Playlist 182 - June 28 2011

The Underground of Happiness
uplifting pop music of every creed

www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness


Playlist 182
Tues June 28th 2011
11.00am-12.00pm
(repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm)
Cork Campus Radio, 98.3FM
listen live on the web at www.ucc.ie/ccr
*listen back to this show at
https://rapidshare.com/files/3371091017/UOH_Podcast_June_28_2011.mp3

Playlist
Future Islands - Before the bridge (playing Plan B, London, July 9)
Thread Pulls - Weight (playing Crane Lane Theatre, Cork, July 1)
Cian Nugent - Sixes & sevens (excerpt 2) (playing Triskel Christchurch, Cork, July 22, w/ Ryan Francesconi)
Patrick Kelleher & his Cold Dead Hands - Too many harsh words (playing The Grand Social, Dublin, July 15, album launch)

The Reich Effect Festival, Cork, July 27-31
Ensemble Avantgarde - Pendulum Music I (Steve Reich Public Interview, Cork Opera House, July 27)
Efterklang - Illuminant (playing Savoy Theatre, Cork, July 30, w/ Daniel Bjarnason and their Messing Orchestra)
Johann Johannsson - Sifreri (playing Triskel Christchurch, Cork, July 31)

Vessels - Later than you think (Eyan Green remix) (playing 2000 Trees Festival, July 15)
Liam Singer - Words make the master
Qluster - Haste Tone
Larsen feat. Little Annie - It was a very good year
Gang Gang Dance - Glass Jar

*next week's show features music from Readers' Wives, Umpire, Shonen Knife and The Go! Team among others

e-mail the show on radio@ucc.ie
or text +353 (0)86-7839800
please mark messages “uoh”

Conor O'Toole,
c/o Cork Campus Radio,
Áras na Mac Léinn,
Student Centre,
University College Cork,
Cork,
Ireland.

Fleet Foxes in Cork

I remember a time, just about 6 years ago (bear with me on this, it won't take long). It was the Electric Picnic Festival in September 2005. I was attending largely because of one band, Arcade Fire, whose first album Funeral had spent most of that year on repeat at my house, and whose uplifting anthems (or are they anti-anthems) I was very much looking forward to seeing and hearing in the flesh. Of course, I wasn't alone. In fact, at least 5,000 other people had exactly the same idea as me and crammed into the large tent for one of the most anticipated Irish gigs of recent times. Now, I'm not a great one for crowds, in the sense of feeling at one with that many other people in a confined space. I'm a bit too cynical, maybe. I'm happy to share the moment with a few close friends, but beyond that... However as the band came on stage and played through Rebellion (Lies), Wake up, Neighbourhood #2 (Laika) et al, I felt myself surfing a genuine wave of emotion, a wave held up by everyone else in the tent. I had the dreaded feeling of being at one with all 5,000 of these strangers (many of whom might also have been fans of The Frames, who knows). Despite myself, I had to accept the bond, the wave, the kinship. I had to keep a lid on my cynicism and just sing along, like I knew I wanted to. I had to admit that Arcade Fire were not just "my band", I had to share them with loads of other people. It was a moment of culture, a shared, communal experience.

What does this have to do with Fleet Foxes? Last Sunday night I attended a gig by another North American band in another similar-sized tent, The Marquee located at the Docklands in Cork. Like 2005, when I looked around the crowd I thought to myself, "I'm not sure I have a lot in common with these people". Like Funeral, the first Fleet Foxes album has had plenty of air at UOH Headquarters over the last few years (their just-released second album, Helplessnes Blues, will soon follow suit, I'm fairly sure), their impeccably arranged folk-rock songs being belted out of car windows, living room windows, all kinds of windows. And just like 2005, when the band started playing, the dreaded communal bond came over the room. It was emotional. You'll get a taste of it from this video of Your protector, courtesy of genkisparkle.



It was one special gig. Funnily enough, it struck me, Fleet Foxes are not really a band with charisma. There's no between-song banter to speak of. Robin Pecknold generally just looks down and tunes his guitar, mumbles a thank you and counts in the next song. Which is kind of refreshing in one way. Especially when the songs are that good. And with the flawless live sound on the night, every nuance was conveyed. It didn't get any better than their version of this, from the new album.



P.S. By the way, I haven't seen desert boots since, I don't know, about 1988. As if to underline the complete lack of pretentiousness about this band.

*Special mention also for Owen Pallett, who played beforehand (violin, and very very well). Staggering musicianship, a beautiful lilting voice, a shade of electro-pop and some brilliantly unexpected motorik - you say krautrock, I say tomato - drumbeats.

