Kai Ginkel from Darmstadt, Germany is recording under the Phirnis moniker, producing what was recently tagged as “enigmatic and evolving washes of sound”. His latest work is called Apnoea which has been just released by Fwonk netlabel.
The whole Friends album is a treasure trove of unorthodox ideas, yet at at the same time everything about it feels incredibly bright and peaceful. There really is no other music quite like this.
2. Alice Coltrane - Los Caballos
This track is based on a riff totally worth obsessing over. To me, the Eternity LP always seemed to exist in a world of its own and I think there's something magical even about its cover art.
3. Mark Kozelek & Jimmy Lavalle - Gustavo
Kozelek's work has been consistently great and inspirational over the years and I find this particular song to be every bit as touching as it is thoroughly grumpy. 4. J.S. Bach - Contrapunctus IV
One of my very favourite Bach compositions and I just love the somewhat controversial sound of Gould's unfinished organ recordings of The Art of the Fugue.
5. Incapacitants - Track 3
There's a video circulating where you can see these guys perform outside in the Fukushima mountains sometime in the early 90s. Beautiful stuff. They're pretty much the ultimate Noise act as far as I'm concerned.
6. Kyuss - One Inch Man
I grew up on Kyuss and rediscovered their records as soon as I got old enough in order to feel nostalgic about the music of my youth. It's fascinating how they got such a huge and heavy sound out of such sparse arrangements.
7. M.B. + E.D.A. - Universal Order
Bianchi teamed up with Emanuela De Angelis for this unique effort. This is some of my favourite drone or loop music around, bordering on actual static but still driven by a somewhat peculiar sense of rhythm.
Enablers are a post-punk band from San Francisco, California which features the poetry/spoken word of Pete Simonelli.
In addition to Simonelli, a published poet and writer who was working as a courier in the band's early years, the band's original lineup included Joe Goldring (guitar, formerly of Swans, Toiling Midgets and [concurrent with Enablers] Touched by a Janitor), Kevin Thomson (guitar, Timco, Nice Strong Arm,Morning Champ, and [also concurrent with Enablers] Touched by a Janitor), and Yuma Joe Byrnes (drums, ex-Tarnation / Broken Horse, Touched by a Janitor).
Enablers' last album, The Rightful Pivot, was released on Atypeek Music, Lancashire and Somerset and Exile on Mainstream in 2015 with European tours.
I first heard it in 1983 in Austin TX in a dorm room. Mind fully blown. That bass line?... give me a break, I could skate to it all day in the Texas sun. The freak singer. Shit. I immediately copied and pretty much worshipped Ian Curtis for awhile.
2. Birthday Party - Friend Catcher
Out of my mentor's 7" collection came this fucking screech of guitar and an animal bass riff. I knew right away that I wanted to play guitar like Rowland S. Howard and I still try to on occasion. HERO.
3. Brian Eno - Baby's On fire
The tune is weird, and lyrically funny enough, but the first time Fripp's solo hits your ears you are done for. I've been getting inspiration off that tone and technique for decades; even tried to straight up copy it with lots of overdrive. Hello? Anybody listening? I'm still waiting for my Fripp "call-out" which can only mean that I am failing.
4. PIL - Pop Tones
From the tape swish intro into the best bass line ever and a totally incomprehensible guitar part this song builds a completely falling down a staircase in slow motion feeling. Evil. This tune is so pivotal for me in so many ways. I don't know Keith Levene and I don't have to; I have this guitar part to thank for many twisty circus riffs.
5. Gang of Four - Damaged Goods
Perhaps one of the most aggressive songs aside from 12XU from that era. That crazy dry-assed production. Raw when turned up. Again, first heard in '83 in a dorm room. I borrowed a guitar shortly after hearing this.
6. Sonic Youth - Tom Violence
This song and this band opened a lot of doors. I was literally about to never play a guitar again until I heard this and suddenly anything seemed possible. My first serious band, "Nice Strong Arm" was oft compared to these greats and rightly so on our first LP. It was truly special to get to open for them.
7. David Bowie - Ashes to Ashes
I taped it straight off the radio in 1980 onto my boombox, missing the first ten seconds or so. The atmospherics were like nothing I had ever heard before and the vocal melody has never left me. I don't know. I can't really listen to it anymore but something about it really wormed into my teenage head.
L’Effondras it’s a French instrumental trio. Two guitars, a drum and a dialog between noise and silence. L'Effondras explores and stretches sounds, play with time and emptiness, excitement and frustration. Hypnotic like the few seconds of the deafening peace before the first thunderbolt crack the sky...
1. Steve Reich - Music for Mallet Instruments Voices & Organ
We chose this one for the fantastic ability Reich had to compose pieces that appear repetitive at first but are actually in perpetual motion, like molecular processes. His use of tones is incredible and creates a special space, almost palpable, out of time, constantly modern. I love the Music for 18 Instruments piece aswell.
2. The Gun Club - Mother of Earth
For me it's simply the most beautiful song in the world. The evocations are universally shared, well-identified, classic in a way (endless westward roads, heat, dust, etc) in the collective imagination of the faded american dream. But there is something particularly broken and desperate in this one. It's like a leak, a suffered renunciation, a sacrifice. The pedal steel guitar is fabulous and the lyrics incredibly good.
