Kelley Polar - Love Songs of The Hanging Gardens (Environ CD05)

-- justsaying (jus...), December 5th, 2005.

I posted my frustration with ILMers about this exact issue on the Richie Hawtin thread, but you have to understand that this is I Love Music, and therefore identifying genres and picking apart the music as it applies to such is part of a valid discussion.

That said, it is annoying that the tendency here with posts discussing dance/electronic music, which contain enough absurd esoteric genres (folktronica, microhouse, etc.) to drive one batty, is to dismiss the content of an album in favor of academic muscle flexing intent on proving that the author's argument is superior, whether or not it's correct.

But it's still fair game in this arena. If you want to know about what an album sounds like exclusively, check allmusic or amazon or one of the many dance record store sites that offer up snapshot reviews. Or jump in the fite with a good argument.

Or just trust everyone here (these people know better than most) - it's a fantastic record, regardless of what genre it falls under...

I know when I talk about IDM I'm thinking way more about early Warp stuff than anything else, because that's where all my reference points (stuff I've listened to enough to internalize) lie. I stopped buying when it got boring, and a lot of other people did too - more people understand IDM in terms of the Richard D James album than in terms of Chocolate Strawberry Fuckstick or whatever Venetian Snares' new one is called.

People tend to anchor to the golden age of any genre. When people talk about "classical music" in generalities, would you assume they're talking about something more like Beethoven or more like Philip Glass? When you say "punk", do more people think of Rancid or the Ramones?

i don't get it.
-- vahid (vfoz...), December 5th, 2005

=

I, being among said culprits of this exact tendency in the last several 200+ post dance threads will now attempt to mask guilt and throw subtle wink/nudge to my accomplices by inserting dismissive comment.

Get that, smart-ass.

but the golden age of IDM as you talk about it lasted about 6 albums worth. I go with whatever the largest amount of people agree on. The difference between Rancid and Ramones, sonically, isn't really enough, your analogy would work better if you asked "when people think of punk, do they think of Television or do they think of Blink-182" and unfortunately, the answer is Blink-182. You can even replace Television with the Voidoids and it still works.

Not really. Odd dichotomy here: pure sound description vs. genre classification. Still leaves plenty of other stuff to talk about, in my opinion.

Of course I'm fine with hearing about genre. And hey, I like retro-disco too. One would just imagine that, with a 500 post thread, the album must have touched some nerve. I guess the nerve it touched was the classificatory one. What this says about dance music right now I won't dare to speculate.

"In a year when electronic dance artists such as Jamie Lidell and Roisin Murphy have made a good fist at innovative pop, along comes Croatian-born Kelley Polar to steal their thunder."!

+ omg "nefarious rave rumble"!!

(um, & anyone have any suggestions on what I could stick on a mixtape between "Here In The Night" & Pulp's "Seductive Barry"?)

Have any videos been released?

but now I love it

;-)

it's f***ing rude to retitle the thread when KP is actually posting, joining in the conversation. Can a mod change it back?

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d148/jonwilliamspwn/JonWilliams.jpg

-- ha (idon...), December 27th, 2005.

i disagree

I AM KELLEY POLAR

I AM KELLEY POLAR

no offense intended to vahid but will someone please change this thread back to it's orig title? who the hell changed it anyway?

I have a music crit friend Darren here in Melbourne who subscribes to the "deep house forever/death to the false electro/german-house idols" pov; I'm quite keen to get his opinion on this album.

xpost - yeah, just as Scritti's C&P'85 was way too OVERproduced and camp for it's own good. The music/production remained its saving grace however, whereas here I'm left imagining a version of this with less lyrical abandon and lush chamber orchestra arrangements instead.

If there is an electro-house backlash I don't think it will result in a return to deep house (too recently the hipster music of choice, at least in Australia), I suspect it'll all go detroit techno or something. But we'll see. Anyway I'm wandering off-topic now so please ignore...

Kelley Polar! I will say of this album that nothing grabs me quite as much as "The Rhythm Touch" did.

my pick on this album is "in time", but it only really works if you've heard the preceding songs...and it's the last song. "ashamed of myself" is also awesome like a disco matias aguayo with a breathy chic vocal section. and cowbells!

-- jed_ (colin_o_har...), December 29th, 2005 6:04 AM. (jed)

if this happens I AM QUITTING ILX FOREVER