Discoteca Ideal Qobuz

En 2018 Rodrigo Leão, compositor y pianista nacido en Lisboa en 1964, conmemoraba 25 años de carrera en solitario tras el enorme éxito cosechado durante casi una década junto al grupo Madredeus, fundado por él mismo y Pedro Ayres Magalhães en 1985. Ave Mundi Luminar (Columbia, 1993) fue su primer eslabón en un viaje que le ha convertido en uno de los músicos portugueses más emblemáticos y reconocidos del panorama internacional. La celebración incluyó el relanzamiento de la banda sonora del documental Portugal, um Retrato Social (serie de televisión realizada en 2007 por Joana Pontes y Antonio Barreto) bajo el título de Os Portugueses (Sony Music, 2018). Su largo catálogo de 28 canciones incluye 10 nuevas grabaciones de temas de Madredeus (entre las que se encuentran O Pastor y Guitarra) y de Sétima Legião, primera formación del compositor (Mil Maneiras de Amar). Destaca un tema inédito titulado Restos da vida, interpretado por Camané, uno de los más grandes cantantes de fado en la actualidad. Selma Uamusse y Ana Vieira son las otras voces que acompañan las melodías nostálgicas concebidas como música de cámara, cuerdas y acordeón entrelazados con las suaves texturas de sintetizadores y piano.La selección que ha realizado Rodrigo Leão para Os Portugueses pone en valor la lengua lusa y la música tradicional puramente instrumental, que conectan con una visión minimalista más contemporánea. Una mirada íntima de los conceptos que expanden la sonoridad tan característica de un creador que se ha ganado un lugar incuestionable en la música de Portugal. Sigue estando Madredeus presente de manera inequívoca en la mirada del músico, no sólo en su memoria relatada a través de este trabajo sino también en sus proyectos actuales. Un aniversario, en definitiva, de los rasgos más actuales de la música portuguesa. © Ulyses Villanueva/Qobuz

¡Con dos acordes de sintetizador tenemos suficiente! No hace falta más para reconocer el singular sonido de Eurythmics, aquel emblemático grupo de los 80. Y es que el tándem conformado por Annie Lennox y Dave Stewart es hoy de los más representativos de la new wave sintética (de contenidos pop y formas futuristas) de aquella década, cuando se declaró la guerra a las guitarras… El dúo británico se encaramaría varias veces a lo más alto de los charts en los 80, pero Sweet Dreams ha quedado como su obra más recordada. Las composiciones de Dave Stewart son pura new wave sombría, en cierto modo a la manera de Bowie (Love Is A Stranger), con algunas dosis ligeras de krautrock (Sweet Dreams), aunque ocasionalmente pueden adoptar apariencias funky (I’ve Got An Angel) o incluso disco (Wrap It Up). Al micro tenemos, cómo no, a Annie Lennox, que aún hoy sigue impresionándonos con su voz teñida de soul o, por el contrario, con tonos rigurosamente austeros. Todo un clásico del género. © Clotilde Maréchal/Qobuz

Tras un primer, enérgico y fascinante álbum de country alternativo (A.M.), concebido en el momento de la traumática separación de su grupo Uncle Tupelo, Jeff Tweedy se tomó su tiempo para alumbrar este segundo trabajo de Wilco, un doble disco con el que apuntaba muy alto. Formato que, unido a las influencias musicales manejadas, haría pensar a bastantes periodistas que con este álbum aparecido en octubre de 1996 Tweedy había querido componer su Exile On Main Street. Y es que al igual que en esa ecléctica obra maestra de los Stones, las directrices son aquí el rock & roll más básico, el bluegrass, el country rock, la psicodelia, el folk y el soul más sudoroso. Con las guitarras campando por sus respetos, el steel pedal y los metales como parte de una instrumentación poco común, los Wilco de Being There tejen inesperadas conexiones entre los Stones de su mejor época, los Replacements, los Beatles y los Big Star del álbum Third. Alternando baladas y tempestades eléctricas, Tweedy demuestra que con unos fundamentos clásicos (en realidad intemporales) es aún posible escribir grandiosas canciones, componer excelentes piezas de la más sorprendente arquitectura… Esta edición Deluxe remasterizada propone, además del álbum original, quince bonus inéditos que incluyen, entre otras cosas, versiones alternativas de I Got You y Say You Miss Me, así como el directo grabado el 12 de noviembre de 1996 en el Troubadour de Los Ángeles y una sesión para la emisora KCRW de Santa Monica, registrada un día después. © MZ/Qobuz