3. Skip James - Hard Time Killin' Floor Blues (late version)
Regarding to his skills, Skip James could be seen as a prince in the pantheon of the 20s'-30s' bluesmen. He had everything : an astonishing, nimble fingering technique and a clear, beautiful and appealing voice. He could also play the piano. Most people know the story : he was paid a few bucks for his early recordings, lived quite poorly until he was rediscovered in the mid-60s', earning enough money then to pay for his funeral. On this recording he is at the end of his life, but his voice still delivers something luminous and hopeful eventhough the lyrics are sad.
4. Cheval de Frise - Phosphorescence de l'Arbre Mort
The most remarkable thing with this duo is that they succeed in making us forget all the extreme complexity of their compositions, all their technical tricks evaporating to materialize a free-associations poetic field. They compose the way wheatgrass grows. I chose this track because I can't put a whole album here but La Lame du Mat is their summit.
5. Nirvana - Milk It
We could have chosen any song from this band we still love and listen to regularly since our early teen years. This one pushes the limits of its songwriting, including a twisted violent riff, dark tattered lyrics and the creepiest solo ever. One of the best of their last period. Most generally I feel the music of Nirvana as the most upright thing ever made in rock and its purity refocuses myself each time I listen to it.
6. Erik Satie - Danses de Travers (played by Leeuw)
It's pretty hard to explain why I find this piece sublime... What moves through this (the feeling of absence, the breath of time, immemorial stuff, etc) are indescribable things. His work is unlike anything else, isolated from all the artistic movements of his time, but nobody represents this period (Paris end of the XIXth century) as great as he did. Technically, behind the apparent simplicity, each note is essential and his pieces are very difficult to play, all is about interpretation, feelings.
Rosetta is an American post-metal band from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania incorporating elements of post-hardcore, shoegazing, drone, post-rock, avant-garde and ambient. The band somewhat humorously self-describes its music as "metal for astronauts", and its members are very interested in astronomy and space travel. They have just released a new album called Quintessential Ephemera.
For me, Oceansize is the sound of early-Aughties despair. For whatever reason, I spent an enormous amount of time listening to their entire discography last year, as it clicked for me in a new way. This particular song, though it's an early one, is representative of a lot of what I like about them... it has the slightly weird tonality, shoegazey vibe, big dynamics, etc.
2. Boards of Canada - Sundown
The most recent BoC album is great because it's a concept album with a topic but it has no lyrics. And it works perfectly! This one track is really short but it's detuned out of concert pitch and has a beautiful melancholy to it without a defined harmonic center or key.
3. Nine Inch Nails - La Mer
NIN's The Fragile turned out to be a huge harmonic influence on the new Rosetta material. The Fragile has a recurring motif of a major tonic chord as part of an otherwise minor progression. That same thing showed up a lot on the new Rosetta record, sort of by accident. This song does that major/minor tension the best; you don't even notice it as dissonance. I've never met anyone who didn't like this song.
4. A Winged Victory for the Sullen - Atomos VI
Probably my favorite currently active band. I think this is the best track on their new LP, with a lot of beautiful variety and interplay between electronic and classical instrumentation.
5. YOB - In Our Blood
The new YOB record has a strong progression from dark to light, which I love coming from a very heavy band.
6. Gorguts - Forgotten Arrows
It's easy to write consonant harmonies because there's so much precedent to draw on. We expect things to resolve in specific ways depending on context. It's hard to write good dissonance. Gorguts does a tremendous job of creating specific moods with innovative dissonance. They build up these hugely complex layers and then let it fall apart.
London-based producer Sinah (pronounced Xena) is debuting these days with a self-titled album. Hailing from Berlin, Sinah’s arresting style is influenced by a love of hip-hop, which she blends with dance elements and organic sitar sounds to create a unique electronic sound. Combined with her hypnotizing, ghostly vocals – a half-sung delivery she says is designed to bring to life the relatable anxiety of today’s youth – she has already drawn comparisons to the likes of FKA Twigs, Bat for Lashes, and Hundreds.
Haunting tune that really develops into something beautiful.
2. FKA Twigs - Papi Pacify
This was my first exposure to her music. It's brave to create so much space within a song and build it up that slowly without loosing the listener's interest.
3. Aphex Twin - Avril 24
To me one of the prettiest and most soothing piano tunes out there!
4. Ben Kahn - 1000
Slightly schizophrenic music which I usually avoid. This one deserves an exception though.
5. Forest Swords - Thor's Stone
Brilliant sounds and atmosphere. I love the tribal vibe to it.
6. Jacaszek - Lament
My all time favourite song and greatest live act I have seen so far.
7. Little Dragon - Pretty Girls
The production and sounds are great as well as the lyrics of the song. This track puts me in good mood straight away.
Samuel van Dijk is an electronic music producer, sound designer and media artist from the Netherlands, having released electronic music under a variety of projects, namely, Mohlao and VC-118A. With his current project Multicast Dynamics he creates ever-evolving sound textures culminating in intriguing soundscapes while preserving a tranquil cinematic atmosphere.
