Archives : all posts by Sean

Fantasia - "Lose To Win". The first great pop song (ok, R&B song) of 2013. Nine years after she won American Idol, Fantasia remains one of the series' great discoveries. She's a great singer. A song like this - well-written, pleasingly redemptive - could so easily feel slight, a pleasant balm. But Fantasia is such a powerful interpreter, forceful of feeling; she makes this pop ballad a thing of intense will, of self-discovery. She catches someone's eye and holds their gaze. She hits.

"Lose To Win" uses the Commodores' "Nightshift" as its beams and struts. So the shimmer is the shimmer of skyscrapers in the 80s, starlight on old fashions.

A warning: the Commodores call-back is too much for my dear friend T, who winces at each recollection. Sons and daughters of faded nightclubs - steel yourselves.

[buy]

(photo source)

Said the Gramophone has no advertising.

We are kept alive by the extraordinary kindness of our readers around the world.

Our 2013 Funding Drive benefited from the incredible generosity of:

Thank you so much, so much, so much. You are all fanfares & champions & patrons of the arts.

AroarA - "Crying Out For Me". AroarA formed last year, the partnership of two musicians I have long admired: Andrew Whiteman and Ariel Engle. Whiteman's work I knew best from recordings - for his work as Apostle of Hustle, and as a member of Broken Social Scene. Engle was more elusive - although she has past projects, no recordings ever came close to the heart-stopping/heart-starting effect of her live performances. One of the city's most admired singers, Engle has performed with everyone from Feist to Socalled, Jerusalem In My Heart to Martha Wainwright. She has that rare, rare singer's gift - the kind of voice that changes the gravity in a room, drawing everything toward her silhouette. Magnetic, bewitching, undeniable as a hot coal.

Engle and Whiteman are husband and wife. AroarA, therefore, is more than a band: it's something lovers are doing with their lives, together. From this, the group's music gains a seriousness, a sensuousness. AroarA's songs inherit part of their intimacy: these songs are the sum of a thousand touches, a million glances. Hearing AroarA's mingling voices, cigar-box guitars, I imagine the moments on the periphery: dusk drives, breakfast-table debates, midnights.

Which brings me to this first release, a self-titled EP, five songs from their In The Pines LP. It's called In The Pines because Alice Notley wrote a book of poetry called In The Pines, and AroarA's songs use Notley's poems as lyrics. The songs don't just borrow scraps of stanzas: I believe these are Notley's complete poems. Because of this, there's a certain formality to these songs - a "literariness", for lack of a better word, that can at first feel like a thin paper screen. There are big words, literary allusions; this is free verse, not pop-song rhyme.

That can be the first impression, but it fades. Especially now that AroarA have completely finished these songs, adding strings and brass to voice and beats and guitars, with mixing by Sandro Perri, these tunes are lush, not formal. They are direct, not mediated. Engle and Whiteman are staring at us, at each other, as they sing. Yes, In The Pines has a concept. But this music is hot and intimate. AroarA's use of Notley isn't a cerebral exercise, a scheme for arty recognition, or even a shortcut to a Canada Council grant. Notley's In The Pines was simply beloved. It was one of Engle and Whiteman's private secrets, a set of passwords. A pillow book. Part of two lovers' secret code.

Now, they sing those secrets. "Crying Out For Me" feels at once like a lesson and confession; a revealing of oneself. It feels troubled and changing - seeking, glimpsing. You seek and then you glimpse - there; there. AroarA sink and seek and shout "Goodnight Irene!". They let clear & muffled sounds roam over a scuzzy beat. They rasp warnings, they console. They make a beautiful sound. Some of the harmonics here are sinister, unresolved. And then there comes a line where the mist parts, and the sun is low, and every angled form seems to shiver with promise.

[bandcamp/buy/website]

(image from Rubens' Anne of Austria)

If you enjoy Said the Gramophone, please give us some money.

In 2013, this blog celebrates its 10th anniversary. A whole dumb decade of finding wonderful songs and writing about them.

