I bought a copy of Uncut Magazine today because it had a cover story on the making of David Bowie’s Station to Station. It came with a free CD callled TransitionTransmission: 14 tracks from the New Heroes of Art Rock. This piqued my interest as that is the genre we are most often lumped in with and I’ve largely ignored stuff with this label from the last 10 years or so. I’ve decided to go track by track and tell you what I think of the songs. Although 95% of the music I listen to is from other eras I am always game for a great new song. I promise to listen with an open mind.
1. The Juan Maclean “The Future Will Come”
This song falls under this new-wave funk hybrid that is all over the new Gorillaz album. The singer is doing this sarcastic Gary Numan thing and singing lyrics that could be twitter posts criticizing an ex.
2. Phoenix “Countdown (Sick for the Big Sun)
There’s a great drum thing with these compressed crash snippets happening. Unfortunately that’s the best thing about the song. I used to love Phoenix. I was a big fan of United and even some of the songs on Alphabetical. At some point the band decided that they wanted to be the French version of The Strokes. It’s worked out for them as far as commercial success, but it’s a regression.
3. Charlotte Gainsbourg “IRM”
Ok. I’m biased on this. I read about it and she used MRI sounds on this song. The main beat from our song Worms is based on one of many MRIs I had around 2002-2003. The novelty is somewhat lost on me, but the song is ok. She’s got some really nice tracks on 5:55, but this song is just sort of b-side sounding. There’s a nice line: “Leave my head demagnetized/tell me where the trauma lies”.
4. Field Music “Measure”
This reminds me of early Genesis with Peter Gabriel replaced by Jimmy Emotionless. Nondescript strings and 80s fusion bass along with requisite choppy beat and handclaps to modernize. Some people are really into this band. I think it’s the name.
5. Caribou “Bowls”
This is the best so far. There’s a beautiful harp sample and what sounds like someone banging on bowls along with a drumbeat with claves. Underneath it is an early 90s slow trance track that I could do without, but I suppose it’s coming back. The production is neat and somewhat innovative. There are no vocals (Caribou is generally better without vocals) but it would make a great backing track for a great singer.
6. Panda Bear “Take Pills”
When men sing in harmony on a rock song these days, people generally say it sounds like the Beach Boys. This actually sounds like The Beach Boys. Ok, it sounds more like Paul Simon and Broadcast got together and reworked The Beach Boys. The vocals are buried for some reason. I will say I prefer Panda Bear to Animal Collective except for the EP they made with Vashti Bunyan. This song is ok. Your Dad could easily confuse this for Fleet Foxes, and he wouldn’t be that far off.
7. The Knife In Collaboration With Mt. Sims And Planningtorock “Colouring Of Pigeons”
There’s some operatic vocals that are kind of nice, but this is an 11 minute Annie Lennox song firmly fixed in a new age palette. There’s an upright bass drone at the end that lasts a minute and a half. It’s neither here nor there, it just is.
8. Wild Beasts “This is Our Lot”
This song is mid tempo, as are most of these songs thus far. The groove is like The Cure with the guy from Spandau Ballet singing. He’s singing very passionately, but I can’t tell what he’s saying. There’s cowbell which is a trend that’s quickly surpassing handclaps on unremarkable indie rock songs.
9. Broadcast & The Focus Group “I See, So I See So”
I am once again biased here. I like Broadcast. I even like this record. I like this song. The melodies with the exception of the chorus are indie folk bedroom time, but there’s harpsichord(?) and a sound collage that actually takes you somewhere. This is the only track thus far that sounds art-like to me. And even though it’s rooted in psych-folk, something kind of fresh is happening here.
10. Gayngs “Faded high”
This uses an 80s casio beat on top of another mid tempo drum part. There’s layered male/female vocals and vocoders and moog and autotune. This is a generic jumble of trends from the last decade. The vocals are turned down in this one too. There’s a wanky guitar line that makes me think this is a joke that I don’t get. A soulful autotuned voice does kind of a nice pass for about 20 seconds. It’s like they watched Miami Vice once and decided to make a song about watching Miami Vice once. It’s a 7 minute song that needs to be 2 minutes. It’s repetitive and not in the nice meditative sense. I think the band name is a pun on gay gangs, which is one of those band names you come up with but don’t use because not enough people in the room are laughing.
11. Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti “Envelopes Another Day”
This band is getting fantastic press right now. The song is actually kind of okay. This is one of those songs that has sections that don’t go together, but isn’t prog. It’s legitimately a little weird, which is refreshing. It’s this lo-fi warpy synth track and the singer is doing a faux Silver Jews/Scott Walker thing that sounds kind of dishonest but the song is catchy and nice. He’s singing “The grave silence”. The good thing about this is given the hype surrounding this band, I was not expecting this “weirdo in the corner” kind of song.
12. Flying Lotus Computer Face//Pure Being
I like this. Even though it uses 80s synths and stupid laser sounds, the jalopy percussion loop keeps it fresh. Of the people my age who were influenced by 90s IDM (Aphex Twin, Plaid etc.) Flying Lotus is one of the most interesting.
13. Steve Mason “All Come Down”
An 80s Ballad. I can’t tell if he’s kidding. I don’t know if he knows either. Regardless, it sounds insincere. This is the worst track on here. The weird thing is it sounds like a lot of time was spent making it sound 80s.
14. Oneohtrix Point Never “Physical Memory”
This is an instrumental which seems like somebody bought exactly one brand new synth and tried to make a noisy ambient Boards of Canada song. I don’t like it, and Fuck Buttons does this kind of thing better, but not much. I make no bones about being particular about electronic music. It’s easy to go wrong and end up with something that says nothing, which makes Aphex Twin and Autechre seem even more brilliant.
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Ok, I’m considering not posting this because A. it’s overwhelmingly negative, and maybe it seemed as if it was going to be from the outset, and B. These bands will probably not ask us to open for them.
If you read the whole thing you may end up with a feeling of “who the fuck are you?”. I’m a guy who wants to be blown away by something new, some new ideas. New music. I want to be inspired by and feel a healthy competition with what’s being pushed in my face by the rotting hand of the music industry. There are people making music today that are breaking away from trends and trying to forge into undiscovered territory, but not nearly as many come to my attention as they did even 10 years ago, and I keep my ear to the ground as I’ve done a weekly radio show for the past 3 years.
Maybe because there are no proverbial carrots left (money, a career, notoriety, promise of security) to dangle in front of the donkeys (artists) that we (and I do include myself), don’t work as hard to create something fresh. That concept can be flipped and I think because there’s nothing to gain, there’s nothing to lose by sticking one’s neck out. Sure, it’s harder work, but I’d rather make an innovative piece than a popular one. I have never written an innovative song, a few pretty ones, but not truly innovative music. I’m going to try. The roots of my songs are never inherently innovative, but I feel like with working triple hard on arrangements and a “nothing to lose, nothing to gain” sense we might just make something interesting. It’s a daunting aspiration and I can’t say I’ll stick with it, but I’m going to try.
These might not be the best songs to represent these artists, and I realize that bands are desperately trying to find a marriage of art and commerce, but the package says “new heroes of art-rock” and I want to believe in my heart there are some. Just because I haven’t heard them here doesn’t mean they don’t exist.
Carlos
P.S. I in no way am speaking on behalf of the band even though it’s on the band blog. They are probably rolling their eyes while reading this. This was a failed experiment that I can’t really legitimize posting, but what the hell.
