Beats + Pieces Vol. 58
Some listening, reading and viewing recommendations for the week ahead.
Selected Works is a weekly (usually) newsletter by the Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Aotearoa (Wellington, New Zealand) based freelance music journalist, broadcaster, copywriter and sometimes DJ Martyn Pepperell, aka Yours Truly. Most weeks, Selected Works consists of a recap of what I’ve been doing lately and some of what I’ve been listening to and reading, paired with film photographs I’ve taken + some bonuses. All of that said, sometimes it takes completely different forms.
BEATS:
How about some Samoan language indie-folk/country rock? Keen? LEAO is the project of the Auckland-based singer-songwriter, composer and musician David Feauai-Afaese, as supported by bassist Navakatoa Tekela-Pule, Hawaiian steel guitarist Levi Gemmell and drums/percussionist Larsen Tito-Taylor. ‘TAEAO’ and ‘MEA UMA’ (featuring Samara Autagavaia) are the first songs LEAO has released since the GHOST ROADS album in 2019.
Here’s some words from LEAO: “Weaved within a larger constellation of work that is to set reveal in its moon’s return, both songs carry messages of hope, reflection and hauntological reminisce. Conceptually paying homage to the Samoan choral reference and alaga’upu - whakatauki/proverbs, whilst presenting a ‘niu wave’ of ideas and dialogical styles.”
The New York-based musician Cassandra Jenkins, who recorded my favourite song of 2021, ‘Hard Drive’, returns with her third full-length album, My Light, My Destroyer, released through Dead Oceans. Aside from being a remarkable stylist with an ear for effortlessly ethereal indie-rock and ambient-pop, Jenkins knows her way around a lyric and has the ability to depict a situation or context with an economy of phrase. There are a few lines on here that stopped me in my tracks while I was out walking earlier today (sample: It's a thin line / Over the planet / Just a thin line / Between us and nothingness). I look forward to getting to know this record better.
Eight slabs of dancefloor-ready neo-soul/R'n'B from the northern reaches of the United Kingdom. Based in Manchester, Lovescene is the work of the loved underground producer and song-writer Pops Roberts (aka Private Joy) alongside a coterie of musicians, including Adisa Allen, Alex Hill, Ben Price, Jack Duckham and Ruben Milner-Edwards. If you’ve ever had a taste for soulful British music, be it Britfunk, Street Soul, trip-hop, or the more modern electronic soul variants (a la Cleo Soul, Raye, etc), there will probably be something in here for you.
Formerly best known for his work in the Melbourne tape-scuzz post-post-punk group Wunderlust and crafting cinematic strains of majestic instrumental post-rock with Council of Elders, Gardenworld sees Adam Hipwell, aka Hipwell, leaning into the very depths of atmospheric, soundtrack music slanted ambient. Expect a cycle of unmitigated flights of fantasy, fancy and unmitigated synth-meets-guitar psychedelia. When Hipwell released this album in 2022, it was accompanied by a fascinating essay penned by M. Geddes Gengras. Now, that’s what I call a character reference.
Unsurprisingly, HANISI GARUE - STILL HERE SEASON 2 is the soundtrack to director Litia Tuiburelevu and her extended creative community’s YouTube video series of the same name.
The premise of the show is a series of love letters to the inner-city Pasifika community in Auckland, New Zealand. Since the 1950s, they cultivated a unique central Auckland identity that many youths from the community continue to proudly embrace, both as an act of resistance to ongoing gentrification and as an unapologetic reminder that they and their families are Still Here.
Styled as “a compilation of Moana-Fi (Mo-Fi) recordings pieced together in love by Navākatoa Tekela-Pule and David Feauai-Afaese,” the HANISI GARUE - STILL HERE SEASON 2 soundtrack serves as a remarkable soundtrack to the stories, anecdotes and visuals shared through the show. All of that said, however, listening to the music as a compilation almost made me hear it in a completely different but very welcome way. At the crux, this is urban folk music rendered through a split lens of Pasifika tradition and the sense of experimentation and exploration you’d expect from some of the greatest ocean navigators human society has ever produced.
