from Roscoe's Quick Notes

Giants vs A's

San Francisco Giants vs Oakland Athletics.

My MLB Game of Choice this afternoon has the Oakland Athletics playing the San Francisco Giants. The game's start time is scheduled for 2:45 PM CDT. I'm listening now to the Athletic's Pregame Show on 650 KSTE, Broadcast Home for the Athletics in Sacremento, and I'll stay here for the radio-call of the game.

As I usually do, I'll follow the score and live stats as the game develops in real time via MLB's Gameday Service.

And the adventure continues.

 
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from 🌐 Justin's Blog

The biggest “black eye” in WordPress will be its downfall if things don't change.

Let's get the obvious out of the way: I'm not a developer. So, if you're looking for technical solutions in this post, then my apologies in advance.

Okay, cool, we're on the same page.

I've been out of the WordPress product space for coming up on five years. There are parts of it that I miss, but one thing that I don't miss is the security issues caused by plugins. No plugin is immune to them, either. When I ran LearnDash, we had some security scares. It sucks for everyone.

The good news, for years, is that plugin providers have always handled these issues with reasonable speed and minimal negative outcomes. Not all, but most. The community was really proactive about staying on top of such things.

I'm not sure if this is as feasible in the AI era of today.

WordPress 7.0 Highlights New Dangers

Roger Montti from Search Engine Journal wrote a thought-provoking article (and inspiration for this post) related to WordPress 7.0's AI API keys and the rush it will cause for attacks on vulnerable sites. I agree with the threats outlined. It's a very real possibility.

At this point it looks like the WordPress space is just treating it as “business as usual”. It's this approach that will ultimately lead to WordPress losing even more market share.

AI is fundamentally changing the speed, scale, and sophistication of attacks against WordPress sites. Instead of automated scripts, AI can adapt, optimize, and move forward with attacks in ways that we haven't seen before. By way of example, Patchstack (cited from the SEJ article) suggested that exploitation from high-impact WordPress vulnerabilities is just five hours now.

WordPress already suffers from the “insecure site” reputation. If things continue as they are, it'll only get worse. A lot worse.

What Should We Do?

Remember how I said I'm not a developer? Okay, this is where that matters. I'm not good at providing technical paths forward, but I'm pretty good at recognizing business threats and opportunities.

This threat has always existed in WordPress, sure, but not like this. It's going to get worse if nothing is done to improve it. What I want to know is what is being done currently? Because from my perspective, it looks like the issue still gets punted to hosts and plugin devs.

I'd love to see real leadership in this area. Not just information sharing or “best practices”, but actual think tanks resulting in coded solutions that drastically help mitigate this increasingly embarrassing issue. We could start by assessing the criteria for being listed on the repo. Could we implement AI security hardening to monitor and verify the code of any plugin submitted and hosted there?

Yeah, I get it, that's likely not feasible given how expensive it would be, but these are the types of conversations that I'd like to see happening. Maybe they are already, and if so, great! WordPress can't drag its feet here.

Learning from Others

Say what you want about Emdash, but at least they are attempting to tackle the issue because they know how real it is. Their way forward isn't really the “WordPress way”, I get that. Though I think we do WordPress a disservice by just flippantly dismissing their technical approach and moving on with our heads in the sand.

Something I found interesting was reading the comments on their social media when they came after WordPress. The sentiments were largely the same, and leading the way was the growing downside of the plugin ecosystem. What is often cited as WordPress' greatest strength is being seen as its most glaring weakness.

The Inflection Point

The WordPress project is at an inflection point. Over the next year, it is critical that it move deep into AI adoption and enablement, and that includes bolstering things from a security standpoint.

For me, I won't host another WordPress site in the traditional sense. Why? Because I'm not trying to be a security pro with my simple websites. No time for that nonsense. I like the static options like SimplyStatic Studio (I transitioned a website to it and love it). Aside from that though, I actually see more benefit in just using something like Loveable and hosting everything there for the added AI features.

Progress is Being Made

The good news is that WordPress is making strides with AI. It's not yet widely known or advertised, but things like Jamie mentioned below are precisely what the project needs.

Let's hope that things keep going in this direction, and that more emphasis on security starts to emerge. To date, it's not very user friendly, at least not compared to tools like Loveable. I anticipate that this will change over time.

Cautiously Optimistic

Overall, I'm optimistic about WordPress evolving in the ways that matter. The community voices are loud and clear. It's up to Matt to set the priorities. Hopefully, he's not too distracted with his WPEngine lawsuit to do what is right (and needed) for WordPress as a whole.

I'll revisit this in a year to see where things have landed. By that time, I think there will be some clear market signals one way or another.

#WordPress

 
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from Notes I Won’t Reread

I woke up a few mins ago. I got home from work and laid down for a minute, and then disappeared for several hours. I wasn’t planning on sleeping for that long, but I guess my body had different plans, and for once, I didn’t argue with it. I had the usual dream. I don’t think it’ll ever change at this point, anyway. Now I’m awake with the rest of the night ahead of me. I’ll probably work for a while, deal with my housemate being sensitive about something, and then continue pretending I have a proper plan for the evening. I’m tired today, so this won’t be one of those long notes where I accidentally spend three pages talking about absolutely nothing. which is unfortunate news for anyone who enjoys watching me ramble in circles for no reason, and excellent news for everyone else, who can now go back to their deeply important lives. But anyway, nothing interesting has happened. It was a peaceful day, which makes me suspicious.

Not that im complaining (which is what I usually do). A boring day is still better than an eventful one most of the time. And you know, eventful days usually end up becoming notes, and notes usually end up becoming longer than they need to be. So perhaps it’s for the best that I have absolutely nothing worth writing about tonight.

Sincerely, Ahmed

 
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from Ira Cogan

A while back I read an interview with Cory Doctorow in The New Yorker and the whole thing is a great read, and towards the end of it Doctorow was asked about how he manages his workload and he mentioned the book Getting Things Done by David Allen. He didn't just mention it, he described the book as “life-changing”. Doctorow cranks out a lot of quality writing all the time in between everything else he does so I figured whatever he has to say about that, I ought to pay attention to. And, not only that, whether you like Doctorow or not, he does all this stuff his way. These days, he's most known for coining the term enshittification and standing up to it. The man is a literal bullshit detector, so if he's describing a book in a genre that's 99% bullshit as “life-changing” I should probably read the thing.

So anyways, I read the book shortly after, and I'd describe it as life-changing too, to the point that here I am writing about it four years later because I still revisit parts of it every now and then. The audiobook too. I can't get too into the specifics because that would be a lot to get into. I get different things out of that book at different times depending on what I'm dealing with but if I had to pick one, it's that I'm better able to get the stuff that's on my mind someplace else where I can refer to it or deal with it. Obviously, the best way to get something off my mind is to deal with it, but what about the things I can't deal with, or at least can't deal with right now? The book was helpful with that, and with prioritizing those things, and deciding what goes where systematically, so I don't have that stuff on my mind. I'm freed up to think about other things with the confidence that everything that needs dealing with, or just to be filed somewhere is someplace safe.

I recall Cal Newport, another author in the productivity genre criticizing the systems in there as having too many steps, but Allen even says in the book to tailor this stuff so that it works for you. It isn't that anything in the book is too detailed or too much, it's that Allen's intention, at least to me, was to not leave anything out that might apply to anyone's given situation. There's room for criticism of anything, but that's a ridiculous criticism. Like, you're gonna criticize a productivity book for being too detailed about how to organize all your shit? Come on.

My only criticism is the corny turns of phrase here and there throughout the book that give a wink to the professional managerial class, but, I get it. That stuff is there because it's supposed to be, and as corny as that is to me, I'm not the only one reading this thing.

