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bye bye emusic.com
iTunes younger, cheaper, cooler cousin is no longer very young, very cheap nor very cool.
What with the creeping prices the leaking of indies and embracing of mainstream, eTunes… i mean emusic has just become a smaller, cheaper, crapper version of iTunes.
I’ve bailed after finding less and less of your catalogue appealing each month I was struggling to actually fill my (much diminished for the money) download quota.
What started out as a really cheap, risk free way of finding new bands became a much less cheap way of wading through mounds of crap, old music to discover the occasional gem.
Neither am I a diamond miner, nor am I a long-tail cool-aid drinker so I’m afraid I’ve had to say good bye after a fun (at first) five years…. I kept holding out on the hope that one day you would come to your senses. But you never did, so I guess it’s…
…Good Bye Emusic…
emusic download manager blues and repurchasing
emusic is really starting to take the piss. Price hikes and monthly song quota cuts has already dented its once proud image as “iTunes’s younger, cooler brother.”
Now we have a site with buggy, sub standard download software and a policy which aims to make you repurchase tracks that have failed to download fully.
OK, so what happened?
I clicked on the download button, and the album started to download. (Much slower than it used to, I might add.) I then paused the download momentarily by accident (clicking the pause button).
When I clicked resume, it resumed from the next song! I now had two 30 second snippets. Nonplussed, I cancelled the download in the hope that I could restart it… Nope
Going back to the website, I found that there was no longer an option to complete your album… I’d have to pay the whole $6 to download the whole album again!
It’s a download site, for fuck’s sake and they’re charging me PER DOWNLOAD, when it’s THEIR SOFTWARE THAT’S BROKEN.
I really think that this time, I’m done with emusic.
For reference, here’s the mail I sent to their customer support… Not my most eloquent prose, I must admit.
"To whom it may concern" I paused the download.... when I resumed, it tried to download the next track... I now have four half downloaded tracks.... I thought if I cancelled the downloads, and reselected them manually I'd be ok... but IT SAYS I ALREADY DOWNLOADED THE TRACKS. With the OPTION OF REPURCHASING (WHAT THE F***?!) ARE YOU KIDDING! This is not good enough... You are not iTunes, the only thing you have going for you is that your prices are cheap... If you can't make a system as painless as iTunes you will go out of business. Please let me redownload the songs which I paid for but now don't have. The album is http://www.emusic.com/album/modwheelmood-Pearls-to-Pigs-MP3-Download/11475231.html It says I have 7 tracks but I don't. I'm getting sick of music's draconian "REPURCHASE" policies requiring me to justify my existence every time you have a bug in your software. Yours, Disgruntled, Craig Lloyd.
Elbow: One Day Like This Featured in Apple’s new Macbook Air Commercial
I just watched the recent Apple Stevenote (keynote speech by Steve Jobs) and as usual, Apple chose some uplifting music for the Macbook Air advert at the end of the show, to which I found myself humming along.
Then it hit me who the song was by!
ELBOW!
A rather stoned looking Elbow winning the Mercury Music Prize.
It would seem that Elbow, the band named after what the Singing Detective described as the “loveliest word in the English language,” have finally “arrived!”.
Was it the Murcury Prize they won a few years back that would ear mark them for success? Nope.
Was it the fantastic performance of said song at Glastonbury in the same year? Nope…
No, Apple’s choice of backing track for their new Macbook Air 13″ and 11″ might just prove the break this epically talented band needs to get them and their remarkable back catalogue spanning 20 years or so, some much needed air time.
Here’s hoping that a day like this is just what elbow need to nudge them into the spotlight.
Album Review: Cloud Cult – Who Killed Puck?
Cloud Cult is a band with a long history that I have just started to appreciate. They are hard to identify because of their eclectic mix of acoustic and wired instruments with genre busting arrangements swinging from lo-fi to orchestral not just within any particular album, but within a single track!
