Perhaps I'm predictable, but lately I've been delighting in a genre of music best described as sepiachord. And what, you may ask, is this "sepiachord"?
I'm shamelessly borrowing the term from the Seattle-based Web site that coined it, and explains it thusly: ...something that looks back to the past to comment on the present while looking sideways at the future. A cubist aural experience... assembled like a clockwork orchestra... It is the music our grandparents or great-grandparents would have listened to, if they were as off-set as we are.
Like steampunk, sepiachord is open to interpretation, and the genius is in the marriage of seeming opposites. The label is broad enough to include genre-busting favorites like Beirut, Tom Waits, and the Dresden Dolls, but it's the electronic-beats-versus-old-timey-jazz-samples that I've been swooning over as of late.
This whole notion was first introduced to me by my dear friend of startlingly impeccable tastes, Meester Ralph, and then furthered by Stache. Both have gifted me with delicious play-lists featuring all manner of lovely musicians - British band The Real Tuesday Weld, French hip-hop talent Wax Tailor, and Austrian artists Waldeck and Parov Stelar spring to mind. 
It's the mash-up that pleases me most ~ the thoroughly postmodern pursuit of blending the most disparate elements into an enjoyable and seamless whole. Behold "Crazy in Love" by the Puppini Sisters - a cover of a Beyoncé song, remixed by The Real Tuesday Weld. Brilliant.
San Francisco Bay Area band Beats Antique takes the fusion a step further by adding a dash of middle eastern flavor and a sprinkle of circus whimsy... which just may spontaneously combust into the coolest beats ever.
I've only recently discovered them and I have yet to see them live, but I hear they're splendid. Who wants to come out and play?
4.20.2009
Things That Please Me: Sepiachord
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4 comments:
Choklit, This is a huge part of what I DJ or rather will soon DJ. Check it out. http://www.myspace.com/chrononautclub Date to be announced soon.
It's a wonderful music, and the founder does an incredible job of finding music that fits in with the theme and the aesthetic.
disparate binaries indeed can be compelling.the only danger with the term sepia chord/steampunk etc is the minute things belong to a genre and are classified they loose their potency.this paradoxically is exactly what the music belonging to these "genres" and indeed the genre in my opinion opposes.anyway good choice of music
Sepiachord is the best thing that can be found on the interent as far as music is concerned! I keep up with their song of the day and weekly updates since it began several years ago.
Thanks for reminding me. I should go check the site updates today...
JR.K
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