#Xena Elshazlii

[lyrics365]

زينة الشاذلي My Shit

ساكت ليه مش فالح غير لما الف تبرطم تانيه ايه الأولى مش جايه اصلا تجيلى فين؟ انا أعلى من ما بتفكر حتى لو نطيت الف متر مش هتوصل متفكرش تعملها عشان مش بخسر قصر فالكلام اصلى بقبض بالدقيقة قاعد تهرى بالساعات دفترك خلى من شيكات مش دوجا كات بس احسن منكو بفلوهات فرحانين بوجودكم عالشاشات مفيش فلوس فاهات أفاك What the fuck is that? Where y’all at? I’m the greatest motherfucker that’s why you be mad That’s…

[anarcho-mom-unist]

A survey of my ‘spotify wrapped’ from 2020

So, I listen to music between a lot of platforms, I hate how spotify operates as a company (and like in a way that’s pretty comparable to my loathing of the publishing/distribution sides of creative industries,) and I fucking refuse to ever pay for spotify askjdhd

However based on the aggregate of my 100 most-listened-to songs from a year of mostly hitting shuffle on an artist, album, or playlist on mobile, I do have some reflections and highlights. From that I made something of a survey of that list which includes my #1 and #100 song in addition to 1 song from each set of ten, for a total of 12 songs. These represent artists and genres I really got into this year, as well as longtime favorites that are worth talking about:

1. “Bad Trip” - Bad Trip (single) - Xena Elshazlii & Fady Haroun: "Bad Trip” is probably my favorite 2020 release, like if I had to pick one. The track has incredible energy, from the soft piano and vocalization intro to the verse with it’s sparse drums, subtle bass line, and slight strings to an absolute banger of a chorus with punchy staccato synths, reinforcement of the drum groove, and addition of an electric guitar. Elshazlii & Haroun pack a lot into 2-and-a-half minutes of music, and the variations in texture, mix, & music in each iteration of the song’s discrete sections are *chef’s kiss* ---verse 1 and chorus 1 are not identical to verse 2 and chorus 2, to say nothing of the short instrumental transition b/n the first chorus and second verse. Whenever I listen to “Bad Trip” I’m compelled to hit ‘repeat’ ---which is not a normal occurrence for me---and experience the builds and releases that this track brings once again. I don’t know much Arabic beyond the slang terms and exclamations that peppered my grandparents’ & parents’ speech when they spoke to each other in Armenian, but I’d be a liar if I didn’t tell y’all that “Bad Trip” is among the songs that make me want to learn the language so I can better sing along w/ them.

3. “City Lights” - Sailorwave II - Macross 82-99 ft. Kamei:  "City Lights” is the opener to Macross 82-99′s 2018 EP Sailorwave II, and it does that job immaculately. While I recommend the entire EP and an exploration of the Future Funk genre as a whole, you can’t go wrong with getting a taste of either through “City Lights.” The track bursts to life w/ synth brass chords and fast drums, quickly finding its way into punchy up-tempo horn line w/ light rhythm guitar and an active & bouncy bass line joining the mix. “City Lights” more or less goes from A to B to C and after the instrumental opening, the track shifts to a more under-voice horn line offering a countermelody to a mid-to-low register vocal line which is soon after joined by high voices punctuating the beginning of each phrase. The horns, guitars, and singers are cut from the track as the song enters its final section, a rap verse from featured artist Kamei accompanied with a slower-moving bass and light synth chords & wash in the middle register. Taken all together, “City Lights” ---like “Bad Trip” before it---packs a lot of music into a short duration & leaves me wanting more, which I especially long for when listening to the track outside of the context of the EP (which is what I usually do.)

