On Sundays I try to at least quickly note some of my favorite listening from the week prior — things I would later regret having not written about in more depth, so better to share here briefly than not at all.
▰ There’s a new album out, Friendship Survival Guide, that is a classical-tinged drone collaboration between Adam Wiltzie (of Stars of the Lid) and the late film composer Jóhann Jóhannsson (Sicario, The Theory of Everything, Arrivals). Wiltzie has done several scores, too. Its Bandcamp page has it for purchase but not streaming. This is the opening track, and there’s an informative interview by Peter Kirn with Wiltzie at cdm.link:
▰ I’ve been listening to the forthcoming David Cordero ambient album, Más allá de las palabras (“beyond words”), a lot, and tracking down Cordero’s previous work as a result, which led me to this live set with Miguel Otero recorded on a narrow balcony in San Fernando in Cádiz, Spain, in October 2020, at something approximating the height of the pandemic. You’d never know, the sounds are so relaxed and inspiring. Both Cordero and Otero are based in Cádiz.
▰ Due to the current Disquiet Junto project (“Remix Therapy”), I’ve been thinking a lot about remixes — a deep dive, correspondence, and conversations that, fortunately, led to this excellent edit of Paul Desmond and Dave Brubeck’s “Take Five,” in which all we hear is the first eighth note of every bar. It’s quite something. The musician, Behrooz Parham, is apparently obsessed with “Take Five,” because the YouTube channel is full of other versions, like one with the drums and piano at regular speed but the sax and bass at half speed, and another with the same two beats removed from every bar, and on and on. Parham is based in Sweden.
