safe at last

i have listened to and liked cocteau twins for about 7 years. as with many, the appeal began with their ethereal classic album Treasure (1984), and then it moved to their bright and funky album Heaven or Las Vegas (1990), but apart from liking several other tracks from different albums i had never fully immersed myself in their glory.

as of the past month, that has changed dramatically. i listen to the twins morning, noon, and night. every day. i have not been this taken by a band and their entire output of work for as long as i can remember.

Know Who You Are At Every Age

when i get high, which isn't THAT often, i love to listen to music. and when i listen to music, i almost always choose something i am not that familiar with but am interested in getting to know. i chose Cocteau Twins - Four-Calendar Café (1993), an album i had never listened to in its entirety, despite absolutely loving the final track "Pur."

well, being in that state of mind causes me to travel deeper into the music than i ever would normally. i usually lay in bed frozen in place, with absolutely nothing in my head except for these heavenly sounds. i am transported not only out of my daily life but into the very fabric of their music. and with the twins being such a multifaceted and unendingly intricate band, their music allows for endless journeys into the layers and layers of beauty with which they construct their songs. if this sounds a little wild, it IS!

so let me try to explain.

cocteau twins were so incredibly ahead of their time it is not even funny. their first album, Garlands (1982), is possibly their most dissonant and murky with mechanical drums and guitar timbres and harmonies that are harsh, shrill, sometimes even ugly. the melodies are very different than what i am used to in their other music, often going to very unexpected places...

liz fraser, a woman whose voice cannot be defined by words alone, sounds more raw and unpolished than she does in their later albums, contributing to a very rough-around-the-edges atmosphere. think industrial, dark, or any number of other adjectives similar to these. knowing this, i once would avoid listening to this album because i was more attracted to the lush and exotic sounds of their later work, but seeing as i just went through a HUGE joy division phase i decided that this music is actually incredibly valuable and wonderful to listen to. i now love how dark it is, it shows a completely different side of their musical personality.

so here is my favorite track from the album, "The Hollow Men," which i feel sums up the overall sound of Garlands perfectly.





HEAD OVER HEELS (1983). this is an album without parallel. i can honestly say it is one of the most powerful fucking things i have ever heard. from the very first kick of the drums, you can hear echoes all around as if you were inside an extremely high-ceilinged cathedral with these musical gods. the atmosphere they create with the exaggerated reverb on both the drums and her voice, which is often doubled and tripled upon itself to add even more thickness of sound, is utterly stunning.

one thing i keep saying to myself as i listen to them is that they seemed to have understood pure musical beauty on a level i have never heard manifested anywhere else or by anyone else. it's like every note just builds and builds on the beauty of the one previous, every song, every album even... that is why i am so overjoyed that they have so MANY albums and each with completely different aesthetics (although still adhering to their one unique and inimitable sound), it's like i could spend a lifetime exploring. a worthwhile endeavor? i think so.

to give you a preview of this album, here is the monumental closing track "Musette and Drums." the GUITARS are SO FUCKING FULL AND AMAZING. it's like the music is alive and breathing with me.



i think i must show you the song "Five Ten Fiftyfold" as well. there is just something about this song that give me extreme chills, but in the amazing way. the ceilings of the cathedral are super high in this one, because to me the echo factor is much greater than in the other tracks, lending it such a breadth of space and atmosphere that it is really astounding to listen to. there is even a highly reverberated saxophone, which makes the track sound almost darkjazz-esque, or spacejazz, like it came straight out of the soundtrack to the movie Blade Runner.





TREASURE (1984). this album is nothing less than a treasure to behold. every single song is gorgeous, and liz fraser's voice is constantly spiraling in and out of itself, building, exploring, going beyond all bounds. the sound of the tracks is cold and icy, but beautiful, like you are entering a world of sound never heard before. it is not an easy task to describe, but here is (one of) my favorite track(s) on the album, "Persephone."





Victorialand (1986). it begins with the electric swoosh of a shooting star, and reveals an album soft to the touch, as soft as a kitten. there are a lot of major seventh chords, an essential element of Cocteau Twins' music that is used in nearly every song but somehow it never seems like they overdo it.

here is my favorite track, "How To Bring a Blush to the Snow." a lot of the time the lyrics are comprised of random sounds or unintelligible nonsense words.