12. “Turn to Hate” - Pony - Orville Peck: There’s a lot I could have done better in 2019, and “check out Orville Peck” is pretty high up there. “Turn to Hate” is a song that is at once heartrending, sincere, & catchy as all get out. Peck does one of my favorite possible things a musician can do on this track, and that’s make me Feel Things at a quick tempo. The vulnerable lyrics sung in outlaw country bass are supported by a fairly simple chord progression that acts as a solid foundation for a lot of texture ---moving guitar lines in the accompaniment part and middle-ground lines that move in and out of the melodic foreground. My moment of pure delight on the track is Peck’s laconic “yeehaw” that leads into a guitar solo that does so much work w/ its relative simplicity. “Turn to Hate” is an excellent song to get you into Orville Peck’s music if you aren’t already, if any of this piques your interest then I strongly recommend exploring his output of classic country meets 2010s indie meets camp gay sensibilities meets emotional realness. (This is as good a place as any to advise you to check out Yola and her album Walk Through Fire.)

27. “Water No Get Enemy” - Expensive Shit - Fela Kuti & Africa 70: I’m a newcomer to Afrobeat which is a fuckin’ shame because it contains a lot of the things I love most in music: rhythmic density and variety, jazz and “folk” idioms working together, a sense joy in the music-making with righteous anger at injustice in the music’s purpose, and a kick-ass horn section. "Water No Get Enemy” by Fela Kuti & Africa 70 is as good an intro as any to Afrobeat as it’s a delightful & excellent piece of music by the genre’s pioneer. It’s worth mentioning that in addition to its musical quality, Afrobeat is also deeply connected with Pan-Africanism and the resistance to the presence of European colonizers in Sub-Saharan Africa. To be frank, whatever I write can’t really do justice to this song or the musical movement from which it comes, go listen to it... a jam you can dance to while hating the British!? Immaculate. 

31. “Vardavar” - EP No. 1 - Tigran Hamasyan: The first of two songs from Armenian Jazz-fusion pianist/keyboardist and composer, Tigran Hamasyan, is a fast moving rhythmically dense piece of music named after the Armenian holiday of the same name ---Vardavar is a holiday of pre-Christian origin that Armenians celebrate in July in observance of the transfiguration of Christ, it involves throwing buckets of water on each other! Appropriate to its namesake, the running piano line through much of the track and the melodic lines are both exceptionally fluid and reminiscent of water. The rhythm of the tune follows a highly irregular subdivision of the bar that it’s best to feel along w/ as a listener ---seriously, unless you’re transcribing the tune or practicing/rehearsing it, don’t worry about counting---and get lost in with the flow of the music. Notable features of the track are the dense layering of instrumental/vocal lines on the melodic and countermelodic material, breakdowns & entire sections where the music takes to longer notes, “slower” feel & division of the bar, and a slower harmonic rhythm, unexpected unisons b/n instruments, and the transformation of Armenian folk melodies & texts between vocalized material and statements of the original material. There is no living musician whose work I love more than Tigran’s and if you’re not familiar with it “Vardavar” is an excellent place to start.

46. “Boyish” - Tropical Jinx - Little Big League:  "Boyish” is better known as one of the singles from Japanese Breakfast’s sophomore album Soft Sounds from Another Planet where Michelle Zauner presents the tune at a slow tempo with an unassuming instrumental accompaniment, wash of synths in the chorus, and low-register closing guitar solo which leaves the audience with a sense of melancholy & vulnerability. The original version from the 2014 LP of Zauner’s former band, Little Big League, offers a different take on the text: noisy guitars, driving rhythm, aggressive drumming on a rock groove, and a vocal delivery offering more of the rage of heartbreak than its sadness. Zauner refers to “Boyish” as an ‘ugly girl anthem’ and that intention is very apparent on this version of the track ---whereas the Japanese Breakfast take on it gave me a sense of being in the gender hinterlands b/n acceptable presentations of masculine and feminine. Both versions of the song are really worth seeking out for different reasons, and I chose to highlight Little Big League on this list because they’re a solid guitar-driven emo band that deserves appreciation in its own right.

