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On A Not-Knowing Knowledge
The jazz guitarist John McLaughlin says that when he played with Miles Davis in the late 1960s, Davis gave him some advice before a recording session for In A Silent Way (1969): “Play like you don’t know how to play guitar.” McLaughlin, of course, went on to great heights of jazz-Indian music fusion with his… Continue reading
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Microthought: On Musical Process
Music. Music finds a way around us. Music, that subliminal force, finds a way around us, through our ears, into our hearts. Your Music might not be my Music, that subliminal force that finds a way around us, through our ears, into our hearts. If we traded musics, you and I, do we trade minds… Continue reading
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On Lip Syncing And Musical Authenticity
Like a lot of folks, I watched the music acts perform at the Obama presidential inauguration. The Brooklyn Tabernacle choir, singing “Battle Hymn Of The Republic” sounded fantastic; American Idol winner Kelly Clarkson, singing “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee,” sounded smooth and polished; James Taylor’s “America The Beautiful” was a reassuring presence; and megastar Beyonce sounded… Continue reading
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On Negative Achievement: The XX Perform In New York
“The creation of a style often begins with a negative achievement.” – Tracy Kidder and Richard Todd, Good Prose If you are a fan of musical minimalisms, atmospheric indie rock, and electronic beats, there was a lot to like about the xx’s poised and elegantly understated performance at Hammerstein Ballroom last week. The young Mercury… Continue reading
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A Question On Pop Musical Irritants
If you get annoyed by a pop song after just a few months of hearing it on TV and the radio, how do you think this music will age? Will you like it in ten years? Will it remind you of when you first heard it, conjuring vague feelings? Or will it become even more… Continue reading
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On The Rhythms Of Soccer And The Game Of Music
At home my wife and I watch a prodigious amount of English Premiere League soccer–that’s real football to the rest of the non-North American world. In earlier posts on this blog I have written about watching soccer and golf for their ambient sound potentials–the roar of the soccer fans, or the hushed-reverent tones of the… Continue reading
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Microthought: On Multisensory Sounds
Stereo sirens, stumbling man spoke strange tongue, greased air, frying sounds. Continue reading
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Observations On A Musician Playing Guitar
A tune beyond us as we are, Yet nothing changed by the blue guitar; Ourselves in the tune as if in space, Yet nothing changed, except the place Of things as they are and only the place As you play them, on the blue guitar, Placed, so, beyond the compass of change, Perceived in a… Continue reading
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Zadie Smith On Joni Mitchell’s Blue
In her recent essay in the New Yorker, novelist Zadie Smith recounts her listening history with the music of Joni Mitchell–specifically, Mitchell’s 1971 album Blue. Here is the title song from the record: Smith describes encountering Mitchell’s idiosyncratic and alternate tuning jazzy-folk music for the first time while in college and hating it. But years… Continue reading
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On Rhythmic Instabilities And Brand New Feelings: DJ Rashad’s “Feelin””
“The technology’s so on point now: we can sample almost anything now.” – DJ Spinn One of the talked about music releases of 2012 is DJ Rashad’s Teklife Vol.1: Welcome to the Chi. Rashad is a Chicago musician who makes music to accompany a dance style known as footwork. Footwork is characterized by its hyper… Continue reading
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