October 29th, 2007 12:52pm
You Can Rest Your Body
Velella Velella “Flight Cub” – Velella Velella are the musical spawn of Warp, Mo Wax, and Quannum; a live funk band who arrive at the genre via a generation of crate-digging DJs and electronic musicians sampling, interpolating, and mimicking the grooves of old records. Rather than freak out about authenticity, the band carries on with the new aesthetic, and rightfully so — the reason any of us ever cared about the likes of DJ Shadow, Squarepusher, Luke Vibert et al in the first place was that there was a particular sound to those records that was fundamentally different from the artist’s source material. Whereas it seems that most people view late 90s downbeat electronica as an aesthetic cul de sac or a form of musical necromancy, Velella Velella seem intent on using the previous generation’s manipulation and recontextualization of classic funk recordings as a blueprint for a new sort of music that never had to be specific to artists dependent on laptops, samplers, and turntables.
Most of the elements in the arrangement of “Flight Cub” seem to be floating around, and though the bass line seems to be the track’s center of gravity, even that part feels as though it is hovering just above the ground. Despite its calm, loose feeling, the song is rather tightly composed, with its duet vocals, smooth melodies, and relaxing textures flowing up and through the piece with the subtlety and grace of an expertly performed magic trick.(Click here for the official Velella Velella site.)
Elsewhere: Erik Bryan offers some erroneous biographical info about Sissy Wish on the Morning News:
Rocketing to stardom in the mid-’50s by meat magnate, famed producer, and then-husband Leland “Porks” McLaughlin, Sissy Wish (born Sally Hope) was able to hide her socially unsettling condition (she was born without a face) from all but her closest friends and family until an ill-advised performance on The Steve Allen Show in 1959 where she was set to perform her hit song, “Beauties Never Die,” but could not due to an ensuing riot after Allen himself declared her the “worst abomination a vengeful God could muster.” She proves her song’s rule by celebrating her 70th birthday this year.
Also: In light of discovering the epidemiological term “John Henryism,” Jack Feerick wonders: What other previously unidentified conditions might be found within the bars of our folk and pop songs?
No Responses.