The Album Club: "Music From the Penguin Cafe" by The Penguin Cafe Orchestra
 

http://www.trollheart.com/penguincafe.jpg
I've been looking forward to this one! Review, rate, discuss and comment here.

Trigger warning: This is a totally not a positive review. So let me start from when the album was released. Except for a few rare exceptions I really don't like albums from 1974 to 1976, and it just so happens that this album is recorded between those years. This album is only reinforcing an opinion I hold even before I attempt to listen to it. Even though I am a fan of the 70s I don't consider every single piece of music from the 70s worthwhile. If this is an example of what music was like in 1976 no wonder that Disco and Punk took over.

Somewhere I saw it said they were discribed as "Avant-garde Pop" another place I saw them "Instrumental Folk." This is too far removed from "Folk" for me to consider it as such. Other than using a fiddle which is one of the go-to instruments in Folk, there is very tenuous connection to the genre. OK I see them calling this "Avant-garde Pop" but being both is part of its demise.

I really didn't like this album from the start. I guess felt trolled by this album. I was set up to like it only to get put off by annoying part of it. Another thing is that the instruments didn't match or something with the mix that didn't gel right. The music at best sounded like a incoherent mess. It is like they are stealing ideas from The Beatles or emulating some Pop band and then riffing off of them for a while then go into a Avant-garde mode for a while. There's always a music idea developing but it going nowhere. It does this over and over again. There's somewhat of a hook, it repeats and builds then it falls apart it becomes either whimsical or inane. That becomes annoying after a while. There is some nice stuff on it where I could love the album if wasn't for all the BS every other minute. However that makes it very consistent throughout, the way music vacillates between mushy melodies and random wankery. And if anything positive can be said about the album it'd be that it is consistent.

When I got to the song "The sound of someone you love who's going away and it doesn't matter" I was so conditioned of them tanking a music idea, I couldn't get into the song even though it started out very sentimental and something I would like. However I was anticipating some kind of nonsensical avant-garde experimentation to happen next. Don't get me wrong, I can love some Advant-garde stuff, and I don't mind Pop sensibilities. But the way they handle I couldn't get into it. Yes it happened it after it ventured into a musical area I couldn't care less for.

I didn't care for the album. Unless I am curious why I didn't like it and try to see if my opinions still hold, I probably won't return to this mess.
2/10

The Penguin Café Orchestra- Music From the Penguin Café (1976)

Best Tracks: Penguin Café Single, From the Colonies, In a Sydney Motel

Weakest Tracks: Milk, Pigtail


I can see how Trollheart was looking forward to reviewing this one.

Brian Eno is listed as a producer (executive producer actually), and his influence is heard throughout the album. The album starts off with a classical sounding piece that goes into a dreamlike state in the middle. It’s one of my favorites on the album.

The following seven tracks, all at about two minutes each, are listed as from a band known as Zopf. Some of these are vocal compositions with the Penguin Café backing. These tracks are especially Eno influenced. Did I happen to mention I happen to like Eno a lot? In a way, these tracks play like one of McCartney’s medleys in Abbey Road; it’s certainly creative, and I mean that in a good way.

Side two starts with the melancholy ‘The Sound of Someone You Love Who’s Going Away and It Doesn’t Matter.’ Try saying that one three times. Anyhow, it’s very sad and beautiful. It continues on side two in a similar vein.

I guess what I got out of it was a brilliant avant-garde piece. Is it perfect? Is anything? Milk and Pigtail, while not bad short tracks, maybe have been a little too avant-garde even for me. But overall, I really like the album, in fact I think I’m going to say I love it.


And I saw Neo didn't like it. I guess that proves that the Avant Garde is something you'll either love or hate. As for me, it led me to listen to a little bit of John Cage who was also something of an experimental artist.







8.5/10 (The Word has spoken :D)

The Penguin Cafe Orchestra - Music From The Penguin Cafe

I'm definitely more of a fan of Side 2 than Side 1 here: Simon Jeffes is at his best as a composer when he's going for more exploratory, lengthier forays into his melodies and a core motif. When he's particularly inspired, such as the beautiful 'The sound of someone you love...", you can appreciate the odd synthesis of stringed instrumentation with the less folksy elements more common in R.I.O. or Zeuhl music of the late 70's / early 80's (or perhaps even The Residents, though without the emphasis on atonality).

