Today is the 50th birthday of Kate Bush. (Oh, only now I am aware that she shares the same surname with that um…president.)
I thought I had forgotten to put her, my teenage goddess, on my tricky list of favourite music. Sadly I had not, so I cannot express some regrets and add some drama to this bland post.
But how could I? The first unabridged novel in English I ever read in my life was “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Bronte, because of her debut song of the same name. What a painful read for me then, with so many vocabularies! The dictionary soon became my best friend. And I probably only began to love learning English after reading that. Thanks Kate.
Young and incredible Kate Bush sang “Wuthering Heights”
One word, genius!
Wednesday, 30 July 2008
Saturday, 26 July 2008
happily hopeless wanderer came across Favourite Sons
Now and then when I wandered on the Net, I would gladly find musicians of some long lost bands still around and making music. And last week I was too happy to learn that Ken Griffin, ex-Rollerskate Skinny and ex-Kid Silver, had formed a new band called Favourite Sons. I like both old bands of his. The former made original and interesting soundscapes, with good melodies, and the latter made captivating mellow songs, with good melodies.
The route to this Internet encounter was a bit convoluted. Wandering on some MySpace Music pages as I sometimes did, I accidentally checked out a little known new French band called Mondrian that made interesting music with catchy tunes. If there is any justice, they should become more famous.
MONDRIAN "Can't Call Her My Own"
On Mondrian’s MySpace page, it was shown that they had covered a song by the Band of Holy Joy. The Band of Holy Joy! I have long forgotten this band. I heard them on the radio years ago. And this is one of those bands that I thought I like but always failed to get their records. Then after a while I just forgot to seek them. On YouTube, I found that they have reformed and performed live in 2007. In the gigs, they played alternative folk music. The instrumentation was good but the singing was not impressive. Actually, I don’t even remember what their music was like in the old days. But it should be better than those songs in the videos I found on YouTube.
In the process, the band Rollerskate Skinny came to my mind (though I got the band name wrong at first) and I found one and only one video of theirs on YouTube (but sadly none of Kid Silver’s).
The one and only MV of the one and only Rollerskate Skinny - "Speed to My Side".
Behold the young Ken Griffin.
I knew little about Rollerskate Skinny. And shamefully, I must admit that I only got to really know their music when I got their CDs at low prices on sale. Naturally I looked them up at Wiki’s and so I, finally, learnt that Ken Griffin had formed a new band called Favourite Sons.
Their songs sound like that of Kid Silver. But, alas, Mr. Griffin looks so much older now. The few new songs I heard were good, but they gave me an impression that of a weary middle-aged bloke rather obsessed with women (perhaps it’s rather the false impressions from the videos). And naively I wondered why he would leave Ireland for America for all these years (and turned into a rather ordinary looking middle-aged bloke). (((Always slightly sad to see people grow old.)))
FAVOURITE SONS "Tear the Room Apart". A good song.
So this was my occasional hopeless wandering behaviour in the Web.
And it ended up happily sometimes.
The route to this Internet encounter was a bit convoluted. Wandering on some MySpace Music pages as I sometimes did, I accidentally checked out a little known new French band called Mondrian that made interesting music with catchy tunes. If there is any justice, they should become more famous.
MONDRIAN "Can't Call Her My Own"
On Mondrian’s MySpace page, it was shown that they had covered a song by the Band of Holy Joy. The Band of Holy Joy! I have long forgotten this band. I heard them on the radio years ago. And this is one of those bands that I thought I like but always failed to get their records. Then after a while I just forgot to seek them. On YouTube, I found that they have reformed and performed live in 2007. In the gigs, they played alternative folk music. The instrumentation was good but the singing was not impressive. Actually, I don’t even remember what their music was like in the old days. But it should be better than those songs in the videos I found on YouTube.
In the process, the band Rollerskate Skinny came to my mind (though I got the band name wrong at first) and I found one and only one video of theirs on YouTube (but sadly none of Kid Silver’s).
The one and only MV of the one and only Rollerskate Skinny - "Speed to My Side".
Behold the young Ken Griffin.
I knew little about Rollerskate Skinny. And shamefully, I must admit that I only got to really know their music when I got their CDs at low prices on sale. Naturally I looked them up at Wiki’s and so I, finally, learnt that Ken Griffin had formed a new band called Favourite Sons.
