It's raining, of course. It's March in Minnesota, so it's actually a nice change from snow. It cleans the streets and melts the snow berms, so I will gladly take it.
While I am enjoying the distraction of the weather, it's time I press on with Day 5 of the Doomtree Diatribe. Today's post won't just focus on the dusty guitars and rattling drums with which Cecil Otter supports his brilliance, it will also highlight a secret, mega album you can assemble Voltron-style via playlists. I'm gonna be a jerk and just assume you're using iTunes, but that's my choice, not yours, so you don't have to get in a twist about it. Point is, we can play cut and paste. But let's take a closer look at the contemplative poet, the George Harrison of the Doomtree crew - Cecil Otter.
Cecil Otter is another longtime Minneapolis resident, having met fellow founder P.O.S. in high school. In between skateboarding sessions he and P.O.S. got acquainted, beginning to make music shortly after. As I mentioned in the post about P.O.S. they collaborated often in their early endeavors, splitting EPs and producing beats for each other. When it came time for Cecil to do proper albums he not only enlisted former members MK Larada and Beautiful Bobby Gorgeous, but ended up creating his own as well. Cecil Otter's False Hopes served as a fantastic first album, establishing the palate with which he paints his soundscapes. Using a liberal amount of slowly creaking drum beats and broken-machine sounding samples, Cecil created a slew of wonderfully off-kilter and laid back songs, such as the epic one-two opening salvo of 'Atreyu And The Swamps of Sadness' and 'City Girl (Amuse Meant To Get Her)'. They show exactly the kind of art he would create - songs that convey his twisting and cuttingly witty wordplay in the train-hopping drifter attitude.
As any artist can tire of their own repertoire, Cecil Otter set about constructing a new album worth of material from the ground up. In both a surprising but hoped-for move, he also produced the album himself, crafting the songs from the ground up. Every dusty string, every sampled music box - they were all hand picked and arranged by Cecil himself. An advance copy of the album was completed surprisingly quickly and sold at the second annual Doomtree Blowout, held in First Avenue downtown. I was fortunate enough to pick up a copy and was amazed by the growth he displayed on just the advance version of his album. His lines were more intricately written, often times with several running and interlacing similes and metaphors that converge into one brilliant picture. The sparse, laid-back approach was more refined and unified, not simply being low-energy but a low-burning intensity that never loses its momentum. It was, though, an advance, i.e. not what was to be viewed as the final, polished offering. The actual album, Rebel Yellow, would be released just over a year and a half later with a revised track list and re-mastered production. Feeling just a hair more smoothed over and polished around the edges (and a more balanced mix), this version of Rebel Yellow was the proper album. Featuring a few key substitutions in tracks, it felt different than the advance - not worse, just a differing tone and sensibility when listened to straight through. What I began to ruminate on, though, is the merging of the two.
I'm sure any artist would shudder at what I'm about to propose. No one wants an improperly assembled or illicit version of their work to be in the public spectrum. I understand. So, Cecil - on the off hand chance you read this, I apologize if this irks you, but the temptation was too good to pass up. Here's how it goes:
Take the final track listing for Rebel Yellow and stick it in a play list. Then, taking the tracks from the advance version, fill in the gaps on the official version, interlacing them where they would potentially have lain. There you have an expanded version. Now if you really want to be excessively nerdy take the individual tracks Cecil offered for False Hopes 13 and 15 and pepper those in. What you have, then, is the Voltron-esque Rebel Yellow that contains everything after his last album but before his next official release. A playlist would look something like this:
1999
Poet is Rapist
Rebel Yellow
Sufficiently Breathless
100 Fathers
Untitled God
Firewalk With Me/Last Archer
The Archer & The Scarecrow
City Girl Prequel
Untitled
Forensics
Beat It Loose
Boxcar Diaries
Down Beast!
