Music

Arnold Schönberg: Playing Cards

Image ~ ~ Mark

Arnold Schönberg: Playing Cards. I love those designs.

This facsimile edition of playing cards painted by the composer Arnold Schönberg in c.1910 was published by Belmont Music Publishers in 1981 and produced by Ferd Piatnik (Vienna), with a preface by the composer’s daughter, Nuria Schoenberg-Nono. The original cards were made in watercolours and gouache on cardboard with gold and silver, size: 10.5 by 5.5 cm. No reverse has been found for the cards so a coloured pattern painted in one of his diaries was used.

Filed under: not just a composer.

I Want You Still: Celebrating 40 Years of Marvin Gaye’s Sensual Classic | Pitchfork

Link ~ ~ Mark

Fun interview about creating one of my favorite albums. Nice bit:

Out of the 13 months we took to make the album, there was six months of partying. Seriously. We would come into the studio, and Marvin would say, “Let’s go play basketball.” And we would play basketball half the day, on studio time. There was no pressure.

I Want You Still: Celebrating 40 Years of Marvin Gaye’s Sensual Classic | Pitchfork

The Weird Global Appeal of Heavy Metal

Link ~ ~ Mark

The explosion of local bands around the world tends to track rising living standards and Internet use. Making loud music is expensive: You need electric guitars, amplifiers, speakers, music venues and more leisure time. “When economic development happens, metal scenes appear. They’re like mushrooms after the rain,” says Roy Doron, an African history professor at Winston-Salem State University.

The Weird Global Appeal of Heavy Metal

That Ominous Pulse

~ Mark

I’ve noticed a few recent movies with electro-ish scores that feature some sort of pulse or buzz or building waves of raw sound. Not especially melodic, just a persistent, engulfing motif that swallows you up.

From *Upstream Color*, one of my favorite soundtrack moments in recent memory, “As If It Would Have A Universal And Memorable Ending”:

From *Gone Girl*, “Consummation”:

And recently in *Ex Machina*, there’s the last minute or so of “Hacking/Cutting”:

The last two especially remind me of the opening few seconds of Yeezus. I’m sure I’m missing some other good examples?