Their songs sound like that of Kid Silver. But, alas, Mr. Griffin looks so much older now. The few new songs I heard were good, but they gave me an impression that of a weary middle-aged bloke rather obsessed with women (perhaps it’s rather the false impressions from the videos). And naively I wondered why he would leave Ireland for America for all these years (and turned into a rather ordinary looking middle-aged bloke). (((Always slightly sad to see people grow old.)))
FAVOURITE SONS "Tear the Room Apart". A good song.
So this was my occasional hopeless wandering behaviour in the Web.
And it ended up happily sometimes.
tell Laura I love her
Forget the fatty Adele, forget the ugly female Duffy, or whichever young lady who sounds like she is in her fifties. Here’s the beautiful Laura Marling.
Poorly informed as usual, I only got to know Laura Marling from the announcement of Mercury Music Prize nominees last week. And she simply stood out among the ten nominees.
She easily reminds people of the likes of Feist, Cat Power or KT Tunstall. But she’s only 18, wow! And she looks cool, like a very charming model, wow! And of course she composed her own music, wow! And she designed her own interesting Sunbox CD box set, wow! And, what, she even has a beauty mark on her face! Wow wow wow! How could it be true? She could only be an imagined character from a romance fiction. She’s too good, to the point that she’s almost disgusting, hah! She’s so bright that she just makes other stars look dim, and makes ordinary people like me feel like a hopeless idiot.
But her true roots lie in the good folk tradition. She’s the musical granddaughter of Joni Mitchell. Her voice is warm and sweet, at times with a country twist. Listening to her reminded me of many other good female vocals - female voices of the sixties (umm, which I really don’t know much) like Sandie Shaw, Dolores O'Riordan without the exaggeration, and many more. Unlike the bunch of talented young ladies who sound sophisticatedly soulful but affected and way too old, She’s capable of sounding sophisticated, effortlessly natural, and still youthful.
All her MVs are beautiful (for she’s charming). And here on the TV show, she’s so overly talented that she’s put on a trial by the show host, who was like accusing her of writing too mature songs for her age.
Enfants terribles! All the old ghosts of precocious young talents came to my mind once again. Not long ago, I was just disturbed by another young talent called Sarah Jaffe. If I were not a fan of Jason Castro, I wouldn’t have learnt about this unsigned Texan musician, who has an influence on the former. She also reminded me of Feist and Cat Power. Her musical roots were also mostly folk. But she tends to sing with a slightly cracked voice and her music is darker than Laura’s and resembles more the earlier Cat Power and Jeff Buckley. And… she is less good-looking than Laura Marling.
And her video here is rather boring despite the good song.
Poorly informed as usual, I only got to know Laura Marling from the announcement of Mercury Music Prize nominees last week. And she simply stood out among the ten nominees.
She easily reminds people of the likes of Feist, Cat Power or KT Tunstall. But she’s only 18, wow! And she looks cool, like a very charming model, wow! And of course she composed her own music, wow! And she designed her own interesting Sunbox CD box set, wow! And, what, she even has a beauty mark on her face! Wow wow wow! How could it be true? She could only be an imagined character from a romance fiction. She’s too good, to the point that she’s almost disgusting, hah! She’s so bright that she just makes other stars look dim, and makes ordinary people like me feel like a hopeless idiot.
But her true roots lie in the good folk tradition. She’s the musical granddaughter of Joni Mitchell. Her voice is warm and sweet, at times with a country twist. Listening to her reminded me of many other good female vocals - female voices of the sixties (umm, which I really don’t know much) like Sandie Shaw, Dolores O'Riordan without the exaggeration, and many more. Unlike the bunch of talented young ladies who sound sophisticatedly soulful but affected and way too old, She’s capable of sounding sophisticated, effortlessly natural, and still youthful.
All her MVs are beautiful (for she’s charming). And here on the TV show, she’s so overly talented that she’s put on a trial by the show host, who was like accusing her of writing too mature songs for her age.
Enfants terribles! All the old ghosts of precocious young talents came to my mind once again. Not long ago, I was just disturbed by another young talent called Sarah Jaffe. If I were not a fan of Jason Castro, I wouldn’t have learnt about this unsigned Texan musician, who has an influence on the former. She also reminded me of Feist and Cat Power. Her musical roots were also mostly folk. But she tends to sing with a slightly cracked voice and her music is darker than Laura’s and resembles more the earlier Cat Power and Jeff Buckley. And… she is less good-looking than Laura Marling.
And her video here is rather boring despite the good song.
So, where are the precocious boys now?
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