¡En Vivo! A live account of all things musical in Denver, CO: Andrew Bird at the Ogden Theater

This show began innocently enough: as a date to go out and hang with my lady on a pair of free tix to a potentially great show. Unfortunately it ended in one of the biggest fights we've had thus far in our going-on-three-year relationship! Wha' happen'? you may innocently wonder. After all, this show should have been swoon-central. I should have obtained a guaranteed hero-status after this one in her eyes. Although this was an artist she wasn't very familiar with, Mr. Bird has just about everything going for him that she loves: a sweet, handsome sounding voice, happy-go-lucky whistle-tunes, he's a string player, etc. etc.; this is easily palpable, digestible, wholly-enjoyable, good old-fashioned indie-pop from a talented artist... Hold it. Listen to myself here: this is the kinda guy she fell for, in the first place, isn't it? Except he's - egad! - much more handsome and about ten-times more talented than I am. Good lord, what was I thinking? I wondered to myself during the performance, is Andrew Bird too hot? Maybe I should keep guys like this to myself, and secretly pine over their gloriously genius threads of musical-tapestry; leave the girl out of the picture altogether. Alright, this is starting to sound a little homo-erotic for sure, but with a musician like Andrew Bird, there really is a ton to love, and most, if not all of it, was on in full form at his performance last Thursday at the Ogden Theater. Bird is an artist whose mastery of his instrument(s), his ability to perform at an extremely high and entertaining level, is a little unnerving for us "little-guys." Granted, my fight with my girlfriend was about much more than what happened that night at the show, and she'll deny it had anything to do with Andrew Bird in the very least [riiiiight... ;)], but the point still stands: Guys, look out. That's all I'm sayin'.

Moving forward...

Bird entered the stage all by his lonesome, amongst an array of oversized gramophone-style bell-horns, one of which periodically rotated throughout the night. It wasn't until later on in the evening that I realized that these were more than mere decorations: these contraptions were mic'd. Then, even later on, I finally realized that these were in fact Leslie's, the kind you might hear vibrating the tone of a B3 Organ. These horns provided the entire set with an air of mysticism: you really wanted to know where he got these things, first of all, how they worked, etc. But musically, too, Bird's set was full of ambience, largely orchestrated by his drummer and electronic-mixer Martin Dosh, which was only augmented by the wonderful, pulsating drones being put forth by these entrancing machines.

Aside from Martin Dosh, who also composes and performs as a solo artist under the moniker "Dosh" (on the Anticon imprint), Andrew Bird's band was largely forgettable. But Dosh and Bird had a chemistry on stage that worked wonders. Both were extremely adept rhythmically, which was an extremely important factor to the success of the music. Bird would often begin songs, taking the first 10 seconds or so to create instant-symphonies, looping parts over one-another systematically and carefully to ensure that the overall rhythmic flow of the song would not be disturbed by any means - but it was of course up to Dosh, the drummer, to really lock that in solid with the entire band. This kind of egg-shell style of performance was obvious to see, as Bird often had to sort of re-set himself once in a while to be sure he was getting it right before signaling "Go" to his band-mates.

Of course, the real draw of this concert, and the one that kept me there through a healthy three-song encore, was Bird himself, and his amazing proficiency as a musician. He effortlessly dashed from guitar to violin, to whistling-loops, and back again at what felt like a break-neck pace. His voice, as previewed on his recordings, translated beautifully in a live-setting, laced with an improvisatory, melismatic-style that just felt so good. His encore opened with an especially impressive tune, which I later discovered is called "Why?" featured Bird in solo-fashion with only his violin to support the bluesy-melody - "Why'd you have to go and do nothing?" he asked, sweetly and innocently, perhaps even a little defeated. This specific number made me also realize the power of Bird's presence as a performer - his singing often felt like a kind of acting, and his songs therefore translated into a very cool kind of storytelling. Not new to music in general - true - but I haven't really heard an artist do this kind of dialogous style, at least this well, since maybe Tom Waits. I'm not at liberty to call it Musical Theater, but maybe you get the idea - Bird's lyrical-performance could often become playfully and enjoyably theatrical.

