Long Is the New Short...and Coal Coal Black

I understand short attention spans and all that, but I do like the idea of slow being the new fast. Or rather, long being the new short.

There's a company that provides a service to radio stations of cropping down songs to just the 'best' parts, i.e. the hooks, and will chop out, say, that unecessary third chorus, or that outro, or that bridge, so that all songs fit into a two-minute format, on the theory that people really only want the good parts anyway and don't have time for more. (In fact record companies have also sliced up songs into ring-tone portions; you pay more for the chorus than you do for the verse.)

I'm not a big fan of nostalgia (hate it, in fact) but when the odd mood strikes me I'll go on iTunes and listen to thirty-second clips of old favorites. Of course you don't get the full emotional arc of the song or have time to get into the groove... but in my head I already know the song so that's enough for me, so I kinda get the evil reasoning...

I also used to be the music editor for a music mag, and would get, sometimes, 100s of CDs a month. I could only review a handful, and set up a couple of interviews. Now these were all CDs that had the weight (that is, finances) of a large corporation behind them, so you knew that at least the production quality was going to be pretty good, and that enough people had to like the music for it to even get released (in fact it's how I first heard "Dubnobasswithmyheadman" by Underworld, and fell in love with a certain "Cowgirl",) unlike the ocean of Myspace artists. So to give everything a fair chance, I'd fall into the trap of listening to the first 45 seconds or so of the first three songs, fast forwarding through a song, or skipping ahead a few tracks to maybe listen to one more. If something caught my attention, I'd listen to the whole thing, and if it was good and I really liked it, I'd study it and set up an interview or do a review. Now this was a small magazine... I can't imagine the volume of material the New York Times must get. I empathize, with you Jon Pareles. You must have a lot of coasters at your place.

If you read music reviews, one thing critics hate (for the above reasons) is a long recording. The words 'bloated' or 'self-indulgent' will inevitably be used. And to be sure, that is sometimes the case, but not always; however you will very rarely read a review that says something like 'at 24 songs, this cd is just the right length'. I have noticed that there is a correlaton between better reviews and shorter discs. Through a very unscientific study, according to my observations, most good reviews are for CDs under 38 minutes, which means most songs in the 2 to 3 minute zone. For writers on a deadline, I get it. For civilians (music lovers) though I hope this isn't the case.

Dangermouse (of Gorillaz, Gnarls Barkley, The Grey Album fame, etc) said something like all he needs for a song is about two minutes. Iggy Pop gave an interview recently (the Stooges have a new disc out, "The Weirdness") where he said that when they were originally putting out albums they only had to have 6 to 8 songs, and songs back then were barely three minutes... and that making an album these days requires at least twice that effort. (So their new single is about 2:30, so 12 songs at that length still put the new full-length at only about half-an-hour. My guess is the CD'll come in around 38 minutes. I also suspect that it'll get 3 star reviews, because it won't be very good but there will be the nostalgia factor giving it that extras-star. I will listen to it on iTunes in 30s clips for this reason.)

This isn't a quantity/quality argument, what I'm saying is I like good long songs. And I'm not talking about remixes, just the original versions. One factor is that the experience of the song is like that of reading a really, really good novel versus the Coles-notes or Reader's Digest version; you get more involved intellectually and emotionally, and want that feeling sustained. (An shorter analogy: sex). Longer songs are harder to make captivating. They have to evolve, not just repeat elements in a familar pattern.

I don't think any musician sets out with the motiviation of specifically wanting to write a long song (well, not me anyway) because they aren't so easy to write, they do take 3 or 4 times the effort...but they just happen, and if in the re-writes and edits they don't get cropped down because all the elements truly remain necessary, they can be just as precise and impactful as a shorter song.

So having said all that, here's just a few of my favorite long songs. (The first one being from "Various Chimeras" CD by Shinjuku Zulu; the heartbreaking vocal on Coal Coal Black is by Shankhini, and the mournful, bluesy vocal on the second song, My Man Amen, from the "Sonorous Susurrus" CD, is by Sydney White:

Coal Coal Black by Shinjuku Zulu

My Man Amen by Shinjuku Zulu

Tale Me Into Your Skin by Trentemoller

Angel by Massive Attack

Dark and Long by Underworld

Banjos and electronica... and Dirty Liar

Banjos (or is that Banjoes? Dan Quayle, I feel your pain) and pop music are great, especially in electronica. Yes, you heard me, electronica.

