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Kate Bush releases 50 Words for Snow, a new CD, today via the Anti imprint. Below is an animated video accompanying one of the album tracks from her official YouTube channel.

Tom Waits’ Bad as Me is out now on Anti.

Peter Gabriel
New Blood
EMI

Peter Gabriel has recently turned his attention to covering songs by other artists. He now returns to his own body of work, reinterpreting earlier material with a 46-piece classical ensemble, dubbed the New Blood Orchestra and conducted by Ben Foster.

For some pop stars and rockers, the later career symphonic album is a black eye in an otherwise distinguished discography. But throughout his career, Gabriel has strived to create music with an epic sweep and richly hued soundscape, and his recordings have long incorporated a diverse palette of instruments to enflesh the material. Thus, adding the symphonic treatment to many of his songs is an apt, indeed well nigh inevitable, next step in their evolution. John Metcalfe has collaborated with Gabriel in the past, and his arrangements never jar with the spirit of the originals. Thankfully, that doesn’t mean that they treat the original recordings as holy writ either. In fact, New Blood is often at its best when songs are deconstructed a bit to reveal new facets. “In Your Eyes” is given a spirited string introduction which then serves as an accompaniment figure, replacing the syncopated drumbeat one heard on its So iteration; imparting a post-minimalist vibe to the song.

I’ve long thought of “San Jacinto” as a late prog epic that yearned to be a symphonic tone poem: and so it is here. Meanwhile, “Solisbury Hill” has its guitar riffs taken over with jaunty flair by strings, remaining an effervescent popsong with, in typical fashion for Gabriel, a far more weighty and autobiographical backstory submerged in the lyrics.

Even more “groove-oriented” songs like “Digging in the Dirt” are dealt with deftly by Metcalfe, with ricocheting lines between brass and winds giving toes ample opportunity to tap. Perhaps only “Downside Up” strikes one as a bit too familiarly adorned with patterns from symphonic rock albums past. Of course, effective arrangements mean little if a singer isn’t up to the task of tackling the songs. A few of the keys of songs have been lowered in deference to the intervening decades, but Gabriel is still in fine voice: an expressive interpreter with excellent control of his instrument.

While one eagerly awaits the next serving of brand new material from Peter Gabriel, New Blood is no mere stopgap, but an interesting recasting of his catalog that’s well worth exploring.

Songs for Persephone: Mimi Goese & Ben Neill

Take a seductive voiced art-pop singer and a post-jazz/alt-classical trumpeter. Add fragments of nineteenth century classical melodies, electronics elicited by a “mutantrumpet” controller. Then add influences ranging from ancient Greek mythology to the Hudson River Valley. What you have are the intricate yet intimate sounds on an evocatively beautiful new CD: Songs for Persephone.

The Persephone legend is one of the oldest in Greek mythology, with many variants that provide twists and turns to the narrative and subtext of the story.  In the myth, Persephone, daughter of Zeus and the harvest goddess Demeter, is kidnapped by Hades, god of the underworld. During her absence, vegetation is unable to grow in the world; fields fall fallow and crops cannot be harvested.

To break this horrible time of famine, the gods come to an understanding with Hades. Persephone is eventually freed, but on the condition that, if she has eaten anything while in Hades’ realm, she must return to his kingdom for a certain length of time. Thus, each year she must remain in the underworld one month for each pomegranate seed that she has consumed. This serves to rationalize, in mythic terms, the change of seasons, times of decay and renewal, shifts in light and weather; even the autumn foliage and the falling of the leaves.

Vocalist Mimi Goese and trumpeter Ben Neill have updated the Persephone story, while retaining its iconic essence, on their new recording Songs for Persephone (out now on Ramseur Records). As one can see from the pomegranate on the cover, (a visual designed by Goese), the duo is mindful of the legendary Persephone’s history; but they are not hung up on providing a linear narrative.

In a recent phone conversation, Goese, who wrote the album’s lyrics, said, “The artwork that I did for the cover, featuring the pomegranate, is one acknowledgement of the myth of Persephone. And there are other images that I found in the lyrics. But we were interested in using what was evocative about Persephone to create our own story. That’s sort of how the myth evolved too – one storyteller picks up the thread from another down through the years.”

They started work on this music some five years ago, but originally presented it as part of a theatrical production by the multimedia company Ridge Theater, starring Julia Stiles. In 2010, it was produced at Brooklyn Academy of Music as part of the Next Wave Festival.

The theatrical presentation and the mythological story behind it are only two strands in a disparate web of influences that resonate with Songs for Persephone. Both Goese and Neill make their home in the Hudson River Valley. Both for its stunning natural surroundings and its history as a home for artists of all sorts, the valley is rich with reference points. Neill feels that these are subtly imparted to the music.

