colleen

I would like to start this update with a celebration of my ten years of artistic collaboration with Italian artist Iker Spozio. On 23rd May 2005, my second album The Golden Morning Breaks was released and marked the beginning of my collaboration with Iker : ever since then, I’ve had the great privilege of having Iker illustrate and design every single one of my records, gig posters and websites. We both believe in the importance of the record being a beautiful physical object and it’s been awesome to know that whatever the musical direction I was taking, Iker was going to be able to translate it into visual terms way beyond my expectations each and every single time. You can see more of Iker’s work for me on my website and more of his work in general on his website. Thank you so much Iker!!!! :-)))

Thanks so much to everyone who came to the LSO St Luke’s show in London on 24th May and to Francis Gallagher for these beautiful photos! I really had a brilliant time playing in that amazingly beautiful space!

Here’s the setlist of the show, which those of you living in the US and planning to come to the US shows starting on 11 June can have a look at if you feel like knowing what’s in store for you!
1. Holding Horses
2. I’m Kin
3. This Hammer Breaks
4. Salina Stars
5. Lighthouse
6. Soul Alphabet
7. The Weighing of the heart
8. O Willow Waly (from the film The Innocents)
9. Captain of None
Encore:
10. Geometría del Universo.
11. Once upon a time there was a pretty fly (from the film The Night of the
Hunter)
12. Breaking Up the Earth

As you can see, the set now features two cover versions of songs taken from the soundtracks to two films, The Night of the Hunter and The Innocents.

If you’re not familiar with the films and the songs, I strongly urge you to watch the films, and in the meantime, if you’re curious as to what the originals sound like, here are two excerpts from Youtube.

Speaking of music that I like, here are more things that you can have a look at and listen to.

If you’ve read and heard some of my recent interviews, you’ll have noticed I keep mentioning a reggae tape containing mostly Lee Perry productions which my parents bought when I was very little (probably 4, as the compilation’s last selections are from 1979 and I was born in 1976). To this day my parents have no recollection of when or where they bought that “Kings of Reggae” tape, my best bet being that they got it at a motorway petrol station and were probably attracted by the Bob Marley mention (they’re definitely no reggae heads! ;-)). In any case, blessed be the day of that purchase, because hearing gems such as “Roast fish and corn bread”, “Return of the super ape”, “Come along” and “Little flute chant” probably had quite an influence on my subsequent development as a musician!

American radio programme The Dinner Party Download invited me to select my ideal dinner music for their programme.

Finally, in connection with a special concert held at the Barbican in April with music influenced by Terry Riley, I was among the artists to whom the Boiler Room asked what it is about Riley’s music that we like.

On the live front, I will be flying to San Francisco on 9^th June to start my US tour, I’m very excited indeed to be hitting American shores for the first time since 2008 and I’m very much looking forward to sharing the stage with musicians that I love – you can see the full details on the live page and on my Songkick.

I will also be playing my first concert in Brussels since 2007, on August 24th, courtesy of Ancienne Belgique at the Park Royale (free event).

As always, thanks for your support!

So many things happening and too much travelling for me to update this newsletter as often as I would want to! Don’t forget you can check out my Facebook page for more regular updates, even if you’re not a Facebook user.

On the live front, unfortunately my two shows at the Cappadox festival in Turkey this weekend are cancelled due to legal reasons. I apologize for any inconvenience caused.

Lots of photos were taken at my show in Lisbon’s ZDB, both here and here – some of them are truly beautiful, and I had a very special time there, thanks ZDB! Thanks also to Fractured Air for the show in Cork’s Opera House and to GNRation in Braga!

Don’t forget that next week on 24th May I’m playing at LSO St Luke’s in London, the show is presented by the Barbican in association with Artic Circle, get your tickets here!

More interviews and things to listen to this week: a long interview in English on the 405 and also on Music Won’t Save you, both in English and Italian (the interview was originally published in Rockerilla last month).

I had a double page spread in the cultural supplement of Portugal’s biggest national newspaper Publico, Ipsilon, here’s the link to the full article and a nice photo below!

I also finished the Facebook series on how I recorded the songs on Captain of None: head over here for details on “Eclipse” and “Captain of None”.

I had the great and unexpected pleasure of Captain of None being chosen on the Album de Minuit radio show on France Inter, so for those of you who understand French, head here to listen to the show and the mini-interview in which I was asked what is my favourite midnight album.

I made a second 100% Jamaican mix, this time for FACT Magazine, focusing on songs that have specifically influenced Captain of None. Here’s the full text I wrote about the mix, and as always, thanks for your support! :-))))

