A CLOSER LISTEN weekly #21
kranky, interviews, and our favorite music books
Dear Listeners, it’s been a busy fortnight indeed. Crazy as it seems, our end of year lists are right around the corner, and have come to take up most of our December publishing schedule. Since readers seem to love lists so much, Jeremy Bye has been hard at work devising new lists for our staff to generate. Earlier this year, we put together a list of our 40 favorite compilations of all time. Now we’ve got 40 of our favorite books on music, with some even more niche bonus lists focusing on art and children’s books. Speaking of books, I’ve just begun Victor Szabo’s Turn on, Tune in, Drift Off : Ambient Music's Psychedelic Past (Oxford), which is sure to be of interest to many of you. Szabo
rethinks the history and socioaesthetics of ambient music as a popular genre with roots in the psychedelic countercultures of the late twentieth century. … In so doing, Turn On, Tune In, Drift Off illuminates the social and aesthetic rifts and alliances informing one of today's most popular musical experimentalisms.
Keep an eye out for this one. I also recently published the latest episode of the Sound Propositions podcast, featuring kranky co-found Bruce Adams discussing his new book. More about that below, but first, a few more recent recommendations. One of my all time favorite producers Sasu Ripatti aka Vladislav Delay has just released Speed Demon, under the newly modified Ripatti Deluxe moniker and on his newly minted Rajaton imprint. Ripatti’s exploration of uptempo ‘90s rave happy hardcore is surprisingly captivating.
And one final recommendation. As noted in a previous newsletter, the great Philip Jeck sadly passed away earlier this year. Yesterday, on what would have been his 70th birthday, the Touch label released Resistenza, which consists of two live recordings, including “Live in Torino.” I was present for that performance, at the 2018 Ambienti Digitali, part of the Today’s Festival. As I described it at the time, the event took place in “a former carpet factory soon to be converted into a museum, a suitably minimal space for performances by Philip Jeck, Fabio Perlatta, Simon Scott, and the mighty Giuseppe Ielasi.” I’ve been enjoying revisiting that evening, and digging through Jeck’s extensive catalogue in his memory.
LANE DISCIPLINE – with kranky [podcast]
The Sound Propositions podcast returns, kicking off the second half of season 3. Kranky co-founder Bruce Adams sits down to discuss his new book, You’re With Stupid: kranky, Chicago, and the Reinvention of Indie Music. (UTPress) Adams explains the unique conditions that put Chicago at the heart of the ‘90s indie rock scene, the emergence of the kranky aesthetic, and sings the praises of Labradford. Adams’ book is full of personal memories and reflections, including meeting partner Joel Leoschke, kranky’s early roster of bands, and many fascinating recollections from the wider Chicago scene. But Bruce also provides much valuable context that helps us to rethink the history of independent music. Cutting off in 2002, just as the era of file-sharing began to really disrupt the music industry, You’re With Stupid offers an insider’s perspective on the importance of interdependence.
Read/listen here (or find the podcast at all the podplaces)
FROM THE ARCHIVE
Speaking of kranky, Christina Vantzou has just released No. 5. I spoke with her back in 2015 upon the release of No.3. Check out our conversation. As I explain in the article, our "interview was conducted over Skype in late October [2015], and edited and refined by email in the months since. This process feels, in retrospect, to mirror her method of composition." Having this window into her process, it’s been especially fascinating watching her work, both solo and with collaborators, evolve since then. As our friend Marc Weidenbaum of Disquiet (and the This Week in Sound substack) put it: “There’s a new Christina Vantzou album out, and as always it is willfully less than the sum of its parts: substantial classical instrumentation, ethereal vocals, and textural electronics all coaxed to a sublime, minimal state.”
Happy Holidays
Perhaps these book lists will get you thinking about holiday gift shopping. But perhaps you need a hazy mix of Christmas oldies to ignite that holiday spirit. Well, our old buddy Alexander Grawoig has just the thing for you with his recently released Soundscape: Sitting by a relaxing fireplace listening to oldie Christmas songs from another room (2022)
Listening to a soundscape that creates a sonic landscape of Christmas oldies (1907-1920) being played in another room while you sit in a comfy chair, in front of a soothing, crackling fireplace. It's snowing outside, but you're comfortable in a warm room on a beautiful Christmas evening. This is relaxing, chill ASMR bliss for you to enjoy. This soundscape is created for: sleeping, studying, relaxation, stress relief, painting, drawing, visualization, deep work, collaging, relaxing background music.