As concept or “story” albums go, this one’s story is somewhat low key. It is a loosely themed collection of songs telling the story of the birth of “Puck” his alienation from society, his initial attempts to fit and final rejection ending in death. Depressing subject matter, perhaps, but delivered with a lyricism of startling compassion and warmth that sounds more “hope springs eternal” than Armageddon.
At first I was a little underwhelmed, but having become a fan of The Mountain Goats, Elliott Smith and Lost in the Trees, I knew that repeated listens would bear dividends… And I wasn’t mistaken. What at first appears to be a mishmash of unrelated tracks, or unrelated verses within the tracks, turns out on careful listening to be a finely crafted story of the demise of a young man who had done nothing to deserve his fate.
Who Killed Puck?
- Where it starts – A track I prefer to think of as “I found God” since that lyric is repeated throughout the whole song. It is a coming of age classic where a boy is constantly reaching higher highs and lower lows on his trip through adolescent to adulthood. Repetitious and remarkably catchy, the simple construction belies the multilayered music that builds slowly throughout the track. It would appear to be the story of the meeting of Puck’s parents.
- Conception – One voice, one guitar, recorded on a tape deck and filtered to death doesnt get much lower fi than this. A killer melody tugs on the heartstrings and makes this track a Low-Fi masterpiece. Seems to be talking about the soul of Puck moving into its host…
- 9 Months – a meandering, instrumental track that sways from a Mike Oldfield, Amarok-style multilayered drum heavy “native” rhythm to his electric-guitar heavy, riff laden and back without going anywhere… An ode to Oldfield, perhaps… There is a sense of frustration in the song but it’s title would suggest it is the birth of Puck…. Ending inthe whispered lines “I am Human”.
- Pucks 6th Birthday – a Micro segue of a warbling childlike taunt…. unsettling stuff. Thankfully short.
- Becoming One of You – The story of a boy who does anything and everything to fit in with the crowd, ultimately ending in disappointment and rejection. The Eels could have sung the first minute or so of this song, but the almost Heavy Metal like bass and electric guitar which come into the forefront as the track progresses might give the fact away that it wasn’t. At just under a half of the way through, the song takes a left turn and heads into familiar electronica overladen guitarwork with repeated lyrics, as is common throughout the tracks on this album…
- Ad Brainwash (Part 1) – A minute or so is samples and sounds from the swinging sixties, highlighting consumerism and idleness which blurs into the main event:
6 Days – One of the highlights of the album. A mutating rhythm underlies a narrated discussion on the brevity of Human existence. Based on a speech by David Brower, an environmentalist and the founder of Friends of the Earth. Nice, but I don’t see how it furthers the concept of the album.The lyrics are so compelling, I took the liberty of quoting them here:
Compare the 6 days of the book of Genesis
to the 4 billion years of geologic time.
On this scale, 1 day equals about 666 billion years.
All day Monday, until Tuesday noon
creation was busy getting the earth going.
Life began on Tuesday noon
and the beautiful organic wholeness of it
developed over the next 4 days.
At 4 P.M. Saturday, the big reptiles came.
5 hours later, when the redwoods appeared
there were no longer big reptiles.
At 3 minutes before midnight, man appeared.
One-fourth of a second before midnight, Christ revolted.
One-fortieth of a second before midnight, the industrial revolution began.
We are surrounded by people who think
that what we have been doing for
one-fortieth of a second can go on indefinitely.
They are considered normal.
But they are stark. raving. mad.
- Pretty – Puck finds temporary solace in the infatuation with a girl. The key word being temporary. Starting off with one voice, one guitar, the song builds into one of the strongest, most a soaring climaxes of the album.
- Sane As Can Be – The song starts off as a gentle acoustic track marks the middle of the album and is perhaps the turning point in Puck’s life as he goes over the edge as he reveals his secrets and philosophy to his girlfriend, who appears to reject him. This turning point comes as the song flips to an electric guitar track with some fine Metal drumming. Comparisons might be drawn to About a Boy mutating into Susu or Spoon.
- Do You Ever Think About – Segue hears two people discuss suicide as its rhythms build into something which would have fit on the heavier bits of “War of the Worlds”
- Ad Brainwash (pt 2) – Are two segues in a row technically segues at all? Who knows.
