The most underrated act ...

I saw him once and he was great, couple of decent albums too and the masterful



Regards

Diccus

quote:

Originally posted by scottyhammer:
porcupine tree deserve much more credit but steve wilson apparently likes it that way.

I totally agree with this comment. IMHO this band should be huge but I suppose for those who are in the know it is kind of good how they are and that you can see them live in decent, small venues.

As well as PT, Steve Wilson's other projects such as No-Man and Blackfield are first rate and again should get a wider audience. I am amazed that SW can release so much stuff, of consistently high quality.

quote:

I've heard that Graham Parker is great, but it was just a Rumour

The Rumour issued three albums of their own; Max is well worth a listen

Oops - tried to post an image, but it didn't work.

Pierce Turner of course





SJB

quote:

Originally posted by Unstoppable:



Pere Ubu

"Pere Ubu will be looked back on as the most important group to have come out of America in the last decade and a half. Either that or they will be entirely forgotten" (Rolling Stone, cica 1990)

Oh yes second that. Also David Thomas and the many incarnations of his band (The Pedetrians, His Legs, The 50 Frogs, The Wooden Birds, etc)

Amanda Lear - a legend!

Funny how history repeats Munch

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:
Basia Bulat - hardly anybody mentions her on this forum and she's absolutely wonderful and she released just about the best debut album of all time

So many Canadians, so little time....

Jim,

Please don't encourage him he already has a mixed condition known as HMHB/Bulat OCD this may tip him over the edge

Regards

perfectlysanediccus

Never heard of her!

You thought there was only one photograph of her in existence, well my spies have been out there and............................................



Don't ask me about the middle one, it was taken by 'The Man from Ankle'

Made to feel underrated .... a great band from Canada - how come there are so many great Canadian artists?

The highly underrated British singer Angie Palmer is also working on a new record.

German group CAN. Original material which influenced alot of other musicians.

Caberet Voltaire - Just listen to anything electronic and it's likely to lead back to the Western Works.

Talking Heads never really got the mainstream airtime they deserved.

Jono

For me, it's got to be Magazine. What a group!

Oh, and the Beatles. I never thought they got the kudos they deserved.

the strawbs, loreena mckennitt, terry reid and cara dillon, all are music geniouses, but arent massively well known
james

just downloaded snakes and ladders by basia bulat on recommendations, beautiful! ill be buying some of this, how many albums has she got?

quote:

Originally posted by jamesfuge:
just downloaded snakes and ladders by basia bulat on recommendations, beautiful! ill be buying some of this, how many albums has she got?

Basia has only made the one album: Oh My Darling, but it is available in two versions - the newer version has an extra track on it - In The Night. I've got both versions because I'm a bit sad like that. I've collected music for over 40 years and ever now and then a album just hits me as incredible: Oh My Darling by Basia is one of those. This album is totally unique and brings a new vitality to folk music.



Basia is a singer-songwriter from London, Ontario, who now lives in Toronto (home of the wonderful Martha and the Muffins). Basia recorded Oh My Darling, which was engineered and produced by Howard Bilerman at the Hotel2Tango in Montreal. Howard Bilerman produced Godspeed You! Black Emperor and Arcade Fire, but don’t hold that against him. Basia is not from the earnest female singer/songwriter school - this is music for music’s sake and it’s great. Recording her debut album in Arcade Fire’s studio means comparisons are unavoidable and you do get that 'what on earth is this?' feeling when you first hear Basia.

Put simply Oh My Darling is folk-rock album with some jazz overtones and some superb string orchestration and a touch of ragtime. Basia's vocals are viscous and full-bodied. Her chamber-folk orchestra includes her brother Bobby on drums, Dave on viola, Holly on backing vocals, percussion and ukulele, Seo-Jin on violin, Sebastian on cello, Stephanie on piano and Jay on guitar.