Michael Price presents ‘Sundays & Raindays’ [mix]
And yet more to listen to!Some listeners may remember Entanglement, Michael Price‘s 2015 debut album on Erased Tapes Records. Price has been busy since then writing music for piano, orchestra, and soundtrack, much of which is sure to fall in the sweet spot for readers of this site. His 2021 collection, The Hope of Better Weather, featured reworkings from Bill Ryder-Jones, Yann Tiersen, Eluvium and other great artists. Earlier this year, Price released Whitsun, “a profound exploration of the connection between sound and memory.” Whitsun is a deeply personal record, dedicated to the memory of Price’s grandfather, as well as his father, who sadly passed during the recording of the album. Accompanying this release, Price has put together Sundays & Raindays, a fabulous mix of deep ambient textures and nostalgic moods, situating Price’s music amongst tracks from Harold Budd & Brian Eno, Rachel's, Alva Noto & Ryuichi Sakamoto, Rafael Anton Irisarri, Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch, and others.
The 40 Best Books On Music (part one, part two)
It’s probably time to retire the phrase ‘writing about music is like dancing about architecture.’ If its origins are vague – you can read about it on its own Wikipedia page – it still sounds like the phrase that gets trotted out when a musician gets a less than favourable review. It hasn’t stopped people from writing about music, as our lists ably demonstrate, certainly more than dancing about architecture. Unless, of course, there is a secret cabal of choreographers armed with theodolites ready for their next piece.
We have to confess that we are biased in favour of writing about music. At A Closer Listen we’ve devoted thousands of hours listening to records that have been sent to us, and then trying to put our response into adequate language – and we can only imagine there are literally tens of other websites doing similar things. There are many motivations for doing what we do, but the main reason is that we love music, and we want to communicate why. And that is often the starting point for the books on our list.
The selection is listed alphabetically by author (or, in some cases, editor), and is divided over two days. Such was our enthusiasm that we have written two other lists, one of more image=focused books and one of books about music aimed at younger readers. These will appear over the weekend and might give you a few pointers when buying gifts for friends or family.
And if that’s not enough bibliomania to take in, Jeremy and Richard have some extra special bonus lists:
Best Art Books on Music
While a picture may be worth a thousand words, it may also be worth a thousand notes ~ or in the case of our cover photo, thousands of albums containing millions of notes. The books below take us deep into the realm of collecting, from massive vinyl bookcases to limited edition packaging to the beauty of covers and concert posters. Sometimes a band is celebrated, other times a label or genre. One unifying theme is a love for large images, a facet of the industry once taken for granted and that in the digital era has suffered. While some may say that music is distilled to its purest essence when presented as “just” music, we disagree; we love posters, album covers and the tactile experience. Art books help us to celebrate what we have seen and to discover what we have not seen: rare images collected for all to enjoy. And while these books may make great gifts, you’ll want to order copies for yourself first!
Read the entire piece.
Best Children’s Books on Music
One of the joys of childhood is being read to sleep by a loved one: a parent, a grandparent, an older sibling. But books aren’t just for sleep, and children’s books aren’t just for children. In this article, we gather ten of the best books on music and sound, presented in developmental order. As much as your children may enjoy them, we recommend keeping a copy for yourself as well.
RECENT REVIEWS
Reviews are at the heart of ACL. Here are (excerpts from) a few of my favorite reviews we posted on the blog in the last few weeks.
AVAWAVES ~ Savage Waters
AVAWAVES was the perfect choice to score the surf documentary Savage Waters. The ocean is in their compositional blood, while their debut album was appropriately titled Waves. The enthralling trailer provides an indication of the cinematic thrills, as a surfer chases a legend found in an old book and attempts something some might call extraordinary and his daughter calls “stupid.” These are savage – and as stated in the trailer, uncharted waters. What causes a man to pursue such a risk at the potential expense of life and limb? Is there ever an end to the madness, the chase for adrenaline, the siren call to hover, literally, on the precipice of life and death?
Gold Panda ~ The Work
Gold Panda‘s The Work exudes happiness. The music is upbeat, there’s a giant sun on the cover, and early purchasers were able to bundle the CD version with a “Happy Toast” t-shirt. And yet, this happiness was hard-earned; the title is an expression of the work it took to arrive at this juncture. Six years have passed since the last Gold Panda album, a period during which the artist turned 40, played gigs while drunk, struggled with depression, had a daughter and subsequently reevaluated his life. While playing this album, it’s hard to imagine that the turnaround began when the artist looked out of a 24-story building in Japan, saw the netting installed to prevent people from jumping, and thought, “I can still jump.”
John Hayes ~ Beautifully Lost Mind
Our notion of who we are is partly created by the context in which we live, the people with whom we surround ourselves, the work that we do. When change to that context is forced upon us, we often struggle to cope. Which of us has not experienced that struggle in the last few years? When writing his fifth album, Beautifully Lost Mind, John Hayes found himself locked down and cast adrift from his work as the resident pianist at Minneapolis St Paul International Airport. Isolated from the context which had helped give meaning to his life, he learned to appreciate what he describes as “the strange beauty of his own mental instability”.
