PF gives it the highest non-10 giving Animal Collective :: Merriweather Post Pavilion was awarded with a slightly-too-high 9.6 a few years ago.
The sorta self titled (sort of not) album received a tremendous 9.5 yesterday.
Whether or not you think a numerical score means anything, from pitchfork or from any outlet period, a huge site giving a huge score is a statement. A statement that could mean a lot of things, but always that attention should be given is due. And so, now, for all people that follow this sort of thing, it's time to listen to something you might not have bothered with otherwise.
Something isn't given a 10 (or five stars, if you prefer) because it's just better than 99% of all other records. It's not a perfect record--as if there has ever been one--but one that comes at a perfect time, as Kanye West's opus My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy did at the end of last year. Or something so certainly ahead of its time it's importance is immediately obvious and doesn't need to be reevaluated years down the line. Both OK COMPUTER and Kid A.
For the rest, the world eventually gets its shit together and comes around and realizes they've let something terribly special slip by without the undivided attention it deserves. In the Aeroplane Over the Sea fits here nicely.
And for the most part, we can all happily listen without wild dissent when any of these albums get played. Throw in the not-quite-perfect modern classics, too. Arcade Fire :: Funeral. Sufjan Stevens :: Illinois. Joanna Newsom :: Ys. Modest Mouse :: The Moon & Antarctica.
It's pretty good company.
And so we come back to Bon Iver, Bon Iver. Bon "9.5 from pitchfork!" Iver. A record that, now that I've listened to it a few times, and has managed to be unlike anyhting I've discussed above.
An album far from perfect, far from a social requirement or document of our time, synonymous with pretty, exactly the status quo, exactly expected. And barely anything else.
Creative/constant member Justin Vernon moves away from the rickety fragile warmth of debut For Emma, Forever Ago, but doesn't tread a step further than he ever has. 2009's Blood Bank EP's love/hate standout "Woods"--the track later adopted, adapted, and fully realized by Kanye West for the closer of MBDTF-- where where electronics either were introduced to/intruded upon the bleedy heart aesthetic For Emma, Forever Ago built.
Later that year, a band called Volcano Choir (consisting of Vernon and others) released a short album, Upnam, that expanded this sound into a realm of post-rock and ambient music. It enjoyed mild attention and critical acclaim.
2011, Bon Iver, Bon Iver backpedals on the Blood Bank EP and on Unmap. It sounds like the album anyone who listened to For Emma, Forever Ago expected.
Any real newness in Bon Iver's sound...isn't. Anything that seems new is just plucked wholesale from the orchestral touches Sufjan Stevens used years ago. Beyond that, the album's major credit, it is only becomes painfully terrible during the final track, "Beth/Rest", where ridiculous 80s-style synthesized saxophones and flaged guitar really shit up the place. Then it's over.
I'm sure surprised something that feels just routine and nothing more is what a major review outlet has chosen to rest its credibility on. A credibility that has been steadily, fairly rebuilt since the site's early days, where giving a 10.0 meant something else entirely.
12RODS :: Gay?
Amon Tobin :: Bricolage
Walt Mink :: El Producto
and now
Bon Iver :: Bon Iver, Bon Iver
And we all wish there was a better way to do this.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
TMT :: Album Review Samples
Felt Drawings - Body
(stream/free download)
It's best to get this out of the way first: Body is an incredibly good album. Body is also an unrelentingly sad album. It details a great loss without hope anywhere on the horizon. Without a laptop in sight, sole-Felt Drawings member Dom Tiberio creates dark, industrial drones highlighted, but never brightened, with dancible synth-pop melodies. Instrumentally, the album is stuff you could dance to but never would. Over which Tiberio's frank lyricism informs the music, answering the question of why this music sounds this way. And why it has to.
It's not an unfamiliar dichotomy (see: the Smiths, the Cure, etc.), but is here taken further and is all the more intriguing for it. Body is pop music daring not to be, and uncaring where it lands. Music that is not literally hard to listen to, but music that can sober any mood. The refrain of "How is it Supposed to Be?" desperately demands "just tell me how to love / show me how it's done", before qualifying the question with the only two options left: "is it kiss and hug or is it punch and blood?" Felt Drawings has always been high stakes music. Everything or nothing. Now more than ever.
There is a lot to love here on Body, but it is going to hurt. And if you are going in, understand you will have to play by some uncomfortable rules. If you put nothing in, nothing is going to come out.
As with life, as with love.
The Mountain Goats - All Eternal's Deck
This is not a twist in the vein of Mount Eerie's Black Wooden Ceiling Opening. It is not exactly the unexpected black metal record that the All Eternal's Deck art, title, and super legitimate, super hyped production credits might suggest. Those hopes and assumptions were dissipated after a listen to the album's first single, album opener, and slow burner "Damn These Vampires". It sounded like a good Mountain Goats song but not much like something anyone would call metal.
If the inscrutable hype/power of death and thrash metal is anywhere to be found here, it's not too obvious. All Eternal's Deck will not destroy your speakers (but as always, your mileage may vary regarding damage done to your heart. Oh, ho ho.). It's not an affront to the music of dad rock dads. Really, the album doesn't even make much of a mess. The most brutal moments don't borrow from Morbid Angel-producer Erik Rutan, but certainly hold their own against anything else John Darnielle has done post-boombox. The fury of "Estate Sale Sign" can run with Heretic Pride explosion "Sax Rohmner #1", while the slightly quieter "Prowl Great Cain" scalds a lot like "No Children".
The occasional twists in approach that pepper Mountain Goats albums are easier to spot but harder to conceive of. "High Hawk Season" brings in some barbershop harmonies, "For Charles Bronson" is a song Darnielle could have written and recorded at any point in his career, while "Never Quite Free" could have never come before now. The imbalance is strange, but ultimately it works both because Darnielle is Darnielle: someone with inexhaustible talents as a songwriter, and an ear for things that work for him and never against.
Dirty Beaches - Badlands
As Dirty Beaches, sole member Alex Zhang Hungtai, channels the spirit of the 1950s pop utterly. He works inside the ghostly, vague memory of a decade that has gone more or less unacknowledged in the current collective pop music conscious. We nod to Elvis, sure, but contemporary pop music history starts with the Beatles. Many of these sounds are taken directly as Hungtai borrows from a variety of samples and standard melodies. The whole thing sounds like it was bootlegged onto tape by a motorcycle passenger, tuning their radio into some nonexistent copy album. And going seventy miles per hour.
Badlands is frustrating and difficult to understand contextually, but not particularly difficult to listen to and to like. It sounds nothing like anything else happening in music today, but borrows so heavily from its inspirations it creates a bit of a conundrum. Is listening to Hungtai lay down ghostly vocals over a 2 bar sample of Françoise Hardy's "Voilá" worth listening to? And if it is, is it worth attention, praise?
Probably. Because what sounds unimpressive on paper ultimately kind of works. Badlands sounds unlike anything else happening in music today, a phenomenon given weight by the fact that the 1950s have been so widely passed over for so long. With a carefully managed, but effortless—and when you play these songs side by side with the source material, the sensation of low effort is uncomfortably apparent—aesthetic, Badlands is an album worth of attention. If only to have an opinion on it, which is to have an opinion on what music created like this means.
As for praise, lack thereof, or condemnation, you'll have to call this one for yourself.
Buck 65 - 20 Odd Years
Buck 65 has been hard to deal with for a while.
And 20 Odd Years more or less solidifies the unfortunate trend that Buck 65 is just...a whole lot better when someone else is handling production duties. 2009's Bike for Three! collaboration with Belgian producer Greetings from Tuskan found the whiskey-rasping MC sounding more competent than he ever did on 2007's "Situation".
Something about rapping over his own work brings out the worst in Buck. He constantly defeats his concepts with completely cringe-inducing lines. Had opener "Superstars Don't Love" been handled by someone else, maybe we wouldn't have to uncomfortably shift in our chairs as "rural China" gets rhymed with "girl's vagina". Sigh.
The rule--for better or for worse--holds here with 20 Odd Years, an album that collects four limited edition EPs released months apart last year celebrating Buck 65's twenty (!) years recording. For better, because Buck sees 20 years time as a cause for celebration and has invited a lot of friends along. This is where things get good. Really good, actually. Nick Thorburn's work on "Gee Wiz" goes beyond his floaty vocal on the song's hook. On "Stop", Hannah Georgas delivers a pop chorus that completely dominates the rest of the song on its own merits.
Yeah, there are missteps so bad they are unforgivable. It's so hard to deal with solo-Buck on "Zombie Delight" when it's surrounded by great collaborative efforts. It's unfortunate to have to pick apart these outings when whisperings of a second Bike for Three! album are heard on the horizon.
(stream/free download)
It's best to get this out of the way first: Body is an incredibly good album. Body is also an unrelentingly sad album. It details a great loss without hope anywhere on the horizon. Without a laptop in sight, sole-Felt Drawings member Dom Tiberio creates dark, industrial drones highlighted, but never brightened, with dancible synth-pop melodies. Instrumentally, the album is stuff you could dance to but never would. Over which Tiberio's frank lyricism informs the music, answering the question of why this music sounds this way. And why it has to.
