[Music]: "People who like (Artist 1) also like (Artist 2)"

Rasselas,

You have GOT to check out Leonard Cohen. He has been nicknamed the poet laureate of pessimism and the grocer of despair, lol. I admit that his singing voice is an acquired taste (sorta like Dylan's) but I like him and I think he is worth you checking out.

Nobody else really jumps out at me other than Cohen. Oh, you might want to look at Peter Gabriel and even Genesis when he was the lead singer. I wouldn't get any Gabriel albums after "Security" as his music got more and more upbeat (i.e. commercial) but his third album, the Melting Face one is a masterpiece and has many dark songs to it.

I would continue this by asking the board on who else I need to get or buy but I am at a point in my life where I don't buy many CDs anymore (although I am going to have buy 2 live Cohen albums).

 

Lout Reed?
The Church?
Arab Strap?

 

Leonard Cohn for sure is someone you should check out, and shortly after that you should check out Dan Bejar (aka Destroyer), especially last year’s Destroyer’s Rubies. Like Cohen it won’t be for everyone, but if you like it you’ll like it a lot. It takes a few listens to get into too, but once you do it’s a great album. He’s one of the song writers for the New Pornographers, btw, but his own music is quite different. Speaking of the NPs, you should check out Neko Case. She does some great, darkish, alt country. Also, The Besnard Lakes is a new buzz band in the indie world that does some very dark atmospheric music. I’m sure all these artists have MySpace pages but note that Destroyer and The Besnard Lakes are Canadian bands and so are on the New Music Canada site too, and often bands post some additional songs on the NMC site that aren’t on MySpace. Fairly often they post different songs on each site so it’s a good idea to check both if you want to hear more from them. (Note also that the permanent links on that site don’t work, at least not for me, and I keep getting bounced back to the radio3.cbc.ca home page. To get to the bands from there click on the New Music Canada link near the top right, and then click on the Artists link, and then search for the artists alphabetically, and also note that band names that start with The are listed under T).

 

The Essential Leonard Cohen would be a good start or you could go with his 2 best albums in "The Songs of Leonard Cohen" and "I'm Your Man". I will warn you that after 1979's "Recent Songs", Leonard's voice changed from being somewhat nasally but on-key (for the most part) to being this booming bass voice. You'll sit there and say to yourself, "Is this even the same guy?" "The Songs of Leonard Cohen" was his debut and was produced by John Simon (of The Band fame) and contains such classics as "Suzanne" (made famous by Judy Collins who has sung many of Leonard's songs), "So Long, Marianne" (probably my favorite Cohen song by him and there are many), "The Stranger Song", and "Sisters of Mercy" to name a few. "I'm Your Man" has some great songs on it too but this is sung by the bass Cohen. "First We Take Manhattan" was originally sung by Jennifer Warnes (yup the same Jennifer Warnes that was always singing those cheesy movie duets whether it was with Bill Medley or Joe Cocker or someone else) and was featured on her tribute album to Cohen called "Famous Blue Raincoat" (not a bad album to pick up, by the way). That album has all Cohen songs sung by Warnes and even features Stevie Ray Vaughan on guitar on "First We Take Manhattan"; that album is also considered to be one of the best indicators to how good a sound system sounds as it was impeccably engineered. The last thing about Jennifer Warnes (I promise I'll quit talking about her) - she actually has appeared on many Cohen albums singing background vocals and even duetting with him (like on "If It Be Your Will" from the "Various Positions" album). One thing about Leonard is that he always surrounds himself (for the most part) with top-notch musicians and background singers/vocalists.

I think your safe bet is to go with "The Essential Leonard Cohen" and if you dig it, get the albums that have your favorite songs on it. However, I think you will wind up liking the songs off his first album and "I'm Your Man" more than any other. You'll have to let me know what you think about Leonard.

Hopefully, Batman Jones will see this thread and post in it. He was the person who turned me onto Leonard as he knew of my love for Dylan and the singer songwriter genre. Batman will probably have some other recommendations for you.

EDIT - I went on and on about Jennifer Warnes but the point is "First We Take Manhattan" is on the "I'm Your Man" album along with "Everybody Knows" and "Take This Waltz".

 

Jared Van Fleet/ Sparrow House

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/anYgCRFSUXQ"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/anYgCRFSUXQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object>

Jeff Buckley

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/k5YmuS5zNzk"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/k5YmuS5zNzk" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object>

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/E3SBKgf5eNQ"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/E3SBKgf5eNQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object>

Jump, Little Children

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/T3i8R3JJVGk"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/T3i8R3JJVGk" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object>

 

I thought about Jeff Buckley - not a bad pick. He has a connection to Cohen as he covered "Hallelujah" on his "Grace" album.

 

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/vsa_xWLOghg"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/vsa_xWLOghg" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object>

 

I can only think of albums, like Blue by Joni Mitchell very dark and very moody.
And maybe a compilation of The Band songs where Richard Manuel (commited suicide) is singing lead.

 

there's a site out there that uses the Amazon API to show you a visual map:

www.liveplasma.com

 

You might also want to check out 2 albums by Neil Young in "Tonight's the Night" and "On the Beach" - part of his famed ditch trilogy (the other album of that trilogy "Time Fades Away" has still not been released on CD).

 

Hmmm... There’s a curious theme emerging here.

Leonard Cohen
Dan Bejar
The Besnard Lakes
Joni Mitchell
The Band
Neil Young

What do all these artists have in common?

Spoiler

A: They’re all Canadian

 

Y'all are a depressive bunch, huh? Must be the lack of sunlight.

 

... or the long, cold, winters, or all the big, open, empty, spaces. Or it could be just a counter point to our reputation as friendly, cheery, people, or perhaps a counterpoint to Celine Dion and Bryan Adams. I’d never noticed this trend before so I haven't really thought about it. The new Arcade Fire is on the dark side as well, come to think of it.

(On the sunlight, most of these bands are from places where we get a lot of sun, actually, except Bejar who is from Vancouver and probably periodically forgets that the earth has sun.)

 

rasselas, you may like them:
http://www.winterdrawings.com/daryl-waller/the-mutineer.html

 

I love them. I like the moody depressive stuff too. especially with killer guitar motifs and weird instrumentals.

 

Good call. Cohen, for sure. I saw him a few times, but sitting on the side of Castle Hill, here in Austin (1967?), with about 20 other people, listening to him sing (with various herbs getting passed around) is easily tops. Suzanne was a hit for Judy Collins, and Cohen does a marvelous job with what is, after all, his own poetry.

Like it dark? You have to get Lou Reed's Berlin. Brilliant.

The Bed -

This is the place where she lay her head
When she went to bed at night
And this is the place our children were conceived
Candles lit the room brightly at night

And this is the place where she cut her wrists
That odd and fateful night
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling

This is the place where we used to live
I paid for it with love and blood
And these are the boxes that she kept on the shelf
Filled with her poetry and stuff

And this is the room where she took the razor
And cut her wrists that strange and fateful night
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling

I never would have started if I'd known
That it's end this way
But funny thing, I'm not at all sad
That it stopped this way

This is the place where she lay her head
When she went to bed at night
And this is the place our children were conceived
Candles lit the room brightly at night

And this is the place where she cut her wrists
That odd and fateful night
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling


It sounds better than it reads.