David Darling Tops Echoes Top 25 for March
This year is already shaping up to be a diverse and unusual one with fantastic, innovative music coming from unlikely sources. David Darling’s Prayer for Compassion topping the list, is of course, no surprise. He was our Echoes CD of the Month for March and he’s been an Echoes favorite from the beginning. But also infiltrating the top ten are relative unknowns like the chamber world folk of the Beyman Bros, the chamber rock of Balmorhea, the ambient rock of bassist Erik Scott, the ambient chamber music of Matthew Shoening and space ambience of Solar Fields.
Morgan Doctor’s Other Life, already at #3, will top the list in April since she’s our Echoes CD of the Month right now. At #4, The Beyman Brothers are an odd trio of studio dog and keyboardist CJ Vanston, Drala guitarist and “Midnight at the Oasis” composer David Nichtern and filmmaker Christopher Guest, best know for Spinal Tap, Best of Show and A Mighty Wind. Look for an Echo Location with them next week and a deeper interview feature April 13 when they talk about a music that isn’t a joke.
Balmorhea leaped to the fore at #6 with their CD All Is Wild, All Is Silent. We’ve been fans of this group since their debut and they have a live track on our latest CD, Vapor Trails. Now others are finally picking up the thread on their third album.
A lot of acoustic guitarists on the list this month beginning with Forastiere at #2 followed by Antoine Dufour, Stefano Barone and Tony McManus.
Only five truly electric albums this month, but they include my favorite electronic disc this year, Solar Fields‘ Movements coming in at #9. Magnus Birgerssonis Solar Fields has created a disc that has the atmosphere of vintage space music, but with a beautiful melodic sensibility and a sound design that’s more modern than retro.
So check out the rest of the March Top 25. You’ll also find links to reviews, Echo Locations and podcasts of many of the artists and albums as well as the CDs themselves.
John Diliberto ((( echoes )))
I am a free spirit in a very discriminatory economic enviornment.
I first found John De laberto and Echos while incarcerated for civil disodedience acts I commited in the late 1980s.
Echos brought me streams of sanity in a very harsh and psychologically depredating enviornment, legality misnomers as corrections.
Words cannot fully discribe my indeptedness, as being in a perpetual state of economic deprevity do to this genetic predisposition, I regret not having more then this compliment to contribute presently.
I am also a musical troubedour giving musical voicing to loving states of consciousness.
Thank you
Would you happen to know where I can buy a copy of the Prayer For Compassion CD in the UK? Alternatively download it at greater than 256 kbps (320 or lossless ideally)? I can’t find it anywhere here and I find I can always hear the artefacts at the lower bitrates.
Fantastic album.