Glastonbury Festival 2011

I flicked around the BBC love-in over the weekend, otherwise known as the Glastonbury Festival. In among the constant back-slapping, there were some genuinely memorable pop moments. (Not including Gwyneth Paltrow, Beyoncé and Jay-Z standing together in the VIP pit watching Coldplay. Or U2. Although both had some anthropological value.) I'm thinking more of Metronomy's performance of The look in the backstage "fairy garden", which was brilliant. They came complete with compulsory wellies, handclaps, watertight vocal harmonies and that unforgettable vintage keyboard riff. Magic. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to locate the footage of the performance on the net, so we'll have to make do with the video.



And as a bonus, here's the ridiculously entertaining video for their new single The Bay, a sub-Ian Fleming fantasy, showing off lovely Torquay, I believe.



*I must also mention the mindblowing performance of Janelle Monae. Apart from the flawless singing, her eye-catching bonnet/quiff, the hilariously incongruous jump-suited string section, the sheer craic being had by everyone on stage (and there were many of them), her scat-tap dancing, the lanky legs of the guitarist, and of course the fantastic pop tunes, I think my favourite part of the whole affair was the white-socks-and-sleeves-over-black-catsuit ensemble of the two female dancers. Honestly, the amount of entertainment on that stage was staggering.

Josh Ottum - Watch TV (Tapete Records)

Josh Ottum - Watch TV (Tapete Records)

Thrilling revival of all that is good about 70's AM rock and a certain 80's high fidelity sound (you know you love it), from America's Pacific Northwest. Goin gone has authentic prog-pop chops (a bit like a calmer Darwin Deez) and a knockout chorus (two different ones, in fact) that recalls the theme tune to The Greatest American Hero. The spectre of Chicago (the band) hangs comfortably around the twin guitar solo of Fool in the night. The very next song, Storms in the summertime, takes a left turn with synth gurgles and handclap syncopations - sounding quite like a 21st century Steely Dan - underlining the experimental heart beneath the pop hooks. The gorgeous male falsetto of Green in the sun belongs on primetime television (not a putdown), which is appropriate given the title of the album. Not built for two seems at first like the type of electric piano ballad not heard since Dean Friedman's I am in love with a McDonald's girl, but it reveals decidedly more depth as you are thrown pleasantly off-balance by the tempo shifts and free jazz cymbal squalls. Throughout, the laconic, underdog vocal cuts through the plastic textures and deliberate pop clichés like a knife (oh go on so, a "hot" one) through butter. Also the production is a joy, as you'd expect from something recorded with Richard Swift and Casey Foubert. A joy of an album that provides a pretty good answer to the question "What is the The Underground of Happiness?"

Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat - Everything's getting older (Chemikal Underground)

Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat - Everything's getting older (Chemikal Underground)

Grand Snr's a big fan of this and it's grown on me like something you'd look forward to wearing. We already spoke last month about the brilliant single The copper top, a plaintiff meditation on mortality. Among other things worthy of your attention on the album, check the shopping list monologue of Cages with its handclap jazz beat backing; the raw, and very Arab Strap-ish, confessional of Ballad of the Bastard; the scuzzy Scottish street funk of Glasgow Jubilee, all back-alleys and blow jobs; the great Runyonesque noir gone wrong of Dinner time. The arrangements of legendary jazzman Wells, anchored by sombre piano, are pitch-perfect all the way, sincere or playful as needs be. And Moffat's writing jumps off the page, characters fully formed, a dirty-realist page-turner. It's a great piece of work, this album.

Playlist 181 - June 21 2011

The Underground of Happiness
uplifting pop music of every creed

www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness

Playlist 181
Tues June 21st 2011
11.00am-12.00pm
(repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm)
Cork Campus Radio, 98.3FM
listen live on the web at www.ucc.ie/ccr
*listen back to this show at
https://rapidshare.com/files/332237186/UOH_Podcast_June_21_2011.mp3

Playlist
Patrick Kelleher & his Cold Dead Hands - Multipass (Catscars remix) (Catscars playing The Spiegeltent, Cork, June 26)
The Doomed Bird of Providence - Fedicia Exine (Zoon van snooK remix)
Josh Ottum - Goin gone
Darren Hayman & the Secondary Modern feat. Emmy the Great - Calling out your name again (playing Deaf Institute, Manchester, June 29)
Metronomy - The bay (playing Oxegen Festival, Punchestown, July 8)
Ryan Francesconi - Palios Karsilamas (playing Triskel Christchurch, Cork, July 22, w/ Cian Nugent)
Cashier No. 9 - Lost at sea (playing The Marquee, Cork, July 1, w/ Bell XI)
Agnes Obel - Riverside (radio edit) (playing The Marquee, Cork, June 26, w/ Fleet Foxes)
Owen Pallett - Lewis takes action (playing The Marquee, Cork, June 26, w/ Fleet Foxes)
The Scaramanga Six - Spent force
Neville Skelly - Brambles & heather
The Raveonettes - Apparitions (playing Shoreditch Festival, London, July 9)
Dutch Uncles - X-O (playing Latitude Festival, July 15)
Grimes - Vanessa (playing Whelan's, Dublin, Aug 3)
I Break Horses - Hearts

