Catching The Waves

Fabergé Eggs? I'll Take Two

Imagine, if you will, a craftsman hunched over a workbench, his concentration bent on producing a matchless gem fit for none but the cream of society. Further imagine, for the sake of an uninspired analogy, your nose pressed up against a jeweller's shop window as he places a Fabergé egg on a cushion of crushed velvet. If only you had access to the riches inside.

Let's face it, buster - you ain't gettin' no steenkin' jewellery. But do not fret. Succour is at hand in the form of one of the internet's great untapped music resources. If you visit blocSonic you'll get the following free musical Fabergés:

• Sixteen (you heard me, sixteen) zipped compilation albums, each painstakingly sourced from netlabels and Creative Commons websites around the world, available for free download in lossless FLAC format or mp3 (with a choice between 320kbps and 192 kbps). All tracks can be downloaded individually, which is good news for the many people without broadband.
• Highly professional and distinctive packaging artwork in tif, eps and pdf formats for your CD and jewel case, should you need something more tactile than an mp3 file.
• A substantial PDF file giving full track information and biographies, etc. of the artists. From netBloc 16 onwards there'll be a brief Q & A session with each artist.

As with all compilations, the tracks will elicit the following reactions: yuck/meh/dat is da shit, boyeee. With 16 albums to choose from, CTW's modus operandi was to download the 192 kbps mp3s, compile an enormous playlist in Microsatan's Windows Media Player and whittle the list down to tracks that rang my bell. Those tracks left standing in the rubble are the ones I will download at the better-sounding bit-rate of 320 kbps. I can tell you're impressed.

Of course, the compilations serve as a great starting point when searching for free netmusic. We all know how difficult it is to find music that suits our tastes perfectly, so being able to sift through blocSonic's compilations makes things easier and is also a lot of fun. Sites like blocSonic, Free Albums Galore, Phlow and Netlabelism are vital signposts on the open road to free music, and will help artists who don't have the backing of a record label to contemplate/sustain a music career, or who simply enjoy the buzz of releasing their music to a global audience.

BlocSonic should go from strength to strength. But here's the rub: given the high production values and the superb value for money (the music is free, donations to the artists are optional but welcome), the download figures are criminally low. It seems to me that the netlabel/Creative Commons scene is music's best-kept secret. Please, do me a favour - email your friends and colleagues with a link to blocSonic. They'll think you're terribly trendy, you'll walk a little taller, and the netlabel scene will continue to gather momentum. And, dammit, CTW's sidebar of "General Netlabel Sites" is far more exclusive than any hawker of trinkets to high society, so if blocSonic's been allowed to perch there for the last few months then you can rest assured it's worth visiting.

*gets off high horse*

The illustration at the top of this article is the cover for the latest compilation, Sweet Sixteen. Not only does it look lovely and give you an idea of the high standard of presentation common to the entire blocSonic website, it stops me having to use the blocSonic logo as the main illustration. I mean, as lovely as it is, it's this big:

 

..and the CTW computer boffins can do nothing with it. Stop laughing.

netBloc Volume Sixteen (Sweet Sixteen) (link to zipped album and individual files)

blocSonic

The Secret of Success is Sincerity

All together now: "Once you can fake that, you've got it made."

One of the joys of reviving the still-warm corpse of this blog is reminding myself of music I've enjoyed, he said, boastfully. On that note, Brad Turcotte (not-so-secret identity, Brad Sucks) is about to release another album. So what, says you? Well, surly internet readership, CTW has already wibbled about I Don't Know What I'm Doing, which remains the catchiest free album I've yet found on the internet, so you should sit down, keep your hands on the desktop and listen to your mad teacher while he subjects you to a spittle-flecked diatribe. You can find IDKWID at Brad's own website and at Jamendo, where it's currently, ahem, riding the crest of a wave. Heh. Mind you, CTW's endorsement of IDKWID and the enthusiastic response of CTW's 1000000* readers has almost certainly nothing to do with its position at the top of Jamendo's "popularity this month" statistic. It's just rather good. Simple, really.

Fake It is a preview release (just the one track) from Brad's new album, Out Of It. The vocals, with respect to Brad, still sound endearingly homespun, but the guitars are meaty and the song is just as ridiculously addictive as anything from IDKWID. Brad has the priceless ability to get you bawling his lyrics while strumming the air guitar like a novice on Guitar Band or Rock Hero or whatever the latest penny arcade craze is. God, I'm getting old. The full album, Out Of It, will be available on 8th September 2008.