1. Vladislav Delay - Raamat
A soundtrack for vision. 2. Oddworld Inhabitants - Fire Free Zone
Ellen Meijers videogame ambient from 1997. 3. Brian Eno - Unfamiliar Wind (Leeks Hills)
Warm and dreamy electronics drawing cinematic landscapes. 4. Edward Artemyev - Stalker
Incredible soundtrack to a monolithic film. 5. Martin Stig Andersen - Mirage
Absorbing acousmatic music from Denmark. 6. M. Von Schommer - Untitled 9
Downtown Detroit 3:00AM covered in thick fog. 7. Phalangius - Falcklands Flashback: Assault on Goose Green
Eccentric sound adventures played solely on a Roland Juno 6 synthesizer.
Dollboy is the project started back in 2001 by Oliver Cherer. He had been a fan of the early Eno records in my teens and had just discovered the ambient stuff and when he discovered the Laraaji album (Ambient 3).This period produced the first two Dollboy albums, "Plans For A Modern City" and "Casual Nudism", appearances on various compilatons and radio shows, a couple of 7" singles and remixes and acclaimed shows at The Big Chill. Now there's "Further Excursions Into The Ulu With Dollboy". The fifth Dollboy album is a vocal album of twelve songs. It's less electronic, there's more singing than before.
This has stillness, fragility, boldness, soul and intellectual rigour. It’s been with me since I was 15 but has been a regular touchstone throughout everything I have done in the last 15 years. Still sublime to me after more listens than is healthy.
2. The Jesus And Mary Chain - Just Like Honey
This, in its stark, bare bones simplicity taught me about melody in a way nothing before it did. When I first heard it on Janice Long’s Radio One show it soared and yet when I examined its constituent parts it seemed to be made of nothing.
3. Brian Eno - 1/1 Music For Airports
First hearing this was like being rescued after four years of making very noisy dance music and jolted me (gently) into making a series of ambient records of which I’m still proud. It also led me to making experiments which still occasionally reward with listenable and useable results.
4. David Bowie - Art Decade
This tune, amongst many, many others by Bowie strikes me as the perfect balance of craft, discipline, art, pop, cool and cultural savvy that I’d love to stumble upon one day. It exudes decadence and elegance in equal measure and I have not made my last attempt to steal it.
5. Matching Mole - O'Caroline
This sounds too simple to be this breathtakingly beautiful. How do you do that?
6. Jack Hayter (featuring Suzanne Rhatigan) - Sisters Of St Anthony
I can’t overstate how important my friends are to me as an artistic influence. Jack has a rigorous approach to his words which work, for me, as a bench mark to which I can only aspire. Jack will never include a throw-away line and will agonise over the right words until they are just that – right. This sets him apart.
7. King Creosote and John Hopkins - John Taylor’s Month Away
I came to this a year late and it made such an impact that I’m still working on avoiding the slavish copying of this tune and others from this record.
Old Lost John is the folk-noir project of singer-songwriter Tomas Thunberg. He used to be a woodsman and a horse-keeper. These days he lives in Malmo, Sweden, delivering newspapers in the morning hours and writing songs in the evening.
A true masterpiece by one of my absolute favourite songwriters. His picking, phrasing, relaxed delivery and lyrical imagery have all been pivotal to my development as both writer and performer.
2. Gordon Lightfoot - The Ballad of Yarmouth Castle
Less famous than his other shipwreck epic about The Edmund Fitzgerald, this was nevertheless the one that caught most of my attention. Solid picking, no chorus and a set of lyrics that plays like a movie before your eyes.
3. Bert Jansch - Rosemary Lane
Bert Jansch was my guiding light into the world of Britsh fingerstyle folk, and this traditional the first song to catch my ear.
4. Townes Van Zandt - Our Mother the Mountain
For a long time, I was only familiar with two or three TVZ songs, and it wasn't until I dug deeper and found mournful gems like Rake, St John the Gambler and this enigmatic masterpiece that I got hooked for real. It reads like an evil fairytale, shrouded in mystery.
5. Christy Moore - One Last Cold Kiss (Live in Dublin 1978)
Written by Felix Pappalardi and originally recorded by heavy rockers Mountain, brilliantly interpreted by Irish folk hero Christy Moore. The arrangement is a whirlwind of various stringed instruments and made me wanna get myself a mandolin to go with the guitar.
6. Bob Dylan - The Man in the Long Black Coat
One of Dylan's darkest and most atmospheric songs. Daniel Lanois' production ideal with a close and warm centre surrounded by distant embellishments has always been a strong influence.
7. Hank Williams - Alone and Forsaken
Hank wrote a barrelful of songs but very few in a minor key. When I first heard this, it was an instant favourite with me and a song that I used to cover in my formative years. And what young man hasn't at one point or another felt completely alone and forsaken?
