It is currently Thu Mar 28, 2024 2:36 pm

All times are UTC




Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 230 posts ]  Go to page Previous  1 ... 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 ... 16  Next
Author Message
PostPosted: Mon Feb 09, 2015 4:16 am 
Offline
Moderator
User avatar

Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2009 5:22 pm
Posts: 2398
Location: ~ +38.4, -122.7
^Yes, I recall her saying she was a big fan of Morphine. She studied sax in her teens, but Blandford's biography says she later found the sound of the sax to be "quite nauseating".

Thanks for the Clock DVA links, very interesting. Never heard of them.

Don't forget the Beefheart angle (Soprano sax solo at 22:22 - mercifully short that time, LOL).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7f7gBv0TjE
Beefheart can arguably be called one of Polly's largest influences, but I doubt she would incorporate any of Don's "Ornette Coleman/free jazz" style.

_________________
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JelqPcoaAB8"


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Mon Feb 09, 2015 3:43 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
WIN TICKETS ON THE FINAL SESSION: http://now-here-this.timeout.com/2015/02/09/win-tickets-to-the-sold-out-pj-harvey-recording-in-progress-at-somerset-house/.


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Mon Feb 09, 2015 9:36 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
Kuk91 wrote:
05/02/2015: "You could bring in the instruments one by one" Flood suggested on one such foray from his two seater sofa, a statement more than a question. "No" remarked Polly laconically, with a smile. Perhaps a polite reminder that this was her album and vision. Flood didn’t argue, he smiled back.

05/02/2015: "One of the producers or engineers messes around with some cables. 'Maybe the best thing is if someone starts and then you all join in gradually' he says. 'No' she replies firmly and that is the end of that."

"She stands up, puts her guitar on its stand, applies lip balm and prepares to sing. It will be a guide track. There are eight bars of intro - but she isn't sure where she is, she holds up four fingers with a quizzical expression."

"'Heard it was 28,000' she sings, 'and watch them fade out'. Her voice is so familiar but I can't catch many more of the words. Maybe it's about drowning? 'I think that the intro was too long' says the drummer, 'I agree' I want to say."

http://cathylomax.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/pj-harvey-recording-in-progress-050215.html

The song is, most likely, "The Revolving Wheel".


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Tue Feb 10, 2015 10:51 am 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
"The Q Radio Show" from 08/02/15, they start talking about Polly on 1h and 16min mark: http://www.qthemusic.com/8439/listen-again-to-this-weeks-q-show-on-absolute-radio-080215/.

One of the hosts has been on the last Wednesday session. Correct me if I heard it wrong, but he said that the band listened back to "The Age of the Dollar", and Polly went "Oh, it's got a lot of holes in it, isn't it?", and then they were about to re-record the vocals for that.


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Tue Feb 10, 2015 4:24 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
@JurassicLen: "It's too beautiful at the moment, can we have more darkness?" @PJHarveyUK's recording session was a wonder to witness."
_______________________________________________________________

Image

@laurasnapes [Features editor @NME, contributor @uncutmagazine]: "New issue! Richey Edwards, Strokes, Carl Barat in features + my piece on a week of PJ Harvey's recording sessions".


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Wed Feb 11, 2015 11:39 am 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
"I'll Be Waiting"

They swept across the land
They did not leave a thing
They did not leave a person
A stone or a tree

They did not leave anything
They did not leave anything

All they left is sand
All they left is sand

I remember father
I remember him
Every minute I remember
Every moment

Now I hate everyone
Now I hate everyone
Before I used to love

One day God shall grow
One day God shall grow
From their graves
When they return

Over their graves
I will be waiting
And when they return
I will be waiting

I will not leave a person
Standing
I will not leave anything
I will not leave anything

All I'll leave is sand
All I'll leave is sand

And then God shall grow
And then God shall grow
From their graves
When they return

God will be growing
Over their graves
I will be waiting
When they return


From this VERY detailed review about Jan 27: https://theunapologists.wordpress.com/2015/02/10/pj-harvey-recording-in-progress-27th-january-part-2-in-the-bowels-of-somerset-house/.

"She goes on to say how she wants a young boy to take the lead and that she would shadow him on this track. We then suddenly hear a brief blast of music, a brilliant-sounding track which certainly seems like a logical progression from Let England Shake. ‘Claps, no drums’ she says after it’s switched off, ‘not even the rhythm, just the clapping’, and turns to pick up a fender jaguar. She plays the chord sequence of G D E A C Am C Am Em with several strums of each chord. ‘Does that sound right?’, she asks Parish. ‘No’ he replies. ‘I knew it was in the wrong key. How could you tell John?’ she asks. ‘By looking’ says Parish. After a brief moment of chuckling, she adds a capo to the second fret of the guitar and plays <...>"

"She goes on to describe how she wanted the guitar to be stuttering, in a bid to try and replicate the stuttering of children suffering from post-war trauma."

