Frenchy’s Fracas

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!)

Read the rest of this entry »

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# - Nostalgia - New Zealand 2001 Vacation: “Polaris” by Zero 7.. Walking around Auckland while totally enjoying this track..

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# - wow, saw AWinehouse on the BeebGlastonbury thing: that girl’s performing a slow suicide and everybody has 2 watch http://tinyurl.com/3ofrym

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General Info
Artist/Group: Brasilintime - Sujinho CD release
Location: Paradiso, Amsterdam
When: 09 May 2008

Who?
An interesting mix of artists collaborating on a musical experiment. Have a look at the intro..

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Some of the artists:
Madlib
Tony Allen
Ivan “Mamão” Conti
and a whole list of other performers.

Impressive, right?
Well, the group gave a show in Paradiso and I just had to go have a look.

The Show
The warm up session was nice but waaaay too long so when the show finally started after more than an hour, I was really psyched for some action. And boy, the opening was impressive! The setup: three drum kits and a small percussion set in front; in the back two DJs and Madlib behind keyboard and sample kit.

The set was played as a jam session: one large and uninterrupted performance of a number of songs and compositions.

The rest of the show is hard to describe: it’s a mix of extremes. On the one hand, some stuff was really horrible and noisy crap. But on the other hand there was almost Perfection in what was performed. The third element: I experienced what it is to discover something you’ve never heard before. Something you know you won’t be able to understand. Like a caveman looking at a computer, I felt out of my league and I loved it!

What stood out for me was the discipline these guys showed: keeping the different drumming actions in sync (or sometimes willingly out of sync) and the DJs and Madlib doing their different things as layers of sounds, mixing it all up to interesting music, noises and soundscapes.

Conclusion
I was totally exhausted after the concert, mulling over all that I just had experienced. Like I said: some of the music was not that good, some was incredibly great. And some parts were just An Experience and An Education. Some stuff was just Complex Science and I hope to get old enough to really understand in time what I’ve heard this evening.
And I’m gonna get me the DVD asap!

This concert should’ve been programmed for the North Sea Jazz Festival: it’s fresh, it’s experimental and risky and it’s friggin’ great. That’s what the festival should be about.

read hieronymus fox’s review here!

Rating:

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