Publicado en diciembre de 1976, el quinto disco de los Eagles se convertiría en su mayor éxito. Hotel California, que incluía el celebérrimo single de igual título, marca un giro en la carrera del grupo estadounidense. Bernie Leadon, el miembro más country de la banda, había abandonado la nave y Joe Walsh vino a sustituirle, mientras Don Henley aprovechaba para ponerse al timón. El resultado es un álbum más mainstream que los anteriores, con un sonido suntuoso, a la altura de las composiciones. ¡Y es que todo está pensado a escala colosal! La producción, las melodías, los solos ¡absolutamente todo! Obra maestra del AOR (Adult Oriented Rock) concebida para conquistar las FM, estamos ante un álbum que goza desde hace mucho de estatus de intemporal y que sigue dejando al oyente con la boca abierta. Glenn Frey, Don Felder, Joe Walsh, Randy Meisner y Don Henley no volverían a alcanzar nunca semejante grado de complicidad ni ese estado de gracia… Lanzado en noviembre de 2017, esta edición por su 40 aniversario nos ofrece la posibilidad de gozar del disco original remasterizado y, de propina, de un potente directo grabado en el californiano Forum de Inglewood en octubre de 1976. © CM/Qobuz

La regla del juego había quedado suficientemente clara ya en su primer disco, pero los Ramones consiguieron superarse con este tercer álbum, que viene a sumarse a las nuevas ediciones rematerizadas de su legado. ¡Y no solo superarse, sino perfeccionar su estilo! Una vez más, con Rocket To Russia, lanzado el 4 de noviembre de 1977, en plena guerra fría, su intención pasaba por crear sus micromundos con solo tres acordes, historias gozosamente estúpidas salidas del imaginario adolescente y, sobre todo, por devolver orgullosamente el rock&roll al lugar de donde había salido: ¡el garaje! Claro está que los estribillos de Sheena Is A Punk Rocker o de Teenage Lobotomy resultan insuperables por su eficacia, en tanto que particulares relecturas de géneros como el rock&roll, el pop bubblegum y el surf. Es que incluso cuando revisitan clásicos de culto, como Surfin’ Bird de los Trashmen o el Do You Wanna Dance? popularizado por Cliff Richard, los Beach Boys y Bette Midler, estos guerrilleros punk oriundos de Queens se sacan de la manga el rock más salvaje y cortante que se recuerda. Esta edición conmemorativa de los cuarenta años de tan soberbio atentado sonoro propone al audaz oyente dos mezclas del álbum: la original y una nueva bautizada como Tracking Mix, a cargo de Ed Stasium, ingeniero de sonido de la versión histórica. Y que incluye también 24 temas raros o inéditos, demos, versiones alternativas y caras B. Y como guinda, un incendiario directo inédito de los hermanos Ramones (bueno, no exactamente hermanos...) grabado el 19 de diciembre de 1977 en el muy escocés Apollo Centre de Glasgow. © MZ/Qobuz

Elliott Smith's third album sees his one-man show getting a little more ambitious. While he still plays all the instruments himself, he plays more of them. Several of the songs mimic the melody mastery of pop bands from 1960s. The most alluring numbers, however, are still his quietly melancholy acoustic ones. While the full-band songs are catchy and smart, Smith's recording equipment isn't quite up to the standards set by the Beatles and the Beach Boys. The humbler arrangements are better suited to the sparse equipment. "Between the Bars," for example, plays Smith's strengths perfectly. He sings, in his endearingly limited whisper, of late-night drinking and introspection, and his subdued strumming creates a minor-key mood befitting the mysteries of self. "Angeles" is equally ethereal -- Smith's acoustic fingerpicking spins out notes which briskly move around a single atmospheric keyboard chord, like aural minnows swimming toward a solitary light at the surface of the water. The lyrics are a darkly biting rejection of the hypercapitalist dream machinery of Los Angeles (it would make a great theme song for Smith's label, Kill Rock Stars). Ironically, "Angeles" was included on the Good Will Hunting soundtrack, which won Smith the acclaim of Hollywood's biggest, brightest, and best connected voting body, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences. Smith's stock in L.A. soared after he took his bow at the Oscars with Celine Dion and Trisha Yearwood. It might have been more interesting had he sung "Angeles." © Darryl Cater /TiVo

The supporting tour for Green exhausted R.E.M., and they spent nearly a year recuperating before reconvening for Out of Time. Where previous R.E.M. records captured a stripped-down, live sound, Out of Time was lush with sonic detail, featuring string sections, keyboards, mandolins, and cameos from everyone from rapper KRS-One to the B-52's' Kate Pierson. The scope of R.E.M.'s ambitions is impressive, and the record sounds impeccable, its sunny array of pop and folk songs as refreshing as Michael Stipe's decision to abandon explicitly political lyrics for the personal. Several R.E.M. classics -- including Mike Mills' Byrds-y "Near Wild Heaven," the haunting "Country Feedback," and the masterpiece "Losing My Religion" -- are present, but the album is more notable for its production than its songwriting. Most of the songs are slight but pleasant, or are awkward experiments like "Radio Song"'s stab at funk, and while this sounds fine as the record is playing, there's not much substantive material to make the record worth returning to. © Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