Brad's nervous about the reception his album is going to get, despite the fact that he's already received extensive mainstream press coverage for his previous efforts. I think he's going to be pleasantly surprised by the number of downloads, paid or free, that he's going to rack up. Besides, CTW's finance department has ratified the deposit of a few doubloons to BradCorpMegaIncKeepMeInBeerLtd when Out Of It gets pushed into the spotlight, so at least he can get himself a bottle of something to drink under a railway bridge. Yes, "railway". I'll be damned if I write "railroad".

Damn.

In case you're wondering, here's proof, in Brad's own words, that the netlabel/free music movement is wonderful:

"Just like 'I Don't Know What I'm Doing', it ['Out Of It'] will be available in CD, MP3 and lossless FLAC format. Pay what you want ($5 minimum for CDs) or download the MP3s for free. The full source will be available for remixers (or whoever wants it)."

God love him, the industrious, talented, free-spirited, entrepreneurial sprite.

Brad Sucks - Fake It (direct download)

Brad Sucks website

*This numeral may be in binary.

Because You're Worth It

It seems that Germany, despite losing last week's European Football Championship final to Spain, isn't quite ready to admit defeat. In response to the previous CTW recommendation, the German coach has thrown on an extraordinarily last-minute substitution straight from the heart of Berlin:

Dubplates From The Madhouse by Dub One! (The exclamation mark comes as part of the package. It helps if you say it as. If! YouwereCaptain...KIRK!)

The first sound on this five-track EP is a cool double bass, then a cooler dusty beat. Hmm, so Jack's Pot (Radio Edit) is trip-hop, surely? But no, here's a pulsing organ and swelling horns. Sit back and enjoy dub delirium. Rather appropriate for something from a madhouse.

A minute in to Odd Man's Planet Dub and what was an exemplary dub track gets a bespoke, crackly trip-hop drum beat that elicits a Neanderthal grunt of satisfaction from CTW. Play this (not the grunt) to your friends and watch their jaws drop when you tell them that you got it for free without resorting to a balaclava and sawn-off shotgun. Your friends may scoff at your claim, but you will remain calm and untroubled because your inner soundtrack is set to "trip-hop", permitting your yin and yang to enact a slow-motion duel between sitar and guitar. Satisfaction ensues. You've just been levitated by the Sitar Sensi (2007 Jah Crazy Edit).

Next is Wise Man's Dub, in which the narrator tries to find the path of enlightenment by bothering old age pensioners for the answer to life, the universe, etc. He gets nowhere until he talks to a nubile young lady. That's wisdom. And it's extremely wise of Dub One! to produce such a blend of trip-hop, light dub and rock guitar, not to mention a dusting of sitar.

We end the EP surrounded in a cloud of smoke with Dub One!'s whimsically titled "Sedative Gunjah Remix" of Knock Me Down by ETF. There's sax, flutes, organ, a soaring rock guitar solo, and a lithe young woman singing along - all it needs is a reverberating snare drum and you could file this remix in the dictionary under "Dub". And, would you credit it, the snare drum's there too. Somebody give the Oxford University Press a call.

I think this glimpse inside an asylum is the best thing that Dub One! has dub done. Each track is a head-nodding treat, and there's a professional sheen to the sound. If you want more of his stuff, you'll find it at ever-reliable Ideology, where he joins up to good effect on various releases with Authist, his usual partner in crime.

Dub One! - Dubplates From The Madhouse (EP) (link to zipped album and individual mp3s & oggs)

Dub One! on MySpace

Ideology netlabel

Neither Do I

Brad Turcotte's album title is disingenuous. He knows that getting free music publicised is difficult because there's so much of it. He's a canny operator whose excellent website reveals a keen understanding of the effect that the net is having on budding musicians who won't/can't deal with the big record labels i.e. get the music heard by giving it away for free and then make a living out of concerts, merchandising and subsequent albums. I first heard Brad's music because Reaper, the music production software, uses the first track on his album as its demo project; then I saw his album on Jamendo and wanted to hear more of his stuff. Like I said, canny. But first, a quick digression:

1. If you make music using Cubase, Logic, Fruity Loops, Sonar, etc., check out Reaper. It's programmed by the same guy who made Winamp and it's got a lot of the music production industry excited/scared. The software works beautifully. And it's free until you want to pay for it. Read the previous sentence again, think about it, and then go meet the Reaper.
2. Jamendo has over 8,000 free albums available to download - all you have to do is register. There's no charge, no hidden fee. The software works fitfully. The music is free unless you want to make a donation. Read the previous sentence again, think about it, read the first sentence again, think about it, and then take a large shopping bag to the musical equivalent of The Matrix.

