It seems that events having to do with music rarely make headlines. In other forms of entertainment, such as sports, we can always count on hearing about the World Series or Super Bowl champion when that time of year comes around. In music however, the only thing close to a major yearly event is the Grammy Awards, which seems to get less and less important/respected every year. Though music is a huge part of so many people’s lives, it affects us all in different times and different places. Furthermore, developments happen slowly and aren’t fully realized until years later. With the exception of the Beatles’ concert on the Ed Sullivan show in 1964, I can’t think of single, specific music-making event that went down as truly significant in recent history. As you might have figured out by now, all this goes to say that music only makes news when people pass away. It’s just the nature of the partnership between music and the media.
Without a doubt, I can say that Michael Jackson is the most famous musician to die in my lifetime. I’m sure I can speak for many people to say this came as a shock. As unhealthy as he looked, that was the basically the norm and I never imagined that this giant would ever kick the bucket in the current decade, or even in the next one. His music, his oft-imitated dance moves, his tabloid appearances and all the jokes about him seemed to be as much a part of our culture as iPods and cell phones. Because of this, it will take us awhile to adjust to having the throne of pop sitting startlingly empty.
Shortly after hearing the news, I felt the need to pay my respects here on Page 43. To tell you the truth, I’m not that much more familiar with Jackson’s catalogue than the average 20-year-old. I’ve heard “Billie Jean” tons of times and attempted to do the moonwalk with little success. I’ve seen the music video for “Thriller,” grooved to the awesome bass of “I Want You Back” and sung along with “ABC” when it's been on the radio. I even bought a copy of Off the Wall a couple years ago and oddly enough, checked Thriller out from the library two days before MJ died. Nonetheless, I’m hardly an expert on the man’s career.
I can say this, however. Michael was tremendously talented and recorded some of the catchiest songs ever heard. It’s easy for music snobs like myself to scoff at people like Mr. Jackson while we listen to artsy bullshit all day long simply because that’s the route we’re supposed to take. Well you know what? Michael Jackson’s work is just too damn good to categorize as bubble gum music. Off The Wall is the only album I’m entirely familiar with but it’s instantly clear that this is a well-crafted record of substance AND style. I give the great producer Quincy Jones a huge credit for this, but if anyone out there this can listen Michael sing “Working Day and Night” and honestly not feel just a little bit inspired to bust a move, I pity you deeply.
A month ago, if I’d posted an homage to MJ, it might have been slightly weird. A common reaction might be, “Umm…yeah that’s nice and all but why are you throwing praise at a guy who spends his free time doing God knows what with small boys?” This is very sad. As we (myself included) got caught up in making fun of “Wacko Jacko,” we neglected how much life had screwed him over. The press, his own family, his management and just about everyone connected with him exploited his fame and the guy just wasn’t built to take it. I have no doubt he was an extreme oddball and certainly am not defending what he may or may not have done. Still, we’ll never know exactly what went on in Michael Jackson’s head and what he would have been like if he hadn’t become a global icon at 24. All that we have now is his music and I know I won’t stop listening to it till I’ve had enough. And trust me, that won’t be anytime soon.
P.S. Last week’s subheading was from Bob Dylan’s “Absolutely Sweet Marie.” Let’s see if anyone can guess the next one.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Monday, June 22, 2009
Back In the USA
After two weeks in China, I am back in the land of forks and knives. The trip was a true whirlwind of awesomeness. The group of 71 PLU students and faculty went to Beijing, Xi’an, Chengdu and Shanghai to play concerts in each city and look at the scenery along the way. If you’d like to know about all the sightseeing I’d be happy to tell you but as this is a music blog, I’m going to keep this post limited to that aspect of the adventure.
As I was anticipating, sharing jazz with unfamiliar listeners was a blast. In Xi’an particularly, the audience went absolutely crazy. Probably the closest I’ll ever be to rock stardom and that’s okay. Despite my varied experience playing music, this is the first sort of tour I’ve gone on and what a first taste! Each facility we played at was different from the next and of course, the best of all was the Great Wall of China. Not only did we play on the 4,000 mile partition, we played during a windstorm of epic proportions. Apparently the ancestors didn’t approve of our modern sounds.
