Ensemble - Excerpts... Hard To Describe
Posted by: Nick Lees on 26 March 2011
Heard this lot (who are French Canadian) on Maconie's Freakzone the other week and bought the album. It's a little gem.
What it is is hard to describe (and I'm not normally lost for words in this regard). If you started off with recent Stereolab but replaced the group with a chamber ensemble and added in a dash of electonics/dissonance to stop it being too saccharin, then that would be a starting place, though they're a lot more pastoral than Stereolab.
Vocals male and female in English and French (Quebecois?), lovely instrumentals, just made for a Spring afternoon.
Anyway, recommended and here's the Spotify link: Ensemble – Excerpts
Thanks for the feedback Denis. And thanks for the links - I've always liked Piano Magic, but have never got around to buying anything, so I'll fix that. Liked the Klima too. :-)
As for the old blockbuster threads, I just don't think they work any more. And by work I mean act as jumping off places for other recomendations. I bought more CDs from recommendations on that one Jellyfish thread than I recommended myself (and certainly far more than I dreamed of when I started it), so I came out a winner. Same with the Jam Bands thread (and many others).
We've either lost critical mass or people have become too lazy and think that slapping up a picture of a cover is contributing. Much more interesting is to say why they listened to it and maybe why anyone else should try it too.
The "What was the last cd you bought" thread could be a valuable source of info on new music, but mostly it's just a picture posted with no comment: e.g. What sort of music is it? Is it really good? Is it a classic in the making? Or is is a bit of a clunker?
Maybe I'll start a new music thread and see if we can encourage to put their thoughts down in writing (I'm thinking non-classical here as those folks do tend to write informatively about their musical choices - fair play). Maybe we should resurrect Nick Lees Head 
(I'm joking).
Because there's one thing for sure, and that there is a mountain of good new music being made these days, but a lot of it is tucked away in well-hidden niches and needs to be dug out...