John Talabot
Dude can do no wrong as far as I'm concerned.
Are there any dance music hair-splitter than can define his 'style' for me to investigate similar people please?
Delorean - Seasun (John Talabot Kids n' Drums Remix) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhtGMSqfdys
The XX - Shelter (John Talabot Feel's It Too Remix) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJa9fMQr3xQ&feature=related
Teengirl Fantasy - Cheaters (John Talabot's Classic Vocal Refix) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEMoC-sOqyw
He seems to have a habit of remixing songs after they've been out for a while. That might why they seem to 'work' so well to my ears. The XX remix was one of my favourite tracks of last year. The 'Cheaters' remix might be one of my favourites for this year (especially because it sounds like Cutting Crew / painfully mid 90s. Similar people anyone?
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This is great
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcSQF-_cOMM
The new album, Fin, is exquisite
Seriously, it's already been said about 1000 times but this guy just has such a nack for timing and arrangement.
First and last tracks are belting. In fact, the whole album is a massive win.
it's the best new album
i've heard this year so far
The last track is excellent
and the whole album flys by despite the fact its over 50 minutes in lenth. good stuff!
Yeah, looked him up 'cause he's playing primavera
really good stuff
Can't stop playing Fin
Agree with everyone above, first album of the year to really grab me, the tracks are all beautifully arranged, like a cross between Blondes, The Field and Villalobos. Love the varied lengths of the tracks, make it realy work as an album which isn't often the case with these kinds of techno(?) albums....or nay other styles. Fantastic.
Oh and I saw this act earlier this week, not dissimilar
AU PALAIS - TENDER MERCY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttYzCBB4DEM
If you like Walls, Blondes, etc, you'd probably enjoy it
Just listened to this today.
Didn't think much of it.
Just seems like run-of-the-mill chill out music for indie smokers.
I'd be surprised if it makes my end of year top 100. Is that a stamp of approval?
Show your working
i'm always a bit wary of dance crossover stuff
Not really feeling this.. The production is pretty weak, and that sort of mid tempo shuffle it holds throughout is not my thing at all
Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs - Tapes & Money (John Talabot's Ritual Reconstruction)
http://soundcloud.com/t-e-e-d/tapes-money-john-talabots
House for people who don't normally buy house
It is pretty nicely done but nothing special, unless you know f'all about the genre - in which case you will think he is a genius.
exactly
f'all = nothing
If only we all had your knowledge of the genre
then we wouldn't fall for fakers like him!
You always do this
i don't really see how it proves anything.
what's your point with this sarcasm?
nobody here is talking about "knowledge in house music" neither criticizing his music or the people who listen to him
but it's a fact that great part of talabot's public don't listen to house music very often...
The same goes to Blondes and Nicolas Jaar.
In what possible way
could this album be described as "house", unless you're using house as a catch-all term for vaguely danceable electronic music? Most of it sounds nothing like house, to me anyway.
GabrielGuerra & Scomatsho..........really?
It's an incredible production (fin). Everyone i know who exclusively listen to beats (I reckon Talabot is minimal tech house) is loving this lp. Go ask the guys in Phonica. I'd agree that people who listen to beats don't normally buy lp's, but that's it.
To arrogantly state this is house for people who know f'all about the genre is just rude and innacurate. Maybe you're just trolling? It's a great lp and hopefully it find's a wide audience, like Lindstrom and Pantha Du Prince, he deserves to.
The Xlr8r review is pretty bang on: http://www.xlr8r.com/reviews/john-talabot
Exactly.
It's 2012, why are people still giving a shit what genre this is or isn't? Can't you just accept that it's a fucking superb album & enjoy it on its own merits, rather than getting all peeved because the mainstream media are all over it and, horror or horrors, it might cross over?
We give a shit because the music marketplace make us give, stop with this eclectic bullshit.
I'm not a big fan of fin, but I must admit he made a good album... and I not even saying that they fans are stupid or something, anyone can listen to John Talabot and like it, i'm not censuring his music. Just look his remixes... The xx, Delorean, he's clearly into a more pitchfork-and-related-sites scene than the more traditional dance/house/techno/electronic music, the same thing happened with another artists (Pantha Du Prince and minimal techno, Hercules & Love Affair and nu-disco, Oneohtrix Point Never/Tim Hecker and ambient music). It's not arrogance, it's just admiting that artists have their scenes and publics, and sometimes it's nothing related to what you would expect basing on his genre.