Musically, China is an interesting combination of Eastern and Western styles. This is true for just about everything there but I thought is was interesting hearing Pearl Jam in the hotel gift shop shortly after seeing a Chinese flute/pipe player perform live at a restaurant. Another example of this is the music shop in Shanghai where I purchased my liuqin or Chinese mandolin. One half of the store was filled with guitars and band instruments, the other with gongs, erhus (Chinese violin equivalent) and pipas (Chinese lute equivalent).
I’ve written a few times about the never-ending abyss that is Western music. Popular, classical, and all that fall in to this category make up a more vast set of sounds than we can imagine. But focusing on Western music is often like looking only at the Milky Way instead of the entire universe. There are so many other styles of music, built on entirely different sets of fundamental principles. This is a bit overwhelming and I don’t claim to ever become an expert on any other musical system. Still, it’s important to know what else is out there at the very least.
It would take more than two weeks abroad to really digest anything substantial about the Chinese musical tradition but still, I’m now very interested and hope to spend this summer picking up recordings and teaching myself the liuqin. Speaking of summer, after my month-long hiatus, I plan on writing here with consistency again. Also, I may do some contributions to this sports blog a friend of mine has set up recently.
Lastly, congrats to Luke Freedman on getting the last subheading which was from The Beatles' "Hello Goodbye." Who’s up to the next challenge? And here’s the latest music review. It’s of the New Pornographers Twin Cinema album.
As I was anticipating, sharing jazz with unfamiliar listeners was a blast. In Xi’an particularly, the audience went absolutely crazy. Probably the closest I’ll ever be to rock stardom and that’s okay. Despite my varied experience playing music, this is the first sort of tour I’ve gone on and what a first taste! Each facility we played at was different from the next and of course, the best of all was the Great Wall of China. Not only did we play on the 4,000 mile partition, we played during a windstorm of epic proportions. Apparently the ancestors didn’t approve of our modern sounds.
Musically, China is an interesting combination of Eastern and Western styles. This is true for just about everything there but I thought is was interesting hearing Pearl Jam in the hotel gift shop shortly after seeing a Chinese flute/pipe player perform live at a restaurant. Another example of this is the music shop in Shanghai where I purchased my liuqin or Chinese mandolin. One half of the store was filled with guitars and band instruments, the other with gongs, erhus (Chinese violin equivalent) and pipas (Chinese lute equivalent).
I’ve written a few times about the never-ending abyss that is Western music. Popular, classical, and all that fall in to this category make up a more vast set of sounds than we can imagine. But focusing on Western music is often like looking only at the Milky Way instead of the entire universe. There are so many other styles of music, built on entirely different sets of fundamental principles. This is a bit overwhelming and I don’t claim to ever become an expert on any other musical system. Still, it’s important to know what else is out there at the very least.
It would take more than two weeks abroad to really digest anything substantial about the Chinese musical tradition but still, I’m now very interested and hope to spend this summer picking up recordings and teaching myself the liuqin. Speaking of summer, after my month-long hiatus, I plan on writing here with consistency again. Also, I may do some contributions to this sports blog a friend of mine has set up recently.
Lastly, congrats to Luke Freedman on getting the last subheading which was from The Beatles' "Hello Goodbye." Who’s up to the next challenge? And here’s the latest music review. It’s of the New Pornographers Twin Cinema album.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Wiegand EP ℗
Most of you have probably been guided to here by my little facebook message today. Without further ado, here are the MP3s, here are the lyrics, and here is the artwork. (edit: Apparently some of the lyrics aren't accurate. The Word document has a couple errors, not the recording. Now it's too late to change as I leave tomorrow, 5/25. I tried. Sorry!) Basically, this is my sustainable/cheapo way of releasing the original music I’ve been working on this semester. The following paragraphs are more or less the liner notes to this short album so hopefully you will read them after downloading the music. As far as downloading goes, it’s pretty straightforward and doesn’t take very long, despite the fact that RapidShare tries to get you to pay for faster service. If you have any problems, let me know.
This spring semester, I decided to take composition lessons from a guy named Aaron English who was asked to teach at PLU by my past composition teacher and longtime faculty member, Gregory Youtz. I started taking from Aaron because his focus is on songwriting and popular music as opposed to the more classical approach of Dr. Youtz. I’ve loved studying with Dr. Youtz and plan to continue next year but I wanted to reconnect with my songwriting roots that I have so long neglected.
