A Sense of Doubt blog post #2323 - Lisa Gerrard's Favorite Music: Musical Monday for 2106.28
Don't tell me you have never heard of Lisa Gerrard of DEAD CAN DANCE??
One of the best ways to learn about more music and amazing music is with recommendations from some of your favorite musical artists.
I hope you like it, too. Thanks for stopping by today.
https://thequietus.com/articles/30130-lisa-gerrard-bakers-dozen-favourite-albums
A Drone And A Drum: Lisa Gerrard's Favourite Music
Lottie Brazier , June 23rd, 2021 08:57
From falling into the ‘massive abyss’ of Alfred Schnittke, to the ‘silly and lovely’ Electric Light Orchestra, Lisa Gerrard of Dead Can Dance delivers Lottie Brazier a guide to her thirteen favourite pieces of music
You’ve probably heard Lisa Gerrard’s voice without realising it; as a sample, it introduces the first hazy bars of The Future Sound Of London’s one-of-a-kind rave anthem ‘Papua New Guinea’. Signed to 4AD alongside Cocteau Twins, Gerrard’s own group Dead Can Dance sound more earthy than their labelmates; listening to Cocteau Twins, for her, is more like flying or floating instead. Gerrard herself is a fan of the Cocteau Twins, but stresses that they were in no way trying to emulate them. Dead Can Dance’s self-titled debut was most evocative of their namesake, a palette cemented in a murky guitar sound, distant-sounding drum machines and grainy samples.
Although this most certainly earned them a place on the 4AD roster, their sound became more spacious and dramatic over time, growing as if perceiving their setup more like an orchestra than a band. Gerrard describes how Dead Can Dance toured all over Europe, listening to cassettes, absorbing folk and classical traditions. Their song structures eventually become unrecognisable compared to their early work; The Serpent’s Egg has a kind of regal melancholy and a choral focus, and Aion a medieval-sounding range.
Aside from smattering of impressive performances with Dead Can Dance in recent years, Gerrard has become increasingly more focused on her own solo output. In 2020 she released an album with The Genesis Orchestra, conducted by Yordan Kamdzhalov; a challenge for her to sing in Polish. This May, she released the album Burn, composed with Jules Maxwell, and produced by James Chapman of Maps. It is also to be released as a NFT on the eco-friendly platform Hic Et Nunc.
Listening to Lisa Gerrard talk about her Baker’s Dozen choices, and her musical roots in piano accordion, it’s easy to see how the Dead Can Dance sound is so engulfed in the traditions that inspired them. However, among these are a few surprises, showing a much lighter, humorous side to a singer who just commands so much seriousness in her voice.
Lisa Gerrard's new album 'Burn' with Jules Maxwell is out now. To begin reading her Baker’s Dozen, click the picture of her below
Bulgarian State Radio & Television Female Vocal Choir - Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares
I’ve always loved them, because they’re so full of light. I wanted to sing like them, so I wrote the ‘Host of the Seraphim’, and really with that song I was trying to copy them. Brendan [Perry] helped me of course, but it was really inspired by the Bulgarian singers.
When I first saw them sing live, they came on stage like red triangles, with these flowers, and these triangular gowns. It was at the time when we were in London, and would have been during the mid-80s, maybe early 80s. It was very dark, music was very sad, people wanted to talk about things that were affecting them that they weren’t happy about. Then you had this Bulgarian music that was 1000 years old, this music that just elevated you right out of the darkness; you realised that the way out of the darkness was in this context.
When you are in the presence of these women, when you hear them sing, you don’t have to know anything about their history, which by the way is phenomenal. They had to avoid the Ottomans. On the back of that, there’s a huge history with them of secret languages, embroidery and gowns. It’s stunning stuff, you know. Their singing was developed because of calling animals in the mountains. I have also been told by the Bulgarians that the Ottomans couldn’t actually convert the Bulgarians, because there was a body of water that they couldn’t cross on horseback. So there were places where they could actually hide in the mountains. They dressed their sons up at 12 years old as women, so that they wouldn’t be captured or killed. There are all these kinds of amazing stories.
