The Rice Thresher, Vol. 96, No. 23, Ed. 1 Friday, March 20, 2009 Page: 16 of 28
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16 A&E
the Rice Thresher
Friday, March 20,2009
KTRU Pick of the Week:
Dr. Ragtime & His Pais +
Self-Titled Bonus Disc
By Miguel Quirch
Thresher Staff
Every week at KTRU, eager DJs scrib-
ble out short reviews of music's cutting-
edge albums. KTRU's Music Department
uses these reviews to judge the quality
of the albums it receives and to provide
information for the DJs who play them.
Each week, a DJ polishes one of these re-
views so that KTRU's riches can shine for
the larger Rice community.
Dr. Ragtime & His
Pals + Self-Titled
Bonus Disc
Artist: Jack Rose
Label: Tequila Sunrise
Release: Apr. 16, 2008
Jack Rose's dual album is a
compilation of some excellent
bluegrass-folksy-bluesy music that
provides interesting insight into the
experimentations of an artist that
is sure to catch your ear. He takes
a combination of old and new and
blends the two to form something
that borders on growing into a
wholly new style that is both enjoy-
able and soothing to listen to.
The first part of the album presents
KTRU TOP 35: WEEK OF 3.15.2009
beeeeeeeer biiiiiiiiiiiiike!!!
artist
mo-dettes, the
blank dogs
antony and the
johnsons
good for cows
har-you percussion
group
various
bogner, ursula
wawes
zomby
atom tim
menahan street band
mv + ee
glass candy/profes-
sor genius/indeep/
mirage/chromatics/
fa rah
dj elephant power
human bell
dj baba james
doktorski, henry
skream. distance,
dq1, loefah, digital
mystikz, armour,
hijak, dj pinch & p
duffy, moving ninja,
loefah & scream,
omen, cyrus
bulbs
connors, loren
horde of two
mij
dragon fli empire
fight bite
lambkin, graham &
lescatleet, jason
23 skidoo
mi ami
gunn, steve
haba haba group/
marios group/pimp
rubiah/samsimar
franco phonic
thomas, james "son"
terminal sound
system
insengrind/twin-
sistermoon/natural
snow
black joe lewis ft the
honeybears
dj /rupture & andy
moor
album
the story so far
the fields
another world
good for cows
sounds of the ghetto youth
1970s algerian proto-rai
underground
recordings 1969-1988
wawes
where were u in '92
liedgut
make the road by walking
drone trailer
after dark
scratch the hulu
human bell
the house of good juju
vaudeville accordion clas-
sics: the comptete works of
guido deiro
tectonic plates
light ships
the curse of midnight fairy
guitar and bass actions
yodeling astrologer
redefine
emerald eyes
the breadwinner
seven songs
watersports
sundowner
folk and pop sounds of
Sumatra vol. 1
africa's greatest a retrospec-
tive vol. 1:1953-1980, franco
& le tpok jazz
beefsteak blues
constructing towers
the snowbringer cult
advance
patches
label
cherry red records
woodsist
secretly Canadian
evander music
esp-disk
sublime frequencies
faitiche
woodsist
werk
raster-notion
dunham
dicristina stair
italians do it better
sonig
thrill jockey
funketabla
bridge records
tectonic
freedom to spend
family vineyard
smarten up! & get to
the point
esp-disk
makebelieve
self-released
erstwhile
Itmcd
quarterstick
digitalis
sublime frequencies
sterns music
evidence
extreme
students of decay
umg records
unsuitable
Listening to "The Songs of Nature"
Rose in the band, Dr. Ragtime & His
Pals, and contains some very compel-
ling journeys into different music forms.
The band consists of veterans such as
Micah Smaldone from the Pinkerton
Thugs and Glenn Jones from Cul de Sac
on guitar, Mike Gangloff from Pelt on
banjo, Nathan Bowles from Spiral Joy
Band on washboard and Harmonica
Dan playing, you guessed it, the har-
monica. With this strong lineup of mu-
sicians, Dr. Ragtime & His Pals proves to
be a formidable force to be listened to.