My lesson scheduling was unconventional since Aaron was on tour with his band in the Midwest for the first half of the semester. Instead of having an hour lesson once a week, I started having two-hour lessons every week halfway through the semester. I wrote the songs in February and March and started recording them in April down in the Wiegand Multimedia Lab (hence the title), located in the Morken Center for Learning & Technology, PLU’s new, fancy-schmancy, computer savvy building. During these past couple months, the emphasis of my lessons was learning Pro Tools recording software. It was a crash course (closer to the literal meaning than usual) but I eventually transferred my GarageBand skills over to the real professional recording software and was fairly proficient by the end.
The whole process was stressful for a plethora of reasons. First and foremost, having an ambitious project that takes hours and hours doesn’t go conveniently with being a busy college student. And of course, I started quite late because of the lesson schedule. Along with being foreign to Pro Tools and the whole mixer setup, the room where I worked is a public place, quite available to people who find pleasure in mixing up various cables, which was just a bundle of joy.
After what seemed like hundreds of setbacks, in late April, I finally got into a solid schedule of going down to the lab with all my bells and whistles and recording for several hours every weekend. Even with all the equipment funtioning right, recording is an extremely tedious, painstaking process. My already enormous respect for bands like XTC or Steely Dan whose recordings sound pristine just went way up after struggling to make something that was adequate in terms of quality/mistakes. During the last few weeks, Aaron gave me lots of helpful advice on mixing and manipulating the tracks. This Monday, May 18th, I burned the final disk to finish for good.
Musically and lyrically, I hope the songs will speak for themselves so I won’t go into what they are about. Let’s just say that the narrator (whomever that may be) had some odd experiences this year and felt the need to make sense of them through music. It’s definitely a thematic work and I tried to be intentionally repetitive with certain images (light, time, thoughts etc.) However, it was completely unintentional that four of the five songs are 4:20 give or take a few seconds. No reefer was used in the time writing or recording the songs, I promise.
I recorded using just about all the instruments I can play or attempt to play: guitar, trumpet, keyboard, ukulele and bass. There’s also a shaker and one song with a drum loop. Since the songs are fairly serious, I decided to give the work an arbitrary name, as everything else I thought of seemed too pretentious. Plus the word Wiegand (pronounced Wig-ind) is entertaining for some reason. Maybe because it sounds like Wiccan. Also, the artwork is a photograph by my friend Jon Post. Hopefully, you’ll be able to drag it right into iTunes.
I hope you enjoy what I’ve made. Overall, I’m fairly happy with it considering the circumstances. I may have been able to make a better recording with more time but not all that much better. My experience is limited so I am just happy to have actually finished what I started. Thanks for reading this and I’d love to hear what you think!
Copyright 2009 Ben Tully
This spring semester, I decided to take composition lessons from a guy named Aaron English who was asked to teach at PLU by my past composition teacher and longtime faculty member, Gregory Youtz. I started taking from Aaron because his focus is on songwriting and popular music as opposed to the more classical approach of Dr. Youtz. I’ve loved studying with Dr. Youtz and plan to continue next year but I wanted to reconnect with my songwriting roots that I have so long neglected.
My lesson scheduling was unconventional since Aaron was on tour with his band in the Midwest for the first half of the semester. Instead of having an hour lesson once a week, I started having two-hour lessons every week halfway through the semester. I wrote the songs in February and March and started recording them in April down in the Wiegand Multimedia Lab (hence the title), located in the Morken Center for Learning & Technology, PLU’s new, fancy-schmancy, computer savvy building. During these past couple months, the emphasis of my lessons was learning Pro Tools recording software. It was a crash course (closer to the literal meaning than usual) but I eventually transferred my GarageBand skills over to the real professional recording software and was fairly proficient by the end.
The whole process was stressful for a plethora of reasons. First and foremost, having an ambitious project that takes hours and hours doesn’t go conveniently with being a busy college student. And of course, I started quite late because of the lesson schedule. Along with being foreign to Pro Tools and the whole mixer setup, the room where I worked is a public place, quite available to people who find pleasure in mixing up various cables, which was just a bundle of joy.
