Sublime Noises

So This Is Christmas...

2008-12-24T00:09:00.003-05:00

Well, Christmas Eve. What to do to celebrate the Christmas season?

How about listening to the Beatles' Christmas albums? All of them. From '63-69 and beyond. You can find them here: http://www.beatlesource.com/bs/mains/audio/xmas/xmas.html

It's fascinating to hear the Beatles evolve from happy go lucky band to experimental group. The first few years are near-drunken efforts, full of thank-yous and song fragments. 1968 is a full blown tape collage ala Revolution 9. It's a sort of alternate document of the Beatles' rapid rise and dissolution.

Check it out.

5 Songs 2008 Made Me Hate Myself For Liking

2008-12-18T12:40:00.000-05:00

I listen to music. Plenty of music. So much music that words often fail me when I try to describe exactly what kind of music I like. I like everything...but not that, that, and certainly not that.

My taste has led some to call me names. "Elitest," they say. "Playlist Nazi!" they call. This usually happens when I am chucking their Dave Matthews Band CD out the window, or when I'm trying to prove a point (don't call my music collection "white").

Still, I am just like everybody else--I have weaknesses. 2007's dirty secret was my unabashed love of 'Lil Mama's "Lip Gloss." The first CD I ever bought with my own $10 was WWF the Music: Volume 2. I have a history of buying CDs for the cover, bad albums from good bands, quirky throwaway singles for the b-sides.

In short, I fall for music, regardless of my tastes. Here are five songs from this year, presented in no particular order, that I am not ashamed to love.

Britney Spears - Womanizer

Britney Spears |MTV Music

Last year I might have said some bad things about Britney Spears' first attempt at a comeback, Blackout. A year later, I find myself taking back nearly everything I said, unless it was funny, because Blackout served as a pretty damn strong prototype for this year's Circus, which is Spears' true comeback I guess, because she's sober.

Listen to this song. Tell me that if you heard it at a party or a club or some trendy establishment that you wouldn't be in the least bit tempted to dance. You can't. You know why? Because underneath the annoyingly catchy chorus that most people sing with no sense of tonality lies a huge, screaming monster of a club jam that owes more than a little to Soft Cell's "Tainted Love." Maybe I'm just assuming that everything with lasers owes something to Soft Cell, but fuck, there's something in this song that moves.

Rihanna - Disturbia

Rihanna |MTV Music

At this point, I think, I'm supposed to be tired of autotune, but fuck it. This song combines a good beat, Rihanna, and what the MPAA would call "mild elements of horror," and the music video makes me laugh. What weird, campy thing won't Rihanna co-opt for a video?

Yes, Tokyo drifting is pretty fucking campy.

Weezer - Pork and Beans

Weezer |MTV Music

I've been disinterested in Weezer for a long, long time, but between Rivers Cuomo's mustache, the awesomely awful cover to their new album, and this song, I was almost convinced that they were ready to return in a big, big way.

Weezer is one of those bands that falters under the weight of their brilliant debut. Sure, they have their fans, their apologists, and their decent sophomore effort, but they kind of suck, and people who aren't fans or apologists have given them shit about it since 2003.

"Pork and Beans" is, in many ways, a response to those critics, including me. Everything about the song, from its slacker attitude to its meme splicing music video, hearkens back to the Blue Album. It's lazier sounding than anything they've done, but that's the point. It's like that Bon Jovi song "Have a Nice Day," but with personality.

Kanye West - Heartless

Kanye West |MTV Music

I like this song for the lead-up to its release more than for the music itself. Having graduated, Kanye decided to detour to 808's and Heartbreak before something more worthwhile--Grad School, Med School, or TV/VCR Repair. 808's is a departure for Kanye, because it's more about singing than rapping, and Kanye doesn't sing all that well. Granted, autotune makes it so that you don't have to sing very well, but soon Akon and T-Pain will meet a reckoning for unleashing this plight upon the earth.

I like the song because, for weeks, Kanye hyped it up on his blog, releasing version after version to his adoring public. Two years ago, an artist wouldn't be caught dead doing something like that, but all of the newfangled fuck the record label price scheming and album releasing has made it such that a guy as huge as Kanye could upload this to his blog until he got the finished product.

Say what you will, but that's progress.

Britney Spears - Circus

Britney Spears |MTV Music

See everything I wrote about "Womanizer." That Ms. Spears has managed to remain relevant while most of her teen pop peers have fallen is probably more a testament to America's tabloid mentality than to any inherent skill, but she is a hitmaker. If she manages to keep relatively clean while showing a knack for adapting and changing to America's pop music needs, she may just be my generation's Madonna.

You just have to wonder if Britney will be as ripped as Madonna 20 years from now.

2008 Was a Year of Listening to Music, Which Is Rated Herein

2008-12-17T01:07:00.014-05:00

Because of a man named Jesus and some monk friends of his, in a few weeks an arbitrary denomination of time (itself a man-made concept) will pass. It's time to bid adieu to 2008 and sashay our way into 2009. Jews, don't fret: it's still 5769!

This means that we must look over the new music that came out over the year and rank it. 10 is the number, probably because us Normals have 10 fingers.

10: Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend

Vampire Weekend - Oxford Comma
I purposely ranked Vampire Weekend tenth, just to spite them. I really want to hate them: their ubiquity, their Urban-Outfitters-ass-looking album cover, the fact that both David Byrne and Paul Simon appropriated Afropop much better and earlier than them. Perhaps most of all, they are unabashedly upper-class New Englanders, who even sing about the fact! I have a class consciousness, and I shouldn't relate to these guys. Lyrically, I don't. But I love the sound of the music. It takes a lot for me to listen to rock music these days; chiefly it must be danceable and innovative. Vampire Weekend are danceable, and though they aren't completely new, they're different from their peers. Good enough.

9: Neon Neon, Stainless Style

Neon Neon - Raquel
Neon Neon is Boom Bip, a producer of mostly hip-hop, and Gruff Rhys, the lead singer of Super Furry Animals. Super Furry Animals are a pretty dope rock band in their own right, from Wales. This is a concept album about John Delorean, and as such is going to be awesome even before you hear the music. The music is great, though. It's New Wave as it actually sounded in the '80s, not filtered through irony or attempting retro-ness. It's got guests from the worlds of rap and rock, and if you want a soundtrack for a coke-fueled party that also has some ennui, here it is.

8: Sébastien Tellier, Sexuality

Sébastien Tellier - Roche
Imagine that Daft Punk did the score for a porno. That is essentially what this album is; it's produced by Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo. Most of the lyrics are in French, which I am admittedly not fluent in. It sounds so raw, filthy, and yet seductive. Sébastien is a pervy dude. Some of these songs bring to mind Serge Gainsbourg, especially when he was singing about Brigitte Bardot. This is the perfect background for rutting by candlelight.

7: Koushik, Out My Window

Koushik - Be With
Koushik Ghosh is an Indian-Canadian chap that makes beats for Stones Throw Records. If this album was just instrumental hip-hop, in the vein of J Dilla, Madlib, et al it would be great. However, it straddles the lines between hip-hop, ambient sounds, trip-hop, and other stuff. His vocals are so ethereal on here, I can't make out much of what he says. He just takes me to new atmospheric levels of happiness! This is the perfect record for driving in the summer, or swinging a little kid around by the arms in a meadow.

6: Q-Tip, The Renaissance

Q-Tip - Move
It shouldn't need to be said that Q-Tip was at his best with Phife Dawg and Ali Shaheed Muhammad. A Tribe Called Quest isn't reuniting (yet?), so we get this. It's arguably the best hip-hop album of the year. Tip's rhymes are smart, funny, fluid and everything else you could want. J Dilla, the greatest beatmaker that ever lived, graces the album with the song "Move". This is how you make a "real" hip-hop album; not by pandering to backpackers, not with excessive paeans to the golden age. Hip-hop is alive, and Q-Tip is dope.

5: Wale, The Mixtape About Nothing

Wale - The Opening Title Sequence
Wale is a rapper from the D.C. area that incorporates hilarious and deft wordplay with cool beats that borrow a bit from D.C.'s native go-go style. Go-go is a funk/hip-hop hybrid that is extremely local. Anyway, his first proper album doesn't come out until next year, but this mixtape is great in that it is inspired by Seinfeld. "The Kramer" takes Michael Richards' racist rant and spins it into a balanced look at modern prejudice. "The Cliché Lil Wayne Feature" really does feature Lil Wayne and is hilarious. All in all, worth the free download at his myspace!

4: Santogold, Santogold

Santogold - Anne
Earlier in this space, I popped Santogold in as my favourite album/artist of 2008. She's great, but not that great. Critics call her a biter of M.I.A.'s style; I think it's just because they're both beautiful brown ladies that make music tangentially related to hip-hop. Santogold's mix of new wave, ska, hip-hop, and Pixies-esque rock (did I miss anything?) seems like it would be overreaching. It's a testament to her awesomosity that it rocks and begs multiple listens.

3: Silver Jews, Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea

Silver Jews - What Is Not but Could Be If
If Bob Dylan wasn't still making music and as relevant as ever, then Silver Jews' David Berman would be this generation's Bob Dylan. His lyrics could be the stuff of Great English Literature. The music is pure Americana, evoking the countryside to the hipster enclaves. Berman's latest album is one in which he sounds ecstatic to be past his depression and discovering his Judaism in a way that makes sense to him. This is earthy, inspiring, gutbusting rock that means something.

2: Hercules and Love Affair, Hercules and Love Affair

Hercules and Love Affair - Blind
I was watching one of those VH1 nostalgia shows, and there was footage from the '70s of rock fans basically rioting inside a football stadium. They were burning disco records and going crazy with hatred for the despised genre. Like Donna Summer sang, I'm coming out, in favour of disco. Beyond that, I'll be so bold to say that anti-disco feelings were and are homophobic, sexist and racist. People said rock was the only real music, because disco was the music of gay men, women, and black people. As such, it couldn't be as badass as the white man's rock and roll. Rock stars were doing cocaine too, disco musicians just wanted people to dance while they snorted! Hercules and Love Affair is a modern yet faithful blend of house music and disco, featuring occasional vocals by Antony & the Johnsons' Antony Hegarty. Soaring and debauched, and funky as all hell. This is music for covering yourself in glitter and dancing until your ass falls off.

1: Girl Talk, Feed the Animals

Girl Talk - Hands in the Air
Do I really need to sell people on Girl Talk? Gregg Gillis is a national treasure by this point, at least in the crowds I run with. Like most people, I came to him via 2006's Night Ripper. I wouldn't be disappointed if that album played at every party I ever went to, and it seemed for a while that it did. There can be no fruitful debate over whether Night Ripper or Feed the Animals is the better album; it's Godfather vs. Godfather II. Feed the Animals is an instant party, blending everything awesome and making pop trash transcendent.

The Raconteurs - Consolers of the Lonely (2008)

2008-12-02T14:48:00.004-05:00

If Jack White's intention in forming the Raconteurs with Brendan Benson, Jack Lawrence, and Patrick Keeler was to sound as different from the White Stripes as possible, sophomore effort Consolers of the Lonely finds the group failing, but doing so with flair.

The myth of the White Stripes, according to the media that adores them, is that the duo is a tightly controlled, orchestrated garage rock outfit featuring drums, guitar, and piano. They broke that convention with Get Behind Me Satan, an album focusing on marimbas and fractured pop music, and Icky Thump, which worked within the Stripes ethos but worked in organs, horns, bagpipes, and, on the Conquest EP, a third musician.

With all that out of the way, Consolers of the Lonely sounds a lot more like a White Stripes album than debut effort Broken Boy Soldiers did, and benefits as a result. Here and there are the horns, organs, and blistering guitar work of Icky Thump, but with less Delta blues and more (way more) 70's rock.

The album came together at the last minute and was released a week after it was announced. The quick turnaround is and isn't evident at turns. This is the most lavish of Jack White's production efforts, yet the album lacks a sense of cohesiveness, as though White or Benson came up with an idea in studio and pursued it to the bitter end.

There's a touch of Dylan ("Carolina Drama"), Ennio Moricone ("The Switch and the Spur"), garage rock ("Hold On"), and countless hand waves to the classics that Black and Benson grew up on. A nice touch: Typical Benson tune "Many Shades of Black" has White on vocals, giving the song just enough edge to make it stand apart.

Often, it's hard to tell where White's voice ends and Benson's begins. White's presence dominates the album though, mostly because the album focuses more on guitar solos than Broken Boy Soldiers did. Again, a good thing. This is a supergroup with one superstar, but in 2006, it sounded like White was hiding behind his less heralded bandmates, and while songs about werewolves and secretaries are cool, songs about killing a man with a milk bottle are way, way cooler.

I said earlier that this sounds more like a White Stripes album than the Raconteurs' first album did, and I'm not lying. The White Stripe's tour supporting Icky Thump was cut short due to Meg White having a mental breakdown of some sort, and this, well, is the fall back. As a result, it sounds a lot like Icky Thump, without the meandering experimentation of "St. Andrew (The Battle Is in the Air)." The album is also more bloated than a typical White-led album, clocking in at 55:30. Yes, too much of a good thing is a bad thing.

Otherwise, I wouldn't be upset at all if we went White Stripes/Raconteurs from now until the end of time. The promise of Broken Boy Soldiers (Hey, Jack White might sound good in a proper band!) has officially been fulfilled. It's no longer fair to call this a side project - the Raconteurs' ambitions outstrip the label.

Rating: ****

Salute Your Solution

Guns n' Roses - Chinese Democracy (2008)

2008-12-01T23:43:00.004-05:00

For 13 years, Chinese Democracy was an album as unattainable as the concept the name intones. Like Brian Wilson's Smile, rumors, speculation, and the occasional song wafted through the air like vapor, taunting and tantalizing fans who hoped beyond hope that The Spaghetti Incident? wouldn't be the band's final statement.

After a rush of propaganda, including songs released to Guitar Hero and Dr. Pepper's promise to give everybody in America a free drink on them if Axl delivered the goods, Axl, well, delivered the goods. The verdict?

Worst album I've heard this year.

You've probably noticed that the first two things I mentioned in this review are the wait (14 years) and the promotional effort (massive) behind the album. Am I jaded? Am I bitter? Not particularly. Life is, surprisingly, the same with a new Guns n' Roses album as it was without. While Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, The A.V. Club, and All Music Guide can blow Axl's horn all they want, lauding the album with four star review after four star review, I did the brave thing: I listened to the whole goddamn album.

It starts well enough. As a matter of fact, "Chinese Democracy" and "Shackler's Revenge" are fine songs - the sort of thing I'd want to hear in a mosh pit. Considering the state of mainstream rock music these days, that is a high compliment.

Things take a turn for the ballad-y with "Better," but it's fine, as far as ballads go. With "Street of Dreams" though, Axl crosses into straight up "November Rain" territory, and to make matters worse, it sounds like he's using Auto-Tune. It's an odd effect for a rock album, let alone a Guns 'n Roses effort. "If the World" uses both Spanish guitar and strings to such an effect that it sounds as though Rose replaced Seal in the studio.

Without going into every painful detail, the album veers from rocker to ballad with varying success. Some songs start with some absolutely weird vocal arrangements ("Scraped"), while others sound like the bloated AOR that was supposedly vanquished with Appetite for Destruction ("Catcher in the Rye"). None are particularly good, minus the minute or so interlude in "Madagascar" where you can hear the famous opening words from "Civil War."

Yes, it's really been 13 years since Axl entered the first of 14 studios necessary to complete the album. Yes, the album saw 66 people replace Slash & Co. If anything, Chinese Democracy proves that giving unlimited money and turning a blind eye to a man who wouldn't save a concert if Metallica were on fire is akin to giving AIG some of that sweet, sweet bailout candy: There's enough money to do the job, but the guys at the top just weren't made for these times.

For Axl, the time was 1991. The place was Sam Goody. The people were lined up around the block for Use Your Illusion. I've always argued that, pared down to a more manageable 14 tracks, Use Your Illusion would have been one of the best albums of the 1990's. Here, 17 years after "November Rain" and "Civil War," Axl effectively proves me wrong. With nothing to lose but other people's money, Chinese Democracy is a meandering album made for an audience that no longer exists.

Chinese Democracy is no longer a myth; it's a nightmare.

Rating: *

Chinese Democracy

Styx

2008-12-01T20:06:00.002-05:00

Toby Keith, you're a Pornographer

2008-11-23T21:35:00.012-05:00

God Love Her as she fellats.

From Old...to Gold

2008-11-11T22:13:00.005-05:00

They're a bit late, but the Raconteurs are now promoting their second album, Consolers Of The Lonely, via a rather clever YouTube channel/website combination.

On display is Jack White's depreciating sense of humor, as well as a few notes from the albums title track. The above spot premiered on boingboing, which makes no sense, but then again, neither does the decision to promote an eight month old album. Maybe that's the point...from old to gold. It'll be interesting to see what kind of old/gold things pop up on the YouTube channel. In the meantime, I now have an excuse to post a bunch of Raconteurs cover songs. If their third album was all covers, I don't think I'd object. They should just call it From Old to Gold and get it out there in time for my birthday. Lord knows not enough kids know Teenage Kicks.

Crazy (Gnarls Barkley)

Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down) (Nancy Sinatra)

It Ain't Easy (David Bowie)

Teenage Kicks (The Undertones)

You know they call it the White House, but that's just a temporary condition C.C.

2008-11-05T16:29:00.001-05:00

I Remember Halloween!

2008-10-29T16:11:00.004-04:00

Check out BSD for a list of some of the greatest Non-Halloween, Halloween songs. There you'll find classics from Mr. Corwley to Witchy Woman and more contemporary frights like Weird Scene by Mr. Brown and or Tom Waits Ice Cream Man.

A Life in Song II

2008-10-21T01:23:00.003-04:00

A follow-up to Karl's excellent list, here's my choices for favorite albums from 1988 to now. I'm young, I'm dumb, and I'm probably a hipster. Explanations where I deemed them necessary. Feel free to ask why I like Cat Power and Songs: Ohia so damn much.

1988: Violent Femmes - 3

Criminally underrated disc that bounces back from the uber-Christian Hallowed Ground (which wasn't bad) and their best left forgotten actual third album. "See my Ships" and "Mother of a Girl" are almost better than anything on their classic debut.

1989: Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique

An excelent year for rap, seeing Public Enemy and the D.O.C. drop their classics in a year full of great stuff. Paul's Boutique trumps them all though. It's so good that even Chuck D said that the Beasties had the best beats in rap.

1990: A Tribe Called Quest - People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm

1991: Metallica - Metallica

For some reason, I can't shake this album. I don't think it's particularly good anymore, and I'm in the minority as far as liking this album more than their faster, thrashier early output, but I hear "Enter Sandman" and instantly wish I were good enough to be a Major League closer. That counts for something, I guess.

1992: Dr. Dre - The Chronic

1993: Wu-Tang Clan - Enter the 36 Chambers

1994: Nirvana - MTV Unplugged in New York

Don't laugh. This is Nirvana's only great album and you know it. While Nevermind is the one that blew up and In Utero let Cobain do what he wanted, this live set exposes the songcraft under all those crunchy guitars and mumbled words. Introduced me to David Bowie.

1995: Ol' Dirty Bastard - Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version

Probably my 2ed favorite Wu-Tang effort, after the original. ODB led a wild, tumultuous life, but his genius cannot be disputed.

1996: The Olivia Tremor Control - Music From the Unrealized Film Script, Dusk at Cubist Castle

Not the first great album to come from the Elephant 6 Collective, but part of their big three that defined the entire Collective's sound until of Montreal broke all the rules. Listen to this along with the Apples in Stereo's Fun Trick Noisemaker and Neutral Milk Hotel's On Avery Island and tell me that this shit isn't good.

1997: Sleater-Kinney - Dig Me Out

The best album the riot grrrl movement ever produced. Ideology and musicianship meet as the band triumphs after 1996's warm up act Call the Doctor. "One More Hour" is probably the best song about a failed lesbian relationship uncovered by Spin magazine ever.

1998: Neutral Milk Hotel - In the Aeroplane Over the Sea

My favorite album, period. Words fail it.

1999: The White Stripes - The White Stripes

Not the White Stripe's finest hour, but it's their first, and it's their most workmanlike. For a long time, "St. James Infirmary Blues" was my favorite song of theirs, and "Screwdriver" is always badass live.

