In
any given week I listen to a wide variety of music. As I write,
The
Definitive Louis Armstrong is playing. A
couple of Tool CDs and David Bowie’s
Reality are waiting on the
pile. I pulled out Jethro Tull’s
Thick
as a Brick a few days ago. Eberhard Weber’s
Endless Days,
David Torn's
Door X, my own compilation CD of 60s pop — Spencer
Davis, Traffic, the Kinks, the Small Faces and the Who,
The Complete
Robert Johnson, Schubert’s
Quintet, Richard Strauss’s
Don
Quixote and
Till Eulenspiegel, the
Essential Duke Ellington,
a Robin Trower compilation, a Soft Machine compilation (from volumes
one and two and
Bundles), Joss Stone’s
Soul Sessions,
Tommy from
the re-release of the Who’s
Live at Leeds, The
Sixteen’s
Flowering of Genius and
Taverner’s
Western Wynde Mass, Pink Floyd’s
Obscured by Clouds,
Hariprasad Chaurasia’s
Rag Bhimpalasa, Cassandra Wilson, a Marvin
Gaye compilation, and Damien Rice’s
O have all been played this
week.
If
we are to tack labels onto some of this, I have listened to contemporary
pop, contemporary Jazz, Delta Blues, Bengali Classical, Renaissance Polyphony,
twenties Hot Jazz, Swing Jazz, Rock, Psychedelic Rock, Progressive Rock,
early 20th century Classical, 60s pop, contemporary Soul, Motown, Classical
and ECM Jazz. Country would admittedly be more rare — late 60s and early
70s Rock and pop, Swing, 20 th century Classical, Renaissance Polyphony,
Blues, ECM Jazz and Indian Classical are my standard fare.
Different
musics suit different moods and different tasks. This week I haven't actually
sat down to listen properly to anything. I try to spend an evening a week
doing only that, but it rarely happens. Instead I soak in music while I
write. Occasionally, I will take an album turn it up loud, stick a headphone
on one ear and play along on my drum kit. Damien Rice’s
O and Kenny
Wheeler’s
Angel Song are the most recent examples of this. Welcome
to my world.
February 2002
