I’ve been really feeling Stereolab lately. Their incredibly unique mixture of old fashioned jazzy pop, electronics, and the motorik pulse of krautrock was the reason they were one of the first bands to ever be called post-rock.
If you’ve never heard them, you’re in for a real treat. This is the 18 minute epic centerpiece of their second album, 1993’s Transient Random-Noise Bursts With Announcements.
I’ve been on a weird nostalgia binge lately. Instead of wallowing in the shallow pleasure of reminiscence though, I’ve been trying to hear my old favorites with fresh ears. What’s new about it? How has my perception changed? Does it still hold up?
For a lot of my music choices past age 18 or so, the answer to that last question is yes more often than not. I present as evidence the first Gorillaz single, Tomorrow Comes Today:
I heard that Taylor Swift dropped a science fiction kung-fu extravaganza of a music video and needed to see it right away. A remix of of Bad Blood, from her gigantic album 1989, the song prominently features everyone’s current favorite rapper, Kendrick Lamar, as well as a posse of women from across the entertainment spectrum.
The cameos all burst onto the screen with code-name titles in a futuristic take on Kill Bill‘s Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, and each one appears to reference a different sci-fi movie. Being a giant nerd, I decided to catalog the ones I recognized. List is below; tell me what I missed!
I don’t really have anything clever or interesting to say about this song, other than this: it hits me right in the feels.
This song always makes me feel like I’ve been shot out of a cannon.
It’s a shot of pure adrenaline, that irrational rush of falling in love for the first time. Three whiplash minutes to express the insanity that throws into the atmosphere, leaving responsibility and real life below.
The forces of order try to capture the young lovers. A daring chase through the woods ends at a mysterious party, bursting with lights and color. The jig is up, but our heroine has a plan. Slapping handcuffs on her and her lover’s wrist, they take flight into the dark as the song spirals away.
The camerawork, the costumes, and the urgent sense of drama make this one of the best music videos of the 1980s, and all time as far as I’m concerned.
I’ve been in love with Kate Bush for a long time. Her music reached its pinnacle with the album Hounds Of Love, a weird mutant of operatic ambition, entrenched firmly within an 80s pop production framework. It’s as daring and progressive as anything she ever recorded, yet reaches the apex of pop perfection several times within its first half. The second half, subtitled The 9th Wave, takes us out into the open ocean before erasing any boundaries between the reflection and the stars.
I’m going to have to follow up with a post about her Running Up That Hill video.
I’m new to k-pop but I’ve often enjoyed what little I have heard in the past, far more than American counterparts in the sugary pop game. Other than Taylor Swift, there’s nothing currently on Top 40 radio that I’m remotely interested in. I like to hear pop that crackles with audacity.
This brings me to the earworm-worthy tune below: Red Light, the first song I heard by Korean pop stars 에프엑스 – aka f(x).
In this exchange, we join a Skype conversation deep into the workday. There’s nothing incredibly insightful here. I just wanted to share a bit of our back and forth on a topic that’s often relevant to something my peers encounter on a daily basis.
Me: Here’s where “weird” just sounds hilarious as a pseudo-criticism to me: in 2004 I was way into Arcade Fire, and many of the somewhat related Canadian indie rock bands. They were so weird to top 40 pop fans. So alien, so ugly.
In 2014 I’m hearing an unending stream of bands that sound exactly like those 2004 bands, right there on Top 40 radio.
So here’s hoping that in 10 years the spacey jazzy synth shit I’m into is on 104.5! (Note: it’s a local pop station)
Jzn: Assuming that commercial radio as we know it it still around by then.
Me: Oh god, it’ll just keep smashing headlong into a future that doesn’t want or need it. All the same shit, no matter what city or state you’re in! Which is the true death of radio. It’s no longer vital, it doesn’t champion local sounds or spread the news about a regionally popular band.
Because now you’re either popular everywhere, or “underground.” There’s nothing in between.
So now you get the same garbage here as you do in Arizona or Alaska. How insanely boring.
Optimistic Underground 