2000: Songs: Ohia - Protection Spells

2001: The Dirtbombs - Ultraglide in Black

Better than White Blood Cells, which was/is the standard bearer for that whole "savior of rock and roll" thing that Rolling Stone was harping about. Also better than the Strokes and the Hives.

2002: The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots

2003: Cat Power - You Are Free

2004: Saturday Looks Good to Me - Every Night

This album never ceases to make me happy. A total throwback to AM radio, this is probably one of the first albums I make friends listen to when they go through my albums.

2005: Sleater-Kinney - The Woods

The power of Sleater-Kinney's farewell disc cannot be denied.

2006: Beirut - Gulag Orkestar

2007: LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver

I was premature in tipping my hat to of Montreal when I declared Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? the best album of 2007. Sound of Silver boasts maybe one weak song, but it's kind of like that song before "Jungleland" on Born to Run - nobody will remember it years from now, and people will struggle to place it when it pops up on the iPod. Even if it is the title track.

2008: Stephen Malkmus & Jicks - Real Emotional Trash

You can hear the guitars being played!

G-Rock & Chris Millz' New Single

2008-10-16T15:51:00.003-04:00

As promised in my previous post on this illustrious blog, I've recorded a rap single. I don't know if it qualifies as a Sublime Noise, but I will say it's Dope As Fuck to see my own nom du rap on my ipod. Chris Millz is a guy I met this semester who lives on my floor. He's got a record deal through Universal and is very talented. He makes beats, but for this song we decided to use a RATATAT instrumental. The song is called "Let My People Go" because that was the line of mine that made Chris laugh the most when trying to title it. Days upon days of alcohol & malaise-fueled writing culminated in 45 minutes of recording in a dorm room. I like it. Tell me what you think.

Bone Thugs' Weed Song

2008-10-11T23:16:00.005-04:00

My smoky friend found this on my non-smoky girl's playlist. It's a powerful song, as he pointed out to me. He said "this is the perfect song to blaze to. The hum engulfs you; in your lungs with the smoke it engorges you. Really it's an R&B track but instead of being about your woman it's about your weed; and how well she fucks you."

cml

96 Tears

2008-10-06T23:17:00.006-04:00

A thousand apologies to anyone who noticed that I haven't written anything in a while. I assure you, my creative juices have found other outlets. I've been busy innovating new and increasingly irrelevant things to worry about. I've been creatively overthinking my love life. I've also been writing rap lyrics. I go by the name of MC G-Rock (my real-life surname is pronounced similarly) and I will be collaborating with a friend of mine who has a record deal. I will post an update the second the track hits vinyl (mp3).

On to the topic at hand: songs that make me cry. Music has the power to affect emotions, as anyone who has ever gotten an erection while listening to the Bosnian national anthem will tell you. However, whenever I tell my friends that I'll cry simply because of a tune, it seems I'm in the minority. Maybe you don't want to own up to it, but I've selected three songs that make me cry, for various reasons.

1. Ween - "Baby Bitch", from the 1994 album Chocolate and Cheese

Ween is one of my favourite bands. I love their complete lack of pretension, and that they play almost a different genre on every song, to say nothing of the stylistic jumps from album to album. That's not to say that they are incapable of heartfelt emotion. I've been in a few relationships. The first is one that in some ways I'm just now recovering from, years later. "People say 'how beautiful, how sweet, how kind. You're perfect, you've got nothing to hide.' But I, for one, have seen the sun and the bitch that you've locked up inside." This spoke to me at a time when I was simultaneously in the emotional Bastille that is clinical depression, as well as raging and wanting to punch her in the face. Now, time has passed, other girls have come and gone, and I feel more in line with an earlier quote from that song: "Baby, baby, baby bitch. I'm better now! Please fuck off." I am better, but the song takes me right back to that time and I cry.

2. Bob Dylan - "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright" from the 1963 album the Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
Bobby Zimmerman has ingrained himself into the psyche of every thinking, feeling soul in America. He is America. I almost feel stupid writing about him; it seems that all the world's a choir, and I'm futilely preaching to it. "I'm walkin' down that long, lonesome road, babe. Where I'm bound I can't tell. But goodbye's too good a word, gal, so I'll just say fare thee well. I ain't sayin' you treated me unkind; you could have done better but I don't mind. You just kinda wasted my precious time, but don't think twice, it's all right." Fast forward to another relationship. It was perfect. We were truly meant for each other. Then, it turned out that her priorities were vastly at odds with mine, and that was it. I can't feel the anger that I did for previous lovers, as I was treated better than ever before...but I can't help but think of my time as wasted in some ways. I still fare her well, though. And cry when Zimmy makes me think of her.

3. Bright Eyes - "First Day of My Life" from the 2005 album I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning
I am no fan of Conor Oberst's. I find his music precious in the pejorative sense and boring. However, I saw the music video for this song on MTVU whilst doing laundry and I melted. If you haven't seen it, it features shot after shot of couples holding hands and smiling. They are of every race, age, and orientation. As cynical as I get at times, thinking of my past and current romantic failures, I still have some semblance of hope for the future. "This is the first day of my life. I’m glad I didn’t die before I met you. But now I don’t care, I could go anywhere with you and I’d probably be happy." All of your relationships are doomed to fail, until one doesn't. It only takes one. This song makes me cry in a good way because I'm thinking of that person.

George Clinton and his Gangsters of Love - George Clinton and his Gangsters of Love (2008)

2008-10-01T00:50:00.004-04:00

Towards the end of the P-Funk era, it seemed like George Clinton and company were losing steam. Trombipulation played more like a Bootsy Collins album than a true Parliament disc, and George followed that with the uneven Computer Games. That album ushered in the George Clinton solo era, where put out albums that hit, missed, and came out of left field in the span of eight or so songs. Up was down, black was white, dogs and cats lived together, but George was George, plus a plethora of friends (Thomas Dolby!), and at times without that something that made P-Funk tick.

George Clinton and his Gangsters of Love has the occasional flash of old P-Funk brilliance, but for the most part sounds like George found his inner Michael McDonald. He's letting his mellowed out easy listening flag fly...for the most part.

The first thing about this album that you'll notice is its cover art. It's awful; move on. The second thing will likely be the vocorded voice of El Debarge covering not only Marvin Gaye ("Ain't that Perculiar"), but Barry White ("Never Gonna Give You Up") as well. The other thing about "Ain't that Perculiar" is that Sly Stone guests on it, making it the first time he's popped up in a studio in forever. Carlos Santana also appears, providing the guitar on "Gypsy Woman."

There's nothing here to dislike, other than that the promise of new Parliament and/or Funkadelic material in the wake of How Late Do U Have 2BB4UR Absent? appears to have gone unfufilled, but there's nothing here to rave about, either. The album plays like a radio friendly unit shifter for people who are afraid of George, but I'm not sure that the weedy growl that opens up "Never Gonna Give You Up" is going to convert the heathens who haven't already bowed down at the Mothership.

One more uneven album in the George Clinton discography doesn't hurt anybody though, and as long as he's still got the funk, odds are he'll give it up at a later date.

Rating: ** & 1/2*

Download: Ain't That Perculiar (ft. Sly Stone & El Debarge)
Download: Never Gonna Give You Up (ft. El Debarge)
Download: Gypsy Woman (ft. Carlos Santana)

He's so Funky

2008-09-27T15:42:00.006-04:00

From the 1989 run away hit Teen Witch I am happy to bring you a song for the season- TOP THAT!

Monthly eMusic Round-up #1 (Pt. 1)

2008-09-18T14:11:00.016-04:00

I've had an eMusic account for the better part four months, and I like it a lot. It allows me to download a bunch of albums at a good quality for a price that's way less than what I'd be paying at the record store, and I feel like less of a bastard when I look at my music collection.

I'm on the 75 song a month plan, which roughly translates to about five or six albums, most of which are old rarities or current indie rock business. I figured that, this being a blog about music, I could write about how I spend those 75 songs. Since I generally spend wildly on the first day of the month, I'll just provide a short review of each album, its cover artwork, a link to its eMusic page, and maybe an mp3, if I'm feeling up to uploading. Expect a more professional intro next time, I guess.

(Note: I'm going to start with all 26 albums I've gotten thus far, because I feel very far behind on working on this blog. Got it? Good.)

Bell X1 - Flock (2005)
I downloaded this album after hearing a song on one of the Pandora Radio channels that I study to, and while that song, "Flame," is very good, the rest of the album disappointed me. There's a lot of soft rock here, including "Eve, the Apple of My Eye," which is famous for being played during a lesbian kiss on The O.C.. The rest of the album is much less purple than "Eve," but it isn't for me. I did get a laugh from some Brit magazine's assertion that a song had a "Violent Femmes-ish" guitar riff. The emphasis, clearly, was on "ish."

Flame

Flock @ eMusic

Rating: **

Blitzen Trapper - Wild Mountain Nation (2007)
Downloaded this after noticing that ex-Sleater-Kinney member Carrie Brownstein really, really liked it. The title track, in all honesty, is one of the best songs from 2007, an extremely folky, rootsy CCR-esque track. The album is nowhere near consistent, swerving from garage rock to folk rock to indie pop and everywhere between, but Blitzen Trapper pulls it off, bringing something to every genre that they attempt. One of 2007's best.

Wild Mountain Nation

Wild Mountain Nation @ eMusic

Rating: ****

Cat Power - The Greatest (2006)
Chan Marshall's voice is gorgeousness and gorgeosity made flesh. That's all there is to it. This isn't her best album, but it is her most appealing. A lot of the bitterness of her previous records is left at the door, gone through in title track and opener "The Greatest," and left behind to produce an album that both my sister and I enjoyed. Considering that my sister's tastes run from assorted reggae to flavor of the month rap, that's quite an accomplishment.

The Greatest

The Greatest @ eMusic

Rating: ****

Creedence Clearwater Revival - Green River (1969)
Part of CCR's prodigious, three album 1969, Green River provided us with not only the title track, but "Tombstone Shadow," "Bad Moon Rising," "Lodi," and "The Night Time Is the Right Time." Those four songs are rock and roll canon, and the rest of the album ain't exactly chopped liver. If the best tracks from here had a three-way with the best songs from Willie and the Poor Boys and Bayou Country, CCR probably would have released the greatest album of all time. Instead, they put out three classics. This is probably the best of those three.

Green River

Green River @ eMusic

Rating: *****

Culture - Two Sevens Clash (1977)
Absolutely, positively the greatest album about the end of the world ever. The story goes that Marcus Garvey said something about a day of reckoning on the day when sevens clashed, July 7th, 1977. This album came out and was so huge in Jamaica that on July 7th, stores closed and people didn't go outside. What's amazing is that, for all the end of the world mumbo jumbo, the album is amazingly upbeat. None of the songs are about death, destruction, or suffering: It's an end to all that. An incredible, rootsy effort, Two Sevens Clash survived the end of the world, and is one of reggae's great albums.

Two Sevens Clash

Two Sevens Clash @ eMusic

Rating: *****

Famous L. Renfroe - Children (1969)
Pay no attention to how cheap the cover of the album looks. While Famous L. Renfroe (billing himself as "The Flying Sweet Angel of Joy") may be next to completely unknown, this is an album that deserves to be heard. Famous and a group of musicians gather around some equipment and make a down, dirty, and moving gospel/soul album. Many of the songs here have a swagger found in lost blaxploitation gems. Literally nothing is known about this guy - the eMusic review states that the liner notes say that the album was cut in Seattle while the record company that found this claims it was recorded in Memphis. An excellent discovery that has me wanting to plunge through the depths of many a thrift store LP collection - who knows what wonders lie in those musty bins?

Download: Famous L. Renfroe - Believe

Children @ eMusic

Rating: **** & 1/2*

Funkadelic - Cosmic Slop (1973)
Before disappearing into the land of the concept album, George Clinton and the gang released this 1973 masterpiece, featuring Bernie Worrell's knockout punch at the keyboards in "Nappy Dugout," and all the proof anybody needed that the group could survive losing Eddie Hazel. Who needed him with Garry Shider cranking out songs like "Cosmic Slop?" That song is one of P-Funk's best. "March to the Witch's Castle," a song dealing with the return of the soldiers of Vietnam, is like playing the vocals from "Great Gig in the Sky" during a Black Sabbath song. Who said a funk band couldn't play rock music?

Cosmic Slop

Cosmic Slop @ eMusic

Rating: *****

For Those About to Rock; Go to Wal-Mart

2008-09-13T13:17:00.007-04:00

So it's come to this. Wal-Mart, which is somehow the nation's largest distributor of music, will be the exclusive means of release for Black Ice, the first AC/DC album since 2000's Stiff Upper Lip.

I suppose that this shouldn't come as a shock, seeing as the news is three months old, but I haven't been paying attention to AC/DC aside from my vinyl copies of Highway to Hell and Back in Black to know that the boys were joining the ranks of Journey, the Eagles, and Genesis. In short, I'm disappointed.

I know that a large part of AC/DC's fanbase are Jack swilling, beef jerky devouring Wal-Mart warrior, but choosing to sell exclusively to Sarah Palin's constituents seems kind of like treason. This was the band who, thirty years ago, growled out "Rock and Roll Ain't Noise Pollution," a song that criticized the corporations who said that rock was too loud and too vulgar. Newsflash: Wal-Mart has always been one of those corporations.

I guess this year is an exciting one for classic rock folks. The Eagles did an album, Journey did a few new songs, and there's a small chance that Axl Rose will deliver his baby and shower us all with hard rock and Dr. Pepper. If Wal-Mart has their way, Chinese Democracy will be exclusive to them, too.

This is just bad for the music industry. Oh, the suits are salivating, and I'm sure that AC/DC is sitting on a huge paycheck before royalties and live gate figures start rolling their way, but what about us, the people who appreciate the hilarity of some sixty year old Australian guy referring to himself as "one cool devil" in pursuit of "one hot angel?" I at least want to option to buy it on my hipster iTunes, but nope, for those who want to rock, Wal-Mart is the only option.

This is just plain weird business. You'd think that the industry would realize by now the futility of big box stores, and you'd think that artists would rush to support the little guy. Shit, if Metallica did it, why can't AC/DC? I can't imagine a store full of old women buying a 10-pack of L'eggs rocking out to this shit, and I can't imagine a trucker with a Confederate flag baseball hat picking this instead of the new Toby Keith album. I want to board the rock 'n roll train, boys, but for some reason, you're denying me.

So what do you think? Huh? Is this a good move, a bad move, or are you indifferent. The Eagles sold 711k copies of their first album in something like 30 years, but I have no idea how Billboard works, and honestly, fuck the Eagles. As for me?

Rock and roll may not be noise pollution, but today, rock and roll ain't no friend of mine.

Funk List

2008-09-04T18:57:00.007-04:00

The Following Things Are Funky:*
(in no particular order)

- Boss
- Broadway
- Dollar Bill
- Drummer
- Kingston
- Miracle
- Mule
- Nassau
- Stuff
- Voltron
- Woman
- Women
- Homo sapiens

* Source: Itunes playlist, songs containing funky

The Greatest Love of All

2008-08-23T18:26:00.007-04:00

Of all the creatures on this 6000-year-old planet, few mate for life. Of these, humans are perhaps unique in deluding themselves into believing in romantic love. One thing's for certain, however. Everyone masturbates. Fetuses in the womb, camels in the desert. The noble platypus and the industrious basset hound. We are all quite keen to have the occasional wank.

The intersection of songwriting and self-abuse is an intriguing one. Why would a lyricist, with all their creativity, admit in verse to being his or her own sexual partner? Certainly one could sing of all manner of perversity with man, child or beast; no one would be the wiser. We will discuss a few songs that deal with masturbation.

1. Buzzcocks - "Orgasm Addict"

Buzzcocks (no "the"!) are a quintessential English punk band that have a legacy that includes several awesome tracks. They also are the inspiration for the British quiz show Never Mind the Buzzcocks. Sample lyrics: "You tried it once or twice, found it all right for kicks, but now you find out that it's a habit that sticks and you're an orgasm addict. Creepin' in the backdoor with dirty magazines, and now your mother wants to know 'bout all the stains on your jeans and you're an orgasm addict!" Who among us can't relate? Aside from those of us in the digital age who have no need for printed pr0n, but I digress. This song rocks, and it manages the difficult feat of making masturbation seem fun both fun and harmfully addictive. You might not go blind, but you'll rock out profusely.

2. Prince & the Revolution - "Darling Nikki"

The artist formerly known as The Artist Formerly Known as Prince is many things. Lothario, guitar god, pop music machine, style maven. Of particular import to his oeuvre, pre-Jehovah's Witness days, was the sex. Oh, the sex. The Purple One oozed testosterone. Estrogen, too. "I knew a girl named Nikki, I guess you could say she was a sex fiend. I met her in a hotel lobby masturbating with a magazine. She said, 'How'd you like to waste some time?" And I could not resist when I saw little Nikki grind." This song arouses both my libido and my curiosity. There are unanswered questions. Did Prince meet Nikki while he was masturbating with a magazine, or was Nikki masturbating with said magazine? Where is this hotel, where ladies wantonly pleasure themselves in the lobby?

3. Violent Femmes - "Blister in the Sun"

You have to love any song that causes spontaneous clapping on every spin. This song's guitar part is so ubiquitous, I'm not sure anyone pays much attention to the lyrics any more. They paint a portrait of desperation: "Body and beats, I stain my sheets, I don't even know why." To be compelled to masturbate almost against one's will, kinda sucks. Or not, it still feels good.

~Must love local bands~

2008-08-22T16:39:00.008-04:00

Retro-80s perfection, thine name is Starfarm.

And they're not just snappy dressers; their music captures the kitchy wonderment of the 1980s just as their outfits do.

In anticipation of seeing this band this upcoming saturday I decided to swing on over to their website and get a feel for them first. Wow. Their mix-tape is a must listen for any Master of the Universe, featuring such classics as AC/DC's You Shook Me All Night Long, Duran-Duran's Hungry Like the Wolf, and Ah-ha's Take on Me they're a quintessential fuckfest of throwback euphoria. Listening to Starfarm requires a New Coke chaser.

Check out the whole line up here. More to follow after their show---

Blank Generation

2008-07-30T01:39:00.004-04:00

It's probably little surprise that I'm a fan of punk music. I'm an uptight square, so naturally, the sounds of the disaffected youth of thirty years ago appeals to me. I suppose I should blame my mom, who used to entertain my sister and I with stories about how her, my dad, and a few of their friends would sit around in some guy named Ronnie Alstadt's basement smoking pot and listening to his vast collection of 45s.

I've been on a wild goose chase for a lot of the stuff she vaguely remembers, and I've pieced together a lot of it. Clues as vague as "Red lights/green lights/stop and go time" led me to Johnny Winters, while her insistence that somebody somewhere did a song about pink panties dangling from a rear view mirror has driven me insane for somewhere around five years.

I can also blame my mom and blame punk music for my burning lust of Rhino box sets. I own two...the punk one and one featuring 60's girl groups. The punk box - No Thanks! The 70's Punk Rock Rebellion is about as complete a set as one could hope for, as long as you're fine without the Sex Pistols. There is no better document of the rise of the punk underground, aside from some excellent books (England's Dreaming and From the Velvets to the Voidoids) and the records themselves.

Despite the comprehensive nature of the 100-song box set, I'm drawn to two songs most often, "Another Girl Another Planet," and the Voidoid's "Blank Generation," though the latter has been sticking a lot lately.

I'm not sure why. I'm not as joyfully nihilistic as Hell and his group are in the song, and I haven't wanted out since before I was in, but there's just something to the song, its guitar part or Hell's voice, that won't stop assaulting my brain.

Are there any songs that have this particular effect on you? I don't mean the annoying Spice Girls psychological warfare aspect of a song getting stuck in your head, but the Devil's Tower out of mashed potatoes "This means something!" kinda way.

If so, what are they? Are you still fumbling around for the meaning, or have you unlocked the reason why that particular song just seems to stick?

Fuck Yeah, Real American

2008-07-27T15:39:00.007-04:00

This is, perhaps, the greatest combination of truly awful song and truly awful video ever. Hulk Hogan "playing" his guitar to Rick Derringer's now-famous riff, callously superimposed over American landmarks as famous and legendary American heroes (even MLK!) flash before our eyes. This...this is inexplicably bad.