And for you ThirstyDog
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fo1ONZPAJrI
cool
thanks for informing me I know fuck all. Please enlighten me with some similar and superior artists. That was the point of this thread, which the entire world has failed to respond to in almost exactly 365 days.
apologies, malick did.
one person.
not sure the entire world reads DiS.
Such a snobbish thing to say
invariably people who accuse others of knowing 'f'all' about a particular genre are the most musically narrow minded and uncultured of the lot and consequently have the least ground to make snide comments about what other people perceive as good music.
LP's
I think it's all to do with making an accessible lp with a record company backing it. Recommend Moodyman to someone, they look in Rough Trade or on iTunes and there's loads of singles. People like a simple old fasioned album. That's what I've always thought anyway!
This is basically the KVLT argument transferred to electronic music
Urk. I thought that one had died already.
i think it's in the melodicism and in the structure of it, where the songs progress with a naturalism that some would say is a little.. rudimentary. I think that’s why it appeals to a crowd that wouldn’t normally like it. Saying that, it’s been very well received by the dance crowd as well (4.5 in RA?)
I just don’t think it succeeds in terms of the sound, or the strength of the tracks on the whole
The 2nd half of the Blondes LP is awesome though, although I think they have a far more interesting and well crafted sound design
have you listened to his older remixes on soundcloud?
much better, for my money. bit of a talabot fanatic but i found the album lacking something. although it's solid
...which was the point of this thread.
Re: the appeal to pitchfork/indie types
It's basically a useful filter, I think. People who might otherwise listen to stuff like Dinosaur Jr or whatever might well have a curiousity about other genres, but you need a reasonably starting point to guide you in the right direction, rather than trying to choose from a million tracks/albums that you can't yet differentiate between.
Rex_Kramer's point about albums is key too: indie types are usually from the rockist school which prizes the album and sees that as the premier form of musical statement (which isn't necessarily the case, or at least not in the same way, in other genres).
The appeal of this then is sort of like `you wanna get into a bit of electronic music that you don't know much about? Here's something in album format, which you recognise, which those who do know about have vetted for quality (so you aren't writing off a genre based on poor examples), so you can buy this and slot it alongside your other indie records and listen to it in the same way, while branching out into other more exotic genres`.
Doesn't mean that they can't ultimately become bass-heads or whatever, but there's a threshold somewhere.
I did a review of it:
http://www.noripcord.com/reviews/music/john-talabot/ƒ
I think it's okay
it doesn't really have much of a... groove (i don't really do dance music terms. Am I allowed to say groove in 2012? I dunno). I mean it's quite pleasant, so i've just had it on in the background quite a lot, but I can't remember how many of the songs sound.
I think most of it is good.
Some very nice moments, and as has been said before, his arrangements are excellent. Unfortunatley it does occasionally slip into the current housey trends which sound a little tired to my ears - there are some seriously bad vocals going on in dance music at the moment. The malignant influence of the UK Garage era. Bleugh!
Basically this is just another case of someone making a great album
which is so good it actually manages 'crossover appeal', subsequently leading to a load of 'genre purists' who know about 'real house' having to dismiss the album just to make sure it's clear they listened to 'actual house' way before this album and definitely don't read Pitchfork. c.f. Space Is
Only Noise.
c.f. This Bliss
c.f. Where You Go I Go Too
c.f. Every record by The Field
c.f. Every electronic record with good rating on Pitchfork
... but LWE says that it is not something soooo extraordinary
is not bad, but simply because someone is already doing that or even better for years but not had the good fortune of not have fallen into the grace of one publication with a huge indie credibility.
actually, "Space Is Only Noise" went very well in the more traditional dance/house/techno/electronic scene
and we'll have musical preferences that the music marketplace tends to make us "connected" and "owner" of that kinds of music, it's not about judging if the music is "pure" or not, (I don't think that the word "purist" is exactly a fair word to use in your argument) unfortunately this leads to people with very snobbish/elitism views, I personally think that the Nicolas Jaar's album is fucking great, but people dismissing that kind of "crossover" albums because it went beyond the scene that they feel attached it might be disgusting for you but is totally understandable, as Terre Thaemlitz said in the video that i posted early, "the system don't allow us to be [equal]", so don't blame the people for dismissing a album because it went to another scenes, blame the music marketplace.