A lot of things were different, ten years ago:

• Jean Chrétien was prime minister of Canada, Tony Blair in the UK, and George W Bush doddered over the United States.
• the iTunes Music Store didn't exist yet.
• Cory Doctorow published his debut and Jonathan Lethem (an STG contributor) wrote Fortress of Solitude.
• Little Green Footballs was blog of the year.
• Everyone was scrambling to get in to the European Union.
• "Ignition" was remixed.

Said the Gramophone also didn't have any advertising. We still don't. This is not an accident or a mistake. Ads are terrible. Sure, most music-blogs have ads. So do magazines, festivals, our favourite podcasts. But books don't have ads. Vinyl records don't have ads. Conversations with friends don't cut to commercial.

That choice means that Said the Gramophone's writers, Dan and I (and sometimes Jordan), don't really get paid. That's ok. Yes, STG is tons of work - 10 years and 872,282 words. But we made our bed (we'll sleep in it).

Still, once a year we become shills.

There are costs to running an mp3 blog like this one. We pay to keep the site online, and for every song you download.

Since 2007, our most generous readers have covered these costs. They have sent us dollars and pence, krugerrands and money-orders, to keep this pistachio-green website afloat. We forgot to hold last year's funding drive so 2013's is twice as important. We could really use your help.

At Said the Gramophone we don't chase pageviews or post press releases. We avoid widgets and streaming: we ask labels to let us share mp3s. If they can't, we find a different beautiful tune to share. We want this to be simple, and we don't bother you with the things that we don't really really love. But our audience is you, just you. That's it. There's no one else. You small, strange gang.

If you enjoy this site, please donate to keep it going.

This year we will be adding a special Donors page to publicly thank everyone who contributes at least $15. You can link to your website or, if you prefer, remain anonymous. Everyone who donates will also receive a link to download a special Said the Gramophone mix. (It has Captain Beefheart, Nicki Minaj and the Aisler's Set.)

A reminder of some of the things we did since our last funding drive: introduced or (more likely) reintroduced you to artists such as Adam Torres, A Tribe Called Red, Angel Olsen, Anika, Alt-J, Arlt, A$AP Rocky, Au, Augustine Enebeli Olisa, Austra, Avec pas d'casque, Azealia Banks, Bankrobber, Bernice, Big Brave, Black Atlass, Blackout Beach, Blue Belt, Blue Hawaii, Bombadil, Brianna Perry, Bry Webb, Cannon Bros, Carly Rae Jepsen, CFCF, Chrome Pony, Cyrillic Typewriter, Damien Jurado, Danny Brown, Deloro, Delusionists, Detsl, DIANA, Digital Leather, Digits, Django Django, Each Other, Eleanor and Matthew Friedberger, Eric Chenaux, Extra Happy Ghost, Foxygen, Frank Fairfield, Frank Ocean, Fred Woods, Freelove Fenner, Goose Hut, Grimes, Gym Deer, Hangedup, Heartless Bastards, Heavy Times, Hidden Words, Hooray for Earth, Hospitality, Jah Youssouf & Bintou Coulibaly, Jerusalem In My Heart, Jessie Ware, Jhene Aiko, Joey Bada$$, John K Samson, John Prine, John Southworth, Justin Bieber, Karneef, Kendrick Lamar, Lana Del Rey, Leif Vollebekk, The Limiñanas, Luke Abbott, Mac DeMarco, Mari Kalkun, Micachu and the Shapes, Miguel, Milk Teddy, Milton Nascimento, Moonface, the Mouthbreathers, Mozart's Sister, Mystikal, Na Hawa Doumbia, Nap Eyes, Neal Morgan, Nathan Hanson & Brian Roessler, Nikkiya, Norwegian Arms, Orval Carlos Sibelius, Oscar and Martin, Parlovr, Peter Peter, Plan B, Planningtorock, Plants and Animals, P.O.S., PS I Love You, Reversing Falls, Ryan Hemsworth, Sandro Perri, Schoolboy Q, Sleigh Bells, Suuns, Taylor Swift, TEEN, Thee Oh Sees, THOMAS, TNGHT, Travels, Venuses, Walrus, Way Yes, White+, White Label, Willis Earl Beal, Wind-Up People, Woodpigeon, YAMANTAKA//SONIC TITAN, Yellowteeth and Zeus; wrote of digital music-making, Jelly's wife, brothers' judo, "Suzanne", fading away, a book with crossed-out words, David Bowie's deep boats, convicted murderers, the stories of Edmund, eating jukeboxes, the deaths of Jack Layton, Bert Jansch, Whitney Houston, Cynthia Dall, and, er, Bob Dylan, Psycho and Jimi Hendrix, "Moonlight Mile" and Val's Ice Cream, Katniss Everdeen, The Best Show on WFMU, concerts by Jeff Mangum and Gillian Welch, Lou Reed and the Buddha, a Russian road trip, six Megans (and Joanna Newsom), the trials of Abousfian Abdelrazik; composed overviews of le FME, SappyFest (twice) and Pop Montreal (twice). We also wrote about our 100 favourite songs of 2011 and 2012.