True I’m often excited by great new music; but I believe this to be the best album I have heard in years. Obviously, HMHB are my favourite band and from the 80s onwards restored my faith in popular music, a genre that I believed was becoming forever lost amidst the dross of disco, new romantics and boy-bands. In the 90s some other bands came along to shake things up a bit and give popular music new life (most notably Garbage). The 00s seem to have found the resurgence of great popular music especially for somebody like me who likes the influence of folk music on today’s culture. So whereas, in the 80s Martha and the Muffins This Is The Ice Age stood out from the crowd, it was not nearly so easy for a record to stand head and shoulders above the rest in 2007. Basia’s Oh My Darling is the one record that achieves this. I must have listened to it 100 times since I bought it and it is surely one the most played records in my collection.

Basia’s music and her performance is never pedestrian. There is always great attack in every part of every song. Every musician that contributes seems as if he or she really means it and believes that are participating in something special. However, this music is not self indulgent, it doesn’t sound like somebody singing from an experience of being put through the mill. It does not try to put across any message or explain how awful life is. It's pretty music, catchy and played with pace, rhythm and timing. The songs are short and there is no padding, no pyrotechnics (not that I mind a bit of pyrotechnics) nor repetitions. When a song is done then it’s done.

Basia's bitter-sweet little gems are enhanced by delicate string arrangements, urgent drumming and lovely little touches like Katie Saunoris' flute cameo on The Pilgriming Vine. The songs here are so unusually put together that they become addictive - the brief opening track Before I Knew being a case in point. Beginning with a simple ukulele, it incorporates handclaps and harmonies and is finished in just over a minute. The fact that it leads into the wondrous, Tilly And The Wall-like percussion heavy standout of I Was A Daughter just makes it all the more listenable.

Then there's Basia's voice - sometimes fragile and whispy, and at other times strong and passionate, she can sound heartbreaking on the samba arrangement of the aching Why Can't It Be Mine, or urgent and imploring on the fantastic Snakes And Ladders. The latter in fact is possibly one of the tracks of the year, mixing plinking piano chords and a haunting string section to create something quite beautiful.

Maybe Oh My Darling won't be for everyone - she may not break into the mainstream, but it's refreshing to hear a songwriter unafraid to take risks and not settle for the 'family favourite' spot on the Terry Wogan show.

In fact, there's not a duff track on Oh My Darling. By the time that ukulele reappears on the closing track A Secret, the first thing you'll want to do is play the album again. One of the debuts of 2007 - of any year.

Before I Knew
I Was A Daughter

Little Waltz

December

Snakes and Ladders

Oh, My Darling

Little One

Why Can't It Be Mine

The Pilgriming Vine

La-Da-Da

Birds Of Paradise

A Secret

One of the many great things about the album is the way the drums are played on songs like Snakes and Ladders. They hurtle at double-speed, ratatat-tat, chasing the singer breathless. So many female songwriters take-it-always-easy, languishing in slow piano chords and then the occasional strident bit. Here it's like the band (Basia, drums, strings) are throwing themselves down a hill, feet scarcely keeping up with their feelings, this close to tumbling head-over-heels into something. And indeed so it is: It's the way we come undone / what a perfect accident / oh we danced around them all / like we didn't even notice / oh / at the way we'd come undone.

The last song recorded for the Oh My Darling sessions was The Pilgriming Vine - what a great song to end on as it conjures up thoughts of Christmas lights twinkling, when in through the door troops a marching band - bass-drum, cymbal, flute, string section, a guy with a piano balanced on his open palm. And suddenly they know exactly where the song's headed, where it ought to be headed, the path that leads from the girl and her acoustic guitar, hopes in hand, to the moment at 2:55 when with her voice doubled-up we hear every trembling angle of what we're all waiting for: Tell me I'm always your Only / Down by the maypole. If you go.

I borrowed some of the words from other commentators, but I agree with them all.

If you liked Snakes And Ladders then you'll love this album.

ATB Rotf

That had to be some sort of record, that gap between posted pictures of that bloody hat.

Doh! no it wasn't I missed one.

quote:

If you liked Snakes And Ladders

That should be Snakes and Arrows.