That being said, this is Eno's album too in a sense despite the fact he didn't write the music. His production and direction is fantastic without overstating any one element. Subtle, timeless, whatever you want to call it. His sonic manipulations here and there add a flavor to the experimentation that I hear echoed in everything from late 80's Talk Talk to the work of Toby Driver (maudlin of the Well), so I can tell this was a pivotal listening experience for many musicians at some point in their careers even if I'm only a fan of a scattering of pieces here myself.

I'll go with a strong 7 out of 10.

Note: The following is an expanded revision of a feature previously published to my member journal.

In months past, I’d only briefly acquainted myself with The Penguin Cafe Orchestra, primarily with their “Penguin Cafe Single” – their theme if you will. But the time felt right and I found myself in a space where I could really engage their music, and so I settled in one quiet evening and listened to their debut, Music From the Penguin Cafe.

http://i.imgur.com/OVpUXFol.jpg

It was an exquisite experience. The music of The Penguin Cafe Orchestra is tranquil, eclectic, and magically pastoral. The albums are classified as works of minimalism but are impressively dynamic recordings. Rich with subtly and understatedly intricate instrumentation, their music is a seamless and masterful blending of an impressive roster of genres, weaving together classical and contemporary elements. The result is magical and elegantly surreal.

Released as a double album set in Japan in ‘85, PCO’s first two albums are a wonderful pairing. The melodies are refined and artful but instantly accessible. There is no snobbery or exclusivity to this music – it is simply an enjoyable listening experience for anyone with a patient and open mind.

These records are stubbornly difficult to label or classify. The band spans a broad range of influences from classical to jazz, featuring middle eastern or perhaps Indian inspired drones, as well as Cajan, traditional folk melodies, African rhythms, and more, these elements blend seamlessly into marvelous soundscapes and musical vignettes reminiscent of Moondog’s symphoniques.

There is a timeless serenity to these recordings, and I’m grateful that I was at last ready to let them into my life at a time when they serve as a sensational complement to my headspace of late.

The opening track of Music From the Penguin Cafe is one of the project’s best-loved classics - the aforementioned “Penguin Cafe Single.” The track features the eclectic and surreal energies the group would refine and perfect on later albums with songs like, “Air À Danser” from their self-titled follow-up album and “Perpetuum Mobile” from Signs of Life.

The second selection is far more explorative - the fifteen-minute “Zopf.” The track features multiple movements, showcasing an array of vintage instruments, a ballad with gentle vocals, and a strings segment, followed by a bizarre avant-garde section with strained utterances of the word "milk", seemingly random dissonant plinking, and vocal percussion. This curious section quickly transitions into a slow and sorrowful string and vocal ballad beginning marked by the words, "the queen is dead". The next segment is a lovely harpsichord melody which builds to a playful conversation of traditional instrumentation. Upon its conclusion, for the final phase of “Zopf” a sparse atmospheric micro movement begins with an out of tune smattering of notes reminiscent of technostalgic telephone pulses or sounds from some similar 1960s electromechanical apparatus. A quick search confirms that the source is a tape loop of a UK telephone ringing - the sound of which was later sampled by the band Spacehog for the opening of their hit, “In the Meantime.”

Next up is the beautiful and plaintive, "The Sound of Someone You Love Who's Going Away and it Doesn't Matter” As the piece progresses it moves into fragmented and frustrated outbursts of notes before returning to its melodic refrain, brilliantly showcasing the dimensional complexity of the title’s emotional state.

“Hugebaby” continues the album’s theme of gentle chamber music with a timelessness that simply cannot be touched. A magical theme by which to while away an afternoon lost in thought or dreams.

The album closer, “Chartered Flight” unveils itself ever so slowly, unfolding over six and a half minutes to incorporate a variety of strings and blissful chamber melodies. The track is patient, ambling on reflectively with no particular hurry or destination - precisely the headspace it evokes for the listener.