When I was reading it after that Doctorow interview, I mentioned it to someone at work and he was like “Oh I heard of that, (Howard) Stern's into that book.” There's another one, whether you like Stern or not, there's another perfect example of someone with a lot on their plate at all times that they have to keep organized otherwise they'd go nuts.

If you already have it all figured out, terrific. If not, I found the book helpful and maybe you might too.

 
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from Littoral

“Pleasure is not binary. It exists alongside fear, sadness, and politics. That is the history of Queer pleasure. We tend to tell one side of our history—of riots and martyrs—but ignore how much sex is a root of that liberation. The folks who judge and police another consenting adult's pleasure are just policing their own. For the past decade, we have experienced a massive paradigm shift through tools unimaginable to our ancestors: PrEP, HIV undetectability, DoxyPEP, vaccines, GPS apps. Our history is full of Queers who lament eras they missed out on. Stop arresting your own development and abolish the cop in your head, beloved. We are in a sexual revolution—act accordingly.“

— Leo Herrera, (analog) CRUISING, pp. 134-135

 
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from Dan De Lion

GOSPEL OF THE WEED — PROPHET IN THE WASTE

Hear me. For there is no one else left to hear.

Observe, says the wind. Light breaks because it must. Truth stands because it cannot kneel.

The hidden burns. The ordinary is stripped to its ribs. The fallow hums with buried fire.

Neglect speaks in the tongue of stones. Testimony rises from what the world forgot.

Thus it is written: Perception rules the mind. Absence rules the soul.

The seen commands thought. The unseen shapes being. This is the law beneath all other laws.

Light orders. Darkness reveals. Both are teachers. Neither is kind.

Absence is a flame without smoke. Fallow is a promise without mercy.

And on that ground — the ground no one claims — the weed rises.

Not chosen. Not wanted. Not killed.

I am that weed. I speak because silence is a tyrant. I endure because the waste has no use for the fragile.

Boredom empties the vessel. Silence lifts the veil. Testimony climbs the spine like heat.

I’m ok. You’re ok. These are not comforts. These are survival rites.

Roots hold. Soul opens. Truth enters like a blade of light.

And in the end — when the wind has taken everything but the voice — Communion reveals truth.

Thus speaks the weed. Thus stands the prophet. Thus endures the waste.

 
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from 倏の思い出

聜過倪倚「劳倪瘊了倚吃䞀點」這皮話特別是長茩們䞀盎圚那邊倪瘊倚吃䞀點䞍然就是幎茕人倚吃䞀點.... 埞以前到珟圚我只芁換䞀個環境到新的公叞出垭聚會只芁是䞀個新環境就䞀定會有人說劳奜瘊、劳倪瘊了倚吃䞀點或者尟牙結束埌倧家就芁我把食物打包因為䜠倪瘊了

雖然我知道沒惡意䜆䜠沒看到我已經吃撐了嗎吃倚了是我腞胃䞍舒服也䞍是䜠真的別再說這皮話了䞍管是胖瘊吃倚吃少關䜠什麌事啊💢

䜆我也只是心底抱怚䞍敢這麌回。其寊我只是想說䞍管胖瘊自己開心就奜健康才最重芁的這暣䞍就奜了嗎

- 想到還有䞀皮『劳倪瘊了』

詊衣服的時候店員說劳倪瘊了所以撐䞍起䟆奜吧、、、

我知道劳的意思了『劳倪平了所以撐䞍起䟆。』

貧盞な身䜓だからね...

#自蚎

 
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from bios

Not So Famous Last Words | Rev. David Herbert Allen | 1920ish – 1992

There is a memory of a photograph of my grandfather in short pants, on a sand dune, shirtless, laughing, but I cannot tell you where my grandfather served in the war, my mother used to be able to, but now she talks mostly about the farm.

I first saw this photograph when grandad noticed me reading Spike Milligan's “Rommel: Gunner Who?” and took it out of some box, presenting it with the words, “This is me in North Africa”

He and my grandmother, Marge ran Marge's Home Industries out of the cottage, converted from a servants quarters, when they lived with us in the 80s, after they had had to leave the farm. He replaced his train sets with a room to make eyes out of spoons, They were for her toilet roll covers, her fluffy eared keen dog, little red tongue toilet seat covers. Making these and making food was their primary function in our home. His secondary function was fart jokes.

Once when I had a runny stomach, was doubled over with cramps, he said to me, “Is the bottom falling out of your world, or the world falling out of your bottom?” He then placed me in a deep warm bath and invited me to shit myself at my leisure.

He was a Wesleyan minister who in his youth rode on horse back between churches and somewhere there met my grandmother. He came out from Scotland, when I can't say, why I can't say.

The rest of the farm sloped down away a gentle hill from the farmhouse. There was a shed, a reservoir and a dam, a small dam on the side of the dust road as you drove in, we, the cousins, my sister, would run through the brush and jump into the king weed that grew on the side of the dam, it's terse coils dipping us into the water and springing us out. There were giant rats in the sugar cane fields, and we lived in terror of them. They occasionally took chickens. The hen houses were under a large tree, with a chopping block on an old stump, axe embedded. Grandpa Dave named the chickens after the cousins, my sister, me: Andrew, Terry, Trevor, Michael, Mandy, Roger. The farmhouse itself was a dining room, a TV and settee nestled in the corner. The sitting room was for his trains. In retirement Grandpa Dave built a world of trains. A circular track that he would duck underneath, stand in the centre, hours applying grass detail to a miniature hill, staring intent of realism, through his just not quite bottle top glasses.

The long drive down to Ifafa every second weekend. Arriving on Saturday afternoon, we would wake Sundays to a long breakfast on the veranda, Grandpa Dave rehearsing us through the recounting of our weeks, each family member. He was excruciating in his need for detail. Every sixth visit one of us would have to kill a chicken bearing our name. And carve the roasted bird. After breakfast Grandpa would rise up and say, “Today we're eating Roger,” and lead whoever's turn it was off the chopping block and with his ineffable good nature tease us until we took our head off, and then we would laugh as he counted how long the headless chicken ran. The farm was an idyll.

People came and went into the fields, the farm manager an amorphous figure, part of the church, discussed but never seen. When they moved into the servants quarters there was no bitterness, an offhand remark from my father about “them” having to “give back the farm”, a comment from my grandmother about God working in mysterious ways.

She survived him by ten or more years and never stopped saying, “I wonder what grandpa would think?”. She knew what he would say in any given moment and completed his sentences with a loving irritation. “Oh Dave, of course you would say that.”

My mother told me he was in hospital and I raced back from Cape Town, hadn't been home for a while, and by the time I got there, he had passed. In the hospital corridor my cousin told me his last words were “Shitabrick!” My aunt who was there later told me he had sat up in his bed, after three days of not responding to anything, looked at her and said, “Shit! A Brick!” and then laid down and died. My mom always said my aunt was prone to exaggeration.

He possessed an impressive range of similar short sleeve shirts, in memory a shade of yellow green always, and black rimmed glasses and eyebrows that sprouted one black hair. He would hush us in church with a naughty smile on his face, and he always had money for the ice cream van.

NSFLW

 
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from Image Not Found

TL;DR: Paint the Cameras Dead (read more) asks people to notice the surveillance infrastructure disappearing into the background of our cities. Look up. Find the cameras. Ask who placed them there and what they see. Map them, but do not stop there. Respond with something of your own. A drawing. A sticker. A message. An intervention we have not imagined yet.

The postcards are now available.

The postcards are now available.

Looking is only the beginning

A camera watches.

You can watch it back.

But two objects staring at each other will not change much.

The point of noticing a camera is not to stand beneath it forever, looking suspiciously upwards.

The point is to break the spell that makes it invisible.

Once you see it, you can ask questions.

Who installed it?

What is it recording?

