After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

The Minimal Wave vinyl reissue label continues to do the lord's work by exhuming all manner of European synth pop that's been forgotten by all but the most dedicated and marginally obsessed. One of their most beautiful releases of late (and wow, just look at the above painted cover by Lorenzo Mattotti) is Lost and Late a compilation of long out of print early-to-mid 80s cassette tracks from French band Martin Dupont. I picked it up a while back, but just sort of got around to processing it for your pleasure.

The band formed in 1981 in Marseilles, France, eventually building enough steam to support Souixsie & the Banshees, before inevitably fading out after a few releases. Cryptically, there was no member of the band that shared their name. From the MW website, we get a bit more illumination on the band's elusive genre, "cold wave":

"cold wave is new wave without the ridiculous attitude the world could be any better and wthout the anger punk brought into this world."- "nice description...but there is some cold wave there that has some anger (I think of D-Stop, or perhaps it is punk?). As a sound you could say it sounds like the post-punk of groups like Joy Division but mostly with electronic percussion and some synth and a bit more raw on the punk side, at least that is most of the stuff i would describe as cold wave."

It is a style much beloved of my cold, cold heart. A couple frosty shards...

Martin Dupont - "Just Because"

"Just Because," the eponymous track from an '84 LP, pretends to be still and ominous at its onset, before suddenly jet-packing forward at accelerated tempo. "I've been a love song in my head," croons Alain Seghir repeatedly, against quickly chugging synth cogs. No one could mistake his band's creation for an outward expression of his peculiar identity crisis, especially with goony deep voices often intruding on the mix. For a neon monsters, this one does have a whiff of doomed romance.

Martin Dupont - "Shake Your Flowers"

"Shake Your Flowers" is more immediately forthcoming about its synth loops, though it has a more tentative, limping rhythm than the first selection's. The ancient tones they achieved spanned a wide gulf, from a frightening apocalyptic foghorn to quite lush and lovely throbbing notes. Alain intrudes now and again to sigh in an emphatic Gallic fashion, but he mainly ducks out so that the track can focus on the interplay between MD's platoon of synth sounds. The more avant tones can be mildly distracting, but there's a pretty, crystalline architecture to it all not often attempted by the key plinkers of the modern age.

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

- Not nearly the only Stereolab tour-only 7"

- Monochrome Set transcend the singles scene circa '82

- OMD's Dazzling Ships

- Pylon continue to gyrate, mid-Chomp

- James McNew's home-recordings are so good that I refuse to make a "Dump" pun

- Rox-y! Rox-y! Rox-y! Rox-y!

- Saying somethin' 'bout "Spooks in Space".

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Neon Indian - "Should Have Taken Acid With You"

I don't know about my other children of the 90s out there, but my patience with songs exalting dumb adolescence is unravelling a bit. It says nothing to me about my life, you know? But, since what feels like 70% of all pop songs dwells on the young and dunderheaded, a few have to slip through the gate occasionally. At least this one, by Austin/Brooklyn hookup Neon Indian, throws in a few universal phrases that haven't been consistently mined for lyrics. How is it even possible that "told my parents that I'm staying with you" hasn't made it into a pop track before now? Behind the glassy-eyed sloganeering, it's gotta a very pleasant chime and flutter. Close in tone to those Memory Cassette songs we flipped over last year, but not as fully and subtly realized.

Julianna Barwick - "Sunlight, Heaven"

I'm not sure Brooklyn musician Julianna Barwick would classify her own compositions "ambient" music, I'd even wager a guess that she wouldn't. But it's the rich stasis of the songs on her new Florine EP that moves me though, not the specific structure of her music, (though that structure feels quite novel). After basking in it for a few days, I'm fairly certain that there is nothing in this leadoff track that isn't Ms. Barwick's voice. In tones that alternately soar or float, she provides pure melody and then shifts it subtly, combing it here, letting it complement itself there, until it all blurs together into something approaching devotional hymns. It sounds like its title promised it would.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[Photo Cred]

We last heard from Arthur & Yu while deep in the 'Best of' tallying during 2007's blog commencement ceremonies. The group and their veritable melting pot of sweetness comes from a delicate romance of boy/girl harmonies dipping one foot each into Neil Young's folk and Belle & Sebastian's twee-pop. Last month by way of Subpop's 7" single of the month club, the Seattle duo reappeared with this typically unassuming gem that ends with an unsolicited response to the one of the most classic of all Bob Dylan songs.

Arthur & Yu - "Don't Piss Into the Fire"

The song opens with an iffy bongo rhythm before the salvo of crashing cymbals fends off any chances of a drum circle developing. Long and exaggerated intonations are used to fatten and fill as both vocalists stretch the singing of certain words. Staggered harmony also works the same effect and colors for added dimensions of what is otherwise a fairly stripped arrangement beyond simple acoustic guitar chords, tambourine and the occasional woodblock.

Echoing the title's suggestion, calls for tempering rash revolution are repeated in each dissimilar verse. Vague messages are phrased in a way to present conflict and desire as unchained from each other. Lyrics seem to make the argument that one can often aggravate the other despite intentions. Like the tragedy of a curious cat, unearthed rock might awaken more troubles once moved than left alone in its place - no matter how obstructive the walk over. Culminating with clever and thoughtful word play response, they hold and square a shot at Dylan's "Blowing In the Wind" by summarizing the "Don't Piss Into the Fire" mantra in a comparatively shocking way considering the powerful message of change conveyed in Dylan's classic:

So take it easy.
Nothing's blowing in the wind
no question was even asked...for where to begin
the answer is often the orphan of taste
because if the dark dog can't eat it, it's a waste it's a waste.

Posted by Merry Swankster at 05:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Magik Markers - "7/23"

I touched on this briefly in my L review of the intriguing Balf Quarry. It's one of a few standouts of that pretty baffling LP. It starts a deconstructed clockwork noise stitch job, and then just improbably gets sweeter and sweeter as it goes, ending just shy of sappy, at least until the flailing, dying animal guitars start squealing.

Twin Sister - "Ginger"

Twin Sister is a fairly new, unheralded NYC band devoting their skills to some well-travelled styles, but with a swell, able hand. Blissed out, heavy shoegaze-pop, we know thee well. But chest crushing guitar tone and sweetly ominous yet nonchalantly delivered lyrics about the misbegotten freckle-faces among us are easy to like. And lest you think its all mood and suggestion, there's some great, precisely uncoiling guitar work just short of the three-minute mark. You can download their first EP, Vampires With Dreaming Kids here, for free.

tUnE-YaRdS - "Jumpingjack"

I still definitely love Micachu to a whole 'nother degree, but the compositions of tUnE-YaRdS' CAPS Lock epileptic one-girl band, Merrill Garbus, checks off some of the same odd boxes. "Jumpingjack" wobbles forth on the sound of waves crashing, beatbozes sputtering, and pianos desperately crying out for a stern tuning. Weird that these sad little elements can build to such a roar. The tense little keyboard loop that develops in the song's back-half is surprisingly lucid, also, given the static storm it's thriving inside.

Liechtenstein - "All at Once"

One of my favorite sub-three-minute sucker punches of the first half of 09, not surprisingly from Sweden rather than their hilariously tiny namesake. I'm seeing them play at Bruar Falls on Tuesday, and I am steeling myself for the fact that their live, small club show can't possibly be this immaculately echoed. Hope remains for a genius sound tech who can handle the beautiful, floating lady vocal mix. Much cooler than the still-pretty-cool rest of the record, which trends toward less spine-tingling girl-helmed indie-pop.

Eat Skull - "Oregon Dreaming"

From the sound of things, there are brighter and more immediate little Kiwi-loving ditties on Eat Skull's new Wild and Inside LP. I however, am returning to the lush forests of my adolescent home for some extended run in a few weeks, and we all know how we like to project all over our pop songs. I like this track for both its Portland specific detail ("they won't be happy 'til we're all living in a tent city" has some resonance for residents) and its true-in-any-locale sentiments ("...the worst people having the best time..." and isn't that always the way).

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 09:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, the most fun thing I did this weekend was catch The Beets play at Red Star Bar in Greenpoint on Friday night, on a show put together jointly by the Music Slut and Brooklyn Ski Club in celebration of both the utility of free malt liquor in times of recession, and the birthday of Beets member Jose. I've been charmed enough by The Beets to book them for shows twice in 2008 and continually post their high-larious show fliers, but I've never seen them with as few hiccups as this past May Day. Without the kinda ingratiating, yet momentum-killing stops and starts, they seemed like a shoe-in to be the next fuzzy darlings of New York's club scene. Which is why they rightfully made The L's 8 NYC Bands You Need to Hear list just a few days prior. They turned up the squealing distortion slightly, for that au courant queasy edge, but it's easy, gang-shouted harmony that defines their sound.

The Beets - "The Devil"

Maybe my favorite shout-along on their debut 12" is "The Devil" which tackles the old standby rock anti-hero in as crude and funny a manner as Ol' Scratch deserves.

"I'm gonna dye my hair black/ I'm gonna buy myself a shirt that is black/ I'm gonna buy sneakers that are black/ and think about the devil."

Some cohorts compared them to Wavves after the show, which raised my hackles slightly, as that band really bugs me. The difference, I think, is that I'm convinced that The Beets have a bit of sly, self-awareness when they write lines like that. They are being clever and parodic towards teen vapidity. To put it mildly, Wavves, uh, aren't. A fine line, I guess, but one that makes all the difference to me.

--

In the same subterranean spirit of the Beets, I stop briefly to note the release of The World's Lousy With Ideas, vol. 8, a vinyl compilation from Almost Ready Records. All previous additions of the DIY rock series have sold out, and the relatively bigger names involved in this one mean that it's probably gone from select shelves as I'm typing this (though you can make an attempt here). New tracks by Vivian Girls, Sic Alps, Times New Viking, Blank Dogs, Thee Oh Sees, etc., in this hiss-crazed moment in rock culture, pretty much guarantees a vinyl consumption frenzy. The obvious joke occurs to me--If the world is lousy with ideas, why is the only one represented here "turn up the distortion on minimal indie rock/pop songs,"--but I'll sneak it in quickly in the context of a longer sentence as if I didn't mean it.

Intelligence - "The Beetles"

This menacing rock song could nearly be tagged "industrial" due to a truly nauseous low-end rumble. On top of that churning cesspit of poor fidelity, it's strident, snotty pop. Most of the time with early 60s rockers, the actual Beatles for example, it seems silly that parents could have ever been threatened by such an innocuously dapper bunch. This version of decades gone pop-chart rock would have justified a few dozen chastity belts at least. The force with which "Let's make a baby on the 4th of July" is spat could knock-up a teenager solely via headphones.

Times New Viking - "A Lot of Paintings"

For my money, there's still no one who does this sort of thing better than TNV. There's plenty of movement in this song, with obvious thought given to its structure and color. It's not so much that they bury their melodies in noise, as they've figured out how to blow out their melodies to the point that they actually become noise. You turn the knob up to try to make out the words, and realize that they are just as blurred and blistered as before. But bits you can hear make you want to know what they're hollering, still. "She's got a lot of parties, she's got a lot of paintings," they shout, putting both on the same tier of socialite worth. It's a line that's both appreciative and casually dismissive in an evocative way. And as always, they find a way to let their nagging guitars cut through the murk.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

Before we get into this, let me first explicitly state my disapproval for "aural" = "oral" puns. When someone describes a song or a sound as "aural sex" they deserve a sock in the jaw, no exceptions. The freewheeling NYC disco scene of the early 80s is no excuse. So, "Aural Exciters," that's ten demerits (or, you know, one sock in the jaw). On with the praise...

Bob Blank got around. He arrived in New York City in 1973, quickly finding work as a session guitarist (try that career path these days). Two years later, he was opening his own Blank Tape studios, and would eventually engineer or produce "over 500 charted records," not that you can track down a precise list of said. A partial list does the trick though, as he worked on the production for such artists as: Beach Boys, Talking Heads, Donna Summer, Patti Smith, and Sting. He had a finger in both the No Wave and the disco scenes, which continue to seem puzzlingly opposite in retrospect, but as we know were snug as a bug back then. He worked as in-house engineer for some of the best output for the sainted Ze Records, my fondness for which will be familiar to longtime readers. Kid Creole & the Coconuts, James White & the Blacks, Lizzy Mercier Descloux, Lydia Lunch, the Contortions--he was directly involved in most of the label's greats. Funnily enough it seems his day job was recording Sun Ra when most of this stuff was going down. Guy got around.

"Aural Exciters" is billed as Blank's blow-off steam, party production monicker, a claim that's easy to validate with a quick look at the overflowing back of record credits. We have all-time credit classics such as a listing for "Tap Dancing," "Running," and "Bubbles"(?). "Marimba : Rogelio." A vocal credit for "The Mulatto Madness Singers." Geographically and chronologically, it makes perfect sense that James Chance was in this room playing horns, but you have to think he was the wet blanket No Wave guy. Certainly he could not get down like "Sugar-Coated Andy."

The record's title track, and crowning achievement, is "Spooks in Space." The intro is an unimpeachably hilarious send up of the Shirelles' "Mama Said," which I won't quote in full in order to give it the appropriate laugh quotient for the uninitiated. Certainly Mama should have had some more foresight! The ranks of the unfamiliar have been shrunk slightly due to the relatively high profile of Ze's Mutant Disco compilation. But the version on that double CD is the record's "disco mix" which stretches the instrumental vamp out to 5:30, stretches the awesome proto Go! Team girl choruses thin, and doesn't generally add all that much in return. The version below is on the record, a super super super goofy 3 and a half minutes of laser-guided disco-pop, and my preferred (and just coincidentally more obscure I swear) take. Serious grooves are the only serious thing included, which is why Ze hits are so much damn fun. "Ain't ashamed to say I seen a modularistic lunar beam come in on my TV one night." Why would you be?

Aural Exciters - "Spooks in Space"

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

- Not nearly the only Stereolab tour-only 7"

- Monochrome Set transcend the singles scene circa '82

- OMD's Dazzling Ships

- Pylon continue to gyrate, mid-Chomp

- James McNew's home-recordings are so good that I refuse to make a "Dump" pun

- Rox-y! Rox-y! Rox-y! Rox-y!

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Atlas Sound - "Time Warp"

I'm hard-pressed to pin down a specific time Bradford Cox is is porting to in his latest digital single. There's something of a loose, beatnik vibe to the whole thing though, right down to its disdain for the bourgeois 'burbs. "Suburban streets, you've been cruel to me. I hate your light. I hate your time." Alienation is not new to the Cox oeuvre. Notably though, I think this is about as clear and un-fuzzed as I've ever heard his singing voice, which is typically sad and lovely. Remember, just a few years ago, they were getting hit with the "he can only hide under distortion" knock. You don't hear that one much anymore.

Brakes - "Red Rag"

Brakes' frontman Eamon Hamilton is a friend of mine (like an actual friend, not a twitter pal) and when I see him he's mainly pretty jovial. So, understand my surprise upon spinning his band's latest record Touchdown (out now on Fat Cat) to find this nasty, snarling little In Utero unit shifter buried amid a set of tightly crafted melodic rock. I'm not sure the source of the of the puddle that needs soaking up but I think we can safely assume that the rag in question is blood-saturated. Early candidates: fingers, eardrums.

Salem - "OhK"

Is the fog lifting ever-so-slightly on these mysterious hometown name usurpers? A bit, I guess, but not enough to put me off. This whole track is a mixed signal, still. Even as they're brightening their palette a little bit, with decipherable lyrics, cozier synth tones, and warmly distorted guitar, they are exalting the futility of warmth in general. "The sun can't warm you up" after a night of debauchery, sirens coo, sounding delightfully drugged out, even mid-moralization.

Automelodi - "Ciao! Ciao. Ciao?"

I suspect most of you trend hoppers have stopped looking north to Montreal for your cues on cool, but I've got evidence here that the chilly province isn't entirely tapped out of unknown pleasures. Xavier Paradis had been recording under various synth-centric monickers for over a decade, before rebranding himself Automelodi. Thus, it's no real shock that this music should sound so rich and fully formed. Xavier sounds a single Y chromosome over the androgynous line (or slightly like Lissy Trullie smoking another pack a day). It's tempting to call this a modern continuation of the ultra-obscure Franco synth wave that brought us such forgotten early 80s luminaries as Ruth and Charles de Goal, but those bands were barely this warm and inviting. It swings from romantic desolation to giddy pop swells effortlessly, guided by insistent blips. Also, the morphing punctuation makes the song's title unreasonably fun to say aloud. You can order their Fait ses Courses EP here.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 07:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The wee small hours of this morning saw the digital dispersal of the first heard track from the next Sonic Youth record, the Kim Gordon-centric "Sacred Trickster." Given the levels of anticipation for that LP around MS HQ, this has inflamed an already raging itch to hear the thing. Sonic Youth have had an improbably stellar late-career renaissance in the 00s, and with perpetually grinning Pavement bassist Mark Ibold now installed as a full-fledged recording member, there's very little reason to believe the Golden Age of their golden years won't continue, unabated. So, as a salve for our collective lack of patience (a systemic dilemma, these days) I offer a couple SY trifles, flung to the 'net from someone's hoarded hauls of this weekend's Record Store Day. The 2500 physical copies of these split Beck/Sonic Youth and Jay Reatard/Sonic Youth are now long, long gone...

Sonic Youth - "Pay No Mind" (Beck cover)

On Mellow Gold and earlier, Beck mitigated his ridiculous lyrics by delivering them in a hilariously earnest folk-singer fashion. Maybe "a giant dildo crushing the sun" was some sort of Woody Guthrie anti-fascist metaphor? Here, initially backed up by nothing more than some squirming static distortion, "Pay No Mind" seems ludicrous and sinister. Kim Gordon's aggressive whisper is particularly unsettling. Drums kick in soon enough, along with feedback that sounds like a whistling tea kettle and finally some properly nasty guitars. The added instruments give the silly lines some of their conviction back, and they sound like they might mean a little bit of something, after all. Hearing Thurston rasp that "the drugs won't kill your day job," has a particular ring of truth to it (though I can think of quite a few day jobs that the drugs might actually kill).

Sonic Youth - "No Garage"

"No Garage" is even less essential than the cover above, but what the hell. You interested in hearing SY just riff and riff and riff in a primitive manner, while occasionally snapping into dark, catchy guitar rock bursts? At least a little, right?

--

Sonic Youth's 16th studio record, The Eternal, is out on June 9th, for the first time via Matador Records. If you buy it now though, you can listen in a week and a day.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The post's titular match-up would go one way in my own personal esteem, and likely another way entirely in a popularly decided vote. We're here to discuss a cover version, and not a full-frontal assault, though in the hands of TNV the two are often indistinguishable.

Times New Viking - "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)"

Arcade Fire's "Neighborhood #1" was a readymade anthem, and enough of an earworm as an album opener that tens of hundreds of thousands of listeners curious from gushing accolades, stayed put at its close, and started doodling burning Frogger machines on their Trapper Keepers. Compared to Neon Bible, though, it's arrangement is kind of bare. Times New Viking decay that (relative) minimalism even further (like you knew they would). It's not as violent as you might expect though. The original's soaring melody seems to demand that the Ohio no-good-niks meet it at least half-way. This might be one of the least tinny tracks they've ever recorded. Adam Elliott and Beth Murphy are play-earnest in Win and Regine drag, making the stray sarcastic line reading ("...yeah, a tunnel..." should be followed by "You wanna make something of it?") all the more amusing. There's something about it that still reeks faintly of piss-taking. Maybe those loose, optimistic tambourine hits at the end? Who are you calling hippies, TNV?

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 05:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I've been poring over Q1-'09 tracks for which to be included in this year's first podcast (coming this week, he says, knocking wood...). As always in this far-flung moment of ours, there are many great songs willed in to life, and with dedicated curation, quality is fairly assured. I have to confess to a slight disconnect towards the music of the here and now, though, a slight glitch that's barring me from intense preoccupation with any few 09 records. The hows and whys of it are probably best saved for a more thought out post. But, since no one can tell me what to do with this little shared corner of digital space, not even the great and powerful MS himself, I've decided that you loyal/stubborn dead-enders out there might as well share in my less-than-current preoccupations. Some tidbits from a mental spring cleaning...

Dark Day - "Hands in the Dark"

I'd been vaguely looking for this song for over a year, never quite searching hard enough down the right digital alleyways to tip me off to the fact that it had been sitting on my shelf throughout, within the 3rd volume of Soul Jazz's New York Noise compilation. When you get to a certain scope of music collection, it's hard to truly be its master, you know? Anyway, the impetus for the unnecessary goose chase was a cover by Chromatics. If that band's got a singular talent, beyond sighing narcotically, it's knowing how to choose a damn fine cover subject.

Dark Day was the alias for Robin Crutchfield, founding member of late 70s No Wave notables, DNA. DNA has always seemed less like a living breathing band to me, and more like a theoretical line that had to be crossed sooner or later. While I wouldn't call their music bloodless, or even chilly exactly, it's just much much easier to admire intellectually, than feel in your bones. To its credit, this post-DNA Crutchfield track can't help but give me the sincere willies. Its synth tones are crappy/awesome, but the construction is so tightly coiled that I find myself nervous just to be in its presence. Nervousness seems to be its raison d'etre, though. "Hands in the dark/ touch then depart." As a description of the queasy power of a ill-advised tryst, it's hard to beat that lyrical economy.

