One of my favorites, so much so that I’m confused why I haven’t posted this already. If you’re unfamiliar, Isabelle Antena is a French pop and jazz musician and composer, who began making music with her band Antena (whose highly influential Camino del Sol was one of the first records I ever posted here!). She went on to be a highly prolific solo artist, gaining a huge following in Japan–which makes sense aesthetically, as I think her sound very much anticipated Shibuya-kei. In fact, I grew up listening to Isabelle Antena because my dad heard the maddening “Quand Le Jazz Entre En Lice” in a hair salon in Tokyo, where my family was living at the time, and took it home to my mom, who got hooked on it. A lot of her live performances on YouTube were shot in Japan, like this particular gem.
Hoping For Love is jazzier than its excellent predecessor, En Cavale, but it has all the prowess you’d expect from Isabelle Antena, who wrote, arranged, and produced this record. Here she flits easily between Latin, samba, bossa nova, funk, and synth pop, with a few of her signature bass-driven dance floor twirlers like “Laying On The Sofa” and “Sweet Boy,” the latter of which I often catch myself singing to my dog. While it’s still strongly reminiscent of contemporaries like Sade and Linda di Franco, it’s fully her own world, spending most of the record’s second half squarely in the realm of acoustic jazz to terrific effects. Such a special, masterful record–I hope you love it as much as I do.
Hi friends, I hope that whatever your personal circumstances are at the moment, you’re hanging in there. Once the pandemic is over, I think we’re going to have to figure out how to channel our political rage into meaningful change–I know I will, otherwise I think I might poison myself with being so angry–and I hope to talk with some of you about what this could entail and work with you to make it happen when the time comes. I’m realizing as I type this that even using soft platitudes like “stay safe” feels inappropriate, given that safety and isolation are luxuries that many don’t have. Anyway, that aside, I’m grateful that you’re here and reading and listening.
I’ve been sitting on this one for awhile, largely because for me me, this blog has always had a pretty strict ethos of listenability. While a lot of what I share is admittedly leftfield, I like to post records that aren’t super challenging, are a pleasure to listen to from start to finish, and that can appeal to a wide range of people. While this record is definitely pleasurable, it has some pretty wild avant garde moments in a way that might turn some listeners off. But something that I’ve had to regularly remind myself of in the almost six (!!) years that I’ve been doing this is that most of the people who end up here are preternaturally open to musical oddness, and also that my tastes aren’t as singular or rarefied as I sometimes think they are–which means that when I like something, there are usually others who like it too. Musically, that’s exactly what’s made this blog so fun to write–realizing that I’m not alone, that there are throughlines through my taste that line up with other people’s throughlines, that we love what we love. So I’m going to assume that because I love this record, others will too, even if it’s a little more eccentric than a lot of what gets posted here.
I first came to this record through this excellent compilation of Japanese favorites. I recognized the luminous “Kokorowa” from the track “Kokoro Da” by Love, Peace and Trance, but hadn’t realized that the Love, Peace and Trance version was actually a cover of this one–written, according to Discogs, by Killing Time’s drummer, Jun Aoyama, who was a longterm member of Tatsuro Yamashita‘s touring band. I have since put the original on about 29 different mixes because I love it so much, but excitingly there is much more to be found here.
“既知との遭遇 (A Close Encounter With You Know What)” hints that it’s a deceptively breezy bossa nova-esque puff, but ultimately devolves into fully free-form summertime jazz, with multiple time signatures happening at once, tabla and talking drum, and more mallets than you could shake a mallet at. “沈黙する湖 (Psychotropicnic)” turns an abrupt 180 into a cinematic soundtrack for a steamy 80’s movie, with reverbed out hazy saxophone, murky and gorgeous synth pads, and a sleepy, wandering piano. But it’s with the title track that things get properly weird: it’s a 20 minute long five part odyssey, featuring some very sinister vocal processing, bonkers percussion, a wildly cathartic take on the Japanese favorite Indonesian folk classic “Bengawan Solo,” a full free jazz meltdown, and a very stoned lūʻau interlude featuring Sandii (!) serving the most impressively slow vibrato I’ve ever heard (fittingly, she’s trained extensively as a hula dancer and now runs two hula schools in Yokahama and Harajuku).
I think what makes this record so exciting for me is hearing a group of extremely technically skilled musicians making a record that is diverse and ambitious but still ultimately sounds like them all goofing off together: if Irene makes one thing clear, it’s that everyone involved had a sharp sense of humor. The end of the title track really lays into it with a short interlude featuring a childish, singsongy boy-girl duet over an end-of-the-carnival instrumental and a very cute errant giggle. After the exhausting tour-de-force we’ve just been on for 20 minutes, it feels particularly funny. The people who made this were truly sick session musicians with a massive discography between them, and their ability to play together–in the musical sense but more importantly in the game sense–is a joy to be brought along for.