PIECES:
A recent interview Ghostface Killah did with hip-hop historian and journalist Toure, gave insight into something That Dope Sh*t never knew about him; and made him revisit some of his best works. He also breaks down some of Ghost's lyrics during this time and their relation to "schizophasia", which results in rhyming words.
How to Take Vacations as a Freelancer: Luke Ottenhof contemplates whether freelancers can ever fully unplug. Read here.
Through the Shadowland: The disorientation will be hyper-normalised: Where do all the unwanted AI images go once they’ve been discarded? That’s the question Günseli Yalcinkaya asks herself as she taps away at Midjourney’s text-to-image generator. We don’t know where these images come from or where they’re going—they’re just spat out, always appearing yet never quite there. These neglected entities—distorted, disembodied, deracinated—haunt the image graveyard, doomed to an eternity spent inhabiting hidden corners of the net. Enter the spookhouse at your own risk, she thinks, and presses Enter. Read here.
Get to know Mach-Hommy, rap’s new renaissance man: To celebrate the release of his stellar new album #RICHAXXHAITIAN, the enigmatic Haitian-born artist grants Thomas Hobbs a rare and intimate conversation for Dazed. Read here.
Ley Lines: Palestine: What is the sound of Palestine? For those in Gaza, the hum of Israeli drones permeates a soundscape punctuated by air strikes and the cries of children. Then there’s the sound of songbirds providing respite to embattled families, creatures whose ability to freely fly across man-made borders has been a motif of Palestinian literature for decades. But above all, Palestinian music in its rich history and diversity, has remained a crucial thread knitting together a people in exile. For Bandcamp, James Gui. Read here.
Munir Is Leading the Resurrection of Indonesian Disco: When Indonesian designer, art director, DJ, and producer Harry Septiandry—who works under the alias Munir and Midnight Runners—was just seven years old, his uncle gave him a copy of Positive Force’s We Got the Funk, igniting in him a relentless urge to crate-dig. Ever since, he’s been on a mission to unearth records from the most obscure era of Indonesian popular music, opening doors for curious listeners who may otherwise have had limited access, considering how much of this music was only available decades ago, either on cassette or ludicrously expensive vinyl LPs. For Bandcamp, Farah Azizan. Read here.
New Irish Music: June 2024: Eoin Murray on walking around, listening with the weather, and releases from Landless, Autumns, Spit, FC Music and more. Read here.
Reality shifting: why zoomers are choosing to tap out of material reality: From A24’s I Saw the TV Glow to viral TikTok trends, a new strain of Gen-Z spiritualism encourages users to ctrl + alt + delete reality and enter a fantasy world of their own making. For Dazed, Günseli Yalcinkaya. Read here.
Portrait: Saraid de Silva: The strange life – and views – of the author of the year’s Most Admired Novel in New Zealand. For Newsroom, Anna Rankin. Read here.
Sweet Water: Smooth Jazz Tracks That Are Actually Good: One of the most hated and controversial genres around, Smooth Jazz gets a bad rap for a number of reasons: Kenny G is the genre’s undisputed king and earned a fortune off his easy-listening albums; a large majority of the music is a sort of bland, repetitive, and uninspired digital form of jazz that’s miles away from the fierce electric sound of Miles Davis or the spirituality of John Coltrane; the demographics of listeners leans heavily white; for decades, it was near impossible to avoid on the radio. For In Sheeps Clothing Hi-Fi, Phil Cho. Read here.
RA Pro Newsletter: AI Licensing: Copyright concerns could push more AI music platforms to sign deals with rights holders. For Resident Advisor, Nyshka Chandran. Read here.
BONUS:
I’ve updated the Songs about flowers playlist on Spotify. Thanks to everyone who submitted suggestions.
FIN.