How the hell is this not HUGE? Synthpop that sounds a bit chvrches, but her album's a bit more kate bush+caribou /dumbeasycomparisons but about her grandmother's dementia. It's kinda great.
(bad video tho imo)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foIJn4vqFEY
― barbarian radge (NotEnough), Thursday, 20 October 2016 17:24 (two years ago) Permalink
Live, arps and synthshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vROEZvXWMHE
Live, pianohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BNOzGvWBIA
― barbarian radge (NotEnough), Thursday, 20 October 2016 17:31 (two years ago) Permalink
And I'll stop now, but just one more, at the more bush/caribou end:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nivLqAhWok
― barbarian radge (NotEnough), Thursday, 20 October 2016 17:58 (two years ago) Permalink
She's been knocking about for a few years, I saw her in 2010 at a dance music festival on Croatia - the sort where the live acts are mostly there to gently soundtrack people's hangovers.
I went home and listened to her stuff and it was all pleasant but lightweight. This album is an order of magnitude better though - I like it when it goes all deep and abstract in the second half.
Reminds me more of Julia Holter than any of the artists you've mentioned though.
― Matt DC, Thursday, 20 October 2016 20:02 (two years ago) Permalink
yeah holter for sure
― barbarian radge (NotEnough), Thursday, 20 October 2016 20:18 (two years ago) Permalink
I'm actually talking about the album - Awake But Always Dreaming, which is excellent.
― Matt DC, Friday, 21 October 2016 11:35 (two years ago) Permalink
OMG this album.
― Tim F, Monday, 24 October 2016 07:49 (two years ago) Permalink
I know right? I think I played it three or four times this weekend. Helps that it's perfect autumnal music.
― Matt DC, Monday, 24 October 2016 09:25 (two years ago) Permalink
It's amazing how it wends its way from "All That Matters" to "Foreverest", her range is so broad but in this really effortless and unassuming way.
― Tim F, Monday, 24 October 2016 09:46 (two years ago) Permalink
It should be warming up here but we're in some fucking ice age at the moment and this is perfect music for it.
― Tim F, Monday, 24 October 2016 09:47 (two years ago) Permalink
The way "Foreverest" starts off wispy fragmented witch-dream, then gets stuck in some malfunctioning machine, then transmutes into a Mikkel Metal schaffel tune is pretty O_O
― Tim F, Monday, 24 October 2016 22:09 (two years ago) Permalink
I'm a big fan, of course. Naturally, I came to her work from being namedeopped by Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark and because she toured as part of The Maths with John Foxx.
― pen pineapple apple pen (Turrican), Monday, 24 October 2016 22:22 (two years ago) Permalink
*namedropped
― pen pineapple apple pen (Turrican), Monday, 24 October 2016 22:23 (two years ago) Permalink
Totally obsessed with this album.
― Tim F, Sunday, 6 November 2016 11:31 (two years ago) Permalink
First listen and I think I'm in love
― Trump le Monde (Le Bateau Ivre), Sunday, 6 November 2016 12:13 (two years ago) Permalink
What's really impressive about this album is how natural the drift from left-of-centre indiepop into bedroom ambient house actually feels. At no point does it feel contrived or self-conscious.
― Matt DC, Sunday, 6 November 2016 12:42 (two years ago) Permalink
Not my usual thing but digging this on first pass
― Listen to my homeboy Fantano (D-40), Sunday, 6 November 2016 13:03 (two years ago) Permalink
Her approach feels very, um, diffuse to me, like, rather than a single identifiable voice she seems to corral together a lot of competing voices in a dialogue that feels very real - ironically, perhaps this is why the album doesn't feel as idiosyncratic or diverse as it is: the absence of a definable core also means that there's nothing against which to measure what might otherwise seem like experiments, genre exercises, populist appeals etc.
Perhaps this is also why the space she explores - effectively, between Susanne Sundfor and Julia Holter - seems to make intuitive sense at an abstract level as well as at a sonic level, given that Holter in particular (but also, to a lesser extent, Sundfor) are similarly "decentered" artists.
Also, if most of this album recalls The Ninth Wave (in feel, in subject matter and in narrative attack) more than just about anything anyone has recorded since (which I guess makes "All That Matters", "Hope Lasts" and "Don't Take It Out On Me" the sop to side A of that album, but much more distantly), one of the qualities that Peel has resuscitated from it is the sense of these voices crowding around the narrator: most obviously the muted "wake up!" towards the end of the otherwise-instrumental "Octavia", but also the sorrowful "where did you go?" during "Conversations".
― Tim F, Sunday, 6 November 2016 22:20 (two years ago) Permalink
i loooooooove this album holy shit
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Monday, 7 November 2016 04:33 (two years ago) Permalink
^^^^ very good brad
― Tim F, Monday, 7 November 2016 06:25 (two years ago) Permalink
i mean the last song is a paul buchanan cover how could i not
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Monday, 7 November 2016 14:12 (two years ago) Permalink
Thank you for ths thread NotEnough, "All That Matters" is exactly what I need in my life.
― Ross, Friday, 11 November 2016 04:12 (two years ago) Permalink
I love this album, thanks to thread for telling me about it.
― droit au butt (Euler), Friday, 11 November 2016 06:40 (two years ago) Permalink
Rapidly coming to the conclusion that this is my favourite album of the year. I've also only just discovered that it's a concept album about slipping into Alzheimer's, the dense fog of the second half of the record makes so much sense in that context.
― Matt DC, Tuesday, 22 November 2016 11:24 (one year ago) Permalink
Yeah, it's not like it doesn't make sense without that link, but once you know it everything sort of snaps into focus. Again, very similar to The Ninth Wave IMO.
― Tim F, Tuesday, 22 November 2016 13:04 (one year ago) Permalink
Funny how tunes like "Invisible City" and "Conversations" are so obviously directly addressing this subject matter once you're aware. It's a real "ohhh" moment.
― Tim F, Tuesday, 22 November 2016 13:07 (one year ago) Permalink
wow, this is fantastic
― ufo, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 14:19 (one year ago) Permalink
This is by some way my favourite album of last year. She was fantastic live as well.
― Matt DC, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 14:22 (one year ago) Permalink
i didn't see this in EOY.. so i didn't vote it :-(
― Lennon, Elvis, Hendrix etc (dog latin), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 14:36 (one year ago) Permalink
It's in there
― Le Bateau Ivre, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 14:40 (one year ago) Permalink
"awake but still dreaming" is amaaaazing
― k3vin k., Tuesday, 31 January 2017 19:32 (one year ago) Permalink
I was introduced to her work via OMD (who sampled her) and also because she was part of John Foxx and The Maths. Predictably, I like her stuff a hell of a lot.
― Working night & day, I tried to stay awake... (Turrican), Tuesday, 31 January 2017 20:38 (one year ago) Permalink
uh i need to hear this whole album
― k3vin k., Monday, 26 June 2017 21:51 (one year ago) Permalink
There's an intriguing sounding new album called Mary Casio: Journey to Cassiopeia coming soon too: http://thequietus.com/articles/22537-new-hannah-peel-single
― Iain Mew (if), Monday, 26 June 2017 22:05 (one year ago) Permalink
this sounds highly promising
― joshywinty (josh), Tuesday, 27 June 2017 04:53 (one year ago) Permalink
Performing a short free gig at the South Bank in a couple of weeks https://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/whats-on/121724-mary-casio-journey-cassiopeia-2017
― Stevie T, Tuesday, 27 June 2017 10:26 (one year ago) Permalink
I can't stop listening to her new single. It seems weird to call it a single. It reminds me very much of Penguin Cafe Orchestra in mood and composition, although the execution is a bit more epic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEZjDpwuM-w
― brontosaur, Wednesday, 30 August 2017 15:23 (one year ago) Permalink
I'm not sure when Hannah Peel turned into Tangerine Dream, but this is absolutely incredible.
― Einstürzende NEU!bauten (Branwell with an N), Friday, 29 September 2017 08:04 (one year ago) Permalink
Is the new album out? Everything I've heard from it has sounded like a kosmische colliery band and has been fantastic.
― Matt DC, Friday, 29 September 2017 08:30 (one year ago) Permalink
Well, it's on Spotify.
Look, it's like Acid Brass live at Kölner Dom in wibbletastic glory. But more elegant and elegiac.
This is so much my alley, it's rifling through my bins and piecing together my credit card receipts.
― Einstürzende NEU!bauten (Branwell with an N), Friday, 29 September 2017 08:37 (one year ago) Permalink
The little music box interlude on the final song, Planet of Passed Souls, just sent shivers down my spine.
She has a way of being completely EPIC!!!! and MAGNIFICENT!!! and SPACERAWK!!!!!! and yet somehow completely intimate at the same time?
― Einstürzende NEU!bauten (Branwell with an N), Friday, 29 September 2017 08:44 (one year ago) Permalink
this is unbelievable
― ToddBonzalez (BradNelson), Friday, 29 September 2017 14:09 (one year ago) Permalink
holy crap
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Friday, 29 September 2017 14:41 (one year ago) Permalink
chipping in to say that all comments above are true.
first thought it was great, but was panned and mixed weirdly, then the colliery band brought a wall of sound right where I had thought something was missing,
and I was like "ah yes"
kicking myself for not making it out the the southbank show a month or so back....
― my opinionation (Hamildan), Friday, 29 September 2017 16:19 (one year ago) Permalink
Fucking hell
― the article don, Friday, 29 September 2017 20:26 (one year ago) Permalink
Damnit, I need to hear this. ABAD was a top 5er for me last year - this woman is incredibly talented.
― octobeard, Saturday, 30 September 2017 01:27 (one year ago) Permalink
This is everything that you all said it was. Holy shit what a record. Those horns are used so perfectly to blend with the synths to create such sonic harmony, timbral harmony, even. Think it was the beginning of Andromeda, but there's a moment where a horn comes in, is drenched in reverb and surrounded by analog synth tones and blends to become a whole. Another track utilized the intense bottom end on a bass synth tone to fill in the horns filling up the middle of the frequencies. This album is really well mixed.
it's like a synthony! Alright, back to bed.
― octobeard, Saturday, 30 September 2017 07:33 (one year ago) Permalink
She is so good. Glad to see someone who got their start on my friend's label Static Caravan reaching these levels. She completely deserves it. I think each release of hers eclipses the previous one.
― akm, Tuesday, 14 November 2017 18:57 (one year ago) Permalink
this album was incredible
― bodak horseman (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 14 November 2017 19:07 (one year ago) Permalink
certainly one of the best of the year. feel like it'll be overlooked.
― akm, Tuesday, 14 November 2017 19:12 (one year ago) Permalink
(and by that I mean the Mary Casio album)
― akm, Tuesday, 14 November 2017 19:16 (one year ago) Permalink
If you include last year's Magnetic North album she's made three tremendous albums in two years. Hard to think of another artist in such great form right now.
― Matt DC, Tuesday, 14 November 2017 19:20 (one year ago) Permalink
I love this year's album and the one from last year that I knew, don't know of the Magnetic North but will seek that out
― droit au butt (Euler), Tuesday, 14 November 2017 19:26 (one year ago) Permalink
Just ordered it from Juno. Wish she'd put out her covers EP on a 10" or something. Double 7" would be tasty.
― brotherlovesdub, Tuesday, 14 November 2017 19:26 (one year ago) Permalink
3-hour "New Year space mix" up on BBC for another few days - I'll probably have to finagle some sort of VPN to listen to it when I'm home:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09kg5xd
― etc, Thursday, 1 February 2018 23:01 (nine months ago) Permalink
I saw Hannah with Tubular Brass the other night in London and want to encourage anyone who gets a chance to see her (either alone, or with them) to do so. It was quite astounding. They did mary casio; and then tubular brass did their arrangement of tubular bells, which I wasn't expecting at all but was lovely. She's a perfectly lovely and nice person as well. Very grateful I got a chance to see this as her chances of bringing all of this to the US ever are pretty much nil due to the expense.
― akm, Tuesday, 17 April 2018 20:37 (seven months ago) Permalink
also: the chorus boy at the end of the Mary Casio album: this is a recording of her grandfather from the early 20th century. Not sure if this has been noted anywhere else; the guy from Tubular Brass informed everyone after her set.
― akm, Friday, 27 April 2018 02:54 (six months ago) Permalink
Took awhile for me to get into the record as all that matters is a classic pop misdirection move. The rest of the album feels closer to the sideways pop of hukkelberg or stina nordenstam
― synonym toast crunch (Ross), Tuesday, 5 June 2018 19:16 (five months ago) Permalink
Remix album: https://hannahpeel.tmstor.es/cart/product.php?id=37199
― A Box of After Dinner Comics Shipped to Your House Each Month (seandalai), Thursday, 28 June 2018 23:28 (four months ago) Permalink
hell yeah
― flamenco blorf (BradNelson), Friday, 29 June 2018 23:46 (four months ago) Permalink