|
|
 |
|
Categories:
"Pink Orange Red" Worth The Price Alone -- I'll be brief - The Cocteau Twins have made some of the most heavenly, lush, etheral, otherworldly music I've ever heard. The atmospheres they create are so palpable you can almost step into them. For years, my personal favorite CT song was "Pink Orange Red," originally on the TINY DYNAMINE ep. Alas, I became permanently seperated from my old vinyl collection from the 80s (long story) and couldn't get this song for ages. So when STARS AND TOPSOIL came out and I saw "Pink Orange Red" on it, I snatched it up in a heartbeat. I would agree that this is not a "best-of" collection, but nearly every song here is fantastic. Actually, it does include my least favorite CT song "Sugar Hiccup," but I'm the only one that seems to be mildly annoyed with this track so no matter. Undenyably, STARS does include some of CT's best music, like "Aikea-Guinea." This is a fine place to start for newbes although just about anywhere will work since most of their music is wonderful. My first CT was THE PINK OPAQUE which actually is somewhat of a "best of" collection. Maybe the best album to pick up first would be TREASURE or their debut GARLANDS which is a bit heavier, darker and gothic compared to some of their later works which focus more on beauty. Some of the last few albums they released like HEAVEN OR LAS VEGAS are a bit more slick and digestable, but still great. The 44Th Greatest Scottish Band Of All Time... -- ...according to List Magazine, that is. This collection proves that the Cocteau Twins should rank somewhat higher, say, 26th, right behind Nazareth. Seriously, though, no matter how often I listen to it, I can't figure out how the band came up with their song structures, their arrangements, their sound. Multilayered, ethereal, dreamy--their music is unlike anything that came before it to my knowledge. I really have no idea who their influences might have been. Perhaps this quality is why their work has aged so well. Or maybe because Elizabeth Fraser is a brilliant vocal artist, unlike any other in pop. For those who already love the Cocteau Twins, this CD may be interesting for the remastered versions. The liner notes are weak, though. For those unfamiliar with the band, this is a fine place to start. Escape To A Beautiful Place -- I cant say anything bad about Elizabeth Fraser. Her voice makes me melt and she takes me where I want to go.The guitarists Will and Robin work in perfect harmony with liz providing a perfect sureal soundscape. Pure bliss. Great Songs, Inferior Set List -- Ask any Cocteau Twin to choose 18 songs for a compilation, and you're likely to get a different response each time. Still, Stars and Topsoil leaves out too many first-rate songs to be considered truly representative collection. Let's start with track one. Why was Blind Dumb Deaf chosen to represent the Garlands album, and not Wax and Wane? Scanning though the rest of the list, I picked up on some glaring omissions, including From the Flagstones, Crushed, and Oomingmak. Furthermore, a proper collection would have encompassed the whole of their catalogue, not just up to 1990. Bluebeard, anyone? Sorry to say it, but I think this compilation, not being a true "best-of", is a waste of money for all but those completely unfamiliar with the Twins' music. The Future Belongs To Ct -- One hundred, two hundred years from now (if the human race lasts that long!) the CTs will be seen as one of the most influential music groups of this era. Musicologists will do for CT what they did for JS Bach, i.e., pull them out of relative obscurity to a dominant positiong in humanity's all-time music catalog. At his death somebody had ranked Bach as 100th in just Germany alone(!!!); but the sheer power of his music couldn't be supressed. Same with the CTs. Time will tell, but I'm fairly certain I'm right. In addition I'd say the CTs use the electric guitar in its most original, native, intended form. Similar users might be (at times) Neil Young, TD's Edgar Froese, and Michael Brook. Others, no matter how fleet of finger, are transcribers, appropriators of other instruments and styles. Not that there aren't brilliant musicians playing e-guitar, but the vast majority simply transcribe acoustic guitar...which results in the loud, bent, distorted acoustic guitar music we've come to love so much. The CT guitars (Guthrie mainly) rarely if ever borrow, transcribe, approriate, which is one of the freshest ingredients to the CT sound. As far as their originality is concerned, it borders on otherworldly. I run a little Gedanken-experiment on "rock genre" music: If you are familiar with Led Zepplin's "Battle of Evermore," there is a section towards the end where Plant goes off on a near psychotic screeching tangent. It's wonderful, breathtaking, a stroke of genius, etc. etc., but mainly totally out of left field. It's this song's extreme tangent-izing that is so much an Eno-esque "oblique strategy" that I use it as a measuring stick for all manner of genius oblique strategizing. I'm saying the CTs have this Battle of Evermore oblique tangent thing in spades! (I don't mention Eno because the musicologists already know about him!) Somehow the CTs pull out of the aether-void some of the most subtle and sublime tangents there have ever been. In classical music you hear this in some of the more modern French organ composers (Alain, Durufle, etc.) And of course, you can jump at any time into the big discussion of why humans such as the CTs create such music and why our affinity thereto. No doubt this is a mental phenomonon brain scientists will not wrest away from the mysticists for a long time to come. Binding : Music Download Genre : pop-music Release Date : 2000-10-16 Running Time : 0 seconds See also:
| ||
|