That's some of what we did. But for all the pixels we spilled, we are still deeply indebted to our readers. Every year we say it, and every year it feels even more true: your kindness and curiosity, your panache and élan, your wise-cracks and wolf-whistles, your comments and clicks - these are the things that make this thing a thing. You give us your time, and we feel privileged to give you ours. Thank you for leaving messages, writing emails, offering help and hospitality and faraway friendship. Thanks for the retweets and shares, the proffered MP3s. You play our favourite songs to your lovers, send us your lovers' favourite songs. You put up with this stumbling, fumbling project. We understand that not everyone can afford to donate to a silly website. Regardless of any pennies nickels, thank-you thank-you thank-you all yet again for making Said the Gramophone a ten-year project. Soon it hits its teens.

Jerusalem In My Heart - "3andalib Al-Furat".

You can mean it in many different ways. You can write your heart down, try to write it exactly, then try to sing those words in the clearest way. You can sing not plainly but fiercely, coloured instead of clear. You can perform "meaning it", oversinging or undersinging, conveying a convention for sincerity. Sometimes the meaning is cerebral, not emotional: you decide an idea, manifest it in a work. And sometimes meaning it is much more simple: you simply tell, and try not to tell a lie.

As Jerusalem In My Heart, Radwan Ghazi Moumneh sometimes means it more and sometimes means it less. Sometimes the project is pure theatre - as when he fliered Montreal's Mile End with arabic posters, depicting himself and a kalashnikov. Sometimes it's improvisation - music invented in the morning and performed (with attention, conviction, enormous talent) in the evening. Sometimes he hosts a funky theremin-kissed Beirut freakout; other times it's a dozen shirtless men banging drums beneath a decapitation.

Mo7it Al-Mo7it, JIMH's Constellation debut, contains a few kinds of meaning. Moumneh, who grew up in Montreal and speaks fluent English, sings exclusively in Arabic. Most of his listeners will not understand his words - like me, able only to infer, listening to the tone of his vowels, the hardness of his consonants. The album and song titles are even more conceptual than that: he uses latin characters, but represents the abjad in IM Arabic. On an album of buzuq and birdcalls, this is like a banner reading 21ST CENTURY, siting JIMH in the present; the same is expressed with synths, reverb and distortion, processing that connects Moumneh's work with Omar Souleyman or even Fever Ray. (Listen to the splendid, electro-spectral "Yudaghdegh el-ra3ey wala al-ghanam".) Moumneh is not ignorant of these siblings: he has engineered/produced records for everyone from Suuns to Tim Hecker to Handsome Furs.