I like Thaemlitz but he's talking shit
'The system doesn't allow us to be equal'
That might have stood for something 10 years ago, but not anymore
What, you mean the system which means people listen to, write about and buy the music which they actually like? Music needs to find an audience. Not all music is going to find the same sized audience - some is more difficult than others, some is less easy to understand. Talabot and Caribou and all the other stuff like this are great albums because they are accessible without sacrificing their 'realness' and some of the difficult nature of this type of music. That's why they're such impressive achievements.
But even this idea of music being more "accessible" it's totally relative.
I understand your point but this goes to the public sphere that goes beyond the same sized audience (which is never gonna be same sized because even the genres are very specific: That's why we have subgenres) talking about electronic music, like someone said before, for the "purists", the idea of this kind of music, which in your origins has never meant to be "accessible" (especially with the whole idea of underground and house nation that the Chuck Roberts' monologue in "Can You Feel It" would said in the late 80s), going to others audiences it's frustating for them, and that's where the system enters, which is exactly this kind of system that you said. It's the same thing with Skrillex and dubstep, people who used to be big dubstep fans are now saying that Skrillex fans doesn't know a shit about dubstep, the difference between this case and Talabot's success to the indie/pitchfork scene it's that this scenes are creating hypes and there's no one out there relentless criticizing Talabot's music. The problem itself it's not the album being crossover, which I found a great thing, but people dismissing the album for this, which goes to the idea that you and Thaemlitz said about music having their publics, the only difference between your argument and Terre's argument is that for Terre the public is created by own niches inside the own genre (or "same-sized" public as you said), which I agree because Thaemlitz's have really nice writings and ideas about how distributors and media affects inside the own genre, in case of you being interested: http://www.comatonse.com/writings/index.html
I think as this thread shows, there are plenty of people willing to criticise Talabot...
I'm baffled by
comparisons to the Jaar album - its in a different league to this.
well it clearly has crossover appeal
but the reason really isn't because it's so much better than the other releases. surely that's obvious.
You're right, that doesn't always hold true
But in this case I think it's true - just like Swim, it's a record which merges accessibility with the requisite amount of weirdness/genuine house chops and does so very well. That's something to be praised, not to be spat at. I'm sure someone above has already said that albums like this do often work as gateway records. Whatever KennyDope sniffs about people not going out and buying 12"s with download codes for their iPad instead of albums, music like 'Fin' encourages most people who hear it to dig a little into the scene. Not everyone has the money/time to submerge themselves in thousands of vinyl records.
Yeah, I think I was
I just really dislike it when people trash an album apparently just because it has crossover appeal. I'm far more inclined to see crossover appeal as a reason behind an album being good.
Also, as a former rockist, it is hard to get my head around not buying entire records...even though I'm coming around to it thanks to boomkat and their cheap mp3s. I still feel like making a great full LP is something which really gives you a measure quality of an artist, regardless of what genre they're in. To me, if you can't make at least 30-40 minutes of cohesive, engaging and consistent music, you're not really a particularly great artist.
nah
singles artists are often way more consistent than album guys. You can prob buy hours and hours worth of dance peoples work and not get a dud but they get ignored cos they didn't make a 40 min album...
I mean I still hear people gagging for a new Burial album when his last two EPs combined are over 50mins and shit hot but they only vaulgy get counted. And he's a big gun.
Really liking Fin...
... And recommend that anyone else enjoying it check out Orbitals new one. Prob a separate thread on it.
it's mega boring
no groove no melody no kick
tech house for dads and indie kids
messin' of course I just think its a bit well... boring
lol
tough call
The Field is pretty boring, his first album wasn't as boring as Talabot mind. The rest of them are way more boring tho so its a bit tricky that call.
all power to people gettin some kind of joy from this
but its not doing it for me by a long way. It sounds like tech house from way back a poor version at that and an even poorer version of something like Pantha's first album or the Fields first album... Just boring. Dad house. If you want an indie house album John grab some John Roberts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFqFpGa1lqk
no melody?
Come on Jimi, you're lying to yourself there.
So Will be Now is a fantastic track
even the snobbiest tech head on here should be able to admit that
That track just...
