At the request of Wenatchee the Hatchet, and also following my own long-standing interest, I took a dive into the opening track from Björk’s exquisite album Vespertine:
I love Björk for so many reasons. A big one is her ability to make weird ideas sound approachable, which is closely related to her ability to make conventional ideas sound strange. “Hidden Place” is a perfect example. Is it a pop song? An art song? A dance groove? A work of experimental ambient music? The answer is, yes, all of the above. The basic structure is pop boilerplate: verse-prechorus-chorus form, a looped bassline and ostinato-based groove organized into four or eight bar phrases. But on top of that standard foundation is a lot of weird stuff. Continue reading