Archive for: featured
After critically evaluating a few hundred albums in one year (for our best albums of 2011 selections), I found myself developing surprisingly precise, abstract ideas about how everything fit together and what that “means” about the state of all creative music. It was a long year but I finished the whole thing (with a little help from my Brasky frands).
Here is an accurate summary of what’s going on:
Right-brained thinkers should feel satisfied and can stop reading.
For the restless and curious, here are a few more thoughts on the past year in music.
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The following editorial is: 1) A review of Skrillex’s “The Mothership Tour” show at the Ritz last Friday or 2) The rudiments of a manifesto on dubstep sociology.
When I found out I had a list spot at Skrillex’s show, I was surprised by how intrigued I became with the show. The Brasky forums know that I’ve been critical of Skrillex since his Deadmau5/Youtube-fueled emergence, but:
- I enjoy live bass music and stick up for dubstep in this spirit
- I’ve been curious to understand Skrillex’s popularity since noticing that his track “Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites” has surpassed 50+ million views, putting Skrillex in Lady Gaga territory. And, for the most part, he has done it without the visibility gained via mainstream media exposure. How? I needed to get to the bottom of it.
Upon arrival at the show I started ravenously observing the diversity of showgoers that were rolling in. It was clear that Skrillex was reaching a lot of different audiences within the electronic world, with most everyone represented.
8 Types of Skrillex Listeners
| 1. |
Those half-naked rave girls, decorated with fluorescent doodads/trinkets/gewgaws – specifically, those Clydesdale ankle muff things. They are on drugs, but I’m not sure which ones. |
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| 2. |
“Getting laid guys” (credit: Louis CK) in collared shirts, hooting at the fluorescent dancer girls (who of course are immensely detached from the people around them). |
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| 3. |
Awkward computer nerds with Skrillex tees (I think these are the guys who relish the Transformer/dubstep correlation. Note: This correlation has been a terrible thing for dubstep. Also terrible: Zealous YouTube comments about “the drop” or “filth” that are so slobbery you can almost feel the mist) |
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| 4. |
Suburban hipster looking people dressed very randomly with the jean shorts and wayfarer sunglasses and whatnot. I was wearing suspenders so I think that automatically lumps me here. |
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| 5. |
Goth/metal couples on dates. (preemptive correction assuming this class may care greatly about this distinction: “cyber-goth”) |
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| 6. |
People on ecstasy. And weird dudes in masks giving them nose-grazing neon hand jives while they sucked on lollipops and pretended to be rolling hard enough not to notice how REALLY WEIRD THIS LOOKS. IN PUBLIC. |
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| 7. |
Vintage (2000-2005) screamo kids |
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| 8. |
Clusters of white girls who appear to be dressing up to mimic the possibly-sincere fashion guidelines of any combination of the preceding. Most are unfamiliar with Skrillex but they’ve heard of dubstep and they like that band. |
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Now that I’ve judged 99% of the people in the building, let’s judge the final 1%–the performers.
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Some call it “dark rave”, others prefer (yes-it-still-requires-quotations) “witch house”. We’re calling it a pretty awesome debut video from an upstart duo out of Miami.
Sugar nights is Khadija Bhuiyan and Michael Donaldson. The high-school friends, having high musical compatibility and an affinity for a variety of instruments, decided to form an eclectic electronic group under the name Sugar Nights. For their sultry track, “Untitled”, the two teamed up with Richard Vergez to put together a time-synced video collage that seems to perfectly translate the song’s dark moods:
Untitled by Sugar Nights
If you like what you hear, hop over to the Sugar Nights’ Soundcloud. Most of their tracks tease with seductive moods, fluctuating between dark/witchy trip-hop and more Miami-flavored house music (hints of the 90s?). Their recent self-titled EP dropped this year under Overthrow Music Authority, and has been well received both by Miami’s indie/electronic scene as well as the interweb’s blogger underground.
In usual Brasky fashion, we got after them with some questions.
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Circuitree Records is back with the part 3 of 4 in their Universus compilation series.
Universus Vol III takes the campaign in a new direction, with more artists–13–and a greater variety of styles. The prevailing theme? You guessed it: The description-less “post-dubstep” (Remember when I sheepishly described Mount Kimbie as post-dubstep? Hint: there is no such thing as post-dubstep. Or dubstep.)
Circuitree is letting us share a highlight track from the mix – a hi-fi heater with FlyLo-esque soundscapes from Aligning Minds.
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Brasky had the chance to pelt Cameron Bird from Architecture in Helsinki with a few questions before their show this Thursday night at Crowbar.
It’s been more than a decade since you’ve started – what’s the biggest change in your attitude to your music?
Cameron Bird: “I don’t know that there’s been a huge change at the core. We are still the same people with the same attitude. It’s more how our music has changed with experience. We have gotten more and more into arrangement and production with each record.”
Does being Australian have a big influence on your sound?
