Imagining ancient Greek music is a formidable task.  We have the difficulty of historical distance and the lack of evidence that accompanies that distance.  We have the problem of not re-constructing a single, highly localized, musical culture, but actually a series of cultures extending over the better part of a millenium and stretching throughout the ancient world.  We have the problem of unclear degrees of continuity with contemporary practice.  From a modern and western European viewpoint, we have the added difficulty of reconstructing an ancient mediterranean culture to which we undoubtedly owe some debt, but our glance backward tells us too little about a culture which looked forward in a number of directions, and the glance towards western Europe was among the most distant.*

But for all that difficulty, it's our fortune to live in a virtual golden age of scholarship about ancient Greek music and the culture around it.   In addition to Mr Barker, whose collection of translations of the surviving manuscripts of music theory is also invaluable, Martin L. West and Warren D. Anderson have written very useful summary volumes, Pöhlmann and West have made a useful edition of the surviving examples of notated music, and Stefan Hagel has a great site of reconstructed melodies here.  

_____

* Lou Harrison once pointed out to me that the famous missing chapter of Boethius' On Music concerned the division of the fourth into two parts (in contrast to the tetrachordal division into three parts).  Lou practically shouted: "It's NOT missing. Someone just wanted to erase the connection between Greece and Africa."   While Lou's idea of an intentional erasure is pure conjecture, it is true that trichordal lyre tunings are still practiced in Ethiopia, and these tunings are just one step removed from classical Greek tetrachords.

~ Cajun Dance Party, October 2nd, The Cockpit, Leeds

Or how a band with a pleasant album and 2 lovely songs can get ruined live. I was probably the oldest person in there. 13-18 year olds were the vast majority (my first indication that I was at the wrong place). Then the 18 year olds from the band took the stage. They were not bad, BUT there was a lot of teenage angst. A lot. Especially in the singer's performance. He looked ridiculous. Lyrics from their new album {eh?!} should give you a taste: "psycho bitch, so in disguise", "I'm just another, I look like my brother", "the day you left I started medication", "you are a frozen god". Oh, and here's one I came up with that night: I'm too old for this shite.

Award for Most Vivid I'm-Too-Old-For-This-Shite Situation.

~ Late of the Pier, Midnight Juggernauts, October 5th, The Mission, Leeds

MJ: I find their studio material to be mediocre, especially when we have so many new bands from the same genre that do it better. That being said, they have a good live show, giving it their all, even though their material doesn't help.

LofP: I guess the question with LotP was if they could transfer their charmingly disconnected, insanely synthy sound on stage. The answer, luckily, is YES. Hell yes. They're young, but they make beautiful noise like they are old pros. We're talking sonical storms here (I don't know who I mean by "we", I am the only person writing this....I'm scared!). The crowd was going utterly mental, and the lead singer couldn't help but notice "no barrier and no security can hold you back". And truly enough, security men were struggling to keep the crowd under control. Short set, but I found out early on that this is how new bands roll. If they come your way, and you don't make it to their show, you only have yourself to blame for missing one of the most exciting new bands of 2008.

Award for Barely Under Control Show.

~ Foals, Wild Beasts, October 9th, Leeds Academy

WB: I've already rambled about them many times, and chances are that I'm not going to stop. My favourite debut album of 2008, and that says ALOT. Wonderfully quirky and almost unbearably harmonic on stage as well, I'm guaranteeing that they will take you away on a trip (and have you back home by midnight. Maybe.).

F: Oh Foals, with your Greek singer, and your gems of songs. Your rhythm that carries away everybody and causes Greek girls (hi!) to leave the venue with bruises as souvenirs. Your unstoppable energy and your inspired melodies. Oh Foals!

Award of Best Supporting Act Ever.

~ The Last Shadow Puppets, Ipso Facto, October 13th, Leeds Academy

IF: Saving my impressions for future post.

TLSP: OK, what did you expect to read now? That they were awful? That I had a terrible time? That Turner was as unattractive as always? How many liessssssss can fit in one post! OK, I enjoyed this show to my core. They had a full orchestra with them, and although the orchestrations could have been a bit better imho, it was a great sight and listen. From the fast-paced songs to the more slow-paced ones, Kane and Turner did a wonderful job, going with easiness from sonical suspense (it's what I call that sound) to tenderness, and with the orchestra giving more depth in the performance. Call me biased, call me smitten, call me a stalker. They're all true. But that don't mean that this wasn't a marvelous show.

Award for Favourite Show of the Month (surprise! Not).

~ Los Campesinos!, No Age, Times New Viking, October 16th, Leeds Irish Center

TNV: Erm, no.

NA: Not a bad duo at all, but I wasn't exactly touched. Bonus points for being funny, interactive with the audience, and for coming down to dance with us right after the end of their show.