But in other places, Jerusalem In My Heart mean things more directly, without the screen of a governing idea. The closing track, "Amanem", is cavernous and terrible: a wreck, a reverberating plea. As Moumneh hammers his instrument, asking & asking, I imagine the murder in the cathedral, a mosaic or stained glass. This anguish is a beautiful, awful blues.

"3andalib Al-Furat", which I share here, is "Amanem"'s opposite. No vocals - just harp and acoustic buzuq, the whisper of a nightingale. It is a respite, a moment of peace. It is pause; you stop for a while, under sky and branches, and imagine if you could really stay there. Jerusalem In My Heart is more than one person, now; throughout this album, Moumneh plays with Jérémie Regnier, and the visual artist Malena Szlam Salazar is also listed as a member. Dina Cindric Sarah Pagé plays harp. Implicit in "3andalib Al-Furat", I feel the solace of friends, the strength of quiet solidarity. A nightingale in the trees, and other nightingales, and there need be no pact. Your brothers and sisters know what you mean.

[buy Mo7it Al-Mo7it / Jerusalem In My Heart play in Montreal on Friday]

(photo source)

Suuns - "Music Won't Save You". Listening to "Music Won't Save You", I find myself fixating on its samples: the clips of a laughing audience, which flutter over the song like surf, or bird-trills. Where did this laughter come from? I wonder. Did Suuns secretly record a party? Did they plunder it from Everybody Loves Raymond or The Nanny? Was there an excursion to the Comedy Nest or the Montreal Improv Theatre, slipping in with a hidden mic? At first these questions seem tangential, but in a way they gesture to the heart of the song. Ben Shemie sneers about the wrongness of the scene around him, the failures of his (and others') music, and in a way he's asking where the laughter is coming from. Where does the failure happen? How does something right & certain break? How does beauty (listen to that guitar) so easily fall short? Is it there, or there, or there? An inadequacy or just original sin. [buy the beautifully recorded, churning Images du Futur]

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Elsewhere:

My friend Chris, who loves boardgames and the Russian Futurists, introduced me to battle rap about two years ago. Turns out that Toronto - yes, Ontario - has one of the richest scenes in the whole world, anchored in a league called King of the Dot. Battle rap has a long history on Canada's east coast, particularly the Maritimes, but it's not just KOTD's contenders who have elevated its status: in the age of YouTube, where battle-rap is migrating from street-corners to MacBooks, KOTD has made its name with the best-shot and best-produced videos of any league. URL has more street-cred, but the Blue Jays fans of KOTD are now running a California league, Fresh Coast, and luminaries like Drake and Raekwon are showing up to their Toronto events.

Modern battle rap is rarely off the dome: freestylers have been overtaken by writers-&-memorisers who take months to prep for an event, honing shots and punchlines for each opponent. Battles are usually split into three rounds; every round, both battlers go for a couple of uninterrupted minutes. Some battles are judged, some are not. Sometimes there's freestyling thrown in, or improvised flips - ripostes based on whatever the other guy has said. The verbiage is often violent, misogynistic, homophobic or racist; but by the same token it can be breathtakingly precise, lyrical and vivacious. Punchlines trade with personals. Winning takes a combination of wit, words and charisma. It's as much about the way your eyes move as it is about the way your rhymes work. Unlike comedy battle-raps, like the series Dan participates in, there are real stakes. And because it's no-holds-barred, that explicit understanding that everything's on the table, the nastiest bigotry and sexism sometimes feels redemptive. Since we can lob a punchline about everything, at every kind of identity, calcified power structures seem weakened. One guy gets in a funny, terrible line about his opponent's Judaism; so the Jewish rival swings back with a funny rhyme about the first guy's antisemitism. The crowd laughs at both.

Anyway I bring all this up not to tell you about some of my favourite rappers, but to tell you that Chris and his buddy Matt have just started a new battle rap blog, T.O. Battle Blog. It's not just a great way to keep up with the scene - it's a great introduction to it. (I mean check out that terrific underrated battle rappers list - the ballsy jesus-y kid is amazing.) Time.