Blue-Bell Knoll (1988). this album is one of my favorites! it is so happy, bright, and cheery. a great album to listen to in spring time, as the world opens up to sunlight and full blooming flowers and plants. her vocals in "Athel-Brose" have made me feel that tinge of pressure in the back of my throat/nose/eyes, as if i was about to cry... she just sounds so full of joy, bliss, nirvana.





HEAVEN OR LAS VEGAS (1990). this is definitely their most cohesive album. when i recommend a single album to anyone for the first time it is either this or Treasure. i can't even explain how beautiful this album is. the song titles always seemed to me very perfect descriptions of the sounds they created in that particular song, like this one: "Cherry-Coloured Funk." it just sounds like the color of a cherry, somehow. this is usually the favorite album, but i can't speak for everyone.





Four-Calendar Café (1993). okay, so this is my favorite album of theirs at the moment. i am so in love with it, i can't even explain in mere words. i keep saying that, but I CAN'T! my favorite tracks are "Know Who You Are At Every Age," "My Truth," "Summerhead," and "Pur."

i'm just going to show you "Summerhead" because i think that would have to be my all-time favorite twins song at this exact moment in time.



i have only listed their solo full-length albums (excluding Milk & Kisses/1996 which i still have not gotten around to), but they have quite a lot of extraneous releases such as EPs and compliations and collaborations that are all also full of wonderful music. the best place to find all of these and the information on them is here.

a couple other songs that i very much love ~

"It's All But an Ark Lark" from Lullabies EP (1982)
just listen to this at the highest volume possible, my god.



"Pink Orange Red" from Tiny Dynamine EP (1985)
this is the first CT song i showed to my sister and it converted her. :3
another time when the track title seems to perfectly describe the aural world of the song.



"Love's Easy Tears" from Love's Easy Tears EP (1986)
this is such a joyful thing. it sounds like liz is rejoicing with her voice, but in what, i am not sure. she sounds so playful and fun! it was such a pleasure to hear this song, with its manipulations of her voice that sound the most lovely form of ghostly.



i think i have gone to the fullest capacity possible right now in trying to convey my love for them, but i promise you, it is a love that is here to stay. i hope you have enjoyed this post, learned some things about one of the greatest bands of all time, and maybe even heard some music that has spoken to you or moved you in some way...

i think i love them so much because they continuously experimented with sound. i am a huge fan of manipulating harmonies to their greatest potential, which is something you often hear in jazz or in 19th-century expressionist/romantic music, but i am also a huge fan of powerful independent music-making that is selfish and searches for sound and art at any cost. i can hear that in liz fraser's voice and in the musical production by robin guthrie (guitarist). they stop at nothing to achieve what they do, the go to the furthest places in music and grasp at what there is to be held. they are full of imagination, too, child-like and human. it is very inspiring to hear her sing, and i'm sure you can agree there is nothing like it in the whole world.

heart pleasure

i just went through a huge electroacoustic improv, musique concrète, modern classical and field recording phase. it lasted about 6 months.

listening, studying, recording.

i came up with one field recording that combines several different days of walking around the campus. i used audacity, which is great but definitely not the best thing ever. the sine tones i used are notes i heard humming in the air one day while playing outside with my brother. it was a major third, middle C and the E four half steps above it. i am actually in love with this interval. i then modified it a little bit, adding and subtracting. i need a windguard to completely eliminate unwanted sounds, but i find them a little charming in their own way.

i was definitely influenced by Toshiya Tsunoda, whose 2014 work Detour (with Manfred Werder) was completely fascinating and perfect. one of the greatest things i have ever heard. my favorite experience listening to that was in bed with the windows open and the curtains rustling. it lasts for about an hour... and near the end some seemingly inorganic sounds come into play, which are actually the internal vibrations of the insects and other lifeforms of the forest floor. anyway, this is how it turned out. looking back i should have extended each section so that it lasted even longer, broadening the entire track. it is far too short as it is. i am too lazy to go back. i have a Tascam handheld recorder that i now use to record with all the time, but i have not actually compiled a completed track ever since. i do not seem to have the discipline. it has become merely something that gives me immense pleasure.