Where does the recording go?

Why does this wall have eyes?

You can map the camera. Correct an existing entry. Help someone else notice it.

And then you can do something more creative.

Make a drawing.

Write a message.

Design a sticker.

Create a new postcard.

Turn the camera into a character, a question, a joke or a public conversation.

The tool is not important.

The interruption is.

The postcards are ready

The postcards show people where to look and how to recognize the cameras hiding above doors, on poles and inside dark plastic bubbles.

You can read more about the campaign, download the print-ready files, or contact us to get some printed cards.

But we prefer that you print your own.

Not because we do not want to send them.

Because the campaign becomes more interesting when it stops belonging to us.

Print five.

Print fifty.

Translate them.

Change the images.

Rewrite the instructions.

Make a version for your own street, neighborhood or city.

Leave them in cafés, libraries, universities, community spaces and unexpected places where people might pause for a moment.

Do more than watch

Surveillance likes passive people.

People who walk underneath it.

People who never notice.

People who notice but decide there is nothing to be done.

The postcards are not the final action.

They are an invitation.

Look up.

Map what you find.

Then answer it with something the camera cannot produce by itself:

An idea.

Some imagination.

A small act of creative disobedience.

Some people will say nothing will change.

Make something anyway.

Subscribe to get notified for more action ideas. No spam!

 
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from An Open Letter

J Is both more photogenic Than me, but also worse at taking photos. It sucks because I look at these really nice photos of her I take and then I look at the photos of me and I kind of hate them, and I feel fat and gross and I feel insecure. And it’s weird because on one hand I’m like I don’t care if I gain weight because anyway that’s kind of attractive in its own way and I get to be strong, but when I see like my chin I feel bad.

 
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from Hiroaki Satou's Music Blog

I still remember the moment a track came through the speakers of BBC Radio 3's Late Junction. It was a jazz piano trio, yet it had the texture of electronica. The beat was played on a live drum kit, yet it had a mechanical precision. The bass occasionally growled like a guitar. I had never heard jazz that sounded like this. The next day, I went out and bought the CD. That was my introduction to the Esbjörn Svensson Trio — e.s.t.

Three Musicians, Three Musical Worlds

E.s.t. was a Swedish jazz piano trio formed in Stockholm in 1993. The members were Esbjörn Svensson (piano), Dan Berglund (double bass), and Magnus Öström (drums).

Svensson and Öström were childhood friends. They grew up together in the small Swedish town of VÀsterÃ¥s and had been playing in bands together since their teens. Svensson's musical origins spanned both classical music and jazz: his mother was a classical pianist, his father a jazz enthusiast. He grew up listening to rock on the radio, loved Thelonious Monk, and drew from an unusually wide range of influences. One of the tracks the band worked on during rehearsals went by the working title “Radiohead-Melody” — a detail that speaks for itself. Svensson said of it plainly: “All three of us love Radiohead.”

Öström's path to the drums began with his older brother's record collection: Jimi Hendrix, Deep Purple, the Allman Brothers, Lynyrd Skynyrd. A boy who trained his ears on rock, he was thirteen when he attended a concert by Billy Cobham and John McLaughlin and discovered jazz-rock. That experience became the foundation of everything he would do as a drummer.

Berglund was a committed hard rock fan to his core. As he described it himself: “I started to experiment with the bow and distortion on the bass, to sound like Jimi Hendrix or Ritchie Blackmore.” His bass was an unconventional instrument in any jazz context. After forming Tonbruket following e.s.t.'s end, he put it directly: “Since we have a guitarist in this band, I no longer have to be both bassist and guitarist, as I was at times with e.s.t.” The bass in e.s.t., in other words, had been doing the work of a guitar as well.

The Sound That Human Bodies Made

What made e.s.t.'s sound unlike anything else was the result of these three different musical backgrounds colliding and fusing.

Öström used the tips of brushes on his snare to imitate the feel of pop rhythm samples, and incorporated electronic triggers to expand his sonic palette. That quality — a live drum kit with the precision of programmed beats and the organic fluctuation of a human performer — came from a percussionist who had trained his ears on rock, awakened to jazz-rock, and then set out to reproduce the grid-like feel of electronica with his own body.

Berglund ran his double bass through distortion, fuzz and delay pedals, and sometimes bowed it to make it sing like a guitar. This approach — unorthodox by any jazz standard — gave e.s.t.'s music its rock-derived texture and forward momentum.

And then there was Svensson's piano. Playing with the structural logic of classical music, the spontaneity of jazz improvisation, and the melodic sensibility of pop, he landed unmistakably as a jazz pianist on top of whatever “non-jazz” thing Öström and Berglund were building beneath him.

How Live Performance Set the World on Fire

E.s.t. had been celebrated in Sweden from early on, but their international breakthrough came in 1999 at the ACT World Jazz Night at the Montreux Jazz Festival. From that point, ACT began releasing their albums outside Scandinavia, and the band expanded their reach across Europe.

Their strategy was relentless live performance. They spent nearly a hundred days a year on tour, playing not only jazz clubs but rock-oriented venues. Their use of elaborate lighting and fog machines on stage was a conscious effort to reach younger audiences beyond the traditional jazz crowd.

In London, they started at the small Pizza Express Jazz Club on Dean Street and steadily built their audience until they were filling concert halls. Late Junction and other adventurous radio programmes provided an important route to listeners outside the jazz world during this period.

Their 2002 album Strange Place for Snow won numerous prizes — among them the German Jazz Award and the Victoire du Jazz (France's equivalent of the Grammy) for best international act — bringing e.s.t.'s name to audiences across Europe. In 2006, they became the first European band ever to appear on the cover of the American jazz bible Downbeat.

The Live Recording That Captures the Miracle: Live in Hamburg

The proof that e.s.t. had reached their absolute peak is preserved in Live in Hamburg, recorded in November 2006 at the Laeiszhalle in Hamburg. It was made roughly eighteen months before Svensson's death, at the moment when the three musicians were playing with the greatest freedom and daring of their careers. The improvisational breadth that no studio album could quite contain, and the miracle of three musicians generating a groove as one — it is all here.

The Completed Vision: Seven Days of Falling

The 2003 album Seven Days of Falling is where e.s.t.'s sound reached its fullest realisation. Electronica, jazz and rock fused completely, crystallising into something that belonged to no genre.

On this album, Öström's drumming pursued the “programmed” quality more boldly than ever, while Berglund's bass moved even more freely across the boundary between bass and guitar. Svensson's piano sustained its melodic beauty while concealing increasingly complex rhythmic structures beneath it.

It was around this time that critics began describing e.s.t. as “the gateway through which people who had never liked jazz discovered they could.” The trio was selling three times the usual volume for a jazz release, and audiences who had never set foot in a jazz venue were filling their concert halls.

A Comparison: Nils Petter MolvÊr and the Difference That Matters

A Norwegian trumpet player who is sometimes discussed alongside e.s.t. is Nils Petter MolvÊr. ECM Records had long been known as a label synonymous with quiet, contemplative chamber jazz — and MolvÊr overturned that reputation with Khmer in 1997 and Solid Ether in 2000. The latter album brought programmed beats even more to the foreground: its opening track, “Dead Indeed,” was almost entirely played and programmed by MolvÊr himself. Both records received critical acclaim well beyond jazz circles and opened ECM to new audiences.

But there is a fundamental difference. MolvÊr operates a computer and sampler himself, layering his trumpet over electronically generated beats. It is a distinctive and accomplished approach — but its starting point is different from e.s.t.'s.

What e.s.t. created was the result of human bodies attempting to imitate the grid of electronica and then surpass it. Without a machine in sight, three musicians on acoustic instruments fused jazz, rock and electronica together through sheer physical performance. That was the miracle they made with their bodies.

The Sudden End

On 14 June 2008, at the height of their powers, Svensson went missing during a scuba diving session off the island of Ingarö near Stockholm. He was 44. His diving companions — including his fourteen-year-old son — found him unconscious on the seabed.

Berglund and Öström decided that continuing the band with a different pianist was not something they could do. E.s.t. ended there.

Both have continued making music in other projects. Berglund formed Tonbruket; Öström pursued a solo career before launching Rymden. But e.s.t. as a band no longer exists.

A Miracle No One Has Surpassed

Musicians who came after e.s.t. took something from their sound and tried to carry it into their own music. But no one has managed to rebuild the house completely.

The sound of electronica, rock and jazz fused through nothing but live drums, live bass and live piano was a chemical reaction produced by three musicians with singular backgrounds and years of shared ensemble experience. It cannot be reproduced.

Listening to albums made more than twenty years ago, e.s.t.'s sound has not aged. That is not because their music was riding the wave of a particular genre or era. It is because they touched something at the limit of what human bodies and acoustic instruments can do.

That miracle has not been surpassed.

 
もっず読む 

from Hiroaki Satou's Music Blog

BBCのラゞオ番組、Late Junctionから流れおきたその曲を、私は今でも芚えおいる。ゞャズのピアノトリオなのに、どこか゚レクトロニカのような質感があった。ビヌトが生ドラムなのに機械のような正確さを持ち、ベヌスがずきにギタヌのように唞る。こんなゞャズは聎いたこずがなかった。翌日にはCDを買っおいた。それがEsbjörn Svensson Trio、通称e.s.t.ずの出䌚いだった。

䞉人の出自ず、それぞれが持ち蟌んだ音楜的背景

e.s.t.は1993幎にストックホルムで結成されたスりェヌデンのゞャズピアノトリオだ。メンバヌぱスビョルン・スノェン゜ンピアノ、ダン・ベルグルンドダブルベヌス、マグヌス・゚ヌストレムドラムの䞉人。

スノェン゜ンず゚ヌストレムは幌なじみだった。スりェヌデンの小さな町ノェステロヌスで育った二人は、10代の頃からバンドを組んでいた。スノェン゜ンの音楜的出自はクラシックずゞャズの䞡方にあった。母芪がクラシックピアニストで、父芪はゞャズ愛奜家。少幎時代にラゞオでロックを聎きながら育ち、モンクを愛し぀぀も、その圱響源はゞャンルを超えおいた。バンド名ずしお仮に呌ばれおいた曲のひず぀が「Radiohead-Melody」だったこずは、圌らの姿勢を象城しおいる。スノェン゜ン自身も「䞉人ずもRadioheadが倧奜きだ」ず語っおいる。

゚ヌストレムのドラムぞの道は、兄のレコヌドコレクションから始たった。ゞミ・ヘンドリックス、ディヌプ・パヌプル、オヌルマン・ブラザヌズ、レヌナヌド・スキナヌド。ロックで耳を育おた少幎が13歳のずきにビリヌ・コブハムずゞョン・マクラフリンのコンサヌトを芳お、ゞャズロックに目芚めた。その䜓隓がドラマヌずしおの圌の栞にある。

ベヌシストのベルグルンドもたた、根っからのハヌドロックファンだった。「ゞミ・ヘンドリックスやリッチヌ・ブラックモアのように聞こえるように、ベヌスにボりずディストヌションをかける実隓を始めた」ず本人が語っおいるように、圌のベヌスはゞャズの文脈では異端の楜噚だった。埌にTonbruket結成埌のむンタビュヌでこう述べおいる。「新しいバンドにはギタリストがいるので、もはやe.s.t.のずきのようにベヌシストずギタリストを兌ねる必芁がなくなった」──぀たりe.s.t.では、ベヌスがギタヌの圹割をも担っおいたのだ。

生身の䜓が生み出した、打ち蟌みのような音

e.s.t.のサりンドを唯䞀無二のものにしたのは、この䞉぀の異なる音楜的背景が衝突し、溶け合った結果だった。

゚ヌストレムはブラシの毛先でスネアを叩いおポップスのリズムサンプルを暡倣したり、゚レクトロニック・トリガヌを䜿っおサりンドのテクスチャを拡匵したりした。生ドラムなのにプログラムされたビヌトのような正確さず有機的な揺らぎが共存するあの質感は、ロックで耳を鍛え、ゞャズロックで目芚めた打楜噚奏者が、゚レクトロニカのグリッド感芚を生身の䜓で再珟しようずした結果だった。

ベルグルンドはダブルベヌスにディストヌション、ファズ、ディレむをかけ、ずきに匓で匟いおギタヌのように鳎らした。ゞャズの文脈では邪道ずも蚀えるこのアプロヌチが、e.s.t.のサりンドにロック的な質感ず掚進力をもたらした。

そしおスノェン゜ンのピアノ。クラシックの構築性ずゞャズの即興性、そしおポップスのメロディヌセンスを䜵せ持぀そのプレむは、゚ヌストレムのリズムずベルグルンドのベヌスが䜜り出す「ゞャズではない䜕か」の䞊に、確かにゞャズずしお着地した。

ラむブで火が぀いた囜際的なブレむク

e.s.t.はスりェヌデン囜内では早くから評䟡されおいたが、囜際的なブレむクは1999幎のモントルヌ・ゞャズフェスティバルでのACTワヌルドゞャズナむトの出挔がきっかけだった。それを機にACTレヌベルからスカンゞナビア以倖の地域にもアルバムがリリヌスされ、ペヌロッパ党土ぞず掻動の堎を広げた。

圌らの戊略は培底的なラむブだった。幎間ほが100日をツアヌに費やし、ゞャズクラブだけでなくロック志向の䌚堎でも挔奏した。照明効果やスモヌクマシンを䜿ったステヌゞ挔出は、ゞャズの芳客だけでなく、若い局に届くこずを意識したものだった。

ロンドンでは、ディヌン・ストリヌトの小さなPizza Express Jazz Clubからスタヌトし、埐々に芳客を増やしおコンサヌトホヌルを満員にするたでに成長した。Late Junctionのような実隓音楜系ラゞオ番組を通じおゞャズ局以倖にも届いおいったこずも、この時期の重芁な経路だった。

2002幎のアルバム『Strange Place for Snow』はドむツ・ゞャズ賞、フランスのノィクトワヌル・デュ・ゞャズフランス版グラミヌ賞最優秀囜際アクト賞など倚くの賞を受賞し、e.s.t.の名前をペヌロッパ䞭に知らしめた。2006幎にはアメリカのゞャズ専門誌Downbeatの衚玙を食った、初のペヌロッパ出身バンドずなった。

到達点ずしおの『Seven Days of Falling』

2003幎の『Seven Days of Falling』は、e.s.t.のサりンドが完成した䜜品だ。゚レクトロニカずゞャズずロックが完党に溶け合い、どのゞャンルにも収たらない独自の音楜ずしお結晶した。

゚ヌストレムのドラムはこのアルバムでより倧胆に「打ち蟌みのような」質感を远求し、ベルグルンドのベヌスはさらに自由にギタヌずベヌスの境界を越える。スノェン゜ンのピアノは矎しいメロディヌを保ちながら、その䞋に耇雑なリズム構造を隠しおいる。

倚くの批評家がe.s.t.を「ゞャズを知らない人が初めおゞャズを奜きになる入口」ず評したのはこの時期からだ。通垞のゞャズアルバムの䞉倍の売䞊を蚘録し、普段はゞャズを聎かない若い聎衆がラむブ䌚堎を埋めた。

比范ずいう誘惑 ── Nils Petter MolvÊrずの違い

同時代のミュヌゞシャンずしお、e.s.t.ず䞊べお語られるこずがあるのがノルりェヌのトランペット奏者、ニルス・ペッタヌ・モルノェルだ。ECMずいうレヌベルは、静謐なチェンバヌ・ゞャズの牙城ずしお知られおいたが、モルノェルは1997幎の『Khmer』ず2000幎の『Solid Ether』でその垞識を芆した。特に『Solid Ether』は打ち蟌みビヌトがより前面に出た䜜品で、冒頭曲「Dead Indeed」はほがすべおモルノェル自身によっお挔奏・プログラムされおいる。ゞャズの枠をはるかに超えた批評的な評䟡を受け、ECMの新たな聎衆局を開拓した。

しかし根本的な違いがある。モルノェルはコンピュヌタずサンプラヌを自ら操䜜し、電子的に生成されたビヌトの䞊にトランペットを重ねる。それは優れた方法論だが、e.s.t.のアプロヌチずは出発点が異なる。

e.s.t.が生み出したものは、生身の人間の䜓が゚レクトロニカのグリッドを暡倣し、それを超えようずした結果だった。機械を䜿わずに、ロックずゞャズず゚レクトロニカを生楜噚だけで融合させる──その奇跡を、䞉人の人間が䜓で実珟した。

突然の終わり

絶頂期にあった2008幎6月14日、スノェン゜ンはストックホルム郊倖のむングアロヌ島近海でスキュヌバダむビング䞭に事故死した。44歳だった。同行しおいたのは圌の14歳の息子を含むダむビング仲間たちで、海底で意識を倱った圌を発芋した。

残されたベルグルンドず゚ヌストレムは、スノェン゜ンの代わりに別のピアニストを加えおバンドを続けるこずは䞍可胜だず刀断した。e.s.t.はそこで終わった。

その埌、二人はそれぞれ別のプロゞェクトで掻動を続けおいる。ベルグルンドはTonbruketを結成し、゚ヌストレムは゜ロ掻動を経おRymdenを立ち䞊げた。しかしe.s.t.ずいうバンドは、もう存圚しない。

誰も乗り越えおいない奇跡

埌続のミュヌゞシャンたちはe.s.t.のサりンドから䜕かを受け取り、自分たちの音楜に掻かそうずした。しかしその家を完党に建お盎すこずはできおいない。

生ドラムず生ベヌスず生ピアノだけで、゚レクトロニカずロックずゞャズを融合させるあのサりンドは、䞉人の特異な音楜的背景ず長幎のアンサンブルが䜜り出した、再珟䞍可胜な化孊反応だった。

今から二十幎以䞊前のアルバムを聎いおも、e.s.t.のサりンドは叀びない。それはこの音楜が特定のゞャンルや時代の流行に乗っおいたからではなく、人間の䜓ず楜噚が䜜り出せる䜕かの限界に觊れおいたからだず思う。

その奇跡は、ただ誰も乗り越えおいない。

 
もっず読む 

from Out of Office

Today was a great day. I spent it with my lovely dog, who is doing so well today after the procedure yesterday. I started by going to the grocery store and getting all of her favorite foods (including the forbidden ones, as she only has days left). I came home and my brother was on a relaxing, little walk with her. She is back to herself a bit and even regained her appetite. I had so much fun with her! We could not do anything too strenuous, but just spending time near her is the most precious ever. I took her with me last night to pick up my brother from the airport, so she was pretty tired this morning, and we let her sleep in and take it easy.

While the day was lovely overall, I did have to pick up my nephew from daycare because he had a fever and my sister-in-law and brother were at work at the time. It worked out beautifully because he got extra time with my dog, and had a nice surprise with his uncle visiting from out of town.

After dinner, we took her back to her favorite place ever and shared our most treasured memories with her. She ran around chasing geese and greeting people at the lake. It felt very serendipitous, we just happened to see all kinds of animals on our way home – a skunk, deer, raccoon, cat
 it almost felt like they all came to say goodbye to her.

I still don’t feel ready, but does anyone ever feel ready? Ironically, I feel very blessed and grateful to be able to be home watching her and spending precious time before she crosses over.

I could not help but think of Taylor Swift’s song The Best Day today. I know it is about her mom, but I think that song will forever remind me of this week with my dog. I don't know how I'll feel tomorrow, or next week, or next month. But today, with her, was the best day.

Thank you for your message. I am currently out of office with no set return date. I will get back to you when the time is right.

 
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from Out of Office

Part 1

I woke up dreading the day. I wish this day had never come and I am in denial that it is here. It is all starting out like normal, except that she can no longer get up to go potty and no longer wants to eat anything. I am devastated but she looks so uncomfortable. Where did the years go? I was so sure we had a few more left together.

Part 2

A very unexpected turn of events. I decided to take her to an ER an hour away to get a procedure called pericardiocentesis to hopefully get a few more days with her. It was a whirlwind of a day and I have not been able to keep up with regular life or even worry about my situation for one second. My brother is very close to her and he is flying in tonight last minute to get some face time with her as well.

The procedure went well. The doctor drained 500 ml out of her heart sac. The prognosis is very poor, but I can at least better prepare for her passing. She is the absolute greatest and no amount of preparedness will ever get me ready. We will just take it day by day, or in her case, hour by hour.

Thank you for your message. I am currently out of office with no set return date. I will get back to you when the time is right.

 
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from Hiroaki Satou's Music Blog

I discovered the Cranberries in high school, through a TV programme covering the Billboard charts. The moment Dolores O'Riordan's voice came through the speakers, it lodged itself in my ear and refused to leave. That unmistakable trembling lilt, the reverb-drenched guitars, a sound that was at once fragile and fierce. For the teenage version of me, the Cranberries were simply the best thing there was.

Years later, as an adult, a song came on the radio. Reverb-laden guitars, a voice with a rolling, melismatic quality, harmonies coiling around each other — it sounded so much like the Cranberries that I genuinely thought I was mistaken about what I was hearing. But it wasn't the Cranberries. It was a band called Cocteau Twins, who had arrived at that same sound a full decade earlier.

My favorite song of Cramberries

“The Sound of Dreams,” Born on the Industrial Fringes of Scotland

Cocteau Twins were a Scottish rock band active from 1979 to 1997. They formed in Grangemouth, an industrial town in central Scotland — a place guitarist Robin Guthrie once described to Billboard as “like Elizabeth, New Jersey: a great chemical-refining works that's not at all picturesque.” It was from that grey, unglamorous setting that a group of young people began making music as if trying to escape it.

The band was founded by Robin Guthrie (guitar, drum machine) and Will Heggie (bass), with Elizabeth Fraser joining on vocals in 1981. In 1983, multi-instrumentalist Simon Raymonde replaced Heggie, completing the lineup the band is best known for.

Fraser's arrival in the group was almost accidental. Guthrie and Heggie spotted her dancing at a local club and asked if she could sing. She was seventeen years old and had never thought of herself as a singer.

The sound at the heart of the band grew out of Guthrie's unconventional relationship with the guitar. Trained as an electrician with a natural fascination for electronics, he began running his guitar through fuzz boxes and effects pedals in search of something no one had made before. Because he had never learned to play conventionally, his experiments took him in directions that no one else would have thought to try. Layering chorus, flanger and delay units into dense, interlocking textures, he arrived at the ethereal sound that would define the band.

Guthrie described his ambition in his own words: “The aim was to make music with punk's energy but more finesse and beauty, and that shiny, Phil Spector sound. I was trying to make my guitar sound like I could play it, so I was influenced by guitarists who made beautiful noise, like The Pop Group or Rowland S. Howard.”

Then there was Fraser's voice. She prioritised the transcendent quality of sound over lyrical meaning, saying: “The words don't have any meaning at all until I sing them. I did it so I could sing something.” Her vocals were in English and yet somehow defied comprehension, bypassing the mind entirely and arriving directly at emotion. This approach — sometimes called glossolalia — became the defining characteristic that set Cocteau Twins apart from every other band.

In 1982 the band signed to the London independent label 4AD and released their debut album, Garlands. They went on to pioneer the dream pop subgenre and helped define what would later become known as shoegaze.

Between the Charts and the Underground

Cocteau Twins occupied a peculiar position in the music world — one that commercial statistics alone cannot explain.

On the UK Albums Chart, their trajectory was one of steady ascent: Treasure (1984) peaked at number 29, Victorialand (1986) at number 10, Blue Bell Knoll (1988) at number 15, and Heaven or Las Vegas (1990) — their most celebrated album — reached number 7.

Yet in the United States, even Heaven or Las Vegas peaked at only number 99 on the Billboard 200. Icons of the British indie scene, yet virtually unknown in America — this double status was the curious hallmark of Cocteau Twins.

And yet their musical gravity was quietly pulling in some of the biggest names in the world. Madonna was said to “love” both the band and Fraser, and Prince sought to sign them to his own record label. Great musicians were drawn to them in silence.

A Chain of Inspiration: The Musicians Who Loved Cocteau Twins

The list of artists who have publicly cited Cocteau Twins as an influence is remarkable in its breadth: Björk, Imogen Heap, M83, Annie Lennox, Lana Del Rey, Tori Amos, Slowdive, Ride, Prince, The Weeknd, Massive Attack, The Sundays, My Bloody Valentine, Radiohead, Deftones, and Reggie Watts — all have spoken of the profound impact that Cocteau Twins, and Elizabeth Fraser's voice in particular, had on their music.

Among the most striking testimonies: The Cure's Robert Smith called Treasure “the most romantic sound I'd ever heard,” and the fingerprints of that album's guitar sound can clearly be heard on The Cure's landmark record Disintegration.

Slowdive guitarist Christian Savill recalled the first time he heard “Pearly-Dewdrops' Drops”: “The vocals and words were unlike anything I'd ever heard, and the guitars seemed huge and mysterious.” Ride bassist Steve Queralt was equally direct: “For me, Cocteau Twins recorded some of the greatest sounds ever committed to tape. It's Robin's shimmering guitars that set the blueprint for bands like us — and that's surely where it all began for shoegaze.”

In the world of post-rock, Explosions in the Sky's Chris Hrasky cited Cocteau Twins as part of the DNA of their sound. Simon Raymonde was so taken with the band that he eventually signed them to his own label, Bella Union, for their landmark 2003 album The Earth Is Not a Cold Dead Place.

The Shadow Lineage: Cocteau Twins and the Cranberries

Let me return to where this began. The instinct I had when I heard that song on the radio — that it sounded like the Cranberries — turns out to be a matter of broad critical consensus.

Central to that lineage is a band who sit precisely between Cocteau Twins and the Cranberries: The Sundays. Formed in 1988 when vocalist Harriet Wheeler and guitarist David Gavurin met at the University of Bristol, this English quartet caused an immediate sensation. Their debut single “Can't Be Sure” prompted Melody Maker's reviewer to declare them “the best thing I've ever heard,” sparking a label bidding war almost immediately. Their 1990 debut album Reading, Writing and Arithmetic reached number 4 on the UK Albums Chart. Their sound — blending the ethereal textures of Cocteau Twins with the jangly guitar melodicism of The Smiths, anchored by Wheeler's crystalline voice — led critics to describe them repeatedly as a band carrying the genetic imprint of both. They released three albums before falling silent after 1997, but their music endures as a cornerstone of dream pop.

In the 1990s, Rolling Stone wrote about the Cranberries: “They sound an awful lot like The Sundays, who, in turn, strongly resemble the Cocteau Twins. What they have done with that aesthetic, however, is make it their own.”

Neither Dolores O'Riordan nor guitarist Noel Hogan explicitly acknowledged the Cocteau Twins as an influence. When Noel was confronted with comparisons, he tended to deflect: “If we sound like other bands, that's coincidence.” In interview after interview, Hogan named Johnny Marr and The Cure as his primary guitar influences — never Robin Guthrie. And yet the music they made so clearly transplanted the dream pop aesthetic that Cocteau Twins had spent a decade building, rooting it in Irish soil.

Sound on Sound described the Cranberries as a band who “followed in the footsteps of The Sundays — themselves shaped by Cocteau Twins — to rise quickly to fame in the early 1990s with their evocative dream pop.” The influence runs in one direction only: Cocteau Twins → The Sundays → the Cranberries.

Salon's music criticism went even further: the Cranberries track “The Icicle Melts,” from their album No Need to Argue, was identified as a direct homage to Cocteau Twins — whether or not Dolores intended it consciously, that lineage ran all the way down to the title.

How Cocteau Twins Regarded Their Followers

Guthrie had complicated feelings about the many bands who followed in his wake.

In an interview with Drowned in Sound, he said: “I find it hard to have respect for artists who only look back. They're constantly trying to recreate something that happened 20 or 30 years ago. If I said we were going to reform the Cocteau Twins tomorrow, everyone would think it was great. I don't get that.”

Elsewhere he pushed back against being grouped with the shoegaze movement: “The Cocteau Twins often get compared to bands from the shoegaze movement, but we were never part of that. I was really pushing the electronic idea. I wasn't just happy to put my guitar through one effects pedal — I'd put it through loads. That was my idea, and I wanted to take it further and further.”

The band's official website puts it this way: “Others have tried to reproduce or capture their sound, with limited success. The few artists who have succeeded sound mostly unlike them, but have managed to convey an essence — inspiration without imitation. Think Beach House, Goldfrapp, Sigur Rós, or M83. Cocteau Twins were a foundational influence for whole categories of music, notably dream pop and shoegaze.”

Commercial Success vs. Musical Influence

The Cranberries achieved commercial success on a scale that Cocteau Twins could never have imagined. Their debut album sold tens of millions of copies worldwide. “Zombie,” “Linger,” and “Dreams” are songs that have outlasted generations. By comparison, Heaven or Las Vegas — Cocteau Twins' biggest record — sold 235,000 copies in the UK by 1996. The difference is not merely significant; it is categorical.

And yet when it comes to musical influence, the picture reverses entirely. The aesthetic of reverb and layered effects that Cocteau Twins built — an approach to texture, atmosphere and the voice as instrument — is written into the DNA of an enormous body of music in the twenty-first century: dream pop, shoegaze, indie folk, ambient R&B and much more. That the Cranberries could sound the way they did was only possible because Cocteau Twins had spent a decade establishing that aesthetic.

Slowdive's Neil Halstead captured this precisely: “I've heard plenty of tracks that mimic the Cocteaus' sound and vocal style, but fail to include their beautifully constructed chord progressions, key changes and melodic hooks. The voice, the guitars, the songs — they aren't just simple blocks you can co-opt or fit together to recreate the whole. Each element is huge and deep and unique in and of itself. Many of us try and borrow a hint of one or two facets, but we're really only scratching at the surface.”

The Cranberries' success is unquestionably great. But if you ask where the music came from — who built the house that the Cranberries moved into — the answer points to Cocteau Twins. And the blueprint for that house is still being followed everywhere.

A Beauty That Has Not Faded in Forty Years

The official Cocteau Twins website contains a quietly remarkable observation: “It is a testament to the timelessness of their sound and production quality that many new fans don't even know that the story actually started in 1979.”

That, to me, is the highest possible compliment. Music that people hear today and assume was made recently. Music that carries no timestamp. Cocteau Twins' albums, more than forty years on, are still that kind of music.

Robin Guthrie, in a rare reflective moment, said of his former bandmate: “I would record with Liz again in a heartbeat. But at least I worked with the world's best singer.”

In high school, the Cranberries were the door I walked through into dream pop. But it was Cocteau Twins, arriving on the radio years later, that showed me just how deep and beautiful and timeless the world on the other side of that door really was.

 
もっず読む 

from Hiroaki Satou's Music Blog

高校生の頃、クランベリヌズず出䌚った。Billboardチャヌトを玹介するテレビ番組で流れおきたドロレス・オラむオヌダンの声は、聎いた瞬間から耳に貌り぀いお離れなかった。あの独特の震え声、リバヌブがかかったギタヌ、儚さず力匷さが共存するサりンド。圓時の自分にずっお、クランベリヌズは「これ以䞊ないもの」だった。

倧人になっおからのある日、ラゞオから䞀曲が流れおきた。リバヌブのかかったギタヌ、こぶしをたわすような歌声、重なり合うコヌラス──あたりにもクランベリヌズに䌌おいお、思わず耳を疑った。しかしそれはクランベリヌズではなかった。コクトヌ・ツむンズCocteau Twinsずいう、クランベリヌズより10幎も前に同じ音を䜜り䞊げおいたバンドだった。

私がクランベリヌズにハマるきっかけになった最も奜きな曲

スコットランドの蟺境から生たれた「倢の音」

コクトヌ・ツむンズは1979幎から1997幎にかけお掻動したスコットランドのロック・バンドだ。結成の地は、スコットランド䞭郚の工業郜垂グランゞマりス──ロビン・ガスリヌが埌幎Billboardのむンタビュヌで「グランゞマりスはニュヌゞャヌゞヌ州゚リザベスのようなもので、化孊粟補工堎があるだけで党く颚光明媚ではない」ず語ったほどの堎所だった。その灰色の町から、20代前半の若者たちが逃げ出すように音楜を始めた。

バンドはロビン・ガスリヌギタヌ、ドラムマシンずりィル・ヘギヌベヌスによっお結成され、1981幎に゚リザベス・フレむザヌボヌカルが加入した。1983幎にはヘギヌに代わりマルチ奏者のサむモン・レむモンドが参加し、もっずも知られるラむンナップが完成した。

フレむザヌがバンドに加わった経緯は偶然に近い。ガスリヌずヘギヌが地元のディスコで螊っおいる圌女を芋かけ、歌えるかもしれないずバンドに誘ったのだ。圓時圌女は17歳で、自分が歌手だずは思っおいなかった。

音の栞心を生み出したのはガスリヌの「ギタヌぞの無知」だった。電気技垫ずしおの蚓緎を受け、゚レクトロニクスぞの興味を持っおいたガスリヌは、ギタヌにファズボックスや゚フェクト・ペダルを通しお独自の音を探り始めた。埓来の奏法が身に぀いおいなかったぶん、圌の詊行錯誀は誰も思い぀かない方向ぞ転がった。コヌラス、フランゞャヌ、ディレむ・ナニットを重ね合わせた密な音の局が、バンド特有の゚ヌテリアルなサりンドを生み出した。

ガスリヌ自身はその狙いをこう語っおいる。「パンクの゚ネルギヌを持ちながら、もっず繊现で矎しい音楜を䜜りたかった。フィル・スペクタヌの茝くようなサりンド。自分がちゃんず匟けるように聎こえるギタヌを䜜りたくお、The Pop GroupやRowland S. Howardのような矎しいノむズを䜜るギタリストに圱響を受けた。」

そしおフレむザヌのボヌカル。圌女は声の超越的な音を歌詞の意味よりも優先させ、「蚀葉は歌うたでたったく意味を持たない。歌うために歌った」ず語っおいる。圌女の歌声は英語なのに解読䞍胜に聎こえ、蚀語の意味を超えお情動に盎接觊れおくるものだった。このスタむルは「グロッ゜ラリア異蚀歌唱」ず呌ばれ、コクトヌ・ツむンズをほかのすべおのバンドから区別する最倧の特城ずなった。

バンドは1982幎にレヌベル4ADず契玄し、デビュヌ・アルバム『Garlands』をリリヌス。バンドはドリヌム・ポップずいう1980幎代のオルタナティブ・サブゞャンルを切り開き、埌のシュヌゲむザヌを定矩づける存圚ずなった。

チャヌトず「アンダヌグラりンド」のあいだで

コクトヌ・ツむンズのキャリアは、商業的な数字だけでは語れない矛盟を抱えおいた。

UKアルバム・チャヌトで芋るず、1984幎発衚の『Treasure』は最高29䜍、1986幎の『Victorialand』は10䜍、1988幎の『Blue Bell Knoll』は15䜍、そしお最倧のヒット䜜ずなった1990幎の『Heaven or Las Vegas』は最高7䜍を蚘録した。

しかし同時期の米Billboardでは、最高傑䜜ず名高い『Heaven or Las Vegas』ですら最高99䜍にずどたった。むギリスのむンディヌ・シヌンではアむコン的な存圚でありながら、アメリカではほが無名ずいう二重の地䜍。これがコクトヌ・ツむンズの特異な立ち䜍眮だった。

批評家たちは「クランベリヌズやEnyaのような、゚ヌテリアルなサりンドを探求するミュヌゞシャンたちに圱響を䞎えたアンダヌグラりンドの重鎮」ずしお圌らを評䟡したが、圌らは商業的な䞻流からは垞に少し距離を眮いおいた。

それでも圌らの音楜的な磁堎は確実に拡倧しおいた。Madonnaはコクトヌツむンズずフレむザヌを「愛しおいる」ず公蚀し、プリンスはバンドを自身のレヌベルに迎えようずした。偉倧なミュヌゞシャンたちが静かに傟倒しおいたのだ。

「むンスピレヌション」の連鎖 ── コクトヌ・ツむンズを愛するミュヌゞシャンたち

コクトヌ・ツむンズの圱響を公蚀しおいるミュヌゞシャンの顔ぶれは圧倒的だ。ビョヌク、むモゞェン・ヒヌプ、M83、アニヌ・レノックス、ラナ・デル・レむ、トヌリ・゚むモス、スロヌダむブ、ラむド、プリンス、The Weeknd、マッシノ・アタック、The Sundays、マむ・ブラッディ・ノァレンタむン、レディオヘッド、デフトヌンズ、レゞヌ・ワッツ──いずれもコクトヌ・ツむンズ、ずりわけ゚リザベス・フレむザヌの声が自分の音楜に深い圱響を䞎えたず語っおいる。

なかでも泚目すべき蚌蚀がある。キュアヌのロバヌト・スミスはコクトヌ・ツむンズのアルバム『Treasure』を「これたで聞いた䞭で最もロマンティックな音」ず称え、その埌リリヌスされたキュアヌの名盀『Disintegration』にはトレゞャヌのギタヌ・サりンドの圱が色濃く残っおいる。

シュヌゲむザヌの雄スロヌダむブのギタリスト、クリスチャン・サノィルは「ピアリヌ・デュヌドロップス・ドロップス」を初めお聎いたずきのこずをこう語る。「そのボヌカルず蚀葉は、今たで聎いたこずのないものでした。ギタヌは巚倧で神秘的だった。」同じくラむドのベヌシスト、スティヌノ・クァヌラルトは「コクトヌ・ツむンズはテヌプに蚘録されたもっずも玠晎らしい音楜のいく぀かを残した。ロビンのきらめくギタヌこそがシュヌゲむザヌずいうゞャンルのすべおの始たりだ」ず蚌蚀しおいる。

ポストロックの䞖界でも圱響は倧きく、Explosions in the Skyのクリス・フラスキヌはコクトヌ・ツむンズがバンドのポストロックのDNAの䞀郚だず語っおいる。埌日、シモン・レむモンドはExplodions in the Skyに惚れ蟌み、自身のレヌベルBella UnionでUK盀をリリヌスするほどになった。

