A Tribute to Will Stratton

A little late on this but, last Friday was a pretty exciting event.  It was the tribute to Will Stratton coupled with the release of the album available for purchase that also goes to his Medical fund.

It was a pretty fantastic sow held at Spin in Manhattan - a large basement ping-pong club.  I wish I wrote this earlier so I could remember it better.

First there was Beat Radio.  That was a two-man group.  Not usually into that kind of thing, but it was cool.  Next you had Kid in the Attic who I had previously seen at a rooftop show with pow wow! and Crazy Pills on Andrea's birthday.  It's just one woman in a red hat and this was certainly a better venue for her than a drunken Bushwick party.  Both artists are on the tribute album and make pretty cool contributions.

Aaron Roche was the next to perform, an older guy and collaborator of R. Stevie Moore's.  Naturally that piqued my interest and his set, though long awaited from the set-up time was pretty awesome.  It started really quiet and then got louder as he had two young female vocalists with him for harmonies that reminded me of a more successful version of what the Dirty Projectors try to do.  With mostly pre-recorded backing and high intensity, his set reminded the most of John Maus.

The Next two sets were more personal by New York friends Jesse Rifkin and Trevor Wilson.  Both of them are on the tribute album as well, and by then things got so emotionally taxing that I couldn't even pay much attention to Wilson's set, though it was clearly a continuation of Rifkin's with a lot of delicate beauty.  You should look into both artists.

Will closed the set himself which was an unexpected treat, up to some point, and though he was underrehearsed, I doubt I've seen him play better.  It was overwhelming.  There were only three songs in his set but it was the highlight despite some great competition.  He is looking surprisingly healthy and in good spirits, so we all have a lot more to look forward to from Will.  His next album is entitled Gray Lodge Wisdom and will be quite a change of pace, and I personally have very high hopes for it.  A demo of its title track (sure to change a lot) is included in yesterday's article's package.

Photo by Mike Raynes

Photo by Jeff Nasareno

Well, there goes my policy of not reviewing friend's shows, but I have to push the BENEFIT ALBUM and how you should buy it.  I was asked to include a couple tracks and I chose Jesse Rifkin and David Garland's.  The former because it is quite a radical reinterpretation of an old favorite differing from either artist's usual sound, and the latter because of that artist's connection to Connie Converse and the Documentary my wonderful girlfriend Andrea is making about her.

Well, here are those TWO TRACKS, but you really should just buy the album, probably several times.

Anyway, my mind has stopped functioning, rather it's malfunctioning and I should probably stop.

Will You Play With Me?

To call Bülent Ortaçgil (pronounced Boo-lent Or-tach-geel) the Turkish Cat Stevens would be an oversimplification, but it is a good indicator of what to expect from this album.

About two and a half years ago my friend Will gave me the track "Suna Abla," which within about a week was played over a hundred times (that being from whenever I finally got around to listening to it.) Naturally, I had some trouble acquiring any more of the artists work until I was lucky enough to find an actual CD copy of this at Amoeba in Berkley (notably, I also found a vinyl copy at Amoeba in Hollywood which I somewhat regret not buying.) After that purchase the same kind of obsessive rotation occured because this album is a masterpiece. Every tracks is a hypnotic winner which more than just language to distinguish it from English language folk of the same era. Unlike some of his later work made years later after his return to chemistry the arrangements are very simple usually just with acousitc guitar, and some piano and bass. Some *heavier* tracks like the wonderful "Olmalı Mı Olmamalı Mı" and "Şık Latife" do add a bit of a change of pace. Despite the exotic language Ortaçgil conveys not only remarkably powerful emotion but a rare kind of childlike innocence in both vocals and instruments. Simply put this is an album of transcendant beauty, even if you are for some reason put off by music in other languages. Along with the others previously mentioned, the title track and "Dört Kisili Düs" are just otherworldly gorgeousity. The album is brilliantly structured with bookend tracks that pull you in and in most cases leave you ready for yet another spin.


Bülent Ortaçgil - Benimle Oynar Mısın (1974)

In other news, Jeff Hanson, one of the few recent artists that I like died recently. It was some kind of freak accident - I don't know what, that occurred in his apartment. He was only 31. I recommend his self-titled second album from 2005. Maybe I will put it up later.

You Just Wanna Know

KINO is known as the greatest Russian band of all time. I don't know enough to argue otherwise, but they are one of my favorites of any geography, regardless.

Here is their first and probably my favorite of their albums. It is a raw set of underground (as in hiding from the authorities) St. Petersburg Postpunk/New Wave. It is not as apparent here, as on their later work, but band leader Viktor Tsoi's top influence was a black market copy of Duran Duran's first album. Here, though the arrangements focus more on (mostly acoustic) guitars than on elecctronics (or anything else on that matter.) Though, unfortunately the proficiency is not strong as lead guitarist Yuri Kasparyan had yet to join. However, I think the songwriting is perhaps the strongest and this was the first album of theirs I really fell in love with. The eerie "Devero" is one that really seaps into you - I woke up one morning into my dark closet of a room in Boston with that sirculating in my brain not long after hearing it the first time. It is the second track, though, "Proso Khochesh Ty Znat" that I see as the stongest track of the set. Thelament over the common Russian affliction of alcoholism "Moi Druzya" and children's song "Aluyminiyeviye Ogurtsy" also stand out as some of the best. Granted though, what detracts from this album is the presence of some filler tracks, so don't feel disappointed if you have to skip some - other albums, such as the posthumous masterpiece Chyorniy Album (The Black Album), don't have any of those. Either way, this is a great place to start and I, of course, would reccomend this to anyone curious about music on the other side of the Iron Curtain.

Western listeners should know that Viktor Tsoi holds the kind of regard in the former USSR that John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, Ian Curtis, and Bob Marley hold in the West. ...Only combined. He died tragically in a car accident outside of Riga (now Latvia) in 1990. He is also one of the most accomplished Eurasians (half Korean) in history.


KINO - 45 (1982)

The titles here are in Russian, so here is a link that has translierations and translations along with their respective lyrics to not just this, but all of thier records.

In music news, though, something sad. Chris Knox of Tall Dwarfs, Toy Love, and his own solo career has suffered a stroke. He survived, but there are very few details about it. He is only 56 years old.