So below are some are some fantastic banjo tracks, (that's not an oxymoron) to check out, arranged in order from more tradtional to more radical genres, from singer/songwriter (Sufjan Stevens) to Old Tyme/Bluegrass/Country (O Brother) to dance/electronic (The Grid) to folk/electronic (Four Tet) to country/electronic (K.I.A.) to ambient electronic (Air) and finally, rap/dance/blues/electronic (Shinjuku Zulu).

All the Trees of the Field Will Clap Their Hands by Sufjan Stevens

I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow by the Soggy Bottom Boys

Alpha Beta Gaga by Air

Box the Gnat by K.I.A.

She Moves She by Four Tet

Swamp Thing by The Grid

Dirty Liar by Shinjuku Zulu

Acapellas...and Sweetness Likes the Reverb

I was in Istanbul, it was twilight, and it was the most beautiful thing I'd ever heard...

Even though I make 'electronic' music, or at least make music with electronic devices, and love love love cool production (shoutouts to Timbaland and William Orbit and The Neptunes and Flood and Mad Professor and...) there is, of course, no better thing than to hear an unaccompanied human voice in a song. (Unless it's mine, that is; I have a terrible voice, which is why I've worked with a multitude of vocalists, from rappers and toasters to opera, blues, soul, choral, pop and folk singers.) And I always include an acapella or two on my releases...

So back to Istanbul... sitting on a rooftop, overlooking the Bosporus, moments away from the Blue Mosque, sun setting, and the first call to prayer starts, and then a few moments later, another one from a mosque slightly further away, in a different voice, and then another one, still further away, another voice, and then more, and the echoes overlap and the shadows are lengthening and the sky and the sea and the East and the West and such a feeling of timelessness... and it's kinda like the first time I heard Violin Phase by Steven Reich. (A solo violin playing a repeating motif, with tape recorders playing the same motif, but slighty later, so the music overlaps and phases and new melodies spring into existence.) It's extaordinarily simple and complex, and very beautiful. It's like the aural equivalent of looking into a pond, dropping a rock, and then another one, in a slightly different place, and another, and watching the shapes formed by the overlapping wavelets. The fact that the call to prayer was not in English also allowed it to bypass my logical thought and go straight to my emotional core (maybe one of the reasons I also use chants in many songs.)

A fantastic example of the above is the call to prayer featured on the "Powaqqatsi" soundtrack by Phillip Glass-- it's called "From Egypt" (but listen the "Mr. Suso #1" and "Mr. Suso #2" which are sequenced just before and after it for the full effect).

So that was probably the genesis of the song "Sweetness Likes The Reverb" from the first Shinjuku Zulu CD, "Shinjuku Zulu". It's a haunting vocal (once again by Larissa Gomes) and layers of reverb, each 'verb with different settings, so spatially you'll feel like you are simultaneously in different rooms (a church, a living room, a cavern). The lyrics use the analogy of a reverb, ... oh, well, forget explaining, here's the lyrics:

sweetness
oh love
the reverb

Love
my sweetness likes the verb
the action word, the reaction word
the reverb
coming back at her

love
my sweetnees likes the noun
ecstacy found
the profound happiness
gently rocking her
so gently rocking her

love
my sweetness likes motion
the deep feeling
the revealing emotion
overwhelming her
oh overwhelming her

sweetness

So here are some of my favorite acapellas (or nearly... certainly a bare minimum of instrumentation, like a drone...) or anyway, songs that focus mostly on the voice:

Sheila Chandra, anything from her "A Bone Drone Crone" release, but you must hear "A Sailor's Life" from the Zen Kiss CD. Extra-ordinary.

Imogen Heap, "Hide and Seek" (But everybody knows this one)

Bjork, "Mouth's Cradle". Didn't really like her all-vocal CD "Medulla", but this track from it was great.

Don Mclean, "Babylon" from the "American Pie" release.

There's more of course...

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And here's some Shinjuku Zulu / K.I.A. acapellas... some melodic, others rhythmic:

Sweetness Likes the Reverb
Goa-di by K.I.A., from the "Sonorous Susurrus" CD. Ambient.
Shinjuku Zulu from Shinjuku Zulu. Beatbox drum'n'bass.
Bedouin Engine from the "Adieu Shinjuku Zulu" CD by K.I.A. Rhythmic chants.
My Man, Amen the intro, anyway, from the "Various Chimeras" CD by Shinjuku Zulu.