Catching The Waves

Never Mind The Width; Feel The Quality

The astute blurb on the release page at IDMf netlabel for Halogen - Length and Brecht (Remixed) compares it to a classical composition. Uncannily, the EP, consisting as it is does of one track by Halogen, a Brighton-based artist, and three remixes by other musos, feels as though it's the work of one person bent on producing a four-movement composition; there isn't the usual jarring, though often enjoyable, scramble of disparate sounds one associates with remixes essayed by musicians eager to parade their own production's fireworks.

Halogen's original track features a langorous descending piano motif in an abyssal acoustic that is so big it allows for the hammering of the top notes, whose fortississimo is made bearable by the cushioning reverb. A ghostly female vocal joins in and wraps your ears in swaddling clothes while a cello adds to the warmth. Remove 60 seconds from the five-minute running time and you have a contender for the chill-out track of the year. The combination of a cavernous reverb and a leisurely theme reminds me, scandalously you might think, of Vaughan Williams's Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, composed specifically to take advantage of Gloucester Cathedral's superb acoustics. It's a wafer-thin connection, to be sure, but the ethos - if not the execution - is similar.

Strangely enough, the third track, the Field Rotation remix, is a gnat's todger longer than Halogen's original, but feels shorter even though the pace is funereal. A feather-light percussive rhythm, bass booms and swirling vocals blend into the mix to make something that should not be listened to while operating heavy machinery. Play it on a good stereo and alert the coast guard for beached whales. /badtaste

The tempo ups with the appearance of the Woodnote remix, whose synths and crunchy, granular goodness are the fibre in Halogen's musical muesli. It forms an impressive ending to "/Remixed/" as we must call it.

Today's recommended track, Synaecide's remix, (track two) could be described as the allegro of the four movements. Its snippets of the album's overriding piano motif and heart-stoppingly beautiful grainy vocals will give listeners a taste of what to expect elsewhere in the EP. However, Synaecide has also pressed the big red button marked (wears nose-peg in distaste) “IDM” and given us a whirlwind of glitches and clicks that provide an outlet for the suppressed emotion in the other three tracks. It becomes an electro romp with a gnarly bass line punctuated by a brief mid-riff "skip" in tempo; a compositional flourish that I'm sure RWV would have enjoyed. If Woodnote adds fibre, Halogen - Length and Brecht (Synaecide Remix) adds roughage.

Free music is rather scrumptious, isn't it?

I'm now going to undermine completely my pretentious burblings about over-arching compositional structures, etc., by advising listeners to rearrange the tracks' order so that Halogen's effort is followed by Woodnote's and then Synaecide's. That way, your ears build towards a climax (I apologise for that mental image) and then get a rubdown from Field Rotation's chill-out track: when the piano motif resurfaces, it feels like an old friend has returned. I've listened to /Remixed/ a lot and the track order is the only minor quibble I have, even though I've wibbled on about the importance of structural unity. Me = idiot. The album is a treat however you want to listen to it.

I dust memove by - sorry, I must remove my nose-peg to admit that I have nothing against IDM per se apart from the term itself, which I think is nonsensical and divisive. I especially have nothing against IDMf netlabel, which should be proud of itself for releasing such marvellous collections, and the IDM Forum, which should be proud of itself for keeping its shy and retiring members safe and secure in their little padded cells. Please keep the wardens on their toes by sending the netlabel lots of congratulatory emails and a promise of a gold watch - if a Paypal icon ever appears on their site. ;)

Halogen - Length and Brecht (Remixed) (link to zipped album & individual files)

Halogen's blog and MySpace

IDMf netlabel

Getting Down To A Fine Art

It seems that every other album I review has a pristine white background. But don't worry your pretty little head about it: instead, come home from work/college/the pub/prison, select Blue Swerver's The Art of Collapsing from your extensive collection of CTW recommendations, flop onto the sofa, sip something good (tea, beer, wine, life partner) and listen to smoky vocals drift over eleven electronic blues-jazz morsels. Yeah, baby. For those of you out there wondering how to blend jazz and the blues with electronica, look no further than the first track, the spookily good Untempo, which morphs from jazzy blues to downtempo IDM to electronica before culminating in a short slice of trip-hop and an ending that suits the final lyric perfectly. Less than four minutes long, its many changes in tempo and mood provide real value for money – if that's not a surreal thing to say about a free CC album. Don't blame me if you wake up tomorrow surrounded by empty wine bottles, a full ashtray and a trilby you've never seen before. As I said, it's the first track (apologies to feed readers - I'm waiting for Jamendo to do something about its invisible media player):