LC!: Most of you have seen them live, so I don't know what I can say that could be new. Oh well, point is that all the MOGgers are right. Fun fun fun. Them! Us! Dancing! To the point that we missed our last bus and had to catch a cab.

Award for I'm So Rock 'n' roll That I Missed My Bus {erm...\mm/}.

~ Wild Beasts, Eugene Mcguiness, October 31st, Brudenell Social Club, Leeds

EMG: Young lad with indie folk/pop/rock sensibilities and an addictive voice. Keep an eye on him.

WB: See earlier review, with added costumes and masks, since it was Halloween and all :)

Award for My Best and First Halloween Night.

Once again, this was Anna, reporting to you live and amateurishly from the sweaty first rows.

Pictorial souvenirs:

Midnight Juggernauts (yes, I had fun with the lights)

Late of the Pier

Wild Beasts

The Last Shadow Puppets

Plus Move 2099 EP
Expansion Team Records
Electro House Music
Digital Release Date: out now

Listen to Plus Move Boss:
Go get Adobe Flash Player!

Tracks:
1. “2099”
2. “Tic Toc”
3. “Boss”

After years of pounding at the backstage door, it’s pretty much official: dance music is the new punk rock. CBGBs is no more, and guitars are swiftly being eclipsed by laptops, but the DIY aesthetic is alive and well. So it’s only fitting that the future of American dance music should emerge in the form of two New England Art Institute grads, Josh Shifrin and Paul Mihailoff, who left behind their punk rock and hip-hop pasts to form Plus Move, an electronic act obsessed with the future. And for good reason - they’ve been there.

“It’s kind of weird how we got into this,” Mihailoff admits, recalling a time back in Boston before they learned the art of time travel. Both he and Shifrin were playing in rock bands, with their only common thread was a shared interest in Radiohead. “I was actually into producing hip-hop beats when we first met, and I threw Daft Punk in the same category as the bland, repetitive, four-on-the-floor stuff that I couldn’t get into. But once I understood the energy behind it, I started listening to all the other French producers.”

Plus Move got everyone’s attention when they leaked their bootleg remix of Justice’s funk-squelch anthem “D.A.N.C.E” to some of their favorite music blogs back in the summer of 2007. “We first heard the song as a radio rip,” Shifrin recalls. “It wasn’t even the full song or the final version, but we fell in love with it and immediately chopped the shit out of the track to get rid of the radio noise, re-worked it completely and sent it back out to every blog that we liked. Before we knew it, we were getting emails from people all over the world.”

One of those emails got their attention more than the other messages from crazed fans. It was an anonymous invitation to a meeting in a basement underneath M.I.T., just minutes from the Plus Move studio. Shifrin and Mihailoff are reluctant to reveal specifics, but the story goes that they were introduced to someone they refer to cryptically as “Sphinx.” When asked if “Sphinx” is the mythical being described in Egyptian and Greek mythology, Plus Move boldly puts forth that Sphinx “has taken many different forms throughout time.”

The next part of the story may be even less credible, yet the recordings that make up the “2099” EP are presented for your consideration. Plus Move claim to have traveled through time with Sphinx to the year 2099, where together they defeated the evil ruler BOSS. In the ensuing days spent in 2099, Plus Move and Sphinx recorded these songs and brought them back to the present day as documented proof of their travels.

The cool heads at Expansion Team Records, for whom the duo had previously remixed a Ready Fire Aim track, immediately took notice of the change in Shifrin and Mihailoff’s disposition. The “2099” recordings shifted and morphed with more unpredictable dynamics than a multi-car pileup, equal parts apocalypse and apotheosis in the mix. Label boss and fellow futurist Alex Moulton lent his ear to the music, helping co-produce the songs to make them understandable to early-21st century ears.

Plus Move recently relocated to Austin, Texas, a move necessitated by the need for physical space to assemble their next secret project. The duo are reportedly building a structure they believe is a time machine that allows for hundreds (if not thousands) of fans to join them on their subsequent journeys to the future. How’s that for DIY?

2099 is out now digitally on Expansion Team Records.

Links:
www.myspace.com/plusmove
www.expansionteamrecords.com
Electro House Music

Love Is All - "Sea Sick"

Josephine Olausson always seems overexcited and slightly stuffed up. It’s hard to get an emotional read on her, as she seems perpetually halfway between spearheading a party and shutting herself in for weeks. In “Sea Sick” she’s railing against the horrors of her ocean cruise, bored to tears as the only would-be-relaxer with “an original hip.” Her mumbly Scandinavian warble is singular enough that it can make the defiant “I’m board to death on board this ship” sound almost exactly like the even further past wits end proclamation, “I’m bored to death of all this shit!” Her p’s are pointed. The Jock Jams stomp that joins it (that's stomp--stomp--STOMP--stomp--stomp--STOMP, for the record) can’t help but blur it towards the stronger emphasis. The backing track throughout emulates a creative mind reeling with lack of stimulation, reeling from sharpened guitar lines to chaotic horn spillage at ramming speed. Yes, she’s seen the buffet. No, she is NOT amused.

