Posts from the ‘Links’ Category

Links for June 9th, 2010 + a Track

—————————— June 9th, 2010 ——————————

  1. SolarBeat is a really neat little music box program that models the orbits of the planets in our solar system. Really ingenious—my favourite is when you turn the speed up and Venus is kind of a bass drum to nod your head to—. It also puts the solar system into perspective: I still haven’t heard what Pluto sounds like. (And yes, Mark Wilson, I know that Pluto isn’t a planet)
  2. The Whitney Music Box is a more complicated implementation of a similar idea. It is a “musical realization of the motion graphics of John Whitney,” whose book I might have to go pick up. Shockingly, he was writing about the intersections of music and visual art through motion graphics in 1980. Anyway, of all the different options on the Whitney Music Box page, my favourites are the first one, the Microtonal one, the Chromatic Non-Prime one, and the Bell Carol one, but they’re all amazing.
  3. P.U.D.G.E is yet another LA guy with a growing bit of hype. He’s pretty dynamic and big city, but his nonchalant approach is fun. Mostly though, I’m shocked at how awesome Bandcamp seems. I signed myself up, just in case I decide to release stuff. It seems like an amazing platform.

Considering how few people read this blog, I get ridiculous numbers of emails from PR people asking me to post their clients’ tracks. Plantagenet 3 is an exception to this: the main guy sent me a really polite email, and being a history nerd I wondered if his band was named after the Planagenet family. A few emails later and yes, he named his band Plantagenet 3 because his dad claims he’s named after Richard III.

Anyway, their music is awesome. They describe it as “a misguided combination of Spaghetti Western soundtracks, 1960s surf guitar and lo-fi post-rock” and that’s pretty accurate. The sound is interesting and the songs are fun and unpretentious. And they’re using Bandcamp too, hmmmmm.

(♪) Plantagenet 3 – Theme from an Imaginary Western

And, not that I care really, but PR people shouldn’t take this as a sign that emailing me a lot is an effective use of their time.

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Links for March 2nd, 2010

—————————— March 2nd, 2010 ——————————

  • Kate has started a photo tumblr that is really good, and David Lang has a new website for his photography. He’s been chasing Redbull Thre3Style around shooting photos like mad, so his site is always a good place to see snaps of what is going on in Canada’s underrepresented underground music scenes.
  • Code Organ turns a website’s code into sound. Pretty neat, though I’d love to see an explanation of what exactly is going on. It would be much better if non-validating code made unpleasant sounds, and javascript was diminished or something.
  • I’m a big fan of My Jazz World, so I was really disappointed to read that Blogger shut him down. The site only put up out-of-print albums, basically as a public service, and took down any download links to things that became available again. Blogger has always been a shitty platform to publish on, and stuff like this isn’t going to gain it any friends. Anyway, My Jazz World has relocated to Baywords, which is slow but sounds like a great idea. Part of their mission statement says:

    Many blogs are being shut down for uncomfortable thoughts and/or ideas. We will not do that. Our goal is to protect freedom of speech and your thoughts.

    Time to a) update your bookmarks/rss/etc. for My Jazz World, b) consider Baywords for your bootleg blog, and c) move to Sweden.

  • Speaking of links, I’ve added Ile Oxumare to the reading list on the right. He uploads rare and out-of-print stuff, focusing mostly on jazz, folk, etc. with some synthy stuff in there too. Get on it.
  • I’m loving this whole bass=kickdrum thing. I don’t need constant clacky deadmau5 kickdrums: Shackleton – Mountains of Ashes (youtube). When the kickdrum does come in, it’s nice and flat, and Shackleton’s aversion to snare sounds and typical snare timing is as refreshing as always.

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Links for January 7th, 2010

—————————— January 7th, 2010 ——————————

  • XLR8R, Pitchfork, and Create Digital Music have curated a compilation album called Music For Our Future for the SyFy channel. It has some awesome tracks on it, including Hudson Mohawke and Christopher Willits. Also it’s free. (link)
  • Christopher Lee, of Dracula/Jinnah/Lord of the Rings/etc. fame, has made a symphonic metal album about the life of Charlemagne. It is called Charlemagne: By The Sword And The Cross. I can’t think of anything nerdier, or more awesome. (myspace link) (youtube link)
  • Flying Lotus has an album coming out this spring, and he also has a new interview up. On top of the regular banalities about personal development etc., he actually has some interesting stuff to say. (link)
  • Yeasayer’s new album leaked, and I finally got around to listening to it. I’ve said they’ll outlive their genre, and this album proves it. Go download it, and then buy it/go to a show/something to assuage your conscience. (link)

ps. big dose of blather coming in the next few days.

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