Michiru Aoyama is a 29 year old ambient composer from Kyoto. He studied electronic music in Berlin and the result of that journey lead him to ambient music. Fast forward a couple of years and the young producer has managed to showcase an understanding of experimental music that rivals that of already established artists in the genre. His most recent piece, which holds the title In A Dream is a true soundtrack for the ambient aficionado worldwide releases by Shimmering Moods Records
Allysen Callery is self taught folk artist from Rhode Island, USA, with an intricate & unique finger style, & a voice that has been called mesmerizing & angelic. Her first two albums Hopey (2007) & Hobgoblin’s Hat (2010) were self released, but reached an international audience, thanks to radio stations. Her first EPs were released by Woodland Recordings. September 2013 marked Allysen’s 5th release, the full length Mumblin’ Sue on JellyFant Schallplatten. 2014 saw the release of an EP Allysen Callery Folk Radio UK Session.
1. The Incredible String Band - Witches Hat
I was a kid laying on an oriental rug in room filled of incense & furniture from Taiwan, the images in the song reflected where I was , & who I would become. ISB taught me that there need not be chorus verse/chorus verse in every song, but you could just do whatever you wanted.
2. Steeleye Span - Edwin
When I was just picking up guitar as a teenager I was drawn to murder ballads especially, and also wanted to play finger-style as my father had done. I loved how the songs were written on a loop, and that style influenced my songwriting a lot. I also loved how you could tell a compelling story within a song. Later on I recorded a version of this song for my record Winter Island.
3. The Rolling Stones - Lady Jane
The first few bars of this song break my heart, before even the singing starts. I love that music can take us away and make us feel strong emotions, it doesn't matter what language we speak, we can just understand.
4. The Yardbirds - For Your Love
I was 13 and there was a boy I liked, we were hanging out at night in a park and I decided I would sing to him. I sang For Your Love, and a few others...it worked and we ended up making out.
5. Cat Power - Devils Daughter/Troubled Waters
When I was still playing in my bedroom I read an article about Cat Power and looked her up. When she sings she is almost acting, there is so much emotion in her beautiful voice. She played slow, sad songs, and I no longer felt alone. In the beginning most of my set list was Cat Power covers, of covers she had been doing. Cat Power/Chan Marshall made me feel like it could be done . She gave me so much courage.
6. Neil Young - Like a Hurricane
Neil Young was another big influence on my early days of learning guitar, he played easy chords and had simple lyrics , yet went so incredibly deep. It's the way he sings it, with that weird reedy voice, so honest and true.
7. Joni Mitchell - You Turn Me on I'm a Radio
It's always a beautiful sunny day when this song comes on, we're in the car and driving to the beach. We're in love or something close. To me, music is being able to tune into what someone else is all about, sometimes it's static and sometimes it's clear as a bell and you can sing along.
36 is the experimental (mainly) ambient project of Dennis Huddleston from the United Kingdom. Since 2008, the focus for the project has been to develop warm, hugely emotive loop-based compositions, with particular emphasis on melody and melancholic atmosphere.
The End is one of my absolute favourite tracks of all time. It's a synth instrumental sitting quite awkwardly at the end of a vocal disco album. It felt totally out of place on the album, but that's what makes it so special. It really blew me away the first time I heard it. It has this really infectious melody and driving progression that just floods me with happy memories. It's a tune that never felt like anything else I've ever heard.
2. Future Sound of London - Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea started my love affair with FSOL, which continues to this day. When I think of the absolute classic UK club tunes from the 90s, this is the one that sits above all the rest. The best tunes explore the full gamut of human responses and this one has it all. Uplifting, energetic, yet also quite melancholic. They've made some really exceptional albums over the years, but this will always be my go-to FSOL tune, simply because nearly 25 years after it was produced, nobody has yet to match it's brilliance.
3. Metalheads - Kemistry
I grew up listening to the UK hardcore and blossoming jungle scene in the early/mid 90s and it's a special era for me. It was a time of rampant experimentalism and the records released in 1992 were so abstract and alien. It's no wonder the UK government shit itself when flash raves of 10,000 people suddenly sprang out of nowhere, taking over fields, blasting out gunshots and airhorns! My favourite record of this era was by Goldie and his proto-Metalheadz gang, who released this amazing 4 track EP called Terminator. It's one of the most respected and influential records and ridiculously ahead of it's time. My favourite tune is Kemistry, but the whole EP doesn't have a single bad track on it. That's what I love about this record. Every single tune could have been a single, but they went the extra mile and released them all together on one legendary 12".
4. Tangerine Dream - Love On A Real Train
Love on A Real Train is a track most people should know by now. It's a timeless piece of music, that I must have probably played hundreds of times and still get goose bumps listening to it. Edgar Froese sadly passed away earlier this year, but his musical legacy will live forever, with this track as his crowning achievement for me.
5. Pulusha - Isolation
Isolation encapsulates everything I love about ambient music. It's warm, ultra-emotional introspective music, that paints a thousand pictures in your mind when listening to it. Mark Pritchard is a genius really, who can seemingly touch every genre of music and do something special with it.
6. Autechre - VLetrmx21
Autechre are two of my favourite producers and I have a lot of respect for them. They've had this uncompromising vision from the start and made some truly original music over the past 25 years. Along with Aphex Twin, they pretty much moulded my love of abstract electronic music. Though I love all their stuff, it's their more "traditional" ambient track 'VLetrmx21' that is my favourite of theirs. Again, it's a high point in what makes ambient music so attractive for me. It's an incredibly deep, ultra-emotional tune, that sounds like the soundtrack to a dying star.
