Oct 282014
Don’t give up on us, baby. The All-Star Jam is the place to do your thing. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got much to report, once I get the time. Meanwhile, I may post some random thoughts here. Feel free to do likewise.
Don’t give up on us, baby. The All-Star Jam is the place to do your thing. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got much to report, once I get the time. Meanwhile, I may post some random thoughts here. Feel free to do likewise.
I don’t get the acclaim for either of these guys, but this is hilarious. As far as I’m concerned, this spat is the best thing either of them has ever done. Keep it coming!
http://pitchfork.com/news/57232-the-war-on-drugs-responds-to-douche-mark-kozelek-i-dont-have-time-for-idiots/
Eh, I’ve read the article & I think that the Battling Gallagers did it better.
Has anyone read Bob Stanley’s history of pop music, Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! ? It was my reading material for a car trip to VA (I recommend going through the Blue Ridge Parkway) & it was a good read, although for some odd reason it brought back memories of reading the Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll.
Finally, here’s a YouTube thingie of a 60s French singer named Pussy Cat (stage name after the Tom Jones song) doing her version of “Baby, Please Don’t Go”, which has a rather interesting into:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OER8kmKHzAY
Really want to read the Bob Stanley hx. We just got the David J autobio which has some very interesting photos and just goes to show that every English musician of a certain era started out going to art school.
True confession: the first Stones album I ever bought was Got Live if you Want It.
Useless trivia. In Starbucks. They have music playing. I think the singer sounds familiar… Paul Westerberg? I am not a Replacements aficionado but do enjoy the album their real fans seem to hate. Shazam on the iPhone tells me the song is “Swingin Party” by the Replacements.
So I’m at Five Guys getting a takeout burger and I don’t know who plays the music there, but you really never know what you’ll hear. Sort of. You know you’ll hear some ultra mega Classic Rock, but now and then you get something cool squeezed in between Kansas and Chicago and I heard Girls by Dwight Twilley. No one there seemed to perk up and take notice like me, but I thought it made the wait for the burgers pretty enjoyable. Since this is the vid from YouTube I think it’s SFW, but the video is dumb so just listen with something else on top of it.
http://youtu.be/FOwOhJNU4uI
Somebody on a (very inactive) ABC (the band) list serve sent out a link to this 1983 edition of Smash Hits magazine.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/51106326@N00/8908527440/in/set-72157633846013364
Bands I haven’t thought about in years, a pop rock crossword puzzle, and those ads!
Ha! I forgot about that disgusting video when I chipped in on Dwight’s crowd funding page for his new album coming out next month. 30 years later I keep hoping he’ll do another great record.
Have you heard the cover by Lorde?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wavwT7paPs
I don’t think Lorde is “for me,” but I would happily steer my kids toward her if they want to hear something current.
Serious question: Do any of you know of any albums that were improved with a remix? I’m talking about an album that was mixed, released and widely distributed. Perhaps the album was seen as having some deficiency, or maybe it was remixed for a new format (like the stereo mix of Pet Sounds).
Not counting albums mixed in mono and stereo at the same time (the Beatles) or individual tracks. I mean the album is presented as new & improved. Obviously subjective, but I have yet to think of one example. Hit me!
Minimalistic but not very interesting. Not sure I get what it brings to the material.
I can’t imagine any, and I don’t already have issues with any of Yes’ albums really, but Steven Wilson from Porcupine Tree remixed some of their albums. I think Relayer just got released. I’m glad I don’t have issues with that many recordings. I don’t like buying the same things over and over.
Oh you are so close to hitting the target on what motivated my post. But I’ll wait to see more comment before I go further – I’m waiting for somebody to point out a valid re-mix.
Are you thinking of the remix of Raw Power by Iggy Pop?
As a reformed and former Stereophile subscriber the repackaging stuff as “remixed” is something that I used to fall for — DVD audio CDs! What a sucker! The new Who 50 compilation — no thanks! (cool art pop logo though)
I mean I like some remixes that are really alternative versions of songs like some dance mixes of Bowie and B-52s. As I sit hit here listening to a Soundcloud music stream through a Jawbone wireless speaker while my Denon receiver is nearby and idle, I really don’t know what I’ve become, but it sure ain’t an audiophile who can tell the difference between mixes anymore if I ever could.
Right, not dance mixes either. I mean something like thishttp://m.pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/12873-ten-deluxe-edition/
The first Pearl Jam album, remixed by Brendan O’Brian, who was not the original engineer or producer. (And nothing against him, really.) And I have not heard this new version. Maybe one of you have.
But does it matter if the original album was “murky,” as the linked article says? This reviewer quickly dismisses these new mixes. Millions of people bought the original album, so did it really need to be improved?
Any Zappa fans here? Didn’t he remix a bunch of stuff?
I’ll post more later and stop dancing around it.
“improved,” I mean.
The Sleater/Kinney catalog just got an overhaul by Greg Calbi. Supposedly he found some more bass or something. I love the way they did The Woods, and boy does that get panned by the audiophile crowd, but I guess that was the only one left alone (and the only one I bought, I’m good with the others). I totally understand Mr. Mod’s dislike of some of those “remasters.” I buy reissues and original pressings and everything in between but I don’t often think, “wow – that is one hell of a recording!” I think most of them sound pretty good.
Love!
Have you ever had that experience of going to hear a band, you go expecting to hear some sort of music and get blown away by an unexpected musician from the band?