50. “Dreaming” - Eat to the Beat - Blondie: What do I need to say about Blondie!? A CBGB act from the late-70′s that straddled the worlds of Punk and New Wave at their peak with a mix of an exceptional rhythm section (that bass!) diverse and compelling guitar work, and the captivating and ever-iconic vocals and presence of Debbie Harry. “Dreaming” might be my favorite song from Blondie and has had a special place in my heart since I first listened to them with my mom. It’s one of those songs that I’m tempted to call a perfect pop song: a joyful performance, lyrics that are at once simple and relatable ---whom amongst is unfamiliar with longing!?---music full of hooks & containing the kind of energy that just goes and takes you with it!

65. “Holy” - Shadow Theater - Tigran Hamasyan: The second entry from Tigran Hamasyan comes from his 2013 album Shadow Theater ---an excellent work as a whole---and is one of the slower, more spacious, and simpler tracks from it. “Holy” is a setting of the Armenian liturgical piece “Soorp Soorp” which is frequently used in the celebration of the Eucharist (even in the Armenian Protestant church I grew up in) and it’s achingly beautiful. There’s always something to be said about a musician capable of complex and virtuosic feats on their instrument doing something very simply and very well, and that’s what the entire ensemble brings ---including frequent collaborator Areni Agbabian who provides the vocals. Even as the texture thickens in the middle of the song, the middle ground & harmonic support coming from strings and bassoon (Ben Wendel) is simple, under-voice, and reverent. “Holy” is the kind of piece of music that offers an encounter with God ---even if one would never otherwise believe in something beyond the material; even just for a moment.

77. “The Day the World Turn Day-Glo” - Germ Free Adolescents - X-Ray Spex: X-Ray Spex is one of those bands I’ve listened to before on a recommendation I received ages ago but never really followed up on beyond the one song sent my way. “...Day-Glo” is a fuckin’ banger of song that just bursts with this wonderful energy from the jump & showcases the best qualities of X-Ray Spex’s sound: driving guitars, wild saxophone lines, and chaotically charismatic lead vocals from singer Poly Styrene. X-Ray Spex have an output that is wild and fun as hell to explore, and “...Day-Glo” is an excellent place to start ---you’d also do well to check out their more notable song “Oh Bondage, Up Yours!” 

84. “Marquee Moon” - Marquee Moon - Television: Listen, you don’t need to read some internet lesbian with a music degree go off about Television ---one of the most musically interesting acts to come out of CBGB and one of many definitive proofs that Punk is not a label that people should fucking fight about having a true definition of. Clear 11 minutes in your day, find a pair of headphones so you can experience the use of stereo in the recording and enjoy each element of the song, especially with regards to Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd’s interlocking guitar lines.

96. “Leylum” - Kokorec - Collectif Medz Bazaar & Sevana Tchak: Armenian folk music, baby!! Collectif Medz Bazaar offer a lively and joyful rendition of the classic folk song “Leylum” which has been burned in my mind from church and community gatherings ---the fun ones with music and all of your aunties dancing in a circle and such. Listen to this song and DM me if you aren’t dancing along of joining in on the response parts as best you can. I think this particular recording offers a nice entry point into an exploration of Armenian music, the instrumentation hits a lot of the staples of Armenian folk ensembles ---duduks, dohl, dumbek, clarinet, shvi, etc.---and the song itself is an up tempo dance tune which I find to be easier to start with than ballads or liturgical music.

100. “Electrastar” - Paradize - Indochine: Back in the hazy past of 2017, one of my friends from undergrad and I were hanging out and playing music for each other. In a departure from his usual library of French Baroque music, he played a song by French New Wave band, Indochine. That song was “Electrastar” which is a consistent favorite of mine, my favorite song from its album ---Paradize, which is already a solid record---and a great entry point into the musical output of a band which has been active for about 40 years. "Electrastar” features driving rhythm guitar, pulsing synth under the texture, eminently catchy chorus and post-chorus, and a very care-full and effective approach to the mix. Also, not for nothing but that album cover is 👀

Survey of 2020 Listening

[whileiamdying]

