I didn’t realize this was an EP so on my first listen its brevity shocked me. (Suddenly a Rick Beato video started and I was very confused.)
Tag: Chamber Folk
Tim Hardin 1 (1966)
This record has a pretty sterling critical reputation and one has to think that has to do with the overall quality of Hardin’s songs and the fact that this is a debut (so it likely took a few people off guard). Because there is a pretty problem with this album and most of the reviews …
Desertshore (1970) by Nico
There’s something about Nico’s austere approach on this record that is my catnip. I have no idea if I would like this record this much if the songs were the same and the arrangements were more contemporary, but I like the aesthetic so much I don’t care.
New Skin for the Old Ceremony (1974) by Leonard Cohen
This record has the reputation of being the moment when Cohen switched up the way his songs were arranged. But though there is some truth to that, it doesn’t bother me anywhere near how I imagined it would, which might have something to do with my imagining what it sounded like before I listened to …
Songs From a Room (1969) by Leonard Cohen
Songs of Leonard Cohen is over-produced. Like so many singer-songwriter debuts from the late ’60s and early ’70s, somebody somewhere didn’t trust the songs and/or the singer and made the decision to dress up his songs. Cohen likely didn’t know any better himself, not being a musician. But after the record came out, people complained …
Mutations (1998) by Beck
I can imagine that, had I paid attention to Beck more when he first became popular, and only heard Mellow Gold and Odelay, and not his earlier “anti folk” records, this record might have knocked me on my ass. In retrospect it has far more in common with Sea Change than it does those records …
The Marble Index (1968) by Nico
If you only knew Nico from Chelsea Girl (i.e. you had never heard The Velvet Underground & Nico nor were you aware of her subsequent reputation), I have trouble imagining the shock of this record. It’s a little like what later happened with Scott Walker, albeit not nearly as radical, but it took Nico less …
Mark Hollis (1998)
Given how world-changing the final Talk Talk albums were, I guess we could be forgiven that Holli’s solo debut (and only record to this point) would somehow also be world-changing. I think there’s a natural desire for us to believe that artistic innovators will always be innovative, and always to the degree that they were …
Did She Mention My Name? (1968) by Gordon Lightfoot
This is my first experience of Lightfoot outside of hearing 5 or so songs of his ad nauseum on Oldies Radio when I was a kid. I guess I associated those songs with my childhood and so I’ve never had an urge to explore his oeuvre. Reading about this record, I was shocked to find …
Songs of Leonard Cohen (1967)
I was not alive when Leonard Cohen was a minor Canadian poet and not a singer-songwriter so I don’t know what kind of shock it would have been for us Canadians to hear this record. But I can speculate; I suspect it was greeted in some quarters with sneers though it might be hard to …
Morning Phase (2014) by Beck
Beck and the critics both seem to agree this is some kind of spiritual sequel to Sea Change. Now, I’m not sure I would have set what I’m going to say had I not read that, but I suspect I would have.
Pleasures of the Harbor (1967) by Phil Ochs
I have a heard a lot about Phil Ochs as a songwriter and he has been recommended to me both by the critics I used to read and by friends of mine. Yet I have still managed to barely hear any of his songs, and usually only covers. Like so many other artists, his music …
Chelsea Girl (1967) by Nico
The first time I heard the Velvets’ early singles, with Nico on them, I didn’t like her voice. And for quite some time after, I don’t think I did. I’m pretty sure that, for a long time, I regarded her presence on that first album as some kind of weird aberration, forced upon them by …
Missy Higgins: Oh Canada (2016, Nicholas Kallincos, Natasha Pincus)
I saw this music video posing as a short film at Hot Docs last night. It’s an animated film about Alan Kurdi. It includes pictures drawn by refugees but most of it was professionally animated (even though it is given the look of a child’s picture).