Cornelius - Mellow Waves (2017)

it's not melodically rich but he's developed a superb sense of sound design (prob. why he works best in collaboration!)

This "sound design" thing needs to be addressed though. WTF is it supposed to mean? Is he more of a "sound designer" than Metallica, Brian Eno, Billy Childish, Jim Thirwell or literally anyone else who makes a track where a specific philosophy re. the sound is a strong guiding motive? Feels like this has become a genre like "indie" which is now disconnected from the actual definition of the word. Applied to Cornelius, "sound design" seems like a portentous way to describe "Crises"-era Mike Oldfield-inspired production paired with a rather narrow palate of chimes, creaks, rimshots etc (with lots of dramatic stereo effects of course.) As a solo artist, Cornelius has painted himself into a corner with this stuff.

he does one thing and he does it extremely well. if lack of variety is a bad thing in a listener's book, cornelius will never be more than a second rate talent at best. personally i'm not bothered about his limitations.

He only does one thing NOW. His mid-late 90s stuff was all over the place. It's disappointing how narrow his range has ended up.

i don't get it, is he supposed to somehow break the rule that every musician from the dawn of time has succumbed to? people get old, they get conservative. artists's experimental bent naturally becomes more refined with time. compared Bob Dylan 1966 to 1986. what a slacker, right. painted himself into a corner. Paul McCartney wrote "Yesterday" in 1965 and twenty years later he made Give My Regards to Broad Street.

hey I'm just saying what everyone else here seems to be dancing around - that it's quite a boring album - a disappointment. No doubt a month after Give My Regards To Broad Street came out lots of McCartney fans were observing that the hype had mysteriously died and that they weren't returning to the album much, despite the awesome sound design.

Conservative and refined doesn't have to lead to boring.

i'm listening to it more than i am to a lot of the other 2017 records i liked... but maybe i am a boring person!

i also don't think that "mellow waves" is any more stylistically limited as an album than "fantasma" was, once you strip away all of the stuff he nicked from other people. i mean maybe mellow waves would be a better album if he put more effort into ripping off sampha or daniel caesar but it doesn't quite seem like a fair criticism to make?

i think the eno point of reference is an interesting one. i've found pretty much everything eno's done since "my squelchy life" to be really tediously dull, but i haven't had that experience with cornelius. chacun à son goût i guess?

feel like i agree that "it's boring" but it doesn't matter, in fact, i like it. the album is called Mellow Waves so i would just change" boring" to "mellow".

fwiw this year i finally started listening in earnest to Steely Dan and soft rock for the first time in my life, maybe i am turning in a boring old fart lol. if i want to blow my brains out i can always thrown on "Ball In-Kick Off" this stuff will do nicely

I'd take an entire album of that guitar solo on "If You're Here." It's a good record, but there are too many filler tracks, which I'll admit he's always seemed fond of, and not enough content.

the guitar solo on if you're here is one of my favourite things he's done

my vinyl copy showed up friday, im listening this morning. it's really good hangover music

Sounding very nice on my stereo, glad I don't have to stream it anymore. I forgot how much "In a Dream" sounds like Prefab Sprout's "Appetite."

they are on tour right now. saw some cool photos of them playing in Mexico a few days ago. also this!

https://i.imgur.com/jks8CZn.png

got to say a Mac Demarco/Cornelius split EP would be a sweet thing to hear.

there's also Constellations of Music, which is basically CM5 but does contain a few original tracks on it (including two by salyu x salyu, one of which is a great cover of "Hammond Song")

wow, this "hammond song" cover!!

otoh, yeah, this new cornelius album is pretty boring, huh? wish he'd just work with salyu more instead tbh. there's some cool stuff on here but the laid back arrangements make his weak vox stick out kinda uncomfortably imo.

how's the live show these days?