Stereolab - "Old Lungs"

You basically know what you're getting from a Stereolab song, it's just that some are more perfect than others. For me, this rolling 8 minutes is one of their most sublime throwaways (It's taken from a Sonic-Youth-curated ATP festival compilation, and not an album proper). I've always interpreted the title as referencing the rich, blue-veined stank of its repeating horn section, though it's probably just as likely a reference to some piece of obscure propaganda, or revolutionary novel or something. The rusty horns give the track a distinct personality in the band's canon, though. Amid the pervasive smoothness, they chafe just right.

the Human League - "The Dignity of Labour, pt. 3"

If all you know of the Human League is extremely glossy 80s pop, made for cookie commercials, and sake-bombed karaoke duets, I urge you to give this little creeper a moment of attention. The third of four surprisingly emotive instrumentals, all supposedly an exaltation of the common Joe's day of toil. Listening to part 3, the most sinister of the lot, I'm hard-pressed to picture a profession that isn't "Blade Runner." There's a fierce primitivism to the boiling synths here that gives me the same tense thrill as John Carpenter's film scores. But then at around 1:30, the tones change and it becomes surprisingly Utopian, perhaps suspiciously so. It's the sort of thing you might expect under a piece of propaganda in the England of 1984. War = Peace. Coldness = Warmth. It's far itchier and brainier than you might expect from someone working as a waitress in a cocktail bar. That much is true.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

It seems I can't go more than a few weeks without circling back to Roxy Music. To everyone's benefit, I'm sure you'll agree. (Or get the fuck out!) One of the things that puzzles me most when I listen to their records, is how hugely popular they were. Music this cerebral has always been a hard sell. I guess this is the one bubble of high-brow mass hysteria, that proves the lunk-headed rule? Then again, I guess Kid A did hit no. 1 on the charts at the beginning of the decade. It just seems odd as what to me, in this particular instance. In 1976, the band was on a bit of a hiatus following '75's Siren, so they tossed out the live document Viva! as a stopgap. Containing material from '73-'75, it's a great document of one of the all time greats at a creative and commercial zenith. Side B, especially, has a formidable three-song running order from a 1973 show. Eno had sadly departed, but his function on stage always seems primarily visual. Other than that, it's the original line-up, who I"m sure were dressed to kill at the time.

Roxy Music - "If There is Something" (live, 1973)

"If There is Something" was already the early epic in the band's back pocket, but this version flirts with "Marquee Moon" levels of long-winded grandeur (and well ahead of "Marquee Moon," obviously). We're talking about 11 minutes. As devotees might guess, the padding comes in the slow middle build, making the anticipation almost unbearable by the time the drums kick back in and Bryan Ferry commands some cougar to shake her hair down in a ponytail, like she did in the glory years. If we're talking all-time definitive versions here, and we might as well, I'm not sure you can improve on the studio take. But here's to too much of a good thing...

Roxy Music - "In Every Dream Home a Heartache" (live, 1973)

Wow, what a perverse choice for a teeming mass of early 70s teens. "Wooooo, our consumerist lifestyles will continue to escalate until we no longer know anything of meaningful spiritual existence. Owwww, the blow-up doll is a metaphor for how these empty stand-ins we've accumulated can never love us back! Rooooxy Music!" Phil Manzanera's positively raunchy "but she blew my mind!" guitar climax was built for the stadium in any era, admittedly.

Roxy Music - "Do the Strand" (live, 1973)

The crowd noise at the beginning of this track is unreal. "Roxy! Roxy! Roxy! Roxy!" The electric atmosphere captured gives me nerd-bumps. Why did the fervor have to be so fleeting? Why can't we have weird-ol' Bryan Ferry mugging in the middle of a Super Bowl broadcast instead of the Boss? Have we passed the point where an anthem of the people can contain an emphatically odd non-sequitur proclamation like, "Rho-do-den-drum, is a niiiice Flow-er!"? Yes. Yes we have.

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

- Not nearly the only Stereolab tour-only 7"

- Monochrome Set transcend the singles scene circa '82

- OMD's Dazzling Ships

- Pylon continue to gyrate, mid-Chomp

- James McNew's home-recordings are so good that I refuse to make a "Dump" pun

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

British rock music in this decade has been inexcusably bad. I honestly cannot think of a single rock band from Great Britain that I'm dying for an impending record from (Prinzhorn Dance School probably only need the one LP. Long Blondes, Electrelane, R.I.P. Scotland gets a perpetual exemption, a riddle MS anthropologists are hard at work unravelling). Their pop music scene has been been considerably brighter, especially if you don't attempt some fuzzy ethnicity accounting with M.I.A. That Sophie Ellis-Bextor > anything Libertines-related is a duh of the highest magnitude (Grand Royal Duh? Duh-glepexity?). So it comes as no further surprise that my favorite British release this year resides more firmly in the pop camp, though a miscellaneous "oddball" category might be more apt. Jewellery by 21-year-old moppet Micachu and her band the Shapes, was just released on the Isles, via all-time raddest label, Rough Trade.

Micachu, aka Mica Levi, was a precocious child talent, who is currently unafraid to scramble her compositions with unusual instrumentation and a refusal to draw inside the lines of slick pop structures. Her debut record, produced by super respected electronic tinkerer Matthew Herbert, is a playful mess of ideas and tangents, that works far more often than it fails. She's previously performed as a grime MC, but thankfully you'd have no idea from Jewellry. It sounds more like she holed herself up in a studio with a box full of tin cans, and a stack of Fiery Furnaces records. The full-record stream that was living on the MBV collective's site just shuffled off into the great beyond, so let's look at a couple highlights in detail, just for kicks.

Micachu & the Shapes - "Golden Phone"

This track should have been kicking my ass as an advance single as early as last summer. I mourn for our lost time together. The thodding beat, occasionally dropping away to simple strums and incidental clatter, gives this song it's form, but vocal tricks and tics of differing degree fill it with life. She's got quite a range, going from chopped effect at the start to matter of fact breeze in the verses to classically sweet backing oohs wherever they'd seem necessary (not so much as you might think). It seems charmingly ramshackle, but its bits Voltron together into something that's sleek and undeniable.

Micachu & the Shapes - "Wrong"

"Wrong" is slightly more bipolar. It lurches in ungainly directions at times, in a way that breezy singing can't entirely paper over. She plays tough in these choppy waters, lamenting lost love, but warning off anyone who might take advantage of her weakened state. She worked out all night long! When the synth buzzing gives away to tapping junkyard percussion, she let's her guard down (the progressing emotion seems counterintuitive, given the continual instrumental jostling). She's tired and she's lost, but at least she's wistfully melodic as well. "I'm so bored, that my heart can't break" she insists, before the abrasive synths start hopping again. I'm not sure what this is the sound of, but I don't buy boredom for a second.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 08:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Sunset Rubdown - "Jackie" (aka "Paper Lace")
(live @ the Middle East Downstairs, Boston, 09.15.2008)

Though I question whether or not you can really call a songwriter reinterpreting his own songs a "cover" per se (I never really bought it when Cat Power reworked her own songs on a covers record either), that doesn't mean that this Sunset Rubdown reworking of Swan Lake's "Paper Lace" isn't intriguing. Funny, that in listening to SL's Enemy Mine it occurred to me that Dan Bejar was often playing the Camilla Wynn Ingr's role in Sunset Rubdown songs, as soft padding for Krug's occasionally volatile pipes. In practice, she slips in seamlessly. The song itself gains a bit of heft and fragility.

This recording from last fall (which I found nestled in my iTunes this morning, and must have downloaded in the midst of a bleary internet bender) is also amusing in it's ephemera. The inane Bostonian chatter is kind of hilarious (how does the girl by the mic know the number of "haters" in the room? And if she can't be counted in their number, why does she groan when she hears "new song") and Krug's post-song admission that the track makes him feel like he's in the band "Zit Remedy" from Degrassi Jr. High is specifically Canadian teen-geeky enough to be wildly endearing.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 03:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - "Hysteric"

A couple years ago, I was a YYY-fretter, bemoaning a sophmore LP that didn't play to the bands strengths as I saw them. Mainly, I was bemoaning the shelving of the band's best Nick Zinner-dominated, legend of a guitar slayer moments, some of which would eventually pop up on the Is Is EP. Now, faced with a third LP mostly devoid of any shredding, whatsoever, it's sort of funny that I should be so enthusiastic. But the album succeeds primarily on the increased development of Karen O's vocals. When the band first started getting noticed around New York in the early 00s (...and I was there! Playing Daft Punk to the rock kids, etc.) there was an undercurrent of diminishment towards KO's worth to the band in all of their plaudits. Like, "Oh, there's this great guitar player, and a wicked drummer, and this girl...who...uh...pours beer on herself while screaming." All over the inappropriately named It's Blitz (maybe It's Bliss would have been a more apt, but waaaay lamer title?) are gentle songs carried by her gentle, nuanced delivery. The warm breeze of "Hysteric" is an early favorite, but she done good throughout.

the Mayfair Set - "Desert Fun"

I'm all for Blank Dogs' basement experiments in sludge pop, and I've been pretty evangelical about it. This collaboration with LA's Dum Dum Girls just delivers such a wider emotional palette. You want to know how this two voices met, how they coexist, whether it all can last. Does she get tired of his grumbling? Does he think she's terminally silly? It seems like the iPods they brought on the car trip the song describes wouldn't even want to be in the same car together for that long. It makes me think of Lee and Nancy, though it actually sounds nothing like it. That might be enough to make me love it, if it weren't so catchy besides.

the Joy Formidable - "Austere"

Not to get all "Webster's Dictionary defines..." on everybody, but on repeated listens I've given some thought to whether or not I would call this track itself "austere." The opening vocal chimes are too goofy and playful to count as overly serious. It's not particularly harsh, either, as Ritzy Bryan's voice is too soft too really grate eardrums. The definition I can really get behind is "without excess." Sure, the 90s alt-guitars that swell up at its climax are "big" but they aren't arena-showy, or distractingly complex. They just work like they're supposed to, slightly fuzzy, but accomplished and competent enough to outshine the lo-fi blurs that get more attention stateside. Signs of life from guitar Britain! It's about time.

P.S. You can see the video, triumphantly labeled "Banned by YouTube" on the band's website here. Now that I watch it, I guess that rumbling bassline does have the dogged determination of some frenzied self-love...

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

James McNew, photo by Fiona Diffley

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

None of the members of Yo La Tengo are white hot celebrity personalities exactly, but Ira and Georgia's marriage has always provided a frame of reference for the band's music that leaves bassist James McNew as a third wheel by default. I'm sure he's not actually that bummed about it, but he does deserve a warm place in an individual spotlight for his home recordings at least, which were made under the ultra-glamorous name, Dump. Not that the work is readily available for most folks to appreciate. Talking a few years ago to Splendid, McNew groused about his early 90s fetish for obscurity:

JM: I put out a record called Dump International Airport on Smells Like Records, and that was really the only one of the albums I put out before 1997 that was readily available. I don't really know what I was thinking. The early nineties were a strange time in the indie community -- the planned obsolescence of people's work. It was the whole idea of not getting your stuff around -- of making a few things, and if people wanted them they could find them somehow before they disappeared into the ether. It was pretty appealing at the time, but when you're preparing things like that for re-issue then you feel silly. I'm questioning my own logic behind the many artistic decisions I made earlier, specifically decisions regarding commerce. You know, the limited edition objet d'art of a record in 1992 or 1993 was all the rage back then. Everything had to be numbered and limited, and I was all about the numbering and limiting. Now I just feel silly.

The fetish persists in a new generation, of course, but the Internet lets kids have their limited editions and the ease of digital distribution too. Which is no use to the old guard of home recorders, as even that one "readily available" 10" record is, of course, now very out of print. I was lucky to find one in a little shop in a Connecticut tourist town. Below, some of the wealth-sharing we were warned the Obama administration would usher in...

--

Dump - "International Airport"

The first mention I'd ever seen of McNew's Dump recordings (the first one that stuck at least) was Spin critic and Love is a Mixtape author Rob Sheffield proclaiming it his favorite song of all time in the midst of an interview on Fluxblog.

RS: “International Airport” answers the question, what would Pet Sounds sound like as a guitar solo. Not Pet Sounds with a guitar solo, but what if the guitar solo WAS Pet Sounds?

What he alludes to is the startling sonic richness conjures by his lonesome, on a f'in 4-track. For anyone who's even dipped a toe into home-recording waters, the construction of this song is frightfully intimidating. Starting as the merest hint of synth and guitar, the song just builds and builds and builds without any empathic regard for the potential minds it's about to pop. Like "Marquee Moon," it's a song that on first listen generates a kind of ecstatic existential doubt, "Will it ever end? Do I want it to?" It's a full ten minutes before James' soft voice pushes it from a towering experiment in structure into a sweet little pop song. "We've got a long, way to go. We've got a long journey back." It conjures its title well, with the extended instrumental transit sweetening the listener's delayed arrival.

Dump - "Laurdine"

"Laurdine" isn't as majestic as "International Airport," because that's impossible. It's the record's silver medalist though, with a nice balance between proud, fuzzy 90s guitars and a mumbled tune that evokes the feeling of a whisper without actually being one. This would have been a fitting addition to Yo La Tengo's Electropura (also released in 1995) were he so inclined.

Dump - "Flax"

"Flax" sees McNew continuing YLT's storied penchant for cover versions by tackling a song by the band Versus that, at the time of this recording, was only about a year old. It's a moody little version, sulky in its details, but given a compelling if half-formed melody by McNew's velour-soft singing and an organ part that never really gets it together, but is charming nonetheless.

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

- Not nearly the only Stereolab tour-only 7"

- Monochrome Set transcend the singles scene circa '82

- OMD's Dazzling Ships

- Pylon continue to gyrate, mid-Chomp

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Junior Boys - "Parallel Lines"

Evidence of Chris Stein and Debbie Harry is thin on the ground, so rails stretching into infinity seems the more likely inspiration. After their increased "In the Morning" profile, the obvious move for Junior Boys would have been beaucoup block rocking beats. Which is why the icy restraint of this first released track from Begone Dull Care is a pleasant surprise. Jeremy Greenspan even keeps his silken croon in reserve, softly breathing over the slow motion Moroder synth percolation. Despite the instrumental palette, it's got a strange Sunday morning quality to it. The kind where you wake up to face the day, not one where you attempted to hold on to Saturday night and were shamed by an unwated sunrise.

- Junior Boys' Begone Dull Care is out on Domino Records on April 7th in the U.S.

Casiotone for the Painfully Alone - "Old Panda Days"

The default remembrance towards college is one of uncritical nostalgia. Ah, those good old days, of wanton hedonism and nary a lasting consequence or responsibility. And while yeah, that's most of it, it does edit out a good deal of low points in an emotionally fraught period of life. Owen Ashworth is decidedly not a rose-tinted recollection sort. This short cut from a compilation of scattered material released after his career highpoint (2006's Etiquette) recasts collegial drug abuse and cheap sex as the problem rather than the ideal. Also, Tom Tom Club references. If you're up for a mope, this is a nice one.

- Casiotone for the Painfully Alone's Advance Base Battery Life (a collection of singles and rarities) is out March 10th on Tomlab Records.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Golden Triangle - "Night Brigade"

Golden Triangle, whose Southern roots and reckless performance abandon have landed them supporting slots for current notables such as Deerhunter, Black Lips, King Khan, and Jay Reatard, now call my burrough home. Their vinyl EP's second side peak is "Night Brigade," a sweetly pummeling gang-shouting exhibition. There's a mumbly fellow loitering at the front of the mix, murmuring unintelligibly as the guitars and rhythm race ahead. His vocal shrugging is wildly eclipsed by female backing chants, trilling and whooping in a timeless post-punk fashion. The instrumental din quiets a bit, as the ladies announce the charge of the titular zombie division. Given that undead context, the male murmurs make a bit more sense, I'd say. Its raggedness is rousing throughout, though. If dead, I'd likely unearth myself upon their emphatic suggestion. What else would I be doing?

Nice Face - "FUBAR Over You"

Nice Face, a "band" whose previous single was puzzled over here last summer, seems to be yet another nom de rock from Blank Dogs' man Mike Sniper. But while that monicker is devoted to sinister, hooky cold wave synth compositions NiFa is used for choppy guitar workouts that bear a bit of resemblance to the aforementioned Mr. Reatard. "FUBAR Ower You" is the b-side to the "Exterminator" single, the front and back cover of which are blatantly NSFW despite being crudely illustrated (Stop doing that to the vacuum cleaner, cartoon naked man!) The incongruously Brit-toned vocals are pretty smeared, but the punchy stop/start riffs speak clearly for themselves. And the rumbling, aqueous bridge is just rad.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 09:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My apartment, windows drawn wide so I don't get stoned (alriiiight) and then die (oh, boooo) from the fumes of a painting project, is nearly no degrees right now. So, the name of this band, which my eyes have scanned over numerous times bandied about the internet and nestled into my "recent downloads," called out to me know in it's documentary description of my domicile.

Cold Cave - "The Trees Grew Emotions and Died"

A synth band called Cold Cave should sound a lot more seeeerious than this, but really, I like that it's playful. It's keyboard tone sounds a bit like Depeche Mode's "I Just Can't Get Enough" and also a bit like when a used car dealership cuts an ad for local cable, trying to tap into that "techno" craze all the kids are talking about. But once the vocals kick in, staggered, unintelligible, vaguely fluish, I find it hard to resist (despite my funny way of praising it). It sounds like the raddest high school goth kid of all time, jamming with his little sister, who makes him giggle enough times that he eventually forgets to glower entirely.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 06:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As I like to do when I walk my dog alone, I use music for a personal soundtrack to the suburban surroundings around me. I can safely assume that everyone reading these words is familiar with the inherent obsessiveness of music bloggers, be it words, sharing, music, or all three. Another unenterprising hypothesis would be that you probably read other music blogs. And yet another would be my preemptive guess of what you might predict I was listening to, which if you said Animal Collective's new album, Merriweather Post Pavilion, you would be correct. Music bloggers, heh.

Animal Collective - "Bluish"

Though I've listened to MPP almost exclusively these last two weeks, I paused on this track today during the aforementioned stroll. Colorado is enjoying a beautiful day today. A sun drenched, blue sky betrays the crispness of the winter air and its lingering bite. January continues holding court according to the calendar and as sure as the sun will soon retreat for the day, taking the mercury readings down with it, summer is still months away. The peaceful, gentle vibe of this song elevated my quiet neighborhood from a scene of Anytown, USA to a bucolic paradise of doting lovers chasing after each other. A love song by any other name, and just one of the many not immediately obvious standouts from the record.

So far MPP is the de rigueur album, as it were, of this young year. Things happen for a reason however, and if you haven't yet dove in, there's no time like the present to get involved with this ever-evolving band and the fantastic artistry their compositions provide. They don't skimp on the lyrics either, so bonus if you can make them out. (Previous post links to a full album review from fellow M.S. writer Jeff Klingman for Brooklyn's L Magazine - check it.)

Posted by Merry Swankster at 07:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fever Ray - "Seven"

Aesthetically speaking, it's hard to say why Karen Dreijer's Fever Ray record wasn't just released under the more prestigious Knife name. It's unmistakably the work of the same artist, showcasing an emotively alien voice and an uncanny ability to bend crystal synth tones to fit melancholy whims. On the whole, I suppose it's less beat-centered and thus less frenetic. Perhaps that's the vital distinction, meant to guard a set of excellent, but fairly low-key tracks from the savages of enhanced expectation. But the gulf between slaved over and tossed off in Dreijer's catalogue is far less vast than the distance from, say, The Eraser to a properly branded Radiohead LP. "Seven" is an early favorite (and not just for adding heft to Klein's canon du sept). It's not always easy to recognize that in the heart of most of the Knife's songs, actual, relatable human situations are occurring. Slowed, with sonic brush cleared a bit, the old friend subject matter here is readily discernable. What's tough to sort out is how we're supposed to feel about it. Karen's voice is equal parts European pop tart and icy experimentalist. The words seem warm, but it inspires chills anyway.

Salem - "Redlights"

This track, actually included in a late '08 UK EP but hopefully hitting US shelves in some form this year, is less elegantly formed than Fever Ray's and is even more of a creepshow as a result. Limping beats approaching hip-hop bravado are the grounding element here, as everything else seems blurred and indistinct. Industrial guitar buzz intimidates around the edges, and a spectral girls choir floats inhuman in the mix. I'm not sure this mysterious band has actually written a good song yet, but they will. It's a beguiling sound they've stumbled across, simultaneously elusive and forceful. What if shoegaze looked you in the eye?

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

DFA Records did the world a service in '07 by re-issuing Gyrate by Pylon, a true gem of the early 80s Georgian renaissance in angular pop music. There were whispers that the label would double down in '08 with newly accessible copies of the band's 1983 follow-up Chomp. It's 2009, and the record remains out of print, which I believe is my cue.

The original LP sleeve features a serrated top edge, theoretically a victim of the fearsome pictured predator and his desire to perform the titular function on each record's cover. At best it looks like it was nibbled by some unusually uniform squirrels. The art inside is more successful. Produced by Gene Holder and Chris Stamey, members of North Carolina's the dBs, and assisted by their own producer Mitch Easter (whose credits would eventually include R.E.M. and Pavement), the record is slightly warmer, less caustic and austere. Which is not to say that it's all hugs and harmonies; It's still plenty brainy and aloof.

Some hits...

Pylon - "Gyrate"

A title track for their debut LP, held mysteriously in reserve. While it could have fit there, nestled among odes to volume and learning to drive, this nervous call to shimmy might be Chomp's best moment (R.E.M. supporters might claim the track they covered, "Crazy," but I've never been on the same page as that mass). It's not afraid to ask the big questions, or rewrite restrictive conventional alphabets.

2..4..6..8/ Why do we gyrate?/ 1..1..2..3 / We don't need a recipe/ A..B..C..D..E..F..G..Y..R..A..T..E/ Gyrate! Gyrate!

Pylon - "M - Train"

Michael Lachowski (bass) and Curtis Crowe (drums) take your bows. While Vanessa Briscoe's switch from gravel-throated authority to whimsical whistle emulations are exceedingly odd/rad, its the rhythm section's relentlessness in this song that gives it the necessary forward motion. It starts as a, "How could you leave me?" type, with Vanessa left heartbroken by a rail-bound ex. But as the song gathers its locomotive force it becomes clear that its more of a "Get the fuck out of town!" anthem. Not sure we've got enough of those enshrined in the canon. It's further proof that Pylon never quite act in ways you might expect. Despite ridiculously hip-swagger basslines, it never feels right for a dancefloor. Despite goofy pop "whoos" it never feels very light hearted. And in the end, they completely refuse to indulge us...