The opener, Making Me Nervous, is the album's cuckoo, having pushed itself to the front so it gets fed before everyone else. The bouncy dance-rock is out of step with the rest of the mid-tempo album, but it's really catchy. And that's Brad's secret. I Don't Know What I'm Doing is the catchiest free album I've heard so far. Just a couple of listens and you'll grab the nearest broomstick/toothbrush/current squeeze and belt out lyrics like these:

"I wanna know where the hell the days go." Look and Feel Years Younger

"It seems you've mistaken me for someone who cares, I'm just a dirtbag under the weather..." Dirtbag

There's a bit of Beck in there, but I also get a strong whiff of Nirvana. The album betrays its one-man-band home-recording origin, but it still sounds good. Sometimes the vocal needs pushing to the front, and the drums could definitely do with beefing up and a little more variation (Bad Attraction, I'm looking at you). All in all, the album is crying out for a top-line producer to make the sound fly. Though it's still very good, you understand. God, I'm anal.

I like all of the twelve tracks but will mention only a few more for brevity's sake:

Fixing My Brain discusses neural correction and whether it should be stimulated by chemicals and/or love or whether one will lose one's sense of self in the process. Oh hell, it's got dreamy vocals and strumming guitars - just sing along to it. Sick As A Dog is a slow, restrained grind with multi-tracked vocals on top - just the type of thing Nirvana did so well. Give the track a course of vitamins via a top record producer and it would reach rock, well, nirvana. Overreacting, a life-enhancing message for Earth's depressives, sounds like something John Lennon might have written: heartfelt lyrics and a tune that stays with you. I'm not overreacting.

The album's strengths are the multi-tracked vocals, the quirky lyrics, the meaty acoustic and electric guitar riffs and, above all, the melodies. You will find yourself singing these songs in the street/bed/bath/lavatory. CTW's infallible test of quality - only the classiest songs get sung in the toilet.

There are more excellent things on Brad's website: free sound files for each song so you can remix them (a round of applause), remixes from fans, lyric sheets, the opportunity to buy the album in CD format or from iTunes, and t-shirts, etc. And Brad has a new album coming out fairly soon; I hope it's a huge success.

A good song is a good song. I Don't Know What I'm Doing is a good album. Why not suck it and see?

Don't look at me like that.

Brad Sucks - I Don't Know What I'm Doing (link to album at Jamendo)

Brad Sucks home page (there's a lot more here than just the music)

Reaper (if you make music on your computer, take a look)

Jamendo (English language version) (where you will find an insane number of free albums)

Two Wheels Good

The free toy in today's CTW box of cereal is an EP by a ramshackle rock band who love to let rip on the road and in the studio. All the songs here have a loose and improvisational feel about them, as though the band members grabbed whatever happened to be lying around in the studio and barged into a song whenever the feeling took them. They feel a bit like the '60s Rolling Stones but with free added electronica. AdcBicycle - I'll repeat that again for the hard of reading - adcBicycle are a wild-eyed bunch of rebels who by rights should be tearing up the dusty backroads of America or dashing through rain-drenched Budapest squares in search of the next after-gig party.

Except they're not. AdcBicycle is actually one person from Canada who is unfeasibly talented and has released a free eponymous five-track EP on Kikapu netlabel in the hope it will encourage you lot out there to pay to hear the other songs from his album. If life was fair, he'd be pushing a wheelbarrow of gold nuggets to the nearest bank. The five tracks are all of a piece and lead directly into one another, so they are meant to be heard in order. Somehow the electronica elements are made to sound organic; they blend in seamlessly with the acoustic instruments.

The first track, intro, begins with electronic warbling before treating the listener to a blend of brass, over-driven organ, acoustic guitar and finishing with, erm, what sounds like the manic humming of a deformed manservant on his way to help in his master's laboratory.