It's hard to overstate how much the songs of Jagged Little Pill — released on feminist pioneer Madonna's Maverick label at a moment when Hootie & the Blowfish and the theme from Friends were anesthetizing America — shook up pop radio in 1995. No one was prepared for first single "You Oughta Know," which stormed into ubiquity in a blaze of raw fury aimed at a "Mr. Duplicity" who rebounded too soon. Often mis-characterized as pure vengeance, the dynamics-propelled rocker (with bass and guitar from Flea and Dave Navarro, then of the Red Hot Chili Peppers) was really about being forthright and staking a claim to un-pretty feelings: "And every time you speak her name/ Does she know how you told me/ You'd hold me until you died." Of course, Morissette had no choice but to be divisive. From the album's opener "All I Really Want," you'll know if you love or hate her voice, with its affected tics and shrieks. Let it also be said that Jagged Little Pill is not an album for those who find harmonica grating, and that jaunty hit "Ironic" may drive literalists crazy with its litany of inconveniences ("It's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife"). But it's that lack of self-consciousness from Morissette (19 years old at the time) that makes songs such as the grungy "Forgiven" — a defiance against patriarchal Catholic guilt — and self-empowerment bop "You Learn" a clarion call of independence for young women looking to ditch fear. It also let her create a completely new sound that didn't draw directly from typical female influences (save for the folksy "Hand In My Pocket", which comes on like the spiritual descendent of Edie Brickell's "What I Am") and left a mold for countless female artists after. © Qobuz

Uncle Tupelo ended in volleys of bitter acrimony between founding members Jay Farrar and Jeff Tweedy, and as most of Uncle Tupelo's final lineup joined Tweedy to form Wilco, Farrar set out to assemble a new band that suited his specifications. Teaming with UT's original drummer Mike Heidorn, guitarist and multi-instrumentalist Dave Boquist, and bassist (and Dave's brother) Jim Boquist, Farrar's new group Son Volt started with the deep, resonant sound of his work with Uncle Tupelo and moved it several steps further, and the band's debut album, 1995's Trace, ultimately displayed his talent to better advantage than any album he made before or since. Sequenced to highlight the dynamic push and pull between fierce rockers like "Route" and "Drown," full of Farrar's Neil Young-styled electric guitar, and quieter and more thoughtful numbers like "Tear-Stained Eye" and "Windfall," Trace honored both sides of Farrar's musical personality, and the muscular but unpretentious attack of his backing band was made to order for these songs. And the mixed themes of freedom, disappointment, and betrayal that punctuate Farrar's lyrics clearly reflected his state of mind as he walked away from one band and into another. One could reasonably describe Trace as Jay Farrar's version of George Harrison's All Things Must Pass, a watershed work where the artist occasionally looks to an unsatisfying past as he sets out on a bracing new adventure, and like All Things Must Pass it was a triumph that Farrar would never quite repeat as he created a body of work that was satisfying but never balanced songs, performances, and mood with the easy perfection he achieved here. However, when Trace appeared in 1995, it was hard not to believe Farrar had broken up Uncle Tupelo for all the right reasons, and it's still a powerful, beautifully crafted, and deeply moving set of songs. © Mark Deming /TiVo

After the freakish hard rock of The Man Who Sold the World, David Bowie returned to singer/songwriter territory on Hunky Dory. Not only did the album boast more folky songs ("Song for Bob Dylan," "The Bewlay Brothers"), but he again flirted with Anthony Newley-esque dancehall music ("Kooks," "Fill Your Heart"), seemingly leaving heavy metal behind. As a result, Hunky Dory is a kaleidoscopic array of pop styles, tied together only by Bowie's sense of vision: a sweeping, cinematic mélange of high and low art, ambiguous sexuality, kitsch, and class. Mick Ronson's guitar is pushed to the back, leaving Rick Wakeman's cabaret piano to dominate the sound of the album. The subdued support accentuates the depth of Bowie's material, whether it's the revamped Tin Pan Alley of "Changes," the Neil Young homage "Quicksand," the soaring "Life on Mars?," the rolling, vaguely homosexual anthem "Oh! You Pretty Things," or the dark acoustic rocker "Andy Warhol." On the surface, such a wide range of styles and sounds would make an album incoherent, but Bowie's improved songwriting and determined sense of style instead made Hunky Dory a touchstone for reinterpreting pop's traditions into fresh, postmodern pop music. © Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Entertainment! is one of those records where germs of influence can be traced through many genres and countless bands, both favorably and unfavorably. From groups whose awareness of genealogy spreads wide enough to openly acknowledge Gang of Four's influence (Fugazi, Rage Against the Machine), to those not in touch with their ancestry enough to realize it (rap-metal, some indie rock) -- all have appropriated elements of their forefathers' trailblazing contribution. Its vaguely funky rhythmic twitch, its pungent, pointillistic guitar stoccados, and its spoken/shouted vocals have all been picked up by many. Lyrically, the album was apart from many of the day, and it still is. The band rants at revisionist history in "Not Great Men" ("No weak men in the books at home"), self-serving media and politicians in "I Found That Essence Rare" ("The last thing they'll ever do?/Act in your interest"), and sexual politics in "Damaged Goods" ("You said you're cheap but you're too much"). Though the brilliance of the record thrives on the faster material -- especially the febrile first side -- a true highlight amongst highlights is the closing "Anthrax," full of barely controlled feedback squalls and moans. It's nearly psychedelic, something post-punk and new wave were never known for. With a slight death rattle and plodding bass rumble, Jon King equates love with disease and admits to feeling "like a beetle on its back." In the background, Andy Gill speaks in monotone of why Gang of Four doesn't do love songs. Subversive records of any ilk don't get any stronger, influential, or exciting than this. © Andy Kellman /TiVo