It's not an unfamiliar dichotomy (see: the Smiths, the Cure, etc.), but is here taken further and is all the more intriguing for it. Body is pop music daring not to be, and uncaring where it lands. Music that is not literally hard to listen to, but music that can sober any mood. The refrain of "How is it Supposed to Be?" desperately demands "just tell me how to love / show me how it's done", before qualifying the question with the only two options left: "is it kiss and hug or is it punch and blood?" Felt Drawings has always been high stakes music. Everything or nothing. Now more than ever.
There is a lot to love here on Body, but it is going to hurt. And if you are going in, understand you will have to play by some uncomfortable rules. If you put nothing in, nothing is going to come out.
As with life, as with love.
The Mountain Goats - All Eternal's Deck
This is not a twist in the vein of Mount Eerie's Black Wooden Ceiling Opening. It is not exactly the unexpected black metal record that the All Eternal's Deck art, title, and super legitimate, super hyped production credits might suggest. Those hopes and assumptions were dissipated after a listen to the album's first single, album opener, and slow burner "Damn These Vampires". It sounded like a good Mountain Goats song but not much like something anyone would call metal.
If the inscrutable hype/power of death and thrash metal is anywhere to be found here, it's not too obvious. All Eternal's Deck will not destroy your speakers (but as always, your mileage may vary regarding damage done to your heart. Oh, ho ho.). It's not an affront to the music of dad rock dads. Really, the album doesn't even make much of a mess. The most brutal moments don't borrow from Morbid Angel-producer Erik Rutan, but certainly hold their own against anything else John Darnielle has done post-boombox. The fury of "Estate Sale Sign" can run with Heretic Pride explosion "Sax Rohmner #1", while the slightly quieter "Prowl Great Cain" scalds a lot like "No Children".
The occasional twists in approach that pepper Mountain Goats albums are easier to spot but harder to conceive of. "High Hawk Season" brings in some barbershop harmonies, "For Charles Bronson" is a song Darnielle could have written and recorded at any point in his career, while "Never Quite Free" could have never come before now. The imbalance is strange, but ultimately it works both because Darnielle is Darnielle: someone with inexhaustible talents as a songwriter, and an ear for things that work for him and never against.
Dirty Beaches - Badlands
As Dirty Beaches, sole member Alex Zhang Hungtai, channels the spirit of the 1950s pop utterly. He works inside the ghostly, vague memory of a decade that has gone more or less unacknowledged in the current collective pop music conscious. We nod to Elvis, sure, but contemporary pop music history starts with the Beatles. Many of these sounds are taken directly as Hungtai borrows from a variety of samples and standard melodies. The whole thing sounds like it was bootlegged onto tape by a motorcycle passenger, tuning their radio into some nonexistent copy album. And going seventy miles per hour.
Badlands is frustrating and difficult to understand contextually, but not particularly difficult to listen to and to like. It sounds nothing like anything else happening in music today, but borrows so heavily from its inspirations it creates a bit of a conundrum. Is listening to Hungtai lay down ghostly vocals over a 2 bar sample of Françoise Hardy's "Voilá" worth listening to? And if it is, is it worth attention, praise?
Probably. Because what sounds unimpressive on paper ultimately kind of works. Badlands sounds unlike anything else happening in music today, a phenomenon given weight by the fact that the 1950s have been so widely passed over for so long. With a carefully managed, but effortless—and when you play these songs side by side with the source material, the sensation of low effort is uncomfortably apparent—aesthetic, Badlands is an album worth of attention. If only to have an opinion on it, which is to have an opinion on what music created like this means.
As for praise, lack thereof, or condemnation, you'll have to call this one for yourself.
Buck 65 - 20 Odd Years
Buck 65 has been hard to deal with for a while.
And 20 Odd Years more or less solidifies the unfortunate trend that Buck 65 is just...a whole lot better when someone else is handling production duties. 2009's Bike for Three! collaboration with Belgian producer Greetings from Tuskan found the whiskey-rasping MC sounding more competent than he ever did on 2007's "Situation".
Something about rapping over his own work brings out the worst in Buck. He constantly defeats his concepts with completely cringe-inducing lines. Had opener "Superstars Don't Love" been handled by someone else, maybe we wouldn't have to uncomfortably shift in our chairs as "rural China" gets rhymed with "girl's vagina". Sigh.
The rule--for better or for worse--holds here with 20 Odd Years, an album that collects four limited edition EPs released months apart last year celebrating Buck 65's twenty (!) years recording. For better, because Buck sees 20 years time as a cause for celebration and has invited a lot of friends along. This is where things get good. Really good, actually. Nick Thorburn's work on "Gee Wiz" goes beyond his floaty vocal on the song's hook. On "Stop", Hannah Georgas delivers a pop chorus that completely dominates the rest of the song on its own merits.
Yeah, there are missteps so bad they are unforgivable. It's so hard to deal with solo-Buck on "Zombie Delight" when it's surrounded by great collaborative efforts. It's unfortunate to have to pick apart these outings when whisperings of a second Bike for Three! album are heard on the horizon.
TMT :: Live Review Sample
This was the last of three Yoni Wolf solo shows three shows taking place in Philadelphia's First Unitarian Church this weekend, all three with opening support from Frances Quinlan of Hop Along. The space is small, not more than ten rows of pews, each seating three comfortably. The bands set up maybe four feet away from the first row. The extraordinarily intimate setting matched the purpose of the event perfectly And favorably eliminated both a crowd and the need for anyone to stand.
More with aesthetics: It was odd, seeing Yoni at his most put together. His hair showing no signs of the unruly curls that have pervaded WHY? promotional images since the cLOUDDEAD days; instead it is slicked respectably with product. His fairly characteristic mustache sits natural on has face, looking absolutely unnovel. It's the look of a man who might have things together: the same one who posted a picture to facebook of himself signing on first house a week ago..
But his words betrayed him, in the way they've made WHY?'s career doing. Dense, intricate internal rhymes characteristic of earlier WHY? material were matched by some powerful (and powerfully sad, chill-inducing) refrains. On the only item being sold at the merch table--a limited edition screen print--was written the phrase "I know with no uncertainty that I'm uncertain and I don't know." The line was the foundation for a chorus of a song in the middle of the set. Brutally effective, I felt myself wanting to sing along without knowing the words to sing. This question of "ok, but where next?" ran throughout the set, informing nearly all eight of the new songs.
With only two players, arrangements were unexpectedly sparse. Yoni mostly perched at a church piano that had fallen slightly out of tune, Josiah alternating between guitar and bass while operating a bass drum simultaneously. The songs were played with lots of thumping low end, drums keeping time layered with funk-inspired bass lines. Maybe rap-like, maybe not.
As mentioned above, the set (below, with some annotations, including fragments of lyrics so proper titles can be attached once these things have proper titles) was almost entirely comprised of new WHY? material composed between 2007 and now, to be recorded for the next WHY? record in May and June 2011. Stressed online, and again a song or two into the set, a strict rule against any recording was in place. And understandably so, but it's a bit of a bummer that no one will be able to hear these songs again for a few months. Or maybe more than a few, depending.
The hype is hard to handle, especially with the final product farther away than any of us would like. Doing this sort of trial tour so early is the makings for a tough, frustrating wait. In context, it's the highest compliment I can give the band as they and Snake return to the studio with completely new material for the first time in years.
Good luck, godspeed, etc etc. We're waiting to be blown away.
More with aesthetics: It was odd, seeing Yoni at his most put together. His hair showing no signs of the unruly curls that have pervaded WHY? promotional images since the cLOUDDEAD days; instead it is slicked respectably with product. His fairly characteristic mustache sits natural on has face, looking absolutely unnovel. It's the look of a man who might have things together: the same one who posted a picture to facebook of himself signing on first house a week ago..
But his words betrayed him, in the way they've made WHY?'s career doing. Dense, intricate internal rhymes characteristic of earlier WHY? material were matched by some powerful (and powerfully sad, chill-inducing) refrains. On the only item being sold at the merch table--a limited edition screen print--was written the phrase "I know with no uncertainty that I'm uncertain and I don't know." The line was the foundation for a chorus of a song in the middle of the set. Brutally effective, I felt myself wanting to sing along without knowing the words to sing. This question of "ok, but where next?" ran throughout the set, informing nearly all eight of the new songs.
With only two players, arrangements were unexpectedly sparse. Yoni mostly perched at a church piano that had fallen slightly out of tune, Josiah alternating between guitar and bass while operating a bass drum simultaneously. The songs were played with lots of thumping low end, drums keeping time layered with funk-inspired bass lines. Maybe rap-like, maybe not.
As mentioned above, the set (below, with some annotations, including fragments of lyrics so proper titles can be attached once these things have proper titles) was almost entirely comprised of new WHY? material composed between 2007 and now, to be recorded for the next WHY? record in May and June 2011. Stressed online, and again a song or two into the set, a strict rule against any recording was in place. And understandably so, but it's a bit of a bummer that no one will be able to hear these songs again for a few months. Or maybe more than a few, depending.
The hype is hard to handle, especially with the final product farther away than any of us would like. Doing this sort of trial tour so early is the makings for a tough, frustrating wait. In context, it's the highest compliment I can give the band as they and Snake return to the studio with completely new material for the first time in years.