Times New Viking - "No Sympathy"

The Times New Viking songs I’ve loved this year have been warm and trebly to the point of near abstraction. “No Sympathy,” the sleepiest track on their recent Stay Awake EP, falls nicely into the romantic smudge category. If there's a reason it starts by faking an Indian radio signal, though, I’ve yet to discern it. That lively ghost of a signal gives way to the more familiar strains of tenatively sobbing keyboards and Beth Murphy's vocal mush. But I like it for its indistinctness. It’s broad colors are smeared lipstick red and watery mascara black, both bruised just slightly blue.

Clues - "Perfect Fit"

As Alden Penner and crew failed to play New York on election night, this mp3 is still our best lead about the reclusive Unicorn's new work. Their big city debut would have likely been forgotten in the glee riots that ensued anyway. "Perfect Fit" begins with Penner inching a mysterious little keyboard figure forward, sounding like a more frenetic version of a Harry Potter Hogwart's theme. Penner sounds more sincere here than his in his perpetually kidding Unicorn tracks. Which is not to say he follows a straight songwriting course, frequently breaking into wordy Malkmusian digressions, containing lushly emotive declarations themselves. "I wear the past like a second skin" goes one cryptic keeper. It sounds like its stifled a bit of our boy's pluck, really. But really, there's nothing on the horizon I'm more excited to hear than what exactly he's been up to in the Canadian wilderness for the last five years.

Fad Gadget - "Scapegoat"

The only older track here was dragged from complete obscurity to semi-obscurity by Systems of Romance recently. I am informed there that Fad Gadget's frank Tovey was the first act signed to Mute Records after that label launched with the Normal's immortal "T.V.O.D."/"Warm Leatherette" single. "Scapegoat" from 1982's Under the Flag LP is more tongue in cheek than the label's industrial beginnings might suggest. Frank Tovey employs a disco throb, and a goofy Greek chorus to detail the blame laid on his narrator's feet. Where it really gets swell though, is in its final minute. Frank duets with a aloof French lass (is there any other kind?). He sounds big, but detached. She's small and close. The synths come rushing back, unmoved.

These songs make me cry, laugh, rock out, and experience every emotion in between. Every melody is perfect, every transition is perfect, and the overall sound of the album is unlike anything I have ever heard--in my opinion, Nursery Cryme is the most cohesive Genesis album. Being a fan of Anthony Phillips, I enjoy hearing the influence he left on the band; it is my understanding that he still played a large part in some of the compositions. I also urge anyone who hasn't heard Trespass to check it out as well (the only album with Phillips on guitar), as it is highly underrated!

The Musical Box is a notorious fan favorite, and reasonably so. Gabriel gives one of his best vocal performances ever. There is definitely a nursery rhyme or fairy tale quality to the piece that goes way beyond the literal recitation of Old King Cole midway through. This is more than just a song--it is a narrative, a tale, a full production in itself. It contains a powerful message similar to Time by Pink Floyd, but goes the extra mile musically and vocally.

For Absent Friends is loaded with more meaning and emotion than any other 1 minute, 47 second-long track ever created. Phil Collins delivers a fantastic vocal, and the music subtly incorporates church chorale-like elements that complement the lyrics to perfection. This piece has an incredible amount of imagery, just as effective as great literature--I dare you not to envision two little old ladies buttoning up their coats and walking across the grass to church! So simple and yet so amazing.

The Return of the Giant Hogweed is the story of a vicious plant that was stupidly removed from its natural habitat by an explorer figure; the hogweed then sought its revenge by menacing the citizens of London. Only in prog will you get ridiculous, fabulous lines like They all need the sun to photosensitize their venom! I also love the instrumental section The Dance of the Giant Hogweed which begins at about 5:30. This track, aside from being one of the pioneering Genesis tracks, also has its place in the history of rock in general, as the beginning of the track is one of the first recorded cases of tap guitar. Way to go, Steve!

Seven Stones, as a few others have pointed out, is a very underrated track. The vocal melody and accompanying progression are heart-wrenching, as Gabriel tells the story of men both protected and exploited by apparent acts of chance. I myself thank Providence for letting me hear it and the album.

Harold the Barrel is similar to a great short story, short and in-your-face, with subtle point-of-view changes and the like. The music feels a bit more poppy than the other tracks, but this is by no means a pop tune! To me the real highlight of the track is the interplay between the tone and phrasing of the music, and that of the different characters portrayed by Gabriel.