7. Vangelis – Blade Runner Blues
Pretty self-explanatory for this one. Simply the most beautifully made sci-fi film and soundtrack ever.
Thomas Jonsson (born 1979) is an artist of the Swedish indie/folk underground scene. With an expression equally from the contemporary scene and the songsmiths' golden era he has toured extensively in Europe and made a few appearances in US. He has done many albums under different monikers (Thomas Denver Jonsson, Topeka Twins, A perfect friend, I'm Kingfisher) and collaborated with artists such as Jennie Stearns, Rosie Thomas, Damien Jurado, Ned Oldham, Bobby Baby, Dear Euphoria and C-J Larsgarden.
One of my best and most inspiring musical friends Elina Johansson, formerly doing music as Dear Euphoria, is now resurrecting with an EP in April as Eli Na. I was mesmerized by her music when I got to know her around 2005-2006 and she guested both my third album as well as my newest fifth. Her music was one of a few really important things that inspired me to take my own songs in a direction away from the retro alt.country and into a more indie/folk-inspired style.
2. Dwight Yoakam - Second Hand Heart
And speaking about direction. All of a sudden I got this really huge craving for Dwight Yoakam this past winter. I've been listening a lot to his '87 album Hillbilly Deluxe. And now he's releasing a new excellent album, back on the Reprise label where he once started. I don't know what to make of this massive impact of his music in terms of my own songwriting. To be honest, I'm not too comfortable by the thought of doing honky tonk and wearing a stetson hat. So I don't know what to do, I just know I have to do something.
3. Ash - Girl from Mars
From when it was released 1996, every time I listen to this, I'm just stunned. It's a perfect pop song.
4. Johnny Cash - If you could read my mind
Regarding acoustic ballads, this is one of the best and one of the best versions ever made. Johnny Cash is treating every syllable with such comfort and pain. And the lyrics are excellent, never standing still, always in transformation. It's a heartbreaking, undramatic end of a relationship. About things just happening over the course of time, with no obvious reason. It's a topic I often return to myself and this song makes me cry every time.
5. Tom Rush - Child's song
On the same topic, another one of those stripped, reflecting songs I adore. About cutting the strings to your family
and your childhood. About following your dreams. About farewells. God, I want Tom Rush to guest on my next album.
6. M. Ward - Lullaby + Exile
M. Ward is my favorite artist and guitarist. I couldn't do a list like this and not mentioning him. He's so timeless and riveting plus his guitar technique is a joy just watching. I've watched M. Ward play a couple of times and after that I got really interested in trying to take the guitar to new places, instead of just being a dull backing instrument.
7. New Partner - Home
Went on tour with this band just a few weeks ago and not only did we became good friends (I usually don't
like people - but I like them!), their twisted, broken, sore folkpop gave me some answers how to finish some songs I got stuck with for my next album. Something how the beautiful, broken, fun and insane can collide.
There is no "quartet" as such - just several supporting musicians revolving around German composer Thomas Bucker - but the name does suggest the intimacy of chamber music if not its small-scale sound. The self-titled debut album contains slow, lumbering breakbeats cradling warm strings, and dark chords rendered with moody synths. The second album, simply called II, is a sort of movie music for the mind, and has been released by Denovali in 2012.
01. Jean-Michel Jarre - Ethnicolor
Most impact in my childhood. 02. Burial - Ghost hardware
My favorite kind of clubmusic. 03. Mouse On Mars - Bib
Wonderful organic electronic music. 04. My Bloody Valentine - Soon
The beauty of distortion (1). 05. Tim Hecker - Stags, aircraft, kings and secretaries
The beauty of distortion (2). 06. The Necks - Sex
The beauty of repetition. 07. Lucrecia Dalt - Ara
Simply lovely music - reminds me of good times at madeiradig ... (feel free to google).
Coastal formed in 1999 as a hybrid of several musicians who had played for years in different bands in the Provo, Utah area. The band debuted on Words On Music in 2001 with a self-titled album which is an inspired blend of restraint and tonal splendor, punctuating the contemplative atmospheres developed by artists such as Low and Ida. The album was released to great acclaim, and songs from Coastal were played by John Peel, the renowned British DJ, on his BBC Radio 1 show. In 2015 they released a collection of singles and unreleased stuff named Beneath the snow and streetlights.
Huge open space between the piano notes. Beautiful melodies. Painfully honest lyrics. Slow tempo. Dreamy. A lot of people think I was influenced by Low but I was way more into Velour 100 when Coastal was formed.
2. Hammock - Blankets of Night
This song knocked me on the ground the first time I heard it. Still does. If I could sound like any band I think it would be these guys. Brilliant.
3. The Cocteau Twins - Primitive Heart
One of the few songs we’ve covered as a band. I proposed to Luisa while this song was playing. Been a huge fan of this band for years.
4. Red House Painters - Mistress
Hugely influential to me. Amazing how he can craft such pain with such beauty. Achingly sad, yet soothing music.