*next week's show features music from Future Islands, Thread Pulls, Efterklang, Steve Reich, Cian Nugent and Johann Johannsson among others

e-mail the show on radio@ucc.ie
or text +353 (0)86-7839800
please mark messages “uoh”

Conor O'Toole,
c/o Cork Campus Radio,
Áras na Mac Léinn,
Student Centre,
University College Cork,
Cork,
Ireland.

Random Reviews

Qluster - Haste Tone (Bureau B, from the album Fragen)

From Hans-Joachim Roedelius, who (along with Dieter Moebius and others) brought you Kluster, Cluster and Harmonia, and sound installationist Onnen Bock. Meditative, swelling synths ebb and flo like the tide, punctuated by discreet bells and obscure gurglings, until a beautiful piano and flute duo sails into view. Sublime stuff from a master.

QLUSTER - LIVE PREVIEW 2011 from luma launisch on Vimeo.

Cashier No. 9 - Lost at sea (Bella Union, from the album To the death of fun)

An uplifting wall of 60's sound, with a melancholy vocal in the middle and a lonesome harmonica in the wings, from the Belfast band's David Holmes-produced debut album. Tympani and castanets make up the intriguing supporting cast. There's the glorious whiff of the Brill building about the songwriting too.

And here's the equally great first single from the album, Goldstar, sounding a shade like The Stone Roses taken in hand by Lee Hazlewood.



Playing at the Marquee, Cork, July 1, w/ Bell XI


North Sea Radio Orchestra - I a moon (The Household Mark)

Fantastic medieval pop music for the laptop age, from Craig Fortnam and friends. Say no more, you have to hear this.

*Here's a live recording of NSRO from 2009 at Union Chapel.

North Sea Radio Orchestra - Bagpuss Medley (live) by Arctic Circle Radio

Rozi Plain - Humans (Need No Water Records, single)

Itchy guitar with rolling drums and deceptively cosy female vocals on top. Great stuff from the Bristolian.

*There's also handclapping and cooing on the B-side, End can come, which is always good.

Rozi Plain - Humans by neednowater

The Doomed Bird of Providence - The Fedicia Exine Remixes (Front & Follow)

Essential companion piece to the current Doomed Bird album, Will ever pray, on the same label. I'm becoming increasingly obsessed by the Zoon van snooK mix, a mash-up of guitar and fiddle parts from the original fed through a musique concrete blender with, according to Mr Snook, "added synth revelry". Class.

Fedicia Exine (Zoon van snooK mix) by frontandfollow

John Stammers - John Stammers EP (Wonderful Sound)

Wonderful treatment of The fridge, one of the standout songs from Stammers' self-titled debut earlier in the year, with full band arrangement, including gorgeous steel guitar. Comes with two other remixes of album tracks by labelmates Colorama and The Kramford Look, both as sunny and hazy as each other.

http://www.wonderfulsound.com/

John Stammers - Idle I'm (Colorama Coloured In Remix) by seekmagic

A salute to Van Dyke Parks

I've been meaning to put down a few thoughts for quite a while about Van Dyke Parks. He's one of these Zelig-like characters, appearing at many crucial junctures in pop music history. This much I knew. I knew he played keyboards on the title track of The Byrds' 1966 album 5-D (I can hear that sunburst organ on the playout now - actually so can you, here).



I knew about his association with Brian Wilson, co-writing several songs with him for the lost Smile album. Including this absolute classic, Heroes and villains.



What a great lyric -

I'm fit with the stuff
To ride in the rough
And sunny down snuff I'm alright

He was also involved in plenty of other Beach Boys compositions, co-writing with Brian mostly, not always with the approval of the other 'Boys (Mike Love in particular, I think). And I notice he crops up on backing vocals on one of my all-time favourite Beach Boys songs, A day in the life of a tree from Surf's up, 1971. Mmmm.



He returned to work with Brian Wilson for 1995's Orange crate art, another beautiful album (foreshadowing Wilson's recent Gershwin tribute, in some ways). Here's some footage from a documentary about the project made that year.