all i listened to was Michael Pisaro (Continuum Unbound), Toshiya Tsunoda (Detour with Manfred Werder), Morton Feldman (Two Pianos), and members of the collective Wandelweiser. read works of John Cage (Silence). the most important thing i have read in recent times is this: Time's Underground. became inspired then closed my eyes.

a very good friend of mine who has always been interested in field recordings and other things, Joshua Adam Acosta, is now on a private label that is releasing his and other talented artists' works in this style. the label is called speculations editions. one of my favorite releases of theirs so far is Joshua Adam Acosta & Matt Earnshaw - Exposed to Time (#002). it is up for free download at the link above.

one stereophony by two persons

the chords used in pisaro's monumental Continuum Unbound

right now, at this very moment, i am listening to Jesu. Heart Ache. a song from an allie from long ago.

/

think back to every moment of your entire life that you remember. those nights driving home from the beach with your family, tired and covered in dried sand, skin tight from the salt water and sun exposure, cramped from sitting in unusual positions. the look on your mom's face when you gave her flowers for mother's day. the snow angels you made with your little sister at age 6. walking down the aisle as a flower girl. hugging your grandparents. eating at a fancy chinese buffet. first days of school, last days of school.

it's so fucking insane to think those little moments are all a part of this very same life i am living as we speak. for the past couple months that i have been thinking more and more deeply on this issue i am coming to some sort of final observation about things. up until about age 15, which now is almost 7 years ago, i was completely asleep. dreaming. a constant stream of images was flashing in front of my eyes, with momentary breaks allowing me to rest in the darkness of sleep, and i was subjected to this for 15 years. i woke up one day, as if literally spiraled into being from a vast nothingness, and became aware of my being. of the fact that i am a person, a thinking feeling independent being in this great mess of a world in which i once was just meandered completely clueless.

now i am losing that awareness. with each year that passes i am losing that initial thrill of becoming anything, of experiencing failure and unknown pleasures, of discovering myself and feeling triumphant when things felt as they should. i looked around at this world for the first time with eyes that weren't glazed over, but were intelligent, sentient, absorbent. i was always absorbing as a child but this information was being stored in a folder deep in my brain and wasn't being put to use. i could have answered any history or science question you asked but i was merely pulling out files from information i had gathered at school or through another. once i began the stages of maturing, molting even, i was then able to use all of that information to form beliefs, values, identity, purpose, to think critically and then be completely confused about it all.

so now that i am neither a child basking in glorious nothingness or an adolescent learning about the actual shittiness of reality, i am fast becoming an adult who must now act on this large amount of gathered information and experiences. this, i am coming to find out, is the hard part.

I CONFRONT MY PAST, MY PRESENT, AND MY FUTURE WITH A SMILE

a smile that behind it exists no sense of longing, nor a sense of dread

i do not miss you, i do not miss me

i do not miss any part of the world that is not here now

it is gone forever and i am happy

what else is there to say?

/

i am seeing Swans tomorrow. it is pretty surreal to think about. a band whose name and music have been rattling around in my head for years and years is now going to become a tangible thing. i am going to look into their eyes and be quite sure that they are real. all of their words and convictions were not meaningless... and i am going with my sister, my favorite person in the universe. so i am excited to be able to do such a thing.



i need to be practicing piano and doing online exams but i don't waaaannnnaaa ...

i don't really listen to any of the same music i used to. almost zero of it to be honest. i am bored of it all.

it is spring but i know that this initial beauty is not going to last. white and pale pink buds frosting branches of trees all around the city. birds are extra loud in the mornings at dawn, but even though they wake me i somehow am not annoyed by them, and can usually fall back asleep. i played tennis at this beautiful court in the woods and my friend saw a deer. we stared into its eyes as more and more came into focus. the one we had seen was a fawn, a baby with clumsy stick-like legs. the mother or guardian was motioning with her head for it to follow her back into the woods, but it kept curiously sniffing around and investigating. seeing it was like seeing a rift in space and time; something i could only have ever seen if i had made all of the right decisions in my entire life. every choice anyone in history ever made led up to that moment, somehow, following some grand framework.

