People’s Palms

I forgot to mention in the previous post that The Plants Are Listening will also include some ambient electronic music from People’s Palms, the nom de plume of one Austin Freese, a young artist currently based in Oakland, California. You can hear Austin’s music here and here.

Silence or Something Else

On November 8th, in Port Chalmers, a suburb of Dunedin, New Zealand, singer-songwriter Robert Scott recorded an acoustic-guitar-and-vocals version of the song “Silence or Something Else” for The Plants Are Listening. It’s quite an honor to have him contribute some music to the film!

Bob is best known for being the lead vocalist and guitarist in The Bats, as well as the bassist and occasional vocalist in The Clean–both highly influential bands with no shortage of inspired songs under their belts. He’s made solo records too and has played in loads of other groups that most people outside of New Zealand music circles have probably never heard of. Bob also draws and paints art and holds down a job as a teacher’s assistant, and he has children, so it’s safe to say that he’s a workaholic and an overachiever, though he’s probably too humble to admit that.

“Silence of Something Else” originally appeared as a full-band song on The Clean’s underrated 2001 outing Getaway. This version is perfectly good, but by chance one day I happened to see a video of Bob performing a stripped-down rendition of the song with just him and an acoustic guitar in a New Zealand library. It struck me as music that would work well in a film if it were professionally recorded. So I asked Bob if he would be interested in rerecording it solo, and he was game. Listening to the final mix of it right now, I’m quite pleased with the results and feel tempted to have it play more than once in the film, repeating it like Wong Kar Wai did with “California Dreamin'” in Chungking Express.

Ramada Inn and Walk Like a Giant

Last week saw the official release of Psychedelic Pill, the latest offering from Neil Young and his band Crazy Horse. The recording as a whole is worthwhile, and recommended, but listening to “Ramada Inn” and “Walk Like a Giant” in particular is downright addictive! Assuming you’ve got an ear for good rock music, I dare you to sit down and listen to these songs all of the way through only once. C’est impossible!