From start to finish, Music From The Penguin Cafe is a treasure of heady and engaging arrangements, and some of the most peaceful sounds you’ll ever hear. I really enjoyed an observation from a fellow listener named bpnicast who remarked, “The dispassionate, cerebral atmosphere here creates its own unique space that seems to slow time and demand hushed attention – an emotional connection achieved through stillness and abstraction.”

That is precisely what I enjoy about this album. It will be a pleasure to play them again and again and to share them with those who bring joy into my life.

http://i.imgur.com/oDdAfDZl.png
Photograph by Steve Gullick

I heard of these guys years and years and years ago, but I don't think I actually heard their music. The opening instrumental is really nice, very pleasant, while some of the vocal pieces put me in mind of eighties Alan Parsons Project to a degree. I don't know why, but I expected sort of twenties music here; just the impression I had had of this band.

Overall it's put together well, with seven short pieces (ranging from just over one minute to just over two in length) kind of coming together almost as one interlinked piece of music, then a long track on its own which, for its over eleven-minute length, goes by very quickly.

A really good album, very enjoyable, and would certainly induce me to listen to more of their material. 8/10

Sorry to push in here, not as an Album Club member, but as a long-time admirer of Penguin Café Orchestra. Nor can I compete with InnerSpace's excellent review, but I'd certainly endorse his mention of PCO's later albums: the self-titled and Signs of Life are more accessible and completely instrumental, (as long as your definition of "instrument" is pretty broad.)

Knowing what they would later do makes this album under review feel a Little like a rehearsal in which they were trying out a couple of things before discovering what worked and what didn't. Their music was quite experimental, and of course not every experiment results in success, but if you like rubbersoul's "Best Tracks" picks, you'll find plenty of similar material on their later albums. You could even dip into this thread, for which PCO were the starting point:-

http://www.musicbanter.com/avant-gar...r-s-guide.html

I notice that Neapolitan didn't take to this album, and I'd like to pick up on a couple of points he mentions:-
^ IMO the genre labels are all a bit misleading - the PCO aren't really delivering pop or folk and are only sporadically avantgarde. For me their approach was to strip away a lot of musical preconceptions and build things up again with delicate care from the basics; from what I saw of 70's music, (mooching around record shops, for example), there was nobody else playing music the way main-man Simon Jeffes was composing it, and record-shop owners just didn't know which section to put the PCO albums in. Their dilemma wasn't solved until New Age became a genre.

^ Oddly enough, the instrumentation is one of the things I really love about PCO; it's kind of quirky, but you can hear what each instrument is doing. I like that clear, clean sound that lets you hear how the songs are put together from the various instrumental parts.

^ Yes, I agree with you here, Neapolitan. The big weakness of PCO is that a lot of their material sounds very inconsequential; ideas remain undeveloped and they never go for the big, powerful emotional impact so that their music, although often touching on beauty, is always determinedly cerebral. Listening to a PCO album usually puts me in the mood to play something hard and heavy as an antidote to all their refined, clever simplicity.

I'm pretty lousy at putting a number to a listening experience, so my verdict shifts between Anteater's strong 7 and rubbersoul's 8.5, settling therefore at Trollheart's 8 I suppose.

You're always welcome in here, Lisna. What'll ye have? :beer:

Thanks so much for adding your insight, Lisna! And thanks especially for the link to your thread. I am only familiar with Kronos Quartet from their work with Clint Mansell and their Philip Glass performance so I'll definitely look into their other material. I'm really looking forward to exploring the other tracks you shared as well.

Cheers!

I've been listening to this thing multiple times by now but it's still keeping me at arms' length. On the surface, it seems like it should be attractive enough to me. There's a good variety of musical styles exhibited on the album. The sound quality is pretty damn good. All instruments are expertedly performed and... I still don't really like it. I think a lot of it has to do with the general vibe of this project. Some of the orchestral numbers, I really did think were allright, but I'm just not feeling excitied or moved in particular by anything here.

The tracks that went for more of a bit of weirdness especially didn't sit well with me. Take the track Milk, for example. That sort of approach to art just bores me. Hey, let's be weird and mumble the word "milk" into the microphone while a bee-like drone comes and goes in the background. It's just random nonense and strikes me as a lazy approach to art. I know this sentiment won't find much agreement in here, but that's my view.