5. The Field Mice – If You Need Someone
I’m a huge Sarah Records fan. The album Coastal by the Field Mice was an inspiration for our band name. I actually got a coastal CD to Bob Wratten and he dug it and complimented the name.
6. Slowdive - Waves
One of the first Slowdive songs I heard in the early 90s. They’ve been a massive influence on me since then. Amazing to see them live last year. We went together as a band. Spoke to Al from Low at the gig and reminisced about playing with them in London circa 2003.
7. Siouxie and the Banshees – The Ghost in You
I can’t claim to be a longtime Siouxie fan but this song stops me in my tracks every time I hear it. Love the imagery it conjures.
Jessica Bailiff is an American singer-songwriter from Toledo, Ohio. She has been defined the queen of drone-folk. Bailiff was discovered by Low's Alan Sparhawk, who recommended her earlier demos to Kranky Records, the label on which Bailiff later recorded. Bailiff collaborated and released records with acts such as Odd Nosdam of anticon. and cLOUDDEAD fame, Low's Alan Sparhawk, Dave Pearce of Flying Saucer Attack, Casino Versus Japan, Rivulets and Annelies Monseré amongst others.
Hearing FSA the first time ("My Dreaming HIll") propelled me into an obsession with recording at home. "Light In the Evening" inspired me to try to make songs that conveyed certain feelings using a contrast of harsh sounds and soft vocal melodies.
2. Low - On the Edge Of
I was amazed at how this three-piece band, whom I'd followed since their first album, could develop like this - from slow, minimal songs to lush ones full of sonic impact and beauty. Truly raw, brave, and emotional words in this one, and a great example of why Al's my favorite lyricist.
3. Codeine - Cave-In
The first few years I was writing with guitar, I stumbled upon Codeine songs all the time (which led to me covering one). It was frustrating and precious. I still adore them.
4. Nick Drake - Hazey Jane II
I was never a great guitarist or singer (Nick Drake, to me, was both), so I don't know how this song influenced me. But I do know that I listened to it a lot, especially in times of anxiety - it always calmed and re-centered me somehow.
5. Radiohead - Like Spinning Plates
The production on the album version of this is great - curious and playful recording techniques and sounds. It's also one of the most successful songs I've heard, as far as the music emulating what's being sung about.
6. Nico - Janitor of Lunacy
The simplicity of instrumentation is always compelling in this era of Nico's work. I love the idea of singing your guts out to a harmonium and nothing else.
7. My Bloody Valentine - I Need No Trust
There was a time when I absolutely devoured each song by my favorite bands. I would sit in front of my stereo and pan a song to the left channel, and then to the right, in order to hear more detail in an instrument or lyric, and pick it apart to see how it was done. I'd also re-EQ a song to bring out the part I was trying to figure out. I remember doing that with this song, and thinking I could hear that different vocal takes had been used make the one track that Kevin Shields sings. It was a sort of epiphany.
Michael Walton is an electronic musician based in County Durham in the UK. He officially started mwvm in the fall of 2005, but he’s been experimenting with delay pedals & recording techniques since 1996. He has spent the last few years refining his sound, focusing on guitar manipulation, repetition, & ambience. His minimal creations are produced in a self-induced solitary environment; but within this isolation, he found that his music could capture the interests of a larger audience both nationally & internationally.
Probably the reason I picked up a Telecaster in the first place. First time I heard the guitar played in an unusual way. I still love the Binson Echorec feeding back - Syd played it like an instrument in its own right. I realised I didn't need lyrics to enjoy music. Not my favourite Pink Floyd song but a big influence. All their early stuff was.
2. Jean Michel Jarre - Oxygene Part 1
It still sounds like music that belongs in outerspace - even now. Our Ian (my brother) was the biggest influence introducing the electronic stuff. I love the EHX small stone on the strings but equally I also love the emotional dynamics of the song.
3. Neu - Hallogallo
My head nods instantly as soon as the rhythm kicks in. Classic krautrock. The minimal bass line, hypnotic drums and repetition. This is instant good feeling record.
4. Gong - Flying Teapot
Daevid Allen was the glissando guitar king in my opinion. It had a huge impact on me in using a slide to get a violin/cello effect. A good friend from work introduced me to Gong and the Canterbury scene. I think the majority of their stuff is a bit rubbish ...but you know - the glissando guitar spaced out stuff is sublime. I get instant gratification using this slide technique. The song is only 1/5th glissando but it also has great riffs and a hypnotic vibe.
5. Soft Machine - Out-Bloody-Rageous
The tape loops at the beginning of this song are immense. You could knock this type of thing up on computers in seconds these days days. Though back in the day they cut tape, slowed it down, played it backwards and sped it up. A lovely collage. Big influence on me. Primarily Soft Machine had a jazz influence. Lots of solos etc... but I do love their spacer riffer stuff... very nice.
6. Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Storm
I like all the gybe songs. This one in particular gives me tremendous pleasure. It has all the peaks and troughs dynamically and emotionally. I could run through a brick wall after listening to this record. They have a shephard tone thing going on with their ascending charge. But equally I love the harmonic strings and quieter parts. Not a dull moment in this song. Perfection.