Yusor ft. Xena elShazlii meen yes7abni fo2 | يسر و زينة الشاذلي مين يسحبني فوق by Yusor | يُسر https://soundcloud.com/yusor-n-hamed/fo2

[anarcho-mom-unist]

1, 2, and 3 for the end of year asks <3

Yeeess the music questions! Much appreciated! <3

So, I’m going to limit #1 & #2 to 2020 releases (I got into Orville Peck and Yola this year but Pony and Walk Through Fire are both 2019 releases, so they won’t count) which does make my job easier b/c there’s only a handful of songs/albums released this year that I really dug into :)

1. Song of the Year: “Bad Trip” (Bad Trip [single]) Xena Elshazlii & Fady Haroun; “Pink Elephant” (Invisible People) Chicano Batman; “POCKY” (Shibuya Meltdown) Macross 82 - 99

I’m gonna to talk about “Bad Trip” in an upcoming post, so I’ll hold off. As for the other two: Honestly, “Pink Elephant” was a real gem when it dropped this spring, that electric guitar line just hooked me immediately and the kind of choppy, laidback rhythm section parts that match rhythm with it hit the fuckin’ spot. I’ve kept my ears open for what Chicano Batman’s up to since a friend from Stockton recommended them to me back in spring of 2016, I’d recommend giving “Black Lipstick” a listen if you want to check them out! “Pocky” is the second track on Shibuya Meltdown and it’s just a solid & infectious dance track that makes me happy to hear, I didn’t get as much in that EP as much as other Macross 82-99 releases but it’s a standout song. If you like this track, I strongly recommend the Sailorwave I & II EPs! :)

HONORABLE Mention: “WAP” b/c that song is a fucking jam and I’m always stoked to hear it

2. Album of the Year: The Call Within, Tigran Hamasyan (LP); Pop Songs 2020, Bumper (EP); Electrosteen (Compilation) 

The Call Within: I feel like I’m kind of cheating here b/c I haven’t done a full listening session for this LP but I’ve heard a good deal of it and, as usual, Tigran doing some absolutely gorgeous shit with jazz, armenian folk, rock, and mathematics! “New Maps” is a standout track and also the one that got my girlfriend into Tigran a few months back. If you like what you hear, I’ve got to recommend Red Hail (2008) and Shadow Theater (2013)

Pop Songs 2020: When this collab dropped back in July I was beyond excited, I don’t really follow my favorite artists’ feeds so it was a pleasant surprise seeing a notification from like the Japanese Breakfast y/out*be channel of all things saying that a new album had dropped. Four tracks of music that is at turns delightful and longing! Bumper hasn’t done anything else so I would recommend checking out either of Japanese Breakfast’s LPs or Little Big League’s album Tropical Jinx.

Electrosteen: Another utter gem found through listening to this Arab Indie playlist on sp*tif/y. Electrosteen is a compilation of tracks by MENA/SW Asian artists made in solidarity w/ Palestine (I am unfortunately a ditz and didn’t like look into the material work that the project was going toward lkajsd.) Anyway, the album is filled to the brim with bangers! 

3. Favorite Musician/Group I started listening to this year: I started listening to a bunch of new acts this year, and I really have just save an interesting playlist and hit shuffle (if using sp*tif/y) or play (if it’s a y/out*be genre sample video [IDK what to call them but they’re a fuckin’ treat])

My highlights are: Xena Elshazlii, Snarky Puppy, Mashrou’ Leila, Deerhoof, and 4th Curtis. These are a mix of new acts I was fortunate enough to run into in playlists, acts I’ve had recommended to me for years, longtime acts that I just hadn’t encountered before, and obscure ones that I happened to see someone talk about on Tumblr. (guess which is which, it’s pretty easy ajklshdkjh) 

I’m the most vocal about recommending Snarky Puppy, both their originals and their collab albums :) 

Ultimately, there’s a lot of releases from 2020 that I just haven’t gotten to yet b/c of having other things going on but a lot of them are on my sizeable Reading/Writing Playlist and I plan on writing about them as I get thru each album.