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usgunn · 5 years

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September 8, 2019

CLICK HERE for the September 8, 2019 playlist

1. The Walker Brothers - “My Ship Is Comin’ In” (1965)

It may be a music nerd cliché to love Scott Walker, but...I love Scott Walker. I’m sure Scott will show up in other forms on later ARBTR playlists, but this week I felt like kicking things off with some quirky, string-laden late 60′s productions, and this early Walker Brothers song felt like a great way to start. For a primer on Scott, check out the documentary Scott Walker: 30th Century Man, which is currently streaming on Amazon Prime. A little extra trivia: this song was produced by Ivor Raymonde, father of Cocteau Twins bassist Simon Raymonde.

2. The Left Banke - “Desiree” (1968)

The Left Banke are best known for their hit “Walk Away Renee,” from their first record in 1967. That record was primarily written and arranged by keyboardist Michael Brown, who at the time was a mere 17 years old. Brown parted ways with the band before their second record, The Left Banke Too, was released, but this track is one of the two songs on that album that he wrote and played on, and in my opinion a highlight of a small but dense catalog.

3. The Move - “Beautiful Daughter” (1970)

OK, so technically this song was released in February 1970, but...close enough to stick with our late 60′s time period. A really wonderful string arrangement here, presumably done by singer and songwriter Roy Wood, who would later start ELO with Jeff Lynne.

4. The Electric Prunes - “The Adoration” (1968)

This song comes from the fourth album credited to The Electric Prunes, Release of an Oath, but is an Electric Prunes record in name only. The band that recorded “I Had Too Much to Dream Last Night” was gone, and all that was left was producer David Hassinger and composer/arranger extraordinaire David Axelrod, who would go on to compose and produce several amazing, hip, jazzy records under his own name. I’m a big Axelrod fan and I’m sure he’ll show up on a future playlist, but this early example of his forays into the “rock” world seemed to fit with this week’s opening theme.

5. The Soundcarriers - “Signal Blue” (2014)

Getting out of the 60′s, but this UK band has had both David Axelrod and Scott Walker referenced by critics as likely musical inspirations, among other hip 60′s and 70′s acts. This comes from their album Entropicalia, released on the great Ghost Box record label run by Julian House, a graphic designer whose work has graced almost every Broadcast and Stereolab record sleeve, and who similarly does all the design for Ghost Box’s releases.

6. SAULT - “Don’t Waste My Time” (2019)

Literally know nothing about this band. Try and Google them -- as of when this playlist was released, you will find virtually nothing. All I can tell is that the production was done by Inflo, a UK-based producer that appears to have some connection to super-producer Brian Burton, aka Danger Mouse. Kind of a sassy, ESG feel; just heard this this week and loved it.

7. Shape of Broad Minds (feat. MF Doom) - “Let’s Go (Space Boogie)” (2007)

Hip-hop project led by prolific producer (and, I think, part-time Atlanta resident?) Jneiro Jarel. This comes from a record, Craft of the Lost Art, released on Warp Records hip-hop offshoot Lex Records. And of course, this song features the vocal stylings of rap legend (and, I think, also part-time Atlanta resident?) MF Doom. Jarel and Doom later did a full-album collaboration, Key to the Kuffs, under the name JJ Doom. I love the propulsive feel of this song, with a riff that feels like it’s leading somewhere but keeps repeating itself.

8. George Smallwood - “You Know I Love You” (1980?)

I discovered this song on a compilation put out by the enigmatic DC-based label Peoples Potential Unlimited called Peoples Potential Family Album, compiling tracks the label had reissued on 12-inches. PPU mainly mines obscure boogie-funk from the DC/Virginia area, from which blind singer-songwriter George Smallwood hailed. I love the backing vocals on this song, they totally make it for me, along with the demo-like sparseness of the production.

9. Sandra Wright - “I Come Running Back” (1974)

I’ve already forgotten how I discovered this, but something I saw this week led me to listen to this track, from the album Wounded Woman, recorded in 1974 for Stax subsidiary Truth Records but unreleased until 1989. I’m glad I did--I instantly fell in love with everything about this song.

10. Tim Maia - “Brother, Father, Sister and Mother” (1976)

Note the correct song title above - Spotify seems to have mucked it up. Maia was a funk/soul guy in the 70′s in Brazil who was the subject of Luaka Bop’s compilation World Psychedelic Classics 4: Nobody Can Live Forever - The Existential Soul of Tim Maia, where I discovered this song.

11. Daphni - “Sizzling (Radio Edit)” (2019)

Daphni is the name under which Caribou mastermind Dan Snaith releases his more dance-oriented material. This song, released this past summer, is a remix of an obscure 1981 funk track called “Sizzlin Hot” by Paradise. It cooks.

