Antony and the Johnsons.

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― dmun, Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:07 (twenty years ago)

just downloading it now. we've had a thread surely already?

― piscesboy, Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:10 (twenty years ago)

So, today is Tuesday.

― dmun, Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:14 (twenty years ago)

every time i see that picture of him with the painted dolls face i decide i'd rather not hear him.

― jed_ (jed), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:16 (twenty years ago)

I heard his album and a friend's house and I said "Is this the new Tracy Chapman?"

― polyphonic (polyphonic), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:22 (twenty years ago)

saw him with devendra and ms newsom. the crowd loved it but i just couldnt handle the falsetto. people tell me i'd love it if i could get past that and his theatrics. havent given him much of a chance yet.

― jane (jane), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:26 (twenty years ago)

the crowd loved it but i just couldnt handle the falsetto.

Oddly enough I'm listening to the first Tyrannosaurus Rex album now (which works a falsetto very well).

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:29 (twenty years ago)

Jane, if you don't like a voice you just don't like it - in my experience that's something you just can't learn to love like you can with other aspects of music. Maybe im too close minded in that respect.

― jed_ (jed), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:37 (twenty years ago)

i can't get over this whole hoopla. i find his music to be bordeline offensively bad. it's like freshman college gender studies class lyrics or something....so ridiculous

― atrocious, Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:50 (twenty years ago)

only three others:

What do you think of Antony & the Johnsons?

Antony and the Johnsons - I Am A Bird Now

Antony and the Johnsons?

― blackmail.is.my.life (blackmail.is.my.life), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 19:58 (twenty years ago)

pics from last week's Antony show at Barnsdall here:

http://photobucket.com/albums/y12/doppelgg/

― white boi, Tuesday, 8 March 2005 21:55 (twenty years ago)

i like tyrannosaurus rex and joanna newsom both of which the vocals bothered me at first. i'm of the school that if you spend enough time with a cd you could find something to like about it. it's just getting to the point where to give things a second, third, seventh chance.

honestly [and pretty sad to admit], i think it was his live show and the audience's reaction that helped rub me the wrong way. it seemed like caberet more than anything else.

― jane (jane), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 22:02 (twenty years ago)

i thought that the live show was pretty good actually - i liked the sparse arrangements, and i preferred antony's voice to rufus'. he did a nico song too that i didn't recognize, which i think gets to the cabaret thing, but what could/did you expect?

― blackmail.is.my.life (blackmail.is.my.life), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 22:24 (twenty years ago)

What's wrong with cabaret? Just seems like a funny criticism, insofar as Antony doesn't exactly seem to be trying to avoid smacking of cabaret. (Someone the other day raised to me a whole interesting subissue to that question, which has to do with charting the times when queerish musicians try very hard to avoid the types of music they’re generically associated with and when they actually embrace them.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 22:25 (twenty years ago)

nabisco - maybe some folks upthread expected some bizarro eno-esque glam performance, but i actually wrote this up for [insert well trafficked music website here] noting how antony's performance is one of utmost humility, and he pokes fun at himself and the venues he plays, which i think is part and parcel of any good diva's show.

― blackmail.is.my.life (blackmail.is.my.life), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 22:28 (twenty years ago)

its not that i wasn't expecting it to some degree. just turned off by it in comparison to the other stripped down girl and guitar/ guy and guitar performances that night.

― jane (jane), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 22:52 (twenty years ago)

uh i meant girl and harp.

― jane (jane), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 22:56 (twenty years ago)

i think it's cool that antony got lou reed to sing on Fistful of Love since it "borrows" so much from satellite of love. i had no expectations of the performance, and although i might've liked more from the cellist, i liked it overall. i found antony to be very endearing and capable of going back and forth between emotionally heavy material and light stage banter without seeming disingenuous.

― blackmail.is.my.life (blackmail.is.my.life), Tuesday, 8 March 2005 23:18 (twenty years ago)

i just couldnt handle the falsetto. people tell me i'd love it if i could get past that and his theatrics.

i'm having the same problem, and wondering if there's much left aside from that. i've listened quite a bit to the cd a friend made for me, and if anything i'm getting more annoyed with it (and irrationally annoyed with myself for not "getting it").

― lauren (laurenp), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 12:42 (twenty years ago)

Klaus Nomi to thread!