The Godz - The Godz 2
The reason that I loved The Godz was because first of all I fell in love with the name. And in some way, they had this very 60s sound. It was a little bit like a psychedelic Joy Division. They were sort of deep and dark and depressing but sort of psychedelic at the same time. ‘Radar Eyes’ was my favourite song. There’s a kind of gargling drone in the background. It’s really brilliant.
Nico - The Marble Index
Marble Index was the album by Nico that really turned my head. I probably acquired it when I was about 16. I used to buy my records from the Oxfam shops, the ‘opportunity shops’. Someone who went there obviously liked The Velvet Underground because there were lots of their records, as well as Nico and Lou Reed’s solo albums. I didn’t like a lot of their music, but I did love Nico. Marble Index was among that batch of albums. It was way back, pre-cassette. I was just very curious; I used to buy records because I liked the cover. I didn’t have a clue who they were. I loved it when someone had a cigarette or something, I would think, ‘Oh, that looks interesting.’ I would never buy anything if it had a bunch of guys in suits and bow ties on the cover!
Nico played harmonium, she played a little piano. I loved her, because my career started with playing the accordion when I was 12. I did identify with the fact that there was an orchestra inside every note of the harmonium, and the piano accordion. So when I heard her, it gave me permission to play the piano accordion in an abstract way. You didn’t have to do ‘jigs and reels’, you could just play and sing to it. What you realise is that the accordion is inside this huge wooden lung, and it’s got woodwind, and strings and organs, it has all of these sounds inside when you touch these chords. They’re all in there. That’s what struck me about the instrument, that it’s so tactile. It didn’t matter if you played one note or 10. Just feeling the vibration of it against your chest when you’re playing it, it almost activates this automatic response which is to sing. I love that about Nico with the harmonium; even though she didn’t have that presence of this wooden lung against the outside of her chest, she had something that was in some way similar [to the accordion] in that it sounds like an orchestra trapped inside a music box.
Electric Light Orchestra
I love Electric Light Orchestra, because they’re so silly and lovely. Their lyrics tap into the everyday; just the sort of things you have as your thoughts, but you would never admit, because you want to come across as more intelligent. They’re really honest: ‘Hello, how are you, have you been alright? it’s a lonely, lonely night.’ They’re the kinds of lyrics they use. I love their backing vocals, ‘I’m taken! I’m taken!’ I mean, why would they be there? I mean it’s just beautiful. There’s something great fun about ELO, you always smile as soon as they come on, as soon as you hear those robot voices and things.
There’s no ELO in Dead Can Dance, though. I think that Brendan [Perry] would absolutely have me thrown out, if he thought that I suggested that there was any ELO in Dead Can Dance. He’s not a fan, let’s put it that way! But I love them, because sometimes you don’t want to have a heavy trip. Imagine it’s 2am, the party’s almost over, but ELO just gets everyone up and dancing. They have such a lovely vibe.
Alfred Schnittke - Concerto for Viola and Orchestra
The reason I love Schnittke’s Concerto for Viola and Orchestra, is that it makes you feel like you’re falling into this massive abyss. It’s the end of the world, but it never quite ends. If you put that on in the dark, and you’re lying on your bed; I can’t even explain. You have to do it, you know what I’m talking about? You have these bells, death in every note, but in the most apocalyptic way. Everything’s twirling and spinning and falling. It’s unbelievable, it’s such an extraordinary piece of work.
It’s classical; all use of an orchestra, and Yuri Bashmet is the most remarkable viola player. I believe that Schnittke wrote this piece for him specifically, on his deathbed. I’m pretty sure that’s what happened.
Umm Kulthum – ‘Enta Omry’
She’s an Arabic singer, but she’s the only woman who was ever allowed to sing the Quran. She’s extraordinary, and has an ability to sound somehow so grounded, that it’s actually devastating. When she sings a couple of phrases, and the music just rises up out of it; she’s like a sleeping giant. And then the audience goes completely insane, and then it goes back, and then she’ll do another phrase. Oh my God! It’s just so beautiful, so special, so poetic. The thing I love about her is that you don’t need to know the language, what she’s singing for it to make you feel like you’ve been in some way privy to this very private, very sacred message.
