Artists #2 - IDLES & Baxter Dury

Hey everyone

So last week Antoine decided to start posting about underrated artists he likes, and as the other half of the music club, I thought it would be a good idea to do the same. This way, you’ll get two artists at once, and so a bigger chance to find something you like!

The band I’m going to be talking about is a fairly recent, English punk band called IDLES. They are faithful to the ‘traditional’ punk, with very political lyrics and noise-like music. If you’ve watched Peaky Blinders, they had some songs in the soundtrack, so you might already know them from that! They have played some big festivals, such as Glastonbury in 2019, but unfortunately they remain quite unknown. They go absolutely crazy on stage, and the I’ve never seen the guitarist wearing anything but his underwear.

Some songs you should check out if you’re interested:

Danny Nedelko: If I remember correctly, it was named after one of the band’s mates, but the song has nothing to do with him; it has a beautiful message of unity and is overall a great song!

Colossus: This song is what introduced me to them, it’s very intense and heavy I guess, keeps your attention from start to finish.

I’m Scum: This is the song I remember being in the Peaky Blinders soundtrack, it plays when Oswald Mosley’s character is on screen (surely you can see why).

Anyway, that’s all for today, see you next week and in the meantime I’ll let Antoine present the artist he picked!

-Sibylle

__________

Hi bloggers, Antoine here, and I’m going to talk about Baxter Dury ! If you know a bit about punk music, you could know his father, Ian Dury, who wrote the song Sex & drugs & rock & roll. But the topic is Baxter Dury, so let’s stick to him. 

So he’s an English singer who is now already 44 or 45, and released 6 albums, on of which was released not long ago. Anyway, his music is really hard to define, it is a sort of British pop, but that is mixed with a lot of sadness. Wikipedia says, new wave, indie rock, alternative pop, but I’m not really sure about these, so don’t listen to them. However, I agree on the ‘alternative’ or ‘indie’ terms (this article is full of contradictions), because his music does not look like anything else.

His tracks always almost follow the same recipe : loud and omnipresent bass, some piano, strings (that come later in the song), lyrics (often the chorus) sung by women – looks like a charm – and of course, his voice ; it seems like he speaks to the listener and it’s really soothing. The overall atmosphere is really melancholic and sad that is offset with the music that could seem joyful.

Again, here are some of my favourite songs by him, they’ll all be in the playlist ; I really advise you to listen to at least 3 of his albums – Happy Soup, It’s a pleasure, and Prince of Tears – which are absolute masterpieces in my view. I need to pick no more than 2 songs per album, it’s going to be really tough for me :(

Prince of tears : in my view his best song, there’s so much emotion, it’s really calm and soothing

Isabel : perfect first song for an album, really dynamic ; this song really represents his style overall

Palm Trees : if I were a bit more emotional, this song would really make me cry, the female voices really take to that higher ground (;)) that I can’t define – does the same with Radiohead, even if more powerful with them.

Hotel in Brixton : one of his most peculiar songs, no other tracks sound like this one, but again really soothing.

Ok, so that’s it, the rest (like lives) will be in the playlist, see you soon Charlie, I have to go ! 

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKEiDghku6LEUqW17R9P1uz1VYECxczh-

This was Sib and Ant1, at your service  !

The oud

Hellooooooo Charlie, 

Today i'm going to talk about the oud,

while i'm no oud expert ( I can't even play the oud) it is one the best instruments to ever exist and I’m still going to talk about it.  

First of all a little bit of history, as you have may noticed by looking at the picture, the oud is very similar to the lute, an instrument that you may be already familiar with. Well actually the oud is the direct ancestor of the European lute. It has either 10,11,12,13 string arranged in 5, 6, or 7 courses ( two strings played together, just like a 12 string guitar). The major difference is that the oud doesn't have any frets. 

Frets are metal bars that are going to hold a note, just like on a guitar, for example on a guitar every fret is half step (26.164hz). But the oud has none.

And what does that mean? 

Well western music is made of 12 notes (C, Db, D, Eb, E, F, F#, G, Ab, A, Bb, B) But in eastern music we use way more notes, we have quarter step, which means we have 24 notes. and that why the oud has no frets, so we can have this micro-tonality that we are searching for. So we have way more options and notes to play with, opening more doors for musicians. Which make the instrument way more difficult to play with the right notes (just like the violin). 

The oud is a very important instrument in the middle East, it varies from country to country (Syrian oud is different from Turkish oud or Iranian oud), it is used in traditional music and modern music, so it is really present in an arabe daily life. 

Here are some of my favorite Oud artists with some of their music ( and if you are reading this, YES M.Leah, you can add some artists) :

Le trio joubran (my favorites ) : majaz https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Gozewgc3iSo

                                                  Masar https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0zNxeQkK7DY

Marcel khalifa : https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OnwsOcFdhdE

Nasser shamma : https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kw6Qbc3TaEU

Enjoy!!

