What Music Takes You To Church?

Revisiting a few familiar favorites this evening.

Every listener has a few – one or two exceptional records which transport them to a metaphysical beyond, or one could say, records that take them to church.  One unparalleled example is Glenn Goins calling down the Mothership at Parliament Funkadelic’s performance in Houston in 1976.

But my personal favorite out-of-body musical experience is Spiritualized’s Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space.  The entire album is a neo-psychedelic gospel noisepop anthem and one of the finest and most cohesive works of the shoegaze genre.

J Spaceman and his band are accompanied by Dr John on the piano and the Hammond B3, as well as the voices of The London Community Gospel Choir. There are touches of hammer dulcimer, autoharp, accordion, string and horn sections, and pedal steel making for one brilliantly-refined heroin-inspired masterpiece.

The 17-minute closing epic, “Cop Shoot Cop” is a monumental performance.  The track’s foundation is a simple gospel blues oscillation between two fundamental chords.  J’s understated half-spoken vocals usher the listener through a series of verses varying on a primary lyrical theme, each punctuated by twelve bars of distortion pedal punching noise which culminates after the final verse with 6 minutes of an unrelenting eruption of cacophonous clamor.  Impressively, the hyperactive electric bass which has been walking up and down scales for the duration of the piece slowly introduces and repeats the root note of the track and guides the performers through the fog machine and wall-of-sound pandemonium back to the familiar gospel structure for a few minutes of meditative peace while Spaceman repeats, “and I will love you… and I will love you…” for the album’s finale.

This is a record best-experienced in your finest pair of circumaural headphones, and bested only by the 3-disc UK Expanded Edition.

Ladies and gentlemen… we are floating in space.

Days of the Lords: 1976-1997

Weekend Update: Saturday Afternoon Project

Born in ’81, I was just a few years too young for some of the best music of the 80s. This afternoon I dedicated some time to rectifying that issue.

I collected all of the genre-defining albums of the era from RateYourMusic.com and assembled a 175-hour playlist titled Days of the Lords: 1976-1997 comprising 55 artists from the period’s most prominent genres:

• Ethereal Wave
• New Wave
• Dream Pop
  
• Gothic Rock
  
• Shoegaze
  
• Post-Punk
  
• Jangle Pop
  
• & Noise Pop

All the major players are here.  Neoclassical darkwave and goth rock mainstays like The Cure, The Church, The Cult, Joy Division, The Smiths, Dead Can Dance and Cocteau Twins.  Plus post-punk artists like The Chameleons, Cabaret Voltaire, Chrome, Einstürzende Neubauten, Jesus & Mary Chain, Swervedriver, and Fad Gadget.

All the shoegaze giants made the list, from My Bloody Valentine to Spacemen 3 and Spiritualized, Soda Stereo, The Boo Radleys, Brian Jonestown Massacre, Slowdive, Chapterhouse, Belly, and The Catherine Wheel.  I’ve really done my best to assemble all of the artistst discographies that defined their generation’s sound from 1976-1997.

Here’s a preview of the completed list in action.  I’ve got a lot of listening to do!

Some Albums Hit You Like a Ton of Bricks – Others Wait Til You’re Ready

This morning I decided to revisit an album I’d honestly neglected when I’d first picked it up 15 years ago.  Slowdive’s Souvlaki is heralded as the quiet answer to My Bloody Valentine’s epically-loud shoegaze masterpiece, Loveless.  Released in 1993, it has remained to this day one of the definitive albums of its decade.

The opening track, “Allison” is widely-acclaimed as the strongest selection of the album.  Straight away it sets the pace for the dreamy majesty that is to come.  The next two tracks – “Machine Gun” and “40 Days” begin with a sharp attack and relentless guitars and both tracks dissipate elegantly over powerfully-long 16-second fade outs, creating a wonderful sonic-staging of a band performing in the void of outer space.

Still, this isn’t a perfect album.  “Sing” is an attempt at a more freeform, atmospheric piece, but while Nick Chaplin’s bass maintains a simple, melodic structure, the rest of the band appears to disregard it.  The resulting instrumentation seems out-of-focus, and whether intentional or not, the lack of a tonal center takes away from the music.  “Here She Comes” had similar potential, but ends abruptly after only 2 minutes.  Neil Halstead closes the track speaking the title into silence, and you’re really left wishing there was more.

But other tracks like “Slowdive Space Station” return to the strength of the album’s start.  The song features a wash of heavily-reverberating guitar drones and indecipherable vocals that would make Elizabeth Fraser proud.  Rachel Goswell’s speech echoes from a distant star system and by the end of the piece the guitars have slowly decayed into beautiful noise reminding the listener why Souvlaki is one of the essential albums of the shoegaze/dream genre.

The remainder of the album is similarly trademark of the shoegaze scene.  All of the elements are there –  from the backmasked drums on “Melon Yellow” to the infinitely-sustained tones and delicate melodies of “Some Velvet Morning.”  This is a quintessential dream record.

And that’s one of the things I love most about music.  It doesn’t judge its listener for shelving an album for over a decade without ever giving it a fair chance. It simply waits there quietly to be rediscovered, knowing you’ll fall in love with it when you’re ready for its beauty.

Sigur Rós’ First Three LPs available for Pre-Order NOW!

Attention all shoegazers and post-rockers:

In December 2014, VinylCollective.com reported that pre-order pages were beginning to appear for reissues of Sigur Ros’ first three classic albums.

Sonic Records in Halifax has the Icelandic quartet’s first three LPs – Von, Ágætis byrjun, and Svigaplatan (The Bracket Album) each listed from XL Recordings with a reported release date of 16.02.2015.

At present, completed sales of the 2013 reissues are holding steady around $75 each on Discogs and as much as $150 on eBay, but these new deluxe reissues will be only $29.98 (though available again in limited numbers.)

Sigur Ros had posted a teaser video hinting at the releases in 2014.  Check it out below.

Each of the three albums have a pre-order page active on Amazon.co.uk, but ( ) has yet to surface stateside.

I for one am not going to risk missing out.  I’ve pre-ordered the import and will be happy to add it to my library.  Have you ordered yours?

Amazon US preorder | Von | Agaetis Byrjun

Amazon UK preorder | Von | Agaetis Byrjun | ( )