The Art of Collapsing is a disciplined album from Blue Swerver, a five-strong band from London. There's no egotistical jazz twiddling (which is something I love, when in the mood): all the musicians serve the song. Nick Street's electronic trickery and Robin Grey's (for it is he) bass provide a firm bedding for Adam Green's whispered/slurred vocals and Jules Fenton's judicious drumming. Ben Oliver is a dab hand at jazz-blues piano. According to them, the god Orpheus helps out on triangle. So they've got that going for them.

A true fact about track seven: Zinedine Zidane is not the name of a French footballing wizard but is actually a formula invented by Louis Armstrong in his bid to discover jazz's equivalent to the theory of relativity: Satchmo found that those five syllables, pronounced in that precise order, immediately increased a singer's hipness by a factor of cool. He died too soon to publicise his findings – so thank CTW for the research. Adam Green's vocals in the verses totter along the ragged edge between ultra-jazzy and off-key, but the chorus is the coolest, catchiest thing you'll hear all week. (Find Zinedine Zidane by clicking on a track name in the Jamendo player and choose from the pop-up playlist.) It ends with a marvellously pithy line: The rest of the week was much better/I finally had it out with my neighbour's dog/He's been pissin' on my roses/for way too long.

Speaking of which, what a pleasure it is to hear such distinctive lyrics. This from Job, where a jazz piano and light electronica help to tell the Biblical tale: They said, “Crazy, you're crazy still praying to Him.”/He said, “God is my shepherd even though he burns my skin.” Or there's this from At The Movies: Side by side at the movies/disappointing pizza and a slow walk home.

There are a couple of beauty spots in the album's otherwise flawless complexion: the vocals suffer from too much sibilance and my crappy sound system distorts the trumpet solo in Tasky, though the latter's verses of beat poetry come through very clearly, which, depending on your taste for wordplay, may or may not be a good thing.

Right, this review is getting longer than my alcohol-deprived tongue, so I shall leave you to discover the other tracks with the advice to stick the album on your "chilled Anjou/Muscadet/Gewürztraminer/Buckfast Cider" playlist, if you have one. Please think about making a donation to Blue Swerver to thank and encourage them - it's easy to do at Jamendo. I can't remember if I found The Art of Collapsing via the peerless Free Albums Galore, but that's not going to stop me from a drive-by plug. ;)

Blue Swerver - The Art of Collapsing on Jamendo & Modifythevan (zipped album & individual files)

Blue Swerver on MySpace

Modifythevan netlabel

Cologne Commons

I have temporarily conceded my claim to be the centre of global cool to a deserving cause. Today and tomorrow sees Cologne (for geographically challenged readers: yes, that's in Germany) host a festival and workshop of Creative Commons culture including music, art and various forms of media. The idea is to investigate and promote the possibility of a free sharing culture that will be beneficial to all, while not entirely ignoring the possibility of a crazygonuts weekend of drink, dance and debauchery.

There will be workshops, how-to's, panels and expert discussions; musicians and VJs will demonstrate in a quiet, subdued manner how CC sound and visuals might cause one's heartbeat to raise ever-so-slightly; and all involved will try to counter the media's demonisation of shared media as the province of scoundrels, charlatans, thieves and Country & Western fans pirates.

Anyone lucky enough to attend in person will not only hear some great music and see amazing videos but will also learn a lot about promoting CC culture on the internet. An exploration of the Cologne Commons website will reveal links to the hard-working funksters who are part of the Cologne Network. Their efforts should ensure this weekend will be a huge success - but I suspect they might be feeling a little fragile on Monday morning. Is there such a thing as CC aspirin?