12. "Blue” Gene Tyranny - “David Kopay (Portrait)” (1978)

Note the correct song title above. Tyranny was an avant-garde piano player and composer who dabbled the “rock idiom,” for lack of a better term. He was briefly in the Stooges, apparently. This song is adventurous from a compositional perspective but also remarkably funky. Extra trivia: this song’s namesake, David Kopay, was an NFL running back and the first NFL player to publicly acknowledge he was gay. In addition to the many things to love about this song, the extended synth drone outro provides a palette cleanser for the set of songs that close the playlist this week.

13. Will Johnson - “Every Single Day of Late” (2017)

Will Johnson was the leader of the late-great Centro-matic from Denton, TX, one of my all-time favorite bands. He released a couple of sparse solo records while Centro-matic was active, but since that band folded in 2014 his solo records have incorporated more varied sounds and approaches to songwriting. This song, from his most recent record Hatteras Night, a Good Luck Charm (although a new one is due this year) opens with a somewhat menacing electric guitar sound and never quite feels settled, adding junkyard percussion and backing vocals with some interesting atonal guitar work in the middle.

14. Rollerskate Skinny - “Lunasa” (1993)

Really, really weird and fearless 90′s rock band from Dublin, Ireland that featured Jimi Shields, younger brother of Kevin Shields from My Bloody Valentine, on drums and other instruments. This song really gives you no idea of what the album this comes from (Shoulder Voices, their debut) sounds like--I’m not sure any individual song on the record does. All over the place in the best way possible. I felt like the backing-vocal heavy nature of this song went well with the previous song and the next song, even if they otherwise sound like they have nothing to do with each other.

15. Kelley Polar - “Chrysanthemum” (2007)

Polar was (is?) a Julliard-educated violinist with an affinity for dance music who made two great string-drenched dance records in the early 2000′s and then, as far as I can tell, disappeared. This song actually barely features strings, and I therefore hesitated to include it, but I love the starkness of this track and the rhythm “breaths” that drive it.

16. Psychic TV - “The Orchids” (1983)

I’m not a Psychic TV fan, and I don’t get much of what they do. The band, formed by former Throbbing Gristle members Genesis P-Orridge and Peter “Sleazy” Christopherson, often trafficks in drone and noise music that just doesn’t do anything for me. But this song is different. I first heard this song when Califone covered it on their Roots & Crowns album in 2006, and I still love that version. But the original has a strange naiveté to it, with its lo-fi production and overlapping, cut-and-paste vocals.

#playlist #spotify #music discovery #psychic tv #kelley polar #will johnson #rollerskate skinny #blue gene tyranny #sandra wright #daphni #tim maia #george smallwood #sault #shape of broad minds #the soundcarriers #the walker brothers #the left banke #the move #the electric prunes

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debrahnesbit · 7 years

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Good Politics, Bad Policy: Melanie Joly Sends TV Licensing Cancon Decision Back to the CRTC

Canadian Heritage Minister Melanie Joly announced via Twitter yesterday that the government has asked the CRTC to reconsider its TV licensing decision from earlier this year that established a uniform broadcaster spending requirement of 5 percent on programs of national interest (PNI, which includes dramas, documentaries, some children’s programming, and some award shows). The decision, which would lead to a reduction of mandated spending for some broadcasters, sparked a strong lobbying campaign from various cultural groups who claimed the decision would result in hundreds of millions in reduced spending on Canadian content. While the government’s decision should not come as a surprise – siding with the creator groups against the CRTC makes political sense – no one should confuse it with good policy. Indeed, the reality is that the CRTC’s belief that the digital market would create the right incentives for investment is increasingly borne out by recent developments that suggest Canadian broadcasters have few alternatives other than to develop their own original programming.

Reports of the decision have emphasized that CRTC broadcast rulings are rarely sent back by the government for reconsideration, but this particular case was a political no-brainer. The creator groups mobilized effectively and faced practically no opposition. The public had little reason to engage on an insider issue, the broadcasters offered only a tepid response months after the momentum for a reconsideration had been established (Bell, Canada’s largest broadcaster, presumably preferred to use its political capital on the Super Bowl simsub issue), and the CRTC changed chairs weeks after the decision was released making it unlikely the Commission would publicly or privately defend the ruling as the campaign against it unfolded.