- Ready To Fight – This song continues on where from Becoming One of You left off and reveals Pucks anger boil over and his rejection of society and its values.
- Who Killed Puck? – A “noise track” more than a song. You can quite literally hear Puck’s whole life flashing in front of him with lyrics from ‘conception’ leaking in in the background, suggesting his soul’s return to the ether.
- You Can’t Come Back Again / Close – A beautiful ode to the end of life… turning full circle to ‘Conception’. Again building into a climax of Mike Oldfield “Guitars” proportions.This is where the fun ends, so you might as well stop listening here.
- Bonus track 1: Lies – A funky yet unremarkable track about, funnily enough, Lies. If it were to fit into the album, it would have been something that Puck got angry about.
- Bonus Track 2: The Yin and Yan of Sex: A dull closing track. enough said.
Some inspiring Music…
OK I admit this is a recycled post… It’s late, I was asked by a pal on facebook to offer some music suggestions… Half way though, I realised I was actually listing music I like…
Anyway…
I’m avoiding my mainstream faves, like Radiohead, PJ Harvey, The Pixies etc. and it’s a time limited (I gave myself 20 mins to compile this and not a minute more…) report so don’t say “sux compared to xxxx or what about”…. unless you’re offering me some hints on what to listen to…
Here’s some music by people who actually mean what they sing…
Angela Ai – She’s an ABC, somewhat Christian overtones, Piano heavy, Broadwayesque, moments of shining beauty from the darkness.
Tom Waits – Kentucky Bourbon Fried Blues from a man who practically lived on the streets to get his inspiration.
Damien Rice – Awesome emotion, Catholic upbringing, the guy literally has to be carried off of stage on a stretcher.
Magdalen Hsu Li – OMG real life slapyaindaface songs! A truly beautiful person who quite literally went through hell. Famous for her classic, “Fuck Bush” which is actually far lower quality than her usual stuff.
And the rest:
who else who else…
Sia… what a soulful woman. luv luv!!!
Imogen Heap… Best full on fem voice since the Annie Lennox of Eurythmics and solo fame.
Sarah Nixey of Black Box Recorder – Political and Social disconnect brought to life in song.
Emilie Autumn – Life vs. Death, Religion vs. Sex. Violin vs. Rock. Awesome talent, unique voice: Mega intelligent, witty, a gorgeous lolita and a great songwriter (she’s actually one of the finest living violinists on the planet) she’s also a bag of pure contradiction.
The Decemberists – Widest eclectic vocabulary of any band, mixed in with a sweeping vista of influences.
Savatage – Metal – As is often the case with metal, heavy moral/corruption overtones but played out to a T… have Two great albums, Gutter Ballet and Streets.
Gregory Hoskins: Fund this guy randomly last moth… Mix of Sting, Paul Simon and Buena Vista Social Club. The guy is gold.
Didn’t have much to go on but I hope this helps.
’nuff already. I’m off to watch Battlestar Galactica.
Prodigy? Emilie Autumn
I just don’t get it… Of practically every female artist I listen to of late, someone, somewhere invariably says they “sound like Tori Amos.”
Take Emilie Autumn, my latest audio crush. She’s a multi instrumental, cross genre chameleon of a star with prodigious amounts of talent. Classical violin trained from the age of four, nonconformist, Nigel Kennedy aficionado in both style and attitude (which subsequently lead her to being kicked out of several prestigious, yet conservative teaching establishments).
“Victoriandustrial” is a label she’s placed on herself, “corsets and combat boots” a juxtaposition of styles that is mirrored in her heavy hitting gothic rock fused classical.
Yet despite all of this attention and fame granted by her rather sexy alter ego, she has remained true to her solid classical heritage, demonstrating commendably deep and stable roots with her release of a gorgeous classical album at a time when, well, let’s face it, classical is not exactly pop.