After what seemed like hundreds of setbacks, in late April, I finally got into a solid schedule of going down to the lab with all my bells and whistles and recording for several hours every weekend. Even with all the equipment funtioning right, recording is an extremely tedious, painstaking process. My already enormous respect for bands like XTC or Steely Dan whose recordings sound pristine just went way up after struggling to make something that was adequate in terms of quality/mistakes. During the last few weeks, Aaron gave me lots of helpful advice on mixing and manipulating the tracks. This Monday, May 18th, I burned the final disk to finish for good.
Musically and lyrically, I hope the songs will speak for themselves so I won’t go into what they are about. Let’s just say that the narrator (whomever that may be) had some odd experiences this year and felt the need to make sense of them through music. It’s definitely a thematic work and I tried to be intentionally repetitive with certain images (light, time, thoughts etc.) However, it was completely unintentional that four of the five songs are 4:20 give or take a few seconds. No reefer was used in the time writing or recording the songs, I promise.
I recorded using just about all the instruments I can play or attempt to play: guitar, trumpet, keyboard, ukulele and bass. There’s also a shaker and one song with a drum loop. Since the songs are fairly serious, I decided to give the work an arbitrary name, as everything else I thought of seemed too pretentious. Plus the word Wiegand (pronounced Wig-ind) is entertaining for some reason. Maybe because it sounds like Wiccan. Also, the artwork is a photograph by my friend Jon Post. Hopefully, you’ll be able to drag it right into iTunes.
I hope you enjoy what I’ve made. Overall, I’m fairly happy with it considering the circumstances. I may have been able to make a better recording with more time but not all that much better. My experience is limited so I am just happy to have actually finished what I started. Thanks for reading this and I’d love to hear what you think!
Copyright 2009 Ben Tully
Thursday, May 14, 2009
The End of the Line
As the school year wraps up for me, I thought I’d write a brief summary of my musical education over the last eight months or so. I know I said these blog posts would focus on music above my own life but I’ve decided to bend the rules a little bit because this seems to make sense as it combines the two.
The main musical change that sticks out for this year is my appreciation of jazz. In September, I tried out on trumpet for the Wind Ensemble and University Jazz Ensemble because both groups were going to China in May. My first choice was the Wind Ensemble and the only reason I put down Jazz Ensemble was the potential of traveling. After butchering the jazz sight-reading exercise, I somehow got put in the group and will be off to Beijing on May 25th. I’ve played bass in a few jazz bands before but never trumpet. I’ve also never been in one this good and this serious. The immersion has been nothing short of incredible, as I’ve improved as a musician and expanded my horizons at least tenfold if these things can be measured.
I’m also about to finish up jazz theory class where Dr. David Joyner (also the jazz band director) has explained the basic concepts of improvisation and jazz harmony. The experience and formal music training has been invaluable and I’m excited beyond words to take one of the only truly American genres across the Pacific Ocean. Also, as luck would have it, I was recently assigned to write a review of a jazz album on rateyourmusic.com. I still wouldn’t consider myself a huge jazz fan but I appreciate it more than I ever thought possible.
Continuing with the academic side of my musical knowledge, I have taken piano, guitar, trumpet and composition lessons. In my composition lessons, I’ve written three brass quintet pieces and am almost done recording five songs (more to come about this…). There have also been music history and theory classes as mentioned earlier and I’m almost done with keyboarding and ear training forever, which is great! Basically, I take many music classes at school and I know more about it than I did a year ago. Insanity.
I’ve also gotten plenty of play counts logged on my trusty iTunes account. If there are three artists that I’ve fallen in love with over the past year, they would have to be Fleet Foxes, Elliott Smith and Grizzly Bear. I’m jealous of those of you who get to see the two current groups on that list at Sasquatch this year. As for Elliott, may he rest in peace and continue to make me believe that truly beautiful music can often come out of profound suffering.
Next week, I will be posting recordings of the EP I have been working on. I’ll go more into detail about it next week but for now, let me just say that I have spent a lot of time on these five songs. I should really be sleeping or studying right now so I’ll finish up. I am so ready for summer!!!
The main musical change that sticks out for this year is my appreciation of jazz. In September, I tried out on trumpet for the Wind Ensemble and University Jazz Ensemble because both groups were going to China in May. My first choice was the Wind Ensemble and the only reason I put down Jazz Ensemble was the potential of traveling. After butchering the jazz sight-reading exercise, I somehow got put in the group and will be off to Beijing on May 25th. I’ve played bass in a few jazz bands before but never trumpet. I’ve also never been in one this good and this serious. The immersion has been nothing short of incredible, as I’ve improved as a musician and expanded my horizons at least tenfold if these things can be measured.