"A brief pause here as PJ coughs. ‘Excuse me’ she says ‘you’re not supposed to do vocals at this age. Fuck’. She makes a reference to ‘all those gin and tonics’ as well. Was PJ a bit hungover?" )))

"They were discussing having layers of clapping, using as many people clapping as possible."


Last edited by Kuk91 on Wed Feb 11, 2015 2:29 pm, edited 3 times in total.

Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Wed Feb 11, 2015 12:27 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
Here you can download new NME with that article about Polly: https://www.nitroflare.com/view/DEB275D828F2655/NME_Magazine_-_14_February_2015.pdf.
________________________________________________________

A few more song quotes from the German article (http://politiken.dk/magasinet/feature/ECE2540454/pj-harvey-og-lyden-af-en-verden-i-kaos/):

"Imagine This" - "I cannot forget / my father or brother/ they were killed / right in front of me";

Beginning of "Chain of Keys" - "The dusty ground's a dead end track / the neighbour won't be coming back";

"Guilty" - "There's a little figure / on the television / scratching on the ground / waiting for the moment".


Last edited by Kuk91 on Wed Feb 11, 2015 6:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Wed Feb 11, 2015 12:51 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
"Inside stands Polly Jean Harvey, dressed entirely in black, dark hair framing her face, deep in conversation with Alain Johannes (cradling a battered cigar box guitar) and producer Flood (cradling a cup of takeaway coffee). Also present in the soundproofed recording studio/art installation is co-producer and Harvey's regular collaborator John Parish, percussionist Jean-Marc Butty, former Nick Cave cohort Mick Harvey, as well as a phalanx of recording equipment, computers, cables, guitars, brass instruments, drums, vintage keyboards and a pristine white sofa."

"...the piece of music that the group is working on is coincidently a haunting, dark-hearted lullaby that appears to be titled "The Orange Monkey" and contains the see-saw vocal hook: "Restlessness holds my brain/ Questions I could not hold back/ An orange monkey on a chain." Progress is, however, painfully slow as the band tries out several subtly different percussion tracks to seemingly no one's satisfaction.

"Let's try the guitar to get the feel," says Flood, indicating a change in approach. For the next 20 minutes, Parish picks out a bluesy, reverb-drenched melody on his guitar that incrementally builds, mutates and evolves into something resembling a solid backing track.

"That's really great. That's brilliant," responds a suddenly animated Harvey at one point, although Flood is less impressed. "It's not quite right, is it? Try something more subtle," he says to no one in particular. The guitarist duly strips the rhythm track down to its bare bones, and having played it from beginning to end half a dozen more times, suggests a full run-through. Unfortunately for the audience peering through the glass, this is not a live performance in the traditional sense, but simply Parish playing over a previously recorded vocal.

The audio feed cuts out, signaling the end of our audience session, with Harvey sat in silent contemplation, her head tilted back and her eyes closed."

http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/6465849/pj-harvey-london-recording-session-review

Also, Billboard insist on one of the song titles being "A Drug Called Money" (but quite a few previous sources says "Dog").


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Wed Feb 11, 2015 6:11 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
Kuk91 wrote:
"Guilty" - "There's a little figure / on the television / scratching on the ground / waiting for the moment".

From NME: "...musicians repeat the refrain in the martial snare of ‘Guilty’, which recounts a drone attack as witnessed through a grainy surveillance screen: "What’s he doing with that stick? / Which one is guilty?".

"A song provisionally called ‘Ministry Of Social Afairs’ is built around a leery old blues song, Jerry McCain & His Upstarts' "That's What They Want" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPpEwGcMZAI), whose refrain – “Money, honey / That’s what they want / Oh yeah” – Polly sings through an alien vocal effect, matching her swaggering tone with unselfconscious, vampy moves that make her band crack up. <...> ‘Ministry Of Social Afairs’ ofers a grim indictment of modern London: “A million beggars’ silhouettes / Near where the money changers sit / By their locked cabinets”."

Kuk91 wrote:
"Imagine This" - "I cannot forget / my father or brother/ they were killed / right in front of me"

"Imagine This" - "Now I hate everyone / Before I used to love all people".

"‘Sight Seeing, South Of The River’ documents Hope VI, the US’ flawed project to clear out and replace dilapidated social housing – and not always with the same number of residences; ‘River Anacostia’ offers comfort to a now predominantly African-American district in Washington DC that was segregated by the construction of a freeway."

Song "UN High Commission for Refugees In The Field": "How to stop the murdering? / By now we should have learned".

"A heraldic PJ Harvey crest featuring a goat and a two-headed dog, a beast that also recurs in her sketches, are pinned on the wall around Flood’s computer. Parish’s partner Michelle Henning designed the crest, which may form a part of the album artwork."

Polly Jean: "I want songs to remain as singalong-ey as possible. I tried so hard to make them catchy when I was writing them. That's my masterplan."