7. Stars of the Lid - Requiem For Dying Mothers part 1
No one can argue the fact that Adam Wiltzie produces fantastic drones/ambient records. This has everything. It is how I want an ambient record sound. The tone/timbre of the swells, the plucks, the repetition. It is a perfect song. His other music - Dead Texan and A Winged Victory For the Sullen are also tremendous works of art. The guy is a ridiculously talented musician.
In a recent show preview, one Portland music critic wrote, "Which Rllrbll will show up?" It was an acknowledgement of Rllrbll's voracious creative appetite. They write smoky, dark, post-cabaret songs with accordian and dueling male-female vocal harmonies; blat out gnarled jazz-damaged improvisations with reeds, brass, shakers, and wild-eyed drumming; make you ache with melodic bass-and-piano-driven drifters; and get you up with skronking noise-beat laced with samples. They are always exploring, they fairly teeter into chaos, but their strong personalities always ensure that they are not too scattered.
I first heard this song at a party in a small town in Montana. There was a blizzard outside and I was sitting at a kitchen table. This song makes a strong visual and created an energy that changed music for me.
2. Screaming Trees - Caught Between
My first christmas alone ever. This song on repeat. Still holds up forever for me.
3. Sonic Youth - Wish fulfillment
This band influenced me heavily. Especially how they all brought songs in and each person had a style. Lee will always be my favorite.
4. Three Mile Pilot - Eastern wave
Pall is one of my most favorite singers... his lyrics and voice.. all of it. The bass is incredible. Saw them 2 years ago and it still meant the world to me after all these years.
5. Red Red Meat - Braindead
Best times in Portland so long ago. Sitting on a couch with my friends freaking out over this band. Lost in sound and words so you forget where you are. I love Califone just as much
6. Dog Faced Hermans - Keep your laws off my body
I saw this band at Satyricon for 5 dollars. It was like a huge lesson in respecting what music is and how it can help put words of power out there to create change. Magic.
7. Waylon Jennings - Walk on out of my mind
Moves me to drink and cry and hope i can write a song half as good as he does!
When Claudine and Chook first started discussing a common musical project in the winter of 2010, they came from completely different worlds. He had discovered DJ-ing as a teenager and soon made a name for himself not only as a turntable artist, but also as a drum&bass producer; she was a singer-songwriter touring with a folk-rock band and had an admiration for the likes of Tom Waits, Van Morrison and Joni Mitchell. The result of this collaboration is Monophona, a blend of two extremes, electronic and intimate, melodic and innovative. On stage, the line-up is completed by percussionist Jorsch, equally at home in both musical worlds.
They contributed two songs each (Chook 1-2, Claudine 3-4, Jorsch 5-6) and chose one song that the three of them like (7)
1. Nas - Illmatic
Nas' "Illmatic" is simply one of the greatest hip hop albums of all time.
2. Trentemøller - Even though you're with another girl
Trentremøller has been a huge influence on the music I make.
3. The Smiths - Handsome Devil
I love The Smiths and Morrissey - I think he is one of the best lyricists ever. This is one of my favourite songs of theirs. "There's more to life than books, you know, but not much more." I agree.
4. Elvis Costello - Shipbuilding
The perfect song. And it says it all about the absurdity of war: "With all the will in the world, diving for dear life, when they could be diving for pearls."
5. Led Zeppelin - Whole Lotta Love
This was the song that shifted my attention from classical music to rock.
6. Trentemøller - Vamp
Trentemøller's music opened up a new world of sounds for me.
7. Fink - Trouble's what you're in
The three of us really like Fink's music and we were delighted when we got the opportunity to open for him in Luxembourg.
Nick Grey has been releasing experimental yet highly emotional music since 2002. His songs are an expressive, soulful blend of torpid acoustic arrangements and unpredictable electronics, underlined by melancholic and often ironic lyrics. The Wire magazine described is music as “eccentric and highly literary”.
I don’t listen to very much music these days anymore, but when I do, I usually return to old friends. The first Roxy Music album is among the oldest - and this song in particular. The mood shifts - from the aether to the ravine and back - at work here are absolutely incredible.
2. Tim Buckley - Driftin’
Every Tim Buckley record is a masterpiece in its own right, but Lorca’s tonal and rhythmic explorations made it such a staple for me for years. If I allowed myself to be consciously influenced by artists I adore, I’d try to replicate Driftin’s guitar tone.
3. Klaus Schulze - 1. Satz : Ebene
Quite regularly, various events and occurrences in my life force me to temporary retirement. I then sign out and disappear for a certain amount of time. And while I do, I listen to “Irrlicht”.
4. The Stooges - We Will Fall
I cannot stress enough how important the first Stooges album is. “We Will Fall” isn’t among their most-loved pieces, and I could never quite comprehend why. It sounds as much Marble-Index-Era-Cale than Iggy and the Ashetons, and that is precisely why it left an even stronger mark on me than the rest of the record, which is of course incredible but much more straightforward.