Emily Autumn – Opheliac
So this Tori Amos woman… is she the what then? The root of all modern female artists? The *mother* of all modern female artists? Or is it more a case of a “tastes like chicken” moment when people forget what Tori’s music actually sounds like but are left with just a vague impression, an aftertaste if you will? I’m sorry, but I just don’t see (hear) the resemblance in anything more than one of the many influences (because there are oh so many) to grace her songs.
I mean, come on, there are moments, yes, just like there are moments when the flavour of the food you’re eating becomes a little indistinct, and even… dare I say it, chicken-like.
Yet saying she sounds like Tori Amos is much too simplistic and does her a disservice, as if she’s a follower rather than a setter. Why, then, don’t we add the obvious observations of similarities with Kate Bush’s killer flyaway choruses, Sarah Nixiey’s sumptuous prose, Sia‘s sultry smoked out close-miked vocals, Annie Lennox’s awesome vocal presence, The Cocteau Twins’ complex countermelodies, Siouxsie Sioux’s sexy gothica, Bat for Lashes’ beauty and style, Fayray‘s fabulous classical accoutrements, Imogen Heap’s incredible acoustic vocal flourishes. Heck, let’s even add Bette Midler’s beautiful bar-tale storytelling and noiresque mystique and even an occasional splattering of TLC for heaven’s sake! There are heaps of influences in there because this woman is a one-girl artistic encyclopædia who has experienced and even mastered ranges of music and art beyond what most modern “popstars” could even name. She has more talent than an average studio band rolled up into one sexy gothic lolita package.
Come on, admit it, it was a chicken moment… she doesn’t really sound *that* much like Tori does she?
Define Ectopian / Ectopia
Ectopia /ek-TOH-pia/ (noun)
In medical usage the word ectopia refers to displaced or shifted organs. e.g.
Tonsillar Ectopia
Ectopia can be thought of as a state of being out of place, or being displaced from the natural or ideal location or setting; to be in a condition that deviates from the “normal” either in situation or in relation to other members.
c.f. Utopia or “the perfect state.”
Ectopian /ek-TOH-pian/ (adjective)
An object being in a state of ectopia. To be out of place or time, displaced, removed from natural habitat and placed into a new, different, foreign or alien situation.
Current usage patterns of this word, however appear to be limited to artistic and philosophical endeavours, the author being unable to find consistent examples of usage outside of these fields.
When thus applied, it appears to include a distancing from the norms of the genre. Moreover, many example uses imply the positive connotations without the negative implications.
For example, nuances include thoughtful solitude and contemplation, meaningful individuality, otherworldliness, timelessness and often constitutes a willful, conscious choice on the part of the subject to place themselves or their art in said situation without undue emphasis on the disharmonious and discordant aspects of such a choice.
I find it very exciting to be present at the very nascency of a word, especially a word that I feel applies so well to my current situation. For example, I’ve often considered myself as leading a rather ectopian lifestyle here in Japan as perhaps do most expatriates.
I also find that I am far more attracted to ectopians than others, since in my eyes its those very differences that make people special.
Hence I’ve discovered that my taste in music is also characterised by a taste for a juxtaposition different styles shifted into new genres.
Singers like Kate Bush (sheer unadulterated otherworldliness), late 60’s David Bowie introspectives (looking at himself and the world from a distant place), Bic Runga (half Malaysian, half Maori creating a unique style of music that stands alone), Magdalen Hsu Li (American Born Chinese singer who overcame all manner of hardships in the deep south to turn herself into living proof of the existence of positive energy) and most recently Emilie Autumn (A colossal, chameleonic talent for shifting between genres yet belonging to none) to name but a few.
I had been unable to identify what it was I loved about certain music when similar songs sung in a different context failed to turn me on.
It’s the ectopian nature or “ectopianness” (for want of a better word!) of the songs and the artists that make me listen time and time again.
Since the ascendancy of Greek philosophy it has been known that it is the very sophistication of the words themselves allow the human mind to grasp intangible concepts by giving it a firm handle to hold onto.
The words we know and the concepts they represent shape our very thoughts and without them, we are both vocally and mentally mute.
