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STR Mixtape : Now This Is Serious [26/06/2010]
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No is a French hip-hop band, formed by South French Sebastien Casino.
Though I gotta say in advance I’m far from being an expert to hip-hop, I still love to be intrigued with good music, regardless the style.
No formed in 2007, a collective of 9 musicians, with the unusual ensemble of instruments (for a hip hop band), including violin, clavinet (extra cool) and piano (aside for the bass,drums, MC etc).
Singers are like a ram horn to the soul. They are players with a complete control of their voice. It doesn’t mean they have to be in pitch. It means they have to be in a total hold of their instrument, regarding of mathematics. Dylan was a great singer, but academically – he was shit. Still, no one could take away his amazing song deliverance from him. This quality of his allowed him to sing 11 minutes of Desolation Row, and still keep you interested, nine minutes into the song. He has authenticity.
Tom Waits sings Alice like a rusty frog, but he’s such a great actor, that it feels ok jumping of a fairy cross the Hudson. Jacques Brel was a great singer, but one shot of his eyes in Ne Me Quitte Pas, to understand that he doesn’t sing. He cries. With his entire body.
As someone who worked in a music store in the past, I stumble upon many album covers. Obviously, I didn’t manage to listen to each of the albums, but I knew what to say about each of them. At some point, it became index knowledge of albums, and I judged the book by its cover.
Usually I was right. You can indentify an Emo record miles away, let alone knowing that a drawing of a naked lady, that its legs are actually tree roots, who holds an ex stuck in a panther’s head – will be a metal album. But I did missed Cheveu big time. It looked like a b-side album of Stereolab.
When the Israeli label Sshaking Records wrote me about the band, who’s coming to Israel this month, I was glad. I heard so much about them, but never moved an ear to listen to them.
Dominique A is a great musician which I love. I came to know him through Eli Rozen, who brought Dominique A’s word to Israel. For Eli, Dominique A is a musical hero, just like John Fahey, Glen Jones, Jack Rose or Wilco are for me. Somehow I managed to contact him and send him my album and Eli’s album. He sent me back an enthusiastic letter in which he praised our albums, wrote that he enjoys them a lot and that he listens to them on the road, in his current tour.
In 2006 I wrote a this article about his album, L’horizon, which is no less than a masterpiece, if not more then that. I’ve published it at the Hebrew music reviews site The Blind Janitor, and thought of giving it new life (and adding audio and video). I haven’t changed what I’ve written then – and this is the article. This is an album that you really should hear no later than today.