I’m also about to finish up jazz theory class where Dr. David Joyner (also the jazz band director) has explained the basic concepts of improvisation and jazz harmony. The experience and formal music training has been invaluable and I’m excited beyond words to take one of the only truly American genres across the Pacific Ocean. Also, as luck would have it, I was recently assigned to write a review of a jazz album on rateyourmusic.com. I still wouldn’t consider myself a huge jazz fan but I appreciate it more than I ever thought possible.
Continuing with the academic side of my musical knowledge, I have taken piano, guitar, trumpet and composition lessons. In my composition lessons, I’ve written three brass quintet pieces and am almost done recording five songs (more to come about this…). There have also been music history and theory classes as mentioned earlier and I’m almost done with keyboarding and ear training forever, which is great! Basically, I take many music classes at school and I know more about it than I did a year ago. Insanity.
I’ve also gotten plenty of play counts logged on my trusty iTunes account. If there are three artists that I’ve fallen in love with over the past year, they would have to be Fleet Foxes, Elliott Smith and Grizzly Bear. I’m jealous of those of you who get to see the two current groups on that list at Sasquatch this year. As for Elliott, may he rest in peace and continue to make me believe that truly beautiful music can often come out of profound suffering.
Next week, I will be posting recordings of the EP I have been working on. I’ll go more into detail about it next week but for now, let me just say that I have spent a lot of time on these five songs. I should really be sleeping or studying right now so I’ll finish up. I am so ready for summer!!!
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Henry Purcell and Why He's Rad
Right now, in the spring semester of my sophomore year in college, I am taking Music History I. The course has covered Western music from Greek Antiquity up through the Baroque Era, which ended roughly in 1750. Part of the reason I have not posted here in so long is that I’ve been working on a paper about, you guessed it, English composer Henry Purcell. Unlike most of my peers, I enjoy this class. No, I do not love every second of digesting information about the ricercare and the toccata (if you care, these are two types of Baroque keyboard pieces). But the greater picture is fascinating. Slowly but surely, we sophomore PLU music majors are getting an idea of how music as we know it came to be.
My earlier post entitled “The Great Schism” delved into this, but learning about music of old is important for getting a grip on what are truly universal themes of great music. Take Henry Purcell’s opera Dido and Aeneas for example. Don’t worry, I won’t spew out all nine pages of my paper on this topic but I do think we can learn from this 320-year-old work. In 1689, when this opera was first performed, the world was a completely different place. People dressed differently, lived by different laws, had different concepts of science, were governed by a different system, and certainly had different ideas of the purpose of art. The pure beauty of Purcell’s music is so remarkable when thinking that it was intended for the ears of people whose lives and upbringings could hardly be farther removed from ours. Nonetheless, Hammerin’ Hank Purcell (as he was known to his close friends) transcended time and place with his music. Call the pretentious police if you will, that’s how I feel.
This is a perfect example of why we study music from long ago. It is not simply out of tradition, to pay homage to the greats. It’s to strip away our topical preferences and listen carefully for what speaks to us. On the flip side, it’s also important not to praise music simply because it’s deemed high quality. It's quite easy to be concerned more about being in line with musical taste you respect and less about finding what you love. I fall victim to this quite often and I’ll be the first to admit it. I don’t particularly like Godspeed You Black Emperor! Is this because there’s something wrong with me? No! I say this but continue to listen to it, trying to decipher why people love this band so much.
Purcell is a different story. From the first snippet I heard of this opera that premiered 300 years before my birth, I was amazed. I’ve never liked opera before but this was different. It wasn’t about the diva, it was about the music and the heart-felt emotion put forth with every word (in English!). As I write music in an entirely changed world than that of the 17th century, I hope to remember the way Dido and Aeneas made me feel and attempt to recreate that. If there’s one thing that hasn’t changed in three centuries, it’s the way well crafted music can turn a person’s heart on a dime.
Oh and here’s my Blue Scholars article.
And if you haven’t noticed, I’m changing the blog’s subtitle to lyrics I like. Gold star to you if you can figure it out what it is from without google.
