Musical Loose Ends

My NOLA Library CD tour did not end with Norah Jones. I was able to sneak in two last listens before my time ran out:
(1) Actual Sounds + Voices, a 1998 release from Meat Beat Manifesto
(2) The Next Day, the most recent release from David Bowie

Actual Sounds + Voices

Rather than reach for a term like "electronica" or "industrial", I'll characterize Meat Beat Manifesto's output as "abstract beat music that makes liberal use of samples", which is not always the case but that's the description I'm gonna go with. MBM is a band that you find out about from college radio or a video channel or perhaps most importantly word of mouth - you won't hear it on a commercial radio station. (If you have heard MBM on a commercial station, you are welcome to correct me.) I myself was acquainted with MBM in 1989 or 1990 by WKDU, the radio station of Drexel University in Philadelphia, when one night DJ Chris Vecchio played "Strap Down (Part 1)" from Storm the Studio, MBM's debut record, which I subsequently purchased at Third Street Jazz and Rock, which sadly went out of business in the late 1990s.

Fast forward to my time in the Big Easy. From January 2006 to August 2008 - up until the time we were 'swiped' by Hurricane Gustav - I satisfied my listening fix via the CD collection at New Orleans' Main Library, from which I checked out MBM's Subliminal Sandwich in February 2008. Subliminal Sandwich is a sprawling 28-track double CD whose second, more experimental disc contains some seriously mind-blowing music.

That brings us to Actual Sounds + Voices, which I checked out from the Latter Library last July and which is similar in style to the first Subliminal Sandwich disc. My favorite Actual Sounds + Voices track is the eerie "Hail to the Bopp", whose Come [and] join us spoken-word sample may be from Marshall Applewhite of the Heaven's Gate cult, but don't quote me on that. A second highlight is the 11-minute "The Thumb", which comprises
(1-5) five minutes of jazz* and then
(6-8) three minutes of spaciness that could have been written by György Ligeti and then
(9-11) an aggressive groove for the last three minutes.

*"Let Go" also has a jazzy feel: given the free-form nature of many MBM compositions, one could be forgiven for suspecting that, deep down, MBM leader and mainstay Jack Dangers, who plays the clarinet, is a Miles Davis wannabe.

The Next Day

David Bowie has been on the scene for almost fifty years although he hasn't been making music for all of that time. A 10-year gap separates The Next Day and Reality, Bowie's previous studio record, and I believe that Bowie himself was putting out an "I'm retired" vibe for much of the 2000s. Is The Next Day a one-off or is there more to be drawn from the Bowie well? Only time will tell.

On my Blogger profile page I state, My favorite record of all time would probably be Jeff Beck's Wired. However, if I were to choose a favorite set of records it would be the Bowie records running from Station to Station to Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps), inclusive; excluding the live Stage, I own all of these records plus Never Let Me Down and Outside. I have heard Young Americans and Let's Dance in their entireties and, like any self-respecting music listener, know Bowie's 1969-1974 hits like the back of my hand. Adding it all up leaves plenty of Bowie territory that I am unfamiliar with.

So what did I think of The Next Day? The Next Day is a modern rock record with as much edge as could be expected from someone in his mid-60s; it's a good record but not as groundbreaking as Bowie's best work (but what is?) - quality-wise it's much closer to Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) than to Let's Dance. Favorite tracks: "The Next Day", "Valentine's Day", and "Dancing Out in Space".

Bowie is one of many artists who got a lot of radio airplay back in the 1970s but have now all but vanished from the airwaves (at least this is so in New Orleans). I will take aim at the dreadful state of FM rock radio in a future post.

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Ah, it was a glorious run, but all good things must come to an end. There were a number of CDs in the Latter stacks that I wanted to get to, but didn't: Reba McEntire's Keep On Loving You, Atoms for Peace's Amok, and Jennifer Hudson's eponymous debut were on my short list of items to check out. C'est la vie.

I am no longer within walking distance of a library but I do now have a broadband Web connection and for the last couple of months I've been wading through the musical archives at Grooveshark.com, which I'll write about when I can get around to it.