Good luck, godspeed, etc etc. We're waiting to be blown away.
Monday, May 2, 2011
A live show, some words
Last Tuesday I played what is, I guess, the first Natural Light show. Or live action. It's the name I have been using for a whole bunch of stuff. Mainly this blog, art stuff, and some music I've made / played during the last 9 month or so. After last Tuesday, I have derived the following statistic:
Number of good first shows: zero.
I played two cover songs. The first was WHY?'s "The Fall of Mr. Fifths" done as a capella rap sort of thing. Second was a cover of Casiotone for the Painfully Alone's "Killers".
Mr. Fifths went fine. Killers did not.
The biggest difference is probably my own outlook on what I wanted to achieve vs. what I did. Both songs were things I wanted to do, and with the first I did what I wanted to do. I don't really care whether or not anyone watching/listening liked what they were hearing. It's not about that. It is about feeling like I was accomplishing what I set out to do: performing my arrangements of music that means a tremendous amount to me.
I really do get that there might be a disconnect playing such a heavy song when the show started with a Rebecca Black parody. But it's what I wanted to do. Whoever laughed, as if "I know your mom was your age when she had your brother" was a punchline, you are not my intended audience. For this performance, or for anything I will ever create or do in my life. You are not what bothers me. That I played so poorly does.
A lot of it comes down to rehearsing in conditions that were a lot different from the performance itself. Not even now being in front of lights and crowd that probably doesn't care about your music specifically. Things like standing at a keyboard instead of sitting at a piano, basically turning into a totally different instrument under my fingers. Having a drum machine on my right instead of on the left. Things I should have foreseen, thought about, and planned for and didn't.
There were problems with my ability to play a keyboard, sequence, and sing at the same time. And there were technical problems, like something with the drums sounding pretty shitty running through the amp I had to use last minute. And problems with the event itself, where coordinator was insanely rude and asked me, act 18 of 21, to only play one song for the sake of time roughly 50 seconds before I went on.
I was kind of mortified and devastated immediately after, and thanks extensively to my girlfriend, and thanks a small, surprising bit to some guy who came up to me in the parking lot afterward, felt a little better the next day.
Still, I think the experience is something important to come to terms with and talk about while it's still vaguely permeating my thoughts. I won't really get a chance to talk about a first show ever again, anyway.
I don't know when I'll ever do this again (or have the chance to), but I'm not writing it off as completely as I was when I walked off the stage. I have been writing a lot of new stuff (terribly, terribly fragmented new stuff). A semi relevant one:
to never fall into that trap
of a disappointing live act
songs becoming old and played lived less
wearing out not unlike i did sometime after the 12th grade
the run-on of ritualistic mass transit
the reason for this, the reason to consider language in...finite
and it felt infinite
as for what i did to deserve this
went to college, got nervous
I still think about this all a lot.
Number of good first shows: zero.
I played two cover songs. The first was WHY?'s "The Fall of Mr. Fifths" done as a capella rap sort of thing. Second was a cover of Casiotone for the Painfully Alone's "Killers".
Mr. Fifths went fine. Killers did not.
The biggest difference is probably my own outlook on what I wanted to achieve vs. what I did. Both songs were things I wanted to do, and with the first I did what I wanted to do. I don't really care whether or not anyone watching/listening liked what they were hearing. It's not about that. It is about feeling like I was accomplishing what I set out to do: performing my arrangements of music that means a tremendous amount to me.
I really do get that there might be a disconnect playing such a heavy song when the show started with a Rebecca Black parody. But it's what I wanted to do. Whoever laughed, as if "I know your mom was your age when she had your brother" was a punchline, you are not my intended audience. For this performance, or for anything I will ever create or do in my life. You are not what bothers me. That I played so poorly does.
A lot of it comes down to rehearsing in conditions that were a lot different from the performance itself. Not even now being in front of lights and crowd that probably doesn't care about your music specifically. Things like standing at a keyboard instead of sitting at a piano, basically turning into a totally different instrument under my fingers. Having a drum machine on my right instead of on the left. Things I should have foreseen, thought about, and planned for and didn't.
There were problems with my ability to play a keyboard, sequence, and sing at the same time. And there were technical problems, like something with the drums sounding pretty shitty running through the amp I had to use last minute. And problems with the event itself, where coordinator was insanely rude and asked me, act 18 of 21, to only play one song for the sake of time roughly 50 seconds before I went on.
I was kind of mortified and devastated immediately after, and thanks extensively to my girlfriend, and thanks a small, surprising bit to some guy who came up to me in the parking lot afterward, felt a little better the next day.
Still, I think the experience is something important to come to terms with and talk about while it's still vaguely permeating my thoughts. I won't really get a chance to talk about a first show ever again, anyway.
I don't know when I'll ever do this again (or have the chance to), but I'm not writing it off as completely as I was when I walked off the stage. I have been writing a lot of new stuff (terribly, terribly fragmented new stuff). A semi relevant one:
to never fall into that trap
of a disappointing live act
songs becoming old and played lived less
wearing out not unlike i did sometime after the 12th grade
the run-on of ritualistic mass transit
the reason for this, the reason to consider language in...finite
and it felt infinite
as for what i did to deserve this
went to college, got nervous
I still think about this all a lot.
Everything I am Listening To 4
Felt Drawings - Body
(stream/free download)
It's best to get this out of the way first: Body is an incredibly good album. Body is also an unrelentingly sad album. It details a great loss without hope anywhere on the horizon. Without a laptop in sight, sole-Felt Drawings member Dom Tiberio creates dark, industrial drones highlighted, but never brightened, with dancible synth-pop melodies. Instrumentally, the album is stuff you could dance to but never would. Over which Tiberio's frank lyricism informs the music, answering the question of why this music sounds this way. And why it has to.
It's not an unfamiliar dichotomy (see: the Smiths, the Cure, etc.), but is here taken further and is all the more intriguing for it. Body is pop music daring not to be, and uncaring where it lands. Music that is not literally hard to listen to, but music that can sober any mood. The refrain of "How is it Supposed to Be?" desperately demands "just tell me how to love / show me how it's done", before qualifying the question with the only two options left: "is it kiss and hug or is it punch and blood?" Felt Drawings is high stakes music. Everything or nothing.
There is a lot to love here on Body, but it is going to hurt. And if you are going in, understand you will have to play by some uncomfortable rules. If you put nothing in, nothing is going to come out.
As with life, as with love.
Yuck - s/t
Yuck's self-titled debut is the answer to the question of what it would have sounded like if the band that practiced twice a week in your neighbor's garage back in 1995 had been any good. It's pretty cleat these sounds of the 1990s are something artists find themselves longing for. A decade with tastes and innovations more scattered than united in any one way.
In 2009 Japandroids' Post-Nothing delightfully helped to fill a void that had existed since Pavement disbanded. Last year, Surfer Blood's outstanding debut Astrocoast captured a lot of the things Weezer did on the Blue Album. But it's this Yuck album, in 2011, that manages to decode whatever it was that made rock music in the 90s so loved. It's music that isn't only informed by, but speaks to a period of time ten years passed. This time, the music is not as a reaction to whatever it was happening in the late 1980s, but whatever is happening in the late 2000s (and what that is, I'm not sure anyone knows yet).
Beyond all that, Yuck has made an album of good songs. The album opens with back to back hard rockers and from there covers just about all the ground you'd expect. Things slow down on ""Shook Down", become beautiful on "Suicide Policeman", and eventually distort beyond recognition on Rubber, the album's slowburning conclusion.
Dirty Beaches - Badlands
As Dirty Beaches, sole member Alex Zhang Hungtai, channels the spirit of the 1950s pop utterly. He works inside the ghostly, vague memory of a decade that has gone more or less unacknowledged in the current collective pop music conscious. We nod to Elvis, sure, but contemporary pop music history starts with the Beatles. Many of these sounds are taken directly as Hungtai borrows from a variety of samples and standard melodies. The whole thing sounds like it was bootlegged onto tape by a motorcycle passenger, tuning their radio into some nonexistent copy album. And going seventy miles per hour.
Badlands is frustrating and difficult to understand contextually, but not particularly difficult to listen to and to like. It sounds nothing like anything else happening in music today, but borrows so heavily from its inspirations it creates a bit of a conundrum. Is listening to Hungtai lay down ghostly vocals over a 2 bar sample of Françoise Hardy's "Voilá" worth listening to? And if it is, is it worth attention, praise?
Probably. Because what sounds unimpressive on paper ultimately kind of works. Badlands sounds unlike anything else happening in music today, a phenomenon given weight by the fact that the 1950s have been so widely passed over for so long. With a carefully managed, but effortless—and when you play these songs side by side with the source material, the sensation of low effort is uncomfortably apparent—aesthetic, Badlands is an album worth of attention. If only to have an opinion on it, which is to have an opinion on what music created like this means.
As for praise, lack thereof, or condemnation, you'll have to call this one for yourself.
(stream/free download)
It's best to get this out of the way first: Body is an incredibly good album. Body is also an unrelentingly sad album. It details a great loss without hope anywhere on the horizon. Without a laptop in sight, sole-Felt Drawings member Dom Tiberio creates dark, industrial drones highlighted, but never brightened, with dancible synth-pop melodies. Instrumentally, the album is stuff you could dance to but never would. Over which Tiberio's frank lyricism informs the music, answering the question of why this music sounds this way. And why it has to.