Thankfully, this side of the album isn't exactly very pronounced, so I'll have top chalk my dislike of the album down to something vague like how I'm just not feeling all that interested in or connected to the general musical expression of this album.

I think I'm going to do away with numbers for good. I'll just say what I voted. I voted "meh", as in "this is not for me at all, but I can see how it's well made".

Thanks to both Lisna and ISB. I’ll be sure to keep this rotation. I liked the stuff about double suicide. Embarrassed by my ignorance on this one. Fans of this might enjoy Stephin Merritt. Full Five Stars. Up there with the best. Sorry so short recently Trolls.

^ Thank you for the kind comments, Trollheart and Occult. It's coming up to vacation time for me, so I might join you here more often if I may; it's clearly where all the cool dudes hang.

^ Thanks, InnerSpace. It's nice to think that I can add something of interest. I hope you find some good recs in that Chamber Orchestra thread, and please don't feel shy if you want to bump it.....

I can certainly understand MicShazam's indifference to PCO. After all, forty years later, we are not so struck by what was once innovative, and in fact the kind of remorseless control they keep on their music could be considered dated, or perhaps stemming from classical discipline, depending how you look at it.

You know how these days every university, company or local government office has to have a slogan after its name?
> The University of X; devoted to education and reason
> Y Cola; bringing bubbles into your life
> Department of Z; your problems are our problems

Do you think this will this ever become a fashion for bands? If it does, I have one ready:

> Penguin Café Orchestra; never let a crescendo get out of hand.

The opening track was maybe closest to making me care. It almost started reminding me of music from old Tom & Jerry cartoons. Almost. I would like it to have been a bit more lively. A bit more playful.

I quite like this album. I think a lot of its more experimental tendencies work pretty well. I'll go through track by track just because I'm having trouble coming up with something to write.

Penguin Cafe Single - Good, starts out with a nice little theme, and then transitions into a bit of an experimental section, and then back to the initial theme. Nothing terribly special about this one, just a little intro to the band's sound.

From The Colonies - This is such an interesting sound to me. It's like nothing I've heard before. I couldn't even tell exactly what sound opens this song, but whatever it is it works well. The short length of the song to me is a boon, it couldn't have survived much longer.

In A Sydney Motel - This song I think could have lasted much longer, though as it is it's fine. The theme developed in the first quiet section of this song is already pretty great, but when the drums, bass, and the violins come in in the second half, this song goes from great to stellar. Absolutely beautiful song that I wish went on longer.

Surface Tension - This one reminds me heavily of Jonny Greenwood's string arrangements in the harmonies it creates, and also in the way it sort of shifts around. Very haunting and overall enjoyable.

Milk - Others may have found it too experimental, to me this is a pretty good track as well, maybe not as good as some of the others, but still fun and intriguing.

Coronation - Interesting, but nothing particularly special.

Giles Farnaby's Dream - This may be my least favorite song on the album. It's just too cheesy and lackadaisical. That said, it does remind me heavily of a Wes Anderson soundtrack, especially the soundtrack to The Royal Tenenbaums. It's grown on me a bit, I'll say.

Pigtail - Definitely ahead of its time with this one. Experimental electronic music? From '76? Yeah, alright. Odd, but very interesting. And atmospheric as well.

The Sound of Someone You.... - The main guitar theme is quite excellent on its own, but when the strings come in it adds so much life to the song. The way this song progresses is quite great as well. Maybe a bit overlong, but beyond that this is a superb track, even on this album.

Hugebaby - Another guitar/string driven song, and another interesting arrangement. Pretty cool.

Chartered Flight - The arrangement and chord structure here are pretty fantastic, and the keyboard solo really makes the piece. A nice simplistic closer to a soft, simple album.