Harlequin is Genesis at its most beautiful, with plenty of lush 12-string guitar arpeggios, and great melodies and counter-melodies. Nothing that will change the face of music forever, but a great track nonetheless.

As if nursery rhymes, church altars, science-fiction plants, hazardous seas, and suicidal restaurant owners weren't enough, Genesis explores Greek mythology with The Fountain of Salmacis, and in doing so creates an album-ending track worthy of Zeus himself. Hackett produces some great guitar work, Collins shines on drums, Banks delivers his signature organ, Rutherford drives his bass like a semi-truck, and Gabriel gives another absolutely magnificent performance.

Some fans say that this album, like Trespass, was great because it showed us hints of the great things to come with their next three albums. Personally, I think this is as great as it gets, and Genesis was THAT good, that they were able to continue to deliver three equally unbelievable albums thenceforward.

by fragilelambtongues


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As richly captivating as it is innovative, the only problem this New York band’s mostly instrumental debut cd poses is one of categorization. There’s a jazz rhythm section, accordion and layers of strings and melodies here that veer between classical, Russian dances, klezmer and Balkan traditional songs, many with a decidedly cinematic feel. All this should come as no surprise since frontman/violist Lev “Ljova” Zhurbin is a Russian-born composer who gets a lot of film work. In Greek mythology, Mnemosyne is the arch-muse and goddess of memory; there is also a river in Hades named Mnemosyne which serves as the opposite of the Lethe (from which dead souls were supposed to drink to forget their past lives).  While there’s certainly an otherworldly quality to some of this, most of it has an inspired improvisational vibe. This is a very playful group. There’s a great deal of communication and jousting between members, passing the baton, running relays and jumping out from behind things unexpectedly, and it sounds like everyone is having a great time.

The cd’s first cut, Mathias, seems to be a barnyard scene, opening with samples from a chicken coop and building to fast dance featuring Patrick Farrell’s accordion before an almost bop breakdown. The stately, accordion-driven title track features Ljova’s wife Inna Barmash (frontwoman of the wild Balkan party band Romashka) singing a nostalgic lyric by late 19th Century poet Trumbull Stickney, her voice ringing out with characteristic bell-like clarity up to big, lushly orchestrated crescendo. Walking on Willoughby effectively captures a bustling walk through downtown Brooklyn – or Paris, since accordionist Patrick Farrell approaches it as a musette, bassist Mike Savino walking a brisk 6/8 beat.

The most cinematic of the cuts here, Love Potion, Expired is a frenetic dance tense with anticipation that becomes evocatively furtive. Koyl (Yiddish for “bullet”) is a mournful, vengeful ballad sung by Barmash with some gorgeously restrained trumpet work from Frank London over a bed of strings and accordion ambience. The next two cuts, How Easily I Get Lost and Less both have something of a hypnotic afrobeat feel. The cd’s single best number is Untango, Uli Geissendoerfer’s piano’s vivid and rain-streaked with guest accordionist William Schimmel providing a perfect backdrop. There’s also a slow, percussive, haunting instrumental as well as a brisk klezmer dance, a mélange of latin and Balkan with a clever musical quote, and even a showtune (albeit one which doesn’t do the band or its singer justice). Live, the band definitely picks it up a notch, and has a considerably larger repertoire than this cd alludes to. If the members can find sufficient time to keep this band active – they’re all involved with other, excellent projects – the Kontraband’s ceiling is enormously high. They’re fun enough to win over the Gogol Bordello crowd, while their prodigious chops and imaginative genre-bending will draw in all the Kronos Quartet fans. Discover them before they’re samizdat. Ljova and the Kontraband’s next gig is Dec 13 at the Stone.

That is a tough one, hmm...A Case Of You, Carey, maybe Little Green or her version of Pork Pie Hat....tough one is an understatement.

Tom, it should be noted, is big on Carey and California. (He also claims to have once had a dream that included the horns and funky bass of Dry Cleaner From DesMoines. We should all be so lucky.)

Feel free to try and gamely narrow it down to one Mitchell song -- will pass along any suggestions to Tom -- by Friday he's hoping to have a definitive best/most popular Mitchell choice to play on the show. Nervy, he is.

So in a tip of the hat to Tom's short list, here, from a 1970 live performance, is one of his top Mitchell songs. She's pretty (and strong) in pink, and takes no prisoners with her dulcimer playing.

p.s. As for the goat dance? Here's what Exploring Romania has to say about that: "The goat dance appears in the habit of the New Year's Eve as a symbol of fertility and fecundity, connecting the Romanian territory to the Greek antiquity and to the Oriental civilizations." 'Nuff said.