And of course he released his own solo material, starting with the deliriously freewheeling montage of American music, although with a melancholy undertone, that is Song cycle (1968). Check the stunning arrangement on Donovan's Colours, which calls to mind everything from Gram Parsons to silent film soundtracks to John Philip Sousa (Parks' father was a member of Sousa's Sixty Silver Trumpets).



Discover America (1972) was also subversive, in terms of political comment (the hilarious G-Man Hoover, for example) but also in its combination of calypso sounds with musical theatre arrangements. In lesser hands that could have turned ugly. Nothing ugly though about this tribute to gold-plated crooner Bing Crosby. (It also features whistling, always good.)



Just a few years ago I came across another beguiling album he made with Inara George (she's a daughter of Lowell George - who VDP also worked with - one half of duo The Bird and the Bee and possessor of a gorgeous, smoky voice), called An Introduction, a brilliant narrative suite of musical showtunes.



And of course his name has come back into vogue somewhat since his arranging work for Joanna Newsom on her album Ys in 2006. You can hear his fingerprints (yes, you can hear fingerprints) all over this fantastic arrangement from that album.



However, nothing had prepared me for the ridiculously long and varied list of collaborators/artists whose work he has contributed to, meticulously compiled on his official website - www.vandykeparks.com. Like The Chills' Soft bomb. Jesus. (I love that album - now I know why...) Also producing Randy Newman's debut album, working with Frank Black, T-Bone Burnett, Ry Cooder, Arlo Guthrie, Harry Nilsson, Tim Buckley, The Everly Brothers, Nathalie Merchant, The Scissor Sisters, Kinky Friedman, Rufus Wainwright and on and on. And among a load of soundtrack work over the years (Popeye, Scrooged, Geronimo, for example), this treasure from Sesame Street: Follow that bird (he wrote the score).



I'd hazard a guess he's the only person to feature on both the Nuggets: Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era 1965-1968 compilation (playing keyboards on a track by The Mojo Men, among other roles) and Melrose Place: The Music (OST). No musical snobbery about the man, just a broad, open-armed, even attitude to music in all its styles and possibilities.

Plus he once auditioned for a part in The Monkees TV show. What a man.

Here's a great clip of him talking about some of his early musical influences.



I had the privilege of seeing him play at the Primavera Sound Festival in Barcelona in 2010, with a chamber group made up of most of Clare & the Reasons, a group he's been touring on and off with for the last couple of years. Here's some (occasionally shaky) footage of that gig, in the Parc del Forum Auditorium.



Here's what I thought of that gig at the time.

Clare & the Reasons/Van Dyke Parks - Primavera 2010

Family-less on the final day, I decide to begin with an entire gig from start to finish, in the shape of Brooklyn's Clare & the Reasons in the auditorium. I've been looking forward to this very much, You getting me from their last album having got completely under my skin in the last few weeks. And it shapes up in fantastic chamber pop style, with cello, violin, trombones, tuba (or was it flugelhorn?) and pristine multi-part harmonies. However, despite the gorgeous arrangements, the overall effect is a little twee for my taste (I must say though their cover of Genesis' That's all is genius, and elsewhere the moment with all the kazoos is very, very charming). They need something more playful to break the slightly staid atmosphere, I'm thinking. As if on cue, and to prove the point, the venerable Van Dyke Parks joins them on piano for their last song. Immediately proceedings are lifted. Coming back on for his own set, joined by three of the Reasons, he is magic, successfully managing to suggest Gershwin, The Beach Boys and Randy Newman, while retaining his own unique style. When he introduces the pieces he wrote for his children, music set to the Brer Rabbit tales, as "stories of black people in white America, of survival", I don't know whether to laugh or cry. What a legend. Even three of his songs amounted to a priceless experience.

It was also fitting that Grizzly Bear were on the same bill that weekend, a band that often echo VDP in their arrangements and song structures.

This is from a very interesting recent interview with Siobhán Kane for Thumped.

"...music should not be static or formulaic, it is so ho-hum when that happens, better that music be an arena for great imagining and reinvention. It wouldn't be the case if it were the munitions industry, you can take a chemistry set into the attic and blow off the roof if you are a careless adolescent experimenter, and in the hands of adults, bombs do the same thing, you can make huge mistakes, but the mistakes you make in music are fairly modest. I don't think people should be condemned for experimenting in music, I hold to that."

He's only 68 (and hopefully around for another while yet) but that last sentence reads a bit like an epitaph for the man. Never afraid of taking a risk or swimming against the tide, a true innovator. Inventor of chamber pop. And in an age when the word legend is bandied about, a proper legend.

