I often get asked to suggest music I enjoy. The following is some of what I've been listening to recently. It's mostly electronic, but if you're not into "that techno stuff", don't worry, don't be scared off: I love melody meshed with a memorable momentum of production, and it isn't boring robot music. (And hey, even Kraftwerk had a sense of humor.) My point being: listen, and if you like and want me to suggest more, let me know in the comments, 'kay?
Aril Brikha - "Winter" and "Bergain"
This guy's been known for "making techno that sounds like trance". Hmmm. What does that even mean? Heck if I know, labeling evils are near-meaningless to me, but what you should care about is he's got bouncy beats + bass underpinning a sparse weave of echoey chords and a lovely sensibility that makes you go, "If I was in the 80s in a Ferrari driving to the beach with mirrorshades attached to my face, I'd totally be bangin' my head to this!" Only not so obtrusively. A fine choice to photograph models to.
Vangelis - Pulstar: The Hits of Vangelis
Alas, no sample here. There's a funny story behind this, tho: years ago, I found this in a Thai music store on cassette tape, and put it in my Uncle's car deck. He's deaf and a damn good driver, so he was cruising down a Bangkok road (before running into one of those notorious traffic jams) while my bro and I were bopping in the back. The first track is a kickass version of the classic "Pulstar" with a heavy disco beat and synth tom action. It influenced my choices later to use many synth tom rhythms myself. In case I haven't made it clear, this is an album of covers by some unknown source, but they're well-done "parallel universe" versions of the originals. None of the others are as dancy as the "Pulstar" remix, tho. Good to sleep to.
Peter Gabriel & friends - "Make Tomorrow"
This song looks like it took a small army of cooks to put together: chiefly noticeable in the production mix is BT (Brian Transeau), endowing the river of this 10-min. aural masterpiece with his distinctive beats and flanged stutter edits. There's beautiful strummed acoustic guitar and other instruments, making for a very down-to-earth yet soaring sound. The sublime, excited jam that kicks in past the 7-min. mark is UNMISSABLE. What an optimistic message, too. At least on some levels. Wish there was a music video; this track is one-of-a-kind.
If you want to browse music samples at your leisure, I recommend the smartly-designed Trackitdown, the MP3-well-linked Juno Records, and the taste-catering Pandora.
'Round the bend, I've got an action-pax0red review of Pendulum's In Silico (released today!) coming up, so stay chooned!
Every time I hear that "techno" word applied to the whole genre of electronic music, I just sigh. Or maybe it's more of a teeth gnash.
Oh no, music made by machine, it must suck!
"It's repetitive!"
Really? The music you listen to never has the same thing twice? What about the refrains?
Nice mashup music :> It DOES sound like the two genres mixed together. Keeps em both alive in the process, which shows that the musician understands each genre.
I like your taste in music Torley! thank for the links, speically trackitdown. I found a pretty cool music site yesterday Polybonk.com I think its pretty new and they seem to have some really nice tunes.
@Amphithetre: "techno" is a good example of where a word can mean such different things to different people. Myself, I'm fine with it being a blanket for TECHNOlogy-based music, but just because it's generated from machines doesn't mean "it must suck", as you pointed out.
@Steph: Thanks for sharing Polybonk! I haven't heard of them before and like their name already.
I'll share some music back:
http://www.astral-projection.com
Watch the intro, it's still killer after all these years.
I've seen these two live, it was great!
@Amphithetre: Aw yeah, been awhile since I've listened to them but I like progressive goa/psy-trance lots. Infected Mushroom — some of their evolving tracks, anyway — are also among my faves.