What is especially enjoyable from
this part of the album is how Rose and
the band blend in old-style country
blues with some Indian classical style.
This mixing of the two spectra is quite
apparent in the third track, "Song for
the Owl," where sliding microtones give
a sound reminiscent of an Indian classi-
cal slide guitar.
Another piece to be adored is the
guitar duet that rolls from landscape to
landscape and showcases the prowess
and expertise of the artists contained
in the album. My favorite track of the
album is "Walkin' Blues," where Har-
monica Dan comes to the forefront and
belts out a tune on his metallic box. The
emotion behind Dan's use of the har-
monica effectively comes through and
enhances the pleasant trance.
The second part of the album, fea-
turing solo works from Rose, sounds
just as interesting and is guaranteed to
catch your ear if you appreciate classic
blues. In comparison to the other part
of the album, Rose's solo ceries is prob-
ably less experimental, in the sense that
O see KTRU, page 17
By |oe Dwyer
Thresher Editorial Staff
With all the events, meetings
and receptions held in Farnsworth
Pavilion, it is sometimes hard to re-
member that it also serves as an art
gallery from time to time. But from
now until next Wednesday, artist
Charles Liu is showcasing some
of his work in an exhibition titled
"The Songs of Nature," a stunning
collection of landscape and nature-
themed ink drawings on rice paper.
The Songs of Nature
★ ★ ★ ★ yi
The artwork covers all the walls
around Farnsworth, with one par-
ticular panel painting, aptly titled
"Big Falls," taking up an entire
wall by itself. Each wall takes on
a theme of its own that changes as
you move around the room.
Starting to the right of the en-
trance and moving counterclock-
wise, the first wall consists main-
ly of paintings of snow-covered
mountain peaks. Most are done
with black ink on white paper, but
Liu still manages to achieve an in-
credible amount of detail and defi-
nition in the image. In a couple of
paintings he adds several strokes of
color to give warmth to the other-
wise austere setting.
Moving to the next wall, there
are four larger paintings: Two of
them, "Autumn Falls" and "Wa-
terfall" depict falling water, while
"High Clouds" and "Red Land"
show clouds rolling through the
Although blocked by tables and chairs, Charles Liu's work still shines.
sky above a group of bare trees and
a barren desert setting. The most
striking painting of the show would
have to be "Waterfall," which
shows a mighty waterfall rumbling
over the edge of a towering cliff.
All of Liu's paintings appear to
be a jumble of strokes and splotch-
es up close, but when viewed from
the right distance they become al-
most photorealistic.
The third wall is covered by
"Big Falls," a four-panel painting
depicting a large waterfall running
through the middle of a tranquil
wooded forest. "Big Falls" is per-
haps the best example of Liu's "Ori-
ental philosophy," the theme that
he says runs through all his work
and gives it a distinct Asian flavor.
"I think in more Oriental phi-
losophy, about what we think about
in nature, and so for most of my ink
paintings — even when I use a photo
of Western art or a Western landscape
— I still use some kind of Oriental
philosophy in my work," he said.
The final wall holds three large
paintings, one of which, "Terraced
Field," is perhaps the most abstract
in the entire exhibit. At first it ap-
pears to be a school of fish swim-
ming in a stream, but after read-
ing the title and then taking a step
back, the individual paddies in the
field become visible. The other two
paintings, "Snow Mountain 94 I"
and "Dance of Water II," are both
hyperreal and would not look out of
place in National Geographic.
Since Farnsworth is a multipur-
pose space, much of the artwork is
unfortunately obscured or blocked
throughout the day. When I came to
see the exhibit, a projector screen
was covering the second wall and ta-
bles and chairs scattered throughout
the space made taking in the art a bit
of a hassle. That shouldn't discourage
you from making the trip to see it, as
this breathtaking and diverse collec-
tion of art is well worth the short walk
over to the student center.
□ see NATURE, page 17
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Michel, Casey. The Rice Thresher, Vol. 96, No. 23, Ed. 1 Friday, March 20, 2009, newspaper, March 20, 2009; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth443137/m1/16/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.