The idea behind Tunes Past to Present is to talk about new music that might appeal to us, well, older folks. After you reach a certain age, it’s easy to exist in a music echo chamber. You listen to the tunes that you are most familiar with as do your friends. After a while it becomes easy to miss great bands that you would certainly […]
The first time I heard Bastille, I was struck by two things. First, how well they updated 80s dance pop into the modern era. Songs like “Pompei” and “Things We Lost in The Fire” would have had a welcome place on the dance floor of any NYC club in the 80s. They also sounded thoroughly modern. The second impression I had was how good the […]
Electronic music artist Simon Green’s, Bonobos project is modern twist on classic electronica. Bonobos is retro dance in some ways. For example, it uses classic sequencers and samples more than is typical in modern electronic music. This gives an overall analog sound to the music that is often lacking in modern electronica, especially EDM. In addition to the use of retro techniques, the structure of […]
How does one describe Kaelan Mikla? 80s inspired synth pop? Yep, there’s that. Atmospheric dance music? Certainly. Goth? Very much so. Proving once again that weird but great music comes out of Iceland (remember The Sugarcubes?), Kaelan Mikla, produces an amazing mix of dark, strange, and mysterious music that can best be likened to the most goth elements of Siouxsie and Banshees, Bauhaus, and Nine […]
I first heard Kirsty MacColl in the mid-1980s. She had recorded a very synthpop version of Billy Bragg’s “New England” and it was making the rounds of metro New York City clubs as well as the local new music station WLIR. Kirsty’s version was different enough that it was hard to tell if it was the same song. She had a voice that was as, […]
Back in the early 1970s, the rock music writer Lenny Kaye was asked to put together a compilation of lesser-known songs from the 60s. The result was Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era. The album featured raw, DIY music from bands practically no one had heard of, or at least heard from in a long while. This music, later tagged garage or psychedelic […]
Back in the mid 1980s, a group of artists mixed new wave and punk with country, blues, and folk styles to create a genre called roots rock revival. For a short while, 80s style roots rock revival was a fixture on college and alternative charts. Groups like The Beat Farmers, The Long Ryders, The Blasters, Los Lobos, and Lone Justice updated American music to fit […]
Back in the 1970s, I would have hated Jungle’s new album Loving in Stereo. In fact, I would have hated all of Jungle’s music. That’s because they are unabashedly retro but more specifically disco and danceable R&B. At that time, I was all about progressive rock and then punk and new wave. I even had a “Disco Sucks” t-shirt. Now, I’ve grown. I’m still not […]