...sounds like many singles that have come out the last few years
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5eJOhUeWPY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rH0_gVoHC4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OHmTN3klS8
But a wishy washy version with even worse vocal samples that doesn't kick as hard. Tbh it just sounds like a sketchy rigid dad house version of peoples 'post-dubstep' house impressions of late. Its so bad.
never said it sounded remotely original
and yeah iv heard joy orbison and ilk, seen him and floating points a couple of times live last year. granted my knowledge of dance and bass music pales in comparison to yours and loads of people on here, but i still dont think talbot is as bad as he is being painted. it seems slightly reactionary
I mean come on...
you say you aint got much knowledge of it, so do a lot of people that are into this. I aint knocking it. If you dig it you dig it, I mean enjoy. I'm just saying there is a whole world out there... Talabot threads thru out the web have become some kinda indie house equiv of those hip-hop threads where someone finds a rapper and goes oh yeah I don't usualy like hip-hop but I really like this... then you wonder why house goons don't jump on it and go well fuck me dig in enjoy there is loads out there and this is just the tip.
http://shitfuckyou.com/audio/wania97a.mp3
Will Pitch review the Claro Intelecto LP?
It also need some love, please.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0GhY9VK0lo
I've been a big advocator of his work
on these very pages only a few months ago I was guilty of hyping an album i hadn't really had time to digest, only now having spent alot of time with the LP am I feeling ever so slightly underwhelmed.
After repeated listens only two tracks 'So Will Be Now. feat Pional' (worth the purchase alone) and 'Estiu' really stand out with the latter track being guilty of ending far too quickly.
The beauty of his earlier work especially his remixes on tracks such as
Aufgang - Channel 7 (You & Me) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGphbwqV918
and Mario & Vidis feat. Ernesto - Changed (John Talabot Private Mix) http://soundcloud.com/john-talabot/mario-basanov-vidis-feat
... was that the songs had chance to breath and develop and it was on this premise that my admiration grew. On the whole the album just doesnt have that magical build bulid release formula that features so well songs like these or that of his early solo releases like 'Sunshine' or 'Matildas Dream'
Its a decent debut nonetheless but i just hope on his next long player he finds the balance between the aforementioned remixes which was what made him so appealing to me in the first place and the amazing 'So Will Be Now' and my faith will be renewed
that features so well *on* songs like these
I agree
I started this thread, and people only started posting after Fin came out. I was incredibly disappointed with Fin, for exactly the same reasons. I prefer his remixes too.. tnat Mario and Vadis remix particularly. I guess you can compare it to a director of an adapted screenplay, and a writer-director.
and whilst i'm at it...
that new Actress record, thats gonna take some shifting from my 2012 top spot, flippin genius!
Christ alive, this fucking thread
I know nothing about the genre
But surely this is just poser dance music? First, and possibly last, time I will say people who thought this was good must have no knowledge of the genre.
What's it like up there on your pedestal
It is a place of unmatched peace
and self-awareness.
and arrogance
absolutely fucking laughable statement
'poser dance music'.
have you ever written in to the NME?
Hi
I actually mentioned in the OP that I know very little about the genre and am interested in knowing of more things to investigate. Although I posted this last March, before he'd even finished making 'Fin', it's nice to know you and your other precious scene experts want to call me a poser. Thanks a fucking bunch, and well done all for showing up dance music fans as snobbish, backwards thinking, self important, elitist bores.
If someone I know says to me 'hey I like Kings of Leon, what bands should I check out that I might know'. My first reaction isn't to go 'pfff you like Kings of Leon, there's obviously no hope for you, chump', it's to suggest something similar that I think they will like.
So, thanks for nothing.
maybe trundle into the house/techno thread thats usualy banging about
http://drownedinsound.com/community/boards/music/4320642
plenty of talk about housey stuff in here too: http://drownedinsound.com/community/boards/music/4317717
Not sure it's just dance music fans although there do seem to be a lot of boring scene snobs in this thread
Seen this argument run loads of times - whether it's how 'punk rock' you are, whether you're into 'real' hip hop, etc. Not really into black metal but I imagine this is exactly what the 'true cvlt' thing is all about too.
Of course there are always going to be people who are more switched on to certain scenes and/or have been there since their inception, but in my experience these people tend to be pretty welcoming and happy to share the knowledge. It's usually the idiots who feel they have something to prove who bang on about 'posers/hipsters' or 'the scene' or blah blah blah who gives a fuck.
Bottom line - if, when someone says 'I really like this', your first reaction is "you know fuck all" - you're doing it wrong.