Love the propaganda, too. Iran, bad! Russia, bad! These problems, solved with a leg drop!

Hogan demanding that we train, eat vitamins, say prayers, be true to the country, phough, is just a delicious, delicious icing on top of about three minutes of insanity.

Oh...and they actually played this on MTV back in the 1980's, and then on a very special edition of Bevis and Butthead.

Amazing. I need to catch my breath from all the laughter.

The Proclaimers

2008-07-26T00:01:00.002-04:00

I have never really gotten into twins. I understand the attraction but the practicality of it is just beyond me. That is to say in other words, I have two hands but I'm not going to use both of them to masterbate with. Not so with The Proclaimers-

Bo's New Math

2008-07-20T21:04:00.006-04:00

This is Bo. Bo is a badass. Bo is also a clever, musicologist and mix-master of sub-culture, pop-culture, pseudo- science and emotional insecurity. When a white kid can sit down in a tie-dye shirt and lay down 'mad' rhymes without any sign of self consciousness you know he has balls and isn't afraid to have them busted. And by that I mean that Bo performs with confidence enough in this talents that he can be goofy and playful with his lyrics but still impressive.

Part of the confidence Bo shows I can only assume comes from the fact that he's incredibly smart. The lyricism present in Bo's youtube tracks is astounding in it's cleverness and wit but also impressively well informed. Beyond wordplay ("I'm constipated, couldn't give a shit,") Bo's songs each have an elevated sense of theme and purpose, a kind of deliberateness in the jokes which shows obvious thought and clarity. He writes songs that while entertaining make you shit yourself with surprise at how smart they are, entwining creativity and intelligence in each song. It is sort of the way you felt the first time you heard It's the End of the World and thought to yourself "Wow, R.E.M. did that? Really?" This trait of his work I think is most evident in his song New Math-

See what I mean? Sure, you can hate on him and you can bust his huge ass balls but that won't change the fact that Bo is probably smarter than you. He can take it. You faked me out white boy. Anyways....I just shit myself with surprise.

This is Bo's youtube channel where you can listen to some more of his tracks. If you need more evidence of this kids 'skillz' or 'talents' here is the supplementary evidence-

There is more I'd like to say about Bo's stage presence but I'll just let his work speak for itself here.

CML

The Sounds of Liberation

2008-07-14T20:23:00.006-04:00

Full disclosure: I am a guy who is converting to Judaism, after a life spent entrenched against my will in evangelical Christianity. I'm also a suburban white dude, the kind that constantly immerses himself in African-American experience foreign to my experiences, yet familiar in my soul. These two albums contain perfect synthesis of what it means to be black and Jewish.

Soul Messages From Dimona (Various Artists)
When I found this album online I couldn't believe my luck. It's gospel-funk-soul performed by black American converts to Judaism that immigrated to Dimona, Israel in the late '70s. Incidentally, Dimona is the home of the Israeli nuclear program. I haven't bought it yet (you can get it direct from the label on CD, vinyl or mp3 here), but the songs I've heard off it floor me every time. I embedded the Soul Messengers' "Go to Proclaim" below. Tell me it doesn't sound like Curtis Mayfield singing in Hebrew! An Israeli blogger pointed out that you can tell from the accent that they don't really know Hebrew, but isn't that what conversion and immigration is like? You're trying to make your way in a culture that others don't think is yours, but you feel deep in your soul a need to connect to God.

The next record came out this year, after mild hype in the Jewish press, as well as the hip-hop press. Not so much in the Jewish hip-hop press, because it doesn't exist. But I digress. Y-Love (Yitzchak Jordan) is an African-American from Baltimore who converted to Orthodox Judaism and put out an album (This is Babylon). He was originally into punk and metal, and that power and urgency comes through on the album. He originally used rap as a memory aid while studying in Jerusalem, and his lyrics go back and forth between English, Arabic, Hebrew and Aramaic. He is truly amazing and I can't believe more people aren't talking about this record. Matisyahu is all over the place, and rightly so. Dude is dope as well (especially the dub/remix stuff). However, hip-hop is much more relatable than reggae, even though I count myself a fan of both.

There is a connection between the black and Jewish experiences. Both experienced slavery. Both know oppression and hatred. Both have perfected the art of the honest and grimy hustle, making wealth from the ground up. There is also a lesser-recognized connection between hip-hop and Jewish culture. Beastie Boys, sure. But Eminem is the only major example I can think of a white rapper who isn't Jewish. MC Serch, Princess Superstar, Mickey Avalon, Edan, Ill Bill, Blood of Abraham, MC Paul Barman, if you don't know the names check them out. And now, Y-Love, poised to be noted as the greatest of them all.

A Life in Song

2008-07-09T19:35:00.004-04:00

I got this idea from the Onion AV Club's Steve Hyden, who filled out a list of a favourite album from each year he's been alive. He got the idea from Idolator. Since I'm nothing if not original, I'm doing it too. Be inspired to check out something unknown! Judge my taste! Call me a hipster douchebag/member of the great unwashed!

1985: Beastie Boys, Licensed to Ill

1986: Paul Simon, Graceland

1987: George Harrison, Cloud Nine

1988: Morrissey, Viva Hate

1989: De La Soul, 3 Feet High and Rising

1990: A Tribe Called Quest, People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm

1991: Del Tha Funkee Homosapien, I Wish My Brother George Was Here

1992: Dr. Dre, The Chronic

1993: Wu-Tang Clan, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)

1994: Ween, Chocolate and Cheese

1995: The Roots, Do You Want More?!!!??!

1996: Cake, Fashion Nugget

1997: Radiohead, OK Computer

1998: Beastie Boys, Hello Nasty

1999: The Roots, The Roots Come Alive

2000: Jurassic 5, Quality Control

2001: Daft Punk, Discovery

2002: The Flaming Lips, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots

2003: Outkast, Speakerboxxx/The Love Below

2004: The Streets, A Grand Don't Come for Free

2005: M.I.A., Arular

2006: Girl Talk, Night Ripper

2007: Mark Ronson, Version

2008 (In many ways this was the most difficult year, as I am without the benefit of hindsight. Plus the year is not over, but in any case): Santogold, Santogold

Ringo Starr (& His All Starr Band) - 7/8/08

2008-07-09T10:32:00.006-04:00

(No pics or vids or songs or nothing - they were frisking at the door.)

I've been a Beatles fan for quite some time - likely since I discovered the shiny plastic discs that music is distributed on. In childhood, I was such a big Beatles fan that I drove my mom to hating the Beatles. Her response to my getting to see Ringo for free last night: "I hate you."

She, like myself and many others who were born during and after Beatlemania, has never seen a live Beatle. Paul is too expensive, John is dead, George didn't tour extensively before he died, and Ringo always did fringe shows, popping up every summer at whatever casino could afford him. Casino shows are the elephant graveyard of old bands - Ringo is playing at Casino Windsor, for instance, but seeing him amongst slot machines and broken down gamblers just seems so...sad.

Luckily, the Fraze Pavilion in Kettering is a small theater in a park, and my ticket was free. On Monday, I was like "Sure, I've got nothing better to do." On Tuesday? "HOLY SHIT I GET TO SEE A BEATLE!"

Not only did I get to see a Beatle, I saw various other washed-up but badass musicians. The frontman from Men At Work, some guy from the Average White Band, the dude who did "Free Ride," that "Dreamweaver" clown, and Billy Squier. "Everybody here is a star(r) in their own right!" Ringo proclaimed, and, for the next two hours, he and the band set out to prove it.

A few things about Ringo: For his age (68), he looks fantastic. He's an awful dancer. Painting is his madness. His best songs weren't written by him. This was fairly obvious, at least from the crowd reactions, as they stood for Starkey/Harrison tunes "It Don't Come Easy" and "Photograph" and sat down for tunes like "Liverpool 8." Ringo's voice is best reserved for pub songs, which I'm sure he has plenty of, but he kept his set low key with the exception of his early hits.

For whatever reason, he didn't do "Octopus's Garden," which was slightly upsetting. My theory is that Ringo is much too nice of a guy, giving the "Dreamweaver" guy two songs (he introduced the second as "From the 'Dreamweaver' album), and the Average White Band guy a second song after "Pick up the Pieces" (an Isley Brothers cover from the album featuring "Pick up the Pieces"). He did do "Boys," "What Goes On," "Act Naturally," "With a Little Help from My Friends," and "Yellow Submarine," each with a varying degree of success. "Boys" and "Act Naturally," both being cover songs to begin with, sounded just fine, with "Boys" being one of my favorite songs of the show. "What Goes On" was also just fine. "With a Little Help from My Friends" was expected...they brought Ringo out to the stage singing "Billy Shears" before transitioning into "It Don't Come Easy." Squier's guitar solo at the end of the song kind of robbed it of its innocent charm. "Yellow Submarine" only proved how hard it is to cover the Beatles, even if you're a Beatle. Without brass and childish pot banging, it was like an awkward, new band finding their legs on a classic. Singing along was fun.

The other members of the band, particularly Squier and Edgar Winters (he of "Free Ride" and "Frankenstein" fame) made the show worth seeing apart from its "OMG BEATLE" factor. In fact, "Frankenstein" stole the show. Absolutely blistering guitar work from Squier and great synth stuff from Winters. Squier's "Lonely is the Night" and "The Stroke" were particularly awesome - they're songs that I occasionally rock out to on the radio without actually remembering who did them. Seeing a mini "Men At Work" concert was also fantastic, as "Who Can it Be Now?" is one of my favorite 80's songs. The crowd did not share my enthusiasm, but ate up "Dreamweaver" for some awful reason.

In all, Ringo was totally worth seeing, and probably worth paying for. There's a worse way to spend $35 dollars, especially if you're a young Beatles fan without the money to drop on a Sir Paul ticket. He may not perform his best two songs ("Don't Pass Me By" is also conspicuous in it's absence), but what Ringo and his summer band do is fun...a quick, light hearted trip down FM radio memory lane. Starr may not be the most popular or talented Beatle, but he certainly has the most fun (and the hottest wife), and in the end, that's what counts.

The colors

2008-07-06T22:47:00.004-04:00

This hypnotizing clip is called "Alice," which is fitting for several reasons that don't need to be expanded upon. It's a very trippy piece of electronic music, composed using sounds from the Disney classic Alice in Wonderland. The guy who made the video also made the song, and his choices of images to go along with the music are very, very keen. I wish I had more to say about it, but I suppose I'll let the clip speak for itself.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I Am Among You

2008-07-05T23:55:00.008-04:00

My name is Karl! I like to dance!

I'm Karl, I am a new contributor to this illustrious community. I strive for complete eclecticism, and favour glam rock, soul/funk, French pop, and bhangra. However, my first love is hip-hop.

I was listening to Dr. Dre and Snoop Doggy Dogg today, and a thought occurred to me. How can I, a suburban Jewish Canadian, relate to these Crip-walking ne'er-do-wells? Aside from my well-documented status as marijuana enthusiast, there is this: early Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre are mouthpieces of neoconservativism. That's right, Snoop and Dre are neocons, like George W. Bush, Paul Wolfowitz, and Don Rumsfeld. All American lives have been affected by neocon policy, and thus can we all relate to G-Funk.

Take as an example, their 1993 magnum opus "Nuthin' but a 'G' Thang". This is just a representative sample, any track will get you in the mood for nation building, pre-emptive war and the curtailing of civil liberties.

It's like this and like that and like this and-a. First it is one way, then another, and so on. Iraq was an imminent threat to America, then it wasn't but it didn't matter; democracy must be promoted in all corners. Its like that and like this and like that and-a. "I don’t think nation-building missions are worthwhile. " (George W. Bush, presidential debate at Wake Forest University, 2000) It's like this, and who gives a fuck about those? The president has spoken, and we need to support him. Honestly, let's turn the whole place into a glass parking lot. So just chill, 'til the next episode. Iran?

Jaaaaaaa

2008-07-01T02:33:00.008-04:00

Youtube has, for the most part, replaced my television. And while I have not yet taken the Red Hot Chili Pepper's advice and thrown away the old box, I have allowed myself to move away from the couch and into the rolling chair at an alarming rate. Just about any television you want to see you can find online these days and that suits me just fine. However, more and more I'm also reverting to Youtube to settle those late night 'Ohrenwürmer' with music videos and trashy fan made slideshows. All and all it is a good tool of the internet.

Sometimes though it goes above and beyond these luxuries and pays off with a gem I'd never expect- real, enjoyable, user made, content. Is there any group of words more thrilling, surprising and rewarding alive on the internet? Somewhere, someone, is putting something on the web that isn't shit? Who knew?! And wow, what shit it isn't! Speaking as a blogger, trust me, I know shit, I am the shitter of the internet, the man in the high tower with the can of beans- in other words, 'you want shit? I got it.' Jaaaaaaa though isn't any of that. Jaaaaaaa is simply put: damn good enjoyable ukulele skills. Here is a channel created by a cute girl, with incredible talents, and good taste, who has something for everyone, from her creative cut harmonies, through her touching and playful originals, and ending with her noticeably well performed and well known covers.

Also, Jaaaaaaa (also know as Julia Nunes) isn't afraid to play around on camera. In fact, part of my attraction to Julia's work is the air and levity in performing style; there is a certain larkishness and playful disposition which is contagious. The body of Julia Nunes' work doesn't take its self too serious but is still top shelf in quality so that a jump from a Kanye West cover to a fun song about break ups isn't that hard to believe at all and is instead more expected than anything else would be.

Short and Sweet

Check out her channel, there are some 40 videos there with a range of different sounds you're sure to love if you enjoyed any of this.

cml

Tom Russell + Steve Martin + Monkeys = Brain Explosion

2008-06-20T00:12:00.005-04:00

Probably the best music video ever, Steve Martin preforms Tom Russell's "El Paso" word for word with monkeys and elephants. This is from his 1980 special, Comedy is Not Pretty, and is probably one of the greatest things I have ever seen.

Added bonus: "El Paso" is probably one of the best country songs ever.

LCD Soundsystem - 45:33 (2006)

2008-06-12T18:54:00.007-04:00

I have, at one point or another in CWTB,E's history, commented on all three major album-length releases. In looking back at the two earliest posts in that particular blogs history (I am moving all 67 music posts from there to here unless they're awful), as well as my extremely hurried rundown of the best of 2007, I've shortchanged all three albums, which is a travesty, because LCD Soundsystem have become one of my favorite bands, and in extremely short order. This is Pt. 1 in an attempt at rectifying that.

I don't work out often enough. Hell, let's be honest: I don't work out at all. This composition, made up of remixed songs from all across LCD Soundsystem's discography, including tracks from then-unreleased Sound of Silver was intended as workout music, recorded and released for Nike as part of their Nike+ program with the iTunes music store. It starts slow, gets gradually more intense, and cuts out with a cool down part. It is, to workouts, what "All My Friends" from Sound of Silver is to an all night party...a brilliant microcosm.

"Microcosm" probably isn't the best word for a song that lasts 45:58, but from what I hear, morning jogs tend to last 45 minutes or more, and the song is full of references (intentional or not) to what some of my running friends claim is their inspiration for running, namely the adrenaline high of it all. "I'm floating in space," James Murphy says, while a sleazy 70's variety show band waits in the wings to pound the theme home: "It feels so good."

I'm a fan of long-form songs, so that's a bonus. Dark Side of the Moon and the Abby Road medley work brilliantly together, and "Echoes" was, for a long time, my favorite song. My musical tastes have since evolved ("Echoes" is still awesome though), and while 45:33 wouldn't make a favorites list, song or album, it still stands out above a large crop of 2006 releases and, were it released in 2007, would have been one of the albums I covered in all of a sentence...probably #3.

For long stretches of 2006-2007, I listened to this in its entirety two or three times a week, and it's still marvelous on night drives from Cincinnati to Detroit.

In 2007, DFA re-released the album on CD and vinyl. I've yet to purchase it physically, but I suspect that I'll wind up with it on vinyl eventually. CD doesn't seem right - all 46 minutes flow so seamlessly together that I don't want the option of skipping sections.

Download

Thrift Store LPs

2008-06-10T20:18:00.005-04:00

There is a epidemic in this country. Currently an entire generation of bad taste is dying. As we all lie sleeping old people across this great country of ours are dying and leaving all there junk in the hands of family members who have nothing better to do with it all then lug it down to the thrift store and pass it off on to someone else. The problem with this occurrence has nothing to do with health care, social security or over consumption. No, the problem I see here is that not only are these people who are dying old, not only are they record owners, but they’re also of a generation of bad taste and incredibly dated music. While it might please some of you to know that the war against bad taste is a simply fought war, with more casualties every morning on the side of lesser taste in the form of the old and decrepit there still remains the problem for us, the just rebel and lazy freedom fighters, of what to do with their rotting and rotten carcasses. What do we do with all this awful music?

It’s sad to look through the piles upon piles of records in a thrift store and find nothing better than cheap kitsch album sleeves and the soot, cigar ash and dead skin dust that seems to cover everything in those types of places. For every piece of music worth listening to there are dozens of piles of vinyl that never should have been pressed and printed. The amount of polka, organ and big ban fans that are dying out is astounding. Sure, every now and again someone with a half way decent collection will die and leave their kids their junky milk crates of LPs which hide with in them some Cat Stevens or Bill Cosby but not enough to change turning rotation of crap. Sometimes a younger collector might kick it and give up a bit of Leonard Cohen, Bowie or Long John Baldry but it’s a lucky and rare occasion when it does happen.

No, for now we’re stuck in the sad state of record collecting left to us by our partents’ parents’ generation. There are very few good finds left out there; pieces of real music waiting to be bought. But, soon enough, everyone cool is going to die and then people like me and you are going to clean up the bodies, reclaim their goods, and rebuild. So until then, happy hunting friends.

The Kinks' 1970 Lola

2008-05-31T22:13:00.006-04:00

I asked her her name and in a dark brown voice she said Lola. L-o-l-a; Lola.

Vanity Fair said of Nabokov’s masterpiece Lolita that it was “The only convincing love story of our century.” If Lolita is this century’s only convincing love story in literature than The Kinks’ 1970 song “Lola” must be the only convincing love song we are left with.

It’s surprising how catchy the song is when you first listen to it. The strong twanging intro grabs you deep down in your groin with a snug grip only to let go for you to relax as Ray Davies’ tiny, pubescent, boy-girl voice starts to whisper in your ear. There is something entirely faggoty about the sound of the song that, even before you know what it is really about, is exciting and playful to listen to. At first listen “Lola” is simply a summer love song like any other summer love song should like to be, enjoyable; cutesy; moderately lasting. “Lola”, on its surface, is a well to-do love song. But, it is what’s under Lola’s makeup which is truly remarkable and endearing about it as a love story. This love song, like so many good rock and roll love songs, is nothing but a painted whore, a bright pair of leopard print tights, hiding the true nature of love and art, a throbbing, tucked back, veiny muscle of love.

“Lola” is among those other hidden pervert songs like “Blister in the Sun,” “F.H.I.T.A.” and “Longview.” The enduring quality The Kinks managed to impart in this song, besides the slightly masked transvestite and homosexual themes of the story, is that even after the point when it becomes clear to the listener that the song is in fact about an uncommon or expected love affair it is still and incredibly enjoyable satisfying song. Lola dregs up in its listener those feelings of sexual confusion and apprehension that have always lived with us. It’s hard for some people to imagine living a Grecian life style of antiquity and partaking in the styles of man-love only understood between and warrior and his fellow plunderers and spearmen or the occasion and goat farmer and his cattle. The question that should be pressed to our leaders, in politics, religion, and academia, in sociology, anthropology, history and psychology has nothing to do with “nature verses nurture” or “how do we square the cases of child molestation by the forefathers of modern culture with today’s values?” or even “is homosexuality a trait or a choice?” but what would you do for the love of a woman?

Nevermind the bullocks. Over look the five o’clock shadow and that she walks like a man. This is a battle of wills: not the head and the head but the head and the heart. The love for a true woman isn’t physical but spiritual. When you’re left in solitude, away from home for the first time, what will you do for the love of a woman, a woman who you can love and will love you back, just as hard and severely? What price would you pay? Is it so wrong? Should you turn away, run for the door? Or is it more atrocious to deny yourself happiness and to refuse what love there is that’s real?