the deer from my dreams eventually crawled back into the increasing twilight. there were no insect sounds, only birds. i have a desire to take my recorder out there, set it on a pillow, and lie down next to it. drifting off into the space that contains some of the most lovely, spontaneous sounds. i almost can't stand listening to music through earbuds or radio frequencies or through any external sources. it pales in comparison to music made by the pure energy of life itself. i love this picture of Toshiya Tsunoda and some other musicians from the making of Manfred Werder's album 2006¹. instruments among nature. that is where i belong, mind body and soul.

a place,natural light, where the performers like to be
a time
(sounds)

nothing is accomplished by writing a piece of music
nothing is accomplished by hearing a piece of music
nothing is accomplished by playing a piece of music
our ears are now in excellent condition

(the reason this quote is so utterly amazing and lifechanging is because it takes away any manmade predetermined meaning from music as i have known it for my whole life. it takes away rigidity, structure, it makes me feel free and as if music can be anything and everything instead of only a handful of things)

*

the world is always ready to deliver its beauty to you, it's just a matter of watching

verlies

i'm about to go home right now. i am in the library and i just spent a little bit of time looking through my old posts on here. i am listening to Stravinsky's Elegy for solo viola.

so much has changed. everything is always changing, and in my world i am changing the most. the way i see my parents, my friends, myself. i am forgetting essential beautiful things in return for newness and unfamiliarity and i'm not sure if i like it.

it is autumn and the leaves are finally changing their colors and falling onto the ground. i walk to school nearly every morning crunching all the leaves beneath my feet and it is one of the great joys of my life. i have only several articles of clothing that i wear to simplify everything. i try to clear my mind and my life from all that is unnecessary. i love laying on the floor listening to music through the dream machine. drifting away and blocking out all sound that i do not wish to hear. blah blah blah

i started playing some video games (nothing serious) but it really really doesn't come naturally to me. i have started drinking wine occasionally, but i don't really have a preference for white or red. it all tastes quite bad to me honestly. except this one new zealand wine i had that is called massimo i think and it tasted like the most exotic beautiful fruits in the world. i tried pho for the first time and it was pretty glorious. i play tennis and soccer and go on long walks and enjoy the beautiful town i live in. i try to call my parents frequently and tell them i am thinking about them.

i have one really amazing professor who has probably taught me the most in her little weekly 30-minute lessons out of any teacher i have ever had in my life. she knows exactly what is needed, what i need to give, and articulates it very clearly. for next week i have to learn perfectly an artsong by Strauss and be able to explain to her why i am making the artistic decisions i am with the shapes, the phrases. she wants me to prove to her that i can be an artist with any piece of music, that i can be inspired from the very beginning to create beauty with my work and my body. i become disconnected too easily and she can sense that.

/

exclusive limited listening

slint - spiderland
unwound - leaves turn inside you
lowercase - discography
aspidistrafly - a little fable
at the drive-in - relationship of command
la dispute - somewhere at the bottom of the river ...

listening on repeat during long bus rides

american football - "stay home"




béla bartók - four dirges, op. 9a



fishmans - long season



dmitri kabalevsky - cello concerto no. 1, II

morning sun rays

i have started to realize something :

HUMAN NATURE

IS

EVERYTHING

i am human, everyone is human, and we behave according to our desperate attempts to make life tolerable and meaningful. we would be cripplingly confused, otherwise. i want to be so angry at people for hurting me, for making me feel small. i want to be so angry at myself for disappointing myself on a regular basis, failing to do what i set out to do, making consistent mistakes, avoiding things out of fear. i cannot let myself. it would be utterly meaningless. those who have hurt me are no greater than i, no more enlightened, in the end ... so why villify them. we would all make the same mistakes and do the same terrible things but also wonderful things in a million different circumstances. we can only be alive for the unfolding of one historical line but there are infinite potential histories, decisions, thoughts that could influence centuries of progress down the road. i must allow for the mistakes of human nature, the blunders and the victories, the little ones too, of myself and those around me. i must accept myself, my actions. i am only me and this only LIFE, whatever that is. a long continuous process of growth, expansion, etc.

i want to forgive, ultimately