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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DAVID SHRIGLEY

Shrigley has always entertained, always managed to make me laugh. Well, that is, ever since I saw an article on him in the Guardian back in 2005 or 2006.

He’s got a funny website, funnily enough called www.davidshrigley.com. And funnily enough, he lives and works in Glasgow and declares himself to be a Glasgow Artist, even though he’s fay Macclesfield.

Fair enough; after all he did go to the school of art. He does wee cartoons for the Guardian, and he’s responsible for Jason Mraz’s latest album being called after one of his pieces: “We sing. We Dance. We Steal Things”.

Sure, you can always argue about “what is art” and “What art ought to be” — and maybe Dave’s stuff is not art.  Maybe it is. Maybe it is called art because there is no better word, or because art is a catchall word for this sort of thing these days.

But for me, whatever Dave does, it is interesting, thought-provoking, unusual, enlightening, mischievous, fun, funny, and very entertaining.  To draw wee faces on pebbles on the beach, or to put up notices may seem childish or affected, but it’s less pretentious then most other art today, and too good to be dismissed as merely childish.  Too mature to be immatute — if you take my meaning.  It’s one level past that at least.

Anyway, enjoy Dave Shrigley (what else can you do with him?).

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