Moreover, Joly needed a policy win for the cultural groups. Her digital Cancon policy is set to be unveiled next month and many of the groups applauding this ruling (Joly’s twitter feed is filled with dozens of such tweets) may be left disappointed. Joly launched the digital Cancon consultation in 2016 with talk of an export-led, digitally-relevant policy. That was the right vision, but she quickly found that many established creator groups were more interested in Netflix taxes, ISP taxes, and digital sales taxes. The government has largely taken those proposals off-the-table (a digital sales tax remains a possibility but revenues would go to Finance, not Heritage), meaning the strategy will likely emphasize promotion, cultural exports, administrative improvements, and long-term legislative reform of communications and copyright. That’s a reasonable formula (short term copyright reform will focus on the Copyright Board, which helps ensure that creators get paid), but it isn’t quite what some groups have in mind.

While the decision to refer the ruling back to the CRTC might make for good politics, it does little to address the issue of the creation and competitiveness of Canadian content in a digital world. As I noted earlier this year, industry data confirms that private broadcasters are relatively minor players when it comes to the financing of Canadian drama. The most recent CMPA report states: With fiction productions, the largest share of financing came from provincial and federal tax credits; the fiction genre also attracted the most foreign financing among all genres. Children’s and youth productions also derived the largest share of their financing from tax credits, followed by broadcaster licence fees. Distributors also accounted for an important part of the financing picture for the fiction, and children’s and youth genres. In the VAPA and lifestyle and human interest genres, most financing came from broadcaster licence fees.

Indeed, private broadcasters contribute only 9 percent of the financing for fictional programs, less than federal and provincial tax credits, Canadian distributors, foreign financing, and the CMF. Private broadcasters allocate much of their money toward variety and performing arts as well as “lifestyle and human interest” programming, which including magazine style shows. In other words, financing and the success or failure of Canadian programming such as dramas do not depend upon private broadcaster spending, regardless of where the CRTC sets the mandated percentage.

Moreover, recent events highlight why this is a fight over yesterday’s broadcasting world. The upcoming entry of new streaming services from U.S. giants such as CBS and Disney will continue to reshape the Canadian broadcasting landscape as U.S. content increasingly streams directly to Canadian viewers. Canadian broadcasters may still license those programs since they need to fill their schedules, but the programming will be available on a non-exclusive basis, giving consumers the real choice they have long been denied. The changes are not limited to dramatic programming as the sports world is also undergoing a massive transformation. For example, the exclusive rights to NFL Sunday Ticket now rests with DAZN, which is only available via Internet streaming. The Canadian cable and satellite companies will lose millions in revenue, while consumers can purchase the service for less than half of what they previously paid.

Fighting over mandated Cancon spending does little to address the emerging broadcast world in which consumers have far more choice and are no longer locked into the regulated broadcast system. The CRTC decision was developed with this future in mind as the changes were primarily designed to level the playing field for Canadian broadcasters in a market where success is determined by controlling original content. The CRTC ruling hoped to make it easier for Canadian broadcasters to compete with Netflix and the many other streaming services that operate without mandated content requirements.

The shift away from mandated spending is not a shift away from investment in Cancon, however. Netflix spends millions on production in Canada not because it faces a regulatory requirement (it doesn’t), but rather because the entire package – innovative creators, tax credits, good partners – offers a compelling reason for doing so. Indeed, the data shows that the Canadian industry has thrived in recent years for reasons that have little to do with pre-digital regulations with a huge shift in Canadian television production from domestic funding to foreign investment.

For Canadian broadcasters, the battle over mandated spending is premised on the notion that they will only invest in domestic programming if required to do so. Licensing cheaper foreign programming is understandably attractive, yet as that programming becomes available from multiple sources, the benefits of relying heavily on licensed U.S. content will diminish (and older regulatory rules such as simultaneous substitution will become less and less relevant). That means the long-term success of Canadian broadcasters will depend upon controlling original content that can be delivered through multiple channels and markets. Policy fights over mandated spending therefore miss the point. The market now encourages investment in original programming and it is up to Canadian creators and broadcasters to compete in a global market that offers new opportunities without the security blanket of outdated regulations that once typified the Canadian system.

The post Good Politics, Bad Policy: Melanie Joly Sends TV Licensing Cancon Decision Back to the CRTC appeared first on Michael Geist.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8247009 http://www.michaelgeist.ca/2017/08/good-politics-bad-policy-melanie-joly-sends-tv-licensing-cancon-decision-back-crtc/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

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debrahnesbit · 7 years

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Good Politics, Bad Policy: Melanie Joly Sends TV Licensing Cancon Decision Back to the CRTC

The post Good Politics, Bad Policy: Melanie Joly Sends TV Licensing Cancon Decision Back to the CRTC appeared first on Michael Geist.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8247009 http://www.michaelgeist.ca/2017/08/good-politics-bad-policy-melanie-joly-sends-tv-licensing-cancon-decision-back-crtc/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

0 notes