WILT_2023-10

A playlist of songs that intrigued me from Sunday to Saturday. Week of 5 Mar 2023 to 11 Mar 2023.

1. 北ウイング (Kita Wing) – 中森 明菜 (Akina Nakamori)
2. Anasickmodular – Floating Points
3. in drink – Joy Orbison
4. AZD SURF – Actress, Mount Kimbie, Kai Campos
5. Decisions (AM Intro) – Anz
6. Tacken – Modeselektor
7. Easy – 中森 明菜 (Akina Nakamori)
8. Jigsaw Falling Into Place – Radiohead
9. To The Floor – Lil Silva, BADBADNOTGOOD
10. Be Cool – Lil Silva, Little Dragon
11. Invisible Hand – Solomon Fesshaye
12. Don’t You Walk Away – Chok Kerong, Vanessa Fernandez, Kim Olsen
13. Nardis – Bill Evans Trio
14. untitled 05 | 09.21.2014. – Kendrick Lamar
15. There, There – Radiohead
16. Granite – Rosa Anschütz
17. 01 800 – CNDSD, VIIAAN
18. Let Me Take My Life Pack – C.SIDE
19. Rhythm Composition_Track 1 – ritchie
20. Ait Brahim – 3xoj
21. Cant Turn Me Around – Dedicated Men of Zion
22. Call Girl – System Olympia
23. Friday Film Special – GoGo Penguin
24. A Leak in This Old Building – Dedicated Men of Zion
25. Nova – Burial, Four Tet
26. KONCHU ROCK – Yura Yura Teikoku
27. 透明少女 (Tōmei Shōjo) – Number Girl
28. Where It All Leads – Weval
29. Don’t Lose Time – Weval
30. Never Stay For Love – Weval, Eefje de Visser
31. Day After Day – Weval

Hyperlink to Spotify playlist: WILT_2023-10

Notes

It’s quite a long list this week and I had a lot of fun listening as well as discovering. I shall attempt to recount how this particular journey took place.

北ウイング (Kita Wing) by 中森 明菜 (Akina Nakamori) came on as a recommendation just as I was listening to more music by Nakamori. I really am a sucker for the bass lines and guitar work, combined with the backing vocals and overall melody, combined with the flourishes from the string arrangements and synthesisers. It’s a much richer sound compared to what she did in 1982’s Secondalbum and is apparently inspired by Omega Tribe’s 1983 single Summer Suspicion.

From there, it’s a choice selection of electronic music, probably as a continuation of the previous weeks’ delving into the format. Anasickmodular by Floating Points is just pure intricacy and cerebrally stimulating music. in drink by Joy Orbison is a modulation drenched mood, while AZD by Actress is an unbridled catharsis of arppegiating synthesisers. Decisions (AM Intro) by Anz is a lush blanket of serotonin that does make you want to explore the rest of the album (which I have not), and Tacken by Modeselektor is a directed energy attack of focused beats, music on a mission to mend and move.

We then revisit 中森 明菜 (Akina Nakamori) on Easy, a driving disco rock piece with an incredible brass arrangement and rhythm syncopations. 

I came across the music video for Jigsaw Falling Into Place by Radiohead and was spellbound by the concept and cinematography. Music videos tend to be banal expressions of capitalism, but somehow this extremely stripped down approach reveals so much about its performers though body and head movements because it directly impacts the camera movement. 

At this point, I think To The Floor by Lil Silva and BADBADNOTGOOD got introduced to me. While I was taken by the groove of the song, it wasn’t until Be Cool, in collaboration with Little Dragon, that I really stood up to take notice of the producer’s ideas and arrangements. Be Cool is ultra groovy in an effortlessly cool way. To some extent, Little Dragon have never sounded so soulful before, and it’s that new potential that makes it really exciting.

I checked out Solomon Fesshaye after growing the Ghostly International catalogue for a bit. Intrigued by the bio, I explored his music. What greets is something that reminds me a bit of Matthew Dear, and with some sort of melancholic hope. Invisible Hand really does evoke a sort of cosmic force pushing you forwards from inertia.

So thinking about Ghostly International made me think about Singaporean music labels and Syndicate definitely comes top of mind for genre-defying innovative sounds. Perusing through a few artists I learned that Vanessa Fernandez and Chok Kerong had recently collaborated on an album, Spiral (2023), and Don’t Walk Awayreally stood out for me. It evokes a lot of the soulquarian sound that was coming out of collaborations between J Dilla and artists like Mos Def, D’Angelo and Eryka Badu. This song is tight, soulful and full of attitude. 

A bit of a side track, but I have to include this particular video: Japanese Jazz Fusion: I feel weird about loving it by Tim Beau Bennett is an entertaining and educational journey into Japanese Jazz Fusion. It really adds a lot of context to the musical style that I’ve been exploring the past year or so.