Now that the song is over/ You're just a cassanova/ And there's no refrain/ Just the sound of the M-train/ aaaaaaaaaaah...."

Refusing to leave you with one last "whoo-whoo!" after telegraphing it like that is a great little bit of perverse pop denial.

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

- Not nearly the only Stereolab tour-only 7"

- Monochrome Set transcend the singles scene circa '82

- OMD's Dazzling Ships

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In my old room over Christmas, I found myself rifling through a small stack of abandoned mixes from my collegiate tail-end of the 90s. Not too mortified by the gulf between current and discarded tastes, I have to say. While there were some clunkers that I'm keen to never mention again, to anyone, there were also tasty little Napster-era rarities that I haven't thought about in years, to my detriment. A couple, from two pillars of my college soundtrack...

Belle & Sebastian - "Pocketbook Angel" (demo)

Lurking beneath the Times New Viking levels of angry tape hisssss is a sweet trifle from Stuart Murdoch, from the days when he was short on press photos and long on briliiant EPs. Sad that this countrified almost-rocker never made a single one. All of his songs from that time were amazing for the ways in which they carefully avoided aggrandizing their subjects as anything but ordinary, underemployed layabouts, and yet you still found the protagonists to be perfect fodder for friendship/courtship daydreams. In real life, if an office coworker were to perpetually fake a limp, just to be "goofy," it'd probably irk me to no end. In the context of the song, picturing a bespectacled Scots lass and projecting myself back to sophomore year headspace, it's hard to avoid being smitten. Also, Stuart Murdoch circa 1998 predicts a couple years of my "professional" life with these lines;

Oh, sure, I had a job in an office once/ I never talked to anyone/ All I ever do is sit around

Radiohead - "Big Boots" (live)

This was among the scores of songs feverishly traded by post OK Computer fanatics, that had the unintended effect made Kid A initially more alien and confusing than it actually is. Where were all those guitar songs we'd been listening to for months? Would they seriously just rot on the vine, brilliant but unloved? Yup. Well, "Big Boots" or "Man O War" as it was sometimes called, doesn't strike me as a work of divine inspiration like it did when I was 18, but it still crashes and crests in that swell, adolescent Bends way. It's also notable as the most blatant manifestation of Thom Yorke's enduring unease around insects in general, and worms in specific. Beyond the tiny bugs causing "Myxomatosis" or the crushed bug used as an analogy for your sad little 1997 life in "Let Down," we've got the Yorke-assisted UNKLE's "Rabbit in Your Headlights," with its "white worms in the underground" to watch out for. Recently, In Rainbows' "Weird Fishes," offers proof that Yorke's carnivorous worm-phobia persists to the present. In "Big Boots" though, we've got presumably Dune-sized worms who "WILL come for you," and "WILL eat you whole." I've always found his fixation a little weird and silly. I mean, I assume its a metaphor for some existential "death trumps all" dread, but the constant repetition suggests a horrific encounter with some boy's school bullies and a bag of nightcrawlers. Oh well, this was back when Greenwood's guitars always sliced and rumbled just right and the teenage mopeyness of it all is kind of charming in a nostalgic way.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hey girls! Yeah you, the throng of screaming Carey Mercer groupies that have been beside themselves waiting for more drops of sweaty freak out from Mr. Frog Eyes. You've been gazing at his pinups in Tiger Beat for months, grinding your Tears of the Valedictorian LP down to black shavings whilst waiting for new material, I'm sure. Are you ready to get psyched?! Well, you would be, if you existed.

The great, yet baffling music Mercer churns out is barely primed for the top of the Hype Machine, let alone the Billboard charts. He's got a Bryan Ferry flair for theatrics, but he uses it to undermine his obtuse lyrical points as often as to emphasize them. Though his releases have been consistently powerful enough to carve out a bleak little niche of the indie rock landscape, the Mercer cult will not likely need to rent a much bigger room at the Ramada in 09 than it did in 08 for its annual sacrifice. Nevertheless, not one but two Mercer-related discs reach stores in the next few months, including a second edition by the prickly supergroup Swan Lake, along with Wolf Parade's Spencer Krug and Destroyer's Dan Bejar, due March.

Of more immediate note is the second LP released under the name "Blackout Beach," titled Skin of Evil. In comparison to the first, 2004's Light Flows the Putrid Dawn, this new batch of songs is positively cuddly. Only in comparison, however. It is a less frenetic record than usual, however, and has a chance to reach a slightly expanded audience. Some tracks...

Blackout Beach - "Nineteen, One God, One Dull Star"

Flanked by sweetly intoned female vocals, Carey's china-shop bull is sedated here, lead in by shushed piano and the ghost of beat that you're never sure is quite all there. The empty space surrounding Mercer and co., is vast and intimidating--he could be singing from an ambling asteroid. The lyric sheet is casually impenetrable, like some decades old Russian paperback. The sheer wordiness can be quite offputting, I'll admit, at least until little fragments of narrative begin to actually sink in. At 1:30, helpfully underlined by Mercer's own back-up moon-howling, comes this extraordinary bit of characterization for "Donna," the album's continual heroine;

She burned the orphange/ but saved the payroll/ in case the accountant came along/ so dutiful

From there, the track unwinds, thins out, gets starker. Its backstretch, with ominous synth squiggles and vaguely eastern singing that recalls Bowie's Lodger, is likely even more impenetrable than its beginning. But there's a beautiful calm to it all, serenity in the face of oddness that you wouldn't normally associate with Carey's impossibly thick, spittle-flecked Frog Eyes' compositions. It's quite lovely if you'll let it be.

Blackout Beach - "Astoria, Menthol Lite, Hilltop, Wave of Evil, 1982"

This final chapter isn't too much of a spoiler, for those anxiously awaiting the fate of young Donna. Her appearance here is again beguiling for its odd specificity. Still fairly tranquil, but surrounded by the echoes of his more familiar guitar radiation, Mercer's narrator comes upon her:

I found Donna, huddled and wet, holding some cracked tape/ It only played two songs, written by her mother/ I think her name was Kate/ Beautiful songs, man, like "Donna Takes Her Name From the Beauty of the Wintertime (The Candy Crust of the Snow)"/ And the other one was/ "I Shall Love You Always, You Should Know"

Um, Wow. In terms of pop, it's certainly no "She Loves You, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah," but that is a rich stanza.

Persistent references to coves and such help cement the mood, but the music itself evokes the frigid Northwestern coastlines I remember from an Oregon youth. It's beautiful, that's for sure, but there's not a ton of warmth. The layers of female singing are reminiscent of heavy fog, diffusing light in strange ways, lending a softness that coats everything. And then there's Carey himself, irregular, relentless, and occasionally still, but due to crash into the rocks violently every few seconds or so. The water temperatures further north in his home town of Vancouver are harsher still, though. Perhaps that's why, even at their most romantic, these tracks still have a bit of the apocalyptic in them. Gonna take more than a sweatshirt to shake off this dip, would-be Polar Bears.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Of all the tracks on yesterday's podcast--which no-bullshit-allowed readers may have deduced is nearly as much '09 preview as '08 wrapup--the one that I'm most feverishly obsessed with is "Sisters are Forever" by Glasgow's Sexy Kids (formed from bits of debris of defunct outfit The Royal We). Indie-pop is a fickle mistress. The parameters of the genre are pretty strict, and it's easy to fall back on pleasantly produced, though rote hero worship. If cute brogues and polite cuddles were all these Kids had to offer, the result wouldn't have been nearly so sexy. It's got added nervous post-punk guitars, and tough guy skins slamming, sure. But it was just yesterday, on listen, like, 42, that the creepy subtext undermining the vocals' button-cuteness fully dawned on me (it apparently missed Marc Hogan when he wrote the single up for P4K as well). You're there, heart-warming, listening to a young bonnie lass giving love to her sis. "Sisters are forever, honey I'm so glad that you are mine." Fuzzies, warm. But then, less distinct comes "Tie us both together and then wrap us up in twine." If you guys are so "forever," why the forced bondage? Then, "Tie a double knot, you're everything I'm not." Unrequited sister love? Have we broached new lyrical ground, everyone? Cheers all around.

Sexy Kids - "Drown Me"

The 7" b-side to "Sisters are Forever" is pretty perfect, as well. It's a minute shorter, careful not to overshadow its a-side sibling, but packed full of only slightly less charm. Again, and like most of my preferred pop songs, there's a bit of a dark streak present. It starts with appealingly cooed pleas for all manner of physical abuse, ending in murder, and a cover-up to boot. It's a put on, of course, giggles, fa la las, and some submerged handclaps make even a late song detour into broken glass eating evident as merely the product of some fiendishly bored minds.

Sexy Kids - "In a Box, In a Bag"

The only other track I could locate is last year's dormant "In a Box, In a Bag," a comparative epic at nearly four minutes. The Kids are initially more content to jingle-jangle than stomp about, and the boys are given more screen time than usual, perhaps ill-advisedly. At two minutes in, the chorus sorts out the hormonal imbalance with a drum-thwacking call & response pile-up. After that, it gets back to its casual tweeing, but with more sweet Scots lady vocals in the mix to keep us warm and cozy. Not going to dominate your brain like the other two, but it's pleasant without being actively pleasant, which can be offputting. Does that make sense to anyone else in the slightest way? No matter...

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 09:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Kate Bush - "December Will be Magic Again"
(1979 Christmas Special)

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

the Fall - "No X-mas for John Quays" + WPIX Yule Log

By an Actual Christmas Fire, with Mark E. Smith

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Seeking desperately to ease my lingering post-feast fullness by clearing up room from someplace, any place, here are a few non-thematically linked tracks that have been cluttering my mind...

The Shop Assistants - "All Day Long"

Bloggers who've searched for flavor combinations that add up to Brooklyn's Vivian Girls have perhaps been overthinking things. Instead of evoking Phil Spector + Kevin Shields, or wherever the prevailing hyperbole pinwheel ended up, it probably should have started on the Shop Assistants and refused to budge. The Scots group was a minor NME cause celebre in the mid-80s, but their debut album Will Anything Happen has been out of print for over a decade. As the sharper tacks among you may have already guessed, that is no longer the case (tip of the hat to chronically hip label Cherry Red for continuing to monitor shifting retro trends). "All Day Long" is a nicely representative miniature of the album's charm, and prestigiously, Morrissey's declared favorite single of 1985. Simple, cymbal-less drums pound away relentlessly, only partially moored to the sheets of warm fuzz guitarist David Keegan lays down. Vocally, it's sweet and muddled both. Annabel Wright (who'd go on to wider, yet still fairly narrow renown in the Pastels) has a flat but reassuring delivery, struggling slightly to be understood in the midst of rhythm and color. Around 1:20, a simple adjustment to the mix brings the blur into sharper focus. Annabel is placed out front, the spotlight casting a lovely echo behind her. If the 1:50 running time is a bit too slight for you, the re-issue also offers a "long version" that clocks in at a whopping 2:30. You may have to clear your schedule to fit that epic in.

Robert Rental - "Double Heart"

Robert Rental was a minor player in the UK post-punk scene, who made a few drips but no real splash. "Double Heart," one A of a double A-side single released on Mute in 1980, has a warm constitution despite a construction from cold Teutonic elements. The stuttering drum machine delay is not far from sounds conjured by many other early eighties DIY dabblers. The synths sound poorly calibrated and possibly woozy on box wine. But Rob always sounds sincerely and soberly lovelorn, elevating his track above scores of similar unknowns who all sought to distinguish themselves with chilly disconnect. "I like your colors" he wails, perhaps cryptically referring to a dress pattern or just an interior glow. I like his tone, myself.

Fennesz - "Glass Ceiling"

Christian Fennesz' crackling ambient compositions always have a bit more going on inside them than a first passive listen might suggest. "Glass Ceiling" from his latest record, Black Sea, starts off typically enough for him, with a still pond of sputtering static parted by steady string-plucked oar strokes. As it settles in to become stiller still, it becomes beautifully alien. The conspicuous notes cease, clearing space for the palest shades of a hidden pop song. From around two minutes on, it sounds like the strains of a vocal choir, somehow kept aloft on an arctic wind a decade after all its members hung up their robes and drove home from the concert hall.

Max Tundra - "The Entertainment"

I enjoy Ben Jacobs' compositions as a curio, more than a trigger for deeply felt affection. You have to admire an artist who testifies so adamantly in a songwriting language so inscrutable. (Well, I guess you don't, but I do). I fear it suggests a lack of imagination that most of 2008's Parallax Error Beheads You leaves me sputtering around my head and hard drive for familiar reference points. I suppose it is still possible for an artist at this late date, to, gasp, just sound like themselves. The version of himself that's I've hit repeat on most often is "The Entertainment," a broadly named track that sounds specifically like the residents of Nintendoland attending a late 90s rave. "I was born to entertain," he sings calmly amid a manic backdrop. Even if I suspect that he was born mainly to entertain Ben Jacobs, you might well catch some shrapnel of amusement.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 05:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've been meaning to post a couple tracks from Belle & Sebastian: The BBC Sessions, a recently released compilation of the band's excellent early compositions laid to tape in the years just before the internet would have immediately delivered them to my greedy hands. Vacation travel and general hustle/bustle held this intent up. I will do so now, with no further delay...

Belle & Sebastian - "Lazy Jane"

"Lazy Line Painter Jane" obviously stands out among the band's endlessly charming 90s EPs because of guest vocalist Monica Queen. She's a showy extrovert in one of the most introverted pop bands of all time (or at least that was the shtick in their early configuration). Comparing her singing to Isobel Campbell's anemic whispers (or her pale duet partner Stuart Murdoch's for that matter), you get the feeling that she could rip that poor waif limb from limb. Her singing out always made "LLPJ" feel oddly triumphant, in spite of its protagonist's relatively dire straits. Monica Queen wouldn't have to wonder about how she got her name and what she was going to do about it; A) she wouldn't give a shit, and B) if she did she'd go bust some heads. With her part taken in this radio session by fellow wallflower Stevie Jackson, our Jane sounds much more plausibly adrift. That is until the 4:30 mark, when the band summons a instrumental force that restores the original's power, and perhaps even tops it.

Belle & Sebastian - "(My Girl's Got) Miraculous Technique"

Of the four non-released tracks the record contains, this is the best. By 2001, B & S were a band in flux. They'd not yet begun to morph into the good-time fun band of recent albums, but the old bookish persona had lost a lot of critical steam. Fold Your Hands Child, You Walk Like a Peasant was an uneven record with fantastic high points that got shafted in the press despite them. Their soundtrack to Todd Solondz's Storytelling was just flat out bad. It could have used a song like this, with a disconnected piano loop and carefree string samples that predicts the sound Jens Lekman would later ride to his initial minor fame. The session its taken from was the last time Isobel would be present in the band's compositions, and illustrates the toll her departure took. It seems impossible that two voices as shy and retiring as hers and Stuart's could come together in such a grand, romantic way.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[Pumpkin Pie Cheesecake]

Happy Thanksgiving folks. If you are reading this, stop. Spend time with your friends and family.

Of Montreal - "Nonpareil Of Favor"

[Of Montreal: Denver's Ogden Theater - 11.6.08 - photo by Chip Diffendaffer]

Posted by Merry Swankster at 04:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

Anyone who's been in my personal radius over the past month or so has had Dazzle Ships, the lost masterpiece by occasional 80s hitmakers OMD (Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark if yr nasty), thrust into their consciousness. While I can practically guarantee that all members of the blog reading rabble would know the band's chart apex "If You Leave" (thanks John Hughes!) even the most astute and obscure among my circle of nerds was caught unaware. The likely reason was that upon its 1983 release, the record was cut to ribbons by critics calling the record's experiments with found sound and music concrete flatly unlistenable. But while those are indeed melancholy colors in Dazzle Ships' muted rainbow, the quality of the sad pop laments on this record cannot be overstated. Pitchfork's Tom Ewing, writing in March about a 25th anniversary reissue that went otherwise critically ignored and remained invisible on the shelves of even the most pretentious New York City shops all year, posited that:

"Dazzle Ships seems a lot less radical than it did on release: The Kraftwerk records and musique concrète it obviously borrowed from have been more fully absorbed into pop music. You'll have heard uglier noises than the title track's mechanical grindings and foghorn blurts, and stranger constructions than the layered robot voices on "ABC Auto-Industry". Those songs won't sound like clumsy shock-tactics to a new listener, just more parts in the album's sad, effective synth-pop collage."

But it's weird to me that the songs themselves weren't enough to ensure a stay of excommunication from the zeitgeist, that continues to the present. Parsing the Pazz & Jop poll from 1983 doesn't reveal a lot of enduring classics to supercede it. Sure, New Order's Power, Corruption, and Lies is like the more outgoing cousin DS secretly resents, Murmur is still definitive for some, and there's no arguing against Thriller at this point even if you wanted to, but hardly anything else that I'm familiar with there has as many tracks at such a consistently high level. It embarrasses Bowie's Let's Dance, I'm certain. That slick Peter Saville album cover shouldn't have hurt either. I don't get it.

But it found it's way from eBay to me, in spite of it all. Now, for your pleasure, here's just three of the standouts...

Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - "The Romance of the Telescope"

"The Romance of the Telescope" is just a great name for a song, first of all. I wish I was a famous astronomer just so I could title my autobiography that. Maybe I'll get started on that career path, actually, for that express purpose. But removed from the delusions of grandeur it inspires, the song stands as a pristine statement of longing. It pines for understanding, and serves as an elegy of sorts for science as faith. It's as lonely as you might expect. The crisp, echoed drum machine aches like a solitary heartbeat in a metal lab. The warped synth sound that follows seems obsolete and maybe slightly damaged, as if dust was cleared from their keys minutes before recording. Singer Andy McCluskey keeps his lyric sheet as graceful, spartan, and evocative as its backing track.

"We're just waiting, looking skyward
As the days come down
Someone promised there'd be answers
If we stayed around"

Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - "Radio Waves"

"Radio Waves" starts as a Teutonic experiment, marrying a juggernaut rhythm to blurts of squealing blip, and ends as a lo-fi Kiwi pop track, voices warbling ecstatic while jockeying for space alongside cheap party organs. Where the rest of the record can sometimes be chilly and disconnected, this ode to the synthetic comes sparking with current.

"Radio waves have life! Radio waves have life!
Machines are living too, they're working for me and you!"

Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - "Of All the Things We've Made"

Dazzle Ships' last song is a gorgeous Eno ballad, whose oddly tuned guitar strokes fail to jostle the pristine glide of its piano notes. That melody, combined with some solemn, if slightly adenoidal, choir boy singing from McCluskey and accomplice Peter Humphries successfully obscures the track's otherwise rough elements. The drumbeat never evolves from a caveman thwack, and the aforementioned strokes never congeal into a melodic component. But it swoons onwards, regardless.

"To want this.
Of everything we've made.
The times it's worked before.

Of all the things we've said.
Times that worked before today."

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

- Not nearly the only Stereolab tour-only 7"

- Monochrome Set transcend the singles scene circa '82

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 06:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[Sophie Ellis-Bexter as sexy Dorothy?]

Kelli Douglas, esteemed music industry facing representative of the entire Merry Swankster staff, once again chimes in to let us in on the latest songs that tickle her fancy.

If America had been the birthplace of Miss Sophie Ellis-Bextor then perhaps our world of pop music would be so much better. It would only have been a matter of time before she skyrocketed to the top of the charts with millions of fans bouncing to her tunes in tow. However, she is British and that has slowed if not completely derailed her ability to become a huge pop sensation on this side of the Atlantic. Why? Beats me, but I’ve been sold after just a few songs.

From her 2007 album, Trip the Light Fantastic, you can find a great selection of songs to effortlessly sing and dance and have a blast while doing so. My favorites are "Catch You", "New York City Lights", "Love is Here", and "Me and My Imagination". It's the last one of those that grabs me the most. Sophie's playful voice makes it very believable that she doesn't fancy men who throw themselves at her. When she tells her beau to "leave something for me and my imagination", I hope he heeds her advice and plays hard to get.

Sophie-Ellis Bextor - "Me and My Imagination"

Can’t we all agree that thoughts like, "Never give the game away, try to keep me entertained" are ones that we all share when getting to know someone that strikes our interest? Sophie is clearly a fan of the honeymoon phase of dating someone.

Sophie Ellis-Bextor - "Me and My Imagination"

The video for "Me and My Imagination" is just as fun as the song. The clicking of the heels at the start gives the perfect emotion of something flirty and whimsical. The colors and lights match perfectly to the beat. Around the 1:12 mark you will see a dog in the video for just a moment. I guess those British girls have a thing for canines, much like this blog does too.

-by Kelli Douglas

Previously by Ms. Douglas:

Guilt

Posted by Merry Swankster at 05:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

Today's slice of vinyl comes to you, via me, via Dave Klein, who gifted the Monochrome Set's 1982 7" Cherry Red single as a unnecessary bribe to gain the DJ slot at the last Neon Lights show. As the sly Brits' discography has become one of my favorite recent discoveries, I did not inform him of his tithe's redundancy. I've taken the opportunity to mention the abject unfairness of the Set's continued obscurity in this space before, and well, here's another. I don't come by the triple threat of truly smart, musically taut, and uproariously funny as often as I might like.

the Monochrome Set - "The Mating Game"

The lead single from 1982's Eligible Bachelors is as glib and disarming a song about the banalities of sex as anyone has written. It's almost as good as "The Lighter Side of Dating," which they wrote 2 years prior. But while the previous song took childish delight in placing shocking statements next to absurd trivialities, "The Mating Game" is all lyrical economy and witty restraint. Rather than isolating a key line or ten, it's worth just glancing through the words en masse:

"Kiss, lick, stroke, flick
Quiver, quiver, shake and shiver, baby, wow
Un-clasp, flop, gasp
Sopping, sopping, there's no stopping now

Blonde, brunette, or redhead
Black, yellow or white
They’re all the same
In the mating game
But I can' t complain now

Squeeze, suck, pinch, pluck
Wobble, wobble, grab and gobble, darling, moan
Un-zip, ooze, drip
Dippy, dippy, wet and slippy, groan

Blonde, brunette, or redhead
Black, yellow or white
They kiss the same
In the mating game
But I can' t complain now

Bend, peel, slap, squeal
Doggie, doggie, shudder, on your bended knees
Thrust, pump, spurt, slump
Ciggy, ciggy, puff, puff, cough and wheeze

Blonde, brunette, or redhead
Black, yellow or white
They taste the same
In the mating game
But I can' t complain now"

No, Bid, you certainly can't. I originally thought the line was "ciggy, ciggy, puff, puff, cough, ennui" which might have been even better, really. But the sharp, matter of fact tone makes sure the ennui was implied, anyway.

the Monochrome Set - "J.D.H.A.N.E.Y."

