MAHB MUSIC ALBUMS YOU CANNOT L.P R.I.P BREAK UP Is the album dead and buried? BY MATTHEW HORTON n March this year, prog rock behemoths Pink Yes and no. To return to those 2009 figures, the lion’s Floyd won their battle to prevent EMI from share of sales were taken by Susan Boyle’s hotchpotch ELBOW: cutting up their albums and selling them as of standards geared at a quick Christmas sales fix, The Seldom piecemeal downloads, effectively reinforcing Lady GaGa’s The Fame and The Fame Monster packed Seen Kid the idea of the album as coherent entity, rather with singles and a few will-this-do?s and Black Eyed Guy Garvey and Ithan a collection of disparate tracks. Peas’ ungodly collection of party bangers and identikit co’s Mercury Prize-winning On the surface, they were just emphasising the same throwaways, The E.N.D.. The end indeed: none of dedication to a contract that famously stopped EMI from releasing these million-sellers suggest a cohesive, conceptual departed friend Floyd singles back in the vinyl days. But in the current masterpiece it would be sacrilege to carve up. moves from the climate, Floyd’s latter-day victory has extra resonance. But there’s still a healthy quorum of album fanatics pain of loss to In recent years the conceptual full-length piece out there. Witness the growing number of bands some kind of redemption in has become an endangered “The digital age is hawking their past around, playing classic albums in uplifting modern species, now that downloads here, and if punk their entirety. A trend that kicked off when Arthur anthem “One Day mean we can take music any couldn’t kill off Lee’s Love toured Forever Changes a decade ago has Like This”. The way we want it. The figures the dinosaurs, snowballed into an industry, with promoters ATP journey is its own speak for themselves. In the perhaps the running their Don’t Look Back series of gigs, Lloyd Cole reward. UK in 2009, overall album mouse button will” and the Commotions reforming to play Rattlesnakes sales dipped by 3.5 percent and Primal Scream wheeling out Screamadelica later to 128.9m units – that’s the fifth successive year they’ve this year. There even appeared to be an audience for dropped. At the same time, the downloads element of The Wonder Stuff’s Hup, which attempted to justify a that figure rose to 16.1m, an incredible 56 percent hike. spurious “classic” status on the road this April. These So what do we take from this? There’s still an appetite heritage acts won’t let the album die. It’s their cash cow. RADIOHEAD: for the long-player, evidently, but the digital format is So Pink Floyd’s victory is just the latest example OK Computer heir-apparent. And it’s changing the way we consume of the old guard kicking against the forces of change. Radiohead music; we’re less patient, less tolerant of the needless The Beatles also made their sustained case for the spent a fortnight instrumental or the dreaded hip hop “skit”. purity of the album in 2009 by re-mastering their working out the After all, what do you do when your iPod’s full? track-listing alone. entire back catalogue (come on, you wanted the Ringo Proof if it were Do you delete that weighty Rolling Stones best of or songs to stay as much as he did), while Paul Weller’s needed that this pare down the ropey Snow Patrol album to the two new album Wake Up The Nation is a sop to those wary towering paean to half-decent tracks? In short, the singles. Take a scythe of listening to an LP in full. Its 16 tracks zip by in under suburban ennui to your mp3s and you could be left with a greatest hits 40 minutes, leaving you little time to get to the skip and the sickness of pop: no filler, no earnest experiments you think you button. Yet more than ever, these artists are music’s of modern life is meant to be heard ought to like; just the golden nuggets. It would feel King Canutes, stemming the tide against hopeless in full. like a return to the early ’60s, where singles held sway, odds. The digital age is here, and if punk couldn’t kill before The Beatles found their creative well could off the dinosaurs, perhaps that fearsome mouse button support full-length albums. Only the most tediously will. It’s a pity, sure, but as you sit there cherrypicking pedantic, fluffy-bearded Radiohead fan wouldn’t want your favourite tracks from the latest Vampire Weekend that. Wouldn’t they? album, be aware you’re just another brick in the wall. SPIRITUALIZED: Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space A conceptual piece from its pill- packet packaging to its seamless narcotic drift, it’s a symphonic space odyssey that cosmic casualty Jason Pierce has often performed in its entirety. 