Love's Forever Changes made only a minor dent on the charts when it was first released in 1967, but years later it became recognized as one of the finest and most haunting albums to come out of the Summer of Love, which doubtless has as much to do with the disc's themes and tone as the music, beautiful as it is. Sharp electric guitars dominated most of Love's first two albums, and they make occasional appearances here on tunes like "A House Is Not a Motel" and "Live and Let Live," but most of Forever Changes is built around interwoven acoustic guitar textures and subtle orchestrations, with strings and horns both reinforcing and punctuating the melodies. The punky edge of Love's early work gave way to a more gentle, contemplative, and organic sound on Forever Changes, but while Arthur Lee and Bryan MacLean wrote some of their most enduring songs for the album, the lovely melodies and inspired arrangements can't disguise an air of malaise that permeates the sessions. A certain amount of this reflects the angst of a group undergoing some severe internal strife, but Forever Changes is also an album that heralds the last days of a golden age and anticipates the growing ugliness that would dominate the counterculture in 1968 and 1969; images of violence and war haunt "A House Is Not a Motel," the street scenes of "Maybe the People Would Be the Times or Between Clark and Hillsdale" reflects a jaded mindset that flower power could not ease, the twin specters of race and international strife rise to the surface of "The Red Telephone," romance becomes cynicism in "Bummer in the Summer," the promise of the psychedelic experience decays into hard drug abuse in "Live and Let Live," and even gentle numbers like "Andmoreagain" and "Old Man" sound elegiac, as if the ghosts of Chicago and Altamont were visible over the horizon as Love looked back to brief moments of warmth. Forever Changes is inarguably Love's masterpiece and an album of enduring beauty, but it's also one of the few major works of its era that saw the dark clouds looming on the cultural horizon, and the result was music that was as prescient as it was compelling. © Mark Deming /TiVo

Love's Forever Changes made only a minor dent on the charts when it was first released in 1967, but years later it became recognized as one of the finest and most haunting albums to come out of the Summer of Love, which doubtless has as much to do with the disc's themes and tone as the music, beautiful as it is. Sharp electric guitars dominated most of Love's first two albums, and they make occasional appearances here on tunes like "A House Is Not a Motel" and "Live and Let Live," but most of Forever Changes is built around interwoven acoustic guitar textures and subtle orchestrations, with strings and horns both reinforcing and punctuating the melodies. The punky edge of Love's early work gave way to a more gentle, contemplative, and organic sound on Forever Changes, but while Arthur Lee and Bryan MacLean wrote some of their most enduring songs for the album, the lovely melodies and inspired arrangements can't disguise an air of malaise that permeates the sessions. A certain amount of this reflects the angst of a group undergoing some severe internal strife, but Forever Changes is also an album that heralds the last days of a golden age and anticipates the growing ugliness that would dominate the counterculture in 1968 and 1969; images of violence and war haunt "A House Is Not a Motel," the street scenes of "Maybe the People Would Be the Times or Between Clark and Hillsdale" reflects a jaded mindset that flower power could not ease, the twin specters of race and international strife rise to the surface of "The Red Telephone," romance becomes cynicism in "Bummer in the Summer," the promise of the psychedelic experience decays into hard drug abuse in "Live and Let Live," and even gentle numbers like "Andmoreagain" and "Old Man" sound elegiac, as if the ghosts of Chicago and Altamont were visible over the horizon as Love looked back to brief moments of warmth. Forever Changes is inarguably Love's masterpiece and an album of enduring beauty, but it's also one of the few major works of its era that saw the dark clouds looming on the cultural horizon, and the result was music that was as prescient as it was compelling. © Mark Deming /TiVo