Frenchy’s Fracas

Rotterdam Views: Summer Carnival 2008 - 1, originally uploaded by frenchy_rjp.

1. Rotterdam Views: Summer Carnival 2008,
2. Rotterdam Views: Summer Carnival 2008,
3. Rotterdam Views: Summer Carnival 2008,
4. Rotterdam Views: Summer Carnival 2008

Created with fd’s Flickr Toys.

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General Description
Artist/Band: José González || ||
Album Title: In Our Nature
Year: 2007

Talented singer..

How I Got Into This Music
Funny thing, I’ve ignored this album for almost a year. I didn’t mind his vocals on the Zero 7 album The Garden, but it wasn’t something that got me all enthousiastic to go listen to other stuff from this guy. Hey, that’s how things work sometimes in my head!
Anyway, coupla months back I heard a small part of his cover of Massive Attack’s Teardrop and that triggered quite a lot of interest on my part. So, I had a listen.

Reviews: || || ||
Videos: ||
Have a listen on:

Tracks that got my attention:
How Low
Love this opening track: a single guitar and those deep, dubbed vocals give a great threatening/sad mood to this song. Walking happily drunk through a minefield.

Killing For Love
Love the guitar, annoying repeating bit at the end.
Great lines:
You’ve got a heart filled with passion.
Will you let it burn for hate or compassion.

In Our Nature
Sweet title track. Another simple anti-violence song.

Teardrop
Just listen to it (the vid’s a bit crappy, but still..)
Here’s the Teardrop video at youtube:

It’s brilliant because Gonzalez doesn’t try to better Elizabeth Fraser’s vocals, he makes the song his own..

The Nest
Beautiful vocals, mellow track.

Cycling Trivialities
Beautiful vocals, mellow track.
(No, not a copy/paste error..)

Conclusion
It was fun (re-)discovering this version of Teardrop. I mailed friends of mine about it as if it was one of my greatest achievements in finding this song and telling them about it. But.. They already knew the song and had the album.. An ego is such a silly, fragile thing, heheh..
Back to the album. I played it for a month without getting bored by all the syruppy sweetness and that’s something in my book. For this review I played it all again and still find it enjoyable, something I really didn’t expect.
Like the album and the artist!

Rating:

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I reviewed their previous album a while back and wasn’t that impressed with it.
But fair is fair: if the new album Time Traveller has more tracks like this next one, I’ll be all over it!! Damn, this is good stuff: a great tribute!
(Thx Hieronymus Fox for the tip!)

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Well, I attended two days of the North Sea Jazz Festival and it was quite a mixed bag of candy.
Location: Ahoy Event Halls, Rotterdam
When: 11 and 12 July 2008
Last.fm:
Tag: northseajazzfestival

Day 2

Victor Wooten
The incredibly talented bass player, Mr. Victor Wooten, is always a joy to be entertained by. A very solid performance with a great band (including an additional bass player).

Deodato
Not my cup of tea, and that percussionist scared me a lil’ bit..

Chaka Khan
After the incredibly horrific performance I saw from her on MTV with a certain K. West, I was very, very delighted to hear the Lady strut her stuff like the true singer she is. Excellent!

José James
The up-and-coming and yet already here-to-stay vocalist José James gave another fantastic performance, getting everyone excited and grooving.

Lizz Wright
Symptomatic for this year’s festival: arrived half an hour before the set started and there already was a line of a coupla hundred people! It used to be that the smaller stages were problematic, but now even the medium sized locations were overcrowded, sheesh..

Marc Broussard
Short visit and listen, but the man does have a great voice!

George Benson
Great instrumentalist and vocalist, delivers the goods.

Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings
Another great tip from Hieronymus Fox: if Otis Redding was listening from the grave, he’d gave Sharon a thumbs up. Let’s not forget the Dap-Kings!
It really is possible to keep on playing that old Soul groove without being a blatant copycat: carrying on the Good Cause and extending the music.

Christian Prommer’s Drumlesson
Closing act: fantastic band mixing up different electronic, groove and jazz stuff!

Conclusion
This festival wasn’t that great, sad to say. The line up didn’t work for me that much. Saw and enjoyed quite a number of acts, but the overcrowded venues were more of a problem this year than before.
But closing my eyes and thinking of the incredible miss Sharon Jones just keeps putting a smile on my face.

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Well, I attended two days of the North Sea Jazz Festival and it was quite a mixed bag of candy.
Location: Ahoy Event Halls, Rotterdam
When: 11 and 12 July 2008
Last.fm:
Tag: northseajazzfestival

Day 1

Eliane Elias “A Tribute to Bill Evans”
A very calm and relaxed performance by Eliane Elias, accompanied by bass and drums. Have to school myself about mister Bill Evans, but the songs were sweet and highly enjoyable.

Jazzdiggers
Nothing to do with Jazz, just an excellent DJ playing groovy Classics like Prince, Zapp, Latin stuff and other Original Prime Cuts.

Concha Buika
I’m officially In Love With An Artist. Again. Wow..
Her music is very nice too
A musically Talented lady giving a passionate performance.

Angie Stone
An absolute riddle: a talented vocalist and a performance that just couldn’t get me excited. It’s me, I know, I know..

Abdullah Ibrahim Trio
Way too serious stuff for me: it’s like attending your first class in maths and the teacher starting off with Nobel Prize winning theories. Intricately beautiful, but boggled the mind.

Jill Scott
We went to see Abdullah Ibrahim, so we just caught the final three songs by JillyFromPhilly. HieronymusFox lamented choosing Ibrahim over Jilly. And boy, was he right!
The lady should ‘ve gotten the biggest venue in stead of the smaller Maas location. The festival director should use his brains next time and share the Greatness Of Scott on the biggest stage possible!

Bootsy Collins
Meh, we left just when he got on stage, tired after a very weird and crowded festival day.

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