Good Things Come in Threes: Three Women and their Pianos – Angela Ai (History)
This is the third part of the second article in my series “Good Things Come in Threes”. In the previous two articles, I looked at
- Angela Aki a Japanese-Italian solo artist and pianist, brought up in Japan educated in the US and made famous by her Final Fantasy XII theme tune.
- Fayray, a Japanese singer and pianist brought up and raised in the US before finding major success in her home country, Japan with the album Hourglass.
Angela Ai – History (US, 2001)
In this part, I will be looking at Angela Ai and her landmark album, History.
How I found her
I was looking for the song “Rain” by Angela Aki on iTunes when the new iTunes 8 feature “Genius Sidebar” suggested I might like Angela Ai.
Yeah, that’s a laugh, I thought, new the Genius function might be, but not so Genius when it comes spelling it would appear!
On a whim, I clicked on the identically titled “Rain” by the fictitious and misspelt (or so I thought) “Angela Ai.”
It was not the version of Rain that I had expected. iTunes had no information on their Artist page, but intrigued I jumped across to Last FM to see who she was. Fortunately, Last FM had complete versions of her songs for playback. (The whole track is available here if you’re a Last FM member, or a reasonable chunk can be found on her site here.)
Instead of Aki’s shouttastic rendition of a typically staid love song, I found myself listening to an engaging, short romantic-tragedy in the form of a regular, common-all-garden pop song.
With Ai’s sublime voice, it told an insanely solid tale in its few short minutes about a woman watching in dismay as her best friend, to whom she was the bridesmaid and who she’d had a secret crush on for years, got married! Startlingly bold for a debut single!
I was blown away. This was NOT Angela Aki. Not by a long shot. I had found Angela Ai.
Angela Ai is an American Chinese who was, to quote from her website:
…born and raised in Columbus, Ohio. Her passion for the performing arts began at the age of 5 when she began studying ballet. She studied classical piano at the age of 7 following with brief studies on the violin and flute. While in high school, she began auditioning for and was chosen to be the lead in many of the school musicals and plays.
After graduating from University of Pennsylvania with a degree in Finance, she moved to New York City and started a career in investment banking of all things. Her heart lay elsewhere, however and she went on to study Jazz at the Manhattan School of Music before making a career for herself on Broadway in the US.
She is a technically superb pianist, highly trained in both classical and jazz (as are Fayray and Angela Aki to whom I am comparing her) which has set her up perfectly for a wide range of sounds and genres. However what sets her apart from the other two is her background of voice training and experience on the stage as an actress. That experience alone puts her voice and manner in an entirely different category altogether, and it shows on her album, “History”.
She commands total mastery over all aspects of her performance from the piano to her immaculate voice. And there is only one word to describe her voice: spectacular.
Where Fayray’s voice would deftly and delicately give way on the high notes, Ai’s is right there, in control and without the barest hint of stress or strain. Where Aki would tend to shout in order to wring out her full emotional gamut, Ai’s strength and passion manifests itself much like an ice skater’s performance: Effortlessly graceful yet immensely strong.
Her music
She is Asian, a singer songwriter with a classical and jazz background, she plays piano, she has a fine voice. There the similarities with the other two end.
I consider Angela Ai a rather notable departure from my usual tastes in music, even taking to consideration the changes my library has gone through over the last year.
Where she differs most of the music I usually listen to and the other two women to whom I’m comparing her, is that she brings the vivid passions and emotions of theatre, drama, the stage and of Broadway musicalsin particular and moulds and tempers them into songs of remarkable simplicity, elegance and beauty.
Every song is a play, every line is a scene: Much closer to Chicago the musical than Chicago the 80’s pop band.
Thus, this simplicity and cross discipline genre busting comes at a price to the listener, however, as her songs tend to be remorseless assaults on your imagination. Each one is steeped in thespian emotions and soaked in graphical imagery painted with fat, wide brush strokes, like the backdrops to the stage plays from which they might have been used for in another life.
For Ai, there is no hiding behind an orchestra, no percussion or rhythm sections to get the listener going, indeed no backing whatsoever. There is, for the entire album, Just Ai and her piano.
