Music in January 2024
So I begin another year musing on whatever music I happen to stumble across (or what is fed me by the great Algorithm – so named for the ninth century Persian mathematician Al-Khwārizmī). As always, I make no promises and follow no rules.
Strong Hand is a typical cool drink from CHVRCHES, a band I like to start work to in the mornings. Crisp synthesizers crash like waves against a sonic breakwater. Sleigh Bells have a warmer sound, but no less energetic – End of the Line has an overcranked, rushed clicking running throughout, like a rotary sprinkler on speed. But if the metronome is fast, the melody feels slow in contrast, which creates a lovely sense that there are two aspects of the music, one part pulling forward, the other lolling behind.
Chatmonchy’s joyfully cymbal-crashing 恋愛スピリッツ (Love Spirits) feels like someone shouting as the only release valve for a geyser of heartfelt affection. Knees Deep is another minor theme in a major key from The Beths, wryly melancholy as ever. They seem to shrug and say “oh well” to life’s missed opportunities – which we often have to do to move on.
I’ve never watched Fullmetal Alchemist, but Akira Senju’s score rises like a butterfly caught in a sunny updraft; Masaru Yokoyama’s work, in contrast, is cool to the touch and smooth as blue glass.
I’m almost embarrassed to put Sabaton on here, because they aren’t really that good musically, and if you listen to more than one of their songs you begin to realize that they tend to constantly repeat the same lines, as if they can’t think of anything else to say. But sometimes I want a rousing metal anthem, and if I’ve got to pick one of their oeuvre, The Last Battle is the most exciting – a song about a real action that took place in the final week of World War II in Europe at Castle Itter, which was being used by the Nazis to hold political prisoners, including two former French Prime Ministers and Charles De Gaulle’s sister. With Berlin fallen, Hitler dead, and the German lines in full collapse, the priorities of many in the German army swiftly shifted to surrendering to the Americans without getting killed before the end of the war. However, there were SS units in the region that were on a suicidal rampage toward some sort of perverse last stand. In the midst of this, the prison guards fled and the prisoners took control of the castle. With a detachment of the SS closing in on the castle, the prisoners sent messengers for help. One reached an approaching American column, and the other reached a small German unit which had defected and joined the local resistance to protect surrendering civilians from the SS. Together, the American army, the German Wehrmacht, and the political prisoners successfully defended the castle from the Waffen-SS in one of the strangest moments of a very strange war.
Moving along, The Cranberries’ The Rebels begins with a low, wistful remembrance, only to leap into a full-throated anthem of simple nostalgia. Next are two pieces from Sufjan Stevens’ 2015 album Carrie & Lowell, named for the artist’s mother and stepfather. Both pieces have an urgent and beautiful sting to them.
But nothing here is as emotional as Vladimir Martynov’s The Beatitudes – a piece of music which brings peace to all who hear it. This sort of peace can only be achieved by facing our sorrow and breathing slowly through it, and the rise and fall of the strings carry the listener through into a sunlit glade.
Next are two songs from Middle Kids’ album Today We’re The Greatest – the first with a riptide riff that’s sunk its claws in me, the second a sort of playful hopscotch laugh-cry for help. Following are three songs from The Killers’ Imploding the Mirage (I am a late Killers defender). I’ve always felt The Killers are one of the most shamelessly sincere and unpretentious bands, and their sound echoes with the vastness of the southwest in a way that makes me nostalgic for college in Arizona.
Dexys Midnight Runners are mostly remembered now for Come On Eileen, but their other music is also excellent, with the same sort of piercing, upbeat sound that I can’t quite pin down in words. And Sylvan Esso’s Coffee is a dark-roast carousel; I get on it, and am borne off into the dark.
