Otis Redding – The Very Best Of
My dad gave me this record when I was 13, at a time when I was beginning to get a lot more serious about music. He told me to listen to it: to feel how the band functions together. I can’t exactly emulate what they did, but I’d say that it opened my ear up to nuance. What happens when a vocal is slightly ahead or behind the beat, and how that can totally transform the physicality of a song; how it relates to your head and your heart. I find myself coming back to this record again and again when I need to remember how the intuitiveness of music and its technical aspects relate to a feeling. It’s an invaluable instruction manual for me. I mean, I could never accomplish myself but it’s certainly something to continue to learn from. My father was a complicated person. This record doesn’t instill a wave of warm memories of him. I think my musical associations with him are instructive, rather than warm and cuddly. He was not a great dad. But he did impart invaluable instructions to me. I wouldn’t be the person that I am today and Xiu Xiu wouldn’t be anything like it is without his influence.
Baker's Dozen
Oh Yes! Jamie Stewart Of Xiu Xiu's Favourite Music
Oh Yes! Jamie Stewart Of Xiu Xiu's Favourite Music
Hannah Pezzack
, April 7th, 2021 09:03
As Xiu Xiu release latest album Oh No, Jamie Stewart guides us through his 13 toppermost records – including three compilations! I only want the best ice cream, he tells Hannah Pezzack