ReCOWmendations -- September 2023: Five Inspiring Music-Related Bits and Bobs
Two new songs featuring stellar dance videos, a study on why people stop pursuing new music as they age, a rare interview with a rock legend, and a brilliant young musician showing off her drum chops
I didn’t get a chance to write an August ReCOWmendations piece (‘twas a crazy month), so I’m starting September off with one so I don’t forget let that happen again.
I love sharing inspirational media with you all, and relish these breaks from writing about dastardly earworms.
Here are 5 of my favorite sonic-visual goodies of the month.
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1.
Most readers know that I’m a big fan of virtually every genre of music.
Prog rock (often referred to as progressive rock), is one subgenre that I particularly love. Rush was my favorite band as a young pimply teen, and unlike other friends who abandoned proggy groups like Yes, ELP, King Crimson, and Genesis for punk rock, I made room for it all. Making room for it all is my motto. Also: live simply to simply live. Which combined could be, making room for nothing. Or: making room for everything.
An artist who always makes room for everything is Steven Wilson.
Steven Wilson has been the lead vocalist, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist for prog rock band Porcupine Tree since the early ‘90s.
I do love much of Porcupine Tree’s extensive catalog (17 albums and counting). But it’s Wilson’s solo work that impresses me most, with each album (and often every song) exploring a wide array of sonic landscapes, utilizing elements of ambient, metal, krautrock, techno, jazz, pop and so much more.
He’s just released a new single, “Economies of Scale,” from his forthcoming album The Harmony Codex, which will be available at the end of September. It’s a hypnotic, captivating track, with gorgeous piano, electronic percussion, guitar, and entrancing layered vocals.
It’s the music video, though, that elevates “Economies of Scale” from a lovely song to a true work of art. The entire video is filmed in a single shot, performed by two exceptional, emotive dancers. The choreography is unlike anything I’ve seen before. It perfectly captures the melancholic mood of the song, and expands it in all directions. (Note Steven Wilson in the background of the video 35 seconds in.)
“Economies of Scale” doesn’t require us to make room for it. It finds its way in, through the cracks, through the pores, through every breath.
2.
Elise Trouw has built quite a large YouTube following over the past few years. She’s an exceptional songwriter, but it’s her innovative looping videos that have brought her the most attention.
If you don’t know what a looping video is, an example of Elise using the technique on her song “How to Get What You Want” is below. Essentially, it’s when a musician plays a guitar line (or piano or bass or drums, etc), and adds more instrumentation on top, each part “looping” on top of the others.
In this day and age of many musicians earning little to no money for their recorded music (and even their live shows), many artists have incorporated looping into their sets as a way to have a full band sound without the need to pay for a full band.
It can seem like a gimmick when the songs aren’t able to live up to the technique. Elise, though, doesn’t have to worry about that. She’s got the songs and the instrumental chops. And an excellent voice to match.
Her “true” instrument (if she were forced to choose one), would have to be the drums. She’s been playing since she was very young and even gives drum tutorials on Drumeo, a YouTube channel where some of the most respected drummers in the world teach viewers how to play specific rhythms.
The above video is an edited compilation I discovered this week of Elise grooving on her kit, showing off her natural (and clearly well-practiced) percussion chops. She’s only 24 and has been recording originals and covers since her early teens. I predict huge things for her in the years to come.
3.
Andy Partridge is one of the greatest songwriters of all time. I don’t need to add “in my opinion” as it feels like an indisputable fact. As the guitarist, vocalist and main songwriter of XTC (along with Colin Moulding on bass/vocals, who wrote many of XTC most notable tunes, I have to add), Andy has been notoriously zip-lipped, rarely giving interviews (especially if filmed) since the band stopped performing live in the early ‘80s.
In some older video clips I’ve seen, Andy has come off as nervous and reticent, if not strangely endearing. As he’s gotten older, he’s become even more reclusive, especially since XTC’s breakup (roughly somewhere near the start of the 21st century, give or take).
So I was more than a bit surprised to find the above interview appearing in my YouTube feed this week! What? Andy doing a interview, where he talks about the making of some of XTC’s best songs?
Andy is warm and gracious and funny and forthcoming and several other praise-worthy adjectives in this discussion. It made me stupidly happy to watch it.
The video is 71 minutes long, so it’s more for obsessive XTC fans like me, but I feel like even casual fans will get something out of watching this excellent interview.
4.
I’ve been listening to Sound Opinions for what feels like 20 years. That’s probably because the radio show-cum-podcast has been around for nearly that long. I didn’t start at the beginning, but somewhere close to it.
Hosts Jim DeRogatis and Greg Kot are experts at combining rock journalism, album reviews, and in-studio concerts. I wrote about them on E&SL back in July of 2022, for a piece on Baja Men’s one-hit-wonder from 2000, “Who Let the Dogs Out?”