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Thu Feb 12, 2015 1:02 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
You can win the signed poster or lyric sheet reproductions: http://www.somersethouse.org.uk/visual-arts/pj-harvey-recording-in-progress/win-pj-harvey-merchandise.
_____________________________________________________

@noise_jam: "So PJ’s recording was actually a lot of fun! They almost finished the song called “Community Of Hope” #pjharvey"

@melissaterras: "#pjharvey was recording a song called "community of hope" which ends with a choir singing "they're going to build a Walmart heee-eeee-eeere"

Apparently, the song "Community Of Hope" is based upon a poem "Sight-Seeing, South of the River".


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Feb 13, 2015 11:33 am 
Offline

Joined: Tue Feb 03, 2015 3:09 pm
Posts: 67
Thanks for the NME pdf. Here are the three PJ Harvey pages without the rest of the magazine.


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Feb 13, 2015 4:24 pm 
Offline

Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 7:02 am
Posts: 27
The 3pm session today was all Chain of Keys - first playback and suggestions, then edits. She removed the first chorus, half the second verse and half the intro. She was aiming for "more violent, less mournful". This is the most LES like of the songs I've heard, most like All And Everyone, particularly the sax lines at the end.

After a bit more playback she re-recorded the guide vocal to make it less pushy and seemed quite happy with it. Dollar Dollar was also up for getting reworked at some point.


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Feb 13, 2015 4:52 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
czuczu, thanks for your info.


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Feb 13, 2015 8:06 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sun Aug 09, 2009 6:36 pm
Posts: 850
Location: England
from ft.com

Like rugby tours or trips to Las Vegas, what goes on in the recording studio stays in the studio. The wonderful singing we hear may actually be a tuneless shriek fed through sophisticated software. The easy-going tune we hum may be the product of weeks of perfectionism and blazing rows. The studio is a secretive place. Behind its soundproofed door we listeners cannot go.
But there is an exception. It can be found until today at Somerset House in London, where Polly Jean Harvey is recording the follow-up to her 2011 album Let England Shake, which won her the Mercury Prize for a second time and was widely acclaimed as her masterpiece. The new album is being made in a specially designed studio in a room in the former Inland Revenue offices that used to house a gymnasium and rifle range (tax collection has its perks).
For the past month members of the public have filed into the room containing the studio to watch Harvey and her musicians as they rehearse, sip drinks, yawn and make jokes about bass flutes. Devised with the arts organisation Artangel, the project demolishes the distinction between recording songs and playing live, the private and public aspects of the musician’s working life.
Visiting during the last week of the installation, I watched several run-throughs of a nearly finished song, “Chain of Keys”. The studio was a walled-off, boxlike space within the larger room, lined with windows. The glass was one-way, so that Harvey and her colleagues could not see us. Sound was piped out from the studio, making every utterance or chuckle or casually strummed instrument audible. A poster inside, with scrawled song titles (“A Drug Called Money”, “Dollar Dollar”), suggested a continuation of Let England Shake’s leftish politics.
Harvey, in black and wearing headphones, sat on a white sofa next to her producer, Mark “Flood” Ellis. Eight musicians, all male, sat adjacent in opposing lines, surrounded by musical clutter. A baritone saxophonist rumbled into action. Three drummers beat a military tattoo and Harvey climbed to her feet, microphone in hand. Her voice was suspended high above the music, a gothic folk singer.
For the onlooker it was remarkable, a close-up preview of an unreleased song. But in the studio something wasn’t quite right. “Let’s see if we can save this song from the doom of the scrapheap,” Harvey said. It was played again, and then again. Suggestions were bandied about. A flute? Out one came. A trumpet? That too. My 45-minute time slot ended with the studio momentarily silent, the issue unresolved.
The enigmatic Harvey has an exhibitionist streak, as with the outlandish pink catsuits and exaggerated make-up of her stage persona 20 years ago. But “Recording in Progress” goes beyond that. Watching the singer and her musicians at work was to witness a complex act of co-operation. At the same time we onlookers, a collection of strangers gathered together, were engaged in a communal experience.
In a building formerly dedicated to tax collection, a point of contact between the public realm and private life — one that those who believe human nature to be competitive would like to see broken — the message gained amplitude. Harvey’s opening of the studio door is a bold form of self-exposure; it is also an act of sharing.


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Feb 13, 2015 10:02 pm 
Offline

Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2014 7:36 am
Posts: 2207
By the way, found a "new" one:

Image
________________________________________________________

"I literally was behind her while she was on the drums": http://iconosquare.com/p/919562876778263809_194000076#/detail/919562876778263809_194000076.


Top
 Profile  
 
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 230 posts ]  Go to page Previous  1 ... 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 ... 16  Next

All times are UTC


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 78 guests


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum

Search for:
Jump to:  
cron