It's not an unfamiliar dichotomy (see: the Smiths, the Cure, etc.), but is here taken further and is all the more intriguing for it. Body is pop music daring not to be, and uncaring where it lands. Music that is not literally hard to listen to, but music that can sober any mood. The refrain of "How is it Supposed to Be?" desperately demands "just tell me how to love / show me how it's done", before qualifying the question with the only two options left: "is it kiss and hug or is it punch and blood?" Felt Drawings is high stakes music. Everything or nothing.
There is a lot to love here on Body, but it is going to hurt. And if you are going in, understand you will have to play by some uncomfortable rules. If you put nothing in, nothing is going to come out.
As with life, as with love.
Yuck - s/t
Yuck's self-titled debut is the answer to the question of what it would have sounded like if the band that practiced twice a week in your neighbor's garage back in 1995 had been any good. It's pretty cleat these sounds of the 1990s are something artists find themselves longing for. A decade with tastes and innovations more scattered than united in any one way.
In 2009 Japandroids' Post-Nothing delightfully helped to fill a void that had existed since Pavement disbanded. Last year, Surfer Blood's outstanding debut Astrocoast captured a lot of the things Weezer did on the Blue Album. But it's this Yuck album, in 2011, that manages to decode whatever it was that made rock music in the 90s so loved. It's music that isn't only informed by, but speaks to a period of time ten years passed. This time, the music is not as a reaction to whatever it was happening in the late 1980s, but whatever is happening in the late 2000s (and what that is, I'm not sure anyone knows yet).
Beyond all that, Yuck has made an album of good songs. The album opens with back to back hard rockers and from there covers just about all the ground you'd expect. Things slow down on ""Shook Down", become beautiful on "Suicide Policeman", and eventually distort beyond recognition on Rubber, the album's slowburning conclusion.
Dirty Beaches - Badlands
As Dirty Beaches, sole member Alex Zhang Hungtai, channels the spirit of the 1950s pop utterly. He works inside the ghostly, vague memory of a decade that has gone more or less unacknowledged in the current collective pop music conscious. We nod to Elvis, sure, but contemporary pop music history starts with the Beatles. Many of these sounds are taken directly as Hungtai borrows from a variety of samples and standard melodies. The whole thing sounds like it was bootlegged onto tape by a motorcycle passenger, tuning their radio into some nonexistent copy album. And going seventy miles per hour.
Badlands is frustrating and difficult to understand contextually, but not particularly difficult to listen to and to like. It sounds nothing like anything else happening in music today, but borrows so heavily from its inspirations it creates a bit of a conundrum. Is listening to Hungtai lay down ghostly vocals over a 2 bar sample of Françoise Hardy's "Voilá" worth listening to? And if it is, is it worth attention, praise?
Probably. Because what sounds unimpressive on paper ultimately kind of works. Badlands sounds unlike anything else happening in music today, a phenomenon given weight by the fact that the 1950s have been so widely passed over for so long. With a carefully managed, but effortless—and when you play these songs side by side with the source material, the sensation of low effort is uncomfortably apparent—aesthetic, Badlands is an album worth of attention. If only to have an opinion on it, which is to have an opinion on what music created like this means.
As for praise, lack thereof, or condemnation, you'll have to call this one for yourself.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Yoni & Josiah Wolf (as WHY?) 04.17.11 Philadelphia, PA @ First Unitarian Church
This was the last of three Yoni Wolf solo shows three shows taking place in Philadelphia's First Unitarian Church this weekend, all three with opening support from Frances Quinlan of Hop Along. The space is small, not more than ten rows of pews, each seating three comfortably. The bands set up maybe four feet away from the first row. The extraordinarily intimate setting matched the purpose of the event perfectly And favorably eliminated both a crowd and the need for anyone to stand.
More with aesthetics: It was odd, seeing Yoni at his most put together. His hair showing no signs of the unruly curls that have pervaded WHY? promotional images since the cLOUDDEAD days; instead it is slicked respectably with product. His fairly characteristic mustache sits natural on has face, looking absolutely unnovel. It's the look of a man who might have things together: the same one who posted a picture to facebook of himself signing on first house a week ago..
But his words betrayed him, in the way they've made WHY?'s career doing. Dense, intricate internal rhymes characteristic of earlier WHY? material were matched by some powerful (and powerfully sad, chill-inducing) refrains. On the only item being sold at the merch table--a limited edition screen print--was written the phrase "I know with no uncertainty that I'm uncertain and I don't know." The line was the foundation for a chorus of a song in the middle of the set. Brutally effective, I felt myself wanting to sing along without knowing the words to sing. This question of "ok, but where next?" ran throughout the set, informing nearly all eight of the new songs.
With only two players, arrangements were unexpectedly sparse. Yoni mostly perched at a church piano that had fallen slightly out of tune, Josiah alternating between guitar and bass while operating a bass drum simultaneously. The songs were played with lots of thumping low end, drums keeping time layered with funk-inspired bass lines. Maybe rap-like, maybe not.
As mentioned above, the set (below, with some annotations, including fragments of lyrics so proper titles can be attached once these things have proper titles) was almost entirely comprised of new WHY? material composed between 2007 and now, to be recorded for the next WHY? record in May and June 2011. Stressed online, and again a song or two into the set, a strict rule against any recording was in place. And understandably so, but it's a bit of a bummer that no one will be able to hear these songs again for a few months. Or maybe more than a few, depending.
The hype is hard to handle, especially with the final product farther away than any of us would like. Doing this sort of trial tour so early is the makings for a tough, frustrating wait. In context, it's the highest compliment I can give the band as they and Snake return to the studio with completely new material for the first time in years.
Good luck, godspeed, etc etc. We're waiting to be blown away.
Further considerations: Someone managed to get hold of a setlist for one of these shows, so I am editing in what the setlist calls these songs. The set seems to be exactly the same, with phrases I remember matching up with the current "official" titles.
FRANCES QUINLAN
01. Freshman Year
02. Sally
03. Tibetan Popstars
YONI & JOSIAH WOLF
01. New - Paper
02. New - Always
03. The Vowels Pt. 2
04. Half a Person
05. New (My Most Intimate Geometry) - 27
06. Brook & Waxing
07. New - Distance
08. New - Kevin
09. New - Bitter
10. New - Straw
11. New - Mumps
12-13. Pick Fights / Deceived
Encore:
14. Close to Me
15. These Few Presidents
16. One Rose
More with aesthetics: It was odd, seeing Yoni at his most put together. His hair showing no signs of the unruly curls that have pervaded WHY? promotional images since the cLOUDDEAD days; instead it is slicked respectably with product. His fairly characteristic mustache sits natural on has face, looking absolutely unnovel. It's the look of a man who might have things together: the same one who posted a picture to facebook of himself signing on first house a week ago..
But his words betrayed him, in the way they've made WHY?'s career doing. Dense, intricate internal rhymes characteristic of earlier WHY? material were matched by some powerful (and powerfully sad, chill-inducing) refrains. On the only item being sold at the merch table--a limited edition screen print--was written the phrase "I know with no uncertainty that I'm uncertain and I don't know." The line was the foundation for a chorus of a song in the middle of the set. Brutally effective, I felt myself wanting to sing along without knowing the words to sing. This question of "ok, but where next?" ran throughout the set, informing nearly all eight of the new songs.
With only two players, arrangements were unexpectedly sparse. Yoni mostly perched at a church piano that had fallen slightly out of tune, Josiah alternating between guitar and bass while operating a bass drum simultaneously. The songs were played with lots of thumping low end, drums keeping time layered with funk-inspired bass lines. Maybe rap-like, maybe not.
As mentioned above, the set (below, with some annotations, including fragments of lyrics so proper titles can be attached once these things have proper titles) was almost entirely comprised of new WHY? material composed between 2007 and now, to be recorded for the next WHY? record in May and June 2011. Stressed online, and again a song or two into the set, a strict rule against any recording was in place. And understandably so, but it's a bit of a bummer that no one will be able to hear these songs again for a few months. Or maybe more than a few, depending.
The hype is hard to handle, especially with the final product farther away than any of us would like. Doing this sort of trial tour so early is the makings for a tough, frustrating wait. In context, it's the highest compliment I can give the band as they and Snake return to the studio with completely new material for the first time in years.
Good luck, godspeed, etc etc. We're waiting to be blown away.
Further considerations: Someone managed to get hold of a setlist for one of these shows, so I am editing in what the setlist calls these songs. The set seems to be exactly the same, with phrases I remember matching up with the current "official" titles.
FRANCES QUINLAN
01. Freshman Year
02. Sally
03. Tibetan Popstars
YONI & JOSIAH WOLF
01. New - Paper
Features lyrics shown on a video Yoni posted on his facebook a few weeks ago when he was recording the album 5 demos.
02. New - Always
"like that"
03. The Vowels Pt. 2
From Alopecia (2008)
04. Half a Person
Smiths cover. Same arrangement as on this RadioK session.