Next up at CTW is, oh, I don't know, maybe some free music? The last few days have seen a spate of public service announcements and, fun as they've been, it's time to get back to my stock in trade, which is wibbling about free music that you can download and listen to at your leisure. It's the best way I know of supporting the great things that are happening in the CC world. Besides, I need to get my hips a-swingin'.

While you're looking at the Cologne Commons website, feel free to download their two compilation albums, cunningly entitled:

Cologne Commons Compilation 01 and, wait for it...

Cologne Commons Compilation 02.

You'll be more stylish in no time. Anyway, whisk yourself to Cologne via this magical interwebulator Tardis button thingy:

The Italian Blog

Every now and then, I try to convince you that I am not some sort of free music deus ex machina but merely an online simpleton who likes to recommend things that he likes. You, of course, refuse to acknowledge any flaw in my perfection and insist that I am the source of all that is good, free and funky. Not so, planet. There are those who deserve a place in the pantheon that is CTW's “General Netlabel Sites” category. The gilded olive wreath goes, rather appropriately, to Eldino, a native of the Calabria/Marche regions of Italy.

What has he done to deserve this Nobel-like honour? Well, he has taken it upon himself to curate netlabel music. All of it. The lot. Come with me into the heart of the matrix and grasp the scale of his madness.

For the last six years, Eldino has collected and catalogued everything he could lay his hands on. A "Netlabel Music Meter" on his website shows that he has collected...wait for it...316GB of Creative commons/netlabel music. To put that into perspective, the iPod Classic stores 120GB of music, which translates to 30,000 songs, albeit songs stored at a rather lo-fi 128kbps. Actually, Eldino's meter is eight months out of date: he currently has nearly 400GB of netaudio in his private collection. He must have over 100,000 tracks; all free, all legally downloaded. Not only that, he has tagged every track correctly, assigned the appropriate album cover, rated the music and even placed albums in a logical and easy to understand hierarchy of folders instead of emulating the mess of files that you'll find on my most people's hard drives.

His chosen task is Sisyphean. No matter how close he gets to scooping up everything with a CC licence on it, there will always be an obscure Lithuanian label who decides that what the world needs now is 100 albums of tuba nu-jazz. And Eldino will cry a little, bend himself to the task and try to push the huge boulder up the hill once more.

Why is he doing this extraordinary thing? He is thinking of posterity. Netlabels and artists come and go. Without him, countless songs and albums would have been lost in the depths of the net. Anyone looking for anything online knows that the internet is a near-impenetrable jungle; we often discard our accidental discoveries, dismissing them as worthless, on our search for treasure. It is not for us to decide what is worth preserving; Eldino is giving the Future the chance to pick and choose.

Visit his site and you'll find various articles (mostly in Italian, some in English) on Creative Commons culture, occasional album reviews, tutorials on proprietary and open source software, and tips on how to fill your mp3 player without becoming a pirate. Anyone who is curious to find out just how deep the netaudio rabbit hole goes should join his five news feeds, where you will discover oodles and oodles of albums to wade through. You have my extra-special permission to ignore CTW and discover things for yourself. (My ambition is to make CTW redundant.) But I warn you, your cerebellum will explode. Only experienced Italians with an encyclopaedic knowledge of the internet and an obsessive compulsion to bring order to chaos will be able to stand the strain. I'll take a wild stab in the dark and suggest that Eldino is probably the world's leading expert on netlabels & CC music, although Mo Sauer of Phlow or Marvin of Free Albums Galore might give him a run for his money.

I'm sure you've read of philanthropists who have handed their collections over to museums. Eldino has compiled an archivist's dream of Creative Commons material, but it's still less than half of what is floating on the electronic high seas. Wouldn't it be lovely if someone far-sighted from the Italian government or, better still, the Creative Commons rewarded Eldino's insanity industry and diligence by offering him some financial help or - and he might prefer this - seconding an attractive secretary to his side? For now, he ploughs a lone furrow. We salute him. Please visit his site and, should you feel like it, send him an email thanking him for his Herculean efforts.

I must also thank Eldino for helping me to convert CTW into a mobile phone format. (Wanting to go mobile was akin to a toddler deciding to upgrade the Hubble telescope.) He is an evangelist for the Creative Commons music scene and was happy to help.

