique as birds' nests.
Produced by Fellows and recorded mostly at her Osborne Village home, each of these songs creates and briefly inhabits its own tiny, fragile world, like the inside of a snowglobe that will break apart if you shake it too hard.
The basic building blocks are simple: Fellows' honest and unadorned vocals; her delicate yet insistent touch on the keyboard; her ability to conjure up a forlorn melody that sounds familiar even as you hear it for the first time; and her hauntingly poetic lyrics. Let's start with those lyrics. Sometimes they're deadly serious ("Time of death / I failed you once"). Sometimes they're darkly humourous ("We met in the emergency ward / Getting our stomachs pumped"). Sometimes they're light and just plain silly ("We put clothespins in our hair and tissues in our sleeves"). But usually they're nostalgic and melancholy and surreal. And always, they're strangely evocative, somewhere between distant memories, misheard wishes and half-recalled utterances floating up out of the subconscious.
Adorned with only the merest of instrumental accompaniment, they would still hook you and draw you into Fellows' dreamlike world. But she doesn't stop there.
She surrounds her stories with a rich palette of sounds, styles, moods and textures -- from rootsy banjos to classical cellos, vibraphone tinkles to dusty swooshes, electronic loops to nature recordings. Most of it she does herself.
Some of it is played by a short guest list that includes The Weakerthans' Jason Tait and John K. Samson. But it doesn't matter who does what; what matters is how Fellows expertly mixes it all together into an ear-catching yet tastefully restrained soundscape. Not one moment, not one note on this disc is filler or forgettable.
Every tiny element -- even the most subtle one-word background vocal or the most peripheral echo -- is a part of the whole, like a jigsaw piece of blue sky and cloud that fits seamlessly into the corner of a puzzle. Eventually, all those pieces merge into a uniquely framed, magnificently rendered whole.
And it's then you realize that Fellows has given us a gift after all.
printf("shiver in eternal darkness\n");
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Comments
Night Piece is pretty much my favourite albums of the last 5 years or so. It is gorgeous, simple, and richly layered to no end. There are melodies and flourishes working behind the main song, and it really is a fabulous experience to listen to. Not only is he adept at crafting gorgeous soundscapes, he is also a virtuoso at most everything he touches. Comparable to Sigur Ros, yet distinct in that Shugo's sogns draw you into the world in short, lighthearted bursts, a far cry from the melancholic and mournful oceans of Sigur Ros. Some of the songs would be repetitive if they weren't so gorgeous (namely "Light Chair"). my personal favourite song is "Paparazzi," which is almost tragic being as it is only 1:18 long. This deviates from my last 2 selections, namely in that while the lasst 2 were lyrically driven records, you will be hard-pressed to understand anything here, unless you speak Japanese. This album transcends understanding what is being expliticly said (at least, I hope). If you only listen to one album, listen to this one. It is only 23 minutes long, and lends itself well to repeat listens.
Favourite songs:
"Such a Colour"
"Paparazzi"
"The Mop"
Now from the other side of the globe comes Winnipeg's Christine Fellows, who mae my favourite album of last year with this gorgeous folk album-cum-audio collage. not exactly an epic, clocking in at about 38 minutes, and not lush in its instrumentation, either. This relies on a sparsity of insuments, applied in all the right places, melding with found sounds and field recordings (from cars passing, to her cat purring on "Instructions On How To Dissect A Ground Owl"). Fellows shows us her quiet, snow covered life on this album, at the same time fragile and full of resolve. A flowery description to say the least, but you should hopefully see how beautiful this album is, and not find it boring. The confessional lyrics reveal anecdotes from her past, and stories of day-to-day life. The instrumentation, as I said, is sparse, but perfectly placed. I love th slow banjo line in the background of "Phantom Pains." An amazing work of art. I hope you like it as well
Favourite songs:
"Instructions On How To Dissect A Ground Owl"
"Double Takes"
"Souvenirs"
"Phantom Pains"
And before you ask, the file is .Zip and is uploading right now.
If you can't get high on purely music and the sounds that you hear, you're missing out on something.
to the depths of everest
Shugo Tokumaru - Night Piece.
another winner Echoes.
Some days you wake up and sit on a park bench next to an eighty year old Russian architect, and some days you don't. I think this is my new life philosophy.
http://epplehausradio.blogspot.com/
pearl jam @ the astoria, london, 20/04/06
Great song isn't it? I can just listen to it over and over and over again and not get bored.
what does everyone else think?
And just to let you know, he plays with an 8 piece band now (at a gig, that is). That should be very interesting. I'll see if I can catch any of his shows, since I'm sure he's still over here.
The Christine Fellows album hasn't surprised me as much as Shugo yet, but I'll give it a few more spins.
Cheers.
