2018: Music
Ryuichi Sakamoto & David Toop (The Silver Building, June 2018)
I didn’t get out to shows quite so much this year, nor did I stretch much beyond my comfort zone. I went to a few things at Cafe OTO (unmentioned), which, despite not being all that good, did more to reinforce my belief in the sanctity of that space than the very good things did. Seeing Sean McCann hit play on some prerecorded classical music whilst reciting an extended prose poem about eggs over a powerpoint slideshow didn’t really work, for instance, but I’m incredibly glad such a thing exists, and that there is somewhere that I can go to see it. Better was Flora Yin Wong, making sonic future dystopias standing still and stern faced over a laptop, before cracking a smile at the end. And much better was Lucy Railton, who played an almost obnoxiously complex and diverse set based on her recent album that riffed off all sorts of musical styles and techniques, switching between them baroquely and performatively at wiil. After sitting at the cello and playing some extended, piercing durational notes, she spins around and starts poking and prodding her machinery, warping dials and linking diodes to produce all manner of ungodly soundscapes and distortions. One bass-note produced was so dense and deep it felt like the room was entirely full of sound that no space could possibly be left for people or air, and we would soon all be crushed, content and full of music. It was amazing.
Also enjoyable, if predictably so, three shows at the Barbican. I didn’t really get on with the album at home, but seeing Tim Hecker perform ‘Konoyo’ live was good and exciting, with thick mists of fog pierced by laser beams and light pyramids elevating the familiar type drone sounds into something more ethereal and cool. Similarly balletic, the Oneohtrix Point Never MYRIAD show, made to go with the ‘Age Of’ album, was a massive delight, with big operatic sound, smashing light shows, deep web visuals on projection, and very complicated sounding live instrumentation from Kelly Moran, Aaron David Ross and Eli Keszler, a hard-hitting accompanying trio whose own music alone would be just as good to see live one day soon. The Ryoji Ikeda show also delivered, if again in expected ways. All of that image and sound in collision - a sugar rush of crunching sound, rushing data trails, matrix spirals and hACk3r visuals - doesn’t seem to get old.
Last, the clear highlight: two incredible performances by the legendary Ryuichi Sakamoto. First, somehow in the front row for the Barbican show with Alva Noto. Sakamoto scratching around making small sounds atop the grand piano, before striking the first piano note around 20 minutes in, a profound, very pointed pressing of a single key, so exciting because of its massive delay. Then back and forth chaos between him and Noto, minimal piano up against glitchy-tweaky electronics, satisfying combinations making strange harmonies. Next, at the Silver Building with David Toop, a big warehouse structure near the Royal Docks that was an odd fit for it but a fun one. Sakamoto watching from his secret booth up top whilst support acts Curl, with their weird improv thing, mixing messy guitars and various beats with spoken word, raps and other squarks and shouts, and Yves Tumor, battering a single drum continuously whilst screaming as various dancers dressed as suited zombies stumbled around, played. Scenes. Then, for the main show, Sakamoto and Toop making the tiniest sounds with a variety of instruments and objects to a captivated audience straining for each scratch, tap and tremble. Small sounds and big listenings. Total focus for legendary practitioners working in their element.
At home, my favourite album was Autechre’s NTS Sessions, some 8 hours of new music from them broadcast on the radio over the duration of a month in April, then released in physical formats and as a download. Squibble squark wobble parp, everything all at once. This review does a brilliant job of elucidating what the album (?) is and why it is so very good; I certainly can’t. And, If for whatever reason, that one doesn’t count, then Eiko Ishibashi’s The Dream My Bones Dream would be my other pick, a beautiful, transcendent piece of music that came completely out of nowhere (s/o to one man trumpet stand @frozenreeds) yet seemed utterly essential even on first listen. On the radio, I was most often listening to Emotional Landscapes, and to the Blowing Up The Workshop series, both of which I spent much of last year listening to, and both of which continue to get better and better; and increasingly to Grey Matter Archives, to Longform Editions, and to DISCWOMAN. I know all of these picks are far from unusual or interesting, but I note them anyway, if only because it’s interesting (for me) to look back on what I deemed my ‘favourite’ at this period or that. It usually reveals something about where my head was at then, or where I wanted it to go next.
Below, as per tradition, a top 50 albums, divided first into a primary 25, then into a secondary 25 below, then 10 highlights in each category selected arbitrarily, displayed pictorially. Less a top and bottom 25, more 25 albums I’ve spent good time listening to, and 25 I’d like to spend more time with. It was a good year!
SHORTLIST 25
Autechre - NTS Sessions 1 - 4
Cities Aviv - Raised for a Better View
Demdike Stare - Passion
DJ Healer - Nothing To Lose / Prime Minister of Doom - Mudshadow Propaganda
Eartheater - Irisiri
Eiko Ishibashi - The Dream My Bones Dream / Eiko Ishibashi & Darin Gray - Ichida
Francis Harris - Trivial Occupations
Grouper - Grid of Points
H. Takahashi - Low Power
Jim O’ Rourke - Sleep Like It’s Winter
Joe Talia - Tint
Kali Malone - Cast of Mind / Organ Dirges 2016 - 2017
Kelman Duran - 13th Month
Laurel Halo - Raw Silk Uncut Wood
Lucy Railton - Paradise ‘94
Mary Lattimore - Hundreds of Days
Objekt - Cocoon Crush
Park Jiha - Communion
Pendant - Make Me Know You Sweet
Rosalía - El Mar Querer
Sarah Davachi - Let Night Come On Board / Gave On Rest
Skee Mask - Compro
Takecha - Deep Soundscapes
Tirzah - Devotion
Yves Tumor - Safe in the Hands of Love
LONGLIST 25
36 - Circuit Bloom / Ego Death
Alex Zhang Hungtai - Divine Weight
Astrid Sonne - Human Lines
Clara Engel - Eleven Passages
CTM - Red Dragon
De Leon - De Leon
Dylan Carlson - Conquistador
Eli Keszler - Stadium
Gabor Lazor - Unfold
Gaika - Basic Volume
Galcher Lustwerk - 200% Galcher
Harutosyura - Harunemuri
Ichiko Aoba - qb
Kaoru Inoue - Em Paz
Lucrecia Dalt - Anticlines
Lonnie Holley - MITH
M Geddes Gengra - Light Pipe / Haiwaiki Tapes
Oneohtrix Point Never - Age Of
Organ Tapes - Into One Name
Pariah - From Here Where We Are
Rafael Anton Irisarri - Midnight Colours / Sirimiri / El Ferrocarril Desvaneciente
Space Afrika - Somewhere Decent To Live
Tomberlin - At Weddings
Turnstile - Time and Space
ZULI - Terminal