About a minute into poor economic policies you'll find yourself listening to demented pseudo-Native American chanting backing a Nintendo-ish chiptune, and thinking, "Well, this is new. And tuneful. And rather superb. And free." The cackling laughter that follows (this is not your ordinary EP) precedes a transformation into an epic rock sound that implodes into a kazoo-like ending.

It's not easy to describe music, you know.

The third track is called Facing the wall, staring beyond, a line from Samuel Beckett's A Piece of Monologue, an extract of which features in this gloomy piece. Melancholy guitars and organs get deeper and darker as the lyric gets glummer and gloomier. It's a meditative piece that is strangely uplifting. In the name of god ponders religious violence and violence in general accompanied by burbling electronica and slide guitar. It's an easier listen than you might think.

There's a story behind We're taking over the world Richard [sic]. AdcBicycle is an Ottawa resident, and so is Richard Warman, a human-rights lawyer. Someone naughty dialled the wrong number and left this unforgettable message on the wrong answer-phone. I give you one of the best audio extracts ever:

"This is a message, um, to Richard Warman from one of David Icke's nutty followers. We're taking over the world, Richard, we're taking over. And there's fuck all you can do about it. We are right."

A brief chronology of David Icke: professional goalkeeper, TV sports presenter, Green Party politician, ...scourge of reptilian humanoids. Look him up and weep.

AdcBicycle's EP is full of extracts from interviews, speeches and films, all artfully mixed with a beguiling blend of electronica and rock/art music, creating a unique and pleasurable listening experience. I hope he sells some albums off the back of it. And I still don't know how one man manages to sound like a shaggy rock band with a hip electronica producer. The netlabel scene is great, isn't it?

adcBicycle - adcBicycle EP (link to zipped album and separate mp3s)

Complete album available from Noisefactory Records.

Go to the adcBicycle Home Page to find out more, and to read the good news that there's a remix of the album due soon.

A Razor Blade in the Ice Cream

As this is my first post in the brave new world of broadband, CTW has pulled out all the stops to bring you the very latest, most up-to-date, cutting edge release available on the internet today.

Yeah, right.

Here's something that was released into the wild in 1999 on Comfort Stand netlabel, which in internet years makes Soda Fountain by Twizzle older than the Big Bang. If you like free internet music then you've probably heard this charming four-track EP before, but I'm new to it and this is my blog so yah-boo sucks to you. If one person discovers and likes Soda Fountain after this then my work here is done.

*sticks hands on hips, Superman fashion*

Your first sip from the fountain will be a mouthful of Falling, an ethereal trip-hop tune whose haunting vocal is enhanced by studio trickery. Next up is a visit to Black Elk Mountain for an apparently innocent jaunt through David Lynch country where oscillating guitar chords bump into swooping strings, low chuckles and a vocal that does that stretched-vocal thing that worked so well in Fatboy Slim's Praise You.

This Is No Chanson could be sued by Magritte fans; it may not be a pipe but it's certainly a song. It's another sickly-sweet confection with a taste of sitar, a hint of clarinet and a topping of dreamy vocal. Having come to the end of the EP, Twizzle invites us to rest easy at a speakeasy for a late-night drop of bluegrass/jazz with accompanying bass and honky-tonk piano; Barefoot Girl/Pebble Road is a care-free love song that might be hiding a black heart behind the blood-red lipstick. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I give you:

"He's as sweet as lemonade drunken through a straw. I'm his little barefoot girl and we are joined by law."

Four things to note: the production is impeccable, the song-writing is accomplished and the vocals are enchanting in a squirm-in-your-seat fashion. That's three. The fourth thing to remember is that this is a Little Red Riding Hood of an album - there's something dark and disturbing going on here. Oh yes, CTW notices these things.

*taps nose*

Naughty Twizzle.

Twizzle - Soda Fountain (zipped album)

Twizzle - Soda Fountain (link to individual mp3's)

If you're hungry for more of this excellent two-piece band duo, visit the Twizzle website where, as luck would have it, they have a new album that you might like to buy. (Who says CTW isn't at the cutting edge?) Here's hoping the release-free-music-and-hope-to-build-a-fanbase method of sustaining a career works for them. Soda Fountain is very persuasive.