05. New (My Most Intimate Geometry) - 27
I actually have this one on a bootleg from early 2009, performed a capella. It sounded really great with piano at the show. The title above is what I named it on the bootleg when I cut up the soundboard two years ago.
06. Brook & Waxing
From Alopecia (2008)
07. New - Distance
"keep distance"
08. New - Kevin
"I know with no uncertainty that I'm uncertain and I don't know."
09. New - Bitter
"liar pretends to confess"
10. New - Straw
"no, I am not ok, boys"
11. New - Mumps
"as ill as I am"
12-13. Pick Fights / Deceived
From the Rubber Traits CD-single / Dumb Hummer 7''. A really cool surprise. I've never seen either of these Rubber Traits/Dumb Hummer b-sides turn up on any bootleg or "almost live" album.
Encore:
14. Close to Me
Cure cover. Posted to the WHY? Myspace in 2008, but to be released on the forthcomng OIBrecords Split Series Vol. 5 this year.
15. These Few Presidents
From Alopecia (2008)
16. One Rose
From Eskimo Snow (2009)
Monday, March 14, 2011
Everything I am Listening To 3
Astronautalis - Midday Moon (single)
(stream/purchase)
We know some stuff about 'The Four Fists', a forthcoming collaborative EP from Astronautalis and P.O.S. A title, for one. What it's about (F. Scott Fitzgerald short stories converted into song. And, sure, why not), for a big second. Astronautalis' upcoming, untitled solo album is different. He's playing this one close to his chest, and the release of Midday Moon is one of our only clues (the other being that the good company of anticon.'s Alias will be handling a few tracks) as to what the thing is going sound like.
And it sounds pretty remarkable. When asked, Andy told me that James Blake (who I'll get to eventually, promise) wasn't a direct influence on the track's production, but it's impossible not to hear for those familiar. Which is a Good Thing. Tons of synths sounding at once cut in and out like saws, over which Astronautalis does his hip-hop thing. He's distanced a bit from his whiskey-worn persona that informed a much of 2008's Pomegranate. It never worn out its welcome, but movement toward the quiet and the not-there is refreshing. Whenever this thing gets a name, it'll be one to remember to look out for.
note: I'm going to include a link to artist's bandcamp pages when available/possible. Mostly because it's a great service that let's you give a few dollars directly to artists who deserve it.
Destroyer - Kaputt
Kaputt is mostly songs that will kinda sorta remind you of Destroyer's Rubies, but is actually reminding you of something else. Which is to say, most of Kaputt lands closer to 2008's Trouble in Dreams, when the jazzy, carefree Bejar-sound started to wear a bit thin. Things are certainly better on Kaputt, but for all of the programmed drums and loops that replace the jaunty live energy of Destroyer's Rubies. Somehow, for all this, the final product is just not all that exceptional for someone who has been keeping an ear out in Bejar's direction.
The album closes with the standout "Bay of Pigs (Detail)", a track that might be humanity's first and only foray into the, uh, ambient-disco genre. That Kaputt's highlight is plucked mostly wholesale from an EP released on the tail-end of 2009 probably means something, but it was interesting then and is maybe even more interesting now. The unexpected synth stabs still suggest new direction, but do so when change for Destroyer is needed more than ever.
The Mountain Goats - All Eternal's Deck
This is not a twist in the vein of Mount Eerie's Black Wooden Ceiling Opening. It is not exactly the unexpected black metal record that the All Eternal's Deck art, title, and super legitimate, super hyped production credits might suggest. Those hopes and assumptions were dissipated after a listen to the album's first single, album opener, and slow burner "Damn These Vampires". It sounded like a good Mountain Goats song but not much like something anyone would call metal.
If the inscrutable hype/power of death and thrash metal is anywhere to be found here, it's not too obvious. All Eternal's Deck will not destroy your speakers (but as always, your mileage may vary regarding damage done to your heart. Oh, ho ho.). It's not an affront to the music of dad rock dads. Really, the album doesn't even make much of a mess. The most brutal moments don't borrow from Morbid Angel-producer Erik Rutan, but certainly hold their own against anything else John Darnielle has done post-boombox. The fury of "Estate Sale Sign" can run with Heretic Pride explosion "Sax Rohmner #1", while the slightly quieter "Prowl Great Cain" scalds a lot like "No Children".
The occasional twists in approach that pepper Mountain Goats albums are easier to spot but harder to conceive of. "High Hawk Season" brings in some barbershop harmonies, "For Charles Bronson" is a song Darnielle could have written and recorded at any point in his career, while "Never Quite Free" could have never come before now. The imbalance is strange, but ultimately it works both because Darnielle is Darnielle: someone with inexhaustible talents as a songwriter, and an ear for things that work for him and never against.
still soon:
Tim Hecker - Ravedeath, 1972
Bright Eyes - The People's Key
Deerhoof - Deerhoof vs. Evil
Radiohead - The King of Limbs
James Blake - s/t
Akron/Family - S/T II: The Cosmic and Journey of Shinju TNT
Lil B - Illusions of Grandeur
†‡† - Ghetto Ass Witch (EP)
Sam Mickens - Sinistra Secco (EP)
(stream/purchase)
We know some stuff about 'The Four Fists', a forthcoming collaborative EP from Astronautalis and P.O.S. A title, for one. What it's about (F. Scott Fitzgerald short stories converted into song. And, sure, why not), for a big second. Astronautalis' upcoming, untitled solo album is different. He's playing this one close to his chest, and the release of Midday Moon is one of our only clues (the other being that the good company of anticon.'s Alias will be handling a few tracks) as to what the thing is going sound like.
And it sounds pretty remarkable. When asked, Andy told me that James Blake (who I'll get to eventually, promise) wasn't a direct influence on the track's production, but it's impossible not to hear for those familiar. Which is a Good Thing. Tons of synths sounding at once cut in and out like saws, over which Astronautalis does his hip-hop thing. He's distanced a bit from his whiskey-worn persona that informed a much of 2008's Pomegranate. It never worn out its welcome, but movement toward the quiet and the not-there is refreshing. Whenever this thing gets a name, it'll be one to remember to look out for.
note: I'm going to include a link to artist's bandcamp pages when available/possible. Mostly because it's a great service that let's you give a few dollars directly to artists who deserve it.
Destroyer - Kaputt
Kaputt is mostly songs that will kinda sorta remind you of Destroyer's Rubies, but is actually reminding you of something else. Which is to say, most of Kaputt lands closer to 2008's Trouble in Dreams, when the jazzy, carefree Bejar-sound started to wear a bit thin. Things are certainly better on Kaputt, but for all of the programmed drums and loops that replace the jaunty live energy of Destroyer's Rubies. Somehow, for all this, the final product is just not all that exceptional for someone who has been keeping an ear out in Bejar's direction.
The album closes with the standout "Bay of Pigs (Detail)", a track that might be humanity's first and only foray into the, uh, ambient-disco genre. That Kaputt's highlight is plucked mostly wholesale from an EP released on the tail-end of 2009 probably means something, but it was interesting then and is maybe even more interesting now. The unexpected synth stabs still suggest new direction, but do so when change for Destroyer is needed more than ever.
The Mountain Goats - All Eternal's Deck
This is not a twist in the vein of Mount Eerie's Black Wooden Ceiling Opening. It is not exactly the unexpected black metal record that the All Eternal's Deck art, title, and super legitimate, super hyped production credits might suggest. Those hopes and assumptions were dissipated after a listen to the album's first single, album opener, and slow burner "Damn These Vampires". It sounded like a good Mountain Goats song but not much like something anyone would call metal.
If the inscrutable hype/power of death and thrash metal is anywhere to be found here, it's not too obvious. All Eternal's Deck will not destroy your speakers (but as always, your mileage may vary regarding damage done to your heart. Oh, ho ho.). It's not an affront to the music of dad rock dads. Really, the album doesn't even make much of a mess. The most brutal moments don't borrow from Morbid Angel-producer Erik Rutan, but certainly hold their own against anything else John Darnielle has done post-boombox. The fury of "Estate Sale Sign" can run with Heretic Pride explosion "Sax Rohmner #1", while the slightly quieter "Prowl Great Cain" scalds a lot like "No Children".
The occasional twists in approach that pepper Mountain Goats albums are easier to spot but harder to conceive of. "High Hawk Season" brings in some barbershop harmonies, "For Charles Bronson" is a song Darnielle could have written and recorded at any point in his career, while "Never Quite Free" could have never come before now. The imbalance is strange, but ultimately it works both because Darnielle is Darnielle: someone with inexhaustible talents as a songwriter, and an ear for things that work for him and never against.
still soon:
Tim Hecker - Ravedeath, 1972
Bright Eyes - The People's Key
Deerhoof - Deerhoof vs. Evil
Radiohead - The King of Limbs
James Blake - s/t
Akron/Family - S/T II: The Cosmic and Journey of Shinju TNT
Lil B - Illusions of Grandeur
†‡† - Ghetto Ass Witch (EP)
Sam Mickens - Sinistra Secco (EP)
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
You Are Listening to Los Angeles
http://youarelisteningtolosangeles.com/
It's publicly available, live LAPD police band radio played over ambient music.