In a recent phone conversation, he said, “I found myself particularly interested in the Hudson River School of painters. These Nineteenth Century artists depicted the local landscape and the changing of season with a dimensionality and symbolism that seemed to have an affinity with what Mimi and I were after in Songs for Persephone.”

For Neill and Goese, these extra-musical influences – artwork, nature, and theater – are an important part of the music’s genesis. But the polystylistic nature of their music making adds still another layer to the proceedings.

Goese says, “I started in dance and theater and later moved to performance art. Singing came along later. But I don’t have the musical background or training that Ben has – I’m self taught.”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG1XgKytxd0[/youtube]

She doth protest too much. Goese’s voice provided the steely, dramatic center to the work of late eighties band Hugo Largo. One part art rock and another dream pop, the group incorporated bold theatricality and ethereal experimentation, releasing two memorable full lengths, Arms Akimbo and Mettle, and the Drums EP, an alt-pop connoisseur’s delight. She’s also collaborated on several occasions with Moby and, under the moniker Mimi (no last name) released Soak, a solo album on David Bryne’s Luaka Bop label.

Goese is a powerful singer, but Songs of Persephone brings out the lyricism her voice also possesses. Cooing high notes and supple overdubbed harmonies are juxtaposed with the more muscular turns of phrase. Experience plays a role in Goese’s tremendous performances on the disc. But she also credits the musical creations of her collaborator Neill with spurring on her inspiration.

“Ben has been a terrific person with whom to work,” Goese says. “He’s inventive and willing to try new things. From the moment we first performed together, at a concert nearly a decade ago, I’ve felt an artistic kinship with him.”

One can readily hear why Neill’s music would be an engaging foil for Goese. His background as a producer, and his years of work designing the mutantrumpet, have encouraged Neill’s ear toward imaginative soundscapes. His 2009 album Night Science (Thirsty Ear) is an example of Neill’s nu-jazz arrangements and soloing at their very best.

On the current CD, Neill’s playing remains impressive; but his arranging and collaborative skills come to the fore. There are intricate textures to found, on which Neill’s trumpet and electronics are abetted by strings, bass, and drums, but it’s the melodies, floating memorably past, one after the other, that are most impressive here. Some of the melodic lines he crafts are imitative of the voice in their own right: it’s no accident that some of the most inspired music-making on Songs for Persephone are when Goese and Neill create duets out of intricately intertwined single lines.

Neill says, “The classical materials that I used as the basis of the compositions on Songs for Persephone were melodies from the Nineteenth century: from opera and symphonic music. Many of them were from relatively the same era in which the Hudson Valley painters worked. I found it fascinating to juxtapose these two genres that were in operation more or less at the same time.”

He continues, “I’d describe the material as fragments of melodies: small excerpts rather than recognizable themes. None of them are treated in such a way that most listeners will be able to say, ‘Hey that’s Berlioz,’ or ‘That sounds like Schumann.’ They were meant to be a starting point from which I would develop the music: it’s not a pastiche.”

At 7:30 PM on September 27^th, Goese and Neill will be having an album release party at the Cooper Square Hotel, part of Joe’s Pub’s Summer Salon series.  Goese says, “It’s an interesting space – we’ll have glass windows behind us, which is unusual as compared with a more conventional stage. But it’s fun performing in non-standard venues. It allows you to try different things and to bring different elements into the mix in terms of theatricality, lighting, and the way that you play off of each other. I’m excited to see how Persephone changes as we take it into various performing spaces.”

-Composer Christian Carey is Senior Editor at Sequenza 21 and a regular contributor to Signal to Noise and Musical America. He teaches music in the Department of Fine Arts at Rider University (Lawrenceville, New Jersey).

Songs for Persephone is out August 30 via Ramseur.

Randy Newman

The Randy Newman Songbook, Vol. 2

Nonesuch CD

Randy Newman has gained acclaim for his Hollywood film scores, which deploy full orchestrations alongside his singing and piano-playing. His studio albums have featured similar instrumental line-ups, something that’s given his pop a classy sheen that’s served as something of an ironic foil for the ofttimes biting satire of his lyrics. It’s refreshing to hear the songs from Newman’s pop canon in a stripped down setting: you’ll hardly miss the strings!

In this, the second Nonesuch release on which Newman performs his best known songs solo, with only a grand piano for company, one learns or is reminded of, several things about the artist at this stage of his career. First, he’s still a mighty fine piano player, shuffling through mid tempo rags and drawing forth imaginative voicings in a style that may at times sound deceptively simple, but is anything but simplistic. A supple sense of timing is omnipresent, and Newman’s use of articulation and a wide dynamic range help to remind one of the instruments featured in the original recordings of these songs. Newman’s voice has always been a distinctive one; expressive rather than “pretty.” And if it’s lost a fair amount of the limited lilt it had when he was younger, and if a few high notes strain more than they used to, it’s still remarkable to hear the characters his singing calls forth, and the way that he can inhabit a song.

