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Thread: Normal Love - Survival Tricks

  1. #26
    Member Steve F.'s Avatar
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    but what the hell are those two bands doing on that show?
    Steve F.

    www.waysidemusic.com
    www.cuneiformrecords.com

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    “Remember, if it doesn't say "Cuneiform," it's not prog!” - THE Jed Levin

    Any time any one speaks to me about any musical project, the one absolute given is "it will not make big money". [tip of the hat to HK]

    "Death to false 'support the scene' prog!"

    please add 'imo' wherever you like, to avoid offending those easily offended.

  2. #27
    Member Morpheus's Avatar
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    At first I wasn't sure, but the drummer's name is Eli Litwin, and it turns out the host of the show is named Ralph Litwin.

  3. #28
    Quote Originally Posted by Steve F. View Post
    Inzinzac are also very good; I know their album and I got to see them when they opened for Uz Jsme Doma at Orion
    I LOVE their album. They are better at this than Yowie and Grand Ulena (both of whom I like as well). Seeing them with UJD must have been a blast, I suppose.

    I'm off back to the whisky now.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  4. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by nosebone View Post
    Sounds like every RIO band in a blender.
    this is a highly original band
    I can hear the Beefheart influence but other then that ...

  5. #30
    Quote Originally Posted by chalkpie View Post
    This is sonically a modern album I love. What would this album be like recorded analog in the early 70's without all of today's technology? Hmmm.
    I also love the production and sound processing
    take a listen to the live clip to get an idea how they can sound just as convincing without the studio wizardry
    Maybe like Beefheart the vocals and lyrics add that extra dimension that raises them above the rest of the pack like Zs etc.
    What an amazing album

  6. #31
    chalkpie
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    Agreed on the originality aspect. Beefheart never came close to the textural components in this music. Maybe some of the rhythms perhaps, but otherwise, pretty much this is in a league of its own. I would be curious to know if they are Ives fanatics or not? Thanks for the reminder - gonna dust this sucker off and let it invade my bones today.

  7. #32
    chalkpie
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    I LOVE their album. They are better at this than Yowie and Grand Ulena (both of whom I like as well). Seeing them with UJD must have been a blast, I suppose.

    I'm off back to the whisky now.
    Whisky? What you drinking lad? I've been doing my Caol Ila lately - holy shit that stuff is beautiful! Islay malts slay me.

    Sorry, back to weird music.......

  8. #33
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    I actually think they appear rather fresh. When I reviewed their first release back in the day, I seem to remember likening them to a chance meeting between Naked City, Charles Ives and '74-era King Crimson. And I stand by that. The charts they go through in the second half of that album (EP, really) reveal some of the densest "rock" this side of Zs and Woodson's Ellipsis.
    Denser.

    Zs or Ellipsis still sound "musical" to me, if confusing - even at first listening - and I can eventually make some sense out of them with repeated plays. Zs seem like absolutely uncompromising avant chamber music, but scored for guitar, drums, and sax rather than perhaps clarinet and prepared piano. Ellipsis seem more like a compositional interpretation of free jazz. But both still have a sense of melody, harmony, and recognizable structure, even if unconventional, jagged, and very chromatic.

    Normal Love are something else again. The only context I've been able to hear for them is as skilled musicians and composers inspired by No Wave, noise music and other fringe idioms mostly populated by musical primitives. And like their influences, it's hard for me to hear anything in them beyond a pure barbaric yawp. It may be there, but I have trouble finding it.

  9. #34

  10. #35
    Quote Originally Posted by chalkpie View Post
    I would be curious to know if they are Ives fanatics or not?
    Amnon Freidlin ( the main composer) - "I get a kick out of him but haven't gone super deep into his stuff ... Pretty sure some of the other members like him yup "

  11. #36
    Yeah, I agree about Inzinzac. Just another one of those great avant-free jazz-type of bands that Philadelphia is cranking out these days. Plus I love the album cover.

    Alban Bailly, their guitarist, was running a really cool free-jazz night at a Philly coffee shop a few summers ago. A bunch of great acts performing brief, high-intensity sets. Plus, he's buds with Nick Millevoi from Many Arms (and many other groups too).

    But yeah, Normal Love... I have their s/t album, and it is quite angular and mathy. Survival Tricks seems like it might be a bit too difficult for me - I'd have to be in the right mood to listen to it.