This is probably one of the better internet things I've come across in a long, long while. Really beautiful and serene, but alive and intriguing at the same time. Maybe sort of frightening.
Really, really good.
Or you can make your very own local police scanners, here. Link there leads to the NJ section, but pretty much everywhere in the US is available.
Oh no, a urinal at LAX has "continual flush".
It's publicly available, live LAPD police band radio played over ambient music.
This is probably one of the better internet things I've come across in a long, long while. Really beautiful and serene, but alive and intriguing at the same time. Maybe sort of frightening.
Really, really good.
Or you can make your very own local police scanners, here. Link there leads to the NJ section, but pretty much everywhere in the US is available.
Oh no, a urinal at LAX has "continual flush".
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Everything I am Listening To 2
Buck 65 - 20 Odd Years
Buck 65 has been hard to deal with for a while.
And 20 Odd Years more or less solidifies the unfortunate trend that Buck 65 is just...a whole lot better when someone else is handling production duties. 2009's Bike for Three! collaboration with Belgian producer Greetings from Tuskan found the whiskey-rasping MC sounding more competent than he ever did on 2007's "Situation".
Something about rapping over his own work brings out the worst in Buck. He constantly defeats his concepts with completely cringe-inducing lines. Had opener "Superstars Don't Love" been handled by someone else, maybe we wouldn't have to uncomfortably shift in our chairs as "rural China" gets rhymed with "girl's vagina". Sigh.
The rule--for better or for worse--holds here with 20 Odd Years, an album that collects four limited edition EPs released months apart last year celebrating Buck 65's twenty (!) years recording. For better, because Buck sees 20 years time as a cause for celebration and has invited a lot of friends along. This is where things are good. Really good. Nick Thorburn's work on "Gee Wiz" goes beyond his floaty vocal on the song's hook. On "Stop", Hannah Georgas delivers a pop chorus that completely dominates the rest of the song on its own merits.
Yeah, there are missteps so bad they are unforgivable. It's so hard to deal with solo-Buck on "Zombie Delight" when it's surrounded by great collaborative efforts. It's unfortunate to have to pick apart these outings when whisperings of a second Bike for Three! album are on the horizon. I hope it comes soon.
The Decemberists - The King is Dead
It is nice when a band does something completely unexpected. The sensation is diminished slightly when the product is essentially a laid-back collection of R.E.M.-tinged Americana. And so, "The King is Dead" is not exactly groundbreaking stuff, and a lot of the record's pleasantness (the record is nothing if not pleasant) has to do with relief. But there are a lot of people with tiny parts of their hearts (rightfully) that will always remember first time they heard "Red Right Ankle", an important little moment in so many of our histories. And so a return from the preposterously unlistenable "Hazards of Love" is welcomed.
For most of the record's duration, The Decemberists abandon the niche that made, and eventually betrayed, them. Colin Meloy shows he can write a melody without it being inspiration from absurd historical fiction. His singalongs can exist without seven distinct movements. "The King is Dead" is ten songs that don't try to be much more than ten songs. It's what the band needed. A RESET button has been hit. The slate mostly erased. Don't backslide now, guys.
still soon:
Tim Hecker - Ravedeath, 1972
Bright Eyes - The People's Key
Deerhoof - Deerhoof vs. Evil
Destroyer - Kaputt
Radiohead - The King of Limbs
Sam Mickens - Sinistra Secco
James Blake - s/t
Akron/Family - S/T II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT
The Mountain Goats - All Eternal's Deck
Buck 65 has been hard to deal with for a while.
And 20 Odd Years more or less solidifies the unfortunate trend that Buck 65 is just...a whole lot better when someone else is handling production duties. 2009's Bike for Three! collaboration with Belgian producer Greetings from Tuskan found the whiskey-rasping MC sounding more competent than he ever did on 2007's "Situation".
Something about rapping over his own work brings out the worst in Buck. He constantly defeats his concepts with completely cringe-inducing lines. Had opener "Superstars Don't Love" been handled by someone else, maybe we wouldn't have to uncomfortably shift in our chairs as "rural China" gets rhymed with "girl's vagina". Sigh.
The rule--for better or for worse--holds here with 20 Odd Years, an album that collects four limited edition EPs released months apart last year celebrating Buck 65's twenty (!) years recording. For better, because Buck sees 20 years time as a cause for celebration and has invited a lot of friends along. This is where things are good. Really good. Nick Thorburn's work on "Gee Wiz" goes beyond his floaty vocal on the song's hook. On "Stop", Hannah Georgas delivers a pop chorus that completely dominates the rest of the song on its own merits.
Yeah, there are missteps so bad they are unforgivable. It's so hard to deal with solo-Buck on "Zombie Delight" when it's surrounded by great collaborative efforts. It's unfortunate to have to pick apart these outings when whisperings of a second Bike for Three! album are on the horizon. I hope it comes soon.
The Decemberists - The King is Dead
It is nice when a band does something completely unexpected. The sensation is diminished slightly when the product is essentially a laid-back collection of R.E.M.-tinged Americana. And so, "The King is Dead" is not exactly groundbreaking stuff, and a lot of the record's pleasantness (the record is nothing if not pleasant) has to do with relief. But there are a lot of people with tiny parts of their hearts (rightfully) that will always remember first time they heard "Red Right Ankle", an important little moment in so many of our histories. And so a return from the preposterously unlistenable "Hazards of Love" is welcomed.
For most of the record's duration, The Decemberists abandon the niche that made, and eventually betrayed, them. Colin Meloy shows he can write a melody without it being inspiration from absurd historical fiction. His singalongs can exist without seven distinct movements. "The King is Dead" is ten songs that don't try to be much more than ten songs. It's what the band needed. A RESET button has been hit. The slate mostly erased. Don't backslide now, guys.
still soon:
Tim Hecker - Ravedeath, 1972
Bright Eyes - The People's Key
Deerhoof - Deerhoof vs. Evil
Destroyer - Kaputt
Radiohead - The King of Limbs
Sam Mickens - Sinistra Secco
James Blake - s/t
Akron/Family - S/T II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT
The Mountain Goats - All Eternal's Deck
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Everything I am Listening To 1
Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will
I haven't listened to a Mogwai album since Happy Songs for Happy People--which was listening to significantly less than Mogwai Young Team (but more as a result of MYT's strengths than HPFHP's weaknesses)--but an album carrying this name and this album art (look at it) is a lot tougher to ignore than something with a silly looking eagle on it.
And maybe it's not as good as Young Team. And maybe it's not as loud and brutal as the title might imply (still bring earplugs to the show), but it is a solid album. More the most part, Mogwai make music that sounds like Mogwai; it's a fine thing, that. Here and there little memorable bits emerge (it was the 'Death Rays' synth noise that make me call it the best song I've heard in 2011. Only two days into the year, but still). Overall, then, Mogwai remains a post-rock-ish band who makes post-rock-ish albums.
Lil B - Angels Exodus
It's a mystery why this things ends up being nearly as listenable as it actually is. There's more to appreciate here than the astonishing horribleness of 2010's "ambient based freestyles" collection "Rain in England". But the tracks where B might just show evidence of becoming a competent MC are probably not the ones to show your friends. It's the "Life Zombies" (some sort of Resident Evil ode) you'll play for friends in the car. "1 Time" sounds like he's getting there, and "Vampires" might be one of B's best tracks to date, until he closes by doing his best Andy Samberg-"boiled-guuse" voice while exclaiming "don't let the vompires getchoo!" a few times. Choices are
Lil B - Free Music: The Complete Myspace Collection
This is a mixtape that collects all of the tracks Lil B uploaded to his various (uh, 120+) MySpace throughout 2009/2010. So, here's a 676 track, 40 hour long, 2.5 gigabyte collection that I spent more time cleaning out hard drive space than I've so far been able to stand sitting through a fraction of the thing. It's completely triumphant. It's a 0.0 and it's a 10.0. It's a testament to B's mission to be "based for life", but a totally indigestible one. The best we can hope for is to listen to a track here and there, understand and be glad this insane, unfiltered level of proliferation is over with.
Lil B - Red Flame (Devil Music Edition)
And finally, Lil B's first mixtape of 2011. Though the distinction seems a little silly, since both feature stolen beats and original McCarthy GarageBand creations. Either way, positivity seems to be the theme of this newest "rare music" collection, picking up where "Motivation" left off. Again, this trends away from the truly bizarre, but manages to end up something Lil B really never was before: sort of forgetful. His background track skipping and his claims at Red Flame (Devil Music Edition) being the most influential and prolific mixtape of all time are what gets remembered. With some three "albums" and who knows how many mixtapes on deck for the rest of the year, there's probably not much reason to worry.\
Tennis - Cape Dory
A band that sounds like another band making music for a different season. Tennis, Headlights, summer. But the reason I like Headlights, despite them probably being, objectively, sort of kind of dull, is because they sound like fall. It's not hard to hear the sounds of summer's exit in their little pop medleys. "So Much for the Afternoon" sounded like slipping into sleep as the sun began setting earlier even before Casiotone for the Painfully Alone made it undeniable on his remix.
Maybe Cape Dory will be a really nice album to play while sleepy once this snow melts for good. it's just a matter of remembering it until then.
