Wednesday, May 02, 2007

Myspace: Mike Kelly

I found Mike Kelly on a Myspace bulletin from none other than Mike Watt. I thought with that kinda recommendation he desrved at least a listen. Let me first offer Mike's own disclaimer, because it's a good one and something you should know going in. He writes of his songs, "ALL WERE RECORDED IN FIRST TAKE,IN ORDER TO CAPTURE THE ESSENCE OF THE SONG,INSTEAD OF WASHING IT AWAY IN PERFECTION.IM SORRY IF IT SOUNDS ALITTLE ROUGH AROUND THE EDGES, BUT IM DOING IT ALL MYSELF,,TRYING NOT TO FORGET IDEAS AND TRYING TO CATCH INSPIRATION WHEN IT COMES." Rough around the edges might be a bit of an understatement, but he is warning you ahead of time not to expect Dark Side of the Moon or anything in terms of production. Fair warning, no problem. If you can deal with what are essentially the ultimate in DIY recordings (written, performed, recorded by Mike himself) and get over the sheer rawness of these songs, you might be in for a treat. If you can't, I suspect he doesn't really want you visiting anyway, because his music isn't about being slick or smooth or easy. It's about spontenaity and challenge and a good psyche out.

Right now, Mike has four songs up on his myspace page. "Can I" is an acoustic piece with rough vocals. Echoey backing vocals lurk in the background and some trippy guitar noodling rises and falls. It's a pretty freaky track that reminds me a bit of some alumni of the old Enigma Records like the Rain Parade or Jet Black Berries. "Croaxias Inadvert" is another acoustic song that starts off a bit in a Syd Barrett vein, but chanting vocals make it a bit more Eastern as it goes. This one doesn't really get going though, making it the weakest of the four. Getting away from the acoustic, "Hopeonarope Wesp" is domiated by raw, phased and distorted guitar. It's not a complex song, but the subdued wail of Mike's vocals give it nice dimension. It reminds me a lot of the trippier side of 80s punk and alternative, like Wurm or the Enigma stuff I mentioned above. "The Place is You" comes close to being the best of the four songs, but the structure breaks down a bit in the middle. It comes back around, but there's a bit much going on which leads to confusion more than just a listening challenge. I think it's more of a production issue though.

Mike Kelly is a raw musician. Both his playing and singing could use a little bit of refiniement and the production is more what you'd expect from a recording of ideas than even a demo (as he warns us on his page). However, there's a lot of real potential here. The songs have a decidely psychedelic quality and display real passion. Even if he cleans everything up, Mike isn't playing the kind of stuff that will light up the charts, but I say too bad for the masses, because they're missing out. As it stands, I like what he's doing, in spite of (or perhaps because of) the lumps.

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3 Comments:

Blogger Jeff said...

I listened to "Can I" which sounded pretty good. It is most definitely rough around the edges and raw to say the least but the potential is there.

8:36 PM  
Blogger bob_vinyl said...

Jeff - I'm glad you had the chance to check it out. It will be interesting to follow Mike's work over time to see if he fulfills the potential.

9:36 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

IN MY PROFILE,I FORGOT TO MENTION THAT ALMOST ALL MY SONGS ARE IMPROVISED,AND NOT PRE~CONCIEVED.THEY ARE FORMED THE MOMENT I HIT "RECORD",THEN I GO FROM THERE WITH OVERDUBS AND WHAT NOT.SO,THERES ALWAYS PLACES HERE AND THERE IN THE SONGS WHERE IT SEEMS TO ALL FALL APART,AND THATS MOSTLY BECAUSE IM NEVER REALLY SURE QUITE WHERE THE SONG IS TAKING ME.~MIKE KELLY

12:49 AM  

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