Sorry this got so long–not usually my thing–but anyway, I hope you love it, and at the very least I hope it takes you somewhere else for a few minutes. Thanks again for being here.
This is a mix of mostly Spanish, Brazilian, and American orchestral pop music, largely from the 60s–cinematic songs that you would want to listen to while driving along a sunny coastline. It also includes some recent field recordings that I did on the Maltese coast, sounds of the mountains in the outskirts of Barcelona, inside the Barcelona subway, the jungles in Puerto Rico, and the mangroves of southern Florida.
Tracklist:
1. Waves in Dwejra Bay at the collapsed Azure Window, Gozo Island, Malta. June sunset 2018
2. Antonio González “El Pescaílla” – Chica de Ipanema
3. Antón García Abril – Sor Citroën
4. Breakwater in l’Escala, Spain. July afternoon 2018
5. Los Stop – El Turista 1.999.999
6. Augusto Algueró – Será El Amor
7. Frogs and a fountain in the Abbey of Montserrat, Spain. July night 2018
8. Henry Mancini – Party Poop
9. Canoeing in the mangroves, outskirts of Hobe Sound, Florida. August evening 2018
10. Papa Topo – Milano
11. Evinha – Estorinha
12. Alfonso Santisteban – Brincadeira
13. Crickets in a night hike by Collserola mountains just before raining, outskirts of Barcelona. July night 2018
14. Elsa Baeza – Dubeque Dublin
15. Antón García Abril – El Turismo Es Un Gran Invento
16. Taking the subway to rehearsal, Barcelona. July evening 2018
17. Alfonso Santisteban – Manías de María
18. Flipper’s Guitar – Coffee-Milk Crazy
19. Wildlife in Toro Negro rainforest, Puerto Rico. August night 2018
20. Me singing a vocal harmony
21. Le Mans – H.E.L.L.O.
22. Cicadas in Devil’s Millhopper, Gainesville, Florida; and weather forecast in Spain. August evening 2018
23. Marcos Valle – Êle E Ela
24. Stereolab – Miss Modular
25. ユキとヒデ (Yuki & Hide) – 白い波 (White Waves)
26. Los Mismos – Puente A Mallorca
Following in the steps of Jorge Ben, who began incorporating elements of funk and soul into samba music in the early 60s (eventually creating whole new genres that became integral to Brazil’s Black Movement), Roberto Santos (aka Di Melo, “tell me”) didn’t enjoy the international name recognition that many of his more prolific peers did. Perhaps it’s because until 2016, Di Melo was his only full-length release. Still, if the measly two copies of the record currently available on Discogs with a starting price of $732.56 are any indication, the record has since attained its well-deserved holy grail status.
Santos was born in the Pernambuco region of Northeastern Brazil, moved to São Paolo in the late 60s, and was signed to EMI/Odeon in 1974. Other than that, I haven’t found much information about him, and it’s not totally clear why he didn’t continue to release music on the heels of Di Melo, as he’s written more than 400 unpublished songs. From what I gather, he was in a severe motorcycle accident in the 80s that almost left him a paraplegic, after which there were widespread rumors that he had not survived, which might have contributed to his long hiatus. There’s a short documentary about him here from 2011–though it doesn’t have English subtitles, it’s well worth flitting through even for non-Portuguese speakers for its amazing archival footage, as well as some beautiful contemporary footage of him serenading his small daughter in their kitchen.
Sonically, Di Melo is rich and complex, effortlessly winding between funk, samba, tango, jazz, soul, and regional folk. Hermeto Pascoal (!) contributes, though it’s not clear in what capacity. Eight of the twelve tracks are original compositions. It’s a wildly ambitious debut effort, and, as seems to often be the case with Brazilian musical wunderkinds, it succeeds at all of its efforts. I’m far from an expert on Brazilian music, so rather than make uninformed statements, I’ll encourage you to listen to it–it’s a pleasure from the enthusiastically syncopated, brutally grooving opener “Kilariô” (which, as I understand it, was the biggest hit at the time of Di Melo‘s release) all the way to the sunny, cowbell-flecked cakewalk closer “Indecisão.” In between, the unbothered, sinewy “Se O Mundo Acabasse En Mel” (previewed below) is my personal favorite. Ideal warm weather listening.
Thank you Silva for the reminder about this terrific record!
Here’s my most recent episode of Getting Warmer for NTS Radio. It sort of feels like a continuation of last month’s mix–slinky, flirty, loungey, and never picking up too much speed. I recently revisited Dusty Springfield’s version of “Spooky” in headphones, and while I’ve been a longtime fan of hers, I was particularly floored by her vocal quality and intonation, so that was the jumping-off point here. I hope you like it! You can download an mp3 version here.