“History” is an entire album of piano and voice alone.
Also, the subjects of most of the songs could not be considered conventional: child abuse, the imminent death of a father and a believer’s shock at being denied entry to heaven don’t really sound like the sort of things that can be sung about, but on stage anything can happen.
As such, it’s far from the most accessible album released, much less so than her debut, self titled mini album from which the song “Rain” was pulled.
Is it worse for that?
For from it. its shocking simplicity is a refreshing breath of air in a world where every facet of every album is produced down to the ground.
If you enjoy the sheer beauty of what a voice can achieve, if you enjoy musicals and love the sound of a well played, lucidly recorded grand piano, if you’re fed up to the eye-teeth with insipid love songs, Angela Ai’s History is a real treasure.
Angela Ai, History
At nine songs long, it’s not an epic, but each song has something to offer. There are no fillers, no masturbatory demonstrations of piano skill. She doesn’t need them. The album is as sparse and simple as her songs themselves; nothing wasted, nothing superfluous, yet dramatic and emotional as a Broadway production.
(click on the songs’ titles for excerpts direct from Angela Ai’s Web site at http://www.angelaai.com)
It opens with →history, sung in the first person to the listener. On a conventional theme of lost love, it might be considered a taster if you will and something to ease the audience into her world. It offers a nostalgic look at lost love and the pain of living close to the source of your pain while forcing yourself to move on with your life.
Despite her assuredness that the relationship is over, is history, the loss she suffered, the anger she felt and the love that lingers despite her best efforts remains as her voice bursts with every stab of pain, every nostalgic twinge, every memory.
The stage influence on this track as on every one on this album is plain to hear. You can almost see the feel and moody set, a flickering streetlamp, grey extras milling past and among them, in colour, her lost love.
This theme is returned to in the third song on the album, →i Really Miss That, a more mellow, introspective song but sung from the viewpoint of a woman who yearns for the relationship she once had, a relationship that somewhere along the way lost everything that once made it so special. More than the finality of the first song, this one offers a ray of hope for the future.
→world War Three (Yes, the first letter of every song on the album is a small letter)
This is such an unbelievably cool concept for a four minute song that I feel obliged to share it with you.
A “believer” who has behaved impeccably her whole life, yet for all the wrong reasons, dies and is confronted by God. She is shocked on being questioned by Him as to her worthiness in spite of her life of apparently good deeds. He tries to make her understand the error in her ways, that her deeds were all done out of a sense of duty and selfishness rather than out of love. By way of example he explains, but she is unable to comprehend. God, in a final attempt to enlighten His child accompanies her through Hell where she is forced to witness World Wars One and Two. Yet, still unable to comprehend, she is left there to face World War Three alone. Yowzers!
This song with its beautifully memorable chorus sung from the viewpoint of the deserted subject, is a magnificent piece worthy of entry into the Annals of “Seriously Great Concepts.”
→daddy, the fourth song on the album is an emotional song that touches on the trauma left by family breakups.
A daughter visits her father on what may well be his deathbed; a father who it appears left or even abandoned his family and his daughter a long time ago.
As she sits there with her dying father, she remembers the pain that he caused her and the loss she felt at his leaving. She remembers how she blamed herself for his leaving.
She visits him in hospital with the intention of forgiving him for his lies and the past, to let bygones be bygones. The daughter reveals her soul to him, asking him to come back to her, only to be rebuffed bya refusal to accept her, her love and most importantly, her forgiveness.
→raw the most powerful and heartfelt song on the album stays with the theme of family trauma.
A woman comes to terms with the emotional scars left by a self esteem destroying childhood under the thumb of a domineering, perhaps even violent family and moves on with her life.
Ai conveys the confusion and fear of the child through the lamenting chords of her piano and a voice that falls into depths of pain before rising symbolically and soaring above the music to freedom.
Listening to this song, it’s hard to believe that such a powerful number wasn’t written autobiographically. The emotions on display here are palpable and, just like it says on the tin, raw.
For me, this one song alone would justify purchasing the album.