  12. #37
    Member rcarlberg's Avatar
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    Anything Udi likes is worth checking out.

    I think Normal Love sounds like a cross between The Residents and Mnemonist Orchestra. I haven't heard all of their output so I don't know if they occasionally lapse into more normal / less stressful music-making, but for me that's what makes bands like Faust and This Heat great, is that contrast.

  13. #38
    chalkpie
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    Quote Originally Posted by Udi Koomran View Post
    Amnon Freidlin ( the main composer) - "I get a kick out of him but haven't gone super deep into his stuff ... Pretty sure some of the other members like him yup "
    Thanks.

  14. #39
    Subterranean Tapir Hobo Chang Ba's Avatar
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    I've always had Normal Love as analogs to Zs. Their album 2007 (or is it 2009?) reminds me alot of pre-New Slaves Zs. Twisting chambery pieces, though with more rock influences in NL. Then, Zs released New Slaves which is electronic, difficult, and dense and NL released Survival Tricks which is in the same ballpark again (similarly with a bit more energy and rock feel).

    I'm not sure of the timing, so I suppose Survival Tricks may have came out before New Slaves, but IIRC it did not.

    Not trying to call Normal Love a clone band at all, btw. Just mentioning the resonances by ears have made.
    Please don't ask questions, just use google.

    Never let good music get in the way of making a profit.

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  15. #40

  16. #41
    Member Morpheus's Avatar
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    It is very good but different. No electronics, no vocals. I posted a live video on the first page from the first album period.

  17. #42
    Member Steve F.'s Avatar
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    I saw them in 2006; it was VERY different.
    Steve F.

    www.waysidemusic.com
    www.cuneiformrecords.com

    - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

    “Remember, if it doesn't say "Cuneiform," it's not prog!” - THE Jed Levin

    Any time any one speaks to me about any musical project, the one absolute given is "it will not make big money". [tip of the hat to HK]

    "Death to false 'support the scene' prog!"

    please add 'imo' wherever you like, to avoid offending those easily offended.

  18. #43
    chalkpie
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    Kermanator - you dig these guys?

  19. #44
    Last year I took Chris Cutler and Tim Hodgkinson to lunch before their soundcheck and I told them about Normal Love
    None of them heard of them

  20. #45
    Quote Originally Posted by Udi Koomran View Post
    Last year I took Chris Cutler and Tim Hodgkinson to lunch before their soundcheck and I told them about Normal Love
    None of them heard of them
    Udi, I'm gonna find that Tim'n'Chris and kick their ASS!!!
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  21. #46
    Member Steve F.'s Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Udi Koomran View Post
    Last year I took Chris Cutler and Tim Hodgkinson to lunch before their soundcheck and I told them about Normal Love
    None of them heard of them
    I wouldn't have expected them to have heard of them.
    Steve F.

    www.waysidemusic.com
    www.cuneiformrecords.com

    - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

    “Remember, if it doesn't say "Cuneiform," it's not prog!” - THE Jed Levin

    Any time any one speaks to me about any musical project, the one absolute given is "it will not make big money". [tip of the hat to HK]

    "Death to false 'support the scene' prog!"

    please add 'imo' wherever you like, to avoid offending those easily offended.

  22. #47
    Blistering performance - razor sharp-super tight - impressive
    Even this horrible "camera man" could ruin it for me


  23. #48
    I'm here for the moosic NogbadTheBad's Avatar
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    Wow
    Ian

    Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on progrock.com
    https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-a...re-happy-hour/

    Gordon Haskell - "You've got to keep the groove in your head and play a load of bollocks instead"
    I blame Wynton, what was the question?
    There are only 10 types of people in the World, those who understand binary and those that don't.

  24. #49
    Member Morpheus's Avatar
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    It's a shame the band appears to be no more. Would have loved a follow up to Survival Tricks.
    Last edited by Morpheus; 01-14-2017 at 02:05 PM.

  25. #50
    I'm here for the moosic NogbadTheBad's Avatar
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    Damn
    Ian

    Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on progrock.com
    https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-a...re-happy-hour/

    Gordon Haskell - "You've got to keep the groove in your head and play a load of bollocks instead"
    I blame Wynton, what was the question?
    There are only 10 types of people in the World, those who understand binary and those that don't.

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