Tracklist:
1. World Standard – Pasio
2. Frank Harris & Maria Marquez – Campesina
3. Miharu Koshi – Tohboh-Sha
4. Yves Tumor – The Feeling When You Walk Away
5. Dusty Springfield – Spooky
6. Márta Sebestyén & Levente Szörényi – András
7. Karin Krog – Just Holding On
8. Quarteto Em Cy – Caminho De Pedra
9. Lena d’Água – Tão
10. Fred Manda – Cartoon In Kartoum
11. Patrice Rushen – Let Your Heart Be Free
12. Solange (no, not that Solange) – Quero Um Baby Seu
13. Gal Costa – Baby
14. Nora Guthrie – Home Before Dark
15. Hiroyuki Namba – Hiru No Yume
Odd that this is my first Ichiko Hashimoto post, given how much I admire her work–though her catalogue covers so much ground that it’s hard to know quite where to start. A trained jazz pianist, composer, and singer, Hashimoto was one half of Colored Music (friendly reminder that this record is so great), made a slew of ambitious solo records, performed with YMO, collaborated with Belladonna of Sadness composer Masahiko Sato, and scored an anime series, all while establishing herself as an powerful and singular composer, arranger, and producer. Though she’s worked across many genres, she’s maintained a signature proclivity towards gently sinister and avant-garde arrangements, and lugubriouis, pillowy vocals (her love of chanson-style singing pops up all over her discography, not just here).
Mood Music might not be her most canonical record, but it’s a personal favorite and has been on repeat recently. Comprised mostly of jazz standards, the record cribs heavily from bossa nova, samba, and exotica, but Hashimoto quietly subverts these textures into something darker, and at times, less familiar. Her quavering, syrupy-swoony orchestration suggests a Scott Walker-esque approach to sentimentality, particularly on thick and headier arrangements like “Poinciana” and “Night and Day.” The record’s two original compositions, “Flower” and “Île De Étrange,” are its most interesting, with the former a white-knuckled, percussionless tower of taut-string urgency, and the latter a hypnagogic, dubby piece of acid jazz. Mood music indeed.
Originally comprised of four sisters from Bahia (Cybele, Cylene, Cynara, and Cyva; their real names), Quarteto em Cy has been enormously prolific and has also undergone many lineup changes over the years. I’ve been unsure which record of theirs to begin with since this blog started, so I’ve decided to start at the beginning and share their debut (and also their first of maybe five self-titled records), from what Brazilian music snobs consider to be their golden period (although they weren’t signed to the legendary Elenco label until 1966).
Swooning vocal harmonies delivered with expressive precision and set over meandering jazz and bossa textures. No reason not to be listening to this today.
Swooning solo guitar. Sete’s fingerpicking is some of the best ever, and this release catches him at a particularly special moment: his samba, bossa nova, and jazz roots are out in full effect, but this was his first release on John Fahey’s label Takoma, and Fahey’s influence shows. Ocean dabbles in folk (seemingly from multiple traditions) and has that same expansiveness that marks much of Fahey’s work—music that, at the risk of sounding trite, seems to slip outside of time.
Side note: for those in New York, I’ll be doing a guest set of Japanese pop heavy hitters with Evan Neuhausen on WNYU (89.1 FM) tonight at 7:30. Spoiler alert: there will be bird sounds.
Listen to my sixth episode of Getting Warmer for NTS Radio below. I thought a lot about musical migration as I was making this: cross-pollination as a result of colonialism; exotic fantasy, escapism, and essentialism; and Brazil, both as a place of origin and as a source of inspiration. If you like it, you can download an mp3 version of it here. Enjoy!
Tracklist:
1. Carpenters – Invocation
2. Fé De Sábio – Crepúsculo
3. Isabelle Antena – Otra Bebera
4. Yellow Magic Orchestra – Shadows On The Ground
5. The Beach Boys – Til I Die (Alternate Mix)
6. Caetano Veloso – Gua
7. Mudd – Summer In The Wood
8. Orchestre Raymond Droz Avec Pierre Cavalli Et Son Orchestre – Passarinhos
9. Light House – 南太平洋
10. The Coconuts – If I Only Had A Brain
11. Googoosh – Sahel Va Darya
12. Brenda Ray – Another Dream
13. Miharu Koshi – 逃亡者
14. Nightingales Recorded by Jean C. Roché – In A Waste Ground Beside A Stream In Provence, June
The best. Cheeky, punchy, synthy bossa-pop (or electro-samba, depending on who you ask). Production by Alan Moulder (Loveless, Siamese Dream, The Downward Spiral, Korn, casual) and Martin Hayles (Orange Juice’s Rip It Up, also casual). Instant gratification in a big way. Six songs written by Antena, plus a cover of Sister Sledge’s “Easy Street.” You might also recognize “Seaside Weekend” as a rework of a track she had originally done with her band, Antena. For fans of Antena, Sade, Linda Di Franco. Pleased to boast that I grew up listening to Isabelle Antena—my dad heard the maddening “Quand Le Jazz Entre En Lice” in a hair salon in Tokyo, where my family was living at the time, and took it home to my mom, who got hooked on it. Enjoy!