This song, coming just beyond the midpoint of the album stands as a turning point from the darkness of having things taken away, fear, entrapment, hate and remorse proffered by the first five songs to the the latter half of the album on which each song promises so much; dreams, happiness, thankfulness, forgiveness and freedom.
Angela takes a 180 degree turn from the darkness and despair of raw and sings an uplifting, almost Disneyesque song which could have quite easily come from a children’s musical.
Something, (My innate cynicism and dislike of Disney, perhaps) unfortunately prevents me from experiencing this song in the unfettered and childlike manner which it deserves.
Instead, I feel that it doesn’t have the depth of feeling or context that the other songs on the album have. Even so, I can feel that it represents childlike imagination and the purity of childhood joy and thus earns its place at the head of the four Yang songs that counterpoint the five Ying songs that came before it.
→Whole: A woman hungers for solace and finds the man who she feels can fill the hole she has inside. The woman, obsessed with every aspect of his being feels salvation a mere heartbeat away, if only she can hold on to herself and not lose herself in the process.
→you Gave Me, is an unbridled song of thanks to a mother or parents and feels as though it was written with her own parents in mind.
→free, one of the strongest tracks after WW3 and Raw, ends the album on a high note (no pun intended). Where the first track history is a gentle introduction, free is a reminder that Angela Ai is a performance artist at heart with powerful, modern influences and is the best demonstration of how far she has taken her craft.
True to the title of the track itself, the songs form spirals, seemingly out of control as she invites her audience to come with her as she explores freedom itself, building up to a freeform pillar of sound like I haven’t heard since Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon.
“I scream, and you can scream with me ’cause I am free.”
However, Ai demonstrates that there is a fine line between freedom and chaos and her masterful control shows on which side of the boundary she lies as she brings the song masterfully back under control before soaring off, quite literally into the stratosphere in one of the highest notes I’ve ever heard in popular music, proving once and for all the divide that lies between mere, trained ability and given gift.
In closing then, History is a challenging yet thoroughly rewarding listen which offers a touch of class and a LOT of emotion delivered by a master of her craft!
Angela Ai (History)
- history
- world war three
- i really miss that
- daddy
- raw
- just a dream
- whole
- you gave me
- free
Good Things Come in Threes: Three Women and their Pianos – Fayray (Hourglass).
This is my second in a short series of articles looking at good things that come in threes.
The first in the series was Women with Attitude, where I took brief look at Lily Allen, Katy Perry, Amy Winehouse.
This time, I’ll be looking at three culture-crashing Asian singer-songwriters who have taken my fancy over the last couple of years. And no, this is not a typo, Angela Aki and Angela Ai are different people.
The two other articles in this series cover:
- Angela Aki a Japanese-Italian solo artist and pianist, brought up in Japan educated in the US and made famous by her Final Fantasy XII theme tune.
- Angela Ai, an American Born Chinese, raised in Columbus, Ohio who is a Pennsylvania U graduate, an actress, on Broadway, a singer and a talented pianist.
Fayray (Album: Hourglass)
Hourglass is a beatifully produced, audiophile grade album with impressive taste and style. A real treat to Jazz and Pop fans alike or those who want to stretch their hifi with some well recorded accoustics and female vocals.
The opener, “First Time” starts with the powerful, subterranean stings of a beautifully captured double bass that will sound best with decent earphones or a subwoofer. The deep strings give way to an English voice which if not of unfettered, soaring range is one of impressive control and resonance; as rich and pure as the accomplished band that backs her.
Most surprisingly, First Time is sung entirely in English on a Japanese album, making it an unusually brazen opener for a rising star. Taking into consideration its slower, more understated, calmer pace and its also being far less famous than several of the others songs on the album, she bucks the recent trend of lining up the popular singles 1, 2 and 3 to catch casual listeners in the shopping centres at the expense of album flow, rhythm or atmosphere.
The fact that this is so demonstrates the confidence in her craft and control over her own production values.
The pace picks up a little with the third song, a Wong Faye esq ballad “最初で最後の恋” (My first and final love) and a rather 90s retro “Fell” harking back to Nakajima Miyuki with a little added electric guitar.