I haven’t seen her live; gosh, that would have been amazing. I think she died in the ‘80s, but I do chase her around on YouTube sometimes. There’s footage of her with these dark sunglasses on, and this huge beehive onstage; she looks magnificent. She has this fantastic voice and it’s almost like without that, you really can’t define who you are, as a poet, for a country.
Edith Piaf – ‘La Vie En Rose’
I like Edith Piaf for similar reasons [to Umm Kulthum], the directness of her Frenchness. She always bears her soul in this rough and very interesting way, and I love that about her. She doesn’t try to be sophisticated, and there’s something special in that voice; she’s like a little urchin. That has always influenced me heavily, that rising sort of little urchin vibe. I have nothing, but what I give you is my soul, this absolutely deliberate move.
Arvo Pärt - Symphony No. 3
I love Arvo Pärt because it’s like someone who has taken a nursery rhyme, and turned it into the most exquisite thing you’ll ever hear. You have composers like Mahler, and I do love Mahler, I love his third movement - he’s just divine - but there’s something about Arvo Pärt that he can just take this simple motif, and repeat it over about five bars. He’ll sweep along, and you’re completely and utterly enchanted by the simplicity of this mantric, kind of cyclical music. It’s almost like a kind of illusion. The thing that amazes me about most composers, is that they think they have to do something terribly complicated, when in fact he shows us very clearly that they don’t. He shows us that the simple things are the things that touch us deeply.
Zbigniew Preisner – ‘Song for the Unification of Europe’
I work with Preisner sometimes. You can’t even understand how his music is written, I don’t think. There’s something so bewitching about the way that he constructs these Eastern Bloc tunes, but in some way, they have melancholia without being sentimental. They make you think of your childhood, they take you back to a place you preferred to be. When you didn’t realise how terrible the world was. It’s both melancholic and nostalgic; these two things aren’t in conflict.
Various Artists – Music of the Troubadours
The Music Of The Troubadours influenced Brendan [Perry] and I very much, on the Aion album. Because we were living in Spain at the time, working on a movie, doing the score for it. Years, and years, ago. We were in this place in Catalonia, where they burned the witches, it’s such a dark, weird place. I never want to go back there! But anyway, the thing is we were working there, and Brendan was playing me all of these Troubadour pieces, which were really not intimidating from the context that you felt like you were entitled to create music, because the pieces were so simple. I remember someone saying, ‘Lisa Gerrard’s music? Oh that’s just a drone and a drum.’ But with just a drone and a drum, everyone can make music, you know. Not that I would describe my music like that! I love that though, because if it’s a drone and a drum, then it means that everyone suddenly realises that they can write music, because all you really have to do is play a drone with a couple of drum hits and a bell, and then you’re in. You can grow from there, which is fabulous.
Johann Sebastian Bach - St Matthew’s Passion / St John’s Passion
These two works make me feel like we almost aren’t allowed to die, when we are faced with them. They’re so inspired, and you feel like in some way developing some relationship with the heavenly or with God. I don’t want to say the word religious, but they create a kind of soulful elevation.
The 13th Floor Elevators - The Psychedelic Sounds Of The 13th Floor Elevators
I love them because they were very innovative. They mic'd up kettles, and that sort of thing. They had kettles boiling etc, and they were also very dire, deeply psychedelic. They mic'd up things around the kitchen. They are amazing. The music’s very beautiful.
Hans Zimmer - The Thin Red Line: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
I think that this is his best work, I absolutely adore this album. It was written for a war film, and to me that is such an internal journey of questions like: “What of all the meanings of why do we exist? Why do we go to war? What is it that we actually dream about when we are at war, out there on those battlefields?” It’s got all that in there, it’s got a divide between reality and living on the absolute edge of your dreams. I feel that so much in all of that music; it’s so fatalistic, which I love.
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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2106.28 - 10:10
- Days ago = 2187 days ago
- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
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