This is the article he references: The Endless Life Cycle of Japanese City Pop by Cat Zhang. 

I also watched Nardis is the most hip jazz standard and is also super hip by Tim Beau Bennet. It is an incredibly illuminating deep dive into Nardis which I’d not had the pleasure of knowing prior to this, but now I do and I’m glad I did.

124: Bill Evans, ‘Nardis’ by Jeff Meshel is the article he references.

The video he references about the performance of Untitled 05/Nardis featuring Robert Glaspar, Kamasai Washington, Thundercat, Terence Martin, Chris Dave. You’ll find both recordings in this playlist.

At this point, I was reminded of what an awesome song There, There by Radiohead is. I remember listening to the song the first time, the first single from the highly anticipated “back to guitars” album, Hail to the Thief (2003) that followed Kid A (2000) and Amnesiac (2001). It was glorious then and it is glorious now. There’s a simplicity in the arrangement, but nobody writes or arranges music like this except the synthesis of the band known as Radiohead. Every instrument and vocal melody is distinct yet elevates the song, even in some areas of absence. To me, this song marked a profound understanding in my respect for Radiohead’s craft. That they were so confident of not particularly their talent, but confident in what they wanted to pursue. And that was the pursuit of music in all the forms that it entailed. 

From here, I started being thirsty for new music again. So I hit up some online radio stations that I usually stream. I decided to check out HKCR (Hong Kong Community Radio) because I was curious as to what was happening in the non-Western part of the world, and unfortunately, SGCR (Singapore Community Radio) is apparently defunct/on-hiatus now. So yeah, I learned that HKCR had recently put out a compilation album for a fundraiser, and man, some of these tracks are absolutely daring and take no prisoners. 

Granite by Rosa Anschütz sounds like a dinosaur stomping through the city. The way she uses bass rumblings to great dramatic effect, particularly when paired with her shamanistic soliloquies. 01 800 by CNDSD and VIIAAN permeates evil and harsh techno sounds and I am here for it all day. Let Me Take My Life Pack by C.SIDE is that dark and sensual industrial rave where it’s just you and your music and nothing else matters. When Rhythm Compostion_Tracky 1 by Ritchie first came on, it was pure bliss. Having something like this drop in the middle of a mix is a celebration of the beat, and a showcase of how primal music is especially when you strip it of its bells and whistles. And lastly, we end our arc on HKCR with Ait Brahim by 3xoj, another dark and sinister mood interplayed with Middle Eastern incantations, which is not something you associate with for these kinds of dark wave electronica. 

When Can’t Turn Me Around by Dedicated Men of Zion comes on, it’s almost a deliverance of sorts of the heavy atmosphere from prior. It’s a simple gospel blues number with lots of heart. Got this off the Fat Possum show that was streaming off NTS Radio.

I clicked on the System Olympia album, New Erotica Collection (2023) because of its album art. But what greeted me was an album of vaporwave and Call Girl was just too good breezy mood to share.

I added Friday Film Special by GoGo Penguin because I really enjoyed the simplicity of the jam on this piano-forward song. Not going to lie, that baseline also speaks to me as a bass player, what with how thump-y its tone is.

A Leak in This Old Building by Dedicated Men of Zion because I decided to check out their album. It probably sounds similar to their other songs, but I guess I was feeling rather contemplative the evening I added it to this list.

Nova by Burial and Four Tet was an instant add the moment I came across it because I am biased like that.

Then I came across a playlist called Rock Anthems Japan 90s, and I have to say that this is a very different 90s J Rock sound from what I know. No complaints though because the psychedelia found in KONCHU ROCK by Yura Yura Teikoku is too good to leave unheard. Damn, that guitar tone is absolutely scorching.

透明少女 (Tōmei Shōjo) by Number Girl is pure, absolute, garage punk power pop goodness. It’s a pretty shit mix, but I think it was deliberate and somehow it REALLY does take me back to the 90s and early 00s when I was listening to a ton of bootlegs, as well as whatever shitty live recordings I had of my band at the time.

I was ready to call it the end of the playlist by this time, but come Saturday morning, the album art for Weval’s Remember (2023) caught my attention, and it turned out to be a great accompaniment for the Saturday afternoon with its warm and innovative blend of electronica and synthesisers.

Where It All Ends and Don’t Lose Time both illustrate this warmth very well, and you almost find yourself basking in the light of those synth arrangements. Then there’s Never Stay For Love, performed also by Eefje de Visser that adds another dimension of sultriness but also innocence. The sultriness adds a touch of cold or coolness, but there’s still an innocent warmth somewhere in the mix or performance.

But it’s with Day After Day that my mind just lost itself to the glitchy staccato of the song’s arrangement. I really am a sucker for this sort of arrangement, because it just evokes something primal in me. I think it has to be something to do with the reconstruction of something that was deconstructed. That idea has always fascinated me, and to hear it in action will always be astounding.