Classical piano influences show through heavily with most songs featuring an accomplished piano or keyboard track, played by herself.
The fifth song is a meandering, self composed piano instrumental solo demonstrating (perhaps a little unnecessarily) her prowess in front of a keyboard. Although a beautiful piece in and of itself, I can’t help feeling that it was a little unessessary.
“白い二月” (White February) is an Enya-like, synth piano floating number featuring her voice sailing breezily across its entire range into falsetto.
“道” (The Way) ups the pace to about the fastest and most upbeat the album gets with another Wong Faye influenced unashamed pop song and one of the few tracks which dispenses with the keyboard as the main melody carrier and instead pulls in a battery of electric, accoustic and spanish guitar.
“Look into My Eyes” is the hit single that put the album on shelves throughout Japan and features Fayray in her best light: On classical piano and in control of voice, the song’s well crafted rhythm and its gentle melody with other instruments, accoustic and electric guitars, a full string section and decent drums following her piano in its wake like the Pied Piper.
“Living Without You,” the second English composition on the album and signals the entrance to the final, distinct segment of the album.
It is a classic piano ballad, slow and thoughtful and if not a classic in itself is nevertheless a pleasent listen and lays the way for the final three songs, which feature her on the piano with a sprinkling of backing, winding down the tension with her gentle, soothing tones and masterful playing in a string of medium-close miked accoustic compositions, which she produced, penned, perfomed and sung herself.
Fayray’s classical background, starting at the age of 4 with the piano, squarely places her in the top echelon for technical ability. Adding intelligent and thoughtful compositions supported by an accomplished, confident voice which does not squeak, squeal, grate nor need computer assisted modulation makes her accessible and enjoyable to a wide range of Japanese and overseas listeners alike.
Mini Facts
Although she works in collaboration with a number of colleagues, the album is essentially her own production.
She often appears on TV in Japan, in dramas as well as hosting TV programs as an English language interviewer of artists, politicians and other notables.
Fayray, Hourglass (Japan, 2004)
- first time
- 願い (Negai; Wish)
- 最初で最後の恋 (Saisho de Saigo no Koi; My first and last love)
- feel
- 樅の木-樹の組曲- (Momi no Ki-Jyu no Kumikyoku-; Fir Tree -Musical Suite of Woods-)
- 白い二月 (Shiroi Nigatsu; White February)
- 道 (Michi; Road)
- look into my eyes
- living without you
- 口づけ (Kuchizuke; Kiss)
- 愛しても愛し足りない (Aishite mo Aishitarinai; No matter how much I love you, it’s never enough)
- 名前 (Namae; Name)
Next up, I’ll be taking a look at Angela Aki.
How Eclectic are your music tastes?
I’ve been using Last FM seriously for about six months now and find its statistics fun and enlightening, as well as nice for finding out new artists.
I took Anthony Liekens’ Super Eclectic Test, a quite simple statistic for finding how similar your top 50 listened artists are to each other by searching for common “similar artists”.
The concept is that by taking 20 similar artists from each of your 50 top listened artists, you end up with a potential pool of 1000 artists, assuming there is absolutely no overlap between any of them. The more similar your top artists are, the more common artists they have that overlap, reducing your overall score.
Anything over 700 is considered eclectic. I managed 757/1000 as of today, so I can officially say I have eclectic tastes.
So, I appear to be in the most eclectic 6 or 7%… Yay for me.
Unfortunately, I noticed a trend in the way Last FM labels foreign artists: Every female Japanese artist I have in my library is considered similar to every other Japanese female artist in my library!
I guess they just label all Japanese stuff as similar, like old people who say stuff like, “All Chinese look the same.”
It’s a bit sad that this sort of indiscriminate grouping exists considering this is a music site. I can only hope they realise at some point that Nakajima Miyuki (50 something cabaret/ballad singer) and Utada Hikaru (20 something R&B / Pop singer) have about as much in common as I have with Henry Ford.
The Nanchatte Technojunkie 
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