If you can't get high on purely music and the sounds that you hear, you're missing out on something.
What I LOVE about this CD is that there is no pretentiousness. This isn't snob music, nor is it music that takes a million listens to get. I think every single song is very unique yet nothing is out of place. As far as the singing in Japanese, I have no problem at all with it. However and I mentioned this in the last review, the vocals do not dominate any track. if you are just casually listening, you may not even know it was in Japanese. This isn't music to sing along to, just something to simply enjoy. If for example you take Darnielle out of the Mountain Goats and put Shugo in there to fill his vocals, it wouldn't be annoying, I just couldn't exactly sing along nor appreciate the lyrics.
Songs I jotted down while listening where Sleet, the Mop, Paparazzi and Funfair. I love the carnival sounds in that one. appropriately titled.
I would also like to throw out the fact I enjoy getting these music selections from parts of the globe I would never get to hear. Pretty killer start to round 4 I'd say.
Now, Christine Fellows. I am not in the position to fully comment on this. Nice vocals and I enjoy the music, but I am not in the proper spot to concentrate on the lyrics which is something it sounds like I need to do. As backround music there is nothing wrong, i don't skip anything, but I have played it probably 5 times and nothing has stuck out. Time to put it on CD and leave in the Jeep for awhile. So I am glad I have this to listen to however it probably won't get a great listen this week.
So as I type, the Mop is in the backround. damn is it ever catchy. Sweet.
I havent been too big on the Christine Fellows album though, it doesnt grab me really. But i havent been able to really give it a strong listen paying attention to the lyrics or anything either, so it might grow on me.
Anyway, I'm still there with the SMC and if someone lets me know when it's my turn to upload I'll be doing it gladly.
Apologies to Vedhead, I'll be shipping out yer poster soon.
Cheers and hope everyone's having a better life than mine right now.
-The crazy guy with the Ramones t-shirt.
Mexico C. 12/10/05.
"There is a rose that I want to live for
although, God knows, I may not have met her"
-J. Strummer
"And you'll never know just how dark this screen could be"
Thanks mate. I'm actually one of those guys that's always expecting the worst, so anything that comes your way will look good... But God knows from time to time you just wanna kill some suckers you gotta deal with. Anyways my fate at my actual work will be kind of decided on Monday. I actually feel good, because today I made my point to my boss. And he's nice, but the boss over him... man!
Feel so ashamed to talk about something that's not music with my SMC fellas... but you just grabed me with the gin running through my veins.
Take care everyone.
-The crazy guy with the Ramones t-shirt.
Mexico C. 12/10/05.
"There is a rose that I want to live for
although, God knows, I may not have met her"
-J. Strummer
"And you'll never know just how dark this screen could be"
I find that he creates vast atmospheres with his instruments, and to us, his vocals are just another instrument. I don't understand it either, but it rarely (if ever) dominates any of the tracks. That is one of the reasons that I feel it definately makes the foreign language more accessible.
The beauty of Christine Fellows' work is that there is a sense of majesty contained within the instrumentatiosn. We do not get lush scales and massive instumentation opn the scale that Tokumaru gives us, but rather I find that a majority of the beauty is in what the arrangements are hinting at. It is a different type of art, yes, but I feel it is no less wonderful. The sparsity that results from such a selective arrangement helps create her world all the more effectively, and I can't help but be struck with imagery of sparse fields and snow covered plains, with tiny wisps of smoke hanging on the horizon.
A stretch perhaps, but I think both these albums effectively craft their own worlds, and I find it a joy to be drawn into either of them. Both Shugo's nighttime carnival and Christine's quiet hamlet are joys to behold. And you can do both in a little over an hour!
anyway, I am actually finding myself enjoying this as much if not more than the Shugo disc. Souveniers is a gem.
My boss walked in while I was listening to the Shugo album and asked if I was listening to childrens music. As I mentioned before, 'The Mop' went on repeat- I love this song. It's a song that would fit well at the end of a movie when things have worked out for the main characters and they're getting ready to move on from the earlier struggles. Best example of what I'm picturing here is the Penguin Cafe Orchestra's 'Music For a Found Harmonium' playing over the last couple minutes of Napoleon Dynamite. The Mop has that vibe. Typewriter has similarities to a few of Iron & Wine's songs on the Woman King EP which I found interesting. With this album I kinda liked it less the more I listened to it, which is too bad. I can't really pinpoint why that is, it just happened.
Whoa! Weird!
Night Piece is a very playful album, I can definately see where your coworkers are coming from. It is pretty easy to mistake it as being intended for children, it seems so upbeat sometimes. Who says great music has to be tinged with sadness?
Also, I'm not sure if I mentioned it, but Fellows is the wife of Weakerthans frontman John K Samson. You can hear him in the background of "Instructions..."