Mr. Royale and I accompanied some friends to the Treasure Island Music Festival a couple of weekends ago specifically go hear Massive Attack. We enjoy and were expecting to hear their signature sound: bass heavy Trip Hop/Neo Soul/blunted beats (there was plenty of pot smoke in the air). What we didn’t expect to hear was a completely rocking guitarist! Yes, “Angel” does feature an enjoyable guitar solo, but we were not expecting to see this guy, front and center, bending the guitar neck, making an excellent guitar face and plenty of good guitar sounds for multiple songs. I wondered if he was Adrian Utley, but he turned out to be Angelo Bruschini. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angelo_Bruschini
Like a post I wrote several years ago about surprise encores (Tame Impala playing Massive Attack’s “Angel”), we could probably do a whole post on surprise musicians at live shows.
I can’t decide whether to expound or to keep it brief. But who am I kidding?
I know that this site has raised the ire of Andy Partridge, which is unfortunate since he is somebody whose music has been absolutely integral in my life. I’m not trying to piss him off. And I know the Nonsuch album is not so widely loved in these halls, but it does have some tunes I love – yes, I *like* “That Wave.” I’ve played that album many, many times, I know where the little squeaks and clicks are, I know the timing between the songs. I was psyched to hear it in surround, I thought it would be cool.
Feeding this also is that I joined the FB XTC group, mostly to hear news, but honestly I’m a bit turned off by the rampant fandom there, where the praise is generous and lavish and criticism is not especially welcome or considered. Those fan groups can have a weird dynamic and maybe I’m reacting against that. But I’m not trying to piss off those fans either, just to state my opinion.
I heard the surround sound remix of Nonsuch and I thought it was extremely not good. Look for reviews, you won’t find a bad one. I made it through half of the album, but it just made me angry. Set aside discussion of the validity of surround sound, don’t know if you care, don’t think it matters now. Steven Wilson has somehow gotten himself anointed as a surround sound remixer but based on this mix, I’d say he also is mixing things in a way that reinterprets the material, and I think that is a shitty intent. This is not coming from some audiophile angle, analyzing if there are 12 dBFS of headroom or putting magic beans on my speakers. I’m talking purely musical choices here. This is not just intended as a mix, but also as a fix.
One really obvious album to buy in surround is DSOTM. The surround version of that album really sounds like the original stereo mix. Not done by Alan Parsons, but the balances, the eq, the reverb, it’s all very close. It feels like the classic album we’ve heard a million times was spread out across all the speakers. To me, that is what it should be.
Nonsuch, on the other hand, has all kinds of balance changes. The songs feel different. I can hear different parts and different nuances, but it’s because it is a completely different mix, not because elements are more exposed by virtue of having more speakers. It changes the feel of some of the tunes and it’s distracting because it does not sound like the album we know. That’s the nature of a recording, it becomes definitive. Released to the world, it’s out and no longer malleable.
One technical issue I had was that Wilson puts the vocals right in the center channel, which is kind of a no-no for the two reasons that often home systems are not set up well – you can’t really rely on the center speaker to be correct. Some people don’t even setup the center speaker, so now you have zero vocal. Also, now the vocals are basically soloed, you can turn off the other channels and get the vocals all by themselves. I wonder if Andy realized this, as you can now take his vocals and drop them into your house remix or whatever silliness you want. If you’ve been in a studio with a singer, I think you would find that most of them do not want their vocal soloed, it’s like being naked. And maybe it’s even okay in the studio for some, but it seems odd to release it that way. And Wilson’s use of reverb and delay is exposed and excessive, sounds like he got a reverb unit as a new toy and wanted to show it to everyone.
It seems dumb to imply, “who does he think he is, to reinterpret an album that already exists as a mix that fans know very well,” because Andy commissioned the mix and approved it. And I hope it’s making him some money. But it’s not Nonsuch. Not to me. And it’s one thing to screw up a surround sound mix, because not many people care and it’s better than listening to recordings of passing trains, but to also include a new stereo mix, as if this to say, “no, this is really what it was supposed to be,” I think is presumptuous and misguided.
Now Wilson’s mix of Drums and Wires is out, and the reviews will all be barfing all over themselves with joy – and the package has some really, really enticing extras. Wilson is also remixing Tears for Fears’ “Songs from the big chair,” and I’m sure the world is waiting to hear the ketchup he brought to the table, to slather all over people’s well-established knowledge of that album. I’d be happy to be wrong about that, and more happy to be wrong about the Drums and Wires remix.
So yeah, I listened to the 5.1 mix of Nonsuch and it pissed me off.
Are you cool with me moving this to The Main Stage? This is real well written and focused.
Sure!
And I still stand by my original challenge: name one album improved by a remix.
Maybe the only band I could imagine having an album improved by a remix is King Crimson – not that I’m even aware they have had an album remixed! However, I could imagine Starless and Bible Black or Red benefiting from just the right remix.
I do like the Pet Sounds Stereo Mix. I think it was a reasonable representation of the Mono version, but at the same time it opened up a nice sense of space in the occasionally opaque density of the original.
When the Who’s back catalog was reissued on CD (in the late 90s I think?) the tracks were remixed. My memory is that Pete was involved in the remixes. They really took some getting used to, because the original mixes were so much a part of my being, but I got to where I preferred them, primarily because the main change was that the drums were mixed higher.
Say it ain’t so, Bob and Phil.
http://upstatelive.com/2014/11/04/furthur-takes-their-final-bow-and-says-goodbye-to-furthur-net/
A cure for the Wednesday blahs?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fyQeHavCfPg
Buried at the end of an abandoned All Star Jam, I post this article about Dave Grohl, who, in our parlance, is accused of rock crimes:
http://www.bdcwire.com/the-pretender-why-i-cant-stand-dave-grohl/