My earlier post entitled “The Great Schism” delved into this, but learning about music of old is important for getting a grip on what are truly universal themes of great music. Take Henry Purcell’s opera Dido and Aeneas for example. Don’t worry, I won’t spew out all nine pages of my paper on this topic but I do think we can learn from this 320-year-old work. In 1689, when this opera was first performed, the world was a completely different place. People dressed differently, lived by different laws, had different concepts of science, were governed by a different system, and certainly had different ideas of the purpose of art. The pure beauty of Purcell’s music is so remarkable when thinking that it was intended for the ears of people whose lives and upbringings could hardly be farther removed from ours. Nonetheless, Hammerin’ Hank Purcell (as he was known to his close friends) transcended time and place with his music. Call the pretentious police if you will, that’s how I feel.
This is a perfect example of why we study music from long ago. It is not simply out of tradition, to pay homage to the greats. It’s to strip away our topical preferences and listen carefully for what speaks to us. On the flip side, it’s also important not to praise music simply because it’s deemed high quality. It's quite easy to be concerned more about being in line with musical taste you respect and less about finding what you love. I fall victim to this quite often and I’ll be the first to admit it. I don’t particularly like Godspeed You Black Emperor! Is this because there’s something wrong with me? No! I say this but continue to listen to it, trying to decipher why people love this band so much.
Purcell is a different story. From the first snippet I heard of this opera that premiered 300 years before my birth, I was amazed. I’ve never liked opera before but this was different. It wasn’t about the diva, it was about the music and the heart-felt emotion put forth with every word (in English!). As I write music in an entirely changed world than that of the 17th century, I hope to remember the way Dido and Aeneas made me feel and attempt to recreate that. If there’s one thing that hasn’t changed in three centuries, it’s the way well crafted music can turn a person’s heart on a dime.
Oh and here’s my Blue Scholars article.
And if you haven’t noticed, I’m changing the blog’s subtitle to lyrics I like. Gold star to you if you can figure it out what it is from without google.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
I Heard a Few Heads Say that Hip-Hop Is Dead
“No it’s not. It’s just malnourished and underfed.”
This Saturday, I will be interviewing the gentlemen who wrote the song in which the above lyrics appear. Yes, I am sitting down and chilling with the one and only Blue Scholars. They are headlining at LollaPLUza which is an annual concert here at my school in Tacoma. I’m doing a feature article for The Mast, the student newspaper I work for, and I will post a link here sometime in a week or so. I’m really excited because the Blue Scholars transformed my outlook on hip-hop, and made quite an impact on my understanding of music in general. I probably won’t be interviewing Radiohead any time soon, but this is opportunity is close to being that thrilling for me.
Growing up as a white, middle class nerd, I believed I wasn’t supposed to like hip hop. From the snippets I heard on the radio or in stores I happened to be shopping in, I had no natural inclination towards the rapping but occasionally thought the grooves were pretty cool. But instead of believing it might be decent music, I felt like a married man eying other women; it just seemed wrong. It was my problem and I clearly needed to refine my taste to the point where I didn’t enjoy any part of this poor excuse for music. The "melody" wasn't even a tune and the background was all simple synthetic crap. Not to mention the common themes of sexism and violence. How could it be of any quality? Answer: it couldn’t.
By 2007, I’d read and learned enough about popular music to understand that a lot of hip hop was genuinely respected by the music community. I caved and bought The Low End Theory by A Tribe Called Quest to give it a try. To the contrary of what I had previously imagined, the album was pretty good! Their words were highly entertaining (“Yo, microphone check one two what is this?/The five foot assassin with the ruffneck business/I float like gravity, never had a cavity/Got more rhymes than the Winans got family”) and their beats were jazzy and unlike what I’d previously heard in this genre of music. I dug it but I didn’t love it. It basically proved to me that some hip hop could be okay, not that it was a completely legit musical school. Enter the Blue Scholars.
Listening to them for the first time back in the summer of 2007, everything seemed to click. Their lyrics were profound and eloquent yet simple and direct and often about the northwest! Equally impressive was the musicality. The beats were not the same one measure repeated eight hundred times. The sounds were genuinely well-written music clearly made by a musician and not an exclusive mix-and-masher. They were perfect to complement and not distract from the message provided by the vocals. It's hard to describe but from the moment I heard "Solstice: Introduction," I knew this was something I wanted to listen to many times.