https://soundcloud.com/factmag/fact-mix-494-colleen-may-15/s-QPyOx#t=0:00

My second 100% Jamaican mix, this time for FACT Magazine, focusing on songs that have specifically influenced Captain of None. Read the full text I wrote below:
This mix includes music which has specifically influenced me in the making of my fifth album Captain of None, mostly from the point of view of song-writing, interpretation, production, or just a general “feel” in the music, for lack of a better word. No other song encapsulates how these various aspects of music-making are intertwined in Jamaican music better than Burning Spear’s “Door Peeper”: released in 1969, the combination of Burning Spear’s voice, percussion, compressed horn line, minimal instrumentation and lyrics, and dry but deep production make this song one of the most earth-shaking I’ve ever heard. At the opposite end of the spectrum, Scientist’s “Dangerous Match 1” from 1982 sounds like underwater swimming in weird waters and shows how abstract and stylized Jamaican music can be. Tapper Zukie’s “Simpleton Badness” is a perfect example of idiosyncratic toasting, crazy tape manipulation and radical production from 1973. The Lee Perry-produced “Long Time Ago” by Ras Michael and the Sons of Negus marvellously mixes traditional Nyabinghi drumming and intense chanting with Perry’s extremely dense production style , and I just love how the volume and intensity increase unexpectedly at the end of the song with the arrival of a killer bassline. Noel Ellis, son of Alton, has one of my favourite voices, but I chose this track especially for the mind-blowing guitar parts featured in the dub version – guitar perfection in my opinion! When I first heard Augustus Pablo’s “Pablo in Fine Style”, the intricacy and delicateness of the melodica reminded me of baroque music and Mozart, which are not obvious reference points when you’re listening to Jamaican music! Another Lee Perry production, the unusual sounding “Paul Bogle” by King Burnett (NB: attribution to this singer has been debated, but that’s how it’s credited on the 7” label): slow and melancholy with a meandering melody, it’s one more example of how Jamaican music can sound so far from the clichés it’s unfortunately too often associated with. Niney’s “Weeping Lotion” is the opposite, a fast and frantic high-energy feast which is just amazingly mixed! With “Collins Sweat” by Collins Music Wheelers and Wackies Rhythm Force’s “Black Africa”, the amazing flute bended in ways reminiscent of early BBC Radiophonic Workshop and the lilting melodica against the half-tribal half-machine-like backdrop show once again the Jamaican knack for abstraction rooted in physicality which I’ve found so inspiring.
Prince Far I’s voice and vocal treatment on “Plant Up”, Tapper Zukie’s razor-sharp “Man Ah Warrior” and Little Madness’s stirring a cappella on “Mother Country Version” are more examples of the power of the combination of voice and minimal accompaniment in Jamaican music. The Gladiators’s classic “Bongo Red” has guitar that I’m jealous of and excellent lyrics to boot. Black Kush (also known as Black Kish)’s “Natural Rock” is a rare example of acoustic guitar in Jamican music, and its minimal approach to percussion also struck a chord with me. Last but not least, I just had to close with a track that I heard in my childhood: “Return of the Super Ape” is one of the many Lee Perry/Upsetters songs contained on a tape that my parents bought in the late 70s and which we played in the car on long trips. To this day I just love this track and still find it totally unique and one of a kind: you can never be sure of what it is that you’re hearing on this song: monkeys, spanners falling on the floor in a metal house, a jazz band lost in Jamaica, soap bubbles transformed into notes… before one of the best breaks and song finales of all time…

The “Thank You Jamaica” mix I did for Solid Steel can be listened to on their soundcloud and website, where you will find a text I wrote to accompany the mix. I hope you will love the songs I selected as much as I do!

You can also hear me interviewed on American radio NPR and on the Barbican’s podcast in anticipation of my concert in London on 24^th May at LSO St Luke’s presented by the Barbican and Artic circle (tickets here), and read an interview in Polish for Nowa Muzyka here.

I have kept on writing my facebook posts on how I recorded each song on the new album: “Salina Stars”, “Lighthouse” and “Soul Alphabet”.

I have also updated the lyrics section of the website to include all the lyrics of Captain of None.

Last but not least, I’m playing in Cork at the Cork Opera House this Sunday May 3rd (presented by Fractured Air, tickets here),  in Lisbon’s ZDB on 8^th May and Braga’s GNRation on 9^th May.

You can finally view Naoko Tanaka’s incredible video for “Captain of none”, I hope you will love it as much as I do!

The video was premiered on Ad Hoc with an interview dealing specifically with the video and on the Nouvel Obs with a short interview in French.

You can also read another interview in German on Culturmag.

I also started a series of posts on my Facebook showing pictures from the recording of the album and explaining how each song was made. I will do one big post on this blog here once I reach the end of the album, but in the meantime, you can have a look on my Facebook for “Holding Horses”, “I’m Kin” and “This Hammer Breaks”.

And tomorrow I’ll be leaving for Holland where I’m playing in ‘s-Hertogenbosch at the FAQ festival on Saturday 18^th April.

Captain of None

has been released in Japan by Plancha and I did two dub-influenced versions of both “I’m Kin” and “Captain of None” for the Japanese CD which you can now stream from the Thrill Jockey website and buy from Itunes (you can buy the whole album or buy the tracks individually).

Here are some awesome photos of the album in Tower Records Shibuya and Tower Records Shinjuku in Tokyo last week!

I had the pleasure of being interviewed for Fractured Air for an in-depth view of the album, its influences and how it was made. French readers can also find an interview with The Drone.

Last but not least, I was asked by Self-Titled Magazine to choose 5 of my favorite Jamaican versions, so if you want to add some Jamaican dub goodness to your life head this way!

The video for “Captain of None” and the Solid Steel mix are coming up this week, so keep your eyes peeled for more news! :-)))