Cameron Bird: “Without Doubt. If you make honest music, it will always have an element of your surroundings in it. The geographic isolation of Australia means that we are less worried about where we ‘fit’. “
Which albums have been piquing your interests this year?
Cameron Bird: “Metronomy’s ‘English Riviera’, Cut Copy’s ‘Zonoscope’, everything that Johnny Jewel makes.”
Bird Watching?
Cameron Bird: “Too many great memories. Touring in the U.S. is the best. I only wish we had documented our experiences more.”
Your last three albums were 67, 30, and 12 respectively on the ARIA charts. So, your next one should place in the negative. Break out the champagne. Did you ever expect this sort of success when you began?
Cameron Bird: “We never intended to play outside of Melbourne. The band was just something we did for fun. People liked it so we kept recording songs. Somehow it’s been able to sustain itself!”
Short, but sweet. Be sure to catch Architecture in Helsinki’s delicious indie-pop dancey-ness this Thursday. Sure, they’re Australian, but no one’s perfect.
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Here are some recent album covers–notice anything unusual?
Unless you have that rare recognition disorder that plagued Dudley from The Royal Tenenbaums, you have probably noticed a lot of similarity here. 45 degree angles, convergence to a vanishing point, natural horizons, collaging, natural images used as fills between lines, some color coincidence… Pick any two and you can find a remarkable amount of similarities (even the first and last – mostly dissimilar, but nearly identical dusk backgrounds).
Update – Carlos (aka Navigateur) found another one (my alarm is almost real at this point):
Double Rainbow?
Being the average American idiot, I assumed it all had to mean something. So I decided to investigate patterns between the album titles, putting on my best Da Vinci Code paranoia complex:
- Painted Palms – Canopy EP (2011)
- Tame Impala – Innerspeaker (2010)
- Ladytron – White Elephant (2011)
- Goose – Synrise (2011)
- Hushpuppies – The Bipolar Drift (2011)
- Datahowler – Live (DJ set) (2011) – reader submitted, 9-22
“Painted Palms” contains all the letters in “Tame Impala”. Also….
Also….
Shit.
I’m at a dead end. But like any unfounded belief, if we combine efforts and keep looking, we’ll find evidence of what we assumed to be true. So, help! I’d be interested to see if anyone can find more album artwork that seems to fit into this phenomenon.
Regardless of the absence of any substantial coincidences, there’s a VERY good chance that my observations correlate with the imminent enslavement or extermination of mankind.
You heard it here first.
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In light of America’s last shuttle flight, Aaron weighs in on the legacy of the most familiar of space-faring vessels and a true Florida Icon, the Space Shuttle.
In 2011, mankind witnessed the conclusion of America’s grandest technological odyssey: the final launch of the Space Shuttle. STS-135, a four member mission of the space shuttle Atlantis, is the ultimate mission within a thirty year old campaign of scientific exploration and intrepid posturing by the most powerful, free nation in the world. For me, a young man that can recall standing outside in shorts and long socks, waving a tiny American flag and watching the shuttle arc into the sky while the glass doors on our patio shook with the unbelievable thrust of booster engines, this completion foreshadows too many ceilings to adequately name. There is the dearth of jobs to be snagged after NASA’s jettisoned workers enter the job market, the festering of the county that bore my youth, and only a lingering dream of being awakened by the twin thumps of orbiter re-entry. This is the series finale, the funeral of some beloved celebrity, of a distant acquired part of my identity.
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Miami’s Circuitree Records has announced the first of 4 compilations to be released this year.
Universus Vol. 1 features tracks from beat scene pioneer Caural and LA’s veteran beatmaker Take. Future releases in the Universus series will include former Warp artists Luke Vibert (Wagon Christ) and Jimmy Edgar, among other prolific producers – whoa!
Universus Vol. 1
CIRC014
Released: June 14th, 2011
Tracklist:
1. Misel Quitno – Im Halbhohen Gras (Caural Remix) – Download
2. Take – Generation Gap
3. Peripheral – Ratrace
4. Sun Room Generator – Abduction
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Guest author and friend-of-the-blog Dylan Boynton invites you to familiarize yourself with the music of Amon Tobin, weighing in on how Tobin’s newest album fits into his anthology.
Before Ableton Live there were guys like Amon Tobin, mastering clunkier tools to produce music for smaller audiences. For those unfamiliar with his name, Amon (formerly “Cujo”) has been one of the most influential producers in the world of IDM dating back to his first release in 1996. An Amon Tobin track can be listened to several times over without hearing every nuance. Much like other artists who produce such masterful output, Tobin’s works are at worst interesting, and are often on the vanguard of industry trends. But the industry has changed, and while the visibility for production specialists like Amon has increased, so has the competition. With the release of his newest album earlier this spring we wondered if a producer from the 90s could remain stylistically relevant in an age of renaissance for electronic music. Thanks in part to an expressed interest in new styles, it’s easy to argue that he’s succeeded.
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