― zaxxon25 (zaxxon25), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 13:10 (twenty years ago)

The new album is one 35-minute song really, isn't it? Not necessarily a bad thing, but you have to be in the right frame of mind to absorb it. That Boy George sounds a bit wrecked on track 5, doesn't he?

Antony's voice reminds me of Bryan Ferry circa These Foolish Things more than anything else.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 13:27 (twenty years ago)

Antony's voice reminds me of Bryan Ferry circa These Foolish Things more than anything else

Wow, my dad said exactly the same thing. Marcello are you 50+? ;)

― Ludo (Ludo), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 14:00 (twenty years ago)

Hahah, not quite. 40+ is enough to cope with!

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 15:43 (twenty years ago)

I Am A Bird Now is so very adult contemporary.

― Brooker Buckingham (Brooker B), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 16:32 (twenty years ago)

I am totally loving this album at the moment. A faggy Nick Cave singing slowed down versions of the Shangri La's was what it sounded like in the gym this morning.

― alext (alext), Tuesday, 15 March 2005 13:35 (twenty years ago)

I Am A Bird now is gorgeous. Almost overwhelming in its lustrous beauty at times. And it's nice to hear Rufus Wainwright actually singing a fully formed melody ;)

― stew, Tuesday, 15 March 2005 13:41 (twenty years ago)

two months pass...

Bought the Hope Theres Someone 10" single, and the bside Frankenstein is equally as good as anything on I am Bird Now.

― dmun drive-in (dmun), Monday, 6 June 2005 14:09 (twenty years ago)

I rather like the fact he looks like the only gay in the village!

― Adam Park, Monday, 6 June 2005 14:13 (twenty years ago)

He's gay!?

― peepee (peepee), Monday, 6 June 2005 15:19 (twenty years ago)

He's gay!!

― dmun drive-in (dmun), Monday, 6 June 2005 15:43 (twenty years ago)

He wears a wig!!!

― mnm, Monday, 6 June 2005 15:46 (twenty years ago)

He is big!!

― dmun drive-in (dmun), Monday, 6 June 2005 19:49 (twenty years ago)

I wasn't sure if Lou Reed or Devendra were full on gay.
I am now.

― peter d (peter dee), Monday, 6 June 2005 21:49 (twenty years ago)

Isn't he a ... she (a.k.a. bird) now?

― The Brainwasher (Twilight), Monday, 6 June 2005 21:52 (twenty years ago)

I wasn't sure if Lou Reed or Devendra were full on gay.
I am now.

huh? whatthefuck does it matter. for what it's worth,devendra has been with one of the coco rosies for a couple years now.

― william (william), Monday, 6 June 2005 22:46 (twenty years ago)

...
anyone in toronto catch the current 93 & friends shows this past weekend?

― william (william), Monday, 6 June 2005 22:48 (twenty years ago)

i went up and down with this, hated it at first for the "breast amputation" line, then started liking a tune and do like his voice but in general music feels spoiled by too much contrived persona and ideas of what is male/female - which we are supposed to equate with the transgendered reality I guess - or maybe just his reality - or maybe just his persona...I don't know, but in the end it just felt uninteresting

― Susan Douglas (Susan Douglas), Monday, 6 June 2005 22:51 (twenty years ago)

"huh? whatthefuck does it matter."

Wow, people sure are touchy when it comes to sexuality. Being gay isnt a disease so why does everyone get so offended if someone labels them a homo?

― dmun drive-in (dmun), Tuesday, 7 June 2005 08:28 (twenty years ago)

When I said he looks like the only gay in the village, I meant he looked like the Little Britain character...

― Adam Park, Tuesday, 7 June 2005 13:37 (twenty years ago)

My Hope Theres Someone 10" single plays very slightly faster, and very slightly higher than the cd version. Has it been pressed out of speed, or is my turntable most likely knackered? Everything else seems to play fine though!

― dmun drive-in (dmun), Tuesday, 7 June 2005 19:48 (twenty years ago)

So.. Antony is playing at Town Hall on July 26th... anyone get tickets?

― The Brainwasher (Twilight), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 21:35 (twenty years ago)

five years pass...

So: Swanlights.

― markers, Thursday, 14 October 2010 19:51 (fourteen years ago)

When is this actually coming out?

― Fig On A Plate Cart (Alex in SF), Thursday, 14 October 2010 20:51 (fourteen years ago)

it came out this past Tuesday

― markers, Thursday, 14 October 2010 20:52 (fourteen years ago)

haven't heard the new one, but i go back and forth on antony -- sometimes it sounds like the most amazing music in the world, sometimes i can't stand it. guess it isn't very good for "casual" listening.