P.S. This link on the official VDP website is an excellent biographical account of the man's life and work, up to 1985, when he brought out the Jump album, written by Timothy White.

http://www.vandykeparks.com/miscfiles/musician852.html

This superb quote from the article reads like a mission statement for anyone invlved in music and is an optimistic note to end on.

“I’m still reeling with this challenge,” he says, “to keep my hopes pinned to music which feels like it has aspirations, which feels like it has tensile strength, is on the cutting edge, does have something incisive to offer. I want to ensure that it is discerning, that it is anxious, that it flies nervously and not with its grip on the joystick of preordained method. That it remains excited, driven by passion, does not become an oligarchic swill of self-insistence, that it nourishes and flatters our personal dimension and all that’s gone into it."

P.P.S. And I should mention that VDP is releasing new material in 2011, all on 7 inch vinyl no less. Some background on this Tiny Mix Tapes link - http://www.tinymixtapes.com/news/van-dyke-parks-yes-one-who-hasnt-released-any-new-music-over-15-years-launches-7-inch-series - and full sleevework and purchase details on his label website, Bananastan.

Anni Rossi Interview

The new Anni Rossi album, Heavy meadow, is out on the 3 Syllables label. We had Safety of objects on the show this week, here's the video -

Anni Rossi- "Safety Of Objects" from Consequence of Sound on Vimeo.

There's a distinctive bounce to the tune (something of two-step and reggae about it) and as usual with Ms Rossi, it's very catchy. Plus, I don't know anyone else who plays viola (often distorted) while singing. In fact, she's also an accomplished drummer, a talent she showed when she played in Cork a few years ago. I interviewed her that night, in October 2008, and she recounted her interest in Ghanaian drumming, reggae and Swedish pop group Ace of Bass (!). Have a listen here.

Playlist 180 - June 14 2011

The Underground of Happiness
uplifting pop music of every creed

www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness

Playlist 180
Tues June 14th 2011
11.00am-12.00pm
(repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm)
Cork Campus Radio, 98.3FM
listen live on the web at www.ucc.ie/ccr
*listen back to this show at
https://rapidshare.com/files/4075318203/UOH_Podcast_June_14_2011.mp3

Playlist
Julia Kent - Acquario
Nils Frahm & Anne Muller - 7 fingers (playing The Vortex, London, July 28)
13 & God - Old age
Qluster - Haste tone
North Sea Radio Orchestra - I a moon
William D. Drake - Wholly holey
Crystal Stilts - Half a moon (playing XOYO, London, June 20)
Washed Out - Eyes be closed
Anni Rossi - Safety of objects
Left with Pictures - June
Nik Freitas - Middle
Judy Garland, Billie Burke, The Munchkins & the MGM Stidio Orchestra - Come out, come out... (from the soundtrack of the film The Wizard of Oz)
The Beach Boys - Add some music to your day
Flipron - The stupidest face in town (playing Glastonbury Festival)
Cap Pas Cap - We are men (playing Spiegeltent, Cork, June 21)

*next week's show features music from Catscars, Josh Ottum, Darren Hayman, Ryan Francesconi and Cashier No. 9 among others

e-mail the show on radio@ucc.ie
or text +353 (0)86-7839800
please mark messages “uoh”

Conor O'Toole,
c/o Cork Campus Radio,
Áras na Mac Léinn,
Student Centre,
University College Cork,
Cork,
Ireland.

Anni Rossi- "Safety Of Objects" from Consequence of Sound on Vimeo.

Future Islands

No excuse needed for a bit of Tin man, it's just top notch.

The Doomed Bird of Providence - Fedicia Exine Remixes (Front & Follow)

We spoke about the above mini-album recently, a companion to the current Doomed Bird of Providence album, Will ever pray, which is wonderful. Well there's more, in the shape of a Sone Institute remix of the same track. You need to go here to stream it.

http://www.thewire.co.uk/articles/6679/

It's very woozy without losing any of the drama of the original. By the way, as you're at it, check the Sone Institute album of last year, Curious memories, and the Dollboy meets Sone Institute collaboration, The sum and the difference, both on Front & Follow. This is what I thought of them at the time, with listening links added.

Sone Institute – Curious memories (Front & Follow)

Beguiling album of Burt Bacharach tones and gorgeous orchestrations, in among the cut-and-paste glitches and samples, from one man electronic wiz Roman Bezdyk.

Here's the absolutely sublime French woods from that album.

