Jib Kidder – On All Y’All
It took a fair deal of acclimatisation to the sheer weirdness of the sound of this album for me to get to the point where I could say to like it. Before that I think a sort of bewildered fascination best sums up my relationship with On All Y’All.
It is an amazing combination of hip hop and samples, and reminds me just a little of the Avalanches, except possibly even more lurching and uneven. I feel bad posting a couple of mp3s too, because the album functions as a whole, not as bits, but I still think you should hear some of it. It can be downright epileptic in the way it ducks and dives all over the places, builds up, lurches to a stop, reverses, changes direction again and generally keeps the ground under your feet moving so constantly that there’s rarely a moment to pause and draw breath.
Given this is a long way from being a style of music I understand and can therefore comment on with any semblance of understanding I feel a bit adrift writing this. This is compelling in a fascinating way, but there are still plenty of moments where I really, really am not getting it. Nevertheless, I can’t just put it on and ignore it either. It reminds me in some ways of those crazy, experimental guitar album that mix some surprisingly good riffs into minutes and minutes of barely structured white noise and feedback. There is something really bloody good in there, but it can be some challenge trying to tease it out.
Jib Kidder – Great Thieves
Jib Kidder – Aga Aga (Hiromichi Mix)
Bewildered fascination…yes, that sums it up perfectly. I first heard Jib Kidder when you included Flip Flap on the Fightcast. I could not believe my ears. But, amazingly, I really liked it for a reason still unbeknownst to me. I couldn’t open Great Thieves, but really enjoyed (well, was strangely captivated by) Aga Aga. Thanks for posting.
Totally agree about this Jib Kidder stuff. I have yet to pick up the album, but have “Windowdipper” constantly running on repeat on my ipod.
Yeah, Windowdipper is excellent. It took me five minutes to realise that my computer wasn’t actually playing up and that it was the song itself.
i’m giving up song writing. i’m going to get my casio keyboard and press the demo button.
‘Songwriting’ isn’t always the only way to make music. A lot of reels are just basic expression repeated over and over again with variations and a lot of experimental stuff is almost entirely textural. Just because it’s not verse-bridge-chorus doesn’t mean it is piss easy to do properly. I’ve heard loads of this sort of stuff that I don’t like at all.
i was joking. and if you’d heard the kays you’d know i don’t know what a chorus is. i also love music that layers simple sounds together – like eluvium. i also have johann johannsson’s album that he created using the IBM 1401 computer so I am more than happy to accept various styles of writing. in fact it fascinates me. but it has to be good. and this is not.
Aga Aga reminds me of the Braid videogame.
It’s definately a whole heap better than all the Kanye West vocodered pap and fidget remixes of Radiohead that clutter up Hype machine by people that think they sound cool!
except the writing style is no style here cuz the writing isn’t wrote, its only cut so the question is are you happy to accept various styles of cutting? or do not like the cut..