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Tom Jenkinson / Squarepusher
- Thread starter rwagne2
- Start date
Hes gotta lot of records and some are certainly more listenable/commercial than others.
My favorites are deffinetley:
Feed Me Weird things (his 1st)
Hard Normal Daddy
Selection Sixteen
Ones that are harder to listen to (despite quite few fantastic tracks on all of them):
Music is one rotted note
Ultravisitor
Go Plastic
Whats awesome about Squarepusher is you cant define his music. Every album seems to go in a completley different direction. If want to hear some of his chops just listen to "Squarepusher Theme" or "Sarcacid Part 1." If you want to hear him just groove downbeat style listen to "Beep Street," nothing fancy but always a good listen. If you want hear his crazy creativity listen to "Iambic 9 Poetry" or "Futureworld." And if you want to hear more of his jazz side listen to "Coopers World" or "Papalon." Whether you like the music or not (and I'll admit sometimes its a bit much for me) one cannot deny that it is incredibly involved and an accomplishment as a musician, engineer, producer, & performer. I think thats why I like Squarepusher so much.... because it represents one person encompassing all those elements and doing it the way he wants to do it.
My favorites are deffinetley:
Feed Me Weird things (his 1st)
Hard Normal Daddy
Selection Sixteen
Ones that are harder to listen to (despite quite few fantastic tracks on all of them):
Music is one rotted note
Ultravisitor
Go Plastic
Whats awesome about Squarepusher is you cant define his music. Every album seems to go in a completley different direction. If want to hear some of his chops just listen to "Squarepusher Theme" or "Sarcacid Part 1." If you want to hear him just groove downbeat style listen to "Beep Street," nothing fancy but always a good listen. If you want hear his crazy creativity listen to "Iambic 9 Poetry" or "Futureworld." And if you want to hear more of his jazz side listen to "Coopers World" or "Papalon." Whether you like the music or not (and I'll admit sometimes its a bit much for me) one cannot deny that it is incredibly involved and an accomplishment as a musician, engineer, producer, & performer. I think thats why I like Squarepusher so much.... because it represents one person encompassing all those elements and doing it the way he wants to do it.
You have to REALLY listen to get the full effect of what he's doing. Focus on the music and pick out all the billions of little things he stuck in there. I remember when I was first getting into his stuff, I was listening to a particular song called Fat Controller, and I was listening to it and I was just hearing all this crazy electronic breakbeats and stuff, but then I REALLY listened and I heard this strait-up bass guitar line with no effects on it at all, and it completely blew me away. It like he's hiding the best ****, so you have to really listen.
Also, you should be aware that a vast majority of the sounds on his records are made using a bass guitar...who knew?
Also, you should be aware that a vast majority of the sounds on his records are made using a bass guitar...who knew?
my favorite album (and probably just a good starting point) is go plastic. i really dig all of his stuff...something about it just gets me every time i hear it.
got lucky enough to see him live in a tiny club and was all the way up front...he had a crazy custom warwick with a million strings on it and a wall of rack gear and a few laptops...bunch of effects. he was insane!!!
got lucky enough to see him live in a tiny club and was all the way up front...he had a crazy custom warwick with a million strings on it and a wall of rack gear and a few laptops...bunch of effects. he was insane!!!
I think "Hello Meow" isnt great, but it still a good simple composition.
A good starting album depends on what kind of music you already like, but I think Hard Normal Daddy or Feed Me Weird Things are both a good start.
A good starting album depends on what kind of music you already like, but I think Hard Normal Daddy or Feed Me Weird Things are both a good start.
I thought that one was pretty decent! Different vinegar strokes for different folks I suppose!
That's actually one of my favorite Squarepusher songs
and I've heard almost all of them. I think it's very hooky and poppy (not bad things), and the way the beat comes in and out is just perfect. It's a song you'd like to hum.On a different note, has anyone else noticed how Squarepusher's bass style completely changed within the span of 2 records? On Hard Normal Daddy (1997) it was all fingerstyle fretless Jazz, but from Big Loada (1997) on it was almost completely modern fretted Warwick slap. I thought that was interesting, anyway.
YES - although Big Loada does have fingered fretless stuff (such as Problem Child and the middle of Port Rhombus), and it sounds like he's still making the transition on Music Is Rotted One Note.
But yeah, pretty different technique/tone/approach comparing say FMWT or HND to BuMi or Ultravisitor.
oh...oh. Squarepusher. Oh god. Oh great god.
This man slays me. When I first got into Jaco it was primarily because I could hear the influence he had on Squarepusher...the complete freedom of the fretboard, the saucy staccatto attack (at least, before Squarepusher took a 90 degree and became an amazing SLAP player.)
Some of my thoughts on this guy:
This guy is like Jesus Christ to me. It's even more scary, because he's extremely articulate, and is able to explain his motivations and philosophy so well that he really becomes this kind of...messiah. Because after all, he's a kind of hermit, he himself has stated. As musicians, we are always toeing the line with pandering to an audience...because we want to play something that they'll recognize and appeal, and at least entertain the notion of touching popular nerves...this guy is one of those rare instances of someone who manages to avoid that COMPLETELY and yet...now he's very well known. I think that many people have re-defined their tastes in order to accomodate him and not the other way around. Sure, the idm/dnb sound has become ubiqutous...there are car commercials with 250bpm breakbeats nowadays, and Squarepusher was...for better or worse, party to that. But Squarepushers work is quite safe and far from categorization or trend. Of course it has it's "popular" elements, he did work initially from the idm "sound palette." But an album like Ultravisitor is something un-precedented...people who like it like nothing like it because there just...isn't anything like it. And as was said, each album is kind of a new direction for him.
