Amassing rare and forgotten music is a peculiar sort of hobby — one that slowly transforms into an addiction. It’s not that I don’t love mainstream music. It’s just that the thrill of listening to some forgotten gem that everybody else has overlooked is powerful. It also feeds into the collector’s impulse I have to overturn every stone to find that song, and my love of complete collections. Not surprisingly, I also like to collect comic books. I guess I’m the type. In any event, here are five lesser-known musicians that I believe everybody should give a listen to, dating as far back as the 1920s and focusing on jazz, folk, and blues musicians.

HealeyIsland
On Ponzi Bridge
White Label Music

Frances Fukuyama’s book The End Of History, published in 1992, went directly against Jacques Derrida’s Spectres of Marx, predicting the global triumph of Capitalism and of the Spectacle. Greg Healey’s music, as HealeyIsland, is the soundtrack of sprawling shopping complexes and virtual dating sites.

This is the world predicted by Walter Benjamin, in his unfinished Passagenwerken (The Arcades Project): the birth of the pop culture, the beginning of the shopping mall, of commerce, of virtuality. It’s the simulacrum’s smug satisfaction that it is real, that it has it all under control, under wraps. It’s a dustbin museum, full of never-ending card catalogs, everything dated and numbered, and we are told to go pilfer, go explore. But the museum is not real life; Healey remembers the outside, the sunshine and dirty gutters. Healey both pays reverence to and makes a mockery of high-definition, high-gloss early-’90s CGI utopianism in On Ponzi Bridge. Healey loves and hates the spectacle, and fights back with the keenest of British weapons: sarcasm.

Haiku Salut
Tricolore
How Does It Feel To Be Loved? (2013)

Unless you closely follow the little known — but still robust — musical sub-genre of folktronica, Haiku Salut’s Tricolore will likely be unlike anything you’ve heard before. In their full-length debut, Haiku Salut — made up of musicians Gemma Barkerwood, Sophie Barkerwood, and Louise Croft — explores the genre and their place in it, and in doing so, presents us with both an exciting and playful plethora of sounds and a feeling of potential.

The band’s major influences, including Yann Tiersen, Amestub, and early Múm, are prevalent throughout Tricolore, as the purely instrumental album engages various sounds and multicultural elements. Each track features layers upon layers of instrumental dynamism: light and playful piano parts, rhythmic and precise guitar and ukulele fingerpicking, dense accordion arrangements, and the occasional energetic percussion. These various parts ebb and flow across the album, sometimes peaking, sometimes falling, and always working together to give the songs momentum and intrigue.

In Hinduism, there is a term called Shaktipat, in which a guru transmits enlightenment by their very presence. Considering the places that some of us here at REDEFINE Magazine have voyaged to while listening to the music of Jon Porras and Evan Caminiti, solo musicians who are also collectively known as Barn Owl, we decided to harangue the duo with a bunch of questions about meditation, to see how much they had seen in such altered spaces.

Barn Owl’s music seems custom-made for the sweat lodge or meditation hall. As you listen to an amalgam of tribal percussion, temple bells, cosmic synths, and rustic American transcendentalism, you can practically smell the sweet sage burning. Their music knows no bounds, and as such, is a ritual that everybody can take part in.

As increasing amounts of people and culture make demands on our time and attention, the ability to find a quiet, sacred space becomes essential. Barn Owl’s portable ashram is a precious resource — you can strap on a pair of headphones and find some space on a crowded train or a busy street to reflect. They encourage us to slow down, and find a little peace.

Barn Owl’s latest full-length album, V, is out now on Thrill Jockey Records.
PURCHASE BARN OWL’s V ON AMAZON

!!!
Thri!!!er
Warp Records

!!! are by definition FUN. Once you move past the confusion of how you pronounce their band name (it’s “Chk Chk Chk”), you realize that it just adds an extra emphasis on maximum excitement. Their musical goal in life is to get you pumped, get your body moving, and maybe even get you dancing. And this they have achieved, with every one of their previous records; they’ve been shaking booties since 2001, and they don’t plan on stopping now.

Their fifth full-length, Thr!!!er, definitely has a dance rock element similar to the band’s previous releases, but there seems to be a unexpected pop music emphasis to this album. The opening track, “Even When the Water is Cold,” is an odd choice for a start. It sounds off-kilter for !!!, who always struck me as a band who didn’t really care what you think (hell, they don’t care if you can’t figure out their band name) — but now seem to be heading into more mainstream territory. This is a new realm for the band: making normal pop songs, with no synthy dance tangents, or spaced out surreal moments of zen.