― tylerw, Thursday, 14 October 2010 20:53 (fourteen years ago)

guess it isn't very good for "casual" listening.

I think this is accurate. something like I Am A Bird Now, which I think is a great record, falls into that category of stuff that I think is great but can't just put on whenever because it's way too heavy

― markers, Thursday, 14 October 2010 20:57 (fourteen years ago)

― more than ever convinced ilxor is a sock (ilxor), Thursday, 14 October 2010 20:59 (fourteen years ago)

pretty weird thread, looking it over. is there um a better antony thread?

― tylerw, Thursday, 14 October 2010 20:59 (fourteen years ago)

Played Swanlights streaming on NPR at work and was like "ehhhhh" but I wasn't in any sort of ideal setting to be listening to it so I will stfu now.

― more than ever convinced ilxor is a sock (ilxor), Thursday, 14 October 2010 21:00 (fourteen years ago)

i admire his music more than i like it, but his turn on blind is remarkable. he should put his voice to that type of material more often imo.

― Daniel, Esq., Friday, 15 October 2010 01:16 (fourteen years ago)

I thought I read--probably on P4k--that Antony's not even on the next Hercules and Love Affair record that's supposed to be coming out early next year

― markers, Friday, 15 October 2010 01:17 (fourteen years ago)

not surprising, is it? he was just a "featured performer." in other words, a one-shot deal.

― Daniel, Esq., Friday, 15 October 2010 01:17 (fourteen years ago)

I wasn't sure what his relationship with the band was, tbh

― markers, Friday, 15 October 2010 01:18 (fourteen years ago)

heard antony's cover of "pressing on" by bob dylan recently -- stunning stuff.

― tylerw, Friday, 15 October 2010 01:33 (fourteen years ago)

four years pass...

http://pitchfork.com/news/58586-antony-announces-new-album-hopelessness-co-produced-with-oneohtrix-point-never-and-hudson-mohawke/

― Kibbutzki (Jaap Schip), Monday, 23 February 2015 13:48 (ten years ago)

Antony's take on OPN's "Returnal" was a brilliant promise but, wow, ANOHNI is one horribly awkward choice for a project name.

― doug watson, Monday, 23 February 2015 15:47 (ten years ago)

really psyched for this

― nose, Monday, 23 February 2015 17:12 (ten years ago)

nine months pass...

https://youtu.be/Fi0q0O4V5Qs

Pretty fucking excited right now

― You guys are caterpillar (Telephone thing), Tuesday, 1 December 2015 01:30 (nine years ago)

+1 great tune

― franklin, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 03:39 (nine years ago)

I do keep starting it up and catching my brain expecting to hear the Night of the Demon sample from "Hounds of Love" after that opening drum hit though

― You guys are caterpillar (Telephone thing), Tuesday, 1 December 2015 12:54 (nine years ago)

best thing she's done since "blind", wow

― lex pretend, Thursday, 3 December 2015 18:24 (nine years ago)

six years pass...

Buried Oil Makes Great Goo pic.twitter.com/Khb7UH8MgV
— James Austin Johnson (@shrimpJAJ) June 29, 2022

― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Wednesday, 29 June 2022 23:55 (three years ago)

I know I wrote at least one (album review-disguised as) show preview, but can't find it---here's something from 2013 Pazz & Jop comments:

Avicii ft. Linnea Henricksson---"Hope There's Someone" is written by Antony Hegarty, and totally fits that credit, though Spin's Philip Sherburne says she (talent show winner) "affects a Bjork-like hush", but does B. hold-extend-bend notes like this? Anyway, works like Hegarty's usual aural curves, which she rides with her own sense of dynamics

― dow, Thursday, 30 June 2022 00:35 (three years ago)

I know in the review/preview I indicated that I thought he had a better voice than Bryan Ferry (somewhat similar but with a better vibrato, seemed like)

― dow, Thursday, 30 June 2022 01:01 (three years ago)

I heard his album and a friend's house and I said "Is this the new Tracy Chapman?"

― polyphonic (polyphonic), Tuesday, March 8, 2005 7:22 PM (seventeen years ago) bookmarkflaglink

Have never thought of this before and now can’t un-hear it.

― deep luminous trombone (Eazy), Thursday, 30 June 2022 12:42 (three years ago)

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