Music was my first love
And it will be my last.
Music of the future
And music of the past.
Be warned this is a long post. Music is a subject that I am very passionate about, and it took several weeks (on and off) to write it. Apologies for the great length, feel free to skip to the conclusion at the end.
And so commences my Magnum Opus:
Musical much?
It’s fair to say that when it comes to musical ability; i.e. the ability to play an instrument or sing a note, I am very much lacking in that area. Ironic really, as I studied music as a subject for five years at school at “O Level” (I passed with a “B”) and was part of the school choir for a number of those years. It’s also fair to say that I was somewhat sub-par at that, too. I ended up “kind of” being able to read sheet music (after a fashion) and to create chords from notes, but I wasn’t able to do anything other than the simplest notes and then not at all well.
It’s not for the want of trying. I played both a bass and a tenor drum in a marching band for a few years in my youth, but that basically involved just keeping the beat in time for the rest of the band. It was easy enough for me, as although I can’t play anything significant (or anything other than a drum), I can keep time.
In my 30’s I thought (for some inexplicable reason) that I’d buy myself a small(ish) electronic piano and a “teach yourself to play piano” book. Needless to say, that didn’t end well and the keyboard ended up “having a terminal accident”.
I haven’t revisited or attempted to play anything since. A lesson learnt there, I think. I’ve now accepted the fact that I have no discernible musical talent whatsoever.
And I’m good with that.
The dulcet sounds of sweet music!
But I do like listening to music, for sure! In fact, listening to music has been a favourite pastime of mine for many, many years.
Elsewhere on this site, I make reference to my love of electronic music (Jean-Michel Jarre, BBC Radiophonic Workshop), pop & rock music (Sparks, Todd Rundgren) and ska/reggae/electropop/ dream pop (Dubstar). But I listen a much wider scope of music than that. These are amongst my favourite artists, and although they each have glorious and voluminous bodies of work, it’s only scratching the surface of what I actually listen to.
Back in the olden days…
My parents used to listen to a reasonable amount of music (there was nothing else to do at the time – three TV channels, radio and no internet or DVD’s etc.). My Mother liked operas and musicals (a lot of Gilbert & Sullivan and Richard Harris “talk-singing”). My Father liked the sort of easy-listening, middle-of-the-road type of music from the 1940’s through to the 90’s and a weird mix of classical and marching music. The Swingle Singers, The Watney Silver Band and The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra (conducted by Willi Boskovsky) to name but a few (I have the LP’s to prove it!).
I got to experience a variety of live music ranging from Jerry Allen (and his trio) to Edmundo Ros (and his orchestra) to The Cotswold Savoyards performing various Gilbert & Sullivan operas. I got to listen to some classical music, Widor (Symphony for organ No.5), Holst (The Planets Suite), Tchaikovsky (1812 Overture) famous tracks mostly, that had been bought by my Father on both mono and (the new-fangled) stereo LP’s. Added to which were plenty of tracks from Horst Jankowsky, Fingle’s cave and Trumpet A Gogo.
My sister used to play The Monkees incessantly throughout my youth (whilst she lived at home, anyway). I didn’t dislike them, but I would never listen to them on purpose. That being said, I know the words to almost all of their hits (thanks to my sister!).
My Father also liked organ music quite a lot. All types from Jerry Allen’s Lowry to Sidney Torch, Reginald Dixon and Nigel Ogden on the theatre Wurlitzers. He almost never missed an episode of The Organist Entertains on BBC Radio 2 (a 30 minute programme that would consist of organ music played on a variety of organs, from church to electric) and would buy records with (pipe) organ recitals performed by various organists and easy-listening LP’s of covers played on a Hammond or Lowrey organ.
I experienced my teenage years throughout the 1970’s and 1980’s (I relate the beginnings of my musical journey in the Pierre Schaeffer post) and it was then that I discovered Jean-Michel Jarre. I was employed at the time, so I could afford to buy albums (on cassettes and records) and then there was the radio to listen to. In 1978, the Top 40 UK singles were played on BBC Radio 1 on Sunday evenings, giving me the opportunity to listen to what was in the charts. Top of the Pops was also a good source of music, broadcast on Thursdays. So between them, you could get a good cross section of what music was around at the time.
