Tarwater and Tibor
Apr. 14th, 2005 12:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomus
Will I tell you what I often do on my blog? I often recommend records I haven't bought. I still haven't bought the Books album I recommended so warmly to you last month. It's because I'm such an emotional communist that I don't really like spending the money, and I'm not really hooked up with any downloading services. I mean, I don't have the hard disk space, even if I were. And anyway, I want the sleeves. So I will eventually buy the Books album, and I'll also eventually buy The Needle Was Travelling by Tarwater (Morr Music).
I've been buying Tarwater records since I picked up Animals, Suns & Atoms in a record shop on Orchard Street, New York, in late 2000. I liked the sleeve, which looks like it's shot in Jamaica. In fact, dub did seem to figure in Tarwater's textural landscape, but the thing that really came through was some German-Manchester-80s thing. They seemed to incarnate all the best parts of the left-field quirky electronic pop I've always liked. A bit of early song-based Brian Eno in Bernd Jestram's arrangements, a trace of Wire in the lyrics, a German Manchester glum "coldness" in Roland Lippok's singing. Something Martin Hannet-like in the production, blipperty-strange. Bowie's Lodger. Even a more experimental New Order, like the New Order of Turn The Heater On, their Peel session reggae cover. It was perhaps the day I bought Animals, Suns & Atoms in New York that Berlin started calling to me. I bought Silur, Tarwater's earlier, less poppy album. Then I moved to Berlin. Then I bought some more Tarwater records, and started seeing the Lippok brothers around town (like the Nicolai brothers, they're a fixture in the art / music world here. One of them's in To Rococo Rot, you know.)
Well, the new Tarwater is The Needle Was Travelling. I've listened to samples from all the tracks, and it sounds exactly like the kind of thing I love. Some people have complained that they've gone in too poppy a direction, but I think the balance between pop and oddity is just right. I mean, I'll tell you for sure when I buy the record. In the meantime, here's a review and here are some full tracks. Actually, I couldn't get those songs to work, but I liked the way the BBC described them: "the kind of avant-pop opulence that Brian Eno used to dish up back in his pre-ambient days." I hear Eno is working on songs again right now, but I doubt they'll have this satisfying blipperty-bloppitty quirky thing that Tarwater have going for them.Here's a thing you don't even need to buy. It's totally wonderful. It's a reading, set to music, of Oscar Wilde's story The Happy Prince. My Hungarian friend Tibor made it. Tibor lived in Berlin a couple of years ago, but now he's back in Budapest. He works in advertising, but he also makes minimalist electronic music. The Wilde track moved me to tears. It also reminded me of some of the stuff Shazna and I did with our project Milky.
Tibormade: The Happy Prince (mp3 file)
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(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 10:27 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 10:53 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 11:01 am (UTC)Tarwater
Date: 2005-04-14 11:04 am (UTC)And since she's in the jpeg at the top of your post, let me also put in a good word for Masha Qrealla--"I Want You To Know" is a brilliant piece of glitch-pop; I adore it and can't wait to hear more!
Hmmmm...maybe I should be living in Berlin, too...
(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 12:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 01:13 pm (UTC)"Emotional" communists don't subject themselves to political violence and intimidation, do they.
I find it very hard to believe that people who experience/d communism share the same romantic view that you (and for that matter, anyone living in a free society, free to express his/her views without fear) so emotionally identifies with. It is understandable that one might find the ideals behind this or other political/social doctrine attractive, but one should keep in mind that in practice, this "noble" ideal has manifested itself (in reality and throughout history) in the form of millions, MILLIONS, murdered, starved and oppressed - All in the name of communism.
North Korean death camps, Russian gulags and Cambodia's killing fields are not as aesthetic as Vietnamese schoolbooks or Russian propaganda posters, Agreement here. Nevertheless they are part of the same emotional package in my humble opinion.
That said, any "emotional" communist who can come up with "The Guitar Lesson" (originator of first-time shags) or "Sea Song" is just fine with me.
Oh, and that "Happy prince" piece is beautiful. The feminine answer to Richard Jobson after 2 valiums and Ben Watt.
Sorry for posting anonymomus
Date: 2005-04-14 01:16 pm (UTC)Completely unrelated to post, but may be of interest to you and fellow readers of imomus...
Date: 2005-04-14 01:25 pm (UTC)http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050413/ap_on_re_us/secret_service_exhibit_5
If you want to see more on the artwork itself, go here:
http://cspaces.colum.edu/
yay Bush and your administration. So much for the right of dissent.
Re: Completely unrelated to post, but may be of interest to you and fellow readers of imomus...
Date: 2005-04-14 01:27 pm (UTC)Re: Completely unrelated to post, but may be of interest to you and fellow readers of imomus...
Date: 2005-04-14 01:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 03:15 pm (UTC)Thanks again.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 04:51 pm (UTC)Since your LJ reaches so many people and you often talk about the music you are listening to, why not just request a review copy?
(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 05:02 pm (UTC)Music for communists
Date: 2005-04-14 06:32 pm (UTC)You should be able to get a 160 gb firewire drive for somewhere in the vicinity of €120. I have the cheapest available iBook, with a paltry 27 gb, but because I appreciate portability, I've been making do with it, though these firewire drives are tempting as something I could leave at home most all the time. Being a musician, you might see more a benefit. My mother is a photographer (with the same iBook) and she couldn't exist without one.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 09:00 pm (UTC)It is a sweet story. Oscar's face is slipping, revealing his mask. Of all his work, I've always had a soft spot for Lady Windermere's Fan, perhaps for similar reasons.
I've recorded some of my readings, but they always come out sounding like a poor facsimile of the great Wallace Shawn. Perhaps I should pay a visit to Rex Harrison.
W
(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-14 09:24 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-15 07:28 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-15 06:09 am (UTC)Momus, you must hear Jeans Team's new album 'Music von Oben'. I recommended it before. They're a German synth-pop band. Definitely will be at the top of my list of 2005.
Patrick
(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-16 02:00 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-04-16 04:12 am (UTC)Hi
I've just discovered this site:
http://www.worldeventvillage.com/
check it out
TROY