EventsThese aren’t necessarily my all-time favorite artists/bands, just a small collection of some of my fave’s we’ve written about on our humble website. And in the interest of not being too repetitive of Dan’s Favorites, I left out Riverside and Russian Circles, both of whom I think are pretty damn amazing.
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Indukti
This Polish gem is probably my favorite find since the dawn of Obnoxious Listeners. Heavy/post/progressive/experimental metal with a little bit of progressive rock thrown in and a good dosing of regional music like Australian, Indian, and Middle Eastern. And they have a violinist. And they really, really rock.
Indukti - S.U.S.A.R. — Indukti Interview — Indukti - Idmen
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Dark Suns
This progressive metal band isn’t very well known as far as I can tell, but hopefully we can help to change that. I love their dark, moody sound, and the fact that they’ve displayed more growth and variety through their first three albums than most artists show over their entire careers. Existence is definitely one of my favorite albums.
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Charlie Parker
The way I see it, Charlie Parker is one of the most influential figures in the history of music. To me, he was the most important artist to the rise of bebop, which had immediate and lasting effects on the way jazz musicians dissected chord changes. These effects soon also bled over into the genre of blues. Now fast forward a few years. The vast majority of the important rock bands from the 60’s and 70’s were influenced significantly by the jazz and blues music of their era and the generations prior. Obviously you can continue this domino effect forward or backward in time as much as you please, but Parker will remain a vital step in the development of 20th century music.
Oh yeah, I also just plain enjoy listening to him play. Few musicians are equally adept at playing tunes at both 50 bpm and 300 bpm the way this man was. The fast stuff is downright impressive when you realize that everything he’s playing actually makes sense, but my favorites are his ballads and laid-back blues tunes when his emotions shine through.
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Miles Davis
He wasn’t the first musician to understand the importance of silence but he was certainly one of the first to make it his hallmark. Miles showed that what you say isn’t necessarily as important as how you say it. A decent musician can likely play any one of his transcribed solos without missing a note, but it likely won’t have nearly as much of an effect as when those notes were oozing out of this man’s horn.
Miles Davis’ First Great Quintet
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The Roots
Drum machines have no soul… enter Questlove. DJ’s are fun but hardly as versatile as a guitar/bass/keyboard tandem. The Roots have undoubtedly been the most successful group at blending hip hop with r&b, soul, and jazz, and the obvious reason for this is that they use a live band. They’ve been around a long time, have recorded a lot of quality music, and continue to put on amazing live shows. You’ve gotta respect that. Besides, with band members like Captain Kirk Douglas and Tuba Gooding Jr, how can you not love these guys? I don’t have all their albums but my favorites so far are Illadelph Halflife and The Roots Come Alive.
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Beethoven
My classical music collection is slowly growing, and although it’s probably larger than most people’s, I’m no authority on the genre. But Beethoven’s music definitely sticks out to me as being the most moving of what I’ve heard so far. My favorites are his symphonies because I love the raw power a full orchestra can dish out, but his late string quartets are equally impressive in an entirely different way… very elemental and emotional.
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Opeth
Opeth was the band that popped my death metal cherry, so to say. I still remember the first time Dan played Ghost Reveries for me… I was thinking he couldn’t possibly be serious. Why would I want to listen to someone scream at me like this? I have faith in Dan though, so I kept the album around and listened to it sporadically over the next year. Then one day in the car it all of a sudden clicked for me, as if I was struck by a bolt of lightning… these guys fucking rock! I now own every single one of their albums and they are definitely one of my favorite bands ever.
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Porcupine Tree
In my opinion, Porcupine Tree is the most impressive band over the last 20 years. Most impressive in terms of the amount of music recorded, the creativity/variety/technicality of that music, and the quality of the recordings. They pretty much defined the new wave of 90’s progressive rock, and have been extremely influential as a result of this. My favorite of their earlier albums is Up the Downstair, and from their later work I really like In Absentia and Fear of a Blank Planet.
Porcupine Tree - In Absentia — Porcupine Tree - Nil Recurring