One of Sound Opinions’ recent episodes (#917 for those counting), got me doubly excited. Not only does it feature an excellent interview with filmmaker Lisa Cortés about her new documentary Little Richard: I Am Everything (trailer below), but afterward, Jim and Greg interview Professor Timothy McKenry, who published a recent study on why music listeners tend to seek out less new music as they age.
Here’s a link to that study, if you’d like to know more details on what he discovered.
It’s really not all that surprising — a vast majority of us stop pursuing new music by the time we reach the age of 30, because we’re less likely to be seeking out our identities and our communities, which new music tends to speak to. Also, our lives become busier, and are more consumed with jobs, marriages, and parenting by our late 20s.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. The study lists 7 ways to train our musical tastes beyond the “old favorites” of youth. Here’s an excerpt:
Expanding our horizons
Cultivate different modes of listening including informal (concerts), focused (solitary), casual (as an accompaniment to other activities) and social settings.
Make listening habitual.
Be curious about what you’re listening to. You can help your brain form new patterns by knowing something of the story behind the music.
Be patient and persistent. Don’t assume because you don’t immediately like an unfamiliar piece that it’s not worth listening to. The more you listen, the better your brain will be at triggering a pleasure response.
Find a friend to give you recommendations. There’s a good chance you’ll listen to music suggested to you by someone you like and admire.
Keep listening to the music you love, but be willing to revisit long-held beliefs, particularly if you describe your musical taste in the negative (such as “I hate jazz”); it’s likely these attitudes will stifle your joy.
Don’t feel you have to keep up with new music trends. We’ve 1,000 years of music to explore.
5.
I have to give a shout-out to my friend Elizabeth Sale for this pick.
Knowing that I love both dancing and funky, soulful music, Liz sent me links to several of the videos released to coincide with Jungle’s new album (their 6th), Volcano. The videos, like Steven Wilson’s above, are all shot in one take, with each song performed by a crew of unbelievable young dancers. It’s inspiring to watch but they do make me feel guilty for skipping yoga class today.
The choreography of the camera is just as impressive as the dancers. As a videographer in my previous life, I know how much work went into getting it all to match up just right. There’s a video for each of the album’s 14 songs, and I believe they all go together to form a loose-knit “movie.” I’ve only seen a few of the videos and I don’t get a sense of a story or plot, but I look forward to watching them all, in order, soon.
I chose the song “Back on 74” mainly for the funkiness of the song. I love the dancing too, but the dancing in all the videos is off-the-charts.
I’m amazed that I had not heard of this band before! It has so many elements of music that I love — soul, funk, groove, electronics, thick bass — I’m excited to explore their entire catalog.
Jungle is currently on tour right now in the U.S., playing in arenas and larger venues (I had no idea they were that big). Check them out if they come to a city near you!
There you have it! My 5 ReCOWmendations for September 2023.
I’d love to know your thoughts on any of these 5 picks!
Do you have a favorite music video featuring dancers you’d like to share?
What do you think about the “live looping” phenomenon?
Do you listen to the Sound Opinions podcast? Why or why not?
And R.I.P. to Jimmy Buffett. No one exuded flip-flops-on-the-beach cool like he did. I’ll have a margarita in his honor tonight.
Thanks for reading!
-Steve
Love the eclectic mix of things here, Steve--have only gotten through part of it. I'm not familiar enough with Porcupine Tree to call myself a fan, but love some of their (his) stuff, and I also like the backstory, which is pretty amusing. Did not know about Wilson's stuff under his own name--that's a gorgeous piece, and yes, the dancers are great. In both the music and the dance, I got influences of Dubstep, but cranked up a notch and more emotive.
My brother sends me a lot of clips of young musicians making loop tracks at home--there is a huge amount of talent out there. The question is how they will be able to support themselves doing this--I think the jury is out on the evolving music economy. Elise is talented, for sure!
Played the McHenry interview--that's interesting, but I'm skeptical of the "music as sign of identity" part. For me it certainly wasn't--I loved my parents' music and shared my music with them--my mom was much more open than my dad. I was too much of a social outlier for it even to occur to me that music taste was tribal. I just kept trying to get my Manilow-loving friends to check out Deep Purple, and got no-fucking-where with THAT. But I do fit his demographic of the older male voraciously seeking out new music--to the point where it's getting in the way of other responsibilities!
Great article.
Great post Steve! I have a good friend who’s an XTC superfan - he’ll love it (they just weren’t my thing but I love to see folks who are serious fans get a new article or story!).
Over 50 is about that time in life when you start to think what am I going to DO? Music is a good thing to do...