Beans - End It All
More weirdo rap. But in the most opposite of ways compared to, say, oh, the Based God. While the Pretty Bitch sometimes seems like he doesn't always have enough (and not only content-wise; he sometimes just sort of stops), Beans' flow is unrelenting. He talk/raps through every inch of his fourth album (his first in the good company of anticon.), over beats sent in from all over (Four Tet, Tobacco, some dude from Interpol), sounding different but sounding pretty far from B's GarageBand compositions.
Listening to the 30 odd minutes of End It All, it's not hard to draw (MF)/DOOM comparisons. Music that is so obviously rap, but so far stylistically distanced from 99% of what is going on in the rest of the genre. And not always in an accessible, easy, or likable way. The allure is difficult to explain, but the album's length makes it easy enough to sit through a few times, even if you don't end up any closer to explaining the compulsion.
Braids - Native Speaker
"Feels-era Animal Collective with a girl singer". That description works, but kind of dodges a better one: that Braids also sounds a lot like the Brooklyn-based duo High Places. It's, again, a vocal thing. Mary Pearson sounds a lot like Braids' Katie Lee. And it's a watery loop thing. And it's "not a totally outstanding yet" thing. Native Speaker's standouts are almost always surrounded by fun-limiting droney nothingness sequences that work against the outstanding momentum tracks like "Lemonade" so effortlessly build.
soon:
Tim Hecker - Ravedeath, 1972
Bright Eyes - The People's Key
Deerhoof - Deerhoof vs. Evil
Destroyer - Kaputt
Radiohead - The King of Limbs
Sam Mickens - Sinistra Secco
James Blake - s/t
The Decemberists - The King is Dead
Buck 65 - 20 Odd Years
Akron/Family - S/T II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT
I haven't listened to a Mogwai album since Happy Songs for Happy People--which was listening to significantly less than Mogwai Young Team (but more as a result of MYT's strengths than HPFHP's weaknesses)--but an album carrying this name and this album art (look at it) is a lot tougher to ignore than something with a silly looking eagle on it.
And maybe it's not as good as Young Team. And maybe it's not as loud and brutal as the title might imply (still bring earplugs to the show), but it is a solid album. More the most part, Mogwai make music that sounds like Mogwai; it's a fine thing, that. Here and there little memorable bits emerge (it was the 'Death Rays' synth noise that make me call it the best song I've heard in 2011. Only two days into the year, but still). Overall, then, Mogwai remains a post-rock-ish band who makes post-rock-ish albums.
Lil B - Angels Exodus
It's a mystery why this things ends up being nearly as listenable as it actually is. There's more to appreciate here than the astonishing horribleness of 2010's "ambient based freestyles" collection "Rain in England". But the tracks where B might just show evidence of becoming a competent MC are probably not the ones to show your friends. It's the "Life Zombies" (some sort of Resident Evil ode) you'll play for friends in the car. "1 Time" sounds like he's getting there, and "Vampires" might be one of B's best tracks to date, until he closes by doing his best Andy Samberg-"boiled-guuse" voice while exclaiming "don't let the vompires getchoo!" a few times. Choices are
Lil B - Free Music: The Complete Myspace Collection
This is a mixtape that collects all of the tracks Lil B uploaded to his various (uh, 120+) MySpace throughout 2009/2010. So, here's a 676 track, 40 hour long, 2.5 gigabyte collection that I spent more time cleaning out hard drive space than I've so far been able to stand sitting through a fraction of the thing. It's completely triumphant. It's a 0.0 and it's a 10.0. It's a testament to B's mission to be "based for life", but a totally indigestible one. The best we can hope for is to listen to a track here and there, understand and be glad this insane, unfiltered level of proliferation is over with.
Lil B - Red Flame (Devil Music Edition)
And finally, Lil B's first mixtape of 2011. Though the distinction seems a little silly, since both feature stolen beats and original McCarthy GarageBand creations. Either way, positivity seems to be the theme of this newest "rare music" collection, picking up where "Motivation" left off. Again, this trends away from the truly bizarre, but manages to end up something Lil B really never was before: sort of forgetful. His background track skipping and his claims at Red Flame (Devil Music Edition) being the most influential and prolific mixtape of all time are what gets remembered. With some three "albums" and who knows how many mixtapes on deck for the rest of the year, there's probably not much reason to worry.\
Tennis - Cape Dory
A band that sounds like another band making music for a different season. Tennis, Headlights, summer. But the reason I like Headlights, despite them probably being, objectively, sort of kind of dull, is because they sound like fall. It's not hard to hear the sounds of summer's exit in their little pop medleys. "So Much for the Afternoon" sounded like slipping into sleep as the sun began setting earlier even before Casiotone for the Painfully Alone made it undeniable on his remix.
Maybe Cape Dory will be a really nice album to play while sleepy once this snow melts for good. it's just a matter of remembering it until then.
Beans - End It All
More weirdo rap. But in the most opposite of ways compared to, say, oh, the Based God. While the Pretty Bitch sometimes seems like he doesn't always have enough (and not only content-wise; he sometimes just sort of stops), Beans' flow is unrelenting. He talk/raps through every inch of his fourth album (his first in the good company of anticon.), over beats sent in from all over (Four Tet, Tobacco, some dude from Interpol), sounding different but sounding pretty far from B's GarageBand compositions.
Listening to the 30 odd minutes of End It All, it's not hard to draw (MF)/DOOM comparisons. Music that is so obviously rap, but so far stylistically distanced from 99% of what is going on in the rest of the genre. And not always in an accessible, easy, or likable way. The allure is difficult to explain, but the album's length makes it easy enough to sit through a few times, even if you don't end up any closer to explaining the compulsion.
Braids - Native Speaker
"Feels-era Animal Collective with a girl singer". That description works, but kind of dodges a better one: that Braids also sounds a lot like the Brooklyn-based duo High Places. It's, again, a vocal thing. Mary Pearson sounds a lot like Braids' Katie Lee. And it's a watery loop thing. And it's "not a totally outstanding yet" thing. Native Speaker's standouts are almost always surrounded by fun-limiting droney nothingness sequences that work against the outstanding momentum tracks like "Lemonade" so effortlessly build.
soon:
Tim Hecker - Ravedeath, 1972
Bright Eyes - The People's Key
Deerhoof - Deerhoof vs. Evil
Destroyer - Kaputt
Radiohead - The King of Limbs
Sam Mickens - Sinistra Secco
James Blake - s/t
The Decemberists - The King is Dead
Buck 65 - 20 Odd Years
Akron/Family - S/T II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT
Monday, January 31, 2011
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Daytrotter Notes, Jan 6-Jan 10
January 6 - Lone Wolf
Piano on the first track sounds really cool. I don't know if it's how it was recorded (hot and peaking all over the place), or if it's some sort of synth sounding like a piano and a harpsichord sounding at once. Whatever it is, the effect is really neat and is definitely a compliment to rest of the sad-but-still-jaunty-and-catchy song. That fake, long, hyphenated word describes the session pretty well. The other three songs in the session are all played on guitar, where pretty, driving, fingerpicked melodies compliment the strong, soulful (?) vocal really well. This was nice.
Notable track(s): 15 Letters
January 6 - Active Child
Legitimately pretty songs, maybe even ones that accomplish something beyond sounding pretty. It is pretty obviously the striking voices, somewhere between Andrew Bird and Shearwater's Jonathan Meiburg, are responsible for a vast majority of it, but the sparse, airy strings don't hurt.
Notable track(s): Wilderness
RIYL: Shearwater
January 7 - Happy Birthday
The first song, 'Evergreen', was a pretty, slow, pleasant sounding song that probably reminds you over a dozen others, but in an ok way. I liked the little bass line that is mostly tucked away beneath the guitar. The other three songs really took a turn, devolving into a messy sounding, raucous distorted, still twee-ish thing. The sort of music that might be fun live but doesn't really interest me on record too much.
January 8 - We Are Country Mice
Words thought of: southern rock, classic rock, psych-rock, the 60s, the 70s. We Are Country Mice sound like all of those things, for better or worse. I am probably not well-versed enough in any of those topics to name names, but the band definitely spends a lot of time sounding like something you've probably heard before. The final track, "Close Behind", caught my attention more than the others, staying fairly minimal and spacey (and staying sounding a lot like Pink Floyd (ooops, a name), until the thing explodes in its 90 seconds. Crunchy, echoey guitars.
January 9 - Wartime Blues
The riff-driven "California Winter" draws heavily from the same sonic palate Modest Mouse (which I'll be careful to not call "theirs" (see: a few sentences down)) has drawn from on several slower songs, while the rollicking "Grain Belt" would, musically, easily fit in somewhere on Bright Eyes' LIFTED. I hate that I can't do more than say "sort of sounds like Modest Mouse!" or "sort of makes me think of Bright Eyes!" when it comes to things that can be described at a high level as some combination of indie/folk/rock. But it is those comparisons are the ones that are easiest and most apparent for me.
I can talk about things that beep and boop a lot better than ones that twang.
January 10 - OK Go
Inoffensive, if not genetic indie rock/power pop stuff. All of the reverb on "White Knuckles" surprised me (I really like reverb, guys), but really all it does is drag out each sound of what is, more or less, to me anyway, completely ineffectual music.