Bird's set ended with a completely recognizeable track from his earlier album, The Mysterious Production of Eggs, which made me happy considering I've yet to check out his latest release, Noble Beast - something I plan on doing in the very near future. Match the beauty of the music with a packed-yet-amazingly-respectful and attentive crowd, and this chocked up to a well worth it show, sure to be in the running for years best come December. Bird's trek continues on this June, and I urge any and all to get a glimpse of a fabulously talented artist while you can. Check dates and pics (The pics = crummy. I know. Give me a break, I'm learning. Also, there are several others that are coming in flipped 90 degrees, so when I fix it, I'll post! Check back later!):

6/8 - Columbia, MD: Merriweather Post Pavilion
6/15 - Atlanta, GA: Cobb Energy Performing Arts Center
6/17 - Upper Darby, PA: Tower Theatre
6/18 - New York, NY: Radio City Music Hall
6/19 -Boston, MA: Bank of America Pavilion

What I Don't Know May Kill Me: My eMusic-al adventure - The Foreign Exchange: Connected

I think that there is a certain myth surrounding the hip hop genre, tying it inherently to the American-African musical traditions. While in reality, this is not out of the ball park, or even very far off base, I think that the European influence on the entire style of music is often overlooked, or at least marginalized. After all, we need only look at certain staples of hip hop--take cuts like "Planet Rock" by Afrika Bambataa, for example--to see that krautrock bands like Kraftwerk were contributing at the very least samples to the beat-making process. But beyond the samples themselves, the stylistic tendencies should also here be noted: use of frequent repetition, often-monotonal harmonics (i.e. the act of actually rapping itself; essentially a melody-less vocalization), as well as extended uses of pedal tones and elongated forms. These contributions in my mind are at least as important as those of the American R&B, jazz, and Afro-beat stylings that also play such a significant role.

With this in mind, it becomes much easier to look at a collaboration between Dutch beat-smith, Nicolay, and American rapper Phonte. In a way, a pairing like this seems not only inevitable, but almost inborn and natural - and the duo truly make it sound and feel this way throughout their debut record, Connected - an elegant and lush album with smooth and soothing textures, and even smoother rhymes. But where most hip hop albums seem to fuse its various influences into one cohesive notion of a "styling," (we call it "hip hop".. not "kraut-R&B" or something ridiculous like that), Connected, while being truly seamless and tightly wound, has its divisions fairly visible as well. The album, after all, was made possible by our wonderful friend the internet - Nicolay relaying his beats through cyberspace for Phonte to rap on, and subsequently return for mixing and further editing, etc., until wa-la! And the details of these differences are really what make this an interesting record - one that deserves several spins for sure. We have here, for example, a wonderful array of roomy synths, warm Wurlitzer and Rhodes chords that lay a fuzzy carpet for the beats to relax into - reminiscent perhaps of Air's Moon Safari. Then of course, vocally, we hear the American R&B traditions shining through with male/female choruses chiming in to outline a common formal structure we hear in hip hop contemporaries like Kanye West or Common.

Hip hop's insistence on the consistent reference to its own past is another element of the style that is beginning to feel cliched, and this is another strong point of Connected - a record that appears more focused on its current moment than the past. This reliance on self-history is often clearly notable in the proliferation of sample-use: older music is the actual, factual basis for whatever may be coming out. Nicolay's use of the sample is at least much less obvious and more subdued - only a couple of times are we offered a pop or crackle of vinyl through the headphones on the entire record. And when sampling is most apparent, it's interesting to hear its sources coming from, you guessed it, European music. "Let's Move," for example begins with a lovely woodwind loop that sounds right out of "Peter and the Wolf," followed shortly by a stately horn melody that could have been a part of Gustav Holtz's famous epic, "The Planets."

For the most part, though, Nicolay's music, as a composer of his own work, is the focus, and his ideas are remarkable, fun, and sound effortless. A Track like "Von Sees" offers an early example of beat-experimentation on the part of producer Nicolay, where the backbeat is edged slightly to the front of beats two and four, thus morphing the groove a lilted, rolling-triplet feel. This kind of augmentation draws you further into the beat while obstructing our notions of what a "normal" hip hop groove feels like, all without sacrificing its nod-factor in the least.

The most impressive feature of the album, and indeed the one for which the record draws its' own namesake, is obviously the extremely long-distance limitations the two members found themselves in when constructing this music. Technology has indeed "connected" their styles, birthing an excellent, definitely worth-it of a listen debut album. But this record connects much more in my head than just Nicolay and Phonte - two artists I knew absolutely nothing about before approaching the music. Connected feels like an album that is connecting different dots than the common hip hop or rap record, and for this reason more than any other does it really warrant repeated spins. This feels like just the hip hop you want to hear in just the right places, each and every time.

Ladies and gentlemen... we are blogging in space

Alright - first blog ever.

A few questions come up at this stage for me. And these are deep and profound questions that I seriously need to mull over for a time: 

What is this blog supposed to be? 

What exactly is it supposed to do for me? 

What is it about? 

Is it for anyone specific? 

How about everyone? 

Who, if anyone, will read it? 

What do they want to read?

Do I care? 

Should I care?

