Unlike the dickheads who are paid to write about free CDs for newspapers, i think 2011 was a year when a lot of great music got made. I, like everyone else in the world, only got to hear a tiny fraction of it, so this is in no way a ‘best of’ list for the year, just a handful of things that I heard that constitutes my favourites from that tiny selection. Also in no particular order. I’ll start with the ones you can hear straight away, and then list a few that aren’t available to stream online…
Calamateur – The Quiet In The Land
Andrew Howie’s been making brilliant music for years. I love pretty much everything he does. Here he gets angry, he tackles doubt and confusion head-on and writes music to match. It’s at times unsettling but is nothing short of brilliant. (if you get it pay lots for it, so Andrew will send you the hour long ambient track that comes with it – it too is marvellous)
Rob Szabo – Rob Szabo
Rob’s an outstandingly great singer-songwriter. He’s one of those people who like Tracy Chapman, will suffer in his career from being consistently brilliant – there’s no big story in ‘great musician puts out another great record’. Fortunately, we no longer need big stories. We just want great music. and THIS is truly masterful music. I love it.
Lower Case Noises – Migratory Patterns
Andy Othling creates amazing soundscapes that on headphones will make any place you walk through while listening to it feel like a whole new landscape. I love all of his music that I’ve heard, and this is his best so far, IMHO.
Deborah Jordan – What You See
Soulful IDM/Electronica gorgeousness from an incredible singer. Love it.
Fer Isella – #Cosecha
A pure twitter discovery – Argentinean post-jazz experimenter making utterly gorgeous music. A bit fusion-y but without the unnecessary twiddles. Some 70s Miles, some ECM, and then a few songs to finish. Great stuff.
FreekBass – Concentrate
Supremely funky goodness at the intersection of old school funk, hip-hop and electronica. Magic.
Of those that were made by people who don’t put their music on bandcamp, I’d recommend checking out a few of my favourites:
The Waterboys – An Appointment With Mr Yeats
Bruce Cockburn – Small Source Of Comfort
Paul Simon – So Beautiful Or So What
Tiger Darrow – Hello and You Know Who You Are (two amazing albums, released by an 18 year old, on the SAME DAY.)
Animals As Leaders – Weightless
Yvonne Lyon – More Than Mine
Civil Wars – Barton Hollow
Kt Tunstall – the Scarlet Tulip EP
Bela Fleck and The Flecktones – Rocket Science.
That’s a fair chunk of the new music I’ve been enjoying this year. Google ‘em, find ‘em on a streaming thing if they’re there, or just buy the indie ones by people who are nice enough to let you hear the stuffs you’re about to buy
I’ve been finding SO much great music of late, that I thought it was about time I blogged about some of it. I’ve been posting a lot of it to Facebook and Twitter, but it can get lost in the stream there. So here’s a few of my favourites of late (you can play all of them direct from this page, and if you click the download link on any of the players you can buy the albums): [Read more →]
A couple of weeks ago, this review showed up on a French Website called indierockmag.com – with my paltry French skillz, I could tell it was nice, but it wasn’t til I asked on Twitter and Facebook the other night for a translation that I got what it really said… I got 5 translations sent to me, by 5 very lovely people. I’ve only included one here, for obvious reasons, but am v. grateful to Guylaine, Dave (who posted a translation on Facebook), Lorna, Michael and Wayne. Here’s Wayne’s translation – the link to the original review is http://www.indierockmag.com/article14847.html
“Since Steve Lawson became a father, the Londoner appreciates the weight of the years, philosophy, and still more the number three. And that’s good, because we are just as into the poetic meditations that the musician draws from the single six-string bass which, in his hands, becomes a tool of dreams.
“The first electric bassist to have performed solo at the Royal Albert Hall, he is a protege of Michael Manring, who said of Lawson’s 2004 album Grace and Gratitude that it was a real step forward in the art of the bass solo, doubtless referring to a world closer to the ambient music of Brian Eno or the subdued post-rock of Come On Die Young era Mogwai rather than the technical wizardry of Jaco Pastorius. Lawson continues in the same soft lyrical vein with his first album in five years, possessing the good taste to allow it to be downloaded for free. Knowing that the collection in question is even more gargantuan than its predecessors – easily passing 80 minutes – should especially not stop you pulling out your bank card should you turn out to fall in love with it.”
2010 has been, for me at least, a bumper year for new music. I think it’s safe to say that I’ve bought more albums released this year than I have in any year for well over a decade. This is a very good thing. That a lot of them were bought direct from the artist is also a very good thing.
Here’s a list of my 20 favourites – not any preference order, that would be futile, and subject to change at a moment’s notice (they’re alphabetical by artist).
Suffice to say, I recommend all of them, with the obvious caveat that if the are from within a style that would otherwise be something you’d avoid like the plague, proceed with caution…
Bandcamp embeds provided where possible… [Read more →]
OK, I’m going to interrupt my ‘track by track’ breakdown of my own new album to tell you about a GREAT record by my lovely friend Laura Kidd, AKA She Makes War.
Here it is, in its entirety, on bandcamp (naturally) – hit play while you’re reading this (and then hit the ‘buy’ button when you’ve finished):
Laura is a true renaissance woman - singer/songwriter/producer/videographer/session bassist/blogger/social tech ninja/web designer… A huge skill set, all of which has come into play on the process of making the album and telling stories around it. [Read more →]
A decade that began just a couple of weeks after my first ever solo gig.
That gig, unknown to me at the time, marked a pretty huge turning point in my music career.
The ‘session’ work I’d be pursuing and doing up til that point was to dry up pretty damn quick when word got out that I was doing gigs on my own, but equally fast, word spread about what I was up to to the people who might like to listen to it, and I started to play more and more shows, and in August 2000 put out my first solo album. A decade later, and here we are… Where? I’m not sure. [Read more →]
This post is taken from a current Facebook Meme, and the title is fairly self explanatory. Some people have done 25 albums. I’ll just write til I run out… These won’t be in any particular order (just don’t categorise music like that) and will definitely be incomplete and open to change: [Read more →]
I’ve been telling you a lot about what I’m up to musically of late, but I’ve got some rather talented friends who’ve been busy too, so here’s a quick and incomplete round-up of what a few of them have been doing:
First up there’s Ben Walker – fellow Tuttlist and fab singer-songwriter. He was writing 50 songs in 90 days, a few of which he wrote one Friday morning at Tuttle. One of those was called ‘You’re No-one If You’re Not On Twitter’ – here’s the video, which has been watched almost 300,000 times! (warning – it’s insanely catchy…)
Then there’s Jonatha Brooke – I met up with Jonatha in New York in January and she told me about a record she was about to record, featuring songs with words by Woody Guthrie for which she’s written the music. She was very excited, and I’m really happy to say that finished album shows the excitement wasn’t misplaced. I reviewed the album for this month’s Third Way magazine – It’s a truly exceptional album, and here’s a clip of her teaching Joe Sample (jazz legend, out of the Crusaders) how to play one of the songs:
Uhm, who else now? Seth Horan – solo bassist singer/songwriter, recently toured the UK. He’s doing an interesting thing with the production of his new album, that you can be involved in – here are two blog posts about that: Part 1 and part 2.
Iain Archer has an AMAZING new album out, recorded and released entirely under his own steam. Judging by the record, it was a VERY smart move. Beautiful stuff – check out the tunes from it on his myspace page.
And of course Lobelia – we’ve had some great gigs together of late, and here’s a lovely clip of her playing from the same gig as my ‘Don’t Stop Believin’ Vid’ -
These won’t be in any particular order (just don’t categorise music like that) and will definitely be incomplete and open to change:
