List The Direct References of Stereolab

BUT the coda for the song "The Free Design" is an intact borrowing of the intro to ABBA's "Dancing Queen"

Holy shit, so it does! That's why it's bothered me for so many years.

Hey and now Dancing Queen's always going to remind me of The Free Design.

I think they got that part via "Oliver's Army."

j/k

Oliver and his army
Will work on a project
To make the people happy
And further production

NTI -- there was an ILE thread where people were having fun posting my real name a lot, so the Lou E. Jagga code got applied. This will be awesome if I become famous and successful and there are threads like "Nobel Prize awarded to BAN ME."

It's funny how it seems like you agree with me about the mechanics of point (c), but still see it as a problem! I think the thing I'm trying to get at there is that it's not necessarily a matter of varying levels of "creativity" -- the way Stereolab will approach a task like "sounding like Neu!" does not seem to me to be particularly less creative than the way some standard-ass rock band might approach "sounding like the Clash." And Milton's point about having an alternate history of basic references is kind of key here. I think I wrote somewhere (review of Oscillons?) that there was a later-90s point where any given Stereolab track seemed like a thought experiment in imagining different pop worlds: one song where pop's main influences were Hardy / Denny / Faust, another where pop's main influences were Can / Jarre / Gilberto, and so on infinitely. This made for interesting stuff, I think.

I am totally cool with you just plain being bored with it; I just tend not to agree with the idea that it's some kind of shameless mix-and-match "easy" plundering, largely because they've tended to do the mixing and matching in a really sophisticated and hard-working way.

Wait, wait, wait -- I think you misread what I meant. I'm not saying they're boring -- I'm saying I may have missed how fascinating they are! I may have missed the extent to which they were essentially coding everything they did in, yes, another language quite apart from what we think of when we think of "pop." And yes, I'm saying that's actually a helluva lot more fascinating than, yeah, "Now let's juxtapose Neu! and Bridget Bardot."

I still find the depth of their plundering to be kind of remarkable -- it's certainly far more sophisticated than I'd thought when I listened to them during the mid-90s. I mean, Magma notwithstanding, there aren't too many acts who've essentially created their own language.

So, getting back to my earlier point, I guess that's the aesthetic then -- "Stereolab's Bizarro Pop Canon."

Yeah, that's definitely a good part of the appeal! If you listen through the EP tracks on Oscillons, you get more of a sense of how they were working that angle -- a lot of their sidework tracks seemed like fun-experiment answers to questions, some of which actually may be as simple as "what if Bardot fronted Faust?" and the like. Did someone mention upthread how their on-stage set-lists would contain working titles that were just the sources -- songs referred to as, say, "Sun Ra Cage" or "Can samba" or whatever? The main one that always sticks out in my memory had the working title "Heavenly Van Halen," which is the kind of interesting pop-imagination experiment I can totally go for. (Was that the one that wound up being called "Pinball?")

BUT the coda for the song "The Free Design" is an intact borrowing of the intro to ABBA's "Dancing Queen"

Wow, I must say -- I just dl'd Cobra Phase and listened to this w/o actually hearing it, until I played it back. It's pretty clearly intentional but buried beyond belief.

Incidentally, I'm only 3 songs into it, but Cobra Phase seems pretty packed with the Dave Brubeck "Take Five" grooves.

Some further insights via Simon Reynolds' interview w/ them in 1996:

"I'm not into the kitsch element," Gane says. "I'm more into the futuristic side, the way orchestral big band music was crossed in the '60s with early electronic music – stuff that was originally done for cynical, commercial reasons often resulted in some very strange combinations and juxtapositions of sounds."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/3a/Sound-dust.jpg/200px-Sound-dust.jpg
http://img1.gildia.pl/_n_/film/filmy/cul_de_sac/poster-200.jpg

Listened to "The Free Design" yesterday, off "Oscillons"...

Yep.

Here's parts V and VI from that dude who did the youtube dissections that nabisco and others linked to upthread.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZkpyzXVOFk

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZAxxMQwzL0Y

Personally, I think nearly all of these are OTM. Only the Cybele's Reverie one was too much of a stretch for me.

>-- dad a, Thursday, 8 November 2007 14:42 (5 hours ago) Link

thank you! I searched and searched but couldn't find it

I'd forgotten the degree to which they really just used that Polanski poster as clip art

yeah that's amazing

I already knew the majority of musical stuff in this thread but the visual ones like the Polanski poster and the Peng! cartoon are great

Milton, you were so comprehensive I had to read the thread twice to make sure I hadn't overlooked it! For extra credit here's Komeda's Polanski soundtrack:

http://www.soundtrackcorner.de/images/cul_de_sac_HRKCD8137.jpg

It sez something about Stereolab that pt six of that vid has two equally plausible origins of Metronomic Underground (and that's before anyone Kraut rock is considered too.)

the "Symbolic Logic of Now!" rip of Archie Shepp's "Akai" and the "Margarine Melodie" rip of Ron Grainger's "Theme from Omega Man" sound like insane plundering to me, Nabisco

better Philip Glass tracks to illustrate "Kybernetická babicka": "Music In Twelve Parts, Part 11" or some of the choral pieces from "North Star"

ok they're referencing 'The Omega Man', 10,000 points to anyone who can find a "Demon Seed" or "Phase IV" reference

and putting "symbolic logic of now" and scrolling past about 15 mail order hits, you get a fragment of an online book called "PERFORMANCE ANTHOLOGY" about California Performance art in the 70's and a reference to a piece by video artist Joel Glassman

http://books.google.com/books?id=lu7KPDCfcXMC&pg=PA520&lpg=PA520&dq=%22symbolic+logic+of+now%22&source=web&ots=M6h1noVnPN&sig=LXv4xzXCgcPI_0AhFnnvddU8HvU#PPP1,M1

anyone saying that they may not be borrowing _that much_ only makes me think that person isn't even bothering to notice their project, these are not just songs, but clues

oh and I just found two Cluster samples on Fab-Four Suture, if anyone has the packaging perhaps they can tell me if they even credited or paid. they obviously go on listening tears to specific artists while recording single albums.

'Excursions Into Oh, A-oh' samples a loop of 'Prothese' from Grosses Wasser
'Widow Weirdo' samples a loop of 'Caramel' from Zuckerzeit

No mention of Cluster samples in the FFS (FFS!) artwork, such that it is (single card insert, CD back cover, that's it).

not to be self-righteous about uncleared sampling or anything

the loops themselves are more winking ornamental shoutouts than integral elements

10,000 points to anyone who can find a "Demon Seed" or "Phase IV" reference

Add N to X got there first on Demon Seed:
http://www.discogs.com/release/325990

...but Andy Ramsey from Stereolab does play on this track!

(/lab geek. I deserve my 10,000 points for that one!)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Sound-dust.jpg
http://www.starstore.com/acatalog/Castle_Grayskull.jpg

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/0/05/200px-Sound-dust.jpg

Golly, I'm drunk

The Incredible Shrinking He-Man

Was just listening to Steve Hillage's "It's all too much", the refrain of which bears striking resemblance to "I'm going out of my way" from Transient Random Noise Bursts, right down to the overdriven organ.

According to this interview the title of Sound Dust comes from the liner notes to a Messiaen record. Which one?

not sure, it'd be appropriate for any of them. tim mentions the Turangalila here. a lot of Sound-Dust strikes me as Komeda production & arrangements of Messiaen chord sequences). One of my favorite Stereolab moments ever is that shifting filtered sequence at the end of "Gus The Mynah-Bird", which reminds me of "Vingt Regards".

Messiaen POV / POX

Parts 7 & 8 of the 'Stereolab Origins' series, part 8 includes a bit of the Turangalila

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bV78kmTqH3k

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yn7vfuC-waE

Maybe he's talking about this? Pupils of Messaien, A Capella Works by Messaien, Stockhausen & Xenakis - one of the Stockhausen pieces, Agnus Dei, describes the Lamb of God by saying, "its step makes the sound of rainfall on the dust."

Anyone heard the Monade record? I like it but it's basically just Cobra and Phases Group without the fiddlier bits.

the other day I found a copy of the "Stereolab" edition of Tchaikovsky's Symphony #6 Pathetique on Vanguard - the 'Lab nicked the cover design for the sleeve of "Space Age Bachelor Pad Music". Wish I could post a scan, can't find an image online...

http://www.discogs.com/Stereolab-Explosante-Fixe/release/1469221

http://www.amazon.com/Boulez-Explosante-fixe-Ensemble-Intercontemporain/dp/B0007404HI

the Stereolab Origins series on Youtube is up to episode 13. It's so much fun, you try to guess which track is about to be cut to, providing a vague match, but I'm out of my depth by this point (though man, it's clear I really need to hunt down every last Don Cherry album I can find)

4) The alternate set list name for "Blips" is "Emil". Surprised?

Nooo

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/519FURrEsmL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

ha ha WOW the first one on part IX, biggest laugh yet

More film references:
"Fuses": http://www.ubu.com/film/schneeman_fuses.html
"Three Women": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQPnxmVJMrY

And updated links for previously mentioned films:
"Kyberneticka Babicka": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjbHIKwoXCM
"Emperor Tomato Ketchup" (NSFW): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46xmL9OcwrE

Ok, noob here but haven't found a more specific Don Cherry pointer so here goes.

The bass line in Percolator comes from Don Cherry's fantastic Relativity Suite album of 1973, more specifically from the end of "Tantra" or the beginning of "Mali Doussn'gouni".
The Rhodes Piano ostinato riff in Metronomic Underground I think comes from "Desireless" of the same album.

Check it out: http://thebrewingluminous.blogspot.com/2007/04/don-cherry-relativity-suite.html

If you're a spotifyer, check out Sweden jazz giant Lennart Åbergs cover of aforementioned Don Cherry work here:

spotify:track:3f5Z65Jasm4QHl14FGQOPm

http://cdn1.ioffer.com/img/item/139/182/933/ecHJ.jpg

JOHN WRIGHT AND CLEMENT BROWN - HI-FI SOUND STEREO TEST RECORD. Hi-Fi Sound Records HFS75 UK Stereo LP 1974.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41S2T56GREL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

Transient Random-Noise Bursts with Announcements

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41jqqDkhhiL._AA300_.jpg

Transient Random-Noise Bursts with Announcements - back cover

andy ramsey credited with "persuasive percussion"

combines back covers of Enoch Light's

Persuasive Percussion and Provocative Percussion albums of the mid-'50s, which were some of the first albums to exploit the capabilities of stereo recording and 35mm film as a recording devise.

http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/ciu/05/4f/1de4228348a02a7aecc34110.L.jpg
http://tralfaz-archives.com/coverart/L/Light/light_dim3b.jpg

haha this is the very first time i've noticed that the cover of TRNBWA is a record player. i r incredibly unobservant

hmm shouldn't have included cd re-issue

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2099/2213161022_2fd09a5fcb.jpg

did anyone post this Nini Raviolette song? it's not direct, but it can't really get anymore direct

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3n95BQEfLso

I love this thread...
Another film reference - Serene Velocity: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYfNFtLSuv4

Jacques Siroul

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASO4yDmwGfA

wow, that was more fun than a bag of monkeys. thanks.

What a great thread. Too bad some of the Youtubes are now unavailable

i just came here to post that i love this thread.

these are not just songs, but clues

― Milton Parker, Friday, 9 November 2007 00:25 (4 years ago)