This CD’s been in the stereo quite a bit this summer. And one of the marks of its durability is the amount of times tracks have been repeated to get a second listen to a particularly fetching rendition. Those who suggest that Newman’s songbook has too many similar-sounding entries need to listen more carefully; there’s a lot going on above those shuffles; both musical and lyrical nuances. Hearing him perform the songs in this intimate setting underscores their vitality.

Jon Anderson

Survival and Other Stories

After lengthy legal wrangling, Chris Squire holds the rights to the name of prog-rock band Yes (he’s the only one who hasn’t, at some point or another during its four decade history, quit the band!). Still, from an outsider’s perspective, it can’t help but seem churlish that the other members of Yes have ousted Jon Anderson, the band’s vocalist on all but one of its albums (Drama), in favor of a singer from a Yes cover band.

It’s more than a bit satisfying to find Anderson in such fine voice on a solo effort, Survival and Other Stories. Anderson’s solution to being “between bands” was to engage a host of collaborators via the internet. Despite trading mp3s back and forth and engaging in most of the interactions remotely, the results are surprisingly cohesive.

Survival brings together various strands of Anderson’s musical interests – Celtic, folk, New Age, prog rock – resulting in a collection that’s likely to please fans from various stages of his storied career. And, to answer the inevitable question, the 67 year-old can still hit all his high notes – with aplomb!

Brooklyn trio The Pearl and the Beard describe themselves as “three voices, one cello, one guitar, one glockenspiel, one melodica, several drums, one accordion, ninety-six teeth, and one soul.” All of these – well, maybe not the teeth – will be brought to bear in their show tonight at Music Hall in Williamsburg.

The Pearl and the Beard: Sweetness (MP3 download)

Opening for PatB is our favorite banjo wielding, songwriting, ex-Hold Steady member, Franz Nicolay.

Music Hall of Williamsburg (details here)

Doors open at 8; show starts at 9

Over 16 event

SophiA Knapp

Nothing to Lose

Drag City DC456 (7″/MP3/FLAC)

Sophia Knapp is probably best known for her work in the band Lights, a group that has recently morphed into Cliffie Swan (their debut was released a couple weeks ago on Drag City). In the midst of this transition, she recorded a single, “Nothing to Lose,” which is also recently out on Drag City. Those who think that vinyl’s audiophile reputation isn’t all that and a bag of chips need to spin this clear 7″ disc. Eugene Wasserman’s 5-string bass lines provide an earthbound anchor for Knapp’s ethereal singing, which breaks into supple harmonies during the hook. Keyboardist Jay Israelson lays down undulating, slightly bluesy, Wurlitzer licks to complete the package.

The b-side is a remix of the song by Caroline Polacheck. She employs a gentle hand here, supplying additional synth halos and tweaking the vocals here and there. But mostly, she rides the golden bass-line and entrancing singing that are already present, pointing up the single’s virtues rather than, as so many remixers sadly are wont to do, obscuring them.

Are 7″ singles still relevant in the MP3 era? If “Nothing to Lose” is the yardstick by which we consider this question, the answer is a resounding yes!

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Note: We review lots of CDs and videos at File Under ?, but we’re always interested in alternative formats. So, if you are pressing a vinyl recording – be it 7″, 10″, or 12″ – for release, or if you’re putting out a cassette or a 3″ CD, please keep us in mind!

Bobby
Bobby
Partisan Records CD

Bobby, a band based in Montague, Massachusetts, shares some personnel with Mountain Man (including vocalist Molly Sarle) and is filled with alums from Bennington and Hampshire Colleges. Both of these schools are places that encourage self-starters to pursue eclectic courses of study, and this shows in the group’s self-titled debut. It manages to harness the intimacy of bedroom pop while eschewing a lo-fi aesthetic in favor of a spacious, layered production aesthetic.

If one tried to pin down Bobby to a single genre, they’d likely be oversimplifying matters. The band is fascinated with the polymetric constructions of African drumming and the structures of Javanese gamelan. At the same time, the pastoral arrangements that are buoyed by these intricate rhythms frequently channel alt-folk. Sarle’s supple voice and phrasing remind one in places of Vashti Bunyan. She and band founder Tom Greenberg are fetching partners in several vocal duets on the recording. What’s more, there’s more than a smidgen of electronics savoring the mix, creating surprising juxtapositions with the more rustic post-psych guitar textures.

While locating all of these various signatures requires concentration, one’s labors are amply compensated by the often beautiful musical concoctions Bobby has on offer.

Bobby

Bobby is out on 6/21 via Partisan Records.