Saw them at the 930 club in DC and loved the video/visuals and much of the music (the art-pop with rhythmic beat cuts more than the 2 that sounded kinda metalcore0

http://thequietus.com/articles/23926-cornelius-interview-favourite-albums

He did another top album list...Smiths, Prefab Sprout, Donovan, D'angelo, Jeff Phelps and more

listened to (s)oun(d)beams for the first time in a while today and it's still excellent, one of his best works & i really hope there's more salyu x salyu someday. definitely better than Mellow Waves

I forget where I saw this first, but I looked it up again after seeing the thread and think this is new?

http://www.hmv.co.jp/newsdetail/article/1802201001/

https://www.npr.org/event/music/593894464/cornelius-tiny-desk-concert

ah, cool stuff, thanks for the link

xxp - that must be a second volume of music from the NHK Design Ah show. I have the first disc and it's pretty good - even more granular and stripped back than Sensuous but actually a bit better than that album. because at least the concept is clear.

he looks so young

has anyone seen him on the latest tour? bummed i missed the sf show.

xp yeah wtf has he been sealed in a box these last 12 years

nm just read review upthread and watched the npr thing :D

https://itunes.apple.com/jp/album/design-a-2/1357728295

new nhk design is out

nowhere to download if you're not in Japan, though... not as far as I can tell. lotsa samples at the link.

http://towershibuya.jp/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/18_02_22_DA2L-0002-1024x683.jpg

Packaging for the new one looks cool.

mellow waves is good, i just listened to it for the first time

Anyone tracked down a copy of the new NHK Design in the wild? I'm thinking of ordering it. What's the best shop?

I bought it on iTunes Japan.

It's really good. Stands on its own.

I dare say it's better than Mellow Waves!

Check it out.

http://cornelius.patatap.com/

that NHK comp is really good! better than the first one, even. love that he brought back the Teriyaki Boyz beat he did and added in Cibo Matto

Yeah, it's really good. Worth the purchase.

apparently cornelius covered "passionfruit" for a spotify session. i've never heard anything drake's done in his entire career and also i don't spotify so i'll probably never hear it, but i bet it's good.

it's pretty groovy and shockingly faithful to the original

there's a volume 3 NHK comp coming out? damn!

That's great. The second one is awesome.

i forget the name of the track, but the interview about fave albums reminds me that he played a song at field day a few weeks back that was basically Appetite by prefab sprout. not that thats a bad thing, in fact its a very good thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkOdy7l9qZI

「デザインあ3」発売！
2018.07.18 発売￥2,000+税
WPCL-12891

1. 朝の5分版テーマ
2. デザインあのテーマ (うた　ショコラ)
3. 森羅万象 (うた　大野由美子)
4. 見えないものを見る
5. ピッタリ (うた　小山田圭吾)
6. 都市のレイヤー
7. てん せん めん (うた　ショコラ)
8. そざい体操第一
9. 間に合わせる
10. SHOOT&EDIT (うた　LEO今井)
11. くりかえし
12. めでたい - おせち (KAKATO - 環ROY × 鎮座DOPENESS)
13. クラッチ
14. もん
15. まつ (うた　高橋幸宏)
16. きせる
17. うちとそと
18. ポスターフライト
19. ことのはうた (うた　中納良恵)
20. チーム○○
21. エンディングテーマ

There's also a DVD - https://youtu.be/M0QCTBOAsYg

these little design あ records are so fun

Has anyone heard the third NHK yet?

Also, how about this?

https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/international/8466374/japan-cornelius-new-album-ripple-waves

only on the first track but I'm really amused by this so far

I dont think this album is particularly mellow

new NHK record is good. they're all inconsistent and fun and better than mellow waves.

I just picked it up. I think all 3 NHK records are kind of the same but they're all really tasty - lots of great moments on this one.

Not sure what to think of Ripple Waves yet - I kinda wish the new stuff had been sectioned off into an EP or something, cuz that's all pretty good. I don't have much use for Cornelius remixes...he's one of those musicians that always seems to get it right the first time.

What's your take on the third one? I've got 1 & 2. 2 is fantastic. Is 3 worth tracking down?

Yeah. It's more like 2 than 1 - each track is sort of its own thing. The one with Leo Imai is really nice. I think Takahashi makes an appearance too. There is a bit of repetition here (one track is a little jam off "Helix/Spiral" and I think one is repeated from the other volumes) but it's worth getting if you liked the other two. As always the sound design is impeccable. These sort of small, somewhat gimmicky compositions are really up his alley.

new one is really nice. in retrospect Mellow Waves feels like a run up to this. its actually kind of funky in spots but overall quite sad. the death of 2 YMO members I think weighs heavy on this. speaking of which it's a bit odd that he decided to re-record "Environmental" since it was just on the Metafive album from last year. I guess it's a much better fit here. anyways the long track "Dream in the Mist" is a real showstopper, could listen to an entire album like that