{"id":90682,"date":"2012-06-12T12:26:50","date_gmt":"2012-06-12T16:26:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/90682\/bjork-bola\/"},"modified":"2012-06-12T12:26:50","modified_gmt":"2012-06-12T16:26:50","slug":"bjork-bola","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/90682\/bjork-bola\/","title":{"rendered":"BJORK &amp; BOLA"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><font face=\"helvetica\" size=\"3\">What can I say about Bjork that hasn&#8217;t already been said?\u00a0 Love her or hate her, you have to admit that she is truly one of a kind.\u00a0 She has been involved in the music industry since the age of twelve.\u00a0 Before her &#8216;proper&#8217; debut solo album, she was one of The Sugarcubes (the band had several hits, including the joyous Birthday).\u00a0 Since then, she has forged a very unusual and uncompromising career path.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font face=\"helvetica\" size=\"3\">It didn&#8217;t always work too well.\u00a0 For her fifth album (Medulla) Bjork decided she didn&#8217;t want any conventional rhythms (she replaced everything with vocal fragments and effects).\u00a0 Experimentation can result in great things.\u00a0 Medulla isn&#8217;t one of them.\u00a0 Bjork&#8217;s first three albums (Debut, Post and Homogenic) are all excellent.\u00a0 Telegram (a remix album) has its moments.\u00a0 Vespertine is much softer (although more intense in parts).\u00a0 It is a beautiful album.\u00a0 The rhythms returned on Volta.\u00a0 It was a return to form, for the fascinating Icelandic creature.\u00a0 Biophilia, on the other hand, is another step backwards.\u00a0 There are a few box-sets, for hardcore fans.\u00a0 They are not easy to find though.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Bjork - Pagan Poetry\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/pJVsy0z9I40?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><font face=\"helvetica\" size=\"3\">Boards Of Canada (a Scottish duo) specialises in moody electronica.\u00a0 Apart from vocal effects and samples, it is strictly instrumental music.\u00a0 It is very relaxing (similar in style to Ulrich Schnauss but more glitchy and disjointed).\u00a0 Boards Of Canada only had three albums (and three EPs).\u00a0 Music Has The Right To Children (1998) remains the best BOC album.\u00a0 The follow up (Geogaddi) is more convoluted &#8211; and less exciting.\u00a0 More thought and effort went into The Campfire Headphase.\u00a0 If you like the albums, the EPs are worth buying.\u00a0 There is also a mini-album (Twoism) which is a collection of early BOC works (prior to 1998 and previously unreleased on CD).<\/font><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Boards of Canada - Amo Bishop Roden\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZiKI4oK6OPI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><font face=\"helvetica\" size=\"3\">Bola (or &#8216;the Bolaman&#8217;) is one of my favourite solo artists.\u00a0 The Mancunian has crafted four albums, full of intriguing electronic soundscapes.\u00a0 He combines complex rhythms with beautiful strings and effects in a unique way.\u00a0 In the nineties, he worked with Autechre (before Autechre turned to shit).\u00a0 He has since excelled, with flawless productions of his own.\u00a0 There is also an untitled collection of early tracks, which is definitely a worthwhile addition to the Bolaman&#8217;s catalogue (it is usually referred to as Shapes).\u00a0 Don&#8217;t let the titles put you off (Soup, Fyuti, Gnayse and Kroungrine; all very corny indeed).\u00a0 All of Bola&#8217;s albums are superb.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"bola - pae paoe\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZviA0Kpyvlw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><font face=\"helvetica\" size=\"3\">Blancmange released a brand new album in 2010 (the first for a quarter of a century).\u00a0 I haven&#8217;t heard it, but I do have all of Blancmange&#8217;s eighties albums (Happy Families, Mange Tout and Believe You Me).\u00a0 There are more compilations than albums, which is a bit ridiculous (one singles collection would&#8217;ve sufficed &#8211; although there is one great b-side called Get Out Of That, which is not available on the first singles collection).\u00a0 Blancmange was never a &#8216;big league&#8217; player, but there were some good songs (eg. Living On The Ceiling, Don&#8217;t Tell Me and Blind Vision).\u00a0 Evidently inspired by various bands of the era (from Cabaret Voltaire and Fad Gadget to Ultravox and Thompson Twins) Blancmange was never really innovative.\u00a0 The duo did have a certain quirkiness though.\u00a0 I wonder if the comeback album is any good.<\/font><\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=EmWA0DWzH_U<\/p>\n<p><font face=\"helvetica\" size=\"3\">I was never a huge fan of the Brit-pop scene.\u00a0 I seem to remember liking Oasis for about five minutes, in the mid-nineties.\u00a0 I do have The Best Of Blur though.\u00a0 It is a great collection of songs, which highlights Damon Albarn&#8217;s superior and versatile songwriting abilities &#8211; compared with Noel Gallagher and most of his contemporaries.\u00a0 Once Damon focused on the development of Gorillaz, Blur was effectively over.\u00a0 There was one more album (Think Tank) but Graham Coxon had already left the band (he only contributed one song).\u00a0 Damon&#8217;s heart wasn&#8217;t in it anymore.\u00a0 Aside from Gorillaz, he has been involved with various projects (like The Good, The Bad And The Queen).\u00a0 He has worked with Toumani Diabate (who also worked with Bjork) and Massive Attack.\u00a0 Everything he touches seems to turn to gold.\u00a0 He is one of my favourite musicians.<\/font><\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Yx9nuuuquxQ<\/p>\n<p><font face=\"helvetica\" size=\"4\"><strong>Further listening<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=YpqtavXk5ZA&#038;feature=results_video&#038;playnext=1&#038;list=PL88B0E4A087D0C8D6<\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=wkn1rIq_7a4<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Boards of Canada- An Eagle Inside Your Mind (Consumed And Regurgitated by Push Button Object)\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/3HuciyzkWvw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What can I say about Bjork that hasn&#8217;t already been said?\u00a0 Love her or hate her, you have to admit that she is truly one of a kind.\u00a0 She has been involved in the music industry since the age of twelve.\u00a0 Before her &#8216;proper&#8217; debut solo album, she was one of The Sugarcubes (the band [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[5439,5442,5443,5440,5441,108],"class_list":["post-90682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music","tag-bjork","tag-blancmange","tag-blur","tag-boards-of-canada","tag-bola","tag-music-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90682\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}