Sone Institute - French Woods by beneshmade

Various Artists - Long Division with Remainders / Dollboy meets Sone Institute - The sum and the difference (Front & Follow)

Continuing the fantastic furrow they've been ploughing for a while now, the Manchester-based label release two collaborative projects. LDWR features the work of 14 different artists from around the world (including Isnaj Dui, Ken Peel, Leyland Kirby), who were each sent some basic sound files to mould in their own direction. The resulting 14 EP's have now been compiled into one box set, which would fall into the "worthy" category if it wasn't so fascinating and ambitious musically.
The sum and the difference combines the talents of Oliver Cherer and Roman Bezdyk, swapping and re-working each other's material, to create a hazy, drifting 15-odd minutes of pure loveliness. It acts as an interesting companion piece to Mr Bezdyk's (Sone Institute's) brilliant Curious memories album from earlier in the year. As usual with F&F, the artwork by Damian O'Hara provides another compelling reason to invest your money. Highly recommended.

Dollboy Meets Sone Institute - The Sum and The Difference by frontandfollow

Peter Broderick Interview

In the ongoing project to transfer all the content from the old website (www.myspace.com/theundergroundofhappiness) over here, here's the Peter Broderick interview from May 2009, which we recorded before he played at Crane Lane Theatre in Cork that night.

...in which Peter talks about some of his musical influences, including Arvo Part and Max Richter, how he hooked up with Efterklang and Bella Union and about his hometown of Portland, Oregon.



Here's one of the best songs from the then current album Home (Bella Union), which Peter played that night -



(I love that, "music and acted by Peter Broderick"!)

After the interview, as we came back into the venue, Peter grabbed a CD from the merchandise stand and handed it to me. "I'd be interested to know what you think of this," he said. It was called Music for Falling from Trees, a soundtrack to a dance piece which Peter was commissioned to write by Adrienne Hart of the Erased Tapes label. As I found out later, the seven instrumental pieces consist of piano and strings only and are stunningly beautiful. Here's a flavour.

Falling From Trees 2010 from Neon Productions on Vimeo.

Last year, Erased Tapes re-issued the album, compiled with another dance soundtrack of Peter's, Congregation. Here's what I thought of that at the time.

Peter Broderick - Music for Contemporary Dance (Erased Tapes)

Compilation of two dance soundtrack commissions (2009's Falling from trees and 2010's Congregation). Music for falling from trees had already found much love here in the UOH cabin since first heard last year. Although Music for Congregation (a ballet designed, choreographed and composed for pedestrian performers) contains only four tracks (about 24 minutes in total), it's possibly even more beautiful. Minimal percussive samples, swooning strings and drops of glockenspiel on Discovery create a hazy bed which the word gorgeous doesn't do justice to. Understanding begins with a bass throb, before breezy accordion and lurching cello slides add character, with a trademark stoic piano making its first appearance. Together, the arrangements are so big it sounds like the London Philharmonic is involved, but I'm assuming Mr Broderick was responsible for every note and beat himself as usual. It's a fantastic collection and worth going out of your way for.

In fact - and if you've seen Peter Broderick live, you'll no doubt agree - it's worth going out of your way for pretty much anything this man turns his hand to.

Hidden Shoal Records' 5th birthday

One of my favourite record labels is celebrating 5 years in 2011, the Perth-based Hidden Shoal Recordings. They've released some wonderful music in that time. I think it was 2009 I first became aware of them - some of my top albums of that year were from this release list -

2009: A Million Square Miles

I might also direct your attention to a couple of Hidden Shoal artists who have been interviewed on the show, German ambient artist Markus Mehr in 2010 and Blake Madden from Seattle band Hotels just a few months ago (links here, or jump straight to the interview below that - you could also follow a search for "Hidden Shoal" at the top of the page).

http://theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com/2011/01/markus-mehr-interview.html

Markus Mehr Interview Podcast by underground of happiness

http://theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com/2011/04/hotels-interview.html



And even more recently, the glorious and uplifting pop music keeps flowing from Western Australia (via many other parts of the world very often). Check this beautiful neo-classical ambient piece from Welsh artist Antonymes.



Or this great slice of indie guitar-pop from hometown Perth band Umpire.



I'd hate not to mention Liam Singer, Boxharp, Rich Bennett, Elisa Luu, Jumpel, Sankt Otten, HC-B, but that's still only the tip of the iceberg. Check the full roster for yourself. Considerately, and conveniently for you time-pressured types, they've also put together a free label sampler, called Hydrozoa, to give you a taste of the treasures contained within. They describe the music choice on it as "a graduated ride from the ambient and minimal all the way through to the widescreen and guitar-fuelled". Sounds good, I hear you say. I recommend you get some at this link.

http://agora.hiddenshoal.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=12&products_id=169

Happy Birthday HSR, here's to 5(0) more.