UPCOMING RELEASES
(complete list with Bandcamp links here)
Greg Dallas & Jan Esbra ~ Confluence (The Slow Music Movement Label, 17 November)
Nick Klein ~ Slippin Out (Enmossed, 17 November)
Pale Ribbons Tossed Into the Dark ~ S/T (17 November)
Alex Kozobolis, Alkis Livathinos ~ Volta (18 November)
Andrew Poppy ~ Ark Hive of a Live (False Walls, 18 November)
Babak Ahteshamipour ~ Mind Flaying Flavored Flails (Jollies, 18 November)
Cunningham/Nguyễn/Shiroishi ~ Basket of Knives (Astral Editions, 18 November)
Daniel Bachman ~ Almanac Behind (Three Lobed Recordings, 18 November)
Dezron Douglas ~ ATALAYA (International Anthem, 18 November)
Drew Wesely ~ Blank Body (Infrequent Seams, 18 November)
Fabian Filiks ~ Nocturnal Avenue (Via Nocturna, 18 November)
Fallowfaze ~ S/T (18 November)
Feed Me to the Waves ~ Apart (dunk!records, 18 November)
Interesting Times Gang ~ The Spirit of Science Fiction (Pax Aeternum, 18 November)
Johnny Coley ~ Landscape Man (Astral Editions, 18 November)
Jonas Colstrup ~ At the Crest (7K!, 18 November)
JR Samuels ~ SPASM (Lily Tapes & Discs, 18 November)
KAGAMI Smile ~ Deposited Heart (Prehistoric Silence, 18 November)
Kalam Hub ~ Moving Still (CWPT, 18 November)
Kuma ~ You Cannot Cheat the Muse (Sea Blue Audio, 18 November)
Lauren Falls ~ A Little Louder Now (18 November)
Luigi Turra + Belinda Guerreiro ~ Ressac (LINE, 18 November)
Mats Gustafsson & NU Ensemble ~ Hidros 8 – Heal (trost, 18 November)
Michael Cornier-O’Leary ~ Heard from the Next Room (Lily Tapes & Discs, 18 November)
Monogoto ~ Partial Deletion of Everything (Vol. 2) (Polar Seas, 18 November)
Nichunimu ~ Un Cacho de Metal, Un Resto de Vaiven (577 Records, 18 November)
Patricia Brennan ~ More Touch (Pyroclastic, 18 November)
Poly-Math ~ Zenith (Nice Weather for Airstrikes, 18 November)
Porya Hatami & Monologue ~ La Commune (Midira Records, 18 November)
Pulse Emitter ~ Dusk (Hausu Mountain, 18 November)
Rauelsson & Tatu Rönkkö ~ Myriad (Beacon Sound, 18 November)
Shells ~ Outside (Astral Editions, 18 November)
Simon McCorry ~ Mouthful of Dust (Polar Seas, 18 November)
Sunda Arc ~ Night Lands (Gondwana, 18 November)
Taranoya ~ Flying (sound as language, 18 November)
B. Tweel ~ Bring in the Lampstand and Light Its Lamps (Audiobulb, 19 November)
Józef Dumoulin et al ~ felines (Studio Labut, 19 November)
Zaliva-D ~ Misbegotten Ballads (SVBKVLT, 23 November)
Quinta ~ Aeolian Mixtape (Nonclassical, 24 November)
Adriano Zanni & Enrico Coniglio ~ A Corte (13 Silentes, 25 November)
Andrew Wasylyk ~ Hearing the Water Before Seeing the Falls (Clay Pipe Music, 25 November)
Ben Brown ~ soft metals (phonometrograph, 25 November)
Brother Tree Sound ~ Songs Without Words (Bigo &Twigetti, 25 November)
BVDUB & Netherworld ~ Equilibrium (Glacial Movements, 25 November)
Dagerlöff & Galner ~ Haxan: Selected Works (L’Histoire Inconnu du Disque, 25 November)
Eloi ~ Nothing New (Everybody In, 25 November)
Federico Maddedu Giuntoli ~ The Text and the Form (flau, 25 November)
Flight Coda ~ a window at night the 27th (Warm Winters Ltd., 25 November)
Hiroshi Ebina ~ In science and the human heart (Kitchen, 25 November)
The Home Current ~ The Circus Hunter (Subexotic, 25 November)
Jon Iverson ~ Many Worlds Interpretation (Seance Centre, 25 November)
Kodomo ~ SEER (Foil, 25 November)
Kosmo Sound ~ Fruit of the Void (Zephyrus, 25 November)
Marja Ahti & Judith Hamann ~ A coincidence is perfect, intimate attunement (Second Editions, 25 November)