FIELDED
Ninety Thirty Thirty
Captcha Records

When composing her second album, Lindsey Anne Powell of FIELDED wanted to make vocals the star, while getting back in touch with her “deepest love for Pop music”. In Ninety Thirty Thirty, the soulful yet edgy singer-songwriter does both those things beautifully, blending the best elements of futuristic, experimental music and retro pop to create her own unique sound.

Ninety Thirty Thirty is a very enjoyable album, and that’s largely due to Powell’s amazing vocal control. Many of the album’s exceptional tracks, including its break-out “Chapel of Lies,” feature powerful vocal modulations by Powell that slip and slide satisfyingly across her wide range while supporting full and edgy emotion. Either framed by precise harmonies or set against the backdrop of heavier instrumentals, Powell’s voice lends sass and personality as the album’s backbone. The combination of captivating vocals with dense layers of samples and instrumental parts creates an interesting wall of sound. In “Gabrielle,” for example, Powell’s vocals both float over and pierce through an industrial-sounding backdrop, while the lush harmonies in “Eternal Hour” are supremely gratifying against the song’s sparse and energetic instrumentation.

When a concert at Portland venue Wonder Ballroom manages to sell out weeks in advance of the show, it can only mean one thing: the most zeitgeisty of artists must be coming to town. And sure enough, when it was announced that James Blake would be making his second appearance in as many years at the magnificent east side venue, tickets went quicker than expected. If nothing else, it proves that James Blake’s new album was a success.

April 24th, 2013 @ Wonder Ballroom – Portland, OR

Seattle-based label Debacle Records celebrates its sixth annual Debacle Festival taking place May, 3rd, 4th, and 5th. The three-day event showcases national and local electronic, drone, noise, techno, improvised, metal and synth musicians. This year, the label is proud to partner with community instigator Hollow Earth Radio as non-profit beneficiary. Debacle Fest will be held at our partner venues the FRED Wildlife Refuge, The Highline, and Lo-Fi Performance Gallery.

Curated by Samuel Melancon
of Debacle Records

www.debaclefest.com

 

Complete Schedule & Lineup

Friday, May 3rd @ FRED Wildlife Refuge (127 Boylston Ave. E)
8:00pm – $20 door/$15 adv
Expo ’70
Swahili
Plankton Wat
Monopoly Child Star Searchers
Brain Fruit
Panabrite
Total Life
LA Lungs
Secret Colors

Saturday May 4th @ Highline (210 Broadway Ave. E)
Matinee show at 3:00pm SHARP – $7
Sissy Spacek
MTNS
BLSPHM
WaMu
Stan Reed

Saturday, May 4th @ FRED Wildlife Refuge (127 Boylston Ave. E)
7:00pm – $20/$15 adv.
Date Palms
John Wiese
Nate Young
Golden Retriever
Mind Over Mirrors
Marielle Jakobsons
Gabriel Saloman
Morae (Emuul & Hemosis)
Biosexual

Sunday, May 5th – MOTOR Night @ Lo Fi Performance Gallery (429 Eastlake Ave.)
8:00pm – $20/$15 adv
Hieroglyphic Being
Moon Pool & Dead Band
Strategy
GOODWIN
Prostitutes
Black Hat
TJ Max
Patternmaster

Bleep is a column focusing on varying degrees of electronic music news, videos and MP3s. In this post, Bibio shares a brand new single in advance of his new album, Soulwax remixes Pulp for a special Record Store Day release and Disclosure finally discloses some info on their debut album.

Olafur Arnalds
For Now I Am Winter
Mercury Classics

Imagine yourself walking down a deserted street. It’s late in the day; the sky is dappled and mottled with clouds. The sidewalks are littered with the soggy remnants of December, slush and old receipts. Your thoughts uproot, displaced in time, remembering, projecting. A fine, chill mist falls; you turn your face to the sky, baptized like a thirsty young plant.

For Now I Am Winter, Olafur Arnalds’ fourth LP (and major label debut) is a poetic meditation on the coldest season. It sounds like a dubstep opera, with crisp electronic flourishes framing gorgeous orchestral arrangements (with the help of American composer Nico Muhly), and a trembling libretto by Arnór Dan Arnársson (of Agent Fresco), with a fragile ethereal quality similar to that of Sigur Ros’ Jonsi. Tense minimalist strings counterpoint chamber music romance as Arnalds conjures feeling of regret, longing, desire, and wanderlust, with the final result being an elaborate reflection on the season, as complex and layered as real life. The record works best as a whole, but tracks like “Reclaim”, “This Place Was A Shelter”, or the title track serve as a fine illustration of this album’s mission statement, and are fine places for the curious to begin. The music itself could be seen as the elements at work; biting winds, sleet, slush, and snow, while the operatic vocals serve as an inner dialogue.