Bang On A Can – Music For Airports (Brian Eno) [VBR][Requested]

Music For Airports (Brian Eno)
Label: Point Music
Format: CD, Album
Country: US
Released: 1998
Genre: Classical, Electronic
Style: Modern Classical, Minimal, Ambient









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Album requested by Walt.
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One need not be a fan of Brian Eno's ground-breaking original, "Ambient 1: Music For Airports," to appreciate this exquisite rendition from Bang On A Can, a New York City-based outfit comprised of three classically-trained musicians: Julia Wolfe, David Lang and Michael Gordon. Eno's opus emerged as a textbook example of what has become quite an important genre: Ambient music. What this trio (heirs to another important genre: Minimal music) have accomplished is what might be both the simplest and the hardest task of performing other people's music: they offer their own voice without usurping Eno's original brilliant composition.

In an age of remixes, reworks, dubs and covers, Bang On A Can gently present an acoustic version of the original "loops & tapes" classic. Originally, Eno designed "Ambient 1: Music For Airports" to be continuously looped as a sound installation, with the intent to diffuse the tense, anxious atmosphere of an airport terminal. He conceived this idea while being stuck at Cologne Bonn Airport in Germany in the mid-1970s. Contrast that with the startling presence of Bang On A Can's simply-employed layered instrumentations, which rattle, pluck, drone and twitter expressively, whereas the quiet becomes the space for anticipation of the instruments. So, rather than the steady rolling pulse of Eno's modulations, the subtle use of guitar, winds and even pipa give Bang On A Can's cover a worldly feel that the original soars above. It may even be posited that Eno's original is best expressed indoors while this cover complements an outdoor setting. In fact, a 1998 performance of "Music For Airports" in Central Park serendipitously began with an airline jet passing overhead with an awed audience maintaining a respectful silence throughout the entire concert. In an interview with Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson regarding the fact that they had recently attended this performance, they said they were both moved to tears. Eno was later surprised to hear this, commenting that he had written the music to be without emotion, but that he was pleasantly surprised that people had been affected by the music many years after he had written it.

A succinct review from Steve Tignor distills this album endearingly: "Bang On A Can is an avant-garde ensemble playing the 1978 Brian Eno piece which put ambient music on the map. Eno's idea was to make a series of tape loops into tightly composed Muzak. He wanted a sonic backdrop for bland public spaces that would reward close listening. Bang on a Can, playing acoustic and electric instruments, breathe life into it, making the music's neutrality seem coldly beautiful. The piece is divided into four parts, each consisting of a few gentle, minimal figures, calmly repeated and shifted. Rhythm is eliminated and time seems to stretch. What is revealed is the sensuousness possible in a single note. Music has never been the same. This is the best place to hear where it changed."

Review by Walt [http://www.thisismyjam.com/walt.brown]

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Jóhann Jóhannsson – IBM 1401, A User's Manual [MP3][320]

IBM 1401, A User's Manual

Label: 4AD

Format: CD

Country: UK

Released: 2006

Genre: Classical, Electronic

Style: Modern Classical

Comes in a four-panel digipak with a liner notes paper sticked inside.

The orchestra was recorded at Barrandov Studios, Smecky Soundstage in Prague in September 2005. 

Additional recordings were made in Reykjavik, Skálholt, Florence, Madrid, Zurich, Piran and Rennes during the period 2003-2006. 

Mixed in Syrland, Reykjavik in February 2006. 

Mastered in Abbey Road.

Tracks two and three feature the voice of "an unknown instructor from an IBM 1401 Data Processing System maintenance instruction tape found in my father’s attic."

All electronic sounds were derived from the IBM 1401 Data Processing System and the Hammond B3 organ with Ring Modulator, Distortion and Filter pedals. The music and sounds of the IBM 1401 Data Processing System were recorded by Jóhann Gunnarsson, Örn Kaldalóns and Elías Davídsson in Reykjavik in 1971. The musical fragment played by the computer is from the hymn "Ísland Ögrum Skorid" by Sigvaldi Kaldalóns, used by kind permission.

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Fifths Of Seven - Spry From Bitter Anise Folds [320][MP3]

Spry From Bitter Anise Folds

Label: Les Disques Du Soleil Et De L'Acier

Format: CD

Country: France

Released: 2005

Genre: Rock

Style: Post Rock, Modern Classical

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The sound of this band is one of the most touching compositions I've ever heard. They are 3 musicians that made a dream come true for lot of people that was hoping for some calm music to hear in the rain with your girlfriend. This album it's somewhat furious, delicate, in it's own way. I hope you love it.

Files as usually ripped from pure FLAC to MP3 with 320kbps.

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As you might suspect from a Montreal band issuing a record with an unwieldy title, Spry From Bitter Anise Folds is the work of another addition to the extended Constellation family of wayward instrumentalists. Providing the shortest ancestral link is cellist Beckie Foon, who has played with A Silver Mt. Zion and Set Fire to Flames, with pianist Spencer Krug (Wolf Parade, Sunset Rubdown, Frog Eyes) and mandolin player Rachel Levine (Cakelk) connected by slim degrees of separation as well. And though they utilize familiar ingredients, the trio's rigorous, European folk-inflected chamber music manages to sound quite distinct from anything else in their musical genealogy, resulting in this exquisite, understated pearl of a debut.

Given the high activity rate of all three group members-- Krug in particular is having himself one hell of a busy year-- their collaboration as Fifths of Seven risks seeming an afterthought or mere side project trifle, but there is no evidence on these eight collected pieces that anyone's talents have been spread too thin. Throughout the album the three each play with an intuitive delicacy that suggests many hours together in the rehearsal suite, with Levine's mandolin providing an earthy, vaguely Mediterranean air to dynamic compositions that can recall the small-ensemble works of Erik Satie, Gabriel Fauré, or contemporary acts like Rachel's.

On many of their best tracks here, such as the opening "Rosa Centrifolia" or the stately "Echoes From a Wandered Path", the music functions without a true center, as each instrument moves continually and transparently from foreground to rear without ever breaking stride. Witness also Foon's deft, sonorous playing on "Sweet Grace For Devious", as she glides in and around her cello's upper registers, sharing melodic duties with Krug's austere piano. For his part, Krug here appears to betray a preference for detuned upright pianos, as evidenced by his solo turn on "Waiting", which sounds as though it could've been performed on some old tack in an empty VFW hall.

For "Out From Behind the Rigid Bellows", Krug swaps piano for accordion, the three musicians conjuring the mesmeric groans of a ghost ship's riggings as it sails from one exotic port of call to the next, while on the closing "Bless Our Wandering Dreamers" they combine to join into impressively robust drones, distant strains of mandolin and cello hovering about the edges like the rapidly fading memory of a dream upon waking. Of all the tracks on the album, it's this final cut that most audibly contains evidence of improvisation, suggesting bold new possibilities for future Fifths of Seven projects, as hopefully the three musicians find time to become even further comfortable in each other's creative company.

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