Piano on the first track sounds really cool. I don't know if it's how it was recorded (hot and peaking all over the place), or if it's some sort of synth sounding like a piano and a harpsichord sounding at once. Whatever it is, the effect is really neat and is definitely a compliment to rest of the sad-but-still-jaunty-and-catchy song. That fake, long, hyphenated word describes the session pretty well. The other three songs in the session are all played on guitar, where pretty, driving, fingerpicked melodies compliment the strong, soulful (?) vocal really well. This was nice.
Notable track(s): 15 Letters
January 6 - Active Child
Legitimately pretty songs, maybe even ones that accomplish something beyond sounding pretty. It is pretty obviously the striking voices, somewhere between Andrew Bird and Shearwater's Jonathan Meiburg, are responsible for a vast majority of it, but the sparse, airy strings don't hurt.
Notable track(s): Wilderness
RIYL: Shearwater
January 7 - Happy Birthday
The first song, 'Evergreen', was a pretty, slow, pleasant sounding song that probably reminds you over a dozen others, but in an ok way. I liked the little bass line that is mostly tucked away beneath the guitar. The other three songs really took a turn, devolving into a messy sounding, raucous distorted, still twee-ish thing. The sort of music that might be fun live but doesn't really interest me on record too much.
January 8 - We Are Country Mice
Words thought of: southern rock, classic rock, psych-rock, the 60s, the 70s. We Are Country Mice sound like all of those things, for better or worse. I am probably not well-versed enough in any of those topics to name names, but the band definitely spends a lot of time sounding like something you've probably heard before. The final track, "Close Behind", caught my attention more than the others, staying fairly minimal and spacey (and staying sounding a lot like Pink Floyd (ooops, a name), until the thing explodes in its 90 seconds. Crunchy, echoey guitars.
January 9 - Wartime Blues
The riff-driven "California Winter" draws heavily from the same sonic palate Modest Mouse (which I'll be careful to not call "theirs" (see: a few sentences down)) has drawn from on several slower songs, while the rollicking "Grain Belt" would, musically, easily fit in somewhere on Bright Eyes' LIFTED. I hate that I can't do more than say "sort of sounds like Modest Mouse!" or "sort of makes me think of Bright Eyes!" when it comes to things that can be described at a high level as some combination of indie/folk/rock. But it is those comparisons are the ones that are easiest and most apparent for me.
I can talk about things that beep and boop a lot better than ones that twang.
January 10 - OK Go
Inoffensive, if not genetic indie rock/power pop stuff. All of the reverb on "White Knuckles" surprised me (I really like reverb, guys), but really all it does is drag out each sound of what is, more or less, to me anyway, completely ineffectual music.
It is a weird feeling. To feel like you are just not ready to go ahead and create something specific, not yet. Like having a novel you want to write, but somehow knowing you are just not ready to do that.
I feel a little bit like that and can't really explain it to much better.
I've had the words "______ Fight Song" written down on a post-it for a while.
I don't know what it is. But that is what it is called.
I feel a little bit like that and can't really explain it to much better.
I've had the words "______ Fight Song" written down on a post-it for a while.
I don't know what it is. But that is what it is called.
Monday, January 10, 2011
Caltrain blog 2
This train isn't nearly as nice.
But with how good the rest of absolutely everything is, i barely noticed.
I am going to say 'I love you' in every volume of voice I have.
But with how good the rest of absolutely everything is, i barely noticed.
I am going to say 'I love you' in every volume of voice I have.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Daytrotter Notes, Jan 1-Jan 5
Every year, for the past two or three [years], I've resolved to listen to every session daytrotter.com posts (which these days is 365+ a year). In 2010 I made in three months or so before falling a few weeks behind and went back to picking and choosing, mostly bands I already liked. Which isn't really a good way to find out about new things at all.
So I am trying something new! It is called "write a little blurb about each session this year". Mostly for my own reference down the road, but maybe having a place to put it will keep me on top of it a little more. Maybe something will sound nice, or I will make a comparison to a band someone really likes/hate and they will check it out and find new things along with me.
January 1 - Korean is Asian
The year started with what might be the hardest type of music for me to write about. Not because I don't like it, or really like it, or have trouble understand how anyone could like it; just, there are so many things that sounds like this. Even a few days later I can't really recall what this band really was about outside of 'acoustic folky music' even though I listened to the session three times. And it's nothing against them. I just don't know if I have the vocabulary for it anymore. Sorry, guys.
January 2 - Eagle Seagull
I liked this a little more. A lot of the songs they played had some neat things going on aesthetically once in a while. Between lots of sparse jangling guitar (think early Modest Mouse) and some really constant fiddling, it's a fun listen. I guess the vocal (and what is going on lyrically, really) isn't the most original sounding thing if you've heard Franz Ferdinand or the Killers any of the copy-catish bands that popped up around the same time in 2006, but it's nothing that bothered me too much.
Apparently this band released their second album last year and then broke up. That is kind of sad.
January 3 - MGMT
I am sort of weird about MGMT. I am pretty aware of them, and they have their place, I guess, but their place is sort of removed from anything I care about musically. But this was all a lot less irritating than I was expecting. Maybe it was that the set the played here was a lot less electronically-based/reliant (which is usually what I am all into, so I do not know what is up), but these tracks were nice. When they are using synths it's not overpowering. The drone-y pitches in 'I Found a Whistle' work really well. I don't know if they are going to win anyone over, totally, or anything, but it's inoffensive. I sort of would have liked to hear 'Kids' arranged like this.
Notable track(s): "I Found a Whistle"
January 4 - DJ Spooky
The most interesting part of the single track "Daytrotter Mix" is probably the short, found sound collage that serves as the mix's intro. Not that the rest is bad, or not well done, but I am probably not alone in finding it more and more difficult to be impressed by straightforward DJ stuff in a post-Girl Talk world. It ends a bit stronger though. Programmed drums over post-rock violins. Kind of neat, I guess.
January 5 - Twin Shadow
This is a band who put out one of my favorite albums of 2010 so it was exciting to see him here, but even more exciting were the live in studio arrangements. I missed out on seeing him live back in October or November and knowing this was what I missed--that it probably wasn't the low-key intimate performance I expected--makes it even harder.
Notable track(s): Slow
So I am trying something new! It is called "write a little blurb about each session this year". Mostly for my own reference down the road, but maybe having a place to put it will keep me on top of it a little more. Maybe something will sound nice, or I will make a comparison to a band someone really likes/hate and they will check it out and find new things along with me.
January 1 - Korean is Asian
The year started with what might be the hardest type of music for me to write about. Not because I don't like it, or really like it, or have trouble understand how anyone could like it; just, there are so many things that sounds like this. Even a few days later I can't really recall what this band really was about outside of 'acoustic folky music' even though I listened to the session three times. And it's nothing against them. I just don't know if I have the vocabulary for it anymore. Sorry, guys.
January 2 - Eagle Seagull
I liked this a little more. A lot of the songs they played had some neat things going on aesthetically once in a while. Between lots of sparse jangling guitar (think early Modest Mouse) and some really constant fiddling, it's a fun listen. I guess the vocal (and what is going on lyrically, really) isn't the most original sounding thing if you've heard Franz Ferdinand or the Killers any of the copy-catish bands that popped up around the same time in 2006, but it's nothing that bothered me too much.
Apparently this band released their second album last year and then broke up. That is kind of sad.
January 3 - MGMT
I am sort of weird about MGMT. I am pretty aware of them, and they have their place, I guess, but their place is sort of removed from anything I care about musically. But this was all a lot less irritating than I was expecting. Maybe it was that the set the played here was a lot less electronically-based/reliant (which is usually what I am all into, so I do not know what is up), but these tracks were nice. When they are using synths it's not overpowering. The drone-y pitches in 'I Found a Whistle' work really well. I don't know if they are going to win anyone over, totally, or anything, but it's inoffensive. I sort of would have liked to hear 'Kids' arranged like this.
Notable track(s): "I Found a Whistle"
January 4 - DJ Spooky
The most interesting part of the single track "Daytrotter Mix" is probably the short, found sound collage that serves as the mix's intro. Not that the rest is bad, or not well done, but I am probably not alone in finding it more and more difficult to be impressed by straightforward DJ stuff in a post-Girl Talk world. It ends a bit stronger though. Programmed drums over post-rock violins. Kind of neat, I guess.
January 5 - Twin Shadow
This is a band who put out one of my favorite albums of 2010 so it was exciting to see him here, but even more exciting were the live in studio arrangements. I missed out on seeing him live back in October or November and knowing this was what I missed--that it probably wasn't the low-key intimate performance I expected--makes it even harder.
Notable track(s): Slow
Sunday, January 2, 2011
MMXI.1
Year started.
And so far I've spent every second of it in love. And it is great.
There are some other things to probably talk about. Some resolutions, what I am going to be doing/want to do, a bunch of music stuff.
But I am not really thinking about any of that right now.
I am thinking about how good I think this year might be.
And so far I've spent every second of it in love. And it is great.
There are some other things to probably talk about. Some resolutions, what I am going to be doing/want to do, a bunch of music stuff.
But I am not really thinking about any of that right now.
I am thinking about how good I think this year might be.
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