2019 Music
Dec. 15th, 2019 08:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
corviThis is zhelana 's December year in review meme.
December 07 → talk about music this year
I listen to music at work on Spotify, which sent me a helpful summary email of my 2019 listening. According to Spotify I listened to 2129 different songs this year, and my top five genres were:
I've always wanted be the sort of person who appreciates industrial music. It's strange and experimental and perversely dedicated to breaking the fundamental rules of music. Distort the instrument sounds until they don't have a pitch anymore! Play in nonexistent keys and invented modes! Include machinery noises and random screeching!
I often think "oh, that's interesting" when listening to industrial music, but seldom find it enjoyable.
So how'd Spotify put an industrial genre at the top of my list? My guess is that it's a result of the tendency of industrial musicians to do side projects and covers and odd work in other genres. The temptation to apply the black magic learned from wrestling with the basic laws of music itself to other genres is apparently irresistible. Like poetry, knowing which musical rules to break helps. Industrial musicians fooling around in other genres make a lot of really good work.
I suspect I've just hit the <3 button on enough lyrical side projects, deeply unsettling covers, and other oddities to move a genre that I don't even like to the top of my list, which is pretty great.
Still kind of wish I liked industrial music.
"Canadian Indigenous" made the list because this autumn, I went on a katajjaq (Inuit throat singing) binge. Traditionally, katajjaq is a game or performance done by Inuit women. The two performers stand face to face and one of them starts a short repetitive rhythm with breaks in it; the other fills in her own rhythmic pattern in the breaks. It's an endurance contest; whoever lasts longer wins.
Nontraditionally, musicians use katajjaq as the rhythm track, instead of drums or bass, and it's very cool.
Some katajjaq songs I ran into that I think are worth a listen, if you don't mind music with political themes - not sure if it's an unusually political genre, or if I just like the political ones. If you do mind music with political themes, listen to Ukiuq and skip the rest:
The Jerry Cans - Ukiuq
High-energy folk, the sort with fiddle and accordion.
Quantum Tangle - Love is Love part 1
Quantum Tangle - Love is Love part 2
I think these were intended as a single song; I'm not sure why it's in two pieces. Listen to them one after the other. Part 1 is bluesy; part 2 adds katajjaq. (This one's political-ish - it's a lovesong, but it was written for the wedding of a gay indigenous couple to “feel like they were in a place pre-contact and before outside authorities told us who we could love or what we could do.”)
Buffy Sainte-Marie and Tanya Tagaq - You Got To Run
Folky, political. Originally written for a "believe in yourself" montage in a movie about a dogsled race; rereleased, a little sharper, in support of pipeline protests. The video for this one is beautifully filmed, just shots of the recording sessions.
SIlla + Rise - Soft
Glitchy bleeps, vaguely ominous. You ever wonder what Aphex Twin would sound like with katajjaq? No? Me neither, but someone was.
Piqsiq - God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
A cappella, no lyrics. Arguably political, I guess? The musicians have written about trying to reconcile their own rough experiences with "church and crown" and their children's excitement about Christmas, and the song comes out rather ambivalent.
Riit and Zaki Ibrahim - #uvangattauq
Kind of ... R&Bish? Political. #metoo related.
Twin Flames and Charlotte Qamaniq - Broke Down Skituuq
Lower-energy folk, more rootsy. Still have a fiddle, but no accordion. They might have a banjo, I'm not sure.
zhelana 's December year in review meme.December 07 → talk about music this year
I listen to music at work on Spotify, which sent me a helpful summary email of my 2019 listening. According to Spotify I listened to 2129 different songs this year, and my top five genres were:
- EBM
- Lilith
- Canadian Indigenous
- Gothic Metal
- New Wave
I've always wanted be the sort of person who appreciates industrial music. It's strange and experimental and perversely dedicated to breaking the fundamental rules of music. Distort the instrument sounds until they don't have a pitch anymore! Play in nonexistent keys and invented modes! Include machinery noises and random screeching!
I often think "oh, that's interesting" when listening to industrial music, but seldom find it enjoyable.
So how'd Spotify put an industrial genre at the top of my list? My guess is that it's a result of the tendency of industrial musicians to do side projects and covers and odd work in other genres. The temptation to apply the black magic learned from wrestling with the basic laws of music itself to other genres is apparently irresistible. Like poetry, knowing which musical rules to break helps. Industrial musicians fooling around in other genres make a lot of really good work.
I suspect I've just hit the <3 button on enough lyrical side projects, deeply unsettling covers, and other oddities to move a genre that I don't even like to the top of my list, which is pretty great.
Still kind of wish I liked industrial music.
"Canadian Indigenous" made the list because this autumn, I went on a katajjaq (Inuit throat singing) binge. Traditionally, katajjaq is a game or performance done by Inuit women. The two performers stand face to face and one of them starts a short repetitive rhythm with breaks in it; the other fills in her own rhythmic pattern in the breaks. It's an endurance contest; whoever lasts longer wins.
Nontraditionally, musicians use katajjaq as the rhythm track, instead of drums or bass, and it's very cool.
Some katajjaq songs I ran into that I think are worth a listen, if you don't mind music with political themes - not sure if it's an unusually political genre, or if I just like the political ones. If you do mind music with political themes, listen to Ukiuq and skip the rest:
The Jerry Cans - Ukiuq
High-energy folk, the sort with fiddle and accordion.
Quantum Tangle - Love is Love part 1
Quantum Tangle - Love is Love part 2
I think these were intended as a single song; I'm not sure why it's in two pieces. Listen to them one after the other. Part 1 is bluesy; part 2 adds katajjaq. (This one's political-ish - it's a lovesong, but it was written for the wedding of a gay indigenous couple to “feel like they were in a place pre-contact and before outside authorities told us who we could love or what we could do.”)
Buffy Sainte-Marie and Tanya Tagaq - You Got To Run
Folky, political. Originally written for a "believe in yourself" montage in a movie about a dogsled race; rereleased, a little sharper, in support of pipeline protests. The video for this one is beautifully filmed, just shots of the recording sessions.
SIlla + Rise - Soft
Glitchy bleeps, vaguely ominous. You ever wonder what Aphex Twin would sound like with katajjaq? No? Me neither, but someone was.
Piqsiq - God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
A cappella, no lyrics. Arguably political, I guess? The musicians have written about trying to reconcile their own rough experiences with "church and crown" and their children's excitement about Christmas, and the song comes out rather ambivalent.
Riit and Zaki Ibrahim - #uvangattauq
Kind of ... R&Bish? Political. #metoo related.
Twin Flames and Charlotte Qamaniq - Broke Down Skituuq
Lower-energy folk, more rootsy. Still have a fiddle, but no accordion. They might have a banjo, I'm not sure.
no subject
Date: 2019-12-16 04:54 pm (UTC)This post needs commentary on the Lilith genre!
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Date: 2019-12-17 05:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-16 06:38 pm (UTC)I enjoyed 'You Got To Run'. Thanks for sharing these.
no subject
Date: 2019-12-16 07:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-18 06:34 am (UTC)