Music is your own experience,
your thoughts,your wisdom.
If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn.

Charlie Parker

Start of My Heart - Joan as Police Woman

The newest single from the extraordinarily talented Joan as Police Woman is a gentle caress of sounds only made lovelier by a visual patina of shifting colour. Weeping guitar, cradled on a bed of ambient synth, joins the most poignant and soulful of vocals...

Forget the Queen.

Long live Joan Wasser.

Listening Party: Empire of the Sun

In recent weeks Empire of the Sun have been featured in papers and on screens in welcome of their first album, Walking On a Dream, already top of the pops in the UK. This pair of sonic chemists, Luke Steele (The Sleepy Jackson) and Nick Littlemore (Pnau), whip up a blend of ostentatious costume, contagious 80's pop sensibility and emotive vocal intonations of the most deliciously languid variety. Though their appearance may rub some the wrong way (imagine Pocahontas, the Pirates of Penzance and a fat smattering of Star Wars) they don't seem overly concerned. When asked in today's Guardian if their over-the-top look could take away from potential success, Littlemore's reply is "Maybe, but it's great having a project where you can justify buying an $800 headpiece …". Absolutely!

First encountered via Chimera Musica I quickly went on to discover the videos for Walking On a Dream and We Are the People (below), the latter of which features a kaleidoscope of ancient mesoamerican and Mexican imagery thanks to the location (Mexico), appearances made by natives, and wardrobe stylings. The monuments in the jungle sequence are Fondo Xilitla (pron.(s)hee-leet-la) the creation of artist Edward James, and what clearly appears to be one of the most enchanting places on Earth. This quirky couple of "blokes" from Australia bring me back to the blissfully carefree days of youth and episodes of hypnotic dancing to eardrum busting volumes of 80's music. Que alegria!


We Are The People Video

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Listening to: Land of Talk - Speak to Me Bones
via FoxyTunes

Much Ado About Nothing: Bat for Lashes

A wise man once said, "You know, sometimes it's fun to write about stuff that you don't like". The fact that many blogs entertain readers with poetic renderings on how much of a cockswane a particular artist or group is has not been lost on me. A well-written slam can be savoury, hysterically funny and clever. I admit, I'm not a very experienced music writer and normally avoid negative leanings, this is likely because before I deem a song or an artist worthy of a good old fashioned slam sandwich something inside me has to be triggered...a niggling almost imperceptible itch with an impossible to locate origin.

The time has come.

Maybe it was the heat, or my boredom and dissatisfaction with the majority of music I was exposed to at the time, but when Bat for Lashes (aka Natasha Khan) released Fur and Gold last summer I was seduced by the dark comic charms of What's a Girl to Do. As the album gained even more momentum, more pictures like this were published, and Thom Yorke invited the the maidens on tour (kind of like your own personal busload of bohemian chic Barbie dolls eh Tommy?) I began to grow weary of the whole forest-nymph-gypsy-in-Athenian-headdress aesthetic and, in particular, the undeserved comparisons to female pioneers like Kate Bush, Bjork and Siouxsie Sioux to name a few.


The most recent endorsement of Bat for Lashes comes via Kanye West's blog where the single Glass, from the forthcoming album Two Suns, was recently posted (first Thom Yorke, the Moctezuma of sociopolitical eco-rock and now the biggest cockerel in the neo hip-hop nest Kanye West?). Borrowing lines from Song of Solomon Glass treats us to more Kate Bush imagery evoked via lines like a thousand crystal towers, a hundred emerald cities, and the hand of the watchman in the night sky. Tribal drums, some chordal dissonance and a culmination in signature Ani DiFranco vocalizations make this tune a perfect specimen for a quick game of "Name the Pastiche"...And don't get me started on the album art where fans and critics alike are given a colourful, albeit condescending, introduction to the symbolism of alter-egos in true "Duality for Dummies" fashion.


It would be ridiculous to expect that the influence of past and present artists would not colour the music of today. All anyone can hope for is that talent, creativity, and consideration of the treatment of the music will reflect the ability of the artist to bring something uniquely individual to the fore. In this case, at least for me, Bat for Lashes is an example of an artist that simply doesn't make the cut (and this doesn't play in her favour either). On the positive, I will admit she earns at least a pat on the back for this performance. I just hope she can ditch the dissociative identity disorder and settle comfortably into her very own.

Deerhoof: Tears & Music of Love and, yes, that is a tiger

You can hopscotch your way all over the internet, immerse your skull into the murky oceanic depths of all of the sh*t that is passing for music these days and start your own band in frustration, only to discover you've got a whole bunch of half-baked songs and two instruments you can't play (very well anyway) at the same time (limb limitations okay?)...Or maybe that's just me I'm talking about. Enter small miracle! A band that plays original material with childlike enthusiasm, humour and passion. A band whose recent performance on Pitchfork TV in colour block t-shirts has me hankering for Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti, a box of Crayolas, elementary school free gym time and a Taxidermy 101 class.

Yes !!! 3 cheers for Deerhoof!


Deerhoof's current album Offend Maggie, released fall 2008 - buy it!
Deerhoof's MySpace (loving Spiral Golden Town)