Modus Pitch ~ Polysm (Altin Village & Mine, 25 November)
Neptunian Maximalism & Its Supernova Arkestra ~ Finis Gloriae Mundi (Tech, 25 November)
Noémi Büchi ~ Matter (~OUS, 25 November)
Pie Eye Collective ~ Tangential City (Albert’s Favourites, 25 November)
Starlings ~ Ax Locked in Pipeline (Machine Records, 25 November)
Tim Linghaus ~ Yurusu (Bigo & Twigetti, 25 November)
Blos Contrast ~ Hiranyagarbha (26 November)
Oùat ~ The Strange Adventures of Jasper Klint (Umlaut, 26 November)
Snowdrops ~ Missing Island (Injazero, 28 November)
VLMV ~ Flora & Fauna (Bigo & Twigetti, 28 November)
thshlt ~ Fastidious Things Insisting on Their Own Conditions (Peig, 30 November)
TRÓNCO ~ S/T (Torto Editions, 30 November)
Benedikt Schiefer ~ Uncertainty (2 December)
Christoph Dahlberg ~ Blackforms (Teleskop, 2 December)
Christopher Cerrone ~ The Air Suspended (New Focus, 2 December)
Cloud Management ~ S/T (Altin Village & Mine, 2 December)
Frank Carlberg Trio ~ Reflections 1952 (577 Records, 2 December)
Gabriel Prokofiev ~ Strange Blooms + HOWL! (Oscillations, 2 December)
Jameson Nathan Jones ~ Somewhat the Same (2 December)
Laszlo Gardony Trio ~ Close Connection (Sunnyside, 2 December)
Lunt ~ Remember We Were Waiting for the Snow (Cruel Nature, 2 December)
mHz ~ Same Room, Another Day (LINE, 2 December)
Munchi ~ The Mambo Detanao EP (Nyege Nyege Tapes, 2 December)
Olli Aarni ~ Koko Maailma (Students of Decay, 2 December)
Score ~ Now Here (Cruel Nature, 2 December)
Tapefeed ~ Anterograde (Houndstooth, 2 December)
Terence Fixmer ~ Shifting Signals (Mute, 2 December)
Todeskino ~ MMMiniatures (Cruel Nature, 2 December)
Tokio Ono ~ Individuals (Not Not Fun, 2 December)
V/A ~ Imaginary Landscapes (99Chants, 2 December)
Xao ~ Wirehead (C.A.N.V.A.S., 2 December)
Ben Frost ~ Broken Spectre (5 December)
KEDA ~ Flow (Parentheses, 6 December)
The Broken Cradle ~ The Burial of the Dead (7 December)
Lord of the Isles ~ Subtle Thoughts (Lapsus, 8 December)
Eli Wallace ~ pieces & interludes (Infrequent Seams, 9 December)
Mads Emil Nielsen ~ Black Box 3 (arbitrary, 9 December)
Oscar Peters ~ Breath (33-33, 9 December)
This Immortal Coil ~ The World Ended a Long Time Ago (Ici d’ailleurs, 9 December)
Vector Lovers ~ Capsule for One (Lapsus, 9 December)
Eric Van Thyne ~ Tape 1 (Audiobulb, 10 December)
Florence Cats ~ Ys (Edições CN, 10 December)
BJM Mario Bajardi ~ Vortex (16 December)
Camilla Pisani ~ Phant[as] (Aesthetical, 16 December)
Phauss ~ Audiodrome (Room40, 16 December)
VÖ ~ The Sounds of VÖ (thanatosis, 16 December)
Marco Chirico ~ Linea Invisible (Kasei Archive, 17 December)
Petri Huurinainen ~ Nico’s Grave (20 December)
Swansither ~ States (Subexotic, 23 December)
V/A ~ 111122 (Stochastic Resonance, 23 December)
Xqui ~ Hymns for Terry Francis (Subexotic, 23 December)
Unwed Sailor ~ Mute the Charm (Spartan Records, 1 January)
Rainbow Island ~ Moonlit Panacea (Riforma, 18 January)
Lionel Marchetti & Decibel ~ Inland Lake (le lac intérieur) (Room40, 20 January)
Hollie Kenniff ~ We All Have Places That We Miss (Western Vinyl, 30 January)
Grant Chapman ~ Indentations (Métron, 31 January)
Alexander Tucker + Keith Collins ~ Fifth Continent (Subtext, 24 February)
John Bence ~ Archangels (Thrill Jockey, 24 February)
Mark Harris / John 3:16 ~ Procession (Alrealon Musique, 3 March)
YoshimiOizumikiYoshiduO – To The Forest To Live A Truer Life (Thrill Jockey, 24 March)