Boarding House Reach - Record Review

Hello, welcome to everything you've ever learned!
Just kidding, hello everybody, it's been a long time since I've written an article!
Today, I'll talk about a "recent" record that was released in March, Boarding House Reach, by Jack White. I've had time to listen to it, and this is my feedback.

But before beginning, a quick reminder: Who is Jack White?
He was one of the two members of the White Stripes. If you don’t know the White Stripes , stay away from me. For those who don’t know, they wrote (for example) Seven Nation Army, one of the most famous songs in the world, also commonly named the “popolopopopo” song. The WS were an alternative blues band. They wrote several great records. However, they split and Jack White started his solo career. His first album wasn’t that great but it was still good; his second album was very good but there were several useless songs. Never the less, the latest one, Boarding House Reach is great.

“Only” including two major hits, Over and Over and Over and Corporation, Boarding House Reach disappointed a lot of people. Some said it was impossible to listen to, some said it was a fail, but I just think, paradoxically, that they didn’t really took the time to listen to it, they just pressed play, and then say it’s bad.

It’s true that this album is very hard to listen to and that it’s very experimental, as JW tried to sound different and more digital, which really contrast with his previous records, but still, it’s great. Even the most basic country music track contains digital and weird sounds!

But still, let’s really begin and talk about the hits:
 

Over and Over and Over is a typical JW song: a great riff, lyrics you can’t understand, powerful drums, and with all of this you get the energy of the WS (besides, he later revealed that he had the idea of this song while the WS were in activity). Basically, there could be no end to this song, it is well named because it could last forever. There aren’t neither chorus, nor verses, it’s just a song. JW made it last 3 minutes, and I think more wouldn’t be good.

Corporation is “dance” song. It makes one want to do this. It lasts about 5 minutes, but these 5 minutes are just a moment of happiness. It’s incredible, the song has different parts with each a funk groove that is different. I automatically want to dance (even if I’m a poor dancer) when I hear this song.

And then, there are the other songs. I will only talk about the songs that struck me, it would take me too long to describe each song.

Connected by Love is a love song, but not the one you can dance (a slow) on it, it is very weird as a song. It’s very slow as a song, and not pleasant at first. But still, the chorus is great. This song is weird, because it does not make you want to listen to the rest of the record, even though it is the first one. I must confess I didn’t like this song at all when I began to listen to the record. It took time for me to appreciate it, but I finally loved it.

Hypermisophoniac is really the weirdest song; I know I said that most of the songs were weird, but this one wins the reward I think. It begins with a strange sound that loops and that you wouldn’t think is in rhythm. However, the whole song is based on this sound, and everything becomes logic afterwards and it ends up being a “real” song.

I also love Get in the mind shaft. It starts with Jack White speaking, which is pretty weird (STOP USE THIS WORD ANTOINE – I can’t this is the only word capable of describing this record – Very well then but don’t abuse of it- I’ll see…). But then all the instruments « enter » the song, with a funky groove. There’s a digital effect on JW’s voice, which suits a lot the music. This song is very lively.

I invite you to listen to all the songs I talk about, you just have to click on the name of the songs.
 

All of this to say that all the songs are unexpected within the album, but also within themselves. I couldn’t predict how a song could continue or end. Really, listen to this record, it is an experience bit I think you’ll love it if you’re already a fan of Jack White.

Anyway, see you soon for a next article!

The psychology of music.

Hey guys,

Today, I have chosen to talk about how music can have many deeper effects on us then just being nice to hear...

 First of all, music has many effects on our perception:

- It can influence our perception of effort and lead us to forget the state of fatigue thanks to the dopamine it releases in the brain.

- It can help improve deep sleep because of its hypnotic qualities.

- It can aid creativity, give us a helping hand to find ideas because of its memory boosting effect.

- It can improve concentration, by giving us something stable to focus on.

 Next, music can help with our performance at school by:

- Helping with self-confidence

- Helping us learn new languages in the future

- Increasing the duration and intensity of concentration.

Many tests were done to prove these ideas.

For example, one test was done with multiple pupils divided into three groups. One listening to rather fast-tempo Mozart, one listening to relaxing music, and one in silence.

The results showed that the group that had been listening to Mozart scored two times higher than the other groups.

Now, let's focus on the physical side of the matter. When listening to music we can immediately detect the rhythm, we can reproduce it. Also, often if we listen to music that we like, we move on the rhythm, maybe even without noticing. But this is indeed more than just memory. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans on people that were told to lay still and listen show that music activates not only the lobe responsible for interpretation, but also the lobe responsible for commanding movement.

 After finding this, many researchers deducted that music could possibly be used to help people with neuromuscular deceases. It has very positive effects on certain people and none for others.  Finally it has been found that music-therapy has changed the lives of some for whom it works, for example people with Parkinson’s disease.

- Hope you enjoyed, and thanks for reading! -