Girls will be boys and boys will be girls
Its a mixed up, muddled up, shook up, world …except for Lola.

-Caleb Lalinsky, not the worlds most masculine guy

Yer Blues John,

2008-05-19T23:14:00.005-04:00

There are few things on this Earth more astonishing than John Lennon eating noodles with Mick Jagger, until you realize that John Lennon is playing one of the most primal, raw Beatles songs with Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, and Mitch Mitchel from the Jimi Hendrix Experience.

"Yer Blues" is probably top 5 as far as Beatles songs go for me, but I imagine that's a different post.

PEHDTSCKJMBA

2008-05-12T23:10:00.004-04:00

Sonic the Hedgehog 2

2008-05-04T04:30:00.006-04:00

I've been told that the lack of posts here is disappointing. There are two reasons for this, fans of Paul Rodgers telling you what to think/say/listen to. First, I've been locked in my room doing a shit ton of homework. Second, I have been trying to figure out if I should just review albums or...actually talk about music. I guess I'll wind up doing a bit of both.

So:

I've been listening to techno music a bit more lately...if not techno then certainly house, and if not that, then something that very clearly isn't four white men playing instruments and singing. Daft Punk, Cassius, Primus, Fatboy Slim (credibility shot!). I think I've stumbled across the reason why: The music of Sonic the Hedgehog 2.

It might seem strange to say that. Back before today, where you can just license major artists and call it a day soundtrack wise, you had to hire motherfuckers to sit in studios and compose and play music for your video game. The guy who does the music for Final Fantasy got huge off of it. The dude who did the music for Earthworm Jim parlayed that into being on TV a lot to brag about it. Hardly any of it "sounds" like techno though...or house.

Take a listen to bits of the Sonic 2 soundtrack though. Chemical Plant Zone. Casino Night Zone. ROBOTNIK'S THEME. It's all very basic, it's all very rudimentary, but it's synclaviers and symphonic and catchy as fuck and some of it makes me want to dance. Metropolis Zone with its fake record scratch and Death Egg Zone with it's weird time signature and odd synth parts. Oh, and Final Boss with the sirens and doom and gloom.

I went to that huge techno fest in Detroit once and got a splitting headache, because it's all about who can play what baseline the loudest. I think if they would have played video game music; old video game music; good video game music...I would have converted to the whole electronic instruments sooner.

Oh...Hill Top Zone still kicks fucking ass.

In Defense of Super Mario Brothers (The Movie)

2008-04-24T00:22:00.005-04:00

I think that most people would be of the opinion that this movie sucked. It doesn't follow the plot of the video game, it barely has Yoshi, it replaces the Koopa Kidz with two really lame assistants, and the Goombas look like they've got some mutant strain of Down Syndrome.

I say...so the fuck what? Yoshi, in his one scene, was awesome. Daisy was hot. Bowser was off the chain. Big Bertha was cool. Mario running from one end of the level to the next jumping on heads would have sucked, anyhow.

None of that matters in the long run, because bad movie or merely passable 80's movie...it featured this:

George Clinton & The Goombas - Walk the Dinosaur

For my money, that's the 2ed or 3ed best post-Parliament solo outing for George Clinton, a cover of Was (Not Was)'s song of the same name (slightly altered lyrics). The best part? The song is preformed by George Clinton & the Goombas. P-Funk + Mario = awesome. The movie gets a pass.

A post in which Paul Arrand Rodgers lists the rest of the albums from his terrible list and describes them in one sentance so as to sate the peoples.

2008-04-19T19:40:00.003-04:00

Alright. Here it is. The best of 2007. The rest of 2007. Albums you should download/buy/do whatever with. If I really, really like an album, I might review it on that blog about penetration and ears that I hardly ever update.

*ahem*

22. The Fiery Furnaces - Widow City:An album where the Furnaces take what worked from Bitter Tea and Blueberry Boat, smash them together, and produce another album that works.

21. Wu-Tang Clan - 8 Diagrams: Wu-Tang Clan stop arguing long enough to lay down some mad tracks with RZA before getting pissed at RZA, disowning the album, and moving on to the next thing. The sad thing is (for RZA), that this is probably one of the strongest rap albums of the decade, if not in the Wu discography.

20. Deerhunter - Cryptograms: A cool album cover and a trippy sound equate to a top 20 pick; my anticipation for Pitchfork Festival being through the roof.

19. The Good, The Bad and the Queen - The Good, The Bad and the Queen: That guy with the anime band and the song with all the "woo-hoo"ing gets together with a guy from The Clash, a guy from The Verve, some black guy Brian Eno likes to create a nameless band (here called The Good, the Bad, and the Queen for simplicity's sake), hire Dangermouse to produce an album, disapoint a lot of people for creating an album that isn't about police and thieves, feeling good, bittersweet symphonies, and whatever Brian Eno saw in that black drummer (also, no references to Iron Man or Dr. Doom). I am not disapointed. Guess my expectations were low.

18. Radiohead - In Rainbows: Brilliant marketing scheme by Thom Yorke sees millions of hipsters pay $2 and register for their website, social media bullshit, carpooling for preferred parking at shows, etc. I elect to pay "free" via torrents, then $9.99 via Best Buy gift card. Guess who got the best deal.

17. Björk – Volta: An album by Björk. I like her.

16. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Is Is (EP): Fits nicely between the sound of two superb art-punk albums and, in turn, is supurb. Also, Karen O is hot.

15. Joanna Newsom - Joanna Newsom & the YS Street Band (EP): Accomplished harpist with a voice that would tame wild boars, bears, and all manner of toothy, vicious bastards puts together a band, drops a Springsteen joke, fleshes out already terrific songs.

14. The New Pornographers - Challengers: Four really talented Canadians decide to play in their side project again, release another good album, go on tour, work on other shit that is equally brilliant. Very good power pop, very good songwriting, very good singing. Very good.

13. The National - Boxer: A band that I saw at Bonnaroo because I was exhausted and drinking coffee. The stage they were on just so happened to be there. I just so happened to download this album, listen to it, love it, etc. Surprised a lot of people, made a lot of lists. Probably better than Simon and Garfunkel's shit about boxing, too. Fuck them.

12. St. Vincent - Marry Me: Chick from Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Steven's touring band (The Illinoisemakers! The Michigan Militia!) cuts a very cute, tender album that makes me want to marry her, so we can do what married people do.

11. Panda Bear - Person Pitch: An album that I hated, then meditated to, then included on a mix tape for a retreat that I led and went crazy on. Watching the looks on people's faces while "The Search for Delicious" did all of it's tape machine trickery was awesome. Going crazy was not. This album is somewhere between the two extremes, with the needle going towards awesome, as it should, because it's #11 on a top 51.

10. Andrew Bird - Armchair Apocrypha: A man who is talented with strings, bells, and whistles cuts an album that is awesome; tours with huge, spinning gramophones. He had me at Dr. Stringz:

09. Iron & Wine - The Shepard's Dog: A bearded man with all the worldliness of Walt Whitman adds electric guitars to his sound, pisses a bunch of bastards off, still blows the doors down. If I could, I would marry him so he'd sing me to sleep every night. Sounds more likely than my ability to purchase him as a slave.

08. Bruce Springsteen - Magic: It's Bruce Springsteen. It's the E. Street Band. Fuck you if you disagree, but those two things are never, ever a bad thing. Never. Ever. About the best pop album of the year.

07. Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala: The best pop album of the year. Lekman has a voice that makes me want to cry and a way with tape machines like the suavest, sexiest of men have with women. Oh Jens, you're so dreamy.

06. !!! - Myth Takes: This is funk, motherfucker.

05. Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam: An album so good that you need to type "fruit preserves" into Wikipedia to see the article about strawberry jam. Would be number one, if not for the quality of the next four (isn't that always the way?).

04. The White Stripes - Icky Thump: Some bitch at Rolling Stone complained that all of the good guitar riffs of the year were crammed onto "Icky Thump," the title track from this album. Must not have listened to the rest of the album. The only songs that don't rip are "Prickly Thorn, But Sweetly Worn," "St. Andrew (This Battle is in the Air)," and "Effect and Cause." The rest of the songs on here are in competition with each other for the hardest of the album, though "I'm Slowly Turning Into You" is my favorite, simply because of how sludgy, disjointed, and fucking HARD it is.

03. M.I.A. - Kala: Makes third world genocide seem like a party.

02. LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver: Never before have hang-ups, breakdowns, awkwardness, love of other music, chubbiness, and cowbells been more dancable. The 2ed most paranoid album of the year, full of slow burners, ass shakers, pain, love, joy, and sorrow. In two years, when I'm trying and failing to do a "BEST OF THE DECADE, LOL" series of postings, I expect that this will be number two.

01. of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?: And this will be number one. Kevin Barnes went crazy, took crazy pills, nearly lost his wife, sold out, went crazier, and apparently recorded the whole fucking thing. The album is heart wrenching, psychotic, and aggressive. It features an 11 minute song about how shitty life is that has no chord progressions. Kevin Barnes morphs into a hermaphrodite named Georgie Fruit and screams out things like "My, my you've busted me/like a Robocop." He means every word. He feels every word. He bleeds. He screams. He howls. He creates an epic fucking masterpiece so good that the fucking leftovers are 90% better than anything else put out this year. People who didn't put this at #1 did so only because the album leaked in 2006 and had the songs so deeply ingrained in their consciousness that they forgot it was that good and went ahead with LCD Soundsystem or Okkervil River (whoops, forgot about them!) at number one. That, or they suck, suck, suck. It's going to take a lot to knock this one off.

That's it. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got more stringed instruments to fix.

Amen, Brother

2008-03-24T01:11:00.005-04:00

Pretty fascinating piece on, of all things, a drum break. If anything, it's a testament to the ubiquitous nature of sampling. The lifespan of a B side from a random funk/soul single has thus been some near 40 years.

See if you can pick it out next time you're just listening to the radio/watching TV.

Sugarloaf - Sugarloaf (1970)

2008-03-22T03:21:00.006-04:00

If ever there was an argument for Prog Rock (as if Pink Floyd's mere existance wasn't enough), "Green Eyed Lady," the opening song to Sugarloaf's 1970 debut album would be it. Put it up against any Yes song, and it will prove more listen-able. It flat out rocks.

However, if there was ever an argument against Prog Rock, it'd be the rest of the album. The songs on Sugarloaf are long, derivative, and better done by others. You'll find better instrumentals by Pink Floyd, a better riff on Bach by Vanilla Fudge, and better solos by Rush.

At the same time though, "Green Eyed Lady" is so fucking triumphant that I can't help but keep the album on my hard drive. I heard it for the first time on Wednesday in the car on an awful radio station - one of the few times lately that mainstream radio has come through for me. Everything on the track is tight. The organ solo is fucking badass. The lyrics contain atypical prog-y allusions to nature, but in a silky smooth, unobtrusive way. The fact that it segues into a 2 minute guitar solo that'd sound best coming from the boombox of some hick on the infield at Talladega is just sad. The fact that it then goes into Bach is nearly laughable. The rest of the album is forgettable. Lyrics like "West of now and East of yesterday" are best left to children and not committed to precious vinyl.

One great song, five throwaway tracks. Welcome to the bulk of 70's music.

**

Download

Buy it from Amazon

23. Daft Punk - Alive 2007

2008-03-20T19:42:00.002-04:00

From what I hear, Daft Punk had one of the greatest, most legendary tours of all time in 2007. Sadly, I missed all of it. Even the shows where Daft Punk was playing at LCD Soundsystem's house or stage or whatever weak pun I saw a million times on Pitchfork.

No matter...because the boys in robot masks released a CD from their glass pyramid that's chock full of what the live show packed, minus hot chicks, sweat, and alcohol.

The shows themselves appear to be mash-ups of previous Daft Punk material (mash-ups of mash-ups!), and do not fail to convey the energy of the experiance, which is the most essential part of any live recording - the feeling of being there.

That being said, there's really no such things as Key Tracks or Sounds Like...it's a live show, so every song is key, and it sounds like Daft Punk live. It's awesome though. So check out this video and buy that shit.

Buy It! Insound

The Best Concert Ever

2008-03-20T01:58:00.002-04:00

Yep. One note. I can't believe I missed this when it happened. Then Meg went crazy and the Stripes put out some cameras and Jack apparently got together with the Raconteurs, recorded an album, and will tour with them this year.

Oh yeah...new Raconteurs album on Tuesday. No notice. How Godly.

Sufjan Stevens - Palm Sunday Tornado Hits Crystal Lake

2008-03-14T13:56:00.002-04:00

Palm Sunday Tornado Hits Crystal Lake from Asthmatic Kitty on Vimeo.

I am about a month late on this, but it is beautiful, and astonishingly so.

This is from The Avalanche, a collection of outtakes from the Illinois sessions.

24. Saturday Looks Good to Me - Fill Up the Room

2008-03-11T19:44:00.002-04:00

I saw Saturday Looks Good to Me in March last year, arriving just before they went on after going to some jazz club as a requirement for some class. I tried to get some friends to go, but that was a failed effort. I was one of maybe 14 or so people who heard Fred Thomas play through a good majority of the songs on 2007's Fill Up the Room, because the only people there were hardcore fans who would have appreciated such a thing.

At the time, I thought that most of the songs had a very sinister bent to them, and for a good reason considering the turnout and the death of the keyboardist's mother, resulting in his leaving the tour. To be totally honest, I wasn't much for it, because the songs didn't mesh and blend as well live (and early) as stuff found on 2004's Every Night or the earlier All Your Summer Songs.

Thomas was pretty self depreciating that night, turning down requests do do songs because he didn't have the right voice, that voice belonging to Bettie Marie Barnes. She appears on only one song here, "Hands in the Snow," which surprisingly takes nothing away from the group. Instead, there are drunken vocal harmonies between Thomas and the rest of the group, singing along to la-de-da's and clapping their hands.

The album is less thrift store & record collection than Every Night, which means that I like it less (it's one of my favorite albums though, so again, that doesn't take much away from the quality of the album), and there's a terrific set of songs that work just as well as anything they've done with or without Barnes. While they didn't fill up the room (ha!) at the Southgate House, they still put out one heck of an album.

Look for the concert (amazingly clear recording even...) sometime soon on that music blog I've been ignoring in favor of finishing this fucking list.

Sounds Like: A drunken night of reminiscing with friends.

Key Tracks: Apple, (Even If You Die In the) Ocean, When I Lose My Eyes, Make A Plan, Money in the Afterlife

Watch:

Buy: Amazon

25. Deerhoof - Friend Opportunity

2008-03-10T19:58:00.002-04:00

Deerhoof is a band so odd that calling them "progressive" or "experimental" doesn't come close to doing their sound justice. They're so unique that the album came with 12 different covers - you can't pin them down to any single image.

Friend Opportunity is probably the groups most accessible album (I deleted most of their stuff from my iPod in frustration, tired of "panda panda panda" being yelped over clashing guitars before this album came out), and just flat out rips for something like the first 24 minutes. Things get more laid back near the end though, with a 12 minute song that you can probably throw into a pile with 12 minute plus excursions from bands like Yes.

This is the album that convinced me to give them another try, and now I'm haplessly in love with the fucking panda song.

Sounds Like: A tiny Asian woman riding the crest of a huge fucking wave of sound.

Key Tracks: The Perfect Me, +81, Matchbook Seeks Maniac

Watch:

Buy It! Amazon

26. Marnie Stern - In Advance of the Broken Arm

2008-03-10T02:14:00.002-04:00

From the first few seconds of this album, it is clear that Marnie Stern can shred like few humans on this Earth can. No, really. We're talking Van Halen level riffing, though it's completely devoid of perverted David Lee Roth and any studio sheen. The album comes across as shockingly honest and increasingly charming...there's even a jump rope chant later in the album.

I will be honest: this album isn't for everybody. It took a lot of listening for me to be convinced, but every time I listened to the it, I was rewarded with something new. My appreciation for low-fi music has also been on the rise, also contributing to my increased appreciation for Stern's work. She's probably also the best guitarist I've heard since Jack White got huge...the way Stern plays is just bat-shit insane.

It's like how every moron like me plays guitar...only she pulls it off in mind blowing fashion, as opposed to everybody else not knowing how to play guitar.

Sounds Like: People should start getting used to the idea that women can, in fact, rock the fuck out. Did they miss out on Sleater-Kinney and the 90's or something?

Key Tracks: Vibrational Match, Every Single Line Means Something, Put All Your Eggs in One Basket and Then Watch That Basket!!!, Absorb Those Numbers

Download: Vibrational Match

Buy It! Amazon

27. Saul Williams - The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of Niggy Tardust

2008-03-10T01:50:00.002-04:00

No, I have no freaking clue why the album is called what it's called, and no, I have no idea why there aren't any real David Bowie allusions in the album. I came into this expecting a concept album about an alien who crash landed in Virginia during Colonial times, resulting in his enslavement, though his advanced immune system and extremely slow aging allows him to outlive his enslavers, against whom he rises up against, before living through the prejudice of the rest of America's existance, with a late discovered talent for rapping.

What I got instead is a Trent Reznor produced rap album, which means that it's almost rap-metal, though that's a disservice to Trent, NIN, and Saul Williams, a well meaning beat poet who knows how to break it down to the illest of beats.

If you want an example of how badass this album truly is, consider the following: Trent samples Public Enemy. Then he proceeds to industrialize "Sunday Bloody Sunday." And then, just for shits and giggles, he and Saul do no skits. Zero. Fifteen songs on a rap album.

Also, it's another one of those "fuck the record label" albums. You can download it for five bucks. And you probably should.

Sounds Like: A ghetto-Gothic millionaire, a super-duper-star.

Key Tracks: Tr(n)igger, Sunday Bloody Sunday, Niggy Tardust

Watch:

Buy It! niggytardust.com

28. Beirut - The Flying Club Cup

2008-03-10T01:32:00.002-04:00

Another album that has admittedly grown on me since I listed it last year, I suppose I should explain my initial reservations towards it.

Beirut had me, essentially, at hello. I missed the boat on their debut album, being as I wasn't really listening to music, but my short infatuation with music blogs being my measuring stick for all things brilliant as far as new music was concerned led me to this:

And this:

Zach Condon's voice? Silk. Zach Condon's trumpet? Everything I've ever wanted to hear in a band since I started playing trumpet.I will admit, shamelessly, that most of the time I spend playing the damn thing anymore are riffs from The Gulag Orkestar.

So then I went to see Beirut in concert, which really counts as maybe my second real concert after The White Stripes, and they got me hooked on live music. And A Hawk and a Hacksaw. And the song "Siki Siki Baba," which led to Kokani Orkestar, which was all part of my becoming a playlist Nazi. And I gained a new appreciation for my instrument.

So enter The Flying Club Cup, and exit the horn. Condon's voice is still silky smooth, and the addition of a band (before it was just him and Jeremy Barnes, of Neutral Milk Hotel (bonus points later came as a result of my becoming obsessed with E6) and A Hawk and a Hacksaw, with a full band added for the tour and Lon Gisland EP, which is where the supremely beautiful "Elephant Gun" comes from). While friends of mine tried to convince me that this was a better album than the debut, I remained skeptical. I wanted my damn trumpet at the damn forefront.

Sometimes, this happens. Most of the time, the album stays true to it's French roots - trumpet takes a back seat to songcraft, I suppose. The Balkan influences of the first album were melted away with the addition of a full band, something that I'm guessing evolved during touring post Lon Gisland (I saw them beforehand). Putting the horns back in the mix a bit allows Condon's voice to take center stage, as well as his songwriting abilities, which shine on songs like "A Sunday Smile" and "Nantes."

A seriously good album, and if I were to see a drunken Zach Condon post-concert like I did two years ago, I'd probably gush about this as much as I did his debut. Probably top 5 in retrospect, and a shining example of why I shouldn't be allowed to make lists.

Sounds Like: A vacation in France with plenty of alcohol and some friends and a lot of good music.

Key Tracks: Nantes, A Sunday Smile, Guyamas Sonora, Un Dernier Verre (Pour la Route), Cliquot

Download: Nantes

Watch: Videos for all the songs thanks to brilliant French blog La Blogothèque

Buy It! Amazon

29. Tegan and Sara - The Con

2008-03-09T14:32:00.002-04:00

It took the White Stripes covering "Walking With a Ghost" to convince me that Tegan and Sara were a band worth listening to, but I'm glad they did, because The Con wound up being a pleasant surprise.

Tegan and Sara deal in simplistic music, relying on a bit of trickery in the production to make songs worth listening to. Instruments go out of tune, synthesizers wail incessantly, and drums are pounded into the ground. It's all very big, very 80's pop stuff...and it's fun, which matters sometimes. There's a few songs on here that are just insanely catchy. I'm probably going to see them in May, and they're on my extremely long shortlist of bands I want to see at Bonnaroo. There's really nothing more positive that I can say...I'm willing to see them twice, less than a month apart.

Sounds Like: Pop...80's style.

Key Tracks: The Con; In Your Head; Soil, Soil; Like O, Like H

Watch:

Buy It! Amazon

30. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Some Loud Thunder

2008-03-09T13:59:00.002-04:00

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah came out of nowhere in 2005; no record label, no hype, no fucking problem, selling above six figures of their debut album, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Two years then passed, and everybody kinda pushed them away. Like plenty of other bands with blog hype, their time in e-spotlight had passed, and many were frankly tired of them. The band refused to be ignored though, releasing Some Loud Thunder early last year, and even scoring a top 50 spot in the charts. Clearly, this wasn't just some passing fad of a band like say, The Cold War Kids.

If anything changed in the two years between CYHSY albums, it's pretty much limited to the production quality. The songs come through much more clear than they did in the past, which robs the group of their roughish charm. Alec Ounsworth still warbles with the same intensity and yearning, and the group has the same propensity to pull out harps, harmonicas, bells, soaring melodies, and all that other stuff from their debut...but it's all too clean. Adding to that are a few problematic tracks that wouldn't have been exceptional on the debut, either. Still, this is a solid collection of songs, and the good far outweighs the bad. CYHSY remain a band on the rise, slumping only slightly with their sophomore effort. Still very much worth listening to.

Sounds Like: A group tired of their own hype with a bit of money in their pocket and a world renowned producer at the board. Evolution, pretty much.

Key Tracks: Mama, Won't You Keep Them Castles in the Air and Burning; Love Song No. 7, Emily Jean Stock

Download: Love Song No.7

Buy It! Amazon

Funkadelic - One Nation Under a Groove (1979)

2008-03-09T00:30:00.002-05:00

My current obsession with huge, collected, all-inclusive groups of musicians (Elephant 6, Wu-Tang Clan, etc.) started a few years ago when I randomly bought a best of collection of Parliament, based on my liking "Flashlight" as a kid. From there, I became engrossed in P-Funk mythology, thinking it was pretty much the most bad ass shit on the planet. I'd roll down the road in my white Ford Focus, extolling how bad ass Chocolate Cities were, totally oblivious to my whiteness, wishing like hell that I could dance to the awesomeness that was P-Funk.

During these formative years, I probably would have said that, of the two bands, Parliament was better than Funkadelic. The thought of a bunch of afro-headed space aliens embedding Funk in the pyramids and battling against some evil dude named Sir Nose (who was evil because he wouldn't dance) was hilarious and set to really good music. Looking on it now though, I'd have to say that it was Funkadelic that had the stronger stuff - Parliament's stuff was clouded by Sci-Fi and the occasional song about big feet; Funkadelic was pure, unmitigated Funk.

To be honest, absolutely nothing needs to be said about Parliament-Funkadelic. New Wave wouldn't have existed without Funketelechy vs. the Placebo Syndrome, just as rap's evolution would have been hindered without much of the P-Funk catalog being sampled. Still, their contributions to music are somewhat overlooked (Rolling Stone couldn't even put them in their Top 50 when they released their Top 100 Artists of All Time list). It's near criminal.

Like most P-Funk albums, One Nation Under A Groove is a very loose concept album about the power of music. Having already covered the healing powers of the medium ("Funk not only moves; it can remove, dig?"), and having breifly gone over the unifying power of music on albums like Free Your Mind...And Your Ass Will Follow, George Clinton and the gang create a nation forged under the principles of Funk, a theme that is evident from the very album cover, with the Iwo Jima style planting of a flag reading "R&B." The opening 14:30, "One Nation Under a Groove" and "Groovallegiance" cover the topic more in depth: "Funkadelica is the nation I would like to live under."

"Who Says a Funk Band Can't Play Rock Music?!" is, obviously, about P-Funk's ability to cross genres, and really, about the universal reality of music in general. Funk is rock is music, and music is good. Distinctions don't matter, so long as the party keeps rolling. "Promentalshitbackwashpsychosis Enema Squad (The Doo-Doo Chasers)" is like one of those "Repeat After Me" pledges about how much the real world is, pretty much, shit, with music as the only way to cleanse oneself of "mental diarrhea." There's a ballad of no great consequence, though it grooves like a motherfucker, and a closer that focuses on Funk's ability to grow on a listener.

Listening to music like this is like taking the essence of an all night dance party and injecting it straight into your brain. Living in a single, I shamelessly dance around to "One Nation Under a Groove" like the fat, pasty white boy that I am, free of guilt, free of shame, and, at least for 14:30, free of the inhibitions that would prevent me from otherwise going through life dancing. The fact that the rest of the music is great ("Into You" would be grounds for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for any other band of this era, and "Cholly (Funk Getting Ready To Roll!)" is as great an argument for electronic keyboards as I can come up with off the top of my head), is merely the icing on top of a delicious, afro-shaped cake.

With six songs, Clinton and Funkadelic cover musics ability to unite, break barriers, create, heal, and change. Six songs. That's pretty impressive for one album...and this was something like his 18th in nine years. Fathom that.

*****

Key Tracks: One Nation Under a Groove, Groovallegiance, Who Says a Funk Band Can't Play Rock?!, Into You

Download: One Nation Under a Groove

Buy It: Amazon

Major Organ and the Adding Machine - Major Organ and the Adding Machine (2001)

2008-03-08T19:21:00.002-05:00

I think it's entirely too easy to rag on an artist for doing something completely different. Say, in 1998, you released one of the greatest albums ever before disappearing from the face of the earth, with only hints here and there that you're not dead and are, in fact, working on something new. Say, in 2001, you release said new project, and it is so far and away different from 1998's classic that a large majority of the internets are wishing that you had, in fact stayed dead as opposed to releasing your album.

This was the situation of Jeff Magnum, mastermind of Elephant 6 original act Neutral Milk Hotel, whose 1998 album In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is probably my favorite thing ever recorded. After '98, Magnum and NMH toured for a bit, before announcing that they, like many acts from the volatile 90's indie rock scene, were over and done, at least for the time being. When it became clear that Magnum was working on a new project - Major Organ and the Adding Machine - the hype around it was huge. The disappointment surrounding it was, probably, bigger. Magnum has not poked his head out from his conservatory since, with the exception of doing some collages on acoustic guitars that I wish I owned.

The major complaint, and this went for most of the Elephant 6 Collective at this point, was that the group had moved away from it's lo-fi roots and began noodling with electronic loops and oddly mixed in bits of sound. That the collective had expanded from three to a million bands didn't exactly help, either...the critics were lost, lost, lost. An album from Magnum, NMH or not, seemed like a breath of fresh air in comparison...there was a lot of genius in his head, and he'd previously shown an ability to rein it all in.

When Major Organ was released, it was seen as the end of E6; the straw that broke the camel's back. You couldn't have gotten something more different from Magnum's last effort. Whereas Aeroplane was mellow, acoustic, and soaring; Major Organ had all of the electronic noodling that critics had come to hate, and to make matters worse, when there wasn't an actual song going on, it was a sound collage. Oh...and Magnum had dragged Of Montreal's Kevin Barnes into the act, as well as the Elephant 6 Orchestra, which meant that any number of brilliant musicians were involved on what was pretty much a clusterfuck.

What would you expect though, with a description like this?

The major is a sound poet, instrument builder and complete freak with his teeth out, talking alchemy and eggplants to a dog. the elephant six orchestra is the adding machine, interpreting the majors "compositions" and instructions to create a world of beards vomiting and birthing. please note: this is not neutral milk hotel under another name. this is aunt eggma under the name major organ under the name the elephant six orchestra who all are under the name alfred snouts. alfred snouts is the twin attached to the major, so really this would be a major organ album under the name of no one!

So people hated it. Or did they? I'm not sure. Me? I'm engrossed by most of it, being as it is a collection of musicians that I greatly adore fucking around on a 4 track and taking absolutely no credit for it (TWAS THE MAJOR!). There's a lot of early Of Montreal-style vocal modulation, and very clearly, the voices of Magnum and Barnes (the E6 website also claims Julian Koster, Eric Harris, Will Cullen Hart, and Andrew Reiger were involved, though I'm not familiar enough with Elf Power, Olivia Tremor Control, or Circulatory System to pick out their contributions), but a lack of direction, which is probably the album's downfall.. And to make things even weirder, there's supposedly a movie coming out based on the whole deal, which looks to be very influenced by the Magical Mystery Tour movie.

All that being said, I don't fault Magnum, Barnes, or anybody else for experimentation. I enjoy the album for what it is...which is really an impossible thing to describe. There's plenty of interesting concepts and a lot of good moments on the album, and I'm looking forward to eventually hunting the film down (I highly doubt it'll be playing in more than maybe three theaters). In simplest terms, this album is a bunch of awesome dudes wearing fake mustaches and jamming away at whatever instruments they had lying around, like they always did, but this time, they annoy people. It's totally more early Of Montreal than any Neutral Milk Hotel...take that for what you will.

As far as the songs themselves go, I'm a fan of repetition and such, so "Life Form (Transmission Received)" and "Water Dripping on Bread Makes Bread Taste Not So Tasty" will probably resonate better with me than they will for you. There's very little in the way of traditional songs. "Madam Truffle" comes closest.

Everything is quirky. I like quirky. I reward quirky.

*** & 1/2*

Key Tracks: Water Dripping on Bread Makes Bread Taste Not So Tasty, Madam Truffle, Life Form (Transmission Received)

Download: Life Form (Transmission Received)

Buy It: Orange Twin Records

31. Patrick Wolf - The Magic Position

2008-03-06T14:56:00.002-05:00

Now that's an album cover.

Orchestral pop should, by all rights, be some of the most annoying music ever. Pop music is generally sugary sweet to begin with, and the addition of horns and strings and lightly twinkling bells is like frosting the damn thing and drizzling it with caramel or syrup with whipped cream on top. And cherries.

The Magic Position excels as an album despite it's orchestral pop roots for reasons that are completely unlike the Polyphonic Spree - Wolf's music leans more towards the techno aspect of pop, drum machines providing the beat, and his lyrical delivery is often sinister, sometimes bordering on maniacal.

When Wolf isn't depressed, he's an old crooner, singing over little more than bass and piano, which is a welcome change of pace from the string-bass-female vocals frenzy that has dominated laid back pop since the mid '90s. In all, a good pop album.

Also, I like his hair.

Sounds Like: An orchestra, a jazz club, a computer program, and a dude who knows how to sing.

Key Tracks: The Magical Position, Accident and Emergency, Augustine, The Stars

Watch:

Buy It! Amazon

32. Of Montreal - Icons, Abstract Thee EP

2008-03-04T22:00:00.003-05:00

A dirty trick? A twap? Yes. I know that Mika's Life in Cartoon Motion was supposed to be here, but I've really soured on that album since coming up with the list, and this seemed as good a place as any to espouse my love of what is pretty much an epilogue for 2007's best album, Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?

In any case, I've heard it described that the five songs on this EP serve as a bridge between "The Past is a Grotesque Animal" and "Bunny Ain't No Kind of Rider," with "Du Og Meg" serving as a fairytale flashback and "No Conclusion" bringing us back to the stark horror of "Grotesque," with it's lament for the falling apart of the relationship ("I'm allergic to the world when we're separated") and thoughts of suicide ("tonight I feel like I should just destroy myself").

The same stuff that works on Hissing Fauna (lol, spoilers) works here: the music is sugar sweet, masking the completely bitter and broken words. The EP is pretty much the more emotional parts of the album that preceded it in ultra-concentrated form.

If that isn't enough, "No Conclusion," the albums near 10 minute closer, is every bit the musical accomplishment that Hissing Fauna's anchoring 10-plus minute epic "The Past is a Grotesque Animal" was, meaning that it is among the very best music released last year.

An absolute must have...I think it's something like seven dollars.

Sounds Like: Masking depression with the funkiest of funk, then declaring that you want to die...to the funkiest of funk.

Key Tracks: Do Og Meg, Voltaic Crusher/Undrum to Muted Da, No Conclusion

Download: No Conclusion

Buy It! from Polyvinyl Records

Comments:

Ben said: Wow, I totally forgot this came out. I'll have to get this to go along with my recent obsession with Hissing Fauna. Thanks for the kind words on my blog. I will for sure be whoring out your blogs, especially the Heathcliff one. I haven't laughed that hard at the internet in a while.

Nice blog title. <3 for Floyd.

~Ben of Notes Are Shattered

33. Black Moth Super Rainbow - Dandelion Gum

2008-03-04T20:31:00.002-05:00

I started listening to Black Moth Super Rainbow two years ago, because I thought that they had a cool name (mind you, I've only been seriously listening to the music of my generation (mind you, the good shit) for three years, so cool names meant everything). When I finished listening 2003's Falling Through a Field, I fell in love with the fuzzed out, psychedelic trip that BMSR had somehow been able to put to music (and, maybe more impressively, to disc).

Since then, the band's profile has only grown. They've opened for the Flaming Lips (very fitting), and are probably among the more prolific groups of 60's style psych rockers. Just about everything is endearing about them, from the titles of songs ("Neon Syrup for the Cemetery Sisters," "When the Sun Grows on Your Tongue," "Spinning Cotton Candy in a Shack Made of Shingles," etc.), to the pseudonyms of band members (Tobacco, The Seven Fields of Aphelion, Power Pill Fist, *Iffernaut, and Father Hummingbird), to the extremely lo-fi, near cut and paste aesthetics of the album. There's almost no better way to sum up the package than to quote them...

"Deep in the woods of western Pennsylvania vocoders hum amongst the flowers and synths bubble under the leaf-strewn ground while flutes whistle in the wind and beats bounce to the soft drizzle of a warm acid rain. As the sun peeks out from between the clouds, the organic aural concoction of Black Moth Super Rainbow starts to glisten above the trees."

Bad. Ass.

Sounds Like: Wandering through the forest with the sun filtering in the trees when three fairies descend upon you, offering acid and an instrument to play, not to mention eternal bliss. Stunned, you blink at their offer, and the fairies are gone. You find yourself flying above the treetops, music vibrating through your wings.

Key Tracks: Forever Heavy, Jump Into My Mouth and Breathe the Stardust, Sun Lips, Rollerdisco

Download: Sun Lips

Buy It! Amazon

Al Green - So Tired of Being Alone (Live)

2008-03-04T19:21:00.002-05:00

It is generally admitted that Al Green is probably one of the greatest artists from the 70's Soul movement...or ever really. I could listen to him all day.

I still wouldn't get laid though.

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Out of Reaches (Soundcheck)

2008-03-03T15:20:00.003-05:00

This is what I have to look forward to on Easter Sunday. Only there will be more people, because I'm sure that the Southgate House will be full up with soulless bastards who'd rather rock than worship.

Sleater-Kinney - All Hands On the Bad One (2000)

2008-03-03T10:07:00.002-05:00

By the year 2000, Sleater-Kinney was a group with the weight of an entire movement on their shoulders. The riot grrrl subculture of the 1990's was pretty much a corpse: founding band Bikini Kill had broken up two years before, Bratmobile was just releasing their first full-length studio album in six years, and the rest of the movement's heavy hitters (Excuse 17, Free Kitten, Huggy Bear, L7, Team Dresch, 7 Year Bitch, etc.) lay dead or in hiatus on the side of the road.

To make matters worse, the whole "riot grrrl" thing had been misunderstood from the get-go. Bands like Hole, No Doubt, and Veruca Salt were stamped with the label (as was P.J. Harvey), and while bands like the Spice Girls were parading around giving the peace sign and mewling "GIRL POWER!" at every given moment, bands who lingered outside of the mainstream were criticized for dragging feminism into unladylike places like mosh pits and punk rock albums. Not only was the movement dead and rotting, it was being beaten with a switch.

I find it almost funny to read the old Rolling Stone review of the album now, claiming that the album, a "modest effort," would be a masterpiece for another band. Which one? S-K were really the only riot grrrl group to get and press from the magazine, and none of their records received 5 or even 4&1/2 star reviews from the publication. Even the Seattle area's crowning achievement, Nirvana's Nevermind, managed a paltry three stars before guys like David Fricke started reviewing their stuff (Fricke also declared Sleater-Kinney the best American punk group of all time, above even the Ramones, upon the groups going on hiatus).

The record's main fault, apparently, is it's singular focus. Five of the album's thirteen songs focus on the relationship between women and men within the world of rock-'n-roll: "I could be demure like/girls who are soft for/boys who are fearful of/getting an earful/but i gotta rock/I'd rather be a ladyman."

"#1 Must Have" deals with the downfall of riot grrrl in extremely clear terms, stripping down to a very bare bones, D.I.Y. sound that defined the early albums while espousing that something new needs to come up from the ashes of Lilith Fair, the Spice Girls, and poor labeling.

In all, this is the sound of a band evolving, by process of stripping down their sound. The distortion of previous albums is gone, the death of a movement is behind them, and the band stand poised on the edge of their best two albums, The Woods and One Beat. You can't blame them for being a tad nostalgic.

P.S.: Bonus points for "Ironclad," a song that references the Monitor and the Merrimack, of all things.

****

Key Tracks: The Ballad of a Ladyman, Ironclad, All Hands on the Bad One, You're No Rock 'n Roll Fun, #1 Must Have

Download: Ironclad

Buy It: Amazon

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Real Emotional Trash (2008)

2008-02-29T00:18:00.002-05:00

I suppose that the best thing I can do when talking about this album is to be completely honest: I haven't found time to listen to Pavement. Not even Slanted and Enchanted. Stephen Malkmus then, has been a total enigma to me. The reason I was excited about it (and I mean excited) was because Janet Weiss, the drummer for Sleater-Kinney had joined Malkmus' band, The Jicks, and was going to tour for them. If I were forced to place my favorite drummers in order, it'd start like this:

1. John Bonham
2. Janet Weiss

In Sleater-Kinney, her drumming was loud enough to give you a lump in your throat, consistent enough that Sleater-Kinney never looked back or lost focus after 1997's Dig Me Out, and just worked for me on pretty much every level. Her fills on 2005's The Woods are a huge reason as to why I consider Sleater-Kinney one of my favorite groups, if not my favorite American punk act, period.

Janet Weiss' intensity has been reigned in on Real Emotional Trash, but she is no less important here than she was in S-K. Malkmus has a tendency to jam, and he loves his big, driving guitar parts. Weiss is who holds it together. Without her, the albums 10 minute long title track would have fallen flat on it's face.

Oh...not that Malkmus isn't himself a beast - the opening riff on album opener "Dragonfly Pie" is one of the hugest I've ever heard. On most songs, the guitar acts as an extension of Malkmus' voice, which is equal parts melancholy college act and stoned blues. "Dragonfly Pie" will, most likely, be remembered as one of the best songs of the year. An absolute blast from start to finish.

The rest of the songs are similarly good, Malkmus' shit-hot guitar and Weiss' nigh-virtuoso turn on the drums creating something extremely special. Six of the albums ten songs clock in at five minutes or above, and not a single one of them drag. The only middling track is "We Can't Help You," simply because it doesn't match the brilliance of the other songs (though I'm a sucker for Weiss' "la-lala-la-la" background vocals).

Currently, my favorite album of 2008. Can't wait to see them on Easter.

****1/2*

Key Tracks: Dragonfly Pie, Real Emotional Trash, Out of Reaches, Gardenia, Elmo Delmo

Download: Dragonfly Pie

Buy It: Amazon

Welcome to My Blog

2008-02-28T20:51:00.002-05:00

Oh hi. Those of you who know me know that I have a very eclectic taste in music. Those of you who don't know me will likely never read this blog. In any case...here's the introduction.

My first blog was a music blog. It sucked. I trolled around other music blogs, looking for my favorite tracks, then I'd post them. I think I did a post about how cool Quentin Tarrintino soundtracks were. My main blog, Careful With That Blog, Eugene, featured plenty of music - songs, music videos, concerts I'd been to, but it had no real focus or drive.

At the tail end of 2007, I decided that I'd embark on an impossible project for one man: reviewing what I felt to be the best 51 albums of the year. I'm currently failing to do it, time constraints being such though they are. I liked writing about albums though...there's something more complete about it than there is in writing about a song or a music video, so here this blog is.

I intended to start this blog once I wrote about my favorite album of last year, but I don't feel like waiting. Pretty much, if I like something musically, I'll write about it here. Stumbling Thru Myspace will also move here, seeing as that involves music and not the profiles of hipster kids.

I'll make every effort to post a review of something every day. At least one. I'll probably be reviewing a bit of everything, from every time period. I hope you have the heart to read through a Patsy Cline review, should ever I write one.

I'll use a 5 star rating system to begin with...and I may eventually progress into doing the rankings out of 10.

That's pretty much it. I know...you're itching for me to tell you what to listen to.

I live for that shit.

34. Feist - The Reminder

2008-02-20T15:02:00.002-05:00

I can't officially count missing Feist as a "regret" of my Bonnaroo 2007 experiance - the Hold Steady were playing. Now that The Reminder is stuck in my head, I've still got to wonder just how well this would have translated to a festival setting, but Goddamn is this album good.

It's amazing what you can do with a few instruments. At times, there's banjo. At times, there's a horn. Sometimes there's a synth, maybe a guitar, but for the most part this album is piano, drums, and the voice of one Leslie Feist. One word describes it (poorly): Gorgeous. It is equal parts fun, haunting, moving, and soulful as she moves through Jazz to Ambiance to Pop and back again.

I'd like to be able to compare it to something, but it really doesn't do justice to Feist. It's simple to the point of being a gimmick, but unlike so many of today's breed of pop singers, Leslie Feist allows the music to speak for itself, production be fucked.

Sounds Like: An evening at a Jazz club, with a banjo thrown in near the end of the show for shits and giggles.

Key Tracks: 1234, My Moon My Man, Honey Honey

Watch:

Buy It! Amazon

35. Jonny Greenwood - There Will Be Blood OST

2008-02-20T11:36:00.002-05:00

There is something to be said for the power of music when put to film. Stanley Kubrick knew it, certainly, and every now and again there's a movie that places a song in just the right place, sending shivers down your spine.

There Will Be Blood, which is my pick to win Best Picture this year, does exactly that. The movie has a focus on sparse images; deserts, plains, oil derricks. The whole thing is a barren, ominous landscape whereupon the greed of two men clash. The music is fittingly ominous and is, at parts, fairly devastating, becoming a charecter in its own right.

Jonny Greenwood, the guitarist for Radiohead for the uninitiated, works like a master with what he's given. Listening to the soundtrack, you feel alone, you feel hurt, you feel stunned, and there's always, always a foreboding sense of doom, like the characters on screen are set to explode at any minute. That this was ignored in consideration for Best Original Score is fucking criminal, to be completely honest. There aren't many things I've listened to that are more haunting and atmospheric and vital to the crescendo of a film.

Sounds Like: There's an ocean of oil under our feet, and getting at it will cause mass dystopia. Also, milkshakes; drainage.

That's as far as I'm going to go with this album...the tracks are all key to the film, which you need to see if you haven't. No mp3's, either...you need to see the movie before listening to the music on its own.

36. The Besnard Lakes - Are the Dark Horse

2008-02-20T11:21:00.002-05:00

I am jealous of cities that have a burgeoning music scene. Detroit had one, but fuck it if Jack White doesn't think he's from Memphis. Cincinnati prides itself on it's relationship to the arts, but I can't think of that many bands who come from here. Odds are, if I go to a bar, I'm going to see a shitty cover band. Montreal though? They've got one hell of a music scene. So good, in fact, that this particular band was unjustly ignored until this year.

The Besnard Lakes are a group centered around a husband/wife duo and their haunting, Beach Boys-esque melodies, methodological pacing, and overall scary atmosphere. The combination of Jack Leseck's falsetto and Olga Goreas's low, purring voice is, to say the least, unsettling. When the band is moving faster, they sound a bit like Piper At the Gates of Dawn-era Pink Floyd (which is a compliment, not a knock).

While they're doing all of this though, they somehow find a way to take these familiar sounds and make them their own. These are sounds that have been neglected by the mainstream in favor of a streamlined guitars-n-robotic-production approach. The first two songs lead into a devastating middle stretch where everything moves and works as a unit, even though it feels as though every part of the unit seems to be fighting to drag the rest down. For instance, the instrumentation on "Devastation" is monstrous while the vocals are laid back to an eerie degree.

"On Bedford and Grand" suggests that the album might fall apart in the closing minutes, but "Cedric's War" closes the album as it began; in the shadow of Brian Williams and crew. I'm at a loss to explain how a band could go through so many changes, have a few excellent rockers, a few extremely moving songs, nearly kill the album (it's harsh, but I hate shoegaze), and finish strong...in less than 45 minutes.

Sounds Like: A lost weekend spent with a guitar, a record player, and a 4 track. And mushrooms.

Key Tracks: Disaster, For Agent 13, Devastation

Download: Devastation

Buy It! Amazon

37. Band of Horses - Cease to Begin

2008-02-20T10:31:00.002-05:00

There's something about this band that...I just like. I think I initially downloaded their first album or a Tour EP or something based on Pandora's playing a lot of them on a station of mine, which, as it turned out, was pretty cool. Their song "The Great Salt Lake" had me hooked.

Like all new bands, their sophomore effort is out incredibly quick; one year later. It's a little bit country, whereas Everything All The Time was a bit more indie rock 'n roll, but I don't mind. I tend to like good country, and, shockingly enough, the best country seems to come from indie rockers (or indie folkies. Whatever.).

I think the opening seconds of the album are my favorite: Ben Bridwell's voice cutting through a softly strumming guitar and a bit of drum n' bass like the ghost of somebody you love cutting through the fog of sleep. Then the guitars get cranked up and we head into the rest of the album, which is equal parts sad country and loser rock. There's even an ode to a stray dog. To make everything better, Bridwell sings as though he's truly amazed at the humanity in the mundane, everyday moments of life...all while his band churns out the melodic jamz.

Sounds Like: What happens when a Northwestern indie band goes South for the winter.

Key Tracks: Is There a Ghost, Ode to LRC, Detlef Schrempf

Download: Is There a Ghost

Buy It! Amazon

Stumbling Thru Myspace: Chandelier Teeth

2008-02-10T19:51:00.002-05:00

Eons ago, when MySpace was cool, it was announced that there'd be some crazy new set-up for bands to post their pages, music, thoughts, shows, etc. Everybody in the universe simultaneously said "AWESOME," and then record labels got to work and made extremely expensive layouts for their bands, ensuring that groups like Dashboard Confessional had a huge MySpace following and friend spaces filled with "thx 4 teh adz, lul, ryan iz so hawt!"

Not cool.

When I initially joined MySpace, it was for the creation of a band that never got off the ground: The Velvet Bag. My page was pretty fucking simple: white, with information. Eventually, there may have been music. Who knows. That's how I envisioned the bands thing to be like: a bunch of unknowns vying for attention in a world that would otherwise ignore then.

It seems as though Chandelier Teeth has also subscribed to that particular maxim: a look at their page reveals nothing. There's no band members (the blog claims that the drummer died, but that they're looking for another one), no influences, no showtimes, and no pictures of the band...just that grinning heart abomination thing.

What they (she?) do have are a few extremely lo-fi pop songs that don't last much longer than a minute and sometimes last for two. There's also an extremely cheesy cover of "Raindrops," just a chick singing over the mp3 of the song.

Needless to say, I fell in love.

Myspace Profile: Chandelier Teeth

Style: Other/Other/Other

Location: Beverly Hills, CA, USA

Top Eight:

Song: Paino

Verdict: I like it. No, really. The clip above might not be the best, but it's the only one that I could steal from MySpace. The rest of it is less Casio Keyboard, more acoustic guitar, same level of quirkiness. I like quirkiness, and I like demo tapes that sound like they're going places. She sounds a bit like Kimya Dawson and more than a bit like a diversion from homework or whatever she was pushing off to record stuff. Good shit.

38. Kanye West - Graduation

2008-02-09T00:42:00.002-05:00

If you're the kind of guy who goes off of album covers, you're thinking "holy shit, Kanye West has gone crazy." Me? I'm wondering if his next album is going to be called Grad School (hahahahahaha!). To be completely honest, when I was going through this list, I was about 99% sure that Kanye wouldn't make it. Seriously. I hate him. I hate his music. The fact that he's going to be headlining Bonnaroo OVER the Allman Brothers Band makes my skin crawl, etc.

Thing is...as far as mainstream rap goes, Kanye is king. Listening to the radio this summer was torture. "Party Like a Rockstar" was every other fucking song...the White Stripes wasn't dropping until after Bonnaroo...and then...like a bright, blinding beacon from God, "Stronger." Holy fucking shit...Daft Punk was on rap radio.

Daft. Fucking. Punk.

That's the only fucking song on the album I like. Seriously. I'm fucking shallow. One song...and here it is.

The production is tight, as it damn well should be, and the praise for it is well deserved. If there's something Kanye is good at, it's being the most unorthodox of the orthodox. With "Stronger," two Kanye songs have now snuck onto my iPod...the other being a mashup called "Zombies Walk," a clever mix of Sufjan Stevens and Kanye's huge hit.

Also of note: The absolute 180 from his previous album's insistence that Kanye wasn't all about the bling. He is, now that he has it.

Sounds Like: List filler that should probably have...ohhhhh...Of Montreal's awesome post-Hissing Fauna ep? Yeah. Still..."Stronger" is pretty fucking awesome...completely carrying the record.

Key Tracks: Stronger.

Download: Stronger

Buy It! Amazon

39. Ghostface Killah - The Big Doe Rehab

2008-02-08T12:26:00.003-05:00

If you don't think that Ghostface Killah is the best M.C. in the world right now, you probably don't listen to much rap. Between Fishscale, More Fish, this, and 8 Diagrams, there's hardly a man working who is going harder than Ghostface. The fact that all of these albums have been fantastic as opposed to just being alright or listenable or mostly filler is a small miracle considering the depth and breadth of most hip-hop albums out there right now.

This album is packed with old school grooves, huge rhymes, and a cinematic feel that hasn't been around for some fifteen years. Listening to tracks like "Walk Around," "Yapp City," and "Yolanda's House" is like watching some old, gritty crime flick, complete with pops and scratches in the soundtrack and dirt on the print. The delivery is urgent to flat out paranoid, as though Ghostface is worried that nobody will find him relevant in his 11th year as a soloist. In a year where hip-hop was proclaimed dead and dickheads like Souljaboy were doing everything in their power to prove the pundit (Nas) right, Ghostface is not only relevant, he's one of the few M.C.s you can point to in an effort to prove that it's still very much alive.

Sounds Like: Scenes from a movie Tarrintino would direct if he were directing in the 70's.

Key Tracks: Yolanda's House, We Celebrate, Yapp City, Walk Around

Download Walk Around

Buy It! Amazon

Comments:

Caleb said: fuckin' sweet shit. great write up Paul.

42. Electric Six - I Will Exterminate Everything Around Me That Restricts Me From Becoming The Master

2008-02-04T23:00:00.002-05:00

I admit it: I like awful music. My shameless love of the Electric Six is proof enough of that. Ever since 2003's Fire, people who actually listen to music (read: not me) have written these guys off as a joke band. While Fire was extremely dancible, and Senor Smoke was more of the same, Switzerland focused on cock rock, which is a recipe for disaster, usually.

The main strength of the Electric Six is that they don't take themselves seriously. They've obviously listened to their fair share of disco and Detroit rock, have a sophomoric sense of humor, and just don't give a fuck what critics say. They come out on stage wearing capes, shoving audience members off stage, plugging cigarettes, and genuinely creating an overwhelming mayhem. I think all of that comes across much better here than it did on Switzerland.

And you can dance to it. Which is apparently important to me. I dance. With myself.

Sounds Like: Being skullfucked with synthesizers.

Key Tracks: Down at McDonnelzz, Dance Pattern, When I Get to the Green Building

Download: Down at McDonnelzz

Buy It! Amazon

40. The Polyphonic Spree - The Fragile Army

2008-02-04T13:17:00.002-05:00

I've seen a surprising amount of bitching about this album's "departing from Polyphonic Spree's roots," meaning that they use guitars (oh my God, guitars on a rock album!) more than on previous albums. So?

This is the Polyphonic Spree's third album, and it's my favorite of theirs by far. This is the album where the group have matured from robe-wearing novelty act with an ear for a good song into a full-fledged musical force. The word "matured" may not seem to make sense when describing symphonic rock groups who are, by their very nature, bombastic and over the top, but everything that the Beatles started with "All You Need is Love" is finally realized...there's a near-perfect balance between the rock and symphonic elements, and there's actual songs going on.

Also, for those of you concerned that P.S. might be a religious cult, they don't wear the robes anymore...they've evolved into a military force.

Sounds Like: "All You Need is Love," but with actual lyrics.

Key Tracks: Running Away, Get Up and Go, The Championship

Download: Running Away

Buy It! Amazon

41. Italians Do It Better (record label) - After Dark

2008-02-04T11:44:00.002-05:00

Oh, the record label sampler. I've got a few vinyl ones from when my parents probably stole from Sears or something, and they usually blow something fierce. Like...they'll have Manfred Mann's Mantastic Man Band's (not really, but you know?) sixth best song from their fifth best album, and that'll be the headliner. A catalog will be included, in case you wish to purchase "more great music!"

This? This is not that. Italians Do It Better, a record label I've never heard of featuring acts I've also never heard of, assembled a group of absolutely fantastic tracks. If I'm at a music store and I see an album by Glass Candy, I'm going to buy it. If I'm on YouTube and I see some video for Professor Genius, I'm going to watch it. Hell, I'm kind of surprised that I didn't buy this while I was blowing a ton of money on music a week ago. If you like trippy electronica music like I apparently do since this year, give this a listen. Seriously, Glass Candy is fucking great, and half of this stuff sounds like it should be in the greatest Sonic videogame ever.

Sounds Like: A random sampling of bands who like Italian disco.

Key Tracks: Rolling Down the Hills (Glass Candy), Last Nite a DJ Saved My Life (Indeep), Miss Broadway (Glass Candy)

Download: Glass Candy - Rolling Down the Hills

Buy It! Amazon

And, for the fuck of it, a weird-ass music video mash up for Rolling Down the Hills. I have no idea why Snoop Dogg and Glass Candy are thrown together. But whatever.

43. Shocking Pinks - Shocking Pinks

2008-02-04T11:05:00.002-05:00

I think the most endearing thing about DFA releases, apart from how mind-blowing they are, is that they all sound like they were recorded in some garage, polished a bit with a Mac, and put out before the world to see. There's a real rawness to the music put out by the label that hasn't been seen since the sixties. Geniuses like James Murphy bang away at the cowbell, the piano, and whatever other instruments they can get their hands on and do it on what sounds like scratched vinyl...the sound of silver is mined from garage sales.

The Shocking Pink's debut album from DFA, a cherry-picked collection from two previous albums, has the same low-fi quality and half of the dancibility. As such, haunting vocals (Pitchfork compares to the Jesus and Mary Chain) collide with sometimes beautiful, sometimes brutal, almost always fuzzy and feedback drunk rock 'n roll. You won't find people dancing to it like you would with Sound of Silver or a good number of DFA's releases, but if there's a home for low-fi rock that harkens back to disco on the label, there's room for this, too.

Sounds Like: A depressed man wearing ragged jeans who has learned how to play six instruments and just so happens to have a Mac, some rhythm, and a cowbell.

Key Tracks: I Want U Back, Smokescreen, End of the World

Download: End of the World

Buy It! Amazon

Stumbling Thru Myspace: Deathlok

2008-02-01T10:55:00.002-05:00

Death metal is such an awful, awful thing that I'm nearly ashamed to see Black Sabbath, Metalica, and Ozzy when I'm flipping through my CDs; ashamed that I love things that led to this sonic assault. I'm even more ashamed when I read credible music reviewers reviews of albums of this type, most of them are all like "well, I don't like death metal, but this album is fantastic!" or "I've never had my face melted off in such an excruciatingly beautiful manner!" It's one thing to be able to shred like a lunatic, just like it's one thing to grumble out your lyrics as though you had blue fur and googly eyes. It's quite another to do that while singing about dragons and wizards and D-20 dice.

I might have gotten Death Metal mixed with Epic Fantasy Metal, but honestly, they're the same thing; different instruments. Instead of a ten string bass, death metal is SO hardcore that they've got...eleven. Thirty-six drums not enough? Try...thirty-seven. And forget cranking the volume up to eleven, man: they've got twelve. I. Fucking. Hate. That. Shit.

So my first impulse upon seeing that Adult Swim has a show that makes fun/exults the whole genre is to run screaming to the next showing of that Aqua Teen episode where a dude makes a building out of penises or something. But before I could relocate the Stumble button on my browser, a magical thing happened: they started singing about coffee.

Myspace Profile: Deathlok

Style: Metal/Metal/Metal

Quote: N/A

Location: Mordhaus, United States

Members: Skwisgaar Skwigelf, Toki Wartooth, William Murderface, Pickles the Drummer, and Nathan Explosion

Record Label: Williams Street Records

Influances: A big fucking banner proclaiming that THE DEATHALBUM is available at Target for all of $9.99!

Top Eight:

Song: Duncan Hills Coffee Jingle

Verdict: Like I said, I really, really, really dislike Death Metal, to the point where disowning the part of my record collection that gave rise to it seems like an all right course of nature. This though? Totally different. The Cookie Monster vocals grinding over "French vanilla roast?" Absolutely, balls-out awesome. It makes me want to scream...for my cream. Thumbs up.

44. Nina Nastasia & Jim White - You Follow Me

2008-01-30T13:22:00.002-05:00

Another (sadly) late discovery. I've been into Nina Nastasia for awhile...ever since I downloaded a song called "Jimmy's Rose Tattoo" mistakenly off of one of those old, bullshit P2P programs (I'm thinking Aries, but it may have been Limewire). My short-lived eMusic account (I'm considering signing up again though) allowed me to download three albums of her deeply contemplative music, all of which I love and will probably someday add to my physical record collection.

This is more of the same, but different in a major way: Jim White is a master of drums, and his work on this album is just as important as hers. Songs about nothing, the simple life, conversations, etc., they all resonate much differently than any of Nastasia's previous work due to White's brilliant drumming. Also, with this album Nastasia appears to have broken through...I can't recall any attention for her before this, but finally, people seem to be noticing. Thank God...it's about time. All ten songs are fantastic, and through it's just drums, guitar, and Nastasia's perfectly haunting voice, you're never bored, hanging on each chord, word, and hit.

Sounds Like: Stories your grandmother used to tell with a crazy melodic upgrade and perfect rhythms.

Key Tracks: The Day I Would Bury You, I've Been Out Walking, Our Discussion

Download: The Day I Would Bury You

Buy It! Amazon

46. Les Savy Fav - Let's Stay Friends

2008-01-27T18:58:00.002-05:00

Once upon a time, there was a band named Les Savy Fav, and they delighted many a Pitchfork-reader with music that sounded like a prediction of some fad nine months away, only to return with an album that sounded nothing like it. Then they hung it up, left for hiatus, and everybody was left boo-hoo-hooing while this guy...

...developed a food fetish or something. Well, they came back, and the people did rejoice! Let's Stay Friends is less revolutionary than previous albums, but still packs a lot of punch. For not having done a thing together in years, the band is extremely polished. A couple of missed spots here and there, but honestly, just good rock music.

Key Tracks: Pots and Pans, The Equestrian, Patty Lee

Sounds Like: Guitars, screaming, and bearded men covered with sprinkles.

Download: Pots and Pans

Buy It! Amazon

47. Liars - Liars

2008-01-27T18:21:00.002-05:00

I was kinda-sorta on board for 2006's Drum's Not Dead, if only for the sweet, pencil sketch on notebook paper cover, but from the opening 30 seconds of Liars, I'm convinced that this is an incredible band making incredible music. To be honest, I'm not sure why this is so low on the list, lists being things that are made haphazardly and with an eye on filling space. Probably would have been top twenty had I listened to it when it came out.

Key Tracks: Houseclouds, Freak Out

Sounds Like: Beck, but beaten to a pulp and thrown into a wood chipper for the hell of it.

Download: Houseclouds

Buy It! Amazon

More Best of 2007: Concerts

2008-01-25T16:47:00.003-05:00

Yep, January is almost over, but I never really had much time to reflect on my '07, which was a year dominated by music. I went to a ton of concerts, treked out to Bonnaroo (which I strangely never talked about), and saw my CD collection go from Led Zeppelin's discography to the random mess of stuff that it is now. Odds are, if I knew more people who were interested, I would have formed a band. In any case, I've got a few things for you all to download, and this is as good an excuse to post them as any.

Best Concert (non-festival): Of Montreal (Southgate House, Covington KY, 3/20/07)

There's really little I can do to sum up exactly how good this show was. I bought a shitty voice recorder specifically for the purpose of capturing what I knew was going to be a bad ass show. We missed the opener, or I don't remember the opener, or shit really wasn't all that important, but I went from liking Of Montreal to proclaiming them top five. Just about everything was fun, from the merch guy threatening to "hug the shit" out of me, Joe Kasper's awkward dancing, Aaron Hampel's even more awkward dancing, and the fact that Hampelman not only had to put up with a David Bowie cover, but probably enjoyed it, too. The set is made up of songs from Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?, Sunlandic Twins, and Satanic Panic in the Attic.

A tip for recording concerts: Don't stand next to short people. Also, everybody sonicly destroying stuff on "Gronlandic Edit" was a nice touch.

Download: Of Montreal (3/20/07) (Megaupload)

Honorable Mentions: Beirut (w/A Hawk and a Handsaw) @ Southgate House (technically 2006, but late) and Electric Six @ Mad Hatter (being punched in the dick only counts for so much)

Best Concert (festival): The White Stripes (Bonnaroo, Manchester TN, 6/17/07)

This really shouldn't surprise anybody, considering my unabashed love of the White Stripes, crush on Meg, and man-crush on Jack, but let me explain. It was a long, hot, dry as fuck weekend. Magically, the Pabst Blue Ribbon had managed to stay cold in the trunk of Ma Thompson's car. I ate a cookie the night before, and it didn't make The Police exciting. To top it all off, I was sunburnt as fuck, was late in buying a hat, was starting to peel, and had sat by the stage for an hour and a half between The Decemberist's set and the White Stripes. Oh, and I had to drive home afterwards (apparently, we nearly died, several times).

I've seen the White Stripes before, but this time, it was different: I hadn't heard virtually any of their new material, opting to buy it without listening. It paid off, because I don't think I've ever had more fun. Jack White, "of Nashville, TN," played in his usual face-melting way, while I tried (and failed) to protect small people from being crushed by crowd surfers...even to the extent that I was kicked in the face. Three days of great music, and I got to cap it off with my favorite band at the height of their live power, before Meg went crazy, before I learned that they hadn't announced a Detroit show, before Icky Thump dominated my CD player for the next few months. Absolutely awesome.

Download: White Stripes @ Bonnaroo

Honorable Mentions (really, the rest of the shit I saw at Bonnaroo, in order of awesomeneess): The Hold Steady, The Decemberists, Brazilian Girls, Regina Spektor, The Police, Lilly Allen, everyone I can't remember.

Edit: YouTube, ahoy!

Stumbling Thru Myspace: The Mathletes

2008-01-24T22:48:00.002-05:00

So yeah, there's this guy, right? And he does this blog, right? The one where he explains the shit that happens in Marmaduke? It hasn't been active for awhile (matter of fact, all but one of the blogs I link to appear dead), but still, it is a constant source of entertainment for all the children who are fortunate enough to click upon it. Gaze, if you will, at Marmaduke doing the moonwalk. Cancer and madness, indeed.

I cheated a little to cover the Mathletes: they weren't on StumbleUpon...I added them myself. But hell, I StumbledUpon Marmaduke Explained, so I think it counts. Featuring songs like "2003: The Year Punk Pranced" and "Pinocchiobot (Rocky Roll vrsn.)," The Mathletes could be quickly written off as a joke band and discarded...but they're not. I'd like to think that having them on my iPod would prove that, but fuck, I've got Straight Outta' Lynnwood and Corn Mo, so the point is kind of lost. They're (really, just Joe most times) a quirky garage band made possible by computers and an electric guitar. They're the very essence of rock and roll anymore - a group of outcasts playing cover songs and odd originals. According to Joe himself, "What the Mathletes lack in professionalism, we make up for in unprofessionalism. Also in rock and roll."

True.

MySpace Profile: The Mathletes

Style: N/A

Quote: "All music is dance music."

Location: Houston, TX, USA

Record Label: All Star Power Up Records, Asaurus Records

Influences: The Cranberries, My Bloody Valentine, Boards of Canada, Guided By Voices, Bjork, The Unicorns, The Flaming Lips, Belle and Sebastian, The Smashing Pumpkins, Depeshe Mode, Neutral Milk Hotel, Daniel Johnston, The Velvet Underground, that song about making crayons from Sesame Street.

Top Eight:

Song: Ghost (Neutral Milk Hotel Cover)

YouTube Video:

Verdict: I intentionally picked the cover of one of my favorite songs off of an album that I consider one of the best ever made for a simple reason: it kicks my ass. Why? Two words: Kazoo. Solo. There's strings and other shit, too...but honestly, trumpets are replaced with kazoo, and I really could care less. It's a brilliant cover, by a brilliant man. The rest of his shit is brilliant, too. Big fucking thumbs up.

Add these to your mp3 player of choice.

45. Rhys Chatham - A Crimson Grail: For 400 Electric Guitars

2008-01-23T23:43:00.002-05:00

It's hard to comprehend how guitars work. It seems as though seven is the ridiculous limit for how many you can have in a band before it becomes frivolous, and you'd damn well better be playing "Freebird." Rhys Chatham? Seven ain't enough for him. He needs 400. And they need to be playing melodically. Symphonicly. In harmony. An impossible task? Not in the slightest. 400 electric guitars, an absolutely breathtaking masterpiece.

Sounds Like: The most beautiful landscape your eyes have ever seen, the most pristine snow your foot has ever graced, etc., etc., /lofty-praise.

Key Tracks: There are only three.

Download: Nope. They're all too big.

Buy It! Amazon

48. Jay-Z - American Gangster

2007-12-26T11:45:00.002-05:00

It's been a long time since I was excited about a new Jay-Z album, and to be completely honest, I had no idea that this album was coming out until I read about it in...ugh...Rolling Stone. In a lot of ways, I think that's to Jay-Z's advantage. It seemed as though every album he cut after Big Pimpin' dropped had an insane amount of hype - an endless amount of cover shoots, big money music videos, and I think he even popped up on Oprah. Then came retirement, some stupid thing where he said that Jay-Z was just a character, and a bunch of mediocrity. Well thank fuck for Denzel Washington, Russell Crowe, and Ridley Scott, because this album is probably the first I've considered keeping in rotation since The Blueprint.

Key Tracks: Roc Boys (And The Winner Is...), Success (w/ Nas)

Sounds Like: A return to form.

Download: Success

Buy It! Amazon

49. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga

2007-12-25T15:49:00.002-05:00

I think Spoon's less than stellar set at Bonnaroo soured me on this album before I even had a chance to listen to it, but this is very good, straight forward rock. It honestly wouldn't sound all that out of place in the 60's garage movement (if the production was stripped to a large degree). In whole, it's a bunch of songs about getting fucked over, finding a place between sugary sweetness and outright depression. A good album to get buzzed to.

Key Tracks: The Underdog, Don't Make Me A Target, You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb

Sounds Like: Getting kicked in the nuts with a horn overture.

Download: The Underdog

Buy It! Amazon

50. The Modern Lovers - The Modern Lovers

2007-12-24T23:26:00.002-05:00

The only reason this album isn't in the Top 10 is because it's a re-release, and those really shouldn't count. I'd be remiss though, if I were to just leave out this album, as it has influenced countless artists to pick up their guitars and start strumming, just as the Velvet Underground inspired them. Honestly, without these guys, there's no CBGBs scene, and without the CBGBs scene, there's no music as we know it right now. The scariest part about this album? It's nothing but a fucking demo tape: the group broke up before it was released, and though recorded in '73, wasn't out in stores until years after the fact. Just a classic album that nothing new can be said about.

Key Tracks: Roadrunner, Pablo Picasso, Modern World

Sounds Like: A changing of the guard.

Download: Roadrunner

Buy It! Amazon

Stumbling Thru Myspace: Chill Out Experience

2007-12-21T01:22:00.002-05:00

Here's a scenario for you: you're a big Pink Floyd fan...so big that Floyd is all you listen to. You've got bootlegs, studio albums, all of the solo stuff, maybe even an illegal filming of Roger Waters's opera. FLAC, OGG, Mp3, vinyl, CD, 8 track...you eat it up.

Needless to say, you don't get much sex. But tonight...tonight is different! You're macing on some lady that you met at the club, sipping on a TnT while she's drinking Desoroto on the rocks. She says that she wants you. You say that you want her. She tells you to put on some music so she can dance for you.

You panic.

Don't worry, hot shot...you picked up Chill Out Experience's FLOYD. Never before has putting Jews up against the wall sounded so fucking sexy.

MySpace Profile: Chill Out Experence

Style: Lounge / Electronica / Ambient

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

Record Label: EMI

Influences: None listed, but obviously Pink Floyd. They've got a U2 album, too, so I'm guessing that they'd count. But fuck a Bono.

Song: Money

YouTube Video:

Verdict: If somebody were to ask me why South America existed, I'd say that it was to churn out music like this. Between Chill Out Experience and completely awesome things like Bossa & Roses, nothing says sexy like a bunch of covers of crazy rock slowed down and chilled out. I wish I had a lounge, just for this stuff.

Music Video: Bat For Lashes - Whats a Girl to Do?

2007-12-20T20:05:00.002-05:00

Probably my favorite music video of 2007. I would have bought the album at Shake It when I first saw this, if only for the fact that Shake It didn't say who it was by. Still...about as cool as music vids get these days.

Stumbling Thru Myspace: Zelda Metal

2007-11-16T01:12:00.002-05:00

Can I tell you a secret? This dude is the reason I'm doing this blog. Seriously. I decided to stumble through MySpace on a lark, and this was the first thing I hit. I didn't know if I should bow before his majesty, or tremble with fear for what this man hath wrought with yon ax.

Seriously...look at that dude. Within his crazy long locks and metal tenancies lies the power to destroy planets. Alderaan got off lucky. I think the main problem I've had in officially getting this blog off the ground is that I couldn't rightly continue posting until I got this dude out of the way...but at the same time, I don't know what to make of it. Zelda. Metal. Should I make fun? Should I laud him for his insanity? I mean...he's from Reno, and the dude banging away at the drums looks like he's all of 14 (maybe), and like, two weeks ago, their rendition of the Zelda main theme was gut bustingly terrible. On the other hand, his name is Caleb Flint. So...fucking...cool. What's a person to do?

MySpace Profile: Zelda Metal

Location: Reno, NV

Record Label: None

Influences (selected): Buckethead, Pantera, Korn, Kansas, Black Sabbath

Song: Temple Theme

Verdict: I really...really have no idea what to think. Part of me wants to rip him, to say that any cockbag can slap on a six sting, learn some Zelda music, and chuck it onto a MySpace page. At the same time, this is the cockbag who actually did it. That takes gusto. That takes zest. That takes balls. That takes having hair long enough that it obscures your face from a camera and a name so hardcore that it's probably fake. Caleb Flint, rest well. You sir, are an internet inspiration to those of us who pick up First Act guitars and attempt to RAWK. You are Zeus...or have at least been nicked by his thunder. You are a hero sir. Let's save Hyrule from Gannon. Together.

'Lil Mama - Lip Gloss

2007-11-13T17:06:00.002-05:00

Alright, some of you may have looked at the title and assumed that I'd just gone completely insane. I guess I'll just get down to it: I like a song about lip gloss. This may appear to be baffling; I often talk about when rap was good, when rap was great, when my mom went to Notorious B.I.G. concerts, and when this stuff meant something. What you should be asking yourselves, in reality, is "what does this pasty white dude know about the meaning of rap?" but I digress.

In any event...if you put enough sheen into a song, it's going to sound good...no matter how shitty the song is, it'll at least make you want to dance. Look at the album Britney put out before Blackout, Christina Aguleria's "Dirty," and just about every rap hit since around 1997. There's no denying that, no matter how bad the fucking song is, you at least tap your foot to it.

I've heard this song twice. And I really like it. I have no idea how lip gloss can be "poppin'," or what that even means. I don't know how lip gloss, poppin' or not, can result in the school getting a new coat of paint, epic dance-offs, rapping to hand claps, running for student council president, and the revelation that the principle is a major slut in a six hour school day, but everything is hilarious in this music video, and the beat is fucking crazy. Just listen to it.

It's like High School Musical in the ghetto, which makes it SO badass. I can't wait until she's older, disillusioned, and willing to rap about shit that matters. Though she's got a pretty damn good career as a party rapper ahead of her if that isn't what she wants.

Britney Spears: Blackout (2007)

2007-11-07T23:23:00.003-05:00

Looking back on shit, Britney Spears is a lot less hot than she was in pubescence. Matter-of-fact, I’m around 98% sure that Britney’s early popularity was due mainly to older men who fantasized about jailbait but couldn’t work up the courage to score a 15 year old on their own/didn’t realize that Britney wasn’t exactly jailbait to begin with. There was a time when teenage girls thought that Britney was real lucky, that Britney was a star, but in actuality, she cried, cried, cried with a lonely heart.

Her scandals are well known: she’s friends with Paris Hilton and manages to make her look like less of an alkie slut, she’s a terrible mother, somehow managed to find K-Fed attractive, and hasn’t really done anything outside of appear in tabloids for one of the three previously listed reasons since Federline knocked her up in the first place.

Thusly comes “Blackout,” Spears’ first new album since Lord-cares-when. Ms. Spears really has nothing going for her; on this, her great comeback album, she looks as airbrush beautiful as she did in the past, only her girlish innocence has been replaced with a “fuck me, I need a fix” neediness. For comparison…

vs.

Not that either covers are some great work of art (matter of fact, they're both shit), I just find it hilarious that one cover has Brit on her knees, and the other shows the result of some eight years of being in that position. Some of you lower forms of life might look at Britney and would be more than willing to give her whatever drug she wanted in exchange for a piece, but Christina Aguleria has already done that, and has come out looking much hotter for wear! She even looks good pregnant! Matter of fact, Britney has NOTHING on C-Ag, if only because she offers all the hotness of Latina women with all the accessibility of the trailer park.

Oh, the album. Well...I only listened to about ten seconds of it...or paid attention...whatever. Needless to say, if I were being paid to do this, or if I were a Pitchfork contributor, I could just post a YouTube video of a monkey drinking its own piss; but I'm not, and you deserve more. Just know that when I heard "It's Britney, bitch," I about blacked out from laughter. Matter of fact, I'm pretty sure I did black out, which may have been the intent, but I awoke to the sounds of robotic sex and promptly begged Joe to change albums. I got Paul Simon's Graceland, thankfully before I was afflicted with full blown aural Ebola.

Please crawl back to '99, Britney. Crawl back and die.

Comments:

Caleb said: LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE! oh wait, nevermind. Amazing post.

Stumbling Thru Myspace: Janet Klein

2007-11-04T15:35:00.002-05:00

The music of early 20th Century America helped to make our culture one of the most alluring ones in all the world. Jazz, rag-time, and big band created a sound that was previously unheard: it was quick, lively, exciting. It embodied the spirit of the era: rapid change.

The music of Janet Klein & Her Parlor Boys harks back to this era, bringing us the sounds of the turn of the century, from the quiet and refined to the lewd and bawdy. Let's run this down...

Myspace Profile: Janet Klein

Style: Jazz/Blues/Other

Location: Los Angeles, CA

Record Label: Coeur de Jeanette (Indie)

Song: The Sheik of Ave. B

Verdict: Music like this is so old that it's fresh. A really enjoyable band that I hope eventually wanders out of Los Angeles, though you might not appreciate them if you're not much for kitsch. I know of nobody against kitsch though, so enjoy.

The Bostweeds - Run Pussycat

2007-07-16T03:59:00.002-04:00

Oh the exploitation films of my mother's brother's youth...assuming that one of them liked exploitation films and could get away with seeing a Russ Meyer's joint.

"Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" is the incredibly awesome story of 3 go go dancers who kidnap a girl after killing her boyfriend and hide out on a farm populated by a drunkard, a lecherous old man, and a guy who is sex nuts and retard strong. There is nothing that can possibly be said to convince anybody of this flick's overwhelming sense of awesomeness...so here's the trailer.

The song in the beginning is a mystery, mainly because of the band who preformed it. "Run Pussycat," in all its glory, clocks in at just over a minute of sixties jangle-rock, but aside from being covered by the Cramps, has never appeared on any sort of official album. There never was a soundtrack to the film, and nobody really knows who was in the band. Before you download the tune, here's its only recorded appearance: the opening 1:22 of "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!," minus the narrator declaring that "This...is...VIOLENCE~!"

I wish I could provide a link to buy the song from...but there isn't an official release. So enjoy the song.

The Bostweeds - Run Pussycat: DOWNLOAD (Right Click - Save As)

I'll be looking into ways of making this thing not suck as much ASAP. I feel like postin' stuff once more!

Music Video: Fujiya & Miyagi - Ankle Injuries

2007-05-20T11:45:00.002-04:00

In some cultures, 40 is considered an age where one is ripe for the mid life crisis. In the blog culture (as if such a silly thing could exist), it pretty much means nothing. Oh well...here's the music video, Fujiya & Miyagi's "Ankle Injury," which is like the White Stripe's "Fell in Love With a Girl" in that it is animated with toys. There are some marked differences though. Legos have been replaced with dominoes (and Atari references!), and the Stripe's variety of stomp rock has been replaced with a much calmer, no less cool sound.

Did I just invent a genre?

Music Video: Adam and the Ants - Stand and Deliver

2007-05-06T23:25:00.002-04:00

Without question, one of the best music videos ever.

Peter, Bjorn, & John - Young Folks

2007-05-05T08:23:00.002-04:00

Good music is good music, regardless of who likes it. It shouldn't be written for kids, and it shouldn't be produced for adults...it should be made for the sake of creating something good.

Peter, Bjorn, & John get an assist from Victoria Bergsman of the Concretes, and over a very danceable beat, proceed to forget about the people who might buy this album, instead choosing to make good music. The song suggests the strength and innocence in new relationships...the video does the same thing with new music. A positive experience, the whole way through.

Peter, Bjorn, & John - Young Folks
Download - Right Click, Save As
Buy - amazon.com

Various Artists - Instant Karma: The Campaign to Save Darfur

2007-05-02T00:36:00.003-04:00

Today was a good day. Heck, I’d venture to say that today was a great day. The weather was perfect, I only had one class, no work, no band, the food in the cafeteria didn’t suck, Frisbee was played, I found out that I’m going to be a Peer Leader (teacher’s assistant) next year, and got my room assignment for August. Nothing could have made this day suck. I could have been kicked in the balls, and that would have only put a slight tarnish on the day’s events.

This is much bigger than a kick in the balls. It’s something so confounding…something I’m so amazingly torn on that I can’t help but hate the very idea of it. Instant Karma: The Campaign to Save Darfur is a great idea in theory…get a bunch of artists together to raise money for a worthy cause. The problem with this begins when you see the subject matter involved: John Lennon songs. I’m normally against cover songs on a recorded basis…it’s rare that an artist brings the same quality to a track that the original performer did. Even so…I’ve come to recognize and accept their existence, and have a few favorites. I’m sure at some point, I’ll elucidate you on what exactly makes a good cover song…but for now, I’ll leave you with two simple rules:

1. NEVER cover a Beatles song, unless you were in the band.

2. NEVER cover a John Lennon song. Period.

I’d be willing to give Instant Karma a try though, if only for the cause it supports. Alex Jones, a buddy of mine, dropped me a link to the tracklist…and my heart sank.