I realize that these questions are broad and general, and I think instead of trying to tackle all of them at once, I'd rather treat this space with a much more specific tone if I'm able to achieve anything at all, let alone self-satisfaction (of course, the ultimate prize). Life projects have to be a focused affair. You must choose and attack with both precision and persistence. I think basically this project really is just a challenge for me to try and focus my thoughts about what I'm hearing and seeing around me every day, and to try and use these sensations to place myself within this temporal-musical framework somehow. Along these lines, I think that it is also a lot about overcoming my fears of this musical world we live in - staring at culture face to face, and really letting myself be honest about what I think.

Music Journalism is a daunting affair for me at this stage in my life. I used to have no problem sitting down to my laptop with headphones on, ready to commit to type what I was hearing and feeling. Listening to new things almost every day during the second half of my high school years, I basically just had to tell people what I was hearing. It frustrated me so much that bands like the Sea & Cake were likely to spend the rest of their careers unnoticed by my generation, or even bands like Modest Mouse (this of course has proven otherwise with time, an interesting development I would, for example, like to explore in further detail through channels like this blogspot). So perhaps that was a mistake all along - a little selfish to think I was somehow the keeper and gaurdian of "good art" within my community and demographic, and perhaps I should learn from this: I am not the deliverer of good art to the masses, and quite frankly, the masses probably give a fuck about what I think is good art anyway. I will never be able to make the music be ABOUT the culture it sits in... the music does that on its own really. Therefore, I think that this music journal I'm setting out to write needs to be about me first. But then why post it on the web? Why let everyone see what I think? Let's be honest here - Craw-not-the-lord really doesn't know shit about music in the long run...

Harsh, I know. Not 100% true, I know as well. But the musical spectrum itself has gotten so completely, ridiculously huge and out of hand, I think it's fair and reasonable to be a little overwhelmed. If you want to be a journalist on a specific subject, I feel there is somewhat of an expectation that a certain history should be known by the writer, in this case "blogger" -- perhaps not only known, but committed to an absolute encyclopedic-memory as well. And this is the kind of knowledge I have exposed myself to in music journalism, particularly the indie-mag giant known as Pitchforkmedia.com.

But Crawford: Get real. That's not you. You will never be as smart as everyone. You'll never hear every record recommended by every website or friend. You'll never become an expert on every genre or remember every year every great record came out. It is simply impossible. I want to come out of the gate not knowing everything, but rather learning everything. Thus, I think it's time to go back to an original goal I mentioned earlier, and is now becoming more clear and making more sense to me:

Try to place myself in a temporal-musical context

I think this is something concrete and specific I can really use to help guide me through an otherwise scary sort of process. I have to realize that every time I hear something new, or every next time I hear the same thing, I am always learning more about not only what I am hearing, but where I come from because of it. This is the kind of statement that can really confuse people, but basically my idea is that everything we hear is built off of what was heard in the past. And that, then, also becomes a part of my history as the listener of the new music, and in turns, also contributes the overall history of the music itself. It gets even crazier when I think about what that means in terms of the actual music I make and play with, say, my own rock and roll band - but I think this is a subject I can possibly explore later. For now, my introduction grows long and weary, so I think it may be time to jump to the point:

I want to treat this as both an essay and journal format. I want to bring a scholarly approach and critical ethic to the table with what I'm going to be covering here wherever possible - but I want to turn this critical eye onto myself and try to let myself fall where it may as a result of what I experience. I also want to use this as a record of my experiences, hence the "journal-istic" tendencies of the nature of the "blog" itself. I want to report on this as these events occur here in a public forum, where others might provide me with positive feedback and/or provide me with further research and future topics of discussion.

Mostly though, I miss the days of sitting in a coffee shop with a pair of headphones plugged into my Discman, and really digging some great albums, and trying to pull them apart and piece them back together in non-fictive prose. It's a fun thing to do, and I love doing it. Granted, this all is making music a more subjective experience, but hell... that's what it is to me, at least at this point in my life. I don't think we can discount what we bring to the musical table - whether we are creating the music, just listening to it, or writing about it, we all contribute to the shape of its very history. The music is definitely shaping me, and it should in turn shape my thoughts here within the confines of this journal-esque form of historical writing - I want to accept and embrace the fact that I am affecting it to, once and for all. No more fear: I am the music, and it is me.

And as I wrap up my first-blog-ever... it becomes harder than ever to press the "publish post" button below. Don't I want to format my blog a little more first? Shouldn't there be a hyper-link in there? I didn't even mention any of my favorite bands yet, will that be OK?

Shut up. Seriously.

FAVORITE RECORD EVER... RIGHT NOW:

Mt. Eerie w/ Julie Doiron & Fred Squire: Lost Widsom