While I'm not entirely sure that original Set drummer John Haney was "the best in the land," as this b-side maintains, anyone familiar with the album version of "the Monochrome Set" knows that he was pretty damn good. His bandmates' ode (which might have made fancily monickered new man Lexington Crane just stick to the high hats out of respect) is a goony 50s lounge ballad, that's plenty bawdy and droll itself. Charting his meteoric rise from dabbling with the bongos, praising his bride to be, and claiming he had a "twelve-incher but didn't use it as a rule," it's a more glowing b-side picture than Malkmus asserting that Steve "Westie" West "could not drum" many years later. The smart aleck streak is a through line between both "drummer ballads" though. As the song glides to a close, the boys quip, "Well, alright John, that's it. We'll probably see you, uh...in court."

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

- Not nearly the only Stereolab tour-only 7"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Love Is All - "Sea Sick"

Josephine Olausson always seems overexcited and slightly stuffed up. It’s hard to get an emotional read on her, as she seems perpetually halfway between spearheading a party and shutting herself in for weeks. In “Sea Sick” she’s railing against the horrors of her ocean cruise, bored to tears as the only would-be-relaxer with “an original hip.” Her mumbly Scandinavian warble is singular enough that it can make the defiant “I’m board to death on board this ship” sound almost exactly like the even further past wits end proclamation, “I’m bored to death of all this shit!” Her p’s are pointed. The Jock Jams stomp that joins it (that's stomp--stomp--STOMP--stomp--stomp--STOMP, for the record) can’t help but blur it towards the stronger emphasis. The backing track throughout emulates a creative mind reeling with lack of stimulation, reeling from sharpened guitar lines to chaotic horn spillage at ramming speed. Yes, she’s seen the buffet. No, she is NOT amused.

Times New Viking - "No Sympathy"

The Times New Viking songs I’ve loved this year have been warm and trebly to the point of near abstraction. “No Sympathy,” the sleepiest track on their recent Stay Awake EP, falls nicely into the romantic smudge category. If there's a reason it starts by faking an Indian radio signal, though, I’ve yet to discern it. That lively ghost of a signal gives way to the more familiar strains of tenatively sobbing keyboards and Beth Murphy's vocal mush. But I like it for its indistinctness. It’s broad colors are smeared lipstick red and watery mascara black, both bruised just slightly blue.

Clues - "Perfect Fit"

As Alden Penner and crew failed to play New York on election night, this mp3 is still our best lead about the reclusive Unicorn's new work. Their big city debut would have likely been forgotten in the glee riots that ensued anyway. "Perfect Fit" begins with Penner inching a mysterious little keyboard figure forward, sounding like a more frenetic version of a Harry Potter Hogwart's theme. Penner sounds more sincere here than his in his perpetually kidding Unicorn tracks. Which is not to say he follows a straight songwriting course, frequently breaking into wordy Malkmusian digressions, containing lushly emotive declarations themselves. "I wear the past like a second skin" goes one cryptic keeper. It sounds like its stifled a bit of our boy's pluck, really. But there's nothing on the horizon I'm more excited to hear than what exactly he's been up to in the Canadian wilderness for the last five years.

Fad Gadget - "Scapegoat"

The only older track here was dragged from complete obscurity to semi-obscurity by Systems of Romance recently. I am informed there that Fad Gadget's Frank Tovey was the first act signed to Mute Records after that label launched with the Normal's immortal "T.V.O.D."/"Warm Leatherette" single. "Scapegoat" from 1982's Under the Flag LP is more tongue in cheek than the label's industrial beginnings might suggest. Frank Tovey employs a disco throb, and a goofy Greek chorus to detail the blame laid on his narrator's feet. Where it really gets swell though, is in its final minute. Frank duets with a aloof French lass (is there any other kind?). He sounds big, but detached. She's small and close. The synths come rushing back, unmoved.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 07:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Juvelen - "Don't Mess"
(Live on Frida 21:00, Swedish TV)

Most of the acts playing at the Knitting Factory next Wednesday will rock you in some fashion or another, but only Swedish idol Juvelen is ready and willing to sex you up. I normally prefer my Scandinavian pop tarts with a few more lady parts, but I will admit that the Swede TV clip above makes me a feel a bit conflicted. Come 12:30 in the main space, things might get a little weird.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 09:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's going to be pretty impossible to profile every band playing After the Jump's CMJ week events in-depth. There's just too much goodness to go around. Luckily, readers of this site are well-informed regarding the merits of many of these bands already. Just taking the Tap Bar for example, I shouldn't have to tell you again about the specific radness of the Pains of Being Pure at Heart, My Teenage Stride, or A Sunny Day in Glasgow. That quality has been sufficiently parsed. So I dedicate this space towards the lesser-known Best Friends Forever, a group so Minnesota OG that their MySpace influences are limited to Prince, Dylan, and Soul Asylum's Dave Pirner (perhaps the members of the Replacements have personally offended them in some way?). The BFFs in question, Bri Smith and Jes Seamans, sound giddy in love with everything in their songs: life, guitar licks, each other, boys, playing keyboards, presidential history, you name it. Below are a couple shiny apples from a bushel of songs sure to swimmingly kick off next Wednesday evening .

Best Friends Forever - "Twins in Love"

"Oh, I don't know you, maybe that's why I think your the perfect person. I can fill in the gaps anyway I want to, and spend my time dreaming of the fake you."

Now, it's been quite a while since I've been out on the dating scene, but from what I remember, the first lines of "Twins in Love" are damn apt. Everyone disappoints eventually, but this track captures the heart skipping first blush quite well. The combination of playfully earnest lyrics, deceptively rocking guitar work, and a mind-sticking "Oh-oh-oh" chorus is swell.

Best Friends Forever - "My Head in Front of Your Head" (live on 89.3)

This summer I talked about my discovery of BFF's ode to that eminently respectable Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower, and here they are crushing hard on that party's finest representative (no, not Reagan). The girl's make it clear that they aren't in it for Abe's position of power, but rather his rakish charm. "I know you were an unhappy man, funereal, they say..." is the clever in to a happy faced narrative of what Lincoln might have enjoyed in the loving embrace of one (or both?) of our heroines. Dancing, Shakespeare reciting, hair combing, it would have been a hoot, and they even promise to have thwarted JW Booth as a capper. All of this might again be a touch precious if it wasn't for that nagging little ear worm guitar riff that starts the song off and keeps it moving throughout.

--

Best Friends Forever play at 8 sharp on Wednesday, October 22nd kicking off a seriously stacked Tap Bar lineup at the Knitting Factory. It's worth resisting your shattered CMJ attention span to come early and stay late.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

photos by Devon Banks

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

Adding to the undiscovered mountain of vinyl ephemera that Stereolab has unloaded in their eighteen-year pleasure cruise, are the two tracks of their latest tour-only 7", which I put four dollars towards. In posting them here, I'll note that matters of font and design have left me slightly puzzled in regard to their exact designations. Despite being sung in lilting English, there are no illuminating lyrical cues to isolate to confirm my assumptions about bubble-lettered cursive. My college French has not lingered long enough to identify what are sure some irregular verb tenses. I stand ready to blush, retract, and move on if necessary.

Stereolab - "Explosante Fixe"

The A-side is a MalletKAT-driven confection, which, at its beginning, sounds like the laser-beam society having their winter party. Laetitia is too grave and dignified for it to sound continually celebratory, however. Though individual words stick to my eardrum occasionally, her voice has such sustained and familiar melodic tone to it, it sounds almost like a specifically cultivated keyboard setting to me at this point. It's a pleasant light breeze--more color than meaning.

Stereolab - "Lexotisme Interieur"

Nervous doesn't seem like the proper descriptor, so let's say that the drum pattern that starts side B is certainly more active, at the very least. The synth bits here almost have a campy 70s "Love Will Keep Us Together" aura, but Sadler has perpetually provided as even coat of class to any backdrop Tim Gane has ever provided. If it doesn't immediately bowl you over with a tight structure, there are myriad pretty textures, vocal and instrumental, to idly notice as the time glides by.

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

- Pete Shelley, also a homosapien

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The last half of 2007 was more or less dominated by incongruously glamorous disco from my own departed point of origin, the Pacific Northwest. Johnny Jewel and his vocalist harem turned out track after track of stunning, slow-motion Moroder for the Jersey label Italian's Do it Better. To date in 08, the label has been eerily silent. Johnny floated a demo a bit back, but another Jewel is shoring up the imprint's current schedule. Nite Jewel, a mysterious Los Angelina, is set to release a split single with IDIB flagship Glass candy later this month. A full-length follows, oddly on Human Ear Music, at the start of November (I'd guess that deal was in place before the Italians swooped in). Her compositions, all captured on DIY 4-track recorders, sit below. Lo-fi disco: the made up genre that's sweeping the nation/my living room!

Nite Jewel - "What Did He Say?"

"What Did He Say" sounds like a movie's club scene, in which the protagonist has just realized they've been drugged. Time slows down, sounds get warped, and the prop master probably set the smoke machine two settings too high. The novelty here is in hearing what should be slick disco grooves distorted and bloodied, recorded in deepest Idaho-on-election-night red.

Nite Jewel - "Chimera"

Even better perhaps is "Chimera," named for a mythological fire-breather. The low-end synth does stomp around a bit, but there are several melodic counterpoints that are more lovely than menacing. Our girl is more present in the mix here, and less somnambulant than the rest of the label's diva roster. Like maybe she only took one pill, rather than a pick-a-mix handful.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now that the Republican party has opened my eyes to the pervasive evils of sexism in the world around us, I feel a bit shamed for referring to Marnie Stern as "Madame Shredder" in this post's title (though not for the awesome visual that makes it manifest). I mean, why is the "Madame" qualifier even necessary? Do her vitrtuoso guitar skills not qualify her as a plain "Shredder"? Well, it's pertinent I think, because in this case the feminine allure is a main factor in my like of her and her presumably Fiona Apple named new LP, This Is It And I Am It And You Are It And So Is That And He Is It And She Is It And It Is It And That Is That. Because normally, when you have a sweaty dude up their with his axe, finger tapping away, and burning through odd time signatures, I just don't give a shit. It sounds too labored and macho. Take Stern collaborator and stylistic compatriot Zach Hill and his band Hella for example. I just don't care to listen to them. It's all bluster and no charm. But then take a band like Deerhoof or Ponytail, their fierce riffs obscured by a singular female presence, and I'm all for it. I guess I'm a reverse sexist if anything. Sorry dudes.

Marnie Stern - "The Package is Wrapped"

Here's a barnburner from the aforementioned new album, which starts with Marnie standing her ground and diddling her strings. Her voice is a bit thin, but gutsy; the sort that filled alt-rock radio in the 90s. She sounds like she's struggling to ride atop the thundering riffs that she herself gleefully, but shortsightedly unleashed. It's a choppy strut until around 2:40, when she tops it by letting loose a pinched, Joey Santiago-esque, distorted solo. Lyrically, I'm honestly not sure what she's going on about. I'm still in the letting details sink in stage of appreciation. But I'm damn sure, even at this early moment, that a line like "the Celtic knights are calling me from behind" would earn an immediate press of the skip button had it come from inside a bearded maw, and without a playfully feminine touch.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

If memory serves, I think I might have grabbed both of these tracks at some point from Gorilla vs. Bear and then filed them away, only for them to really grab me in recent days. So props to that guy for being perpetually ahead of the curve, as far as romantically warped pop music goes...

Get Back Guinozzi ! - "Carpet Madness"

Get Back Guinozzi ! is a French two-piece, as well as a cryptically specific command. "Carpet Madness" has a peculiar childishness to it that reminds me off Cibo Matto in tone, if they were completely drained of their 90s hip-hop fixation. This one isn't so beat-heavy, despite a sturdy bassline that's worthy of a minor 60s radio hit. It's not long enough to discern much about its titular dementia, but if I had to guess I'd say that adhesive fumes were the root cause. There were some light heads in this studio, surely.

Memory Cassette - "Listen to the Vacuum"

Memory Cassette is an individually branded offshoot if the indistinct Philly project known as Weird Tapes, which is itself an offshoot of a band called Hail Social. Perhaps it took three subdivisions to tap into this specific brand of lush, succinct balladry. A gender-inspecific vocal, which sounds eerily like a fey dude, artificially estrogened up with a few home studio settings. "I've been watching TV just to see another face," our lonely androgyne informs us. Its longing has a light, breezy 70s AM radio universality to it, but sun bent enough to satisfy those of us with a predilection for more obscure melodic delivery systems. At barely over two minutes, it's too feather-light to be a satisfying aural meal. As luck would have it, you can download the "band"s Rewind While Sleeping EP in its entirety here.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I did my pertinent growing up years in Salem, Oregon, and at least at the time, the town did not having a thriving music scene. I remember a few terrible sub-pre-diversification Bonnaroo Festival type acts for the built-in suburban hippie demographic, a valiant garage pop punk band or two, and even a totally incongruous Euro-synth-goth trio called Softcore, but nothing was even within spitting distance of anything you'd call adventurous. Not that we, as sleepy Northwestern citizens in the 1990s were ready for our late 2000s namesake. I posted a dark video for Salem's song "Dirt" a little over a week ago, like a lot of sites did, out of knee jerk appreciation for unsettling creepiness in general and female flesh in specific. The extricated mp3 of said track has been burrowing underneath my skin in the interim, and I thought it might demand a few more words.

It starts with stuttering clicks and robo hand claps, foreshadowing a club banger that it never actually attempts. Before anyone could even attempt motion, a dense fog of electro-distortion engulfs everything. What sounds like a slowed and warped human vox lays a buzzing foundation, which a more sharply rendered voice rests atop. Previous songs from the mysterious band, be it the unlikely Springsteen cover that caught my ear in the winter, or the few other tracks from their instantly unavailable vinyl EP, Yes, I Smoke Crack that have hit the 'net, have had a plaintive female vocal. Here the singer seems masculine, though reflected in a Silent Shout fun house mirror. The words aren't intelligible to my show-battered ear, but the melody is fairly buoyant in the muck. In that sense, the song borrows from the well-trod shoegaze aesthetic, but more for a sense of disorientation than easily recognized guitar racket. It's only a minute before a crystalline tone darts through, it's nagging memorability further demonstrating a commitment to providing easy points of entry within a intimidating framework. Its swirling midsection is just flat out pretty; the aural equivalent of watching TV static congeal into geometric patterns and immediately rescramble. It's all quite intriguing, for sure.

Salem - "Dirt"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 10:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Annie - "Song Reminds Me of You"

The final track on Annie's Don't Stop finds the Norwegian singer less than gushing about her life's work. "Music's all good, music's okaaay," she guesses at the onset. But once the faint praise has floated, we get to the crux of the matter, i.e., the destructive effects of music on the ruins of an already broken heart. "Every song I hear reminds me of you," she breathes in to the synth pop echo chamber. It's a common sentiment that's easily relatable to bleary-eyed sad sacks listening to their local K-100 and adorable Scandinavian pop singers alike. But the song takes it a step further, asking "...and does it hurt to hear your songs on the radio?" Well, according to every music biopic ever, it's kind of a kick, actually. So here's the narrative I've worked up in my head. She's singing a metatextual pop star's lament, serenading a svengali who's crafted hits for her in the past. Now that their professional and presumably personal relationship is ended, neither can take pleasure in the success of their previous work. So here's our hypothetical gal, simultaneously guilting him lyrically, and rubbing his face in this sweet and icy popsicle of a production job. As Anniemal's Richard X is still all over the boards for this record, we'll assume it's just a clever short story.

Chromatics - "Lady" (demo)

It's been a bear market for Johnny Jewel's production work lately. Last year, we were living high on the hog as tracks continually seeped from his Portland factory, and he frantically shipped out orders for breathy vocal parts to not one, not two, but three lithe yet languid lovelies. I can't seem to recall if even one of his nouveau disco classics has made it to my hard drive this year, sadly. So when this new demo appeared online from his dreamy Chromatics brand, I was fully prepared to rationalize its unfinished stature. Remember, it was in demo form that I fell for their still profound cover of Kate Bush's "Running Up That Hill." This is not that, alas. The sound fidelity is bloody red, missing the Ferrari sheen of the band's finished sound. It plods a bit as well, with a portly loop sustaining interest as Ruth Radelet and a vocoder plead with Johnny for "something to do." BUT!...at 2:46, when the beat finally drops in earnest, all qualms are forgiven, and the remaining two minutes are the sound of the song and I having make-up sex in the backseat of an Oldsmobile. (Sorry if that ruined it for you forever.)

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Times New Viking - "Call & Respond"

The first track offered from Times New Viking's forthcoming Stay Awake EP would certainly fulfill the release's titular goal of preventing you from nodding off on a long-haul trucking route. "Call & Respond," however, contains nary a whiff of it's own monicker's back and forth vocal shouting; the blood-red hollerin' is, as usual, sloppily overlapped and built from the primal essence of melody, rather than easily discernible and immaculately articulated lyrics. Fevered snippets like, "to move on/ taking too long," are all I can glean for now. But maybe the title is referring to the track's dueling instrumental impulses, which are, to be accurate, actually going on simultaneously. The trudging Neanderthal guitar riffs seem unmoored from the playful, perhaps taunting even, Westing (By Musket & Sextant) countermelody that prances above it. As both are enveloped by thick, soupy production fog, I feel somewhat unsettled in proclaiming that that nagging line is supplied by organ, but that's the usual set up, so I'm assuming. Anyway, it's not got the faded romance of Rip it Off's finest, but it is still totally lovable...if you're a bit of a misanthrope to begin with.

Previously:

- A, shall we say, minor interview with Times New Viking.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I spent most of the summer in a new music funk, disappointed by the quality of the releases invading my headspace, and turning to neglected records from the past to comfort me in my disillusionment. The tide seems to be turning, though I'm not sure what it's connected to. Perhaps the sustained temperate air of New York's unusually generous August? Maybe I just looked a little harder for some, and then the blogosphere rewarded me for my efforts by spitting out the rest? It matters little. As I have in all the melted months since I've been associated with MS, I offer a smattering of tracks that have kept me sane as my actual brain boiled away. ..

Best Friends Forever - "Eisenhower is the Father" (live on 89.3 the Current)

I must have seen the name Best Friends Forever nestled in the midst of a mammoth Todd P e-mail blast somewhere along the line, but I never really investigated the Minnesota band until catching some modest hype shrapnel from the dates they played in New York this week (I did not attend, but nyctaper did, and his recordings can be found here). Turns out they are pretty GD delightful. I tracked down the group's virtually ignored 2008 debut LP Romance Conflict Adventure, but I still prefer the radio session version of its song "Eisenhower is the Father" that's posted above. It's not so far off from it's studio counterpart, but the vocals of (presumed BFFs) Bri and Jes are perhaps even more casual and off the cuff sounding in a single, lazy take. It flirts with being overly cutesy, but the girls' funny travelogue/love story/presidential narration exudes both a haphazard charm and an obvious intelligence that elevates it above something awful like the Moldy Peaches. They're two lady Malkmuses overlapping each other while on the prowl. Well, at least until the song whips into a Unicorns synth-pop rave-up. Pavement + Unicorns + clever female vocalists = swoon. I actually think that ol' lefty Ike is pretty swell too.

Appropriate Corresponding Summer Activity: Savoring a reassuring breeze. Chuckling to yourself at its improbable pleasantness.

Sic Alps - "United"

I had meant to post a few more songs from San Fransisco's Sic Alps at some recent point, but a lack of motivating enthusiasm did me in. I like the hissing lo-fi rockers, but not as much as I wanted to after reading copious descriptions of their craft. But this Throbbing Gristle cover is a pretty neat trick. "United" is one of the easiest songs to like in the industrial titans' intimidating back catalog, it's, uh, still not that easy to like. The robot blips of the original are downright cuddly compared to the detached vocals and and their off-putting delivery. Sic Alps take sounds like a large truck idling, until it takes on a surprising bit of Nuggets pep. One of the least likely feel-good experiments in recent memory.

Appropriate Corresponding Summer Activity: Strolling home so absent-mindedly that the construction work in the distance takes on a bit of a melody.

Ssion - "Credit in the Straight World"

I'm clearly a sucker for this song, having already posted it performed by two other artists. As the iconography of Courtney Love was prominently displayed both times I've seen them live, I'm guessing it's the Hole version that Cody & co. are primarily smitten with. How better to express diva worship than evoking a smoke machine obscured dancefloor? Not as mysterious as Young Marble Giants' original, clearly, but even when playing a song as straight as they ever have, Ssion manage to devilishly amuse. Once the mental image of Love in a Flashdance off-the-shoulder sweatshirt and leg warmers ensemble set in, it was difficult to displace.

Appropriate Corresponding Summer Activity: Trying several ice-cream flavors until you hit the one that makes you question your own sexuality.

Gang Gang Dance - "House Jam"

Previously, Gang Gang Dance's only nod to easy accessibility was part of one song where it seemed like the band might have, at some point in their lives, heard Morrissey. This new track actually seems made for people who aren't filled by a meal made of occasionally interesting texture alone. It's name might trigger an involuntary face-scrunching, but "House Jam" is a surprisingly apt description. It's got the body movement triggers of blissfully e'd up rave number, but is looser and more playful in form than a standard 4-4 banger. As their previous style was patently unlistenable (I tried, I swear), this has to be considered a major, major improvement.

Appropriate Corresponding Summer Activity:Jamming; preferably in a house.

the Anals - "Commando of Love"

The Anals were French punks, already slipped into the past tense after issuing this debut single this June. According to a tersely worded bio on their Sweet Rot label MySpace page, half of these French duo met an untimely death. Whether that's meant metaphorically or tragically not, this is a great little cult mystery of a 7". Using lingering national angst over World War II for lyrical fodder, and some sort of relentless animatronic gorilla to play the drums, "Commando of Love" is beguilingly spartan.

Appropriate Corresponding Summer Activity: Preparing for an afternoon BBQ by laying down a base coat of grain alcohol, flaming out early.

Stereolab - "Cellulose Sunshine"

The 60s sounds I most associate with Stereolab's career are of the French, lounge, or French lounge variety. "Cellulose Sunshine" from the band's ninth full-length album, has the distinct whiff of "Incense & Peppermints" to it, however. The groove is accentuated by sly strings, though the end result, as always, is a Stereolab song. The title implies a warming glow in even the most mundane items; light beaming from the component parts of things you see every day. Though the British veterans' sound has by now become as familiar as a plant or stone in your garden path, this petite pop nugget has an inner radiance as well.

Appropriate Corresponding Summer Activity: Watching the gleam morph and recombine on the surface of a flowing creek. Ohhhhhm.

--

Previously:

- the Summer of '07
- the Summer of '06

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

The sharp-dressed man who appears to be sitting in Adrian Veidt's office* on the cover above is none other than revered Buzzcocks' frontman Pete Shelley. By end of the 70s, the Buzzcocks were straining a bit at the creative seams. 1979's A Different Kind of Tension was the end result of a dramatic creative growth that leaped from wanking lyrics to Burroughs quoting (I guess the scope of that leap depends on your literary tastes). Despite continued growth, the 'cocks weren't charting like they used to, and as such, weren't too flush with cash. Shelley had holed up with future Human League knob-twiddler Martin Rushent and fell deeply in love with the possibility of synthetic instrumentation. Seeing diminished need for his bandmates, he got his lawyer to fire off a quick letter disbanding the seminal Manchester punks. Goodwill all around, obviously. A cloud of bad feeling may have marred the 1981 release of his first solo record, Homosapien, but the sharp pop tunes in contains are ripe for re-examination.

Pete Shelley - "Homosapien"

The album's title cut preceded the album and became an underground hit despite facing a total ban by the BBC. Their grounds were that the song contained "explicit" references to gay sex, though the meaning of that term has clearly been tightened in the intervening years. Looking at the lyric sheet now-- with its coy boys, shy boys, and cruisers--it does seem very much a statement on Pete's up-'til-then quiet bisexuality. The way he stresses the "homo" in homosapien is a clever way of reclaiming a schoolyard taunt, while affirming the basic humanity of the stigmatized. It's also a pretty slammin' synth-pop number, confirming that Shelley could write memorable hooks in his sleep. I'm certainly not the first to make this observation, but try singing "North American Scum!" over "Homosapien Too!" for an easy demonstration of the song's continuing influence.

Pete Shelley - "Yesterday's Not Here"

Of all the painfully on-the-nose lyrics in rock history, "Looking back on life, is such a retrospective thing..." has to win some sort of a prize of infamy for attempting to sound deep while saying absolutely nothing. It's so clunky and obvious an opening line that it almost becomes charming again. The rest of the track needs no rationalizations. Again, Shelley can't help but write a huge anthemic chorus, which Rushent complements and improves with energetic Moroder-lite synths.

* It's interesting though probably coincidental to note that Watchmen's Veidt takes his alias from the works of another P. Shelley

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

- A hole where the Romeo should be

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 10:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If one day in the not so distant future every U.S. city is forced to pull all their resources together
in order to stave off an alien race whose only weakness is an adversity to low-fi underground rock, well, in that specific scenario, the city of Columbus, Ohio will certainly be ahead of the game. This is because in 1997, 5 veteran members of the Columbus musical tradition pulled together for a few nights in an Ohio barn with the sole mission of recording an album that would “reflect the Blues, Folk, and Punk roots/ heritage of all involved.” The band was named Ego Summit, and the album, which has just been re-issued, was claustrophobically titled The Room Isn’t Big Enough.

True, the story of Ego Summit does sound like an underground musical version of the A-Team, and for the most part if you have a problem, and if no one else can help, and if you can find them, Ego Summit may or may not be able to offer the sort of assistance that you need. But all of that is a wash since they did make a record stamped with a uniqueness that still resonates in mystery eleven years after it was recorded deep under Ohio skies.

The members of this Columbus troop of musically inclined soldiers of fortune were Don Howland, of the Gibson Bros. and Bassholes; Ron House of Great Plains and Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments; the late Jim Shepard, of Vertical Slit and V3; and Tommy Jay and lo-fi legend Mike “Rep” Hummel of Mike Rep and the Quotas.

The last member listed in the Ego Summit lineup should flutter a wavelength. We interviewed Mike Rep whose delicate ears brought us some of our favorite sounding records ( e.g. Guided By Voices’ Propeller and Times New Viking’s Dig Yourself) back in ’07 and he recently introduced us to his work with the band Mors Ontologica.

From the first drum clicks over hiss on the first track of Ron House’s “Beyond the Laws” the album takes on something much more layered than just a recording of five friends playing together in a barn (though the barn does add a level on its own). There is something else at work here, a musical urgency sounding like it is being recorded deep in space and played back through a loudspeaker at mission control in Houston. The resulting sound is familiar but distant. The enigma that an album can sound so remote when it was aptly named The Room Isn’t Big Enough for all literal purposes is Exhibit A in arguing for the recording astuteness of Mike Rep/ Tommy Jay /and engineer Jerry Wick.

Beyond the Laws

Matched with the sense of desperation caused by the dripping of magnetic guitar lines that could make Lou Reed himself check his soundboard, there is a sense of humor dark enough to cause someone to need a flashlight to see the Aurora Borealis.

Rise Sherry

One song has particularly managed to float around my head for over three weeks. This is Ron House's "Rise Sherry." The repetitive pull of the hazy guitar riff must still be moving on some wavelength. The deep bluesy dragging rhythm of the song could have easily been penned as a Ray Manzarek organ line in the Doors’ Morrison Hotel.

Continue reading "Ego Summit: The Room Isn't Big Enough" »

Posted by Yonah Korngold at 12:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

August Darnell, clearly not sweating it.

I don't know if it's just me, but aside from a few scattered tracks (which I'll hopefully get to soon), the late summer has been kind of a wash for new music. Just little blips of interest, but nothing that's matched the compulsive need to listen and re-listen that Kala did a year ago. Fingers crossed that a timely leak of Of Montreal's Skeletal Lamping might provide a salve, but for the past few weeks in the desert I've been sustained by the water-filled cactus that is the work of August Darnell.

The main source of sustenance has been the exceptional Goin' Places: the August Darnell Years (1976-1983) compilation out earlier this year on Strut Records (seriously, buy it). Once that was assimilated, I scoured my CD racks to realize that ol' Kid Creole was one of the elite production geniuses of that genius crowded era, rubbing shoulders with Eno and Hannett and Moroder in creating a different, much less chilly, form of precision. So infatuated am I with his ridiculously goofy yet exceptionally tight disco oeuvre, that I'm declaring the remainder of this month, "August Darnell August." My late start is mitigated by the fact that I actually started it unwittingly in late July. But the proper launch comes with the song below, perhaps the catchiest, most ridiculous track I've stumbled upon in months.

Don Armando's 2nd Avenue Rhumba Band - "I'm an Indian Too" (12" version)

"I'm an Indian, Too" began its life as a Broadway show tune, written by Irving Berlin for his long-running western comedy Annie Get Your Gun and originally performed in 1946 by legendary battle-axe Ethel Merman. Thirty years later, the wide range of racial stereotypes on display didn't stop band leader Don Armando and production whizz Darnell from resurrecting it for a day-glo disco classic on Ze Records' vinyl. From the creeping strings that begin the track, everything is supercharged towards a cartoon representation of the rampaging Injun. The driving beat and silky singing from cult-diva Fonda Rae make the questionable content easy to swallow. Presented as a ridiculous dance-floor filler, the patronizing aspects of Berlin's original also lose a bit of their sting. In the song's world, the only thing keeping you from being an Indian is the appropriate wardrobe. Stock up on "moccasins, wampum beads, totem poles," and the like, and you're good to go. The sentiment feels strangely appropriate for the hedonistic reinvention rampant in the late 70s New York disco scene. Just change your look, make yourself into whatever lovely creature you'd like to be, and hope that's enough to get into Studio 54. One of the Village People seems to have taken the track's advice verbatim.

The unstoppable groove and subtle production twists (dig those warped string breaks!) will make sure that more time is spent shaking your ass than overthinking levels of cultural sensitivity. As the rest of the month's Darnell offerings will prove, ass-shaking was priority one and being gleefully offensive was just icing on the cake.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 10:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

[Hearts of Palm @ Westword showcase - 6.14.08]

I first heard of Hearts of Palm minutes before seeing them at the Westword music showcase about a month in half ago. The eight piece Denver power pop collective brandishes orchestral rock flourishes and is quickly making a name for themselves locally. Formerly known as Nathan & Steven, the band smartly changed their name for practical purposes, bookers and promoters were constantly blindsided when eight people marched into venues rather than the two Nathan and Steven fellows expected. Hearts of Palm satisfy with big choral indulgences that sound like a hybrid of Los Campesinos and the Hold Steady. Lead singer Nathan McGarvey's vocals have an attractive roughness to them, yet could best be described as clean in delivery, much like the deliberate classic rock tones conveyed by Craig Finn.

On stage the band is an explosive force of regular looking, do-gooding folks, the type that may be as quick with a smile as they are putting you at ease. Set to driving pop numbers the band exudes the leave-it-all-on-stage approach. Bands with large onstage personnel are typically the type to serve high energy performances and Hearts of Palm are no exception. In this decade we've been blessed by a number of large rock collectives such as the Polyphonic Spree, New Pornographers, Broken Social Scene and arguably the best of the best, the Arcade Fire. Unique in their own ways, but all build on the dynamic engine of focused exuberance for live shows.

Hearts of Palm - "No Water"

"No Water" might be the best track from Hearts of Palm's the Bridge EP, available free on their Myspace. Starts off with a jumpy bassline and syncopated tambourine before the cool raspiness of Nathan McGarvey paints a dystopian scene of post-rapture desertion. An accusatory nature begins taking shape as it quickly becomes clear the off stage protagonist is someone who has taken more advice from the devil on their shoulder than is sensible. Burning bridges in his or her wake, a trainwreck witnessed by helpless friends who can only wait and watch the inevitable happen.

My favorite declaration of this dark message actually comes when the ominous choral treatment is given to the lyrics, "we have no water here and everybody knows it". Not only does it sound terrific, it serves as a lyrical play to arid Colorado's land-locked status. Like a duh moment that perfectly expresses the mountain west reality while fitting perfectly into the thin narrative of someone's combustible life. They can't save this person even if they tried. The imagery returns in the repeating last lines of the song like a sad conclusion to unheralded warnings of flying dangerously close to the sun: "I wish that you made it, you never had a chance, I never had a chance to tell you."

Hearts of Palm play tonight at the Hi-Dive as part of UMS. Catch them again tomorrow at the outdoor stage at 5pm.
-- -- --

More pictures of that Westword Hearts of Palm show after the jump. But first...

[Hearts of Palm, the vegetable]

Continue reading "UMS Pick - Hearts of Palm" »

Posted by Merry Swankster at 12:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

As our declared # 6 song of 2007, it's clear that we liked Deerhunter's version of "Fluorescent Grey" just fine. But as haunted/haunting as Bradford Cox and his humid piano creeps were, you still had to wait patiently (patiently) for the rock-out. Jay Reatard's version--from his increasingly excellent Matador singles series--stomps and whinnies from its first seconds of blacktop screech. Taking the lyrics literally, his initial agitation seems more appropriate for someone who has awoken suddenly screaming an imagined lover's name. But from there, his froth and the lyrics' mood converge. Spooky and forlorn this version is not. (It certainly does not evoke patience.) Reatard does manage to imbue the fateful words "you were my God in...high school" with the sort of over the top melodrama that a line like that demands (it even gets a bit of a fakey British accent for good measure).

In the original that line sets off a triumphant wave of blistered guitar fuzz. With a slower preceeding context, the moment is all about finally relieved tension. Starting from a more frantic place Jay chooses a looser, more organic twist; token bit of basement buzz jostles with acoustic guitar and a crisply struck tambourine. Where Cox let the next line ("People never really know") cleanly surf on top of his band's radiation wave, Reatard stretches and mumbles it until it loses even vague meaning. Then it's back to the "patiently, patiently," sung in a hurry. I guess lyrics so finely attuned to the mood of their original surroundings aren't flipped by changes as simple as tempo or instrumentation. It's an enjoyably psychotic near miss, anyway.

Jay Reatard - "Fluorescent Grey"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 09:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Beck - "Chemtrails"

Caribou - "After Hours"

I think so.

Posted by Merry Swankster at 02:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Air France, actually from Sweden, looking actively creepy.

Air France - "June Evenings"

The summer nights this song evokes aren't actually the ones we've just lived through. There's no sense of long, slow sweat, unbearably building until the shock of a thundercrack unleashes the full weight of moisture in a relentless monsoon. Air France's June evenings are a perfect 74, with a hair-tussling breeze--but they aren't idle hammock sways at all. The persistent beats and triumphant horns are alive with possibility. When weather is that ideal, it tricks you into thinking that good fortune must be swimming inside such temperate air. It makes you hop one more cab, meet one more friend, convinced of the destiny imbedded in subsequent destinations. The girl singing here sounds half in dream, confused by the bird chirps encroaching on her magical nightlife. Or perhaps in Sweden, they party in the forest. That's not how we do it here, but clearly their summer is more whimsical than ours. Maybe that's for the best. Maybe we need the bugs and the unbearable humidity, the walks to the store that end with a soaked shirt from an angry God. If our real June evenings were as perfect as this, I don't see how we'd make it through the winter...

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 11:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Vivian Girls - "Where Do You Run To?"

Burning through 10 songs in 22 minutes, Vivian Girls' self-titled debut doesn't offer much space to get comfortable. The Brooklyn fuzz-maidens' general M.O. is haunted C86 pop, with loose limbed drumming and clenched fist guitars. It may not be the most inventive configuration, but it's hardly a cynically retro fashion construct either. The band's convicted songs carry enough mumbled melody to charm on first listen and the judicious brevity to avoid a worn welcome on repeated spins. But of all the blinks and snaps this tiny album offers, it's "Where Do You Run To" that feels assured enough to demand some quality time. The vocals elsewhere on the record have a wobbly post-punk skittishness to them. You know, that appealing '79 spark when women without practiced sheen were nonetheless determined to cut a record, like, now. "Where Do You Run To" has an easier glide than the DIY divas that provided its probable influence. The song's bass and drum lines are too lively for "ballad" to be an accurate descriptor, but it's no pogo dust-up either. Three voices meld into a foamy-sweet siren's call, luring surfers to a lovely braining on the rocky shore. It's one of a few places where the group's ramshackle components aren't content with plucky cohabitation, and actually combine towards a tough but gentle tune that's bigger than pocket-size.

The record's miniscule first pressing sold out everywhere it was stocked within a week, though a wider release is planned for the fall. This is the first among several mixtape keepers 'til then.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Love is All - "I Ran (So Far Away)"

Love is All's Flock of Seagulls cover--the surprising centerpiece of their tour's Love is All Play 5 Covers EP--starts like a nervy deconstruction, akin to the Cure skittering through Hendrix's "Foxy Lady." But I should have known that the excitable Swedes wouldn't pass on such a readymade soaring chorus. When Josephine's waiting sidemen chime in with "A giiiiiirl liiike yoou-oooo" it immediately brings a smile to the face, but not because it's being particularly clever, or ironic, or anything. They're just earnestly belting it out like a couple of pals with a few beers under their belts. As with all of the band's original compositions, the energy is infectious. The backing track is still full of all the post punk tics, the horn honks, the guitar scrapes, that we've come to expect, but not once does it ever detract from the undiluted anthemic fun that's kept the song in near-constant radio rotation, long past other one-hit wonders of its time. The scrapes and scratches on the edges just construct an alternate 80s pop landscape where the no wave pioneers of the decade's early years felt confident enough to throw some huge hooks in the middle of their experiments. It's a lovely alternate reality to visit for 4 minutes (though please, please throw us a few bones about the status about the upcoming record, guys...).

High Places - "Vision's the First"

It's increasingly hard to describe the music of local favorites, High Places. Take Rob Barber's backing track to new UK single "Vision's the First" (available through Upset the Rhythm). I mean, I know that it's mostly constructed and manipulated with samplers, but sampling what? I realized I had no clue when I started to type, "Barber's shimmering..." with no idea how to accurately finish that sentence. "Soundscapes"? Blech. Well, whatever it is, it's shimmering, all right? At least Mary Pearson's plain, adorable vocals are easier to pin down. Her singing is modest and hopeful, gelling with the beat, but never dressing up to full diva proportions. This is a band who speaks to quiet moments, small victories, treasured personal discoveries. "The picture's clear, but it's going black/ and your favorite song's still the hidden track," she sweetly sings. She might have said "..still the limited release UK single," if that weren't such a horribly awkward lyric.

I've also been lusting after its 7" b-side, "Namer," since I saw it at the Market Hotel show earlier this year. Thankfully preserved by Pitchfork.tv...

High Places - "Namer"

It's modest dance beat is strong as usual, but what really sells it is the soulful delivery Mary gives to the leaving home lyrics. It suggests that she might morph from a wide-eyed naif to a multi-faceted performer sooner than later. The full-length cannot come soon enough. September, via Thrill Jockey, is the word on the street.

--

Also:

A Sunny Day in Glasgow - "the Cemetery Flowers" (streaming on MySpace)

Our old friends from A Sunny Day in Glasgow have posted a new track, soon to be the a-side for a 7" single distributed in a tiny batch of 300 from mail order label, Geographic North. As usual with an ASDIG song, the beguiling component parts of "the Cemetary Flowers" aren't easy to decipher upon first blush. As a wildly important man with no time for headphoned guesswork (blatant lie-ed), I dropped Ben Daniels a line to clarify. Turns out that Ben plays all the instruments, though the key item is the stately electric mandolin. His mandolin has a rich tone that lies somewhere between an electric guitar and a modest string section. He described it as one of the hardest songs they've ever recorded, a process that took from November of 07 all the way through this past spring. It does sounds labored over, more structured and refined than early compositions. His sisters' vocals are still lovely wisps of smoke, dissolving on touch, but also peppered with cute "ooo-ooo" disco whistles that ground their mysterious qualities with a more a playful air. Be still my heart--it even culminates in a handclap and synth workout! Ben swears that the arduous construction of the song lead to a svelte and concise b-side that surpasses this high bar. Only about 300 of you will be able to confirm or deny the claim, so you might want to get on that sooner than later...

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

Romeo Void was a post-punk/new-wave line-straddling four-piece from San Francisco, whose sole enduring 1982 hit"Never Say Never" also gives name to the EP I poached from the "new arrivals" bin at a local Brooklyn wax merchant. While I fondly remembered the song immediately from name, I confess that I sort of thought it an orphan hit from the 90s. The up-front sexuality of the amusing "I might like you better if we slept together" refrain seemed to slot in perfectly with the riot grrl movement occurring at the time of my first exposure to the song. When it was uncoolly handed to me as the backing music for some dumbshit moment on the Real World: LA I immediately associated it with the L7 videos that had assaulted and intrigued my 14-year old psyche. So, if nostalgia got me to pick up the record, it was Ric Ocasek's name on the producer's line that made me take it home.

Though other 90s children probably think of Weezer's "Blue Album" as the pinnacle of the ex-Cars' production career, he's always astounded me as the man who sweetened up Suicide on their second record. Though something as primal as their first LP's "Rocket Rocket USA" sounds as if it just fought its way out of a subway grate somewhere with a knife in its teeth, the likes of the Ocasek-helmed "Dream Baby Dream" was handled with a sweetness that the NYC duo never achieved on their lonesome. Ric's way with navigating between sugar and spike seems to have been a big plus for Romeo Void as well.

The famous title cut is presented here in its original, 6-minute juggernaut form, which is far more substantial than the radio edit that was shoehorned into the band's 1982 album Benefactor. When mis-imagining them as a bunch of baby-doll dressed Gen Xers, I certainly didn't have singer Debora Iyall pegged for a rotund Native American. But contradicted daydreams aside, it's hard to see how a leering titan who looks like (Pere Ubu frontman) Crocus Behemoth's little sister could make you any less punk. She's the song's star, though Peter Woods' nervous guitar lines and Benjamin Bossi's sax--which blasts out unpredictably like a cloud of mysterious New York City steam--cement its place as more than an amusing novelty. The EP's forgotten gem is the flip-side's "Not Safe." Bossi starts the track being kind of overbearing with his woodwind, but Iyall's dead-eyed late night city travelogue soon restores the track's itchy cool. "I'm not safe...or sorry" goes the chorus. For a band that's seen as a bit of a novelty radio curiosity, it turns out to be a surprisingly factual declaration.

Romeo Void - "Never Say Never"

Romeo Void - "Not Safe"

Previously:

- the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

- Linear Movement play "the Game"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This is where I'm supposed to introduce today's special guest blogger with some wit, a dash of humor and predictably assign her with a goofy name to go along with our goofily named website. Not going to do it however, instead I'll just introduce her by her name - Kelli. Everyone say hi. Better known around these parts as the secret weapon behind back room dealings with industry folks who grant us show invites. The entire Swankster crew is infinitely appreciative for all her hard work and dedication, and relieved that although almost an entire decade has passed since her departure from the deep South, that irresistible charm bred into the locals has yet to shed even an ounce of effectiveness. Today she shares her thoughts on her favorite new song by the site's long, ongoing Sheffield crush, the Long Blondes.

The Long Blondes latest album, Couples, continues on the path of Someone To Drive You Home in that love lost, love found, and love fought are major themes throughout. As a fan of the Long Blondes, these last few weeks I have been listening to Couples searching for that one gem I could declare as my favorite. First track "Century" might seem like the obvious pick for its woozy disco progression, unrepresentative compared to other new songs, but it just didn't do it for me. Something about the word century being whispered over and over wigged me out a little. Yes, I'll rock out to it but I doubt I'll be singing it at the top of my lungs. That's the goal, to find a song worthy of singing at the absolute loudest possible volume.

Long Blondes - "Guilt"

During the virgin listening session, the second track, "Guilt," caught my attention enough to force more attention to the lyrics, to make sure what I thought I was hearing was indeed what Kate Jackson was saying. And what she's saying is roughly, "Look babe, maybe there could have been something and maybe even I wanted there to be something but I've already picked my man and he ain't you!"

A persistent suitor can be flattering but the line between adulation and thorn in your side is mighty thin. On, "Guilt", the wooer is around enough to make his intentions known on more than one occasion, but not enough to cause Ms. Jackson to turn away from her heart's choice, she's "sticking to it". And while the title is "Guilt" the song itself is actually about making an adult decision about love and dedication and feeling confident about it.

As a recently engaged person I respect the message. Maybe it's my favorite song off the album because it's one of the few songs I can relate to "in the now". Whether or not anyone else can relate shouldn't be reason enough to stop from picking up a magazine, rolling it up to look like a microphone and singing along at the top of their lungs in a living room, backyard, car, shower, or even a Presidential Library. It makes no difference. - Kelli Douglas

Posted by Merry Swankster at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Under oppressive heat conditions here in New York City, and it's too gross and sluggish to deal with anything but the most direct strikes to the pleasure center. Grilled hot dogs, cold beer, immaculate super-pop, etc. Luckily, two bullets of finely produced aural love have been shot from the gat of the creator Himself. Don't worry, stay seated behind the fan. They'll come to you.

Annie - "I Know Ur Girlfriend Hates Me"

Norwegian crush Annie Lilia Berge Strand returns to hit the day-glo mark she deserted way back in '04. The best thing about this song, besides Richard X's supernaturally tight production I mean, is that it's so much more innocent than it initially seems. You expect songs of this ilk to slip in a lascivious come-on or two, but Annie takes the high road. She's not the target of the titular girlfriend's malice because she's catting around with her man, so much as for simply being in his company. The girlfriend in question is a total psycho, after all. It's there in the account of his "records broken in two," and in the baseless ultimatums she's laying down. Annie just swoops in to illuminate the situation and give her pal some sound advice about sticking up for himself. If there's anything untoward happening in the song's margins, it's strictly in the imagination of the listener (or perhaps a by-product of the verve given to her adorable "have I got news for you-oo" kiss off). With a direct reading, Annie is motivationally pure and thus her pop charms come without any disqualifying ick factor.

And you know any song that ends with the sounds of an ice cream truck leading giggling children away takes its summer-jam status seriously.

Sophie Ellis-Bextor - "Heartbreak Make Me a Dancer"

Looking over the first post I choked out for this site about posh princess Sophie Ellis-Bextor, I'm kind of embarrassed about how embarrassed I seemed. I was listing all sorts of biographical/nostalgic reasons for liking her instead of clearly articulating her music's appeal. Her best work showcases a combination of upper-crust vocal class and frictionless precision in production that should be acknowledged directly (with no phony base-covering caveats). I suspect this isn't going to be the widespread hipster consensus, as Annie was sort of a harbinger for music nerds easing their distrust of pure bubblegum pop music and our heroine made her first splash in a full-throttle, Strokes-flavored, guitar=authenticity throwback moment (with some awesomely cheesy material no less), but I think Sophie's new anthem takes the post's first prize. There's a complexity in Sophie's emotional range in this song that outshines several legions of bearded young men with guitars. She's going through the motions of a hedonistic club ritual, but you get the feeling that she's not even quite ready to leave her house yet. It's a tricky note to hit, but Bextor makes it seem effortless.

Does it say something troubling about my subconscious that SEB's heartbroken minx act is more devastating to me then Annie's self-assured hellcat? I counter claim that the Freemasons production team's relentless disco pulse is just closer to my current heart, as I leave you to psychoanalyze.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 10:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I've been a bit heavy on the 7" record posts lately, but there's something in the air, and I am but your humble recorder. This entry will be light on exposition at least, as there's nothing to tell. The handsome sleeve above is the only concrete info I've got about Nice Face. The MySpace info cubbard is bare, and even the single's distributors, the Brooklyn aesthetes behind the unreasonably hip Sacred Bones label are reluctant to provide the one man band's real name. The mystery is perhaps for the best. It allows us picture some gruesomely scarred golem with an ironic name seeking sonic revenge on all those who've spurned his abrasive keyboard love. As opposed to, you know, some dude with a beard who lives in Park Slope.

Nice Face - "Hidden Automatic"

My preferred side to the nicely featured one's first glob of vinyl is the killer "B." While there's no shortage of laser noises bouncing around the crinkled edges of "Hidden Automatic" 's tin foil mix, a steady, cascading guitar line that keeps it from pure burbling neon cacophony. The vocals are so warped by fuzz that you'll be lucky to make out the title when sung in the chorus. But there's a strong suggestion of a fine anthemic tune here, both in the vocal melody and the overstuffed 4-tracks it was presumably recorded onto. Maybe if you peeled those onion layers back you'd be tearing up at an alarming lack of substance. As I said before, I can't really tell if we're hiding lyrical gems or junk (or "automatic" for that matter). But lack of clarity can be seductive, I say. Whether a sasquatch or a sex-kitten is beginning to emerge from Nice Face's fog, it's not yet clear. This primal swoon has me hooked into giving our mystery man another couple tracks to further enlighten.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 07:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The fifty-second book in the acclaimed 33 1/3 series, Carl Wilson’s Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste has become somewhat of an internet sensation. Nearly everyone who has read it has loved it. Only originally released in November of last year, in about seven months it has become the thirty-second most popular book in the series. There’s a blog set up solely for the purpose of providing links to the many websites featuring reviews, interviews and analyses of the book. Did I mention that it’s about a Celine Dion album? Not exactly par for the 33 1/3 (holed?) course. But that’s not the only reason this book sticks out from its crowd.

Fact is, Wilson creates a music book that isn’t really all that much of a music book. (I suppose that could be its one drawback.) What it is, is one hell of a pop culture critique, among the better that I have come across. It is well cited, and includes among its roll call of philosophers/theorists/artists/writers Pierre Bourdieu, John Cage, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, David Hume, Emmanuel Kant, among others. It’s practically an academic text book. Yet, as mentioned above, this book has already received a whole lot of critical love. Sure, I’m a little late to the party, but this book is such a stellar achievement for the series and author as well as the entire genre of analytical criticism, that it warrants another look – I’m sure it won’t be the last time it is so regarded.

Continue reading "Interview: Carl Wilson" »

Posted by Randall Monty at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Diet Cola - "Sick Modern"

The debut 7" single from Atlanta's Diet Cola was floating around in the vinyl rumor mill for several months before I actually laid eyes on its golden sleeve in Brooklyn's glass cases of note. Strangely, in the hyping of crumbs era we now inhabit, I'd never seen mention that the less fattening sludge was the solo project of Deerhunter bassist Josh Fauver. I mean, I somehow never even gleaned that info from the Deerhunter blog, whose raison d'être is to shine light on dodgy side projects. Except this isn't even dodgy, it's rad. Or dodgy in a rad way, at the very least.

Ah, synths as bludgeon, you are my favorite tactic. In the EP's third song, "Sick Modern," Fauver grounds the song in key bashing that isn't repetitive so much as it is relentless. As a minimal starting point, that'd do pig, but added power comes from continual climaxes that echo the garage rock bashing that Deerhunter's new LP Microcastle leaves behind for good. But unlike the songs of his buds the Black Lips, this'll never be confused for the work of sloppy teens from 1968. There's been forty years of sweaty teen angst since, after all. This two-minute and twenty second track seems like a valiant attempt to reckon with every month of it.

"Ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-a-ha-ha!"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Been a bit scarce for a while due to pressing outside of blog concerns and various happenings, and will be more demanding of your attention soon. Here's a wee morsel that's appeal is pretty obvious without my explication.

Jay Reatard - "An Ugly Death"

I think the name and the bloody diaper record cover prejudiced me towards this Memphan to this point. This nuanced-yet-muscly Flying Nun Records replicant, out as part of his new 7" series for Matador, is real, real good. Ponder for yourselves, and we'll discuss soon.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've been at a loss explaining the new My Morning Jacket record, Evil Urges, to friends. Literally lost. I waver between liking it, hating it, then really loving it, and then...well you can guess what comes next. As a whole, I'm left entirely confused how the band, any band, comes to terms with selecting songs for album cohesion and ends up with the not-at-all metaphorical mixed bag that is Evil Urges.

My Morning Jacket - "Highly Suspicious"

It doesn't take long to get into wtf territory. By track three Jim James' falsetto takes a seductive back-alley turn into Prince-like androgynous inflection while encountering Michael Jackson's Thriller-era demonic laughing. However, unbeknownst to anyone, least of all My Morning Jacket fans, we were actually transplanted to a 1970s theatrical score of monster porn.

Posted by Merry Swankster at 11:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Free Kitten - "Bananas"

Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon, Pussy Galore's Julie Cafritz, and the Boredom's Yoshimi P-We return as the world's most terrifyingly intimidating female super-group, Free Kitten. Where Pavement bassist Mark Ibold previously filled the band's token male indie-rock luminary role, we now have J. Mascis bashing the hell out of a drum kit (and kicking the proceedings off with a righteous sneeze). A nasty grumble of a guitar line is the ingredient that'll shake your guts, but Cafritz adds even more bad vibes as the featured screaming banshee. "Survival of the fittest is a cruel cruel hoax" she drolly intones. I doubt these sisters in badassery would have any natural predators under any alternative laws of the jungle that she might propose.

Lissy Trullie - "Self-Taught Learner"

We know switch our attention to downtown cool of an entirely more aloof quality. Fetching tomboy Lissy Trullie is already a bit of a renowned fashion plate, chanteuse, scenester, and (we can only assume) incorrigible heartbreaker in advance of her debut EP. Its title track is a perfectly nonchalant cool breeze of a song, with slightly chugging guitars and low-key studio affects getting out of the way to let her nicotine saturated voice fill most of its empty space. It's deep but slight, and if you weren't graced with the above visual, you might assume it was coming from an adrogyne on the other side of the chromosome divide. If there's a nit to pick, it's that the song doesn't feel weighty enough to sustain itself after the lofty bridge at the two-minute mark. Brevity could have been another quill with which to smite hapless passers-by. But at the risk of being slightly condescending, a look at the above photo should clue you in on how much advice she needs to take from me in order to be successful.

Tickley Feather - "The Python"

This track, from Philadelphia single mom Annie Sachs' home-recorded debut has been floating around the internet for a minute, but it's too hypnotic to allow it to pass by unremarked. The song's various elements are pasted over each other like scissored bits in a stylish collage. The beat isn't guiding the wandering-in-a-fog vocal melodies, though it accidentally keeps time for the idle piano circles that seem piped in by loudspeaker from a far away warehouse. Its spare and pretty rather than forced, though. A would-be happy accident that was probably much more deliberate than it initially seems.

Ponytail - "Celebrate the Body Electric (It Came From an Angel)"

Ponytail might have been a math rock boys club if not for the completely bonkers vocal styling of improbably wee front-gal Molly Sigel. This track is the racing heart of the Baltimore band's forthcoming Ice Cream Spiritual, spending seven minutes alternately sprinting away from hornets or stealing a few winks in the shade. Sigel's lungs are a living, wailing instrument of destruction, adding texture but not concrete meaning. She gives 100% conviction to screeches and purrs both, highlighting the reckless fun in the speeding guitar lines. Instrumental pyrotechnics that could have been a wonk too far are instead thrillingly alive and neon-colored.

P.S. I'm not sure if this kitty has offcially cleared the bag yet, but New Yorkers will be able to see these guys for free at this summer's After the Jump Festival!

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

After many years of musical obsession completely removed from a record player, my pile of vinyl now grows incrementally, aided by the quality LP sellers of New York City. Baubles from the treasure chest will be posted here whenever it seems appropriate...

It's a bit obvious to remark that without a record player one can't investigate vinyl-only record labels. The racks of Other Music's east wall had intrigued me for quite a while, though, and no single release more than the strikingly packaged compilation pictured above, a 2006 effort from tireless excavators of my beloved Euro synth sounds from the early 80s, Minimal Wave. Complicating the format fetishism is the fact that all of the LPs songs come from mainly forgotten cassette releases. Funny now to think of blocky little cassettes as a thrilling glimpse into the future when viewed from 1983. While the entire record (and the label's entire back catalog, really) is worth some in-depth investigation, for my abridged purposes I have to go with the unstoppable pop song.

Linear Movement - "the Game"

"The Game" by Belgian band Linear Movement is much much catchier than you'd think given its intense obscurity and the barriers thrown up in front of its discovery. It's billed in the Lost Tapes liner notes as being taken from an "unreleased album." The band would only produce a single proper release in its meager two-year existence, and its difficult to imagine this being topped. Band mastermind Peter Bonne had recently left the equally obscure, and majorly obtuse, synths-trumental band Autumn to cozy up with a "rhythm box" and some appealing female vocals courtesy of a lady named Lieve van Steerteghem. The sound is akin to the Human League keeping the experimental flavor of their underrated "Dignity of Human Labour" instrumentals intact as they morphed into new-wave floor fillers (and had also negotiated their contracts to mandate that all vocals should be recorded in a cave of some sort). There are plenty of legitimate reasons beyond, you know, the lack of an actual release, that this song wasn't a smash on the pop charts. There are far fewer obstacles to it becoming a hit at your next house party,

Previously: the Raincoats, live @ the BBC

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

the Pains of Being Pure at Heart - "Kurt Cobain's Cardigan"

"I'll take 'Things that would make me indescribably sad if I saw them in a Hard Rock Cafe in Tucson' for a thousand Alex." The fey New York City sounds of the Pains of Being Pure at Heart's latest single don't seem to have much of a concrete connection to the famous fuzzy in Courtney Love's footlocker. If we want to try extra hard to make a connection though, the occasionally strident beat and subtly noise-speckled guitar does bear a bit of resemblance to Cobain's Scottish favorites, the Vaselines. The vocals aren't as giddy or as odd as that, but Kip and Peggy (indie pop vocalists should always be referred to in the familiar don't you know?) have an adorably defeated quality to them. It's as if they've prematurely cracked the secrets of Kurt's Leonard Cohen afterworld, and are already sighing eternally. Perpetually, at the very least.

the Capstan Shafts - "(I Dream About You Because) You Have Such Low Standards"

If posts were to be drafted every time lo-fi workhorse Dean Wells hatched some new material, we'd have a new weekly feature. The extremely prolific Vermont home-recorder's 8th release since 2007 (you read that right) is a 12-track EP cryptically called Miles Per Famine. The EP designation is excusable given the writer's extreme brevity. There's only a minute and eight seconds of diminished expectations here. Even Wells' daydreams are contingent on a girl with poor self esteem it seems. But as always, the charm in his broken hearted sing-alongs come from his melodic interpretation of sharp words that carry more lascivious intent they they initially appear to. "If I take your hand, and then some..." he yells, as the camera pans to the roaring fire.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've only owned a record player recently, despite a lifetime of musical obsession. It turns out New York City is a really good place to find vinyl. I'm as shocked as you.

I'll be posting unearthed treasures here occasionally...when the mood strikes...

From the 1994 John Peel Session that was later commercially released as Extended Play, comes this version of the lead track from the British band's 1981 LP Odyshape. They were rubbing slumped shoulders with the alt rock elite then, after Kurt Cobain had leveraged for the re-release of their records and sacrificed Incesticide's liner notes to be evangelical on their behalf. Accordingly, the kit for the BBC set is manned by Sonic Youth's Steve Shelley. This "Shouting Out Loud" is just as urgent, mysterious, and pretty as the one committed to tape 13 years earlier. In the band's handful of true classics, there is a balance of chaos, craft, and charm that is very hard to achieve. Whenever a new song is winningly ramshackle, I find myself tempted to cite the Raincoats as a forebear of its appeal. The tightrope their best songs walked might be to thin for anyone to truly follow though.

the Raincoats - "Shouting Out Loud" (John Peel Show 1994)

Interesting note from Wikipedia, regarding the band's original drummer and former Slits member "Palmolive" (aka Paloma Romero):

"After leaving the Raincoats Romero looked at changing her life around and spent the next six months exploring India. During this time she met and married her husband Dave McLardy. In 1979 Romero gave birth to her first child, Sandy, after moving back to Spain. Soon the family would move back to England. After moving back to England and feeling unhappy with life in general, she became a born-again Christian.

She currently lives with her husband and three children in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. As of 1995, she and her husband led a cover band called Hi-Fi, rewriting key lyrics to reflect their Christian beliefs. Included in their repertoire is The Slits' song "FM," with the chorus' lyrics changed to "Jesus is the answer / Why don't you let him in?"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Ladytron - "Ghosts"

With only limited exposure to the new Ladytron album Velocefiro, it seems that the Liverpudlians are still painting from their usual neon black palette. But "Ghosts" feels a bit different, straining in schizophrenic directions. It starts with an unexpected tough guy swagger but is then upended by maybe the sweetest, most playful vocal Helen Marnie has ever committed to wax. Usually she's H-242 the robot girl, but even singing of guilty ghosts and solo drinking sessions her nimble melody line is almost, dare I say, flirtatious? The knobs twiddle all over any ideas of a bouncy spring pop hit soon enough, but I'm still surprised to find the word "breezy" where "windscarred" used to be.

Of Montreal - "Feminine Effects"

Not much has changed in the months between the Fall '07 radio session where this candlelit ballad debuted and this studio-recorded final cut. The differences can be measured in slightly abbreviated sighs and finally perfected minor chords. But why would Kevin Barnes mess with such a crystalline torch song? It sounds like the perfect hypothetical first act curtain closer in an improbably moving sixties musical. What its inclusion on a new Green Owl Records' compilation means for its penciled-in place on this year's Skeletal Lamping I cannot say.

(via Fluxblog)

Titus Andronicus - "No Future"

The release date for Titus Andronicus' debut LP The Airing of Grievances is still sadly on the run. But I have managed to cut down another of its children to stuff and display on the blog mantle. As opposed to the instantly rambunctious songs readers of this site have come to know, half of the spic "No Future" is dusty build-up (you have to wait for the building dust-up). You can hear the primal scream of (not-so) old favorite "Upon Viewing Bruegel's Landscape..." warming up in its disappointed embers.

Vivian Girls - "Tell the World"

A May release that is, as of now, far too un-noted is the self-titled debut from Brooklyn trio Vivian Girls. The Henry Darger inspired ladies have a wobbly and infectious energy that recalls wobbly and infectious groups of yore like the Raincoats or Tallulah Gosh. If my lo-fi blind spot endears me to the warm fuzz around the track's edges, the converging voices form harmonies big enough for all. They sing of refusing to keep a good feeling to one's self, which should be enough to spurn you into slipping this into a MuxTape at least.

Monotract - "Cafu y Kaka"

Alright, "old" is only a relative term is this case, but the 2007 release that birthed this monstrosity didn't exactly scorch the blog rolls of the fickle indie nation. Monotract are a blazing herky-jerky noise band; the kind the Lower East Side used to make in the days when it looked like the West Bank. "Cafu y Kaka" blasts of noise aren't entirely perpetual, but there's never more than a second or two for caught breath. I imagine electroshock therapy involves a bit of residual buzzing between doses as well.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 07:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Light posting from me for the past week or so, as a long drawn out computer struggle appears to be finally nearing an end. The normal rate of provided delights from my keyboard will resume shortly, but as a harbinger to this flurry of greatness I point you in the direction of Crystal Stilts covering a lesser loved track from the Velvet Underground songbook, currently streaming at their MySpace page. It's the version they opened their terrific Neon Lights gig with. The one whose title I totally flaked on in my blur of memory for the night but will be accurately ingrained in my remembrance now, forever more.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 10:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Ladytron, one of the very few artists to be lumped in with the maligned electroclash scene and emerge successfully from it, returned this week by dropping off the first track from their upcoming Velocifero to little rapturous notice. Their previous album The Witching Hour was also an undervalued gem of modern synth music. Now that a follow-up is starting to become tangible, anticipation is creeping skywards.

Ladytron - "Black Cat"

"Black Cat" is not the undeniable neon injection that "Destroy Everything You Touch" was, not at all. It's more of a continually black and occasionally amazing Eastern European brush off. When Stereolab fluttered off into French the lilt of the language gave their singing a romantic fluidity beyond their lyrics' revolutionary bent. The effect of the sung Bulgarian here may be exactly the opposite, lending the whiff of (sexy) oppression to whatever it is that's being sung. The retro futurist backdrop has some great Blade Runner synths and old fashioned twinkling bells in its favor, as well as thundering drum breaks that sound recorded in an abandoned hangar. So right up my street, as usual.

Previously:

- Ladytron, Live @ the Irving Plaza
- Best Albums of 2005
- Numerology: ...going on Seventeen

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 08:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Bon Iver’s story is one loaded with ingredients for myth making manipulation. It starts with a cabin in the woods of rural Wisconsin and ends with an album influenced by ghosts from within that were granted release with the help of severe isolation prodding a creative catharsis. In 2007, Bon Iver (real name Justin Vernon) spent four months in a cabin recording For Emma, Forever Ago. All it takes is one spin of this record to recognize the harsh, unforgiving climate needed to create such heartbreaking music.

Bon Iver - "Skinny Love"

When the passion in Bon Iver’s voice increases intensity, it breaks through the gentle folksy veneer and reminds of an emotionally overwhelmed version of [TV On the Radio’s] Tunde Adebimpe’s jarring inflection. Otherwise buttery smooth, the dynamic transitions from soft to loud change with such dramatic effect you’d swear a chorus of doppelgangers is lurking in the overdubbed shadows.

The tragic truth behind the words of this gorgeous song lays bare a path blemished by rotten loves poisoning the hopeful airs of springing futures with a memory cloud of past failures. In other words, any promise of new love will ultimately get ensnared by the lingering issues of loves preceding. A point most telling in the painted imagery of romantic bondage from the following lyrics:

“I'll be holding all the tickets/ And you'll be owning all the fines”
-- -- --

Bon Iver is currently on tour with the artist behind my 19th favorite album of 2007 -- Phosphorescent. Dates after the jump

//Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago - buy
//Bon Iver - Myspace
//Bon Iver @ Jagjaguwar

Continue reading "MS Pick - Bon Iver" »

Posted by Merry Swankster at 10:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If any of our current readers were on board way back in our gawky fledgling days of 2006, they'll know that we were then in the grips of a collective death crush on UK new wave band the Long Blondes. With every new track or morsel of news we came running, bits of hyperbole falling from the toppling stacks we carried. So intense was the infatuation that it almost seems silly now. It's like remembering that summer as a kid when all you could think of was race cars or something. Their debut album Someone To Drive You Home is still plenty sharp, and those early singles thrill when they come up on shuffle, but the all-consuming element of our former coverage has inevitably gone. For that reason, hitting play on the band's new album "Couples" made me feel rather apprehensive. How could such a brief, blazing flame be rekindled? Well for the most part it can't. The record does have its moments though and the best is its first. If nothing else, "Well, that's the one with "Century" on it," can be an enduring legacy of recommendation.

the Long Blondes - "Century"

The song and album start with a ominous sustained synth note that sounds not unlike a spaceship descending through cloud cover. Soon Kate Jackson is singing, "catch me when I'm falling/ century." From the beginning it's clear that this will not be a linear narrative like the band's usual soured romances. When the beat kicks in, it's somehow not as kinetic as you're expecting. The background music plays like a snippet of a fast club track, but looped and replayed on a slower speed than originally intended. "Everything I touch, lightning trails of human lust," she says. Jackson usually plays the victim of circumstance, but she's never sounded so adrift. This impression is intensified because she's singing in an airy disco-diva register that's an inch or two beyond her natural range. Throughout "Couples" she uses this device, often to distraction. In this context, with the music ineffably warped and her words removed from the limits of character study, the disorientation from a regular comfort zone fits the song's mood. Something is definitely amiss here.

If there's thematic worth to be gleaned from the word soup, it's the very feeling of disconnect that we'd already begun to internalize through passive listening. "Traffic stops abandoned/ out of sync, out of fashion." It seems that the fingers of our vintage clad fashion plates have slipped off the pulse, to their great dismay. In the song's world that qualifies as some kind of dangerous shift that would provoke panicked pedestrians to flee their vehicles. It's soon apparent that it's the world gone mad, and not our mod heroes. "Sharp lines in gloss/ a new world war/ untimeless beauty/ all the rage, all the rage." We're presented with a realm of fleeting pleasures, a style battlefield where ephemeral whims trump lasting quality. The Blondes seem to be holding up a certain nostalgic ideal that they don't see reflected in the world outside. "Nothing is sacred/ can can dance to the golden age," is Kate's doomed verbal cue before the song suddenly whiplashes the listener into the hedonistic present they've impressionistically described. It's at the 3 minute mark that renowned dance producer Erol Alkan makes his presence felt.

At it's most overtly nostalgic point, the song erupts into spastic day-glo dance music. Alkan has smuggled a techno beat or two into b-sides he's produced for the band previously (see: "Five Ways to End It"), but never has a Long Blondes' song featured an electronic segment so vital and dominant. From the previous lyrical puzzles, it would seem that this sort of amped up Hot Chip breakdown is the lamented perversion of the band's freeze dried Britpop world view. The cerebral content of the band's lyrics don't usually allow their protagonists to get this lost in a specific moment. This is a watershed moment in their catalog, the onset of a brave new world. In the face of such futurism, Kate can barely keep up. She shouts increasingly choppy phrases into the void. "White! Black! Grey Light! Spacecraft!" No time for withering wit in the pulsing swirl. The mournful synth melody from the song's first part returns, though the now-pounding beats underneath threaten to trample it entirely. It's like we're hearing sentimentality failing to stand up to the relentlessness of the present. The warped loop comes back for a second as well, but it's clearer now, snapped clear of its previous speed trap. It too is quickly overwhelmed by aggressively accelerating synth bubbles.

Calm comes with Kate's regally drawn out recitation of the song's title. The song began by viewing the "century" before it as alien and bewildering, but now there's an understanding of sorts it seems. Going forward is still a menacing prospect (as mashed synth stabs forcefully assert) but Kate's voice and it's multi-tracked echoes seem more in control. Then all of the accumulated elements are simultaneously vacuumed from the mix. The last thing we hear is the low sound of an idling motor. Perhaps a sly suggestion that we're not quite ready for the progress we've just glimpsed? As the record immediately regresses back to the Long Blondes' tastefully retro style of old, it seems they weren't entirely prepared for modernity's neon embrace either.

Previously:

- On "Manchasm"
- On "Plus Ones"
- On "Bushels"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

With my current Times New Viking infatuation soaring to ear-threatening levels, I've been willfully subjecting myself to unhealthy levels of fuzz. We currently live in a paradoxical time where cheap software makes producing a fairly polished sounding recording exceedingly easy and good old 4-track recordings are also much easier to distribute to the world outside your basement. It's now just a question of aesthetics and intent. My tastes are bi-polar. Either give me meticulous DFA perfectionism or sublimely undercooked enthusiasm. From the latter column, here's a quick rundown of what's sounding good in the relatively recent world of willfully obscure pop.

Home Blitz - "Stupid Street"

In this inspired single Home Blitz's Daniel DiMaggio captures the seemingly instantaneous glee of golden amateur savants like Jonathan Richman or Dan Treacy. The song's premise is that Home Blitz the band is playing on the New Jersey street across from the house where the song was presumably recorded. The realities of chilly fall air and the negative impact of gloves on guitar playing are comically addressed. There's still room amid the stream-of-consciousness for premeditated sinister couplets like "Hey girl, I'm gonna cut your spine/ down a straight and narrow line." If you don't find the "screw it, let's just record a song" vibe charming, perhaps you should just click away now.

Munch Munch - "Wet Nightmare"

This UK band attracted the ear of the reputable German label Tomlab by sounding like a glorious fucking mess. "Wet Nightmare" is a b-side to a recent single and it sounds about as focused as I've heard them manage, which is actually not all that focused. It starts with epileptic beats and music box twinkles and then introduces a synth tone that sounds vaguely like a pan flute. A minute in to the song, it starts stabbing away at one maniac note while drum fills begin raining down from angry skies. Then it just turns totally awesome for thirty or forty more seconds.

No Paws (No Lions) - "I've Always Been Content"

No Paws (No Lions) are a Riverside, CA band that may have already broken up. The last word I'd gotten (via MySpace bulletin) was that they were already slapping down the creative differences card after maybe a half-dozen promising no frills keyboard songs. It's hard to even know what to say about such an immediately snuffed flame, but the off-kilter singing and adorably rich tones here suggest that any form they might have eventually morphed into would have just left me nostalgic for a minute and thirty second-long pop songs like this. Below is You Tubed proof that they were a fully functioning band for a split-second at least:

No Paws (No Lions) - "Kobe Bryant Jersey (No. 8)"
(live @ KSPR, Pomona College Radio)

Torn Curtains - "Paranoia Strikes Again"

To see that level of obscurity and raise it to an untrumpable level I give you Torn Curtains, the alias of one Byron Tennant with whom I went to high school. Hints of bias should be immediately squashed by a listen to the inspired, Lynchian small town America gone wrong lyrics. When the dread reaches a fevered climax around the 2:45 mark, projecting a sinister motive to "a crowd that gathers all around you," I have to doff a cap of appreciation every time. We also went to school with Jon "Napolean Dynamite" Heder. I rightly consider this the (certainly less lucrative but) more artistically worthy alumni achievement.

Tyvek - "Mary Ellen Claims"

It seems that you almost need to come from Michigan to summon up this kind of frustrated garage angst. Songs about nighttime Satan visits just shouldn't be recorded with any more polish than this. Or anything less than manic pogo energy, for that matter.

caUSE co-MOTION! - "Who's Gonna Care?"

This track, from a new caUSE-co-MOTION! 7" EP sounds an awful lot like all the Brooklyn band's other singles. But if you're shopping for subtly harmonic stop-start nerdery that vaguely reminds you of early Feelies records, they're pretty much monopolizing that niche at the moment. These guys make college kids dance so spastically that you may be better off listening in the comfort of your own home.

the Invisible Hand - "Don't Sleep With Whores"

As I was putting this post together I received an e-mail from one Adam Smith, a compatriot of our recently beloved Neon Lights artist Titus Andronicus. Three cheers for kismet! If your name is Adam Smith, the market pretty much demands that you call your band the Invisible Hand. The double-tracked vocal melody, pleasantly waltzing guitar lines, sloppy countrified Meat Puppets breakdowns, and continual crunch should find a few willing consumers as well. "Client 9" cultural moment, I give you your anthem in waiting.

Sic Alps - "Strawberry Guillotine"

This instantly sold-out 7" a-side from late last year is the only on this list to approach the squealing in-the-red abrasiveness of the aforementioned TNV. But instead of a lovably sweet center, the San Francisco band gives us a throbbing slab of early Sonic Youth menace. There is plenty room in the heart and hard drive for both approaches.

the Capstan Shafts - "61 Sideburns"

And then there's Dean Wells, the home recording prodigy who calls himself the Capstan Shafts. It's not hyperbole at all to refer to him as the second coming of the early Guided by Voices' work ethic and creamy yet fucked with aesthetic. Dean's songs are a smidge less surreal, briefer in composition length, and somehow even more prolifically produced than Bob Pollard's. Such is the man's tireless output that the 2006 album I'm currently smitten with, Euridice Proudhorn, is already 8(!) releases old(!!). "61 Sideburns" is an amazingly catchy and minorly profound way to spend one minute of your life. "We lived in the last genuine time," he asserts, with a convicted wistfulness that really stays with you. It enjoys a moment in our blog sun now before becoming merely a footnote to Dylan in a Numerology column several months in the future.

Wells has only ever ventured out of his Vermont home to perform his songs live twice. Because this is the age we live in, you can watch a moment from the first (in a darkened rural church no less) below;

the Capstan Shafts - "Sleepcure Theory Advancer"
(Live @ Stannard Church, Stannard, VT, 10.06.07)

the Capstan Shafts - "Sleepcure Theory Advancer"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

There's a certain type of vulnerability that takes over when you get robbed, effecting even the toughest, most resilient people. Especially true when the crime occurs in a residence rather than, for example, a car or subway.

A smack of dejected helplessness poisons the welfare of the home environment following a break in. Feelings of defenselessness towards a sudden, invisible enemy lurking in the neighborhood. While some of us may turn towards unhealthy substances to deal with the increased anxiety that follows our living space being violated, others consider moving, or at least stepping up security for a better sleep at night. Whatever the coping measures chosen, those first nights will not result in the soundest of slumbers.

Dawn Landes - "Bodyguard"

Yet others turn around and take loss as inspiration to pen a lovely song. Raised in Louisville, Kentucky and burglarized while living in Brooklyn, anti-folk artist Dawn Landes wrote "Bodyguard" in her kitchen while waiting for the cops to arrive after discovering a break-in. Bandits made out with a keyboard, a laptop and a hard drive -- which housed a finished album, her second. While still in the immediate shock of realizing she became an unwilling crime statistic, work immediately began on new material.

"Bodyguard" gives you the feel of fresh visceral emotion that exists only fleetingly in the immediate reaction to trauma. Lyrics like "erased our signatures from things" and "they stole the subjects from your paintings/ but left the canvas on the frame" punctuate the frustrating loss of her irreplaceable music while slyly referencing the ultimately meaningless and easy replaceability of the physical devices housing the work. It's a clever disguise for deeply personal vulnerability while subconsciously cuing defense mechanisms of acceptance.

With the original music lost and gone forever Landes was forced to work from scratch on a second album. Fireproof dropped yesterday from Cooking Vinyl records.

//Dawn Landes - Fireproof - buy
//Myspace
//site

Posted by Merry Swankster at 12:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Atlas Sound - "Activation"

You really can't sleep on the Deerhunter blog for any significant period of time. This track, from the so-called Orange Ohms Glow EP, sounds much more subtly slaved over than the grand majority of the stream-of-consciousness rough drafts that Bradford Cox posts so prolifically. Its sweet strumming and double tracked self-harmonizing are also warmer than the songs on the chilly Atlas Sound LP by several degrees (a record that is still a little under a week from a proper release, I'll remind you). Perhaps that's a validation of his blog experiment right there. The artist has moved on from his earlier work, but the promotional machine is still struggling to catch up. Those who have avoided all things Cox to this point are encouraged to listen with unguarded ears.

Be Your Own Pet - "Becky"

I wrote about this one earlier this week on Prefix and despite that back-of-the head tickle of recognition, it took a chorus of "duh" comments for me to realize the similarity to Little Eva's "Locomotion." But now that I get it, I think it's even radder (to cop singer Jemina Pearl's slang poetics). This is like "Locomotion" with periodic screaming and a girl protagonist sent to jail for "teenage homicide." What's better than that? The Thurston Moore-discovered kiddy corps couldn't be any funnier here, in their depiction of perhaps the cruelest betrayal of all, BFF adultery. That bitch even made Becky a clandestine friendship bracelet! "Now everybody hates me a whole bunch/ just because I made you cry a little bit at lunch." Genius! I don't see how they can get more perfect than this. I fear for Be Your Own Pet: the College Years. Can we arrange for them to be trapped in amber?

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 08:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Mors Ontologica: DREW CLAUSEN - Guitar, Vox, CROW - Keys,Vox, TIM O'DELL - Drums, JEFF WISEMAN- Bass

I’m now convinced that in an apartment building basement somewhere in the confines of Columbus, Ohio, that there is some sort of force that has been bending the musical timeline like a piece of paper making a direct portal between 1974 and 2008. This is the only explanation that I have for a band like Mors Ontologica, a band that hits on the sound of brazen pre dawn-punk layered with moody textures, but also has the ability to create a landscape that could only have been born as a reaction to the desperate times of the present.

Several months back I interviewed Mike “Rep” Hummel, the lo-fi ear that “lovingly f*cked with" Guided By Voices’ Propeller and Times New Viking’s Dig Yourself. Recently I opened up a package with one of Mike’s more recent projects, Mors Ontoligica’s The Used Kids Sessions. Now most doctors will agree that eight hours is the recommended amount of time for sleep. However what divides their opinion is whether eight hours the recommended time to record an album. On the one side you have the argument for excessive studio sessions; on the other side you have Mike Rep.

Mors Ontologica admits to first being very hesitant about the project. But Mike Rep persisted with the feel of the first Ramones LP in the back of his mind and finally was able to convince the band to go into a whirlwind eight hour session on November 27th, 2006.

Mors Ontologica - "Bombshell"

Mors Ontologica - "Comeing Down"

Mors Ontologica - "Ghost and Shadows"

The Used Kids Sessions not only present an exuberant rush fueled by flasks and cases, but there is also a literate intensity in each verse and chord which is a sound that even the band didn’t expect to hear. When I spoke to the four members of Mors Ontologica a short while ago they still sounded shocked that the bass and drums could be heard distinctively on the album when they witnessed Mike’s use of only one shared mic on the drums and bass rig. Going into the recording session the band was thinking demo tape at best and practice session at worst, to their surprise not only did they have a demo but they had an album.

It’s a strange phenomenon when you play a contemporary band for someone and all of the sudden they are taken back to the days of Nixon resigning. Mike Rep summed it up perfectly saying, “I really like working w/ Mors O. they are the kind of band I always wanted to have in the 70's, a little Stranglers-y, a little Saints-y too I think, though they never to listened to either...”

True, Mors Ontologica know their musical past but it is my belief that they have arrived at this sound and are pushing it forward not because they are trying to do anything retro but because their sound is a direct reaction to a similar taste of dissatisfaction and anxiety prevalent in musical circles in 1974. It’s an example of a half baked theory of musical alchemy which suggests that you could take band A and mix them in a vacuum with the politics of B and the cultural sense of C and open the door and you’ve created say The Rolling Stones. If we took Beethoven and placed him in Chicago in 1970 would he end up being in Styx? If in a hundred years the government again adopts a theory of trickle down economics would bands all of the sudden start making music that sounded a tad like Thriller? This has yet to be determined, but the members of Mors Ontologica have placed the mirror on themselves and the sidewalk and have gone through struggles and angst common in 2008. Their music is a reflection of this present but is also based on the knowledge of an adjacent past.

You can catch Mors Ontologica on their first ever trip out East at:

March 1 2008 - CARABAR Columbus, OH w/ ROSEHIPS & THE LINDSAY
March 20 2008 - TRASH BAR Brooklyn, NY 8pm show!
March 22 2008 - GOODBYE BLUE MONDAYS Brooklyn, NY

// Mors Ontologica: The Used Kids Sessions and much more
// Mors Ontologica @ Myspace

Posted by Yonah Korngold at 02:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Fuck Buttons - "Okay, Let's Talk About Magic"

This track, from the Bristol, UK noise duo Fuck Buttons, is not as abrasive as some key words in this sentence might lead you to believe. At the onset it's basically just an unusually aggressive form of ambient, with radiating waves of white noise ebbing and flowing over a bed of stabbing synths. It remains at buzzing stasis for about a minute and thirty seconds before we first hear a voice. At first, it's low and muddled under the white noise, like a pirate radio signal in a language we can't identify. It soon switches to the their signature vocal mode, i.e. completely batshit screeching. But what makes this more listenable than, Wolf Eyes say, is the band's novel sonic mix. The demonic howling is held at a very low level, buried underneath the pervasive fuzz. The normal balance of things is almost completely reversed, with the screams providing background color, and the fuzz that might would normally do just that is given the starring role. It's an odd blurring of "quiet" and "loud" that resembles the efforts of Deerhunter's Cryptograms, perhaps succeeding in mingling the two within a single track to a greater degree. At this point though, all the beguiling noise is mainly amorphous. It's about texture, not structure.

It's another two minutes or so before the plot really emerges. Suddenly, a manic and industrial beat comes in. It sounds like a squad of robots, programmed to win a step competition at a small southern college. Here, we have movement at last. Taking the cue for change, the synth chords switch to a more overtly dramatic, nearly goth sounding configuration. The crackling white noise is still present, but the track's focus is increasingly on rhythm and melody. Even when the key tones begin to veer towards the apocalyptic, this is "noise music" that's not egregiously noisy.

It's hard to really put a pin in what genre this is. It's buried singing is inspired by hardcore punk and noise, but it doesn't really belong in that bin. It's post-"post-rock" and post-everything, really. If any one word could sum the sound up, you'd really have to go with hypnotic.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 03:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I'm tempted to apologize for the continuing stream of Hellenic hype but hey, this is a music blog, and any so-called "music lover" who doesn't become enraptured to the point of gratuitous repeat from time to time should be the object of intense skepticism. And after wading into the now circulating full length Hercules & Love Affair LP, I'm afraid an inoculation for disco fever will not be forthcoming.

Hercules & Love Affair - "Raise Me Up"

First, to temper expectations, I have to stipulate that this song is not the equal for the previously posted "Blind." I say that not in disappointment but as mathematical fact. That is the sort of single artists spend a whole career trying to live up to, let alone equal in a single disc. But the collaboration between producer Andrew Butler and the very strange man known as Antony provides a handful of highlights throughout the rest of the record. If the stellar non-Antony strut, "Hercules' Theme" already has a lock on its silver medal, Hercules & Love Affair's penultimate track "Raise Me Up," probably gets the bronze.

I'm not quite sure why I haven't been able to get behind Antony and the Johnsons records. I made a snarky Aaron Neville comparison last week, but that's probably more dismissive than strictly necessary. I guess I could never wrap my head around the intense vulnerability in Antony's songs as delivered in such an operatic manner. There was just a fundamental disconnect between the virtuoso performance and the lyrical unease that left me cold.

Set to Butler's beats, his quavering pipes have a much different contextual meaning. In H & LA tracks, Antony plays the part of fantasy diva--personally meek, but empowered by the democracy of the dance club. "Raise me up/ to dance on the hollow of your hand," he begs his godly beat merchant. That prayer is met with an impeccably vintage disco throb, that's punctuated by sneaky key twinkles and sublimely buttery horn blasts. And perhaps simple tempo can't be discounted as the key factor. Without a glacial pace to toy with, Antony doesn't have time for tortured ululation. Reduced by necessity to slight Bryan Ferry bleating, the strength of his vocal gift is all the more easily enjoyed.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 07:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Vampire Weekend - "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa" (MTV Spanking New Session)

Bright and cheerful are the some of the easier ways to describe Vampire Weekend, playful too. Like on this naughty and nice tale of a presumably well off young woman; whose personal eras get defined by name-checking upmarket brands before, what appears to be, the hormonal up tick of puberty hitting full on. Or, at the very least, some general horniness. It appears someone within the narrative of the New England iconography spiked the punch with Paul Simon's Graceland. Reggaeton!

Vampire Weekend - "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa"

The Afro-rhythms of the hand drums are much more pronounced on the studio version, but kudos to Chris Tomson for being able to recreate an honorable representation on a single drum for the above video.

Vampire Weekend's self titled album comes out at the end of the month on XL Recordings.

//Vampire Weekend - s/t - Preorder

Posted by Merry Swankster at 11:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

the Pains of Being Pure at Heart - "A Teenager in Love"

As being an actual teenager in love is akin to an emotional base jump with a tattered parachute, most songs about adolescent romance are goofily self-deceptive. We remember it as golden and lamentable, when it's more often forgettable and fleeting. This New Wave pop hit by New York newcomers the Pains of Being Pure at Heart projects the sort of wistful nostalgia perpetuated by pretty much every media representation of high school ever. But I guess there's a reason that CW network is still in business, and John Hughes has beach houses made of solid gold. The boring reality, filled with awkward groping and petty cruelty, isn't so much fun to watch or dance to. And this track is fun, danceable yet slightly quivering with melancholy that isn't overblown enough to trigger an automatic eye-roll. It's a lie, but a pretty one.

the Teenagers - "Sunset Beach"

The sordid Parisian pop group known as the Teenagers deal in teen fantasies as well; ones emanating from a place slightly lower than their (un-pure) hearts. The songs on their finally imminent debut, Reality Check, often sound like the feverish imaginings of fourteen year old boys warped by forbidden exposure to Penthouse Forum and Cinemax After Dark. The girls in their narratives are easily seduced, and casually degraded. It's hard not to feel a little bit queasy about a song that features a chorus refrain of "this fucking bitch deserves to die." But whether it lets them off the misogyny hook or not, there can be no doubt that all of this is meant to be tempered with a heaping dose of irony. The more Germanic than French accented narration is full of chuckle worthy digressions like the romantic sparks generated by an iPod playlist devoid of Jeff Buckley, and how one night's bliss is worth significantly less than a Fender Jazzmaster. The juvenile playboy protagonist comes across much more foolish than the object of his initial lust and eventual scorn. And musically, when separated from troublesome notions of lyrical intent and gender issues, its brooding baseline, shoegaze guitar and sweet (sounding at least) chorus are really quite addictive.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not to be confused with 4:4 Friday evening...

the Magnetic Fields - "Zombie Boy"

The Magnetic Fields' impending album, Distortion has got its talking point right there in its title. While alot of the record is less skewed than you've been lead to believe, "Zombie Boy" is a right nasty piece of business. "Two roosters I slew/ and with all of my might/ I prayed hard for you/ In Haiti at night," starts the stellar macabre lyric sheet. Stephin Merritt is not one to let feedback take precedence over wit, after all. But if the cracked fuzz was announced and the sharp words expected, the real surprise is the ragged electric guitar solo Steve lets loose at around 2:20. Who knew he had those chops in his pocket? In the context of the horror movie piano and limping drumbeat, it's a thrilling and gory little burst.

801 - "You Really Got Me"

This 1976 live Kinks cover from Brian Eno's prog pop supergroup 801 seems fraught with internal tension. The players are so accomplished that you can almost hear them dying to break out of the troglodyte riff that the young Davies brothers had to get by with. It's too basic to allow for erupting wankery, which is a net plus in my book. And all that unreasonable teenage lust is just drained bloodless by Eno's aloof singing. This version is cerebral and itchy, as opposed to the original's unkempt sexual id. It sounds like a bunch of scientists programming robots to be horny, failing to anticipate the horrifying results.

Valet - "Kehaar"

Valet is the current project of experimental Portland musician, Honey Owens. Honey's been a collaborator to the free wheeling noise troupe Jackie-O-Motherfucker, and has now joined the touring band for Deerhunter frontman Bradford Cox's solo recording project, Atlas Sound. "Kehaar" is listed as a likely inclusion to a 2008 Valet album called Naked Acid (which is much sexier than regular acid). It's a slow, meandering piece, but one filled with gorgeous echo and surprisingly pretty double tracked vocals. I have a hard time accepting that the song is actually about the gruff seagull in Richard Adams' bunny epic Watership Down. Owen's drawn out delivery makes it tough to discern detail, but references to letting the wind carry you can be heard in support of that conclusion. A seagull just isn't regal enough for the swirling textures here though, let alone one with a comic relief Eastern European accent. I don't know what animal/nationality combo it conjures in my mind-eye...something graceful, deliberate, and mean. Maybe a North African mako shark--content from a recent buffet, but with violence never far from its focused mind.

Hercules & Love Affair - "Hercules Theme"

Man, 11 days into the New Year and already my resolution to get my recent disco addiction under control is struck dead. This time it comes from the seemingly infallible DFA label, as opposed to my normal dealer, Italians Do it Better (whose only '08 single I've heard sees them slinking into tastefully minimalist house). Brookyln DJ Andrew Butler tells the tale of his own non-de-plume, utilizing about ten different elements that start out slightly annoying and then become addictive through nagging force. The muted horn loops, the vintage cold water string shocks, those pushy diva vocals, and even the building sex groans are all eventually gold. If this jam was playing wherever the Hercules of Greek mythology went, he'd have no time to fight monsters due to the endless parade of concubines falling at his feet.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 06:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

"Rip it off and start again!" proclaim Times New Viking in "RIP Allegory," one of many fuzz bombs that make up the follow up to last years' beloved (by us) album ...Present the Paisley Reich. It's a slyly funny and semi-dickish deviation on Orange Juice's "rip it up and start again" mantra, later swiped by Simon Reynolds for his book on the post-punk scene. OJ's version implied that in order to create anything "new" you had to chuck the last generation's play book. Columbus, Ohio's finest suggest that pilfering from the right spot is enough to keep you moving.

On the grounds of selection prowess TNV is certainly a band after my own heart, favoring the horrendously recorded but exceedingly charming songwriting of the early nineties rock underground. Back in the Drag City heyday, hissing static was presumably the result of low budgets and home recording necessity. In today's low cost Pro Tools world embracing incomprehensible white noise is a concrete aesthetic choice; nostalgic at best and willfully difficult at worse, right?

So, maybe I'm a sucker or a sappy DIY romantic, but the pop and crackle makes my heart beat faster. It would all be moot if these weren't sharp and energetic songs (see the cautionary tale of Ariel Pink). The Guided by Voices style, sub two minute run times aren't hurting either. A taste from Rip it Off, ahead of its January 22nd release...

Times New Viking - "Drop-Out"

Though the immediately obvious touch point here is the boy/girl duet cacophony produced by Royal Trux, this has a real sweetness that I have trouble finding in that band's work. The brevity is a plus, the relatively unintelligible lyrics a boon. It feels like someone heard the first minute of a their new favorite song on the radio and, after scrambling to find a blank tape, were able to catch only a segment. But they still loved it so much that they taped it again and again for friends, the quality slipping each time. This sounds like the copy one of those friends made for you, which has eroded into a blur of pure convicted melody.

Again, the nostalgia present in the above scenario is palpable, but what can you do? It sounds shitty/perfect.

Times New Viking - "Another Day"

There's a track towards the end of the record called "Times New Viking vs. Yo La Tengo," but the pretense of any animosity between our kids and their former tour partners is annihilated by this sugary minute forty-seven. Beth Murphy does her best down to earth Georgia Hubley impression, but the track is too far into the red for her to gently whisper. Any doubts that TNV's tunes can't escape the din of their production are erased on this evidence.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 01:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Elastica - "All For Gloria" (John Peel Show, December 1994)

Elastica - "I Wanna Be a King of Orient Aah" (John Peel Show, December 1994)

Disaffected, angular, possibly drug addled, smart ass season's greetings from us to you.

XOXOXO,

JK for MS

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After seeing Joly, the lovable spandexed hippy videographer and proprietor of Punk Cast, at the mighty Clean's show Friday night, I thought maybe he'd be industrious enough to transfer his footage instantaneously. No such luck. But trolling around his archived You Tube channel, I did find another resurrected cult act who also saw fit to climb into the poorly ventilated Cake Shop basement in 2007. Their cult is, uh, a bit smaller than the Clean's...

the Homosexuals "Astral Glamour"
(live @ the Cake Shop, 07.09.07)

The D.I.Y. output of late seventies UK punks the Homosexuals would probably have been reissued eventually, if Morphius Records hadn't pulled the trigger in 2004. But without that momentary blip in recognition, I wouldn't have been able to see "the band" open for a decrepit Suicide in one of my strangest ever concert nights that same year. I throw up the quotes because the Homosexuals then consisted of front man "Bruno Wizard" and a bunch of young New York dudes that had evidently been practicing his songs. They were more than competent, but Wizard himself was a trip. Railing against his obscurity, changing shirts multiple times mid song, and rocking a leather jacket with a giant, baffling airbrushed portrait of Martin Luther King, Jr. Then Suicide came on and played abrasive salsa music, which is neither here nor there. I had no idea that Bruno had ever played another New York City gig but, as the video makes obvious, he did. I suppose the reissue didn't buy 4 years of packed rooms, but they've still got a few fans. The hired guns here (billed as the Imaginary icons) don't match my recollection of the '04 show, but what do I know? The Wiz is still an archly theatrical nutbar, and I remain amused.

Here's the track as recorded in 1979, when its brash tunefulness was still the work of odd young men. Had you been hip enough to hear it then, but had somehow missed all of Wire's records until that point, you might have been convinced that these guys were completely visionary. It's still pretty excellent, all snark aside.

the Homosexuals - "Astral Glamour"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 07:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Been back in Brooklyn for the better part of a week, but only regaining my normal balance after the corrosive influence of clean air and lovingly prepared fresh foods now. So here's some stuff that's been dominating the iPod for a while, in one big blur. Good to get this new or novel material out of the way before we go all in for an orgiastic year-end blowout stuffed with crippling self-involvement. Priorities, and all that...

Nine Circles - "Twinkling Stars"

I have no real idea where the British bloggers behind the always good and newly glam, 20 Jazz Funk Greats track down these deeply out of print rarities, because I, uh, find mine over there. With no context clues to work from, I defy anyone to feel 100% certain in discerning the native land and home decade of this track from a band called Nine Circles. To ruin half of that mystery right away, it's from their self-titled 1982 album, of which I'm having trouble finding any concrete information. You can order a import re-issue if you are brave enough to laugh off an unfavorable Euro conversion, but that's really all I've got. It sounds timelessly awesome, a pessimistic vision of a future that will never arrive. With its deep and regal European ice queen vocal perfectly bound to excellent dark electro pulses that seem too well shaped to have sprung from the crude early eighties New Wave well, "Twinkling Stars" must have fallen in some kind of serious memory hole to remain this obscure for so long. Any reader information on this will be humbly appreciated.

Apache Beat - "Tropics" (CFCF remix)

When I fawned over this song's original jungle drum version back in the run-up to Apache Beat's Neon Lights appearance, it embarrassingly never occurred to me that Ilirjana's sultry post-punk vocals might be even better suited to a dance floor remake, cast in gilded neon. This is, like, wow.

Deerhunter - "Calvary Scars" (Daytrotter Session)
High Places - "New Grace"

Regular readers of the site probably just had a "Jesus, again?" reaction at those two names in tandem, but what can I say? My intense band infatuations unfairly skew towards the prolific. Coal + fire = burn. In brief: Deerhunter move into their second year of buzz by trading the stomping, wild menace of "Cryptograms" and "Wash Off" for a sustained and quiet creeping dread, epitomized by this Daytrotter Session highlight. High Places finally bring out the thudding percussion of their live show in the poppiest song they've yet released.

Die Regenbogen Jugend - "With a Name Like Yoko"

Portland's newest hitmakers/my old chums DR J are starting to flesh out the Germanic glory of the impending Mit Schlag. Shifting their focus to another Axis Power, we get a glimpse into the aristocratic childhood of Ms. Ono. I'm assuming from Karen Lynn's steely line readings that this insider info is coming from a biography of some sort? I guess I don't want to know either way, as the image of servants hiding from sight while young Yoko sips her morning tea is too good to ruin with petty fact-checking. Check their MySpace here.

Also:

Tonight at the Cake Shop I get to see the Clean! THE CLEAN, people!! It saddens me that the NYC blogosphere has not exploded in rapture...

The Clean - "Anything Could Happen"

the Clean - "Anything Could Happen"

The Clean - "Tally Ho!"

the Clean - "Tally Ho!"

...report soon.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It very rare that my interpretations of the songs I post goes beyond my own (hopefully) insightful speculations and a bit of skill as a Google ninja. I may get it right by accident or I might be wildly off-base, and really there's no way for me to know for sure. But today, I stand before you as a man with actual first-hand knowledge of what he speaks! Do not get used to it, for it will not last long.

On Tuesday, I talked to Deerhunter/Atlas Sound man Bradford Cox for about an hour at a travel writer's apartment in the East Village (yeah, I'm not sure why it was there either). The full interview, plus a video document of said conversation, will eventually show up on Prefix closer to the February release of the Atlas Sound's debut record, Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See, But Cannot Feel. We covered alot of ground, pretty much all relating to the way Bradford works and why specific musical obsessions continue to follow him from his solo Atlas Sound songs to his more (in)famous band Deerhunter and back again. One of the things that most interested me, as a forward thinking denizen of our new media landscape, was the form and function of the Deerhunter blog. Though it gained notoriety in sort of a sensationalist tabloid manner, the site has been much more fascinating for its refusal to treat new, unreleased music as a commodity to be cunningly doled out to high impact traffic depots.

Atlas Sound - "Cobwebs"

Take for example, "Cobwebs," posted by Bradford maybe five minutes before I walked into the room. The song was recorded on Monday in a Greenpoint, Brooklyn church balcony that also serves as the practice space for the critically adored band Grizzly Bear, by their member/producer Chris Taylor. If ever a breathless Pitchfork or Stereogum lead paragraph was made ready to order, it's that one. But instead of sending it on through a PR agent, and milking the song for another few minutes of name saturation and press awareness for the forthcoming album, it goes up on the DH blog with little fanfare and nary a related e-mail blast. The singer explained that the whole purpose of the site was to capture ephemeral moments of music that aren't predestined or even well remembered after the fact. If this gives quality music the appearance of being slightly disposable, then so be it. That's sort of the point, even.

But the song itself is hardly forgettable. Despite his general reluctance to attach exalted worth to a momentary snapshot, Bradford couldn't help but be excited by the end result. He claims that he doesn't write lyrics ahead of time when conjuring songs for Atlas Sound; that the resulting words and even the chord changes of the mainly spontaneous music is a surprise in retrospect, even to him. "Cobwebs" ' lyrics seem to bear that out, as references to spiderwebs and peeling paint make it seem that he was staring at the old church's ceiling while strumming his guitar. But damned if the whole thing isn't unbearably lovely, blanketing sixties' melodic bliss with downy white noise. It almost makes you wish that he would value the songs more as pieces to be honed, rather than raw extemporaneous snapshots. Because if this was completely off the cuff, then what would it sound like after a few days of polish?

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Maybe its just me, but it seems a sort of marching band ethos seems to be all the rage of late. From mathematical stained rockers Caribou and Battles to more run of the mill White Rabbits, drum skins have had better days. Now North Carolina's Annuals are getting in on the act with this new track from the digital-only Frelen Mas EP.

Annuals - "Nah Keseyi"

Dipping in either the Swahili or gibberish inkwell, the lyrical criticism depends on the standard one holds words and expressive verbiage too. Until I hear otherwise, OCD cursed organizing types should file this one alongside the hopelandic dedicated section of made up languages.

Starting off slow and building the driving push forward "Nah Keseyi" ends up fully symphonic, much in the same way the best Be He Me tracks did. Unfortunately the road taken on this trip ends short and without fully indulging the best aspects of Annuals' whimsical fun. By the end of the ride you might end up wondering if it was worth it. Unlike what you'll feel at the end of their show at the Hi-Dive next Monday - which is totally worth both your while and $10.

** ** **
CONTEST

Next week the band swings through Merry Swankster's Rocky Mountain coverage area along with Atlanta's Manchester Orchestra. Both bands have teamed up to cover each other for a tour-only split 7 inch. We're thrilled to be giving away a copy in celebration of the Denver stopover at Hi-Dive on November 19th.

All you have to do is send an email here and guess what number I'm thinking of between 1 - 10. Closest to the prize gets the goods and possibly some other fun stuff if you can tell us a good joke when entering. No rules against going blue.

Manchester Orchestra - "Brother" (Annuals cover)

Annuals - "Where Have You Been" (Manchester Orchestra cover)

Posted by Merry Swankster at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

O Level - "We Love Malcolm"

O Level preceded the sadly still semi-unsung Television Personalities as teenaged Dan Treacy's songwriting vehicle of choice. The sharp-minded among you will recognize that name from TVP's immortal "Part Time Punks," as the name of the band whose single is purchased at the Rough Trade shop by the trend-hopping Londoners of the title's derision (a nice self deprecating touch, that). "We Love Malcolm" was a response of sorts to TVP's Rough Trade Records single, the truly truly awesome, "Where's Bill Grundy Now?" That classic was penned about the pompous actual television personality who was a casuality of the Sex Pistols juvenile on camera swearing. Similarly, "We Love Malcolm" comes to the defense of the vilified svengali, Malcolm McLaren. This isn't surprising, as the TVP's were perhaps the sharpest and most empathic lyricists of the post punk blast. They had a forked tongue for pretentious scenesters, but a real feel for crafting sympathetic protagonists. Despite the title, it's not a full defense so much as a fair hearing. "You're no hero, and you're no star/ Just a scapegoat is what you are," sings running mate Ed Ball at the song's start. Dan's off-kilter, "na na na na na"s are unmistakable in a support role. An immensely likable, if fairly slight, minute and forty eight seconds.

Juniper Moon - "El Resto De Mi Vida"

Perhaps the site's Mexican border correspondant can tell me what this song is actually about, but I've always assumed it was about puppies driving toy cars made of sunshine. This is the only single I'm aware of on my iPod that was recorded by Spaniards, and it proves that Scotland has not cornered the European twee market. Released in 2002, it is timelessly tuneful with hooks sharp enough to vault over any language barrier. There's also some surprisingly muscular guitar work smuggled inside the indie-pop confection. As long as I don't find out that it's an impassioned defense of slavery or something, it'll be a perennial grin inducer.

// Juniper Moon - El Resto De Mi Vida (buy for, ouch, 50 bucks)

Gerry & the Holograms - "Gerry & the Holograms"

I'm not sure why I'm posting this 1980 single, as it's really not very good. But I'm presupposing that regular readers of the site might be the sort who revel in really weird songs, just for the sake of hearing them once and a while. The compilers of the excellent 7" Up collection divulge in the liner notes that even they have no clue where this thing came from. It might actually have been recorded by a fame seeking hologram. It more resembles a cyborg with a head cold, who posited the theoretical existence of New Order years before they fully developed. Oh, how the scientists laughed.

"Did I say there were 16 of me? / I'm sorry, there's only 1 / The others are just fragments / Of Gerry and The Holograms..."

Where does a band go after recording this? Nowhere at all.

// 7" Up - buy

Farah - "the Only One"

The only track in the foursome that could be called "new" by any stretch of definition. Italians Do it Better has quite a roster of starlets on its hands, and Texan lass Farah sounds the most mysterious. Her brand of disaffected vocals were basically run out of town on a rail when the whole electroclash thing evaporated, but there's something else to her dead-eyed spoken word that doesn't evoke bored decadence. It's more like she's possesed, or in a hypnotic state. It's not just her slips into creepy Latin, either. As Johnny Jewel's nearly peerless synth lines percolate behind her, she seems like she's struggling to become enthusiastic, occasionally even bringing a light skipping melody to her lines before the trance reasserts its dominance. But spooked soothsayer is the mode she's best suited to, so I'm especially fond of the segment when she's allowed to stay in that mode as a vocodered sexbot swoops in to provide harmonic assistance.

// Farah - MySpace

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Though we at MS consider ourselves to be stunningly hip and ahead of the curve in all matters musical, we're never really going to be "first" with anything we post. We're just not. It takes us too long to write our little treatises, and there are too many other buzzing internet outlets with deeper access, quicker fingers, or less painstaking care that will always trump us. No matter how obscure we get, the rock we found the track under probably has at least a MySpace page and some Digg recommendations. We've made peace with this, and soldiered on defiantly. Today however, I add the extremely limited caveat that when a close personal friend of mine records some music of note and e-mails it to me directly, you can be reasonably certain that I will, in fact, bring it to you first.

John Motley is my old pal from high school in the suburban whatever of So-lame, Boredagain (aka Salem, OR). He's now a fellow music scribe, having contributed to Pitchfork, Prefix, Under the Radar, and the Portland Mercury among others. Many a summer night was spent with Mr. Motley aimlessly crusing the back hills of our little berg, while intently krautrocking out. Though his previous musical projects have run the gamut from amusingly ridiculous to sincerely rad, the entity known as Die Regenbogend Jugend ( the Rainbow Youth) is the first time he's really put his motorik where his mouth is. DRJ is the collaborative effort of John and his lady love, Ms. Karyn Lynn Fisette. They are also the sixth band beginning in "die" on my iPod. While you can cynically claim friendship as the true motive for the posting of their new single "Frosted Cupcake," I stand firm by my guarantee that papa don't post no mess.

Die Regenbogen Jugend - "Frosted Cupcake"

"Frosted Cupcake" exists in an alternate universe where Germans are whimsical enough to enjoy colorfully decorated treats. It's also quite a pleasurable and evocative little phrase, especially when carefully enunciated over decadent synth lines and given a cushion of ethereal background "oooh"s. John and Karyn Lynn have a nice little call und response working here. He asks the baked good centered questions in English, she obstinately replies with chilly Deutsch spoken word. Occasionally the drum pattern gives way to some serious, serious hand claps. If up until the two minute mark the proceedings have been both quite good and more than a little goofy, the instrumental bