January 5 - Hatesong/Halo

When I was born, I have a feeling that my parents dropped a giant rock in the ocean. This rock was my musical starting point. It had The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Abba, Simon and Garfunkel, Paul Simon, and Chris de Burgh. That was music both of them liked - although my mom was more Beatles and my dad was more Rolling Stones. Then my dad brought in some songs that were more out of left field, and the one that really sticks with me was Norwegian new wave band The Cut and their version of In Dieser Stadt (I'll have to include that later). That was on the fringe of the rock, but it was definitely part of it. There was probably more to the rock as well, but the pieces that entered the ocean were definitely the ones I remember best.

What happens when you drop a rock in the ocean - or water in general? Waves... Waves form like rings way, way out. And that is what my musical life has been all about - chasing those wavy rings... I found a rock of my own to toss in and create some disturbances in the pattern when I discovered Kiss in 1980, my music teachers tossed in a rock of some classical music, especially Die Moldau by Smetana, which still stays with me, and then Arve started tossing in country music. These disruptions in the patterns didn't stop me, they made me look farther and farther - always seeking the new and the different. The fascinating thing is when you discover rings from rocks that had been tossed in earlier - such as my middle school music teacher Reidar Fiske's love for 10CC - or when they merge unexpectedly, creating new starting points for yet other rings to explore.

The reason I went to such great lengths to describe how I found Opeth, and then in turn Steven Wilson, is that this is once more a set of rings that both separate and unite. From Porcupine Tree I discovered the extraordinary drummer Gavin Harrison, who in turn has been playing for King Crimson, whose records have been remastered and mixed for 5.1 surround sound by Steven Wilson again - and who use Tony Levin as a bass player, whom I first encountered when listening to Peter Gabriel. And, as I previously mentioned, Steven Wilson worked with Fish - and I decided to see what those two albums were all about and found that I had given up on him too soon. I keep chasing those rings in the water, and by following them once more, I found Gavin Harrison's release from 2015, Cheating the Polygraph. It turned out that he had taken some of Porcupine Tree's compositions and arranged them for big band. Now, my experiences with big band music have been limited, but watching the movie Whiplash really made me appreciate some of it a little bit more - and I have had a taste for the work of Mingus and his big band for some time - so this sounded interesting to me. And then I listened, and my mind was blown away. This is challenging music, but man, is it good... Please, give mr. Gavin Harrison a chance and listen to Hatesong/Halo...