At college, most of my college friends were into Heavy Metal, or Heavy Rock (including me). Those genres have remained solid favourites of mine. Bands like Status Quo, Motörhead, AC/DC, Black Sabbath and Girlschool featured heavily in my college years – and still do to this day.
My name is Metal, Heavy Metal
I felt obliged to slip a paragraph in about Metal music, in particular Heavy Metal. As previously mentioned, in my teens and early twenties, I used to listen to a lot of Heavy Metal music. Bands like Motörhead, Girlschool (I used to work with the bass player, Gil), Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Judas Priest and Van Halen to name but a few of the more mainstream Metal bands around at the time.
During the 1980’s however, Heavy Metal as I used to know it during the 1970’s started to split off into several subgenres. I blame Bon Jovi and Mötley Crüe (and of course Kiss) for introducing what was to become known as “Glam Metal” into the world! Not to say that was in any way bad, but I’m of the opinion that they were the catalyst that sparked a big increase in various subgenres of Metal. Today, there are (according to Wikipedia, anyway) an incredible 61 subgenres of Heavy Metal around.
I’ll admit I haven’t heard of probably 60% of the current 61 genres, but more than happy to give some of those a list. With the notable exception of Thrash and Death Metal. Not a fan of those genres (or similar types) at all. Symphonic Metal sounds interesting though…..
Nowadays…
Nowadays is almost 50 years later after my college years. I’m of the opinion that once you like a genre of music, I don’t think you ever get to dislike it. I still love the same music as I listened to at college and still a massive fan of Jean-Michel Jarre.
There are people in this world that will only like or listen to one genre of music (and I have known people like that!). That’s most definitely not me! I’ve picked up many different genres and artists along the way. I’m always willing to give someone I haven’t heard of a listen. Let’s face it, music is so accessible for free today that it’s easy to find many new artists and genres using streaming services like Spotify and YouTube and then invest in them if you like what you hear.
(I’m a big fan of buying artist’s music. You don’t work for free, why should they?)
For example, the French singer Jain. I’ve become a fan of hers because I’d heard one of her tracks in a TV series I was watching. I didn’t know it was her at the time, but I knew I liked the music. Such is the power of the internet that it was easy to discover who sang it and what it’s called. And things snowballed from there. It doesn’t work all the time, but it’s certainly worked for me. Continuing with the French theme, that was how I discovered the French bands La Femme and Air. Big fans of those, aussi.
Oddly enough, I’ve found that recommendations from other people don’t usually work for me. I’m willing to give an artist a listen if they’ve been recommended, but more often that not the artist will not be to my taste and I’ll not bother in future (somebody recommended Slipknot to me, as I liked Metal. I’m not a fan.).
I am a sucker for compilations, however. Sometimes, it’s nice to hear different performers doing their thing, rather than a single performer’s album. It’s always good to mix things up a bit with a variety of songs from an era, a genre or a season. I’m sure that’s why the “Now That’s What I Call Music, Volume xx” albums were popular (do they still make those?): the variety of tracks on one album.
A sucker for covers too!
Somebody famous performs a song. Somebody not all that famous comes along and covers it. Then somebody else comes along and covers it – badly! I love a cover version of a song. It’s great when it’s done well, it’s even greater when it’s done badly!
This love of bad cover songs stems from one of the first LP records I ever bought with my own money: Cy Payne & His Orchestra – Children’s TV Themes. It was 1972, I was 10 years old and I think it cost me about 1 GBP. I don’t recall how I became aware of it (an advert on TV, or in a magazine, perhaps), but I just knew I had to have it because the Doctor Who and UFO themes were on there. I just had to own and be able to listen to those theme tunes whenever I wanted to. My most vivid recollection of the day that I brought it home (of course, I had to play it right away!) was the disappointment and dismay that I felt when I heard the tracks. “Why, these don’t sound anything like the original!” I thought to myself. Of course I had to hide my dismay. I’d made such a fuss about getting the album, I couldn’t be seen to be disappointed. From that day, I became aware of what a cover of a song was (and how bad it could be).
That was my very first experience of a cover (and a bad cover). Listening to those tracks now (yes, I still have the original LP), they don’t sound too bad, I’ve certainly heard worse over the years. It did trigger something in me that’s made me become attracted to a cover song (specifically a bad one). I now look out for covers and have invested in a few albums full of them over the years. For example, I have not one, but four albums covering “synthesizer greats” – popular tunes from people like Jean-Michel Jarre and Vangelis, all played (quite badly) on synthesizers. It is truly wonderful stuff.
Of course there are plenty of good cover versions of songs and there are plenty of “different” covers of songs (covers that take the original song genre, throw it away and redo it in a completely different style). Señor Coconut springs to mind as an example of that. Sade’s “Smooth Operator” as a samba. Interesting.
I do love a pipe organ
Oh I do. I love the sound of them and I love the engineering aspect that goes into making them work. This probably comes from my childhood, having listen to my Fathers records (LP’s) of pipe organ music, featuring the classic organ pieces, such as Widor, Bach and Handel.
Since I started a career in engineering however, my interest in pipe organs (usually church organs) increased. I find the engineering aspect of pipe organs absolutely fascinating. Just getting the movement of the organist’s fingers pressing the keys translated into a 32 foot pipe having wind blown through it to make a note is incredible. Considering they were invented in the 3rd Century BC, it’s a remarkable feat of engineering that they ever made them in the first place. And it’s that engineering over the years the pipe organ has developed that fascinates me, along with the pleasing sound of a nice big pipe organ filling an entire cavernous room. Oh the acoustics!
Prior to the world being a bit more pandemic-y than it is now, whenever on holiday (abroad or here), one of the things I’d like to do is seek out the nearest church and go and have a look at their pipe organ. Sometimes I was lucky enough to be able to hear it in action, but more often than not a good old gaze at the console and the (sometimes false) pipe frontages was all that I could get. Over the years, I’ve seen (and heard) some fabulous pipe organs: Cologne, Notre Damme (before the fire), Quebec, Vancouver, Tromso, Oslo, Gloucester, St. Pauls (London), Canterbury, St Petersburg to name-drop just a few places.
Fortunately, there’s YouTube
There are of course, plenty of videos on YouTube that feature organ music and quite a few that feature pipe organ music. I haven’t stumbled across too many that featured a behind-the-scenes look at a church pipe organ, however. There was one such channel that I followed, a Scottish chap who had lived in Germany for a number of years and was an organist and choir leader at the local church where he lived. He would travel around his local area to neighbouring churches and look at their pipe organs. He would give plenty of in-depth explanations of how the organs worked, how the stops worked and would end his videos with an improv piece of his own. I followed his channel for quite a while, until the Covid lockdown meant that he couldn’t travel to his own church, let alone anyone else’s! His channel continues, however he doesn’t go out and about any longer. He gives organ recitals on his home Hauptwerk installation instead. (They’re excellent, however that wasn’t why I followed his channel!)
Then Anna Lapwood happened. If you haven’t heard of her, she is one of the resident organists at The Royal Albert Hall. She first garnered fame on TikTok by videoing her night-time practise sessions on the RAH pipe organ (yes I’ve seen that “in the flesh”, but haven’t heard it) and then posting them to TikTok (and then YouTube). The YouTube algorithm – in a fit of either prescience or randomness – recommended her channel to me very early on in her “Social Media” career: I’ve since followed her (and her career) for well over a year now. For me, it’s just the right amount of behind-the-scenes and performance, with a lot of fun thrown in. She travels to different pipe organs around the world and gives her recitals – all of which she’ll film and upload.
It all started with Interstellar
Interstellar is, without any doubt, one of my favourite films. The soundtrack to it is phenomenal. Hans Zimmer absolutely excelled himself there (like he normally does) and for me, this soundtrack rates amongst my favourites (up with Vangelis, Mark Mothersbaugh, David Arnold, Sebastian Bohn and Maurice Jarre soundtracks). The Interstellar soundtrack is a truly wonderful piece of work, and one which does not shy away from the pipe organ! Hence the many interpretations of the Interstellar themes that have sprung up on YouTube. By far the best versions I’ve heard of these are Anna Lapwood (who kicked this all off for me) and Laura Scissorhands, both on YouTube and TikTok. (Other interpretations are of course available).
OSTs
Just a note about OSTs (Original Sound Tracks): these are albums that contain music that has been used for a film. These have been around for ages, but they are a fairly recent thing for me; it’s only been since Interstellar that I’ve bothered with them (other than Doctor Who, that is).
OSTs seem to generally fall into four groups:
- All original music composed by the contracted composer.
- Some original music (composed by the contracted composer) along with with commercially available music (by a well-known or mainstream artist).
- Commercially available music by a well-known or mainstream artist.
- Commercially available music, covered by a lesser-known artist.
I can’t see the point in buying an OST album that just has commercially available music by a well-known artist, as more than likely I’ll already have the tracks (or if not, they’ll be easily available if I want them). Where an OST scores (no pun intended) is if it’s original specifically composed music, or has commercially available music that wouldn’t normally be a “mainstream” version, or it’s been covered by an artist or band.
Examples of that would be the OST for the film Tetris which has both original music by Lorne Balfe and some commercially available tracks (such as Heart of Glass)… but a cover… and in Russian. An example of a all original music would be Brian & Charles, completely scored by Daniel Pemberton. (And many, many others.)
What draws me to a band (or an artist)?
It boils down to the melody, or tune. On the first few listens of something new, I won’t pay too much attention to the lyrics (although I’ve got much better nowadays of listening to them a lot earlier). Back in my much maligned youth, I only focussed on the melody, not caring what messages were being sung. For example (and this is true) it took me years to actually realise what Holly Johnson was singing about in Relax. coughs
If it doesn’t grate on my untrained earholes, then it’s good enough for me. It’s probably why I like more than a few non-English speaking bands and performers. I love me some Rammstein, but unless I look it up, I have no clue what Till Lindeman is singing about. (Dicke Titten was kind of a giveaway though to be fair!) Bands like Air and La Femme (whom I absolutely love) do on the odd occasion sing in English, but not often. La Femme; it’s about the weird prog-rock style. Air; it’s about the synths. What they all have in common however, is a pleasing melody.
And just to contradict that; with some bands or performers it’s all about the lyrics! Sparks, Taylor Swift and Dubstar are good examples of that. Every Sparks song is a story – sometimes a strange one – but a a story nonetheless. Taylor Swift (yes, I am a fan of hers too) has basically chronicled the ups and downs of her entire life through her music. Some very good songs have been borne from her sometimes angst-ridden journey through life.
Conclusion
I think that’s enough waffling now (I could go on for ever talking about music). The conclusion is that I listen to a lot of different genres of music. Sometimes mood-based (e.g. Rammstein\metal\punk for the times when I have to energetic!) sometimes era-based (70’s, 80’s 90’s etc.) and sometimes random background music for when I’m servicing cars/bikes or doing some crapentry e.g. a Jean-Michel Jarre album.
Eight points to sum it up:
- Can’t play a note (on anything but a single-note instrument like a drum).
- Can’t read music.
- I like a lot of different musical genres. A lot.
- Happy to try new music.
- Happy to listen to lyrics, but they have to be interesting/quirky/amusing otherwise they’ll get focussed out.
- I’m a tunes kind of guy whatever the language.
- I love a pipe organ.
- I must strive to improve my knowledge of Classical Music.
OK, must dash, I’ve got stuff to listen to!