Oh…have no doubt that I’ll be taking a listen to R.E.M., Jackson Browne, Matisyahu, the Postal Service, the Flaming Lips, and Regina Spektor’s versions of Lennon’s songs. They should at least be interesting. Some of the bands I’ve never heard of, or just am indifferent to. I’m even willing to accept the presence of the most egotistical, overrated man in music’s presence on this disc.

What hits me the hardest…what hurts worse than a shot to the balls…and what absolutely ruins this otherwise perfect day is that the greatest songwriter of all time (say what you will about Dylan…Lennon rocks his block) is going to be sonically destroyed by the likes of Green Day, Avril Lavigne, the Black Eyed Peas, Lenny Kravitz, Big and Rich, and Aerosmith? (Note: I only add Aerosmith to this equation because of their general uselessness since collaborating with Run-DMC and their historical handling of Beatles material, which has been atrocious.) Frank Sinatra was probably more pleased with Sid Vicious’ cover of “My Way” than Lennon would be with Lavigne’s cover of “Imagine,” which will probably have John spinning in his grave upon its first spin.

Again…I’m not against this because of the material that Amnesty International has elected to use…odds are I’ll wind up listening to it for the artists listed two paragraphs above. Lennon was a writer of protest music, no doubt about it. What boggles my mind is the selection process of these artists. Bruce Springsteen wasn’t available to take care of “Working Class Hero?” Two versions of “Imagine” were really necessary? There wasn’t room for “Happy Christmas, War is Over?” Jack Johnson and Avril Lavigne’s versions of “Imagine” are better than that of the man whose face is featured on the cover of the album? AVRIL FUCKING LAVIGNE IS DOING “IMAGINE?”

I want to buy this…really, I do. I’d also like for the Darfur crisis to be over…wars ended, peace given a chance, people sharing all the world. At the same time, I don’t want to see Lennon’s music being thrown to artists who don’t deserve the honor. Green Day will reach #1 in the singles chart…odds are that teeny boppers will convince their parents to buy the album to hear Avril…but it won’t be about Lennon’s message, and it won’t be about Darfur or Amnesty International…it’s just a bunch of corporate rock idols taking the timeless work of one bold, adventurous songwriter and throwing a glossy white coat of paint over it.

Will I be buying the album? No. Will I be giving the list price to Amnesty International instead? Yes. I just hope that in the future, people remember that instead of ruining other people’s music, John Lennon wrote his own, created his own fuss, got his own message out there, and transcended the norm. He dared to Imagine, while this generation is content to imitate.

John Lennon - Working Class Hero
Download - Right Click, Save As

Amnesty International
Pre-Order: Instant Karma: The campaign to Save Darfur (amazon.com
Buy: Lennon Legend (amazon.com)

Comments:

Emma said:
While I agree that two versions of the same song aren't exactly necessary, the rest of your little rant pissed me off to the extreme! I don't think Lennon would have been "spinning in his grave" at all! How can it be a bad thing that his music and his message are being made more available to younger generations? How many 15 year olds do you know that listen to John Lennon? Not to mention the fact that you are focussing on the wrong thing completely! This CD isn't about who covers what, it's about raising money for a deserving cause and celebrating a fantastic songwriter in the process. I'm not a massive Christina Aguilera fan, but her version of "Mother" is great, as is Green Day's take on "Working Class Hero". I don't own anything by Green Day, but Bruce Springsteen would have been a terrible choice! Few under 35 would have bought it or chosen to listen to it, and the singer's gritty vocals make it a song that actually makes me feel emotional - that doesn't happen with songs a lot in my case! Basically, Fuck Off.

Paul Arrand Rodgers said:
I suppose I can't really argue with a well reasoned, rational statement like that, but let me first say that it's cute that you have such passionate opinions about artists whom you don't normally support.

In any event, I think I clearly stated, several times, that it was great that Amnesty International felt compelled to do something to stem the tragedy in Darfur and raise awareness. I also didn't moan that they were doing nothing but Lennon covers, just stated that, as a general rule, it's something you don't do. You can't transcend Lennon. He, as an artist, is much too powerful on his own, without some stupid, Hot Topic bought gimmick. Lennon was real. Lennon was emotional. Green Day being lauded as "emotional" is as much a truism as calling The Lost World an "epic."

How many 15 year olds listen to Lennon? I don't know. How many 15 year olds who buy this album will be listening to Lennon? Zero.

Also, the spot about the Boss was awesome, especially when you stated that nobody over 35 (shockingly, not only are they the target audience for The Beatles, but they're people who can...I dunno...vote for change) would buy it. Exactly why people like U2 are on the disc. Oh...and nothing says gritty like the Boss. I'd point you in the direction of "Adam Raised a Cain," "Devils and Dust," or the live version of "Lost in the Flood," but you probably aren't interested, being as you wish to peddle in arguments that make about as much sense in commenting on a two month old blog post.

But that's ok...because we're in it for the message. A message which has clearly been lost on you.

Peace.

Matt said:
LOL. I was expecting a good comment after you made such a deal about it, Paul... Emma is really disappointing.

Anon. said:
I bought the CD for two reasons. John Lennon would have been flattered and sincerly heartened that proceeds are going to the Darfur effort. If he was here now, can you imagine the causes he would be championing? I ended up buying 2 more CD's for my big brother and sister who I was lucky enough to have had them been 8 and 10 years older than I so when I was 8, I was listening to The Beatles, The Stones, Hendrix, etc. They were thrilled with the CD'S. We've already has discussions about which tune we like and don't like. Greenday does a great cover on Working Class Hero, and yes it will expose a whole new genertion to Lennon. Christine Aguilar is excellent on Monther. Dylan's son and George Harrison's Son are great on Just Gimme Some Truth. I agree, NO ONE can do Lennon like Lennon -That's why he's John Lennon-but he'd be happy we're trying to help the planet, in this, a small way.

Pacific Gas & Electric - Staggolee

2007-05-01T14:22:00.002-04:00

Nothing smacks of awesome more than hearing great music you've never heard before. Even better is when this music is in a totally awesome movie. I'd never heard of Pacific Gas & Electric, and my previous knowledge of "Stagger Lee" was a YouTube video of some old wrestling match with the Junkyard Dog. Yet it was on a cold Easter afternoon where Quentin Tarrintino would once again expose me to some totally bad ass music through the expertly scored soundtrack to Death Proof, which I swear I'll get around to reviewing sometime or another.

Sadly, QT wasn't exactly rewarded for his brilliance, as some people think that three hours is to much time to devote to a movie theater. These are the same people who often moan about paying eight bucks to see two movies. Well...I've seen it twice (thrice if you count the internet), and I've got the soundtrack...and of all the great music ("The Last Race," "Jeepster," "Baby It's You," "Chick Habbit," and "Hold Tight" especially), this song has stuck with me the most. Hopefully next time I'm trolling for vinyl, I'll find some PG&E. Until then though, I've still got "Staggolee."

Download - Right Click, Save As
Buy - Death Proof OST (Amazon.com)

The White Stripes - Icky Thump

2007-05-01T01:38:00.003-04:00

This, my friends, is the song of the summer...without question. After rumors of the White Stripes breaking up due to Jack's other band (The Raconteurs, who are also damned awesome)taking some kind of precedence, it was announced that the Stripes had signed to Warner Brothers and were coming out with an album entitled Icky Thump.

In a weird, un-Stripesish move, the first single is a title track. In a totally Stripesish move, the lead single rocks the block harder than anything that will be released this summer. Riffage, cavewoman stomp, and synth abound, as well as lyrics that are more akin to one of Jack's verbose letters than a #1 Summer Jam. You can't be a pimp and a prostitute, after all.

Getting this song was a weird struggle in itself, as I found it on YouTube...then on Soulseek, only for some stupid idiot to ban me for not sharing stuff. Telling him that I wasn't hooked to my external HD at all hours of the day is apparently not a valid excuse...not even when he suddenly has access to 30 GB of music. Luckily, Soho Joe was not the only asshole on Soulseek...and now the song is mine.

And yours, if you so choose.

Download - Right Click, Save As
Pre-Order (Amazon.com)

Music Video: Beirut - Elephant Gun

2007-04-29T21:47:00.002-04:00

I hereby declare that Sundays be music video day, because when properly executed, the music video is the perfect piece of art. A good song, a good visual...it goes down smooth, like a frosty beverage on a hot day. This also gives me an opportunity to break from writing and let the peoples know what I'm working on...as if the peoples cared.

We will begin with this gem, from Beirut's Lon Gisland LP, "Elephant Gun." Though it's off their newest release, "Elephant Gun" was the first song I'd heard from the group, and it reeled me in immediately, simultaneously giving me a reason to get better at trumpet and exposing me to the stark beauty of Balkan brass music (I nearly flipped when "Siki Siki Ba Ba" was played during Borat). In any event, here is the video.

I'm sure that you'll agree...Beirut is brilliance. I almost bought a Bass Trumpet upon giving a view to this gorgeous video, but then I looked at my credit card and remembered that computer speakers and a ticket to Bonnaroo cost somewhere around $300...and another $300 would only suck for my financial future.

Live: Of Montreal (3/20/07)

2007-03-24T08:51:00.002-04:00

I love going to see live music. It's probably my favorite thing to do...moreso than writing fiction, going to record stores, drinking weird coffees, or seeing movies in the theater. I might like live music more than sleep. The only thing is...every time I go to a concert, I come out saying something like...

"Man...that was the best concert I've ever seen."

It held true for The White Stripes, Beirut, Queen + Paul Rodgers (ugh in retrospect), and "Weird Al" Yankovich (but to be fair, he was my first two live music events), and it's applied for just about everybody in between. The phrase was even used minutes after Of Montreal dropped Starman on us and walked off the stage. I was in a state of pure ethereal bliss.

The thing is...the title of "Best Concert I've Ever Been To" probably still goes to the White Stripes, back in 2003, when Elephant was destroying the speakers in my newish Ford Focus and could do no wrong. Of Montreal comes close to taking the crown though, because the crowd at the Southgate House was insane and ate just about everything Kevin Barnes and Co. did up. I've never seen that place with more than 50 people in it...and I've never seen a crowd so actively engaged in what was going on on-stage.

I also didn't expect what sounds so good on albums to sound just as good, and better in parts, live. What is presented on Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? and Sunlandic Twins are sugary pop gems (though on Fauna, they've got the sinister undertones of clinical depression) that don't sound like they'd hold up well once taken out of their sterile studio enviroment.

Two songs in, and I am proved wrong. Of Montreal is just as good a live act as they are a studio band...and that's a frightening prospect.

I have a recording of the show avalible...I know megaupload sucks, but unless you absolutely can't use it, I'd ask that you download the whole show in one go, rather than chewing the hell out of the bandwidth my free account at FileDen has.

Enjoy.

Of Montreal Live @ Southgate House (3/20/07)

Download Entire Show: Megaupload

Setlist/Individual Songs (Right-Click, Save As)

1. Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse
2. So Begins Our Alabee
3. Suffer For Fashion
4. Cato as a Pun
5. Bunny Ain't No Kind of Rider
6. Will You Come and Fetch Me?
7. My British Tour Diary
8. Climb the Ladder
9. She's a Rejector
10. I Was Never Young
11. Faberge Falls for Suggie
12. I Was a Landscape In Your Dream
13. We Were Born Mutants Again With Leafling
14. Oslo in the Summertime
15. Gronlandic Edit
16. The Party's Crashing Us
*ENCORE*
17. Rapture Rapes the Muses
18. Requiem for O.M.M.2
19. The Repudiated Immortals
20. Forecast fascist Future
21. Starman/Hang On To Yourself (David Bowie Covers)

The Music Industry

2007-03-19T01:47:00.003-04:00

Spring Break is over, and all I have to show for it is a cold, one CD, four records, eight DVDs, and zero fluid ounces of alcohol ingested. You’d think that if I was going to Michigan for S.B. that I’d at least go to Canada and get wasted…but no. Instead I held the First Annual Paul Rodgers Spring Break International Film Festival, thanks in part to Comcast Digital Cable, Star Theaters, Blockbuster Video, and (sigh) Wal-Mart.

While I’ll probably get around to talking about the movies I saw over the week (300!) at a later date, the main issue I wish to bring forth kinda sorta hangs on the last store I listed as being part of the Film Festival: Wal-Mart. Oddly enough, I’m probably not going to talk about where I purchase my DVDs…but rather about something else I care for deeply: the music industry.

The poor thing is dying. The evil bastards at the top of the industry (the RIAA) are convinced that the beginning of the end came when the Internet went from being a military application to a public commodity. Heck, even Lars Ulrich, drummer for revolutionary, fuck the system rock group Metallica claimed that the internet (Napster) was destroying something that had given us the Beatles, Guns n’ Roses, and Public Enemy. The industry, thusly, had to strike back and sue the pants off of anybody who would violate this scanted entity…nobody…no eight year old or grandmother was safe. The argument they had and still have is that people who want to hear the new Nickleback song should go out and buy the new Nickleback album…what is fourteen dollars in the face of artistic integrity? The industry is afraid of change, and you, as a valued consumer, should also be afraid.

As a condition of this…if you’d like to evolve with the industry at the same crippling pace as the industry, feel free to purchase an iPod, but don’t rip the CDs you own onto it. After all, what is consumer convenience to the industry that gave you the Beatles, Guns n’ Roses, and Public Enemy! Without the music industry, you’d be listening to Gregorian Chant…or an equally stupid, unqualified claim (All the Hits of Ancient Greece!).

I’d like to think that the problem with the music industry is more than its inability to change format with the times (or it’s many attempts to bury new formats as they become “problems”), but that the industry has become as stale as the music it puts out in the mainstream. The people at the top are more than a little pissed off that the last Nickleback album didn’t sell as much as say…a Korn album did seven years ago or Guns n’ Roses did in the late eighties and early nineties. You want rock? They’re giving it to you…go snap it up! Listen to the lead single on the radio fifteen times a day…change the channel and listen to it some more! Vote it #1 on TRL, assuming people still watch TRL…but don’t you dare download that track (unless it’s from iTunes…that way we know you can’t use it anywhere but on your computer or your iPod)…that’d make Chad Kroger cry. Nobody wants that.

The mainstream tells us that Nickleback are “cool.” Not as cool as Korn was (pfft…not even as cool as Limp Bizkit), and nowhere near as awesome as Guns n’ Roses, but they’re cool! Guys…look at the number of chicks they score! Girls…fawn over Chad’s perfectly cut hair! That’s all well and good…until you pop in a Nickleback album and realize that it’s the exact same thing as the last Nickleback album…and the one before that. Nickleback hasn’t recorded an original song since their debut album…and it’s debatable that that album was original being that it was one in a long line of albums that came out of the backlash against “nu-metal,” which was by no means setting the world on fire in a post-Korn/Bizkit ruled world. It’s probably arguable that Nickleback and bands like it harkens back to the kind of shit that was obliterated by Guns n’ Roses and later Nirvana…only I’d much rather listen to Jefferson Starships ‘We Built This City” than Nickleback’s “How You Remind Me.”

Similarly, rap has long been dominated by bling, random sex, and drunkenness. Every now and again, something awesome will happen, or a party anthem will be good beyond the week it becomes a smash hit…but without a need for rap to be dangerous, rap has become boring.

Pop is still dominated by the same people who dominated the charts when TRL was in its infancy…the culprits responsible for ruining radio just grew up and got better producers. When Britney or Christina decide to take a break, some other mindless girl jumps on the gravy-train that is almost dancing and singing and becomes a star for some reason. American Idol winner? Husband of pop starlet? Heiress? Winner of contest to be the next Pussy Cat Doll? Congratulations…here’s your record contract, if not a spot on the Billboard charts for a week before we forget your name.

In its complacency, the music industry has become what so many of its artists rebelled against: a big fucking soulless machine. Just like Wal-Mart or any other big box store, the aim is quantity over quality, and a majority of the public will just go along with it…happily spoon-fed and plugged into the Matrix.

So if I want to be part of the public who keeps it legal, the industry encourages me to go to the thing that hurts it the most: the big box store. Sure there needs to be some kind of Brick and Mortar establishment from which one could procure their Nickleback…but the problem thus becomes that the Brick and Mortar establishment stocks little more than Nickleback and other products of the corporate rock monolith.

Now, with the exception of Wal-Mart, I have no real problem with big box stores. If I wanted to buy a fridge, TV, or even a DVD…they’re normally the first place I turn. Best Buy is a godsend when there is nothing better to do…and they’ve also got the best music section of any of the big boxes I’ve been in. Being the best and having a good selection…not to mention selling things at a fair price, are two different things. Best Buy, Wal-Mart, K-Mart, and all those other stores don’t really embrace the creative front of music as much as they hope you’ll buy that $7.00 album and the $400 iPod that you might happen to want to rip that CD onto. The first week a CD comes out, prices are slashed to some insane degree. I bought The White Stripes “Get Behind Me Satan” at Target for seven bucks…the cheapest that an indie shop had it at was $14. Amazon has it listing at $18.98. Twenty bucks is a lot to ask for an album…I’m guessing that it’d cost at least $10 a CD to stock it in store, let alone whatever is sitting in their vast warehouses. If I use my extrapolated (and probably incorrect) figure…Target lost three dollars in selling that CD to me…and if I didn’t buy it then for seven, odds are I wouldn’t have bought it later at $13, remembering a time when it cost six bucks less. They certainly didn’t get me to buy anything more than that CD…so not only did the store lose money in selling me a deeply discounted album, they devalued the merchandise to an insane extent. Honestly…why buy something for $14 when you can REMEMBER it at a much lower price?

Target, by attracting me as a customer, has cost themselves a paltry sum in a gamble to get more of my money, has harmed the music industry by devaluing merchandise, and has harmed the true pulse of what is good, bad, and Nickleback in this world: the independent record store. How in the hell can a tiny store compete with seven dollars? Why would they want to? Why should they try?

I love independent shops…for one thing, human interaction with somebody who knows what they’re talking about is a plus. Odds are if you asked some dude at Wal-Mart what the differences are between Belle and Sebastian albums “Tigermilk” and “The Life Pursuit,” you’d get a blank stare. Hell…have fun finding Belle and Sebastian at Wal-Mart, while you’re at it. It’s not even on the damn website.

Sadly, the music industry seems to dislike the independent store as much, if not more than, the customers they sell product to. Think you like that $35 dollar price sticker on “The Wall?” How awesome is it that the poor shop stocking it stands to make two bucks on it? I wouldn’t be surprised if most indie shops made most of their money from the sale of Used CDs. I also wouldn’t be surprised if the music industry found this irksome…who are people to want something for $6 rather than $16? Who am I to want to buy an album and not be beholden to some dumb promotion? How pissed would you be if you wanted the new Clap Your Hands Say Yeah album, only to find out that it was LAST month’s Target Red Room selection? Couldn’t get enough of “Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?” All apologies, fanboy…you’re not going to find “The Sunlandic Twins,” “Satanic Panic in the Attic,” OR “The Gay Parade” here…how about some nice Nickleback?

In a society where the soundtrack to Hannah Montana can dominate the Billboard 100, we need some fucking variety. Sure watching the Shins and the Arcade Fire drop at #2 is kinda cool…but who in the fuck is Pretty Ricky, and why is Puff Daddy still milking Notorious B.I.G.?

So maybe the problem is that people are too busy downloading The Wall and don’t have the moral decency to buy an album that speaks of the evils of fame, sex, drugs, and rock. Perhaps that 13 year old would be best served finding out how much Nickleback sucks by sitting through an entire album of the same fucking thing. Maybe that grandmother needs to be sued out of her pension.

Or…maybe the music industry needs to look at itself and stop adopting a big box policy to everything. For something that has provided so much revolution, I’ve never seen so much bitching and moaning about something that isn’t our problem. You want me to buy an album? Cool. I’d love too. I’d also like to be able to rip it onto my iPod without Sony trying to eat my laptop, just like I’d love to be able to search for alternate takes of songs or bonuses on different releases of an album (fucking “Crane Wife”) without fear of having my future raped by million dollar lawyers.

The industry needs to embrace change…not just in business policy, but in philosophy and sound. I’m tired of the big box store, I’m tired of corporate rock, and I’m tired of hurting an industry I love.

I only wish that industry felt the same way.