Two days of listening to Bon Iver (the new album) by Justin Vernon’s synonymous band. Part of me admires this guy for evolving, for moving on and not capitalising on what he achieved with ‘For Emma, Forever Ago’ three years ago. Yet another part of me is sad; all that made “For Emma” the jewel it is, is all but gone from this album: the emotion, the pain, the pure, unadulterated sound and simplicity of Vernon’s voice + his acoustic guitar. Without arrangements, without electronics and fx^*, without guest musicians or overengineered sonic landscapes. That’s where ‘Bon Iver’ is different to its predecessor and so much like other contemporary indie/folk albums: there may be some glimpses, sporadic moments of brilliance that reminded me why I liked the band in the first place, but as a whole it’s an average album. But then again, it is clear to me that ‘For Emma’ was the exception, not only because of how it was produced (the product of a three month seclusion at a cabin in northwestern Wisconsin), but also because of the ripple it created exactly because it was so authentic yet so different to everything else that made it stand out. In that respect ‘Bon Iver’ is nowhere near ‘For Emma’ territory, but still an album that showcases Vernon’s songwriting ability and unique voice.

* Ok, there is some autotune in use in For Emma..But it really doesn’t detract from the statement above.

It’s nine years since Brett Garsed’s last solo album, Big Sky. And while his output has more or less declined in volume this past decade, his latest album, Dark Matter is a great example of contemporary Rock Fusion, along the lines of Big Sky as well as many of his numerous appearances and collaborations.

Although I only got the album a few hours ago, I have found it to be particularly interesting in that it literally ‘fuses’ (pun intended!) several familiar — at least to me — related styles: Vintage Satch, Liquid Tension Experiment, touches of Holdsworth, Fripp, Metheny and Shawn Lane.

The tracks are more upbeat and energetic than those found in Big Sky; jazzier at times, heavier in others, with a distinct bent on fusion. I particularly enjoyed Avoid the Void, Dark Matter and Enigma, although I cannot say that any of the other tracks were disappointing.

Dark Matter may be an interesting album, yet it is somewhat typical of the genre, which has been largely stagnant for years. It may lack the exceptional feel one finds at times in Big Sky — there are no tracks like Trinity or Drowning, for example — but includes many tracks with more uplifting, polished and — I might argue — technical deliveries of interesting compositions and improvisations that lean heavily on Garsed’s signature technique and sound.

For those enjoying rock fusion, progressive rock and virtuoso guitar instrumentals this is definitely an album worth getting and listening to. Those more familiar with Garsed’s competence and compositional skills (and more demanding of their music) may have expected a bit more.

If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes I would’ve never have believed this came from a human messing with a pad. What you can’t see from this video is the volume pedal that Haynes typically uses, which takes dynamics to another level, nevertheless this is insanely good.

The Books are back! After four — long — years The Books return with The Way Out. An album upon which they’ve worked for a year and a half, it is a gradual evolution of their fantastic work of the early to mid 2000s. Familiar, yet daring in parts, The Way Out felt like ‘more of the same’ at times, with some notable exceptions (e.g. ‘I Didn’t Know That’). The ‘experiment’ that was Books keeps going; The Way Out may be interesting, true to The Books heritage, and evolved, but somehow the end-result is not as immediately attractive as their previous works.

For some unknown reason someone [or a group of people] have been hitting Magnatune hard with credit card fraud, to the point where the company was dropped by their payment processor.

This is a great example of how a good company [and one that helps artists worldwide] gets harassed by ‘criminals’ only to find itself punished by the very same people whose inadequate systems are responsible for the mess in the first place: Visa. John Buckman reports that Magnatune saw ⅓ of its subscriber base disappear due to this change [Magnatune is now depending on PayPal for its credit card transactions and the fact that each payment goes via another entity makes it slightly harder to charge the recurring fees subscriptions bring, without asking the users to register with PayPal etc].

As regular readers may have noticed, I am a great fan of Magnatune; both ethically and artistically I find their effort and business commendable and I have, over the years, found several excellent albums from that company. I hope that things get better for them soon. As a sidenote, I really wonder why someone would hit Magnatune in this manner. Clearly it’s not aimed at getting hold of the music, given that you can get the tracks for free anyway…

The Silicon Alley Insider raises an important question, with regard to Radiohead’s testimony against RIAA in a case against a college student: Would Radiohead be able to take that stance if they hadn’t sold millions, “without the protection and promotion of an RIAA that Radiohead now blithely dismisses”?

But while arguing RIAA’s importance with regard to the vast majority of musicians is mildly amusing in its fallacy, the article doesn’t stop there:

We love Radiohead, but we’re not sure if the band realizes they’re superstars, and the normal rules don’t apply to them anymore. The band’s “pay what you want” idea for the In Rainbows album may have been successful, but for every one Radiohead there’s ten thousand would-be rock stars selling CDs out of the trunks of their car (or MP3s on some little-visited web site) and starving.

So, one Radiohead per ten thousand would-be rock stars. Apparently the authors ignore that this is exactly the status quo that the RIAA nurtured in decades past, exactly what the internet, mp3, file sharing and indeed Radiohead’s testimony help change: total control over music promotion, repertoire selection, bias in favour of genres/artists by a few multinational corporations aimed at nothing more than profit maximisation. Put another way: A small minority of artists getting all the exposure [and some of them going bankrupt despite the megacorps' multi-million contracts], while millions more being unable to promote their music, make money, live off it. Those same approaches that have led to a just few hundred artists getting millions and the rest starving. If anything, testifying against the RIAA, especially if you’ve attained superstar status, goes against that. Lastly, Radiohead — whether you like or dislike their music — have proven their artistic integrity as well as their popularity time and again, most certainly without RIAAs help. There’s no doubt that the interests of musicians around the world should be protected; RIAA never did that and most probably never will.