Primavera 2011

So the Primavera Sound Festival in Barcelona has been and gone for another year. I didn't make it this year, sadly for me. But I was not missed as about 40,000 other people made up for my absence, and except for some bar hiccups (to do with a new swipe payment system that crashed) it seems like most of them had a pretty great time. (You can find way more detail about this year's festival on Jim Carroll's blog here.)

Just to cheer myself up, here's a couple of samplers of the action from two bands that would have been high on my list, and who both made a big impact at the festival by all accounts.

Courtesy of genkisparkle



Courtesy of MrLiranya



She really makes some racket for just one person, doesn't she?

Playlist 179 - June 7 2011

The Underground of Happiness
uplifting pop music of every creed

www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness

Playlist 179
Tues June 7th 2011
11.00am-12.00pm
(repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm)
Cork Campus Radio, 98.3FM
listen live on the web at www.ucc.ie/ccr
*listen back to this show at
https://rapidshare.com/files/2876851482/UOH_Podcast_June_7_2011.mp3

Playlist
Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat - The copper top (radio edit)
Adrian Crowley - These icy waters (playing King's Place, London, June 10, w/ Serafina Steer)
Kitty, Daisy & Lewis - Messing with my life (playing Oxegen Festival, Punchestown, July 9)
Tune-Yards - Bizness (playing Whelan's, Dublin, June 17)
Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti - Fright night (Damn Funk remix) (playing Field Day Festival, London, Aug 6)
EDM - Stereo/Video
Jai Paul - BTSTU
The Horror The Horror - Wilderness
Chad VanGaalen - Sara
John Stammers - The fridge (full band version)
Papercuts - Do you really wanna know
Diagrams - Antelope
Rozi Plain - Humans (playing Utrophia Project Space, London, June 18)
The Last Sound - Only the lonely know the glow is failing

*next week's show features music from Crystal Stilts, Julia Kent, 13 & God, Nils Frahm & Anne Muller and Qluster among others

e-mail the show on radio@ucc.ie
or text +353 (0)86-7839800
please mark messages “uoh”

Conor O'Toole,
c/o Cork Campus Radio,
Áras na Mac Léinn,
Student Centre,
University College Cork,
Cork,
Ireland.

The Last Sound: Only the Lonely Know the Glow is Failing from Osaka Records on Vimeo.

13 & God - Own your ghost (Alien Transistor)

Grower is the word for this.

13 & God - Own your ghost (Alien Transistor)

The Acher Brothers (The Notwist/Tied & Tickled Trio) are at it again (they're busy this month), this time part of a kind of supergroup with members of Oakland hip hop group Themselves. Many are the delights contained within; the sleepy tick-tock rhythm of Its own sun, the fantastic anti-anthem Armored scarves, the flute and shaker entree to the stalking hip hop main course of Janu are, the dreamy shoegaze of Old age, the compelling half beat with strings of Death minor. It's a real grower this album, pleasingly adventurous without being self-indulgent. Have a listen here.

http://www.anost.net/en/Shop/13-and-God-Own-Your-Ghost.html?listtype=search&searchparam=13%20%26%20God

Smith Westerns - Weekend (Weird World)

Smith Westerns - Weekend (Weird World, from the album Dye it blonde)

It took me a while to warm to this - it actually took hearing the whole album to give it the context, with its psychedelic shades of glam - but it has a place in my heart now. Maybe it's the cavernous "oooh's" of the chorus. Or the throwaway fuzz guitar riff. Or the semi-whispered male vocal. It's all very west coast for a band from Chicago.


SMITH WESTERNS "Weekend" by domino

Random Thursday Reviews

In the words of David Berman, random rules.

Nik Freitas - Middle (Affairs of the Heart, from the album Saturday night underwater)

Understated but insinuatingly catchy tune, anchored by a wry vibrato vocal, somewhere between Harry Nilsson and George Harrison. The arrangement features cooing female singers and heart-tugging mellotrons, two of my favourite things in the world. There's also a drop-dead gorgeous raindrop piano line. Why can't daytime radio start selling some of this? C'mon playlisters...

*In between being a touring member of both Bright Eyes and Broken Bells, Freitas also found time to release an EP at the end of last year. Here's the charming title track, a bouncing paean to vintage synths.



Washed Out - Eyes be closed (Weird World, from the album Within and without)

Washed Out is producer Ernest Greene from Atlanta. His new album was recorded with Ben Allen - Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion, Deerhunter's Halcyon digest - and there are shades of both in the lovely blissed-out, hazy drift of this song. Anthemic quality suggests stadium venues more than clubs. Make space in the chillwave club for a new member.