I now have seventeen hip-hop albums on my computer by thirteen artists (Wu-Tang Clan, Nas, Cunninlynguists, Jurassic 5 etc.). Still the Blue Scholars take the cake. And it’s because of them that I acquired the other hip-hop that I did. The Blue Scholars represent the best of hip-hop in my mind; they bring poetry to life and inspire the listener to get up and do something! Hip hop is all about the rebel mentality, but so much of it has warped into the “I am a rebel because I commit crimes because it’s cool.” The Blue Scholars look at real problems in our society and use their urban sound to get the message home. And they don't glorify the pimpin' lifestyle in the least. When was the last time you heard a rapper say “Wanna be somebody? Better get yourself some discipline”? Tell that to freakin’ Fifty Cent.
Hip-hop, like any genre, has its share of rotten apples. Just like Good Charlotte doesn’t represent rock, Soulja Boy Tellem doesn’t represent hip-hop. But the very best hip-hoppers can stand up with the cream of any musical crop. When I interview Sabzi and Geologic (the members of the Blue Scholars for you poor ignorant souls who are unfamiliar), I hope to get their perspective on popular music today and some of the other questions I’ve pondered on this blog.
This Saturday, I will be interviewing the gentlemen who wrote the song in which the above lyrics appear. Yes, I am sitting down and chilling with the one and only Blue Scholars. They are headlining at LollaPLUza which is an annual concert here at my school in Tacoma. I’m doing a feature article for The Mast, the student newspaper I work for, and I will post a link here sometime in a week or so. I’m really excited because the Blue Scholars transformed my outlook on hip-hop, and made quite an impact on my understanding of music in general. I probably won’t be interviewing Radiohead any time soon, but this is opportunity is close to being that thrilling for me.
Growing up as a white, middle class nerd, I believed I wasn’t supposed to like hip hop. From the snippets I heard on the radio or in stores I happened to be shopping in, I had no natural inclination towards the rapping but occasionally thought the grooves were pretty cool. But instead of believing it might be decent music, I felt like a married man eying other women; it just seemed wrong. It was my problem and I clearly needed to refine my taste to the point where I didn’t enjoy any part of this poor excuse for music. The "melody" wasn't even a tune and the background was all simple synthetic crap. Not to mention the common themes of sexism and violence. How could it be of any quality? Answer: it couldn’t.
By 2007, I’d read and learned enough about popular music to understand that a lot of hip hop was genuinely respected by the music community. I caved and bought The Low End Theory by A Tribe Called Quest to give it a try. To the contrary of what I had previously imagined, the album was pretty good! Their words were highly entertaining (“Yo, microphone check one two what is this?/The five foot assassin with the ruffneck business/I float like gravity, never had a cavity/Got more rhymes than the Winans got family”) and their beats were jazzy and unlike what I’d previously heard in this genre of music. I dug it but I didn’t love it. It basically proved to me that some hip hop could be okay, not that it was a completely legit musical school. Enter the Blue Scholars.
Listening to them for the first time back in the summer of 2007, everything seemed to click. Their lyrics were profound and eloquent yet simple and direct and often about the northwest! Equally impressive was the musicality. The beats were not the same one measure repeated eight hundred times. The sounds were genuinely well-written music clearly made by a musician and not an exclusive mix-and-masher. They were perfect to complement and not distract from the message provided by the vocals. It's hard to describe but from the moment I heard "Solstice: Introduction," I knew this was something I wanted to listen to many times.
I now have seventeen hip-hop albums on my computer by thirteen artists (Wu-Tang Clan, Nas, Cunninlynguists, Jurassic 5 etc.). Still the Blue Scholars take the cake. And it’s because of them that I acquired the other hip-hop that I did. The Blue Scholars represent the best of hip-hop in my mind; they bring poetry to life and inspire the listener to get up and do something! Hip hop is all about the rebel mentality, but so much of it has warped into the “I am a rebel because I commit crimes because it’s cool.” The Blue Scholars look at real problems in our society and use their urban sound to get the message home. And they don't glorify the pimpin' lifestyle in the least. When was the last time you heard a rapper say “Wanna be somebody? Better get yourself some discipline”? Tell that to freakin’ Fifty Cent.