I'm going to be very contrite here
Because I thought I really hated it when people insinuate that you don't actually like what you're listening to, watching etc. You can tell me my taste is crap but don't say its all a facade or whatever....Well that's exactly what I wrote up there, sorry folks. Enjoy your Talabot, chances are you probably know much MORE about music than I do (it just didn't grab me).
why can't music just be music?
all this scene snobbery is ridiculous. why bother with criticism when you could just use the popularity of crossover records as leverage to get people into underground stuff?
I like this record, btw. like brightonb said, it has a nice Balaeric kind of vibe, which is nice. nothing new, but he does what he does really well.
You probably already know Caribou
But his sound isn't far away from some of the more pensive and subtle moments on his last album (can't remember what's called, sorry). Otherwise though easy reference points are Nicolas Jaar, The Field and Delorean. Yeah, check those out.
wow, this thread has it all going on.
Pointless genre arguments? Check
KEEPING IT REAL? Check
I preferred the earlier stuff? Check
Scene snobbery? Check
It's fucking brilliant.
The thread AND the album. :D
:)
two hours of hot sun
has proven this album works perfectly well as a soundtrack to good weather. what else is it really for?
Don't really get why everyone's got so outraged about some of the things said in here
i mean i'm definitely not a dance music aficionado or whatever, but can absolutely see the argument that Talabot is watered down or whatever. It's not really that hard to see where this argument's coming from, is it? Even if you disagree with it.
Plus I think there's a pretty good point to be made about why it's a thing in indie culture that some people or publications feel the need to have a facade of having as broad a music taste as possible. It does happen, don't pretend it doesn't. It's not exactly illogical to make the point that since every once in a while they'll champion records from genres they don't know much about, it's likely that fairly often they're gonna pick albums to champion based on other factors and not solely on the quality of the music (or, the perceived quality of the music is a bit off due to the lack of knowledge of the genre but lets not get into that, I don't want to argue with simpletons). For instance, the Blondes album is decent, but it's the most talked/enthused about record on here purely because of the fact that they have some sort of indie/rockist orientations.
I don't know much about Talabot and his background, but just calling this snobbery is a bit simplistic.
Whatever.
because people get annoyed
when there's an attitude of "you only like this because you don't know much about the genre".
Sure
that doesn't mean as an opinion it's wrong though.
Imagine if someone's favourite indie band was Editors. They've only previously heard three or four indie bands, none of which make the same kind of music as Editors. They definitely haven't heard Interpol or Joy Division or, y'know, any of the bands Editors have ripped off (if you REALLY like editors or something, then just substitute them for the Enemy). It would be pretty easy to not give a shit if that person told you their favourite indie band was Editors, but would you really accept that their opinion on indie music was as valid as yours? Also, say if you were talking to a group of people who wanted to know your genuine opinion on Editors, and they were part of this group if not active in the discussion, would you say something other than your opinion in order to appease them? You don't have to be all like `yeah they're a fucking shit version of Interpol/band x` or whatever, but that's essentially gonna be the gist of it (lets assume that that's what you think). I can't be bothered to go much further than this, but basically what i'm saying is i think it's a not unreasonable thing to say in some circumstances.
Should really stop flitting between essays and dis.
problem with this is
that John Talabot is good, despite not being original, and Editors are neither original or good.
I dunno
i don't really like him that much. There's not much that makes me dance in my chair, which is pretty much the one pre-requisite for dance music for me, being the armchair fan i am. Except that one song that does it for a bit. Can't remember which one.
I like it for the same reasons I like the band Studio, or Lindstrom
not music that makes me want to dance, but music that transports me.
yeah, fair enough
GET BACK TO THE SOCIAL BOARD
Having said that, someone mentions pantha du prince in a list of stuff that's watered down dance music
and i totally can't see how anyone could ever think that. So i dunno.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEd4Hzpj604
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEd4Hzpj604
ONE song
that's pretty unfair. The rest of that album's fucking amazing.
yeah, and it wasn't even his fault
it was Lennox's fault for picking a bad time to be rubbish for once.
I'm only messing
It is a good album, This Bliss is a hundred shades better though
Anyone going to Corsica tonight?
I would like to
but the partner(s) in RAVE I need are not to hand.
I too need these partners you speak of...
Yep
Looking forward to Skudge too.