Get a load of it here.

http://www.dominorecordco.com/uk/news/03-05-11/new-washed-out-song-and-eurowithin-and-withouteurotm-album-artwork-revealed/

Papercuts - Do you really wanna know (Sub Pop, from the album Fading parade)

Lovely slice of wistful, C-86ish indie pop from Jason Robert Quever and friends of San Francisco. Whispered vocals, reverbed guitars and a pitter-patter bassline - a total treat basically.

Julianna Barwick - The magic place (Asthmatic Kitty)

A few months late with this, but there are some things so special you won't mind waiting.

Julianna Barwick - The magic place (Asthmatic Kitty)

From the opening strains of Envelop, with multiple wordless, heavily treated vocal parts creating texture as well as melody, you know you're in the presence of something special here. By the end of that track, as a distressed piano line gradually swamps the vocals, a haunting, heartrending mood has taken over from the initial bliss. The title track is a choral symphony which slowly disintegrates into a lone soprano. Cloak sounds for all the world like a line from a church hymn sampled and looped, until its layers gather a power not witnessed in any church I've ever been in. White flag creates the effect of standing at the mid-point of three competing choirs, which somehow manage to complement each other. You could quibble that a sameness sets in midway through the album which might have been broken by the use of more percussion or rhythm parts (as hinted at on Vow and Prizewinning). But that's like taking issue with Michelangelo's choice of colour tone on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. And it would miss the point too, because Ms Barwick is composing a hymn of praise to the human voice, with the effect of strongly suggesting forces beyond the human domain. Solemn, moving and utterly transformative.

Here's an interesting video where Julianna explains her working method:

Wires Under Tension - Irreversible machines (Western Vinyl, from the album Light science)

Wires Under Tension - Irreversible machines (Western Vinyl, from the album Light science)

A confounding brand of math-rock from the South Bronx duo, with violin, electronics and a stirring brass undercurrent. Pounding toms bring a great rousing quality. And it's catchy as hell.

EDM - Night people (Western Vinyl)

EDM - Night people (Western Vinyl)

You'll have heard of Bloomington, Indiana's progressive rockers Early Day Miners (their 2009 album The treatment was a particular favourite round these parts), now shortened to this acronym. Very reminiscient in places of ex-Cardinal Richard Davies' psych-folk/pop solo style (that's only a good thing), but with extra prog stylings. So you have the dense, galactic instrumental Milking the moon (a bit like a slowed-down Wooden Shjips), also the stirring folk-rock-with-recorder of Turncoats, the itchy psych-guitar of Hold me down, the insistent, circling melodies of Stereo/Video. The initials are no drawback. A fine, fine album.

Stereo/Video free d'load: http://westernvinyl.com/audio/WV90.SV.mp3

Playlist 178 - May 31 2011

The Underground of Happiness
uplifting pop music of every creed

www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness

Playlist 178
Tues May 31st 2011
11.00am-12.00pm
(repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm)
Cork Campus Radio, 98.3FM
listen live on the web at www.ucc.ie/ccr
*listen back to this show at
https://rapidshare.com/files/157275358/UOH_Podcast_May_31_2011.mp3

Playlist
The Phoenix Foundation - Bitte bitte (playing Forbidden Fruit Festival, Dublin, June 4; Glastonbury Festival, June 25)
Colourmusic - Yes (playing Forbidden Fruit Festival, Dublin, June 4)
Thomas Truax - Free as fireflies in May
The Doomed Bird of Providence - Fedicia Exine (Position Normal remix)
William D. Drake - In an ideal world
Cardiacs - Day is gone
Other Lives - For 12
The Middle East - Jesus came to my birthday party
Nik Freitas - Saturday night underwater (playing Columbiahalle, Berlin, June 19, w/ Bright Eyes)
B.I.L.L. - Lovely ending
Rutman's Steel Cello Ensamble - All over (Epilogue)
Austra - Lose it (playing Cyprus Avenue, Cork, July 3)
Alphabet Saints - Jesica's heartbreak
13 & God - Its own sun (playing Garage, London, July 14)
SMOD - Ca chante

*next week's show features music from Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat, John Stammers, Rozi Plain and Tune-Yards among others

e-mail the show on radio@ucc.ie
or text +353 (0)86-7839800
please mark messages “uoh”

Conor O'Toole,
c/o Cork Campus Radio,
Áras na Mac Léinn,
Student Centre,
University College Cork,
Cork,
Ireland.

The Fedicia Exine Remixes by frontandfollow