5. The Strawbs - New World
Cruel, edgy prog-folk at its finest. The sheer intensity of this track always left me breathless, and to me this piece stands out from the rest of their discography, which is also a huge part of my listening habits. An indiscutable influence: certainly, the mantra “Let them rot” has twisted my mind at an early age and brought me to my current musical aberrations.
6. The Loom Soundtrack
Another one that made quite an impression on my young self. Tchaikovsky played by a 1990 home computer! Beautiful, haunting. Later, of course, I would investigate further, unearthing Wendy Carlos, Bruce Haack, Isao Tomita, Raymond Scott… but in 1990, the Loom soundtrack was all my 12-year old self needed to travel the cosmos. (Played the game on Atari ST, if I remember correctly)
7. The Wedding Present – Octopussy
In my opinion, this album by the Wedding Present delivers the same sort of cathartic experience one can expect from, perhaps, a Swans concert, only with a slightly happier outcome: a bitter, gut-wrenching masterpiece that leaves you dried out but ready to start anew. « Dalliance » is one of the finest album openers ever too, but « Octopussy »'s subtlety made me obsess over it for quite a while.
Barzin is a Canadian singer-songwriter known for his slow and melancholic folksongs. He has recorded many EPs and albums; the last one, called To Live Alone in That Long Summer, it's been released on 2014 by Monotreme & Ghost Records.
If permitted, a few opening remarks. Some of the artists who have been influential to me are those who have managed to create a sound so compelling and captivating that it is as important as the songs they create. It is hard to choose one song from their canon and say that it has been their most influential song. Since this project is about songs that have been inspirational, I will try to keep that as the focus. But I do like to tip my hat to some of these artists whose sound has been very influential and inspirational to me. Some of the bands/artists who fall into this category are: Parker and Lily, Tindersticks, Mick Turner, Frankie Sparo.
1. Bob Dylan – Visions of Johanna
Dylan has gone through so many different stages that the only other person that rivals him is Bowie. But the Dylan that I love the best is the one from the Visions of Johanna phase. Lyrically, he walked on the edge of comprehension during this period; it wasn’t complete surrealism, and it wasn’t the straight storytelling of his early years. This song is filled with lines like this: “Inside the museums, infinity goes up on trial. Voices echo, this is what salvation must be like after a while”. “Visions of Johanna” really opened up my eyes to the power of words and what one can do with them. This is one of the songs I always return to when writing my own songs. Every time I hear it, I feel I am being given permission to allow the chaos of my mind to spill out onto the world.
2. Erik Satie – Gymnopedie
Satie always fulfills my endless love of minimalistic music as well as solo piano pieces. But what’s so wonderful about this piece is how the emotions behind it are so ambiguous. I have always gravitated towards pieces whose emotions are not apparent. It’s almost as though a new emotion has been introduced into the world as a result of this piece.
3. Lou Reed – Walk on The Wild Side
In The history of Rock ‘n roll, I think many bands have tried to embody the sound of “cool” in their music. But the “cool” that I love is found in the music of Velvet Underground, and more specifically in this song. I constantly return to bands who I use to love when I was younger, and often times, I find their music has failed to age well with time, and I begin to see the sound they stood for or represented as being a little adolescent. But this song never seems to lose its appeal. This is a great snapshot of what “cool” is, in my humble opinion.
4. Led Zeppelin - Bron Yr aur
Every time I hear a Zeppelin song, I get sentimental, because they were very influential to me during my formative years. I must have been 13-14 when I first heard their music, and it really left a deep mark on me. As a teenager, I loved Zeppelin along with all the other classic rock bands like Doors, Hendrix, Bowie, Stones, etc.... “Bron Yr Aur” opened up a whole new world for me. The song is played using a Open C turning on the guitar, and that was something that was very new to me. I became really interested, not only in instrumental pieces, but also with experimenting with open turnings on guitar. I would sit around for hours with friends as we tried to figure out this song so we could play it.
5. Leonard Cohen – Suzanne
This song comes as close to a perfect song as possible, if such a thing even exists. Cohen has always set the standards when it comes to lyrics. And he has achieved magnificent heights in many of his songs, but with Suzanne he reaches a new height. In “Suzanne” I feel one is listening to a true poet who has found the perfect balance between music and words. Everything that Cohen has always written about- Love, God, Sex, Longing, desire, etc... comes together in this song in a perfect way.
6. George Harrison – Long Long Long
Of all the great songs that the Beatles have written, this one continues to stick out for me. I know it’s a strange choice, but I find this song to be so great and fantastic. I love the production, especially the drums. Love George’s delivery. And the use of space in this song. But most importantly, I love the feeling behind this song. That’s what keeps me coming back to it.
7. Mark Hollis – Watershed
Anyone who has fallen under the spell of the band Talk Talk will know what I am talking about when I talk about Mark Hollis. He is probably one of the most expressive singers I have ever come across. It’s not just the fact that he has such a unique voice, but there is something intangible about his singing that draws you in. Talk Talk was a simple pop band and when they started, but in the span of 4 records they grew and matured into a great band, which is reflected in their recordings. This song reflects so many qualities that I admire about this band--experimentation with arrangements and recording, brining subtle elements of jazz into the world of pop, and Mark Hollis’ exceptional and unique singing style.