So yeah, this album is pretty dang good. I enjoy all of the songs, and I think a few of them are really quite special. It's not the absolute top-tier of albums of all time, IMO, but it's still pretty good. 8/10

Sleater-Kinney - Call the Doctor
Penguin Cafe Orchestra - Music From The Penguin Cafe
Hiatus Kaiyote - Choose Your Weapon

Interesting album. Well played, well produced, lots of interesting musical moments. Listened to it three times and liked it a bit more with each listen. I had heard the opening track before but I can't recall ever listening to the album in its entirety. This is the type of album that really should be listened to when you have the time to pay attention to it, rather than just letting it play in the background. Definitely not background/audio wallpaper type of music.
I don't think there was anything here I didn't like. I'll definitely be giving a listen to some more of their music.

8.5/10

This album was so shockingly normal to me back in the days when I would buy the latest album
on Obscure Records that I was worried that Eno had really dropped the 20th Century Classical ball.
After Gavin Bryars, Michael Nyman, John Cage and Max Eastley were already spinning into
astrologian complexities, why were we now being served highfalutin musical nosh
(later, "cuppings" for the coffee snobs). Times change. NPRistas don't set the stage
for the creatively complex anymore and the tunes and suite have a wonderful life of their own.
Simon Jeffes always seemed to take the backwoods home to show us that a line to the
unexpectedness of avant-folksiness doesn't have to be straight. Even in life, he was born
in a nursing home as well as provided a string arrangement to accompany Sid Vicious.
Maybe this is what bad fish will do to you. Library music for intellectuals. (7.9/10)

Nice Beatles-influenced string introduction to the album. This first track is nice but I certainly hope that the album offers up something a little more diverse and interesting than this because listening to more than 30 seconds of that theme feels like a waste of time. About halfway through the track it gets more interesting with some instrumental conversation trading phrases and taking a slower, sparse approach. This I love.

The first Zopf track starts off by playing around with minimalist microtonal melodies which is pretty cool. I feel like the guitar could be doing some much more interesting things and is kind of added as an afterthought for accessibility.

The second Zopf track is a nice little acoustic ballad with great vocal harmonies after it picks up. Kind of middle ground track but it gives me hope that this won't be a monotonous listen. The transition from this track to Surface Tension is incredibly fluid.

Surface Tension is the best track so far. Melodically and harmonically it's a really lovely piece despite being very by the books. Books written by The Beatles.

Milk has cool sounds and approaches but fails to grip me even though it's probably the most experimental or innovative track so far on the record.

The Zopf series carries on with the track Coronation and it's nice and all but why make this music? It doesn't feel like they want to make an impression on me with these tracks.

Gile Farnaby's Dream is far too upbeat. It came years before La Bamba came out, but the similarity of the melodies only annoys me.

Pigtail is nice, I really like when they take a step back and go meditative with the interesting electronics. I wish that they had extended that track and went other places with it.

The Sound of Someone You Love starts off with lowkey acoustic guitar who let the violin take the lead at points that just saunters for about 7 minutes before it starts to actually get interesting with the ascending climax it hits that it tosses around a bit before descending back into some stuff that's...pleasant I guess.

Hugebaby is another ballady song that has some more interesting melodic moments but again feels like another track that doesn't do much when noticed.

The closer, Chartered Flight, feels like the reason behind releasing this album as it's my favourite. It's darker and has the more pop-driven interludes filtered through a minimalist lens that might even listen to Bitches Brew occasionally. If this were the only track on a single I'd give it a 7.5/10.

My biggest gripe with this album is that it's just nice. It's not bad, it's not amazing, I even hesitate to call it good. It's just there for your background and not much else. Maybe it's because the album tries to please to many people and ends up diluting all of its stronger points. It doesn't connect experimental, classical, and pop music in a meaningful or new way even though it sounds like this is the goal of the group. It might just be the inclusion of the violin that makes me think this, but if I want something of this vein I think I'm going to stick with Tin Hat or Robert Wyatt. I'm going to give it a neutral score of 5/10.

Just wanted to add that La Bamba is actually over 100 years old -
and the famous rock 'n' roll version was from 1958.
You may be thinking that it sounds the same only because
Giles Farnaby's Dream is a son jarocho which is
the Veracruz style that La Bamba adopted.
Giles Farnaby, BTW, was a virginalist from the 1600s.