OWEN PALLETT

Sometimes I come across a name all the time, and that is the case these days with Owen Pallett. For me he’s everywhere.

I probably first came across this name back in 2007 when I heard Arcade Fire’s “Neon Bible”.  It’s a funny name: Owen Pallett. The chap is an overtly homosexual violin player and singer. OK, not my usual bag.

Then I spotted that he appeared on “Joys” from “Worried Noodles” a compilation of David Shrigley’s lyrics set to music back in 2007 (see my post on David Shrigley).

I went to a concert to see St. Vincent last year, she was in support of Grizzly Bear — and up cropped Owen Pallett’s name yet again (see my post on Grizzly Bear, and my review of the St Vincent-Grizzly Bear gig) — Owen did the string arrangements and stuff for Grizzly Bear’s “Yellow House”, and is associated with Beirut from a few years ago (see my post on Beirut’s The Gulag Orkestar).

I have his album “Heartland” which is just out, and tonight I spotted A tweet by Hue & Cry…

Greg: Hav 2 agree with all the gr8 reviews. Owen Pallett’s “Heartland” album is a masterpiece. On my 4th listen :) http://bit.ly/7NVGih    9:46 AM Jan 18th   from web

This was the tipping point I think, it forced me to post here — and to look up YouTube! Here’s a vid uploaded of him with just a violin – live — doing a Joanna Newsom song:

[embedded video from Youtube.com]

The thing is, he’s a clever cookie — not just a violin player, but a graduate in musical composition. This explains why he keeps cropping up in all sorts of places — in my mind, usually associated with East Coast American/ New York and pretty “gay” acts such as  Mika — Owen did the string arrangements for his album “The Boy Who Knew Too Much“, and The Pet Shop Boys (their “Yes” album from last year).

You can pretty-much guess what Owen Pallett/ Final Fantasy will sound like just from the associations, but he is definitely worth a listen; the musicianship is high, and it makes a nice change to hear something fresh! Enjoy!

Here’s an amateur vid of him playing live the Jennifer Rush/ Celine Dion “Power of Love” on YouTube: It’s just him and a violin, and it just ought not to work… but it does!  Brilliant!

[embedded video from Youtube.com]

• www.myspace.com/owenpallettmusic
• Search for Owen Pallett on youTube
• twitter.com/owenpallett
• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Owen_Pallett

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GRIZZLY BEAR

I am really enjoying the new album,Veckatimest, from Grizzly Bear. They have a website — www.grizzly-bear.net — which you have to scroll sideways on! They played on Jools Holland’s “Later” a few months back, and were excellent live and very engaging and intriguing.

embedded video While You Wait For The Others on YouTube:

This song has been in my head for days now, it’s got a Hendrixy guitar thing, and sort-of Beach Boys vocal work — and various people reckon the Grizzlies are a bit like a LOT of bands from Badly Drawn Boy to Gomez. The music reviewers seem to prefer to compare with Fleet Foxes and Animal Collective, although I can’t see why for Veckatimest. Maybe the comparisons work better for their last album, Yellow House from back in 2006.  I know this album, but don’t like it half as much as Veckatimest!

The entire album, after a couple of play-throughs, is actually quite addictive.

The band is from Brooklyn near New York in the USA, which seems to be where-it’s-at just now.

Chris Bear plays the drums to Chris Taylor’s bass.  Taylor also experiments with mad instruments and is the producer. Everyone sings, but the two main singers also play guitar and keyboards — Ed Droste and Daniel Rossen (who is also a member of the duo “Department of Eagles”).

“Two Weeks” has a really strong piano vamp intro, and I’m pretty sure that I have heard it used in some TV commercial or something — it’s a real nag, and I wish I could remember better!

“I live With You” has haunting vocals and a Thunderclap Newman feel at times.

Overall it’s produced in a weird lo-fi fashion — sounding a bit like they have recorded tracks in their bathroom.There’s a lot of reverb and raw sounds, but that’s part of the charm — it actually sounds older than it obviously is!

They can harmonise — I like what they do on “About Face” and on the start of “Fine For Now”.

If you fancy something a wee bit different from the usual pop, but still tuneful and interesting, check out Grizzly Bear; you won’t be sorry you did!

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