(Important part is here)
Now I don't think it happens so often that someone jumps so clearly out of categorization...that they reveal to us that the ingredients of vital music (vital as in "with vitality") are not rooted in an idiom, but in a mind in tension with idioms. This is from his own mouth, actually. Case in point, he's clever and illuminating; if you like him, read some of his interviews at squarepusher.net.
This man slays me. When I first got into Jaco it was primarily because I could hear the influence he had on Squarepusher...the complete freedom of the fretboard, the saucy staccatto attack (at least, before Squarepusher took a 90 degree and became an amazing SLAP player.)
Some of my thoughts on this guy:
This guy is like Jesus Christ to me. It's even more scary, because he's extremely articulate, and is able to explain his motivations and philosophy so well that he really becomes this kind of...messiah. Because after all, he's a kind of hermit, he himself has stated. As musicians, we are always toeing the line with pandering to an audience...because we want to play something that they'll recognize and appeal, and at least entertain the notion of touching popular nerves...this guy is one of those rare instances of someone who manages to avoid that COMPLETELY and yet...now he's very well known. I think that many people have re-defined their tastes in order to accomodate him and not the other way around. Sure, the idm/dnb sound has become ubiqutous...there are car commercials with 250bpm breakbeats nowadays, and Squarepusher was...for better or worse, party to that. But Squarepushers work is quite safe and far from categorization or trend. Of course it has it's "popular" elements, he did work initially from the idm "sound palette." But an album like Ultravisitor is something un-precedented...people who like it like nothing like it because there just...isn't anything like it. And as was said, each album is kind of a new direction for him.
(Important part is here)
Now I don't think it happens so often that someone jumps so clearly out of categorization...that they reveal to us that the ingredients of vital music (vital as in "with vitality") are not rooted in an idiom, but in a mind in tension with idioms. This is from his own mouth, actually. Case in point, he's clever and illuminating; if you like him, read some of his interviews at squarepusher.net.
Tom is simply an amazingly well accomplished, modest bassist. I had the pleasure of seeing him live a few years ago, and what most people don't realise is, he tends to use the bass not only as a bass instrument (in its own right) but as a trigger device for the other stuff that goes on in his music. Really quite incredible to see live.
You should really check out Invalid Link Removed website. There are some videos on there of him playing live.
I also uploaded some Culture Show stuff last year to Youtube:
Video 1
Video 2
One is an interview, the other is a solo 6 string bass performance.
You should really check out Invalid Link Removed website. There are some videos on there of him playing live.
I also uploaded some Culture Show stuff last year to Youtube:
Video 1
Video 2
One is an interview, the other is a solo 6 string bass performance.
In that Culture Show solo video he looks like The Ox with a receding hairline! Interesting solo though, but I'm still not quite into Squarepusher yet...I'm more of an Aphex Twin kinda guy!
"I would like some milk from the milkman's......wife's boobies......"
(aphex twin reference for the truly befuddled).
Aphex Twin is cool, very cool, but not terribly beyond cool. Squarepusher has tracks that make the whole friggin world just melt at your feet. Iambic 5 poetry....circlewave...
As for his appearance, yeah it's weird, he's only 31. Well, the man did spend a lot of the past 10 years fiddling with knobs and gadgets and laptops ALL DAY. Have you seen his apartment? It's like a corner. A corner boxed in with gadgets. At least from what was shown on camera.
(aphex twin reference for the truly befuddled).
Aphex Twin is cool, very cool, but not terribly beyond cool. Squarepusher has tracks that make the whole friggin world just melt at your feet. Iambic 5 poetry....circlewave...
As for his appearance, yeah it's weird, he's only 31. Well, the man did spend a lot of the past 10 years fiddling with knobs and gadgets and laptops ALL DAY. Have you seen his apartment? It's like a corner. A corner boxed in with gadgets. At least from what was shown on camera.
I got the bass mag with him in it. I have heard of Squarepusher, but not his music.
Thanks for this thread to guid me into his music. It's truely a great thing to discover new music.
Thanks for this thread to guid me into his music. It's truely a great thing to discover new music.
i recall a radio interview about 1999 in which he was saying he called himself square pusher cause he used to sell acid and festivals and raves.. it might have been a joke though
probably more likely from the little squares on the mpc...but that's just a guess based on the style of music.
hehe, I think thats probably a joke but I can kind of imagine it maybe being true. I remember reading in some other interview that he just thought it sounded good, and that it kind of worked with his approach of 'what can't be done? ok lets do it...'. you know, squares dont push easy, byu comparison you could call someone like the brand new heavies circlepusher...
not sure about the mpc idea though, I dont think he's ever used one, and its not good for doing the sort of stuff sp does. could easily be the buttons on a 606 or something though!