Il Blog di Eldino

Motor Skills

Professor Kliq - Trip Home from Harald Walker on Vimeo.

The video is closed because the Prof is sorting out some minor copyright problems. *wags finger* Naughty boy. Never fear, he's going to republish his music in the near future - and this time it'll be pure Kliq. I'll let him explain.

Harald Walker (of the very accomplished Sonic Walker, source of countless fine netlabel mixes and a much nicer blog than mine, damn him) has made an excellent video for Trip Home, Professor Kliq's ambient-ish triphop ode to the surreal experience of getting back to the family home/wigwam/igloo. There are lots of nice touches, such as the blurred scenery that accompanies the introduction of ice-cool flanging drums, which show that Harald really knows how to track the mood and tempo of a song. The flashes of humour, like the bicyclist riding while holding an umbrella (who does that?), and a couple's snatched kiss, balance the trippy effect that comes from a sideways look at life flashing by.

EDIT: The comedy cycling routine is apparently quite common in Holland. Spot the odd one out: Rembrandt, Cruyff, a tolerant society, great beer, a cricket team capable of beating England, unicycle with red nose and huge feet. You see now the error of your ways. Stop it and get wet like everyone else.

Trip Home is a track from Professor Kliq's most recent album, The Scientific Method, Volume II, (available from Rec72 netlabel & Jamendo) and displays his recent penchant for splicing ambient sounds amongst his rock-solid rhythms and melodic wanderings. CTW has already reviewed the Prof's wondrous penultimate platter, Guns Blazin' and once again recommends readers to give it and The Sci-Meth 2 disc a try. If you like Fatboy Slim, big beat, funk, and hip trip-hop, you really should investigate him and brighten your weekend.

The Prof is a little under the weather at the mo, so let's hope he enjoys this, the first video ever to grace the hallowed halls of CTW Towers. My sincere thanks to Harald for his exceptional patience in advising me how to use my motor skills and opposable thumbs. You could also brighten Harald's weekend by visiting his website to see how a real Creative Commons music blog should be done. Git. Nice work, H.

Professor Kliq (link to review of Guns Blazin' and other info re. the Prof)

Sonic Walker (as professional as CTW is amateurish - so it's very professional)

Free Music Is A Stupid Idea

I've heard the above quite a few times. Some people even get irate at the very notion of free music, not realising that there's room for both commercial music and properly licensed free music in this big, increasingly not green and blue world.

I reviewed Sean Fournier's Oh My exactly a month ago. It's wonderful to announce that Sean has just signed a contract with a few major shows on MTV, E! and Oxygen who want to use his perfectly formed six-tracker. If you're talented, determined, understand the power of publicity and enjoy a modicum of luck, the Creative Commons paradox holds true: you can give away your music for free and make money out of it. Here's a reminder of his stuff:

Lovely, isn't it? You'll find further details at his beautiful and internet-savvy website, where you can goggle at the man's talent. Before you go, I'd like to point out that there is no connection between Catching The Waves reviewing Oh My and Sean getting a contract with major TV networks a scant month later. It's merely a coincidence and does not in any way mean that CTW is a big hitter, a man of influence, a big swinging dick or a master of the music universe. To reiterate:

D'you see the power of CTW, people? DO YOU SEE?!? I WILL CRUSH MY ENEMIES AND DRIVE THEM BEFORE ME AND HEAR THE LAMENTATION OF THEIR WOMEN!!!

*cough*

Ah, that's better. I haven't said that for ages.

Sean Fournier home page

Undercover Brother

The heart of Sliptone's six-tracker lies firmly in that nebulous genre of music known as, er, “old school funky disco-ish latin/big beat sort of thingy – oh, go on, you'll like it”. My reasoning? Witness the wah-wah guitar chops, electric piano, clavinet riffs, slap bass and movie dialogue that are sprinkled liberally throughout Funkagent 1. If I may be so bold as to venture an opinion, the most successful track here is the opener, Birds and Bees, which immediately drops the hammer and begins a head-nodding enquiry into sex education from a time when men smoked pipes and women just smoked. The track is tight, contains vinyl crackles, a bluesy piano riff, a kick and snare that swing, and chopped vocals: just some of the many things that keep CTW happy. Guinness is another, if anyone's offering.

