There are too many Asians playing violins.<\/p>\n
And don’t bother contradicting me because I should know; playing
\na brass instrument in an ocean of strings at my city’s youth
\nsymphony orchestra, I’ve noticed that not only Koreans like me but
\nAsians of all nations gravitate towards string instruments, in
\nparticular the violin. Though very few artists like Sarah Chang or
\nthe incomparable Midori actually catch the public’s eye, it is
\nstill quite noticeable that the Julliard School of Music is clogged
\nwith Asians playing string intruments.<\/p>\n
But amid this cacophany of feline vocal cord material (though
\nsheep has become a more affordable substitute), there is one artist
\nwhom everyone refers to as “Different.” I first saw her on MTV,
\nwearing a sexy tanktop and playing an even sexier electric
\nviolin.<\/p>\n
She was an Asian and she played violin, but convention stopped
\nthere. Her violin had to be plugged in, she wore a pair of
\nnot-tacky huge sunglasses, and the music video was classically MTV
\n(meaning anything but classic). But the music was what took my
\nattention (after wondering how those sunglasses would look on me,
\nof course).<\/p>\n
The music was familar; “Toccata and Fugue in D Minor” by Bach,
\nbut played in what Mae herself calls “techno-acoustic fusion”,
\nwhich basically boils down to Yanni-Enya type new age music
\ncentered on the violin. The most daring piece of violin work I’ve
\nheard before Mae was a couple of classically famous artists playing
\npopular tunes and they haven’t sold very well, to my knowledge.
\nUnlike those so-called “crossover” artists, Mae goes all the way;
\nI’m quite surprised EMI gave her access to her rosin after hearing
\nwhat she was doing in the studio.<\/p>\n
Non-Koel numbered titles like “Contradanza”, “Classical Gas” and
\n“Jazz Will Eat Itself” accompany the richly textured dimentions of
\nthe pieces themselves. Of course, fully capturing a complete mood
\nis common nowadays in new age music, but it’s something different
\nwhen hearing it from an instrument with an old, old history; the
\nsuper-synthesized atmosphere riddled throughout the genre is much
\nsubdued. In a piece like “Toccata and Fugue in D Minor”, the
\ncomputer is so obvious that it made me wince; not to mention the
\nfact that it was overlong. But it gives a certain point: Vanessa
\nMae ain’t no crossover artist.<\/p>\n
“Contradanza” which follows is a signature to the entire album
\nand a major turning point in All Things Violin. The lyrics coming
\nfrom Mae make actual statements that could not be expressed better
\nwith words. It’s such a good mix, sometimes it’s hard deciding
\nwhether that was a violin or a guitar; and which ultimately has a
\ncooler sound.<\/p>\n
It’s followed by an I-Can-Be-Heartfelt-Too “Classical Gas”, the
\npiece I will always remember as “The single with the funky
\nhaircut.” The promisingly ethereal intro is taken away by
\nmonotonous repetition of the same themes and corny percussion, but
\nit’s relief for the disgusted classic-philes in the audience, as
\nlong as they didn’t walk out during “Contradanza”‘s bridge
\nsection.<\/p>\n
“Theme From ‘Caravans'” is a piece that constantly gives the
\nimpression of going somewhere, from the title to the continuously
\nflowing percussion. The main theme is the only impressive part on
\nbehalf of Mae; the rest could’ve been jazzier. Why go through all
\nthat trouble setting the piece up and cut it halfway?<\/p>\n
By the time “Warm Air” comes up on the playlist, I’m beginning
\nto notice the name Mike Batt who seems to be one of those slash
\ncollaborators (conductor\/arranger\/writer in Mae’s case) who wrote
\nseven out of ten pieces in the album, and arranged “Toccata and
\nFugue in D Minor”. It works against the album because it lacks
\ndiversity overall, but one can’t expect many collaborators on one’s
\ndebut. Besides, she’s jarring as it is; “Warm Air” is an elegant
\npiece without Mae’s usual raw edge. But it’s really a spice added
\nfor the next piece.<\/p>\n
Despite its promising title, “Jazz Will Eat Itself” has a
\ntedious theme and ends in a very non-jazzy way; if that meant that
\nit had finally eaten itself, maybe Batt and Mae went slightly
\noverboard with that one. And the drum machine doesn’t help much
\neither; instead of instilling a good moving rhythm, it hinders the
\nspeed of the song and contributes to the monotony.<\/p>\n
“Widescreen” suffers the same fate. Different is one thing, but
\nthis piece teeters on the edge of going alternative to going crazy.
\nThe sound is random, and Mae’s violin is tired.<\/p>\n
“Tequila Mockingbird” (hilarious title by classical standards)
\nmakes a quick recovery using a more thoughtful main theme. It’s
\nbridge section is irrelevant but forgiven when the life-giving
\ntheme reappears right after. This piece could’ve gone higher if not
\nfor the lack of improvisation, this spontaneous thingamajig that
\nhappens in studios everywhere.<\/p>\n
Wait a minute here … I’ve just noticed; there’s not a single
\ncadenza in the entire album, which is a small window of opportunity
\nin classical violin where you could play your own variations.
\nTechno-acoustic fusion, apparently, does not give room for this
\ntradition. So she had restricted herself … by not restricting
\nherself.<\/p>\n
Batt returns to his experiments with T-AF with “City Theme”.
\nSuch an endless line of messy notes (played clean by Mae) making
\nhardly a blip from the main body cannot be called “alternative”;
\nit’s basically a classical piece with another random theme (does
\nthe composer in question think “random” means “alternative”? Think
\nagain.)<\/p>\n
The final piece “Red Hot” sums it up; the Edge, the Rebel in
\nMae, and also basically announces that I’m done so you can now
\npounce on me or worship me or whatever. There’s a big question mark
\nright out of “The Blob” after this piece.<\/p>\n
To answer her question: good album. But only after considering a
\ncoupla points. Considering that it’s a debut piece, considering
\nthat it’s so different from what is out there today, and
\nconsidering that Mae had only a small choice of collaborators. The
\nexperiment worked, but there are bugs to work out. It has to be
\nmore diverse, less coherent. Potential is written all over this
\nalbum, and it should teach those stuffy violinists what a Real
\ncrossover artist sounds like.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":24329,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5657],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-35533","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-vanessa-mae","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35533"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35533\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35533"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=35533"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=35533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}