Hip-hop, like any genre, has its share of rotten apples. Just like Good Charlotte doesn’t represent rock, Soulja Boy Tellem doesn’t represent hip-hop. But the very best hip-hoppers can stand up with the cream of any musical crop. When I interview Sabzi and Geologic (the members of the Blue Scholars for you poor ignorant souls who are unfamiliar), I hope to get their perspective on popular music today and some of the other questions I’ve pondered on this blog.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
All My Little Words
Man, the Magnetic Fields are so good!
But that isn’t what this week’s rambling is about. I’d like to address how I feel about lyrics. Umm…they are important.
In a nutshell, music with a voice as the melody has a huge advantage in terms of expressiveness. Not only is the voice the most naturally intriguing instrument, you add an entirely new dimension using words. You can marry the lyrics with the music and create a result that’s way better than the sum of its parts. It also gives a chance for the more thoughtful listener to analyze the verse like it was poetry (which many sets of lyrics undoubtedly are).
All of this is to say SONGS WITHOUT THOUGHTFUL LYRICS ARE WASTING A GREAT OPPORTUNITY. I’m not saying songs without thoughtful lyrics are bad. There are hundreds of songs I’ve enjoyed instantly without initially listening to the lyrics. But the reason that songwriting is such a glorious art form is because it combines the best of both worlds. The bone chilling power of music with the life-changing power of language can usually make something half-way decent.
It annoys me when people say they don’t really listen to lyrics. I pity them. They are missing out on so much. It’s like enjoying chips and salsa while never trying nachos. I understand it’s often difficult to understand and more enjoyable to be swept up in melody than straining ones ears for an understandable fragment. But there are countless times where I’ve looked up a song’s lyrics and it has completely changed my understanding of the song. For example, just today the song “Little Brother” by Grizzly Bear. Wow…
Two great tools to use:
-Harmonic by mindquirk software. Download it from mindquirk.com. If you have a mac, it adds a widget that will show lyrics when you use iTunes. Doesn’t work for every single song, but certainly works for the vast majority I’ve played.
-Songmeanings.com. Is essentially a forum for people to discuss what they think songs are about. Lyrics are posted there of course.
I have two Decemberists album reviews I recently wrote. I thought it was appropriate as they are a band with ridiculously good lyrics. The Hazards of Love and The Crane Wife.
And on a completely unrelated note, Ichiro just hit a grand slam. My life is complete.
But that isn’t what this week’s rambling is about. I’d like to address how I feel about lyrics. Umm…they are important.
In a nutshell, music with a voice as the melody has a huge advantage in terms of expressiveness. Not only is the voice the most naturally intriguing instrument, you add an entirely new dimension using words. You can marry the lyrics with the music and create a result that’s way better than the sum of its parts. It also gives a chance for the more thoughtful listener to analyze the verse like it was poetry (which many sets of lyrics undoubtedly are).
All of this is to say SONGS WITHOUT THOUGHTFUL LYRICS ARE WASTING A GREAT OPPORTUNITY. I’m not saying songs without thoughtful lyrics are bad. There are hundreds of songs I’ve enjoyed instantly without initially listening to the lyrics. But the reason that songwriting is such a glorious art form is because it combines the best of both worlds. The bone chilling power of music with the life-changing power of language can usually make something half-way decent.
It annoys me when people say they don’t really listen to lyrics. I pity them. They are missing out on so much. It’s like enjoying chips and salsa while never trying nachos. I understand it’s often difficult to understand and more enjoyable to be swept up in melody than straining ones ears for an understandable fragment. But there are countless times where I’ve looked up a song’s lyrics and it has completely changed my understanding of the song. For example, just today the song “Little Brother” by Grizzly Bear. Wow…
Two great tools to use:
-Harmonic by mindquirk software. Download it from mindquirk.com. If you have a mac, it adds a widget that will show lyrics when you use iTunes. Doesn’t work for every single song, but certainly works for the vast majority I’ve played.
-Songmeanings.com. Is essentially a forum for people to discuss what they think songs are about. Lyrics are posted there of course.
I have two Decemberists album reviews I recently wrote. I thought it was appropriate as they are a band with ridiculously good lyrics. The Hazards of Love and The Crane Wife.
And on a completely unrelated note, Ichiro just hit a grand slam. My life is complete.
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