Tag: John Trainum

Categories
Arts Culture

Sound Choices: New projects break through the noise

A. D. Carson

i used to love to dream

(University of
Michigan Press)

A.D. Carson has made a career out of breaking boundaries. As a Ph.D. student at Clemson University, his dissertation was an album called Owning My Masters: The Rhetorics Of Rhymes & Revolutions. Across the project’s 34 tracks, he examined identity politics, and even challenged the university to look inward on “See the Stripes,” which points to John C. Calhoun, a slave-owning 19th-century statesman whose house is memorialized on campus. After garnering thousands of viewers and listeners on platforms like YouTube and SoundCloud, Carson was offered the position of assistant professor of hip-hop and the global South in the McIntire Department of Music at the University of Virginia.

He continued his work with the “mixtap/e/ssays” series sleepwalking, turning the spotlight on his new home of Charlottesville by tackling themes like the proliferation of white supremacy in the wake of the Unite the Right rally that ravaged the community in 2017. i used to love to dream is the third installment of the series, and it marks another milestone for Carson: It’s the first peer-reviewed rap album ever published by an academic press. Tracing his roots back to his hometown of Decatur, Illinois, Carson harnesses feelings of leaving home and what constitutes the idea of success or “making it.” Elsewhere on the collection, he tackles systemic racism, police brutality, and the impact of discrimination by the criminal justice system. i used to love to dream is a multifaceted, cross-genre display of how art and activism go hand in hand—and is a must listen (released on August 6).

Kate Bollinger

A word becomes a sound

(Self-released)

After generating a lot of buzz with her 2019 EP I Don’t Wanna Lose, Charlottesville native Kate Bollinger returns with another batch of languid dream-pop compositions. A word becomes a sound finds the songwriter, who recently graduated from the University of Virginia with a degree in cinematography, expanding her sonic palette. Across the EP’s five tracks, she incorporates electronic elements and a new level of production, all while maintaining the hazy lo-fi quality that has become her signature. Bollinger once again teamed up with classmate and frequent collaborator John Trainum to achieve this balance. The result is a lush, laid-back offering of R&B, jazz, and indie shoegaze. Bollinger and Trainum finished writing and production for newer tracks like “Queen to Nobody” during the pandemic. But the opener, “A Couple Things,” has been a staple of Bollinger’s live sets for years. “If I mess up a couple things or if I mess up a lot of things,” she muses on the song. “If I fuck up a couple things, well, what if I fuck up everything?” It’s Bollinger’s ability to channel sentiments that are simultaneously personal and universal that makes A word becomes a sound her strongest work to date (released on August 21).

Various Artists

A Little Bit at a
Time: Spacebomb
Family Rarities

(Spacebomb Records)

Richmond’s Spacebomb Records is more than just a record label; it’s a musical nexus. Operating in a newly renovated studio, Spacebomb also serves as a publishing, management, and production company. Spacebomb sought to showcase its many facets with a new compilation, A Little Bit at a Time: Spacebomb Family Rarities. Digging into the archives, the album highlights Richmond-based artists like Andy Jenkins, Sleepwalkers, and Spacebomb founder Matthew E. White, alongside artists like Pure Bathing Culture and Laura Veirs, who have worked with Spacebomb in various capacities. Featuring B-sides, previously unreleased tracks, and demos, A Little Bit at a Time is the perfect deep dive from one of the biggest drivers of Central Virginia’s creative community (released on July 3).

Categories
Arts

Music in me: Kate Bollinger’s lifelong connection to healing through song

Kate Bollinger celebrates the vinyl release of her 2019 EP, I Don’t Wanna Lose, at the Southern on November 14. “Music is always around for a lot of people and it’s, I think, subtly powerful, but [not everyone] knows that it can really change people’s lives and change their brain patterns," she says. Publicity photo

The health benefits of music have been widely researched. Evidence has shown that music can alleviate stress, reduce pain, and lead to better cognitive functioning in patients suffering from memory loss. A popular study released last year asserted that routinely going to concerts can contribute to an increased lifespan. Charlottesville native Kate Bollinger witnessed music’s neurological impact firsthand while growing up: Her mom is a music therapist.

“I think it was important to see music in that context—as something that really, powerfully can help people get better,” Bollinger explains. “[My mom] works with a lot of older people that have dementia, and then she also works with younger kids who have autism and developmental disabilities. Music is always around for a lot of people and it’s, I think, subtly powerful, but [not everyone] knows that it can really change people’s lives and change their brain patterns.”

Bollinger’s musical lineage can be traced back to those early music therapy sessions.

“My mom was always releasing children’s music albums, so I grew up singing in children’s choruses for her albums,” says Bollinger. “From a young age, I had the chance to see how it works to record in a studio and to sing with other people.”

Meanwhile, both of Bollinger’s older brothers played music, hosting band practices in their basement. This exposure informed her own approach: She joined the girl’s chorus in middle school, and by high school was recording and releasing her own songs on SoundCloud.

Now a fourth-year cinematography major at the University of Virginia, Bollinger’s teamed up with classmate John Trainum, and they’ve put out a string of singles over the past couple of years. Trainum plays keys and synth on Bollinger’s tracks, and is credited with mixing and production.

“[Trainum and I] put out two songs together that we just recorded in his room—I guess it was two years ago now—and then he would make beats and I would write over them,” she says. The duo have been recording at White Star Sound in Louisa.

Over the summer, Bollinger released a five-song EP, I Don’t Wanna Lose, which marked a period of growth for her: It’s the first time she’s worked with a full band during the recording process. Along with Trainum, the disc features drummer Jacob Grissom, who Bollinger met in high school. Enrolled in the jazz program at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Grissom brought along fellow VCU jazz students Chris Lewis (guitar) and Jimmy Trussell (bass). Possessing all the familiarity of a lo-fi bedroom recording, I Don’t Wanna Lose is a languid collection that’s easy to get lost in.

While the EP’s themes are universal—a sense of insecurity about the future and the pains of heartbreak—Bollinger says songwriting, for her, began as personal catharsis.

“I feel like I’ve written a lot of songs in tears about something, so it definitely started from a self-centered place, just trying to hash out what I felt and trying to make something productive out of usually bad feelings,” she says.

But as her audience continues to grow, it’s clear that Bollinger’s work harkens back to the touchstone of music therapy—music as a communal tool for healing.

“It’s been really cool to hear that [my songs have] helped with people’s anxiety, so I’m definitely thinking now in a bit of a broader way, that hopefully it can help other people with their feelings.”

Kate Bollinger celebrates the vinyl release of her 2019 EP, I Don’t Wanna Lose, at the Southern on November 14.