As I have mentioned in earlier post, I now routinely sit down and listen to some music. I do nothing else: I relax, eyes closed and open the cabbage leaves on each side of my melon to explore the garden of sound proposed to my attention (we are in the fall, which is the gathering season after all, hence the vegetable metaphors. More coming).
I explore some new stuff, but I have to be careful. The choice proposed by Tidal or even my own CD collection is so vast that I could get lost. So, I make sure I revisit some old friends that have accompanied me my whole life. I am of course talking about French singer/songwriters that were the soundtrack of my youth, but also some good ol’ good ol’ like the Beatles or Toto.
I confess that the oldies that I used to cherish are now a hit or miss. As I am chewing old records of yesteryears like some bunny his carrot, I realize that the 30 minutes psychedelic guitar solo is, in most cases, outdated, for example. Same for the fills on the drum, coming like an avalanche of potatoes at the back of an open truck, every two bars you get a flurry of toms. After half a chorus, it falls on your nerves, let me tell you. There is also the very bad mix where everything is wrong: the guitar too loud, the singer too soft, the drums with a big bass drum and a whispering snare. Those are fun because if you listen to them on a 20 cents radio, as I used to, they sound just fine.
You also get the ones that are impeccable, where everything has been very very well done. The most famous example is Pink Floyd, of course. Oh man, is it a treat to put on one of their record and fly over life as if nothing matters but the sound they propose. Frank Sinatra is also in that category. It’s normal, he was an audiophile. His recordings, specially let’s say the ones after 1950 are gorgeous. I am not talking about the music per say, although I love his music, I am talking about the quality of the recording.
So, as it happens, I could be listening to a dear old recording and discover that of the 10 songs listed, there are now only 3 I like. The rest is not exactly garbage, but it is disappointing.
Now, you also get some nice surprises. On the French radio were French artist doing their stuff. Some sound very bad today, even if the music is ok, the lyrics are dreadful and uninteresting. But you get some surprises: Laurent Voulzy is one of them. I used to think he was merely a teenage idol. Not at all, his stuff hold muster for the most part. Same for Joe Dassin, someone who’s actually achieve greatness. I could go on and on, but I don’t want to bore my American public with a list of French artist of the 70’s and 80’s.
