This week on anniversary albums we take a look at synthpop group the Human League's 1981 breakthrough Dare. With this release, the group went from being an all-male avant-garde electronic band to a more pop-oriented synth act.
Yo! I got some more choice cuts from new music released over the past seven days. Just as last week, I was really impressed with the quality of new music that I've been hearing recently. If you liked/hated any of these selections, let me know with a comment. That being said, here are my five favourite new tracks.
case/lang/veirs – “Atomic Number”
Teaser single for the upcoming project by Neko Case from The New Pornographers, country/pop superstar k.d. lang & singer-songwriter Laura Veirs. Although I do particularly like the backing instrumentation of acoustic guitar, light percussion and string sections, what really struck me was the trio of female voices weaving in and out through the piece, each distinct in their own way. Makes for a captivating concoction of pop, country & indie pop aesthetics. 4/5
JMSN – “Cruel Intentions”
Smooooooooth soul. Feels like a classic D’Angelo joint from the Brown Sugar era. Featuring some bluesy guitars, punchy horns & laid-back grooves, it’s the quintessential slow jam. JMSN croons as if he was born to dish out heavy doses of soul. 3.5/5
Kendrick Lamar – “untitled 06”
Okay, so I had a tough decision to make here. Kendrick’s untitled unmastered. has several standout tracks, and I’ve been noticing a lot of hype around 02, 05, 07 and of course 08 a.k.a. “Blue Faces”. But as a massive fan of OutKast, it was 06 that stood out to me the most. It plays like something out of Aquemini (is it a coincidence that Kendrick muses about his star sign – Gemini – on the intro?) with Cee-Lo singing the hook, and production handled by Ali Shaheed Muhammad & Adrian Younge. It’s definitely added a LOT of hype for me in regards to his upcoming performance at Auckland City Limits. 4.5/5
Yeasayer – “Silly Me”
Brooklyn-based psychedelic/electronic quartet Yeasayer aren’t a group that I’m all that familiar with, but after hearing this track ahead of their fourth album Amen & Goodbye due out on April 1, I might have to start diving into their discography. It’s surprisingly catchy considering how odd and heavily layered the instrumentation is, and the vocals really give me vibes of Andy Bell from 1980s synthpop duo Erasure. 3.5/5
Your Old Droog – “Hip-Hop Head”
Had a good laugh while listening to this. Your Old Droog delivers a couple of funny verses about a girl he meets that really loves hip hop, hence the title. There are some fairly clever humorous lines, for example “Fuck with Bun B, then she givin up the Buns, B”. It’s produced by Alchemist, who gives it an old-school style beat with some druggy horns and a steady backbeat. It’s the kind of comedy rap that I don’t hear very often in modern hip hop, akin to what Biz Markie was doing during the 1980s. 3.5/5
Over the past week on the facebook page I've been posting about Synthpop to kick off the first week in our new feature genre of the week. The above image contains the artists and albums of the songs I've been posting, and should really just be seen as a starting point for listening, by no means a definitive list. Here's a list of all the songs I've posted. Any of these would be a great addition to an 80s party playlist, and are guaranteed to inspire twitchy, robotic dancing (or maybe that's just me)
*Neither of these singles were released on an LP so I've instead suggested albums which were released around the same time and contain equally great synthpop songs.
Be sure to also check out the youtube and spotify playlists which contain these songs as well as a few extras.
If you want to request a genre for us to focus on, leave a comment here or on the facebook page. Next week Sam will take the helm, so look forward to that!
After the somewhat lacklustre A Broken Frame release, Depeche Mode returned in 1983 with their
third studio album, Construction Time
Again – but with a crucial difference. Determined to create a unique niche
for the band within the stereotypical, generic “synth” sound, songwriter Martin
Gore added a new synthesiser into the band’s mix, a Synclavier - capable of
recording and playing back samples. Inspired by the German industrial group Einstürzende Neubauten, Gore sought to use similar sounds
and incorporate them into synth pop.
As a result of this, the
album is littered with scrambled collections of random sounds recorded by the
band, particularly the strange, hypnotic track “Pipeline”, (recorded entirely in
a derelict building site) which almost passes as an ambient track, if it weren’t
for the vocals. Throughout that track, and the entire album, various industrial
sound effects are looped and blended together to sit behind the prominent
synths, creating a genuinely unique atmosphere within the album, something that
was sorely lacking in the band’s earlier releases.
The highlight of the album is “Everything Counts”, which pulls
in similar industrial samples from “Pipeline”, but creates a much more upbeat,
pop-friendly vibe. The song also features an incredibly catchy hook: “The grabbing
hands / Grab all they can”, which is almost on par with “All I ever wanted /
All I ever needed” from their later track “Enjoy the Silence”. This track hints
at the sort of synth-based melodies that would become more prominent in later
releases, particularly Violator. But
still, “Everything Counts” is 80s synth pop through and through, but it’s a
hell of a lot more of a refined, tighter track than most of what featured on Speak & Spell and A Broken Frame.
The album’s second side, though not particularly as
memorable as its first, does demonstrate more and more effective usage of the
Synclavier by the band. Various clanging noises, whistles and scrapes are
scattered throughout the B side, the more notable examples being “Two Minute
Warning”, “Shame”, and “Told You So” – this track in particular features what
sounds like an echoed anvil banging against something, and it’s my favourite
industrial sample on the album. CLANG!
CLONG! CLANG! It’s a curiously infectious sound.
So, arguably Depeche Mode had not quite created their niche
at this point, but the Synclavier is a welcome (and much needed) addition to
the band’s repertoire at this point in their career. It undoubtedly gives the
album substance and would help shape their later work. Definitely an important
record for the band, and I daresay that devout Depeche Mode fans would point at
Construction Time Again and say that
this is where it really started. I’d
probably be inclined to agree.