An electro bass at the start of Mrs Brown presages the odd scream from Mr Brown, the Godfather of Funk himself. It's joined by a slap bass; an unusual combination but one that works. A clavinet joins in the fun, and it quickly becomes impossible to say which musical decade has influenced Mrs Brown the most. Then a Hammond organ turns up and I decide to use the Grove Dictionary of Music to stop my kitchen table wobbling.

If Funkagent 1, the disco-ish title track, were to lose two minutes it would gain a lot; brevity is the soul of hip, as Shakey almost said. The samba piano of Melos Liberal brings Latino funk to the table, though Sliptone abandons it for a trip-hop interlude only to return with a lo-fi flanging effect that goes down as nicely as the previously mentioned pint of porter. A fun break-down section is marred slightly by a snare that is just too late to sit comfortably in the pocket.

Sugar throws trumpet, organ, funk guitar and breathy female vocals at a bass guitar and lets them fight it out. Strangely enough, it's the bass, normally rock-solid in these type of workouts, which to my ears sounds slightly ahead of the beat. But then, my rhythmic sense is as reliable as a politician's promise.

/bitterness towards lazy, corrupt governments and opposition

Don't Stop does what the rest of the album does: it settles into a rhythm and ...doesn't stop. (These tracks are less songs, more extended grooves in a laid-back funky Big Beat style.) Its rolling drums, echoing sax and 60s style vocals bring the EP to a satisfying conclusion. Yeah, baby.

Sliptone's philosophy is to keep things sounding natural; he'll tolerate the odd, er, slip if the performance feels alive. Consequently, Funkagent 1 is raw-boned in places; a couple of tracks need their screws tightened - but there's definitely enough of the good stuff to pass the time pleasantly/move your money-maker. Unfortunately, I can't show you what I mean because Budabeats, in their Hungarian wisdom, supply only a zipped file of the album. True, you can listen to the stream of this straight-outta-Carlisle EP at their website (please do) but it does make things difficult for hip and happenin' blogs who would otherwise be only too happy to spread the word. I'll try some Magyar:

*clears throat*

Kérjük, vessen mp3 link "Madarak és a Méhek" a honlapjára. Köszönöm.

I can tell you're impressed. ;) There's no tip box for the talented Sliptone or the tasty Budabeats so please consider sending an email thanking them for the free virtual platter of funky fun. It would brighten their day as much as Funkagent 1 did mine.

Sliptone – Funkagent 1 (link to zipped album only)

Sliptone's MySpace

Budabeats

All your mobile are belong to us

Ah, my first use of a classic internet meme. I'm so down with the cool kids. Right, pay attention. Run your eyes over my body this website and you'll notice a blue blob that, as Prince Charles once said of modern British architecture's effect on London, is like a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much loved and elegant friend. It's for all you trendies out there, swanning around with your iPhones and Nokias and cranial-audio uplinks. In other words, Catching The Waves is now formatted for web-enabled mobile phones. Please use the button or bookmark this link: http://catchingthewaves.wirenode.mobi/

Like any other new technological wheeze at CTW, the blob is there on sufferance; if it doesn't work or if I don't like it – it'll disappear.

Inevitably, there will be some teething problems. I'm not sure if my recommended songs will be playable for now, and Jamendo's media player doesn't want to appear at the moment. However, the links to recommended albums will still be at the end of each article and will still work.

So here's a rare request (apart from my pleadings for you to shower the musicians with “thank you” emails and maybe even a little cash) for user comments/emails: please let me know if it works or if it doesn't. You may laugh at the new cack-handed logo as long as you tell your trendy friends with trendy phones about CTW – I need to know if the service is compatible with the major phone brands.

Yes, that last plea was a blatant attempt to court popularity. Sue me. My next post but one will feature someone who has helped me tremendously with "CTW Mobile", as I like to call it in my more pretentious moments. Next up is - and I know you'll find this hard to believe - an album review. I like to ring the changes. ;)