Little Demon Girl
Demon Girl
Matchbook Diaries
Le Factuer
Traveling Dunktank
Black Rose
Let Me Tell You
Duel
A Rickety Bridge
I love the idea of cut and paste albums (for evidence see my post on the conspiratorial OK Computer/In Rainbows collection). The resulting product when you make this mega-Otter playlist is a more detailed and fleshed out scene that Cecil may not have intended but illustrates his vision in a unique way. Hearing '100 Fathers' segued into the beginning of the mix gives it a new sense of relevancy to the other songs, like 'Untitled God'. The rawkus 'Black Rose' is a great follow up in and of itself to the single 'Traveling Dunktank'. The progression of the embryonic 'Demon Girl' right next to the finished version plays like a natural growth of a song, showing how ideas change over time.
Cecil Otter is an unparalleled poet who can create a swirling mass of text around your ears that can make you weep while you raise an eyebrow at his puns. God forbid anyone is ever on the receiving end of his wit - his deftness can insult you without you even realizing it happens. So if you hear a verse about bloggers getting his albums all wrong, remind me and I'll simultaneously hang my head and shrug my shoulders. He's working on a few projects at the moment, in particular a new album and a collaborative effort with Lazerbeak where they swap beats and vocals. Do yourself a favor and keep an ear to the ground.
While I am enjoying the distraction of the weather, it's time I press on with Day 5 of the Doomtree Diatribe. Today's post won't just focus on the dusty guitars and rattling drums with which Cecil Otter supports his brilliance, it will also highlight a secret, mega album you can assemble Voltron-style via playlists. I'm gonna be a jerk and just assume you're using iTunes, but that's my choice, not yours, so you don't have to get in a twist about it. Point is, we can play cut and paste. But let's take a closer look at the contemplative poet, the George Harrison of the Doomtree crew - Cecil Otter.
As any artist can tire of their own repertoire, Cecil Otter set about constructing a new album worth of material from the ground up. In both a surprising but hoped-for move, he also produced the album himself, crafting the songs from the ground up. Every dusty string, every sampled music box - they were all hand picked and arranged by Cecil himself. An advance copy of the album was completed surprisingly quickly and sold at the second annual Doomtree Blowout, held in First Avenue downtown. I was fortunate enough to pick up a copy and was amazed by the growth he displayed on just the advance version of his album. His lines were more intricately written, often times with several running and interlacing similes and metaphors that converge into one brilliant picture. The sparse, laid-back approach was more refined and unified, not simply being low-energy but a low-burning intensity that never loses its momentum. It was, though, an advance, i.e. not what was to be viewed as the final, polished offering. The actual album, Rebel Yellow, would be released just over a year and a half later with a revised track list and re-mastered production. Feeling just a hair more smoothed over and polished around the edges (and a more balanced mix), this version of Rebel Yellow was the proper album. Featuring a few key substitutions in tracks, it felt different than the advance - not worse, just a differing tone and sensibility when listened to straight through. What I began to ruminate on, though, is the merging of the two.
Take the final track listing for Rebel Yellow and stick it in a play list. Then, taking the tracks from the advance version, fill in the gaps on the official version, interlacing them where they would potentially have lain. There you have an expanded version. Now if you really want to be excessively nerdy take the individual tracks Cecil offered for False Hopes 13 and 15 and pepper those in. What you have, then, is the Voltron-esque Rebel Yellow that contains everything after his last album but before his next official release. A playlist would look something like this:
1999
Poet is Rapist
Rebel Yellow
Sufficiently Breathless
100 Fathers
Untitled God
Firewalk With Me/Last Archer
The Archer & The Scarecrow
City Girl Prequel
Untitled
Forensics
Beat It Loose
Boxcar Diaries
Down Beast!
Little Demon Girl
Demon Girl
Matchbook Diaries
Le Factuer
Traveling Dunktank
Black Rose
Let Me Tell You
Duel
A Rickety Bridge
I love the idea of cut and paste albums (for evidence see my post on the conspiratorial OK Computer/In Rainbows collection). The resulting product when you make this mega-Otter playlist is a more detailed and fleshed out scene that Cecil may not have intended but illustrates his vision in a unique way. Hearing '100 Fathers' segued into the beginning of the mix gives it a new sense of relevancy to the other songs, like 'Untitled God'. The rawkus 'Black Rose' is a great follow up in and of itself to the single 'Traveling Dunktank'. The progression of the embryonic 'Demon Girl' right next to the finished version plays like a natural growth of a song, showing how ideas change over time.
