Alan Ranta

Alan Ranta is a Canadian music journalist. Alan is known for his tersely-written capsule reviews and a focus on bringing North American attention to electronic sounds.

He has been ACTIVE in the music scene since the early naughties. He started contributing to Tiny Mix Tapes early on in 2004 under the name "Filmore Mescalito Holmes", and became a staff writer shortly after that. In 2007, he started writing for PopMatters, though he still sends the odd article to TMT. As of May 2009, he stopped writing under "Filmore Mescalito Holmes" to use his real name. In June of 2010, Alan was hired to write for Exclaim!, primarily contributing electronic, experimental, and concert reviews to Canada's only national music magazine.

Alan voted in the Village Voice Pazz & Jop poll in 2009 and 2010. He was a member of the Polaris Music Prize jury in 2010.

Style & Tastes

He lists the work of his heroes George Carlin, Bill Hicks, and Lester Bangs as personal inspirations. As such, he is known to hold music to a high artistic and ethical standard.

As of late, he has expressed a love for a wide range of music: classical, breaks, glitch, downtempo, illbient, instrumental hip-hop, and psychedelia. Some of his favorite artists include Olivier Messiaen, Pierre Boulez, Tipper, Venetian Snares, Portishead, DJ Wally, Odd Nosdam, West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band, and Erik Satie.

See Also

Filmore Mescalito Holmes

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