How do you build an album? Well first you start with the basic “album” template. Guidelines include:
- A track count totaling 12, three-minute songs
- An opening track that’s better than most of the other tracks on the album
- A track that really doesn’t take itself seriously. One where you can reasonably assume the artist/band members were struggling not to laugh while recording/producing it
- A track that’s a little too short
- A track that should have been left off and would have been, had the first guideline not existed
If an artist puts together an series of recordings that follow the above layout, it’s guaranteed to, well, be an album. But that’s about it. And the unfortunate truth is that most people who put out albums stop here. Ever wonder why when you go to a record store, neither you nor any of your friends have heard of 95% of everything on the shelves? Well now you know. Making an album is the easy part. Making it yours is where things tend to get a little more difficult.
There are a billion approaches to what comes next. Some people like to add longevity to the listening experience by designing “concept albums” that tell a continued story throughout, using the music to convey the emotion. Others make full length pieces in which all the tracks combine to form one master piece. But even those tactics have become a bit overplayed. After all, who the hell wants to hear even two consecutive Top 40 tracks, much less a full 12 track album?
Onra
France’s Onra has taken a fresh approach to adding flavor to his (gasp) 32 track epic, Chinoiseries. Instead of sitting down in a studio, he travelled to Vietnam (where his grandparents live and are from) to get in touch with his heritage, and returned to France with over 30 pieces of dusty vinyl, off which he built his entire album. It’s got a theme, it’s masterfully produced, and best of all the culture clash that fuels it allows him to present to us a lost sound that we would otherwise likely never have uncovered in a way that is still, somehow, astounding easy to approach.
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And a little something off his latest release. Different approach. Same genius.
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