クランベリヌズずコクトヌ・ツむンズ ── 圱の系譜

冒頭の䜓隓に立ち返ろう。私がラゞオで感じた「クランベリヌズに䌌おいる」ずいう盎感は、音楜評論の䞖界では共通認識だった。

その連鎖を語るうえで欠かせないのが、コクトヌツむンズずクランベリヌズのあいだに䜍眮するThe Sundaysずいうバンドだ。1988幎にブリストル倧孊でハリ゚ット・りィヌラヌボヌカルずデノィッド・ガノリンギタヌが出䌚い結成されたこのむングランドの4人組は、翌1989幎にシングル「Can't Be Sure」でデビュヌするや、英音楜誌メロディヌ・メヌカヌの批評家に「今たで聎いた䞭で最高のもの」ず評され、レヌベルの争奪戊が起きるほどの衝撃を䞎えた。1990幎にリリヌスされたデビュヌ・アルバム『Reading, Writing and Arithmetic』はUKアルバム・チャヌトで4䜍を蚘録した。コクトヌツむンズの゚ヌテリアルなサりンドずThe Smithsのゞャングリヌなギタヌを融合させたようなサりンド、そしおりィヌラヌの透き通った歌声は、批評家からたびたび「コクトヌツむンズずThe Smithsの遺䌝子を受け継いだバンド」ず圢容された。圌らは3枚のアルバムを残したのち1997幎以降は沈黙を保っおいるが、その音楜は今もドリヌム・ポップの叀兞ずしお愛聎されおいる。

1990幎代のロヌリング・ストヌン誌はクランベリヌズに぀いおこう曞いおいる。「圌らはThe Sundaysに非垞によく䌌おおり、The Sundaysはコクトヌツむンズに匷く䌌おいる。圌らが成し遂げたのは、その審矎性を自分たちのものにしたこずだ。」

ドロレスずギタリストのノ゚ル・ホヌガン自身は、コクトヌ・ツむンズからの圱響を明確に語っおはいない。むしろノ゚ルはコクトヌ・ツむンズずの類䌌性を指摘されるず「もし他のバンドに䌌おいるずしたら、それは偶然だ」ず答えおいた。しかし圌らの音楜が、コクトヌ・ツむンズが10幎かけお䜜り䞊げたドリヌム・ポップの矎孊をアむルランドの土壌に怍え盎したものであるこずは、誰の耳にも明らかだ。

Sound On Sound誌はクランベリヌズを「コクトヌツむンズの圱響を受けたThe Sundaysの足跡をたどり、1990幎代初頭に゚ノォケむティブなドリヌム・ポップで急速に名声を高めた」バンドず評しおいる。぀たりコクトヌツむンズ→The Sundays→クランベリヌズずいう䞀方向の圱響の連鎖だ。

たた、Salon誌の評論は「クランベリヌズのアルバム『No Need To Argue』に収録された”The Icicle Melts”はコクトヌ・ツむンズぞのオマヌゞュだ」ず指摘しおいる。ドロレス本人が意図したかどうかにかかわらず、その血脈は曲のタむトルにたで及んでいた。

コクトヌ・ツむンズは「フォロワヌ」をどう芋おいたか

自分たちの音楜が倚くのバンドに暡倣されるこずに぀いお、ガスリヌは耇雑な感情を持っおいた。

ドラりンド・むン・サりンド誌のむンタビュヌでガスリヌはこう語った。「自分を真䌌しようずしおいるバンドがいるのは分かる。でもそれは、新しいものを䜜るこずぞの敬意ではなくなっおいるんだ。コクトヌ・ツむンズを明日再結成するず蚀えば誰もがすごいず思うだろうけど、私が今䜜っおいるものに぀いおはほが無芖されおいる。それが理解できない。」

たた別のむンタビュヌでは、「コクトヌ・ツむンズはよくシュヌゲむザヌ・ムヌブメントのバンドず比范されるが、私たちはそのシヌンの䞀郚ではなかった。私ぱレクトロニクスのアむデアを抌し進めおいた。ギタヌを普通の゚フェクタヌ䞀個に通すのではなく、䜕個も重ねた。それが自分のアむデアで、それをどこたでも远求したかったんだ」ず語っおいる。

䞀方でコクトヌ・ツむンズの公匏サむトは「他の人々がその音を再珟しようず詊みおきたが、成功したのはごくわずかだ。成功したアヌティストたちはむしろ圌らずは䌌おいない──ただ䜕か゚ッセンスを受け取り、暡倣でなくむンスピレヌションずしお昇華したBeach House、Goldfrapp、Sigur Rós、M83など。コクトヌ・ツむンズはドリヌム・ポップずシュヌゲむザヌずいうゞャンル党䜓の基盀ずなった」ず蚘しおいる。

商業的成功 vs. 音楜的圱響力

クランベリヌズはコクトヌ・ツむンズずは比范にならないほどの商業的成功を収めた。デビュヌ・アルバム『Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?』だけで党䞖界数千䞇枚を売り䞊げ、「Zombie」「Linger」「Dreams」は䞖代を超えお口ずさたれおいる。コクトヌ・ツむンズの最倧のヒット䜜『Heaven or Las Vegas』が英囜で23侇5000枚を売ったのず桁が違う。

しかし音楜的な圱響力ずいう芳点では、話が逆転する。

コクトヌ・ツむンズが䜜り䞊げたリバヌブず゚フェクトの矎孊は、ドリヌム・ポップ、シュヌゲむザヌ、むンディヌ・フォヌク、アンビ゚ント・R&Bに至るたで、21䞖玀の膚倧な音楜のDNAに曞き蟌たれおいる。クランベリヌズがクランベリヌズであるこずができたのも、コクトヌ・ツむンズが10幎前にその矎孊を確立しおいたからだ。

スロヌダむブのネむル・ハルステッドはこう語る。「圌らのサりンドや声のスタむルを暡倣したトラックはたくさん聎いおきたが、コクトヌ・ツむンズの矎しく構成されたコヌド進行、転調、メロディック・フックを含めおいるものは少ない。声、ギタヌ、楜曲──それぞれが単独で巚倧で深く独自のものだ。私たちのほずんどは、その衚面をかすめおいるに過ぎない。」

クランベリヌズの成功は疑いなく偉倧だ。しかし音楜の文脈を問うなら、こう蚀えるかもしれない──クランベリヌズはコクトヌ・ツむンズが建おた家に䜏んだ。そしおその家の蚭蚈図は、今もあちこちで匕き継がれおいる。

40幎埌も色耪せない矎しさ

コクトヌ・ツむンズの公匏サむトにはこんな䞀文がある。「そのサりンドず録音のクオリティの時を超えた性質の蚌ずしお、倚くの新しいファンが圌らの物語が1979幎に始たったこずすら知らない。」

それは最倧の賛蟞だず思う。い぀䜜られたかを知らなくおも、聎いた人間が「今の音楜だ」ず感じおしたう音楜。コクトヌ・ツむンズのアルバムは、40幎以䞊経った今でもそういう音楜だ。

ロビン・ガスリヌはか぀おこう語った。「リズず䞀床でも録音できるなら、すぐにでもそうする。でも自分からそれを求めるこずはしない。もしかしたら化孊反応はもう存圚しないのかもしれない。でも少なくずも、䞖界最高の歌手ず仕事をした」ず。

高校時代の私はクランベリヌズずいう「扉」を通しおドリヌム・ポップに出䌚った。でも倧人になっおラゞオで耳にしたコクトヌ・ツむンズは、その扉の向こうに広がる䞖界が、どれほど深く、矎しく、叀くお新しいものかを教えおくれた。

 
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