2 ESQUIRE JUNE 2010 MUST LISTEN NEW ALBUM: MUST SEE GIG: the new pornographers – together DANNY TENAGLIA DJS AT THE FORUM DE BEYROUTH IN BEIRUT, JUNE 5 DJs Jade and Diamond Setter: the future’s so bright even tinted windows aren’t enough WANT TO PARTY LIKE A ROCKSTAR? HERE’S WHERE IN BEIRUT THE BASEMENT AKA Jade’s house for the afterhours. Harsh but chic, intimate but not cosy, The Basement encourages dancing on tables, chairs, ledges and goes out of its way to prove its motto “Electro is Dead” is a little premature. B018 One of the most popular places to go and You can literally raise the roof at one of JOY OF DECKS do just that is his own club. The Basement is Beirut’s institutions. Well, not you personally, Meet the man who provides Jade’s home from home, an industrial Gothic but the roof does retract and disappear. Beirut’s soundtrack sub-level space (hence the name), where the If that doesn’t make you gasp, perhaps one of the coffin seats will, or the fact it was BY GEORGINA WilSON-POWEll city’s party crowd come to dance. His weekly designed by Bernard Khoury. residency sits within an electro/techno remit, t’s sad... the only independent music but visiting DJs also mix it up with other BARTHREESIXTY shop in town and it’s shutting down,” monthly nights. Set up on high above the Sitting on top of the new Le Gray hotel, says DJ Jade, one of Beirut’s biggest dancefloor, the DJ booth brings to mind the this rooftop, circular bar does what it says players in the music scene. He’s a man Faithless track, “God is a DJ”. on the door – you can see across the whole of the city. Iof many talents: DJ, promoter, musician, club A well known face about town in Beirut, owner, singer and one half of a production Jade has always been a bit of a Pied Piper. BRUT duo (with his friend Diamond Setter). Their Whilst working at La CD-Thèque in 2002, after A new player in Beirut’s club scene, work includes composing music for adverts, “DJ Jade is a spell living in Montreal, Brut sticks to what it does well — house music. film scores and remixing Arabic pop singers. a product he was the lead singer of Not underground (or overground for that matter) but the music’s set to 11 from 11pm We’re in La CD-Thèque and we’re having a of Beirut’s Blend, one of Beirut’s first every night of the week. Be ready to dance. High Fidelity moment. Jade used to work here, history and popular rock bands, and a provides its eight years ago, and in the midst of buying up soundtrack” group which successfully DESSAU LIQUOR GARAGE armfuls of discounted CDs, he’s still advising combined Arabic strings Brilliantly named little spot that tries to friends and random customers on what to with Western beats emulate Berlin 100 years ago. Decadently dishevelled, it’s all about the moves, the music buy, what to look for. Whilst recommending and lyrics. He also started DJing at parties, and the moonshine in here. The best antidote German label ECM to me, we talk music. organising raves and then benefit concerts to Dubai you could wish for. “I’m setting up Kashmeer, a lounge style to help the 2006 war relief effort, enlisting bar, where we can play all the records I can’t international DJs to help. Then, in 2005, play at The Basement. Old jazz, chilled out he opened The Basement and became the soundscapes, anything we feel like,” he says soundtrack to life in Beirut when he started hearty discussion whether they’re being invited from behind a stack of CDs, half as tall as he a weekly radio show. because of a hankering for an Arabic sound, is. Jade has a habit of creating mix CDs for The next day we meet at his recording but the scope of their production work would everything he does, a kickback from his party studio where Jade and Diamond Setter are both suggest otherwise. days. Kashmeer’s opening invite is one such downloading tracks for their respective sets That night in the club, Jade watches his mix CD, that includes tracks from Moloko, that night. One ear muffled with headphones, home fill up with the people who make his Jamie Lidell, Gossip and Pink Floyd. the other clamped to his BlackBerry, Jade is musical dreams a reality and it feels like a “We’re going to open in the spring, I’ve also busily fielding calls from people interested family affair.