Since discovering Æon Rings while searching for cover versions of "But Not Tonight" I've been very pleasantly surprised with what I've found. They have one 5-song EP available on Amazon, and they have some tracks that are on Soundcloud that you can download, although it appears that they were using the band name of Night Vision at the time. On Youtube, the selection is often a bit confused; I discovered today's selection billed as a track by Æon Rings but on their soundcloud page, it's credited to the earlier band name. The other song "Keep Moving" is also billed as such.
Æon Rings is called a dark wave band in many reviews, but these songs certainly are more "bright and polite" synthpop. Maybe that's the reason for the two band names; they're meant to be different in style? Either way, it's the same two guys, and the tracks are great. You can download all five of the tracks directly from Night Vision's soundcloud, and I especially recommend "Keep Moving" and "Don't Wait." Heck; "Don't Wait" is my new favorite (for the moment) favorite song; although "Time to Run" from the Æon Rings branded Floods EP is also a contender.
I can't figure out where they've released "But Not Tonight" anywhere; I've only ever seen it as that youtube video I linked to last post.
EDIT: Found it: http://synthrecords.bandcamp.com/album/enjoy-the-covers
Apparently you can get that for free too. I'm looking into the rest of the collection as we speak. Sadly, nothing seems to be nearly as good as "But Not Tonight" so far.
Friday, March 18, 2016
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
But Not Tonight by Æon Rings
The year is 1998 or 1999. America's ill-advised flirtation with a rejection of the pop music model that had served it well for decades via the grunge, slacker-rock "Seattle sound" was winding down, but a few years of it had ruined the popular music scene. Having found my preferred style of music was nearly stamped out, I had wandered into a few somewhat similar scenes; I focused on bulking up my back-catalog collection of 80s New Wave synthpop artists, including some that were more European and hadn't been widely disseminated in America, like Ultravox and Visage, for example. I spent a bit of time exploring Eurodance outfits like C&C Music Factory and The Real McCoy, although I ultimately found that particular genre somewhat shallow and unsatisfying compared to what I really wanted more of. I wandered a bit into electronic industrial—I'd already discovered Front 242 earlier, and a few others, but I wandered more into Frontline Assembly, and Sister Machine Gun, and Foetus and other more esoteric (and often considerably harder) outfits. This was a decent time for that, actually, as Nine Inch Nails was making electronic industrial somewhat mainstream with Pretty Hate Machine, but I still didn't prefer this to synthpop.
Luckily for me, around that time I discovered A Different Drum, an indie label, store and email list-serve that catered to the underground market for synthpop very much like the kind that I had grown up with. In the years since, even indie labels for music have become superfluous, where bands can record in a bedroom instead of a professional recording studio, and can self-release their own music and sell it via Kickstarter or even just stick it up on Amazon and iTunes. This has led to a major wealth of selection and options, but in 1998 and 1999 the breadth of the genre was more limited. I recall very specifically asking on the list-serve if anyone had any theories as to why there weren't more female vocalist synthpop acts—and someone responded somewhat flippantly because female singers don't sound enough like David Gahan.
It's impossible, even now, for the genre to step out of the enormous shadow of Depeche Mode. Even for me, I evaluate synthpop by how good it sounds compared to the "golden years" of DM—by which I mean the early albums of the classic four-man line-up: Some Great Reward, Black Celebration, Music for the Masses, and although I differ from most in starting to see the decline in this one, Violator. By the end of that run, Depeche Mode wasn't even making synthpop anymore at all, and more recently, it's a stretch to even call it electronic music that they produce, but they did, at one point in the mid and late 80s, quite literally define the genre to such a degree that vocalists had to attempt to sound like David Gahan to be taken seriously. That was a semi-flippant response, but only semi-flippant, after all. The album of that period that seems to have garnered the most serious critical acclaim over the years is Black Celebration. I was quite surprised to learn, many years after I had been listening to it over and over and over again as a teenager and even beyond, that the ultimate track, the crowning achievement, the catharsis at the end of the symphony of despair, "But Not Tonight" was never actually intended to be released on the album at all, and was only done so for the American release at the American label's insistence, and against the wishes of the band itself. The song was picked to accompany the movie soundtrack of a rather obscure comedy Modern Girls, and because the label thought that that meant it might be a hit, they prioritized including it. The band itself was annoyed with the song, which they wrote and recorded in very little time, and considered it a throwaway pop song, not worthy of serious consideration (the non-album song that they liked much better, but which didn't really fit with the tone of Black Celebration as it evolved, was "Shake the Disease.") Because the band never really cared for the song, getting remixes of it was challenging. I bought an import single of "Stripped" from Germany because it included a remix as a b-side, although it was a simple extended version that added very little other than length to the song, by Robert Margouleff. In the years since, I've not found anything else, even in the world of bootleg mixes.
That said, the song—in spite of the band's opinion of it—is clearly a classic and popular one. What I've discovered is that although remixes are very scarce, cover versions are not. Scott Weiland, vocalist for Stone Temple Pilots, made one of the most distinctive ones, but the one I've found for today is from indie-synthpop duo Æon Rings, from New York. I've also got a cover version by Paradigm that appeared on the Your World in Our Eyes compilation, I've got a nice one by Jimmy Somerville, and one by Elegant Machinery. I'm sure my collection of "But Not Tonight" covers is not complete, however. I believe Color Theory did one as well. Many of these add very little to the original, but the Æon Rings version is somewhat different; it's considerably more ethereal and dreamy than even the original. It's a good cover. One of my favorite right now, actually.
Luckily for me, around that time I discovered A Different Drum, an indie label, store and email list-serve that catered to the underground market for synthpop very much like the kind that I had grown up with. In the years since, even indie labels for music have become superfluous, where bands can record in a bedroom instead of a professional recording studio, and can self-release their own music and sell it via Kickstarter or even just stick it up on Amazon and iTunes. This has led to a major wealth of selection and options, but in 1998 and 1999 the breadth of the genre was more limited. I recall very specifically asking on the list-serve if anyone had any theories as to why there weren't more female vocalist synthpop acts—and someone responded somewhat flippantly because female singers don't sound enough like David Gahan.
It's impossible, even now, for the genre to step out of the enormous shadow of Depeche Mode. Even for me, I evaluate synthpop by how good it sounds compared to the "golden years" of DM—by which I mean the early albums of the classic four-man line-up: Some Great Reward, Black Celebration, Music for the Masses, and although I differ from most in starting to see the decline in this one, Violator. By the end of that run, Depeche Mode wasn't even making synthpop anymore at all, and more recently, it's a stretch to even call it electronic music that they produce, but they did, at one point in the mid and late 80s, quite literally define the genre to such a degree that vocalists had to attempt to sound like David Gahan to be taken seriously. That was a semi-flippant response, but only semi-flippant, after all. The album of that period that seems to have garnered the most serious critical acclaim over the years is Black Celebration. I was quite surprised to learn, many years after I had been listening to it over and over and over again as a teenager and even beyond, that the ultimate track, the crowning achievement, the catharsis at the end of the symphony of despair, "But Not Tonight" was never actually intended to be released on the album at all, and was only done so for the American release at the American label's insistence, and against the wishes of the band itself. The song was picked to accompany the movie soundtrack of a rather obscure comedy Modern Girls, and because the label thought that that meant it might be a hit, they prioritized including it. The band itself was annoyed with the song, which they wrote and recorded in very little time, and considered it a throwaway pop song, not worthy of serious consideration (the non-album song that they liked much better, but which didn't really fit with the tone of Black Celebration as it evolved, was "Shake the Disease.") Because the band never really cared for the song, getting remixes of it was challenging. I bought an import single of "Stripped" from Germany because it included a remix as a b-side, although it was a simple extended version that added very little other than length to the song, by Robert Margouleff. In the years since, I've not found anything else, even in the world of bootleg mixes.
That said, the song—in spite of the band's opinion of it—is clearly a classic and popular one. What I've discovered is that although remixes are very scarce, cover versions are not. Scott Weiland, vocalist for Stone Temple Pilots, made one of the most distinctive ones, but the one I've found for today is from indie-synthpop duo Æon Rings, from New York. I've also got a cover version by Paradigm that appeared on the Your World in Our Eyes compilation, I've got a nice one by Jimmy Somerville, and one by Elegant Machinery. I'm sure my collection of "But Not Tonight" covers is not complete, however. I believe Color Theory did one as well. Many of these add very little to the original, but the Æon Rings version is somewhat different; it's considerably more ethereal and dreamy than even the original. It's a good cover. One of my favorite right now, actually.
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
Rainy Day by Riky Maltese
It's been a while since I've played an italo-disco song, which is unfortunate. The genre was meant to be practically disposable; it's like garage band dance music from the mid-80s that was specifically made to cater to a relatively small regional audience. Most of the artists were one or two hit wonders who focused on singles rather than albums; many of them only had a song or two recorded at all.
That said, I've always thought disposable pop fun is still fun. Heck; much of the corpus of pop music and New Wave music of the entire 80s, even in American pop music, is disposable one-hit wonder type stuff, and that's part of its appeal.
Honestly, I'm a little unconvinced that italo-disco is truly a genre of its own, rather than a localized expression of Hi-NRG anyway. But because italo-disco as a label is fairly well known, I'll continue to use it. As the mid-80s wound down, Hi-NRG and italo-disco (which by this point wasn't necessarily very Italian anymore; Irish, French, Slovenian, Canadian, and even German artists were producing "italo-disco" near the end. It didn't so much as die as split and evolve into various other similar genres; Eurodance of the 90s was a direct descendant, and EDM of today has a pedigree in the area as well.
Riky Maltese was a four-hit wonder, I guess you could say, for certain definitions of hit. "Rainy Day" was late for "pure" italo-disco; it came out in 1987 when the genre was pretty well and good fragmented and run it's course. It is, however, one of my favorite tracks to come out of the ouevre. I think that the copy I have on my phone as mp3 I modified slightly in Audacity to increase the tempo. I few of these songs sound a little slow and laid-back compared to what dance music has become in the years since. But if I did, it was only by a few percentage points.
That said, I've always thought disposable pop fun is still fun. Heck; much of the corpus of pop music and New Wave music of the entire 80s, even in American pop music, is disposable one-hit wonder type stuff, and that's part of its appeal.
Honestly, I'm a little unconvinced that italo-disco is truly a genre of its own, rather than a localized expression of Hi-NRG anyway. But because italo-disco as a label is fairly well known, I'll continue to use it. As the mid-80s wound down, Hi-NRG and italo-disco (which by this point wasn't necessarily very Italian anymore; Irish, French, Slovenian, Canadian, and even German artists were producing "italo-disco" near the end. It didn't so much as die as split and evolve into various other similar genres; Eurodance of the 90s was a direct descendant, and EDM of today has a pedigree in the area as well.
Riky Maltese was a four-hit wonder, I guess you could say, for certain definitions of hit. "Rainy Day" was late for "pure" italo-disco; it came out in 1987 when the genre was pretty well and good fragmented and run it's course. It is, however, one of my favorite tracks to come out of the ouevre. I think that the copy I have on my phone as mp3 I modified slightly in Audacity to increase the tempo. I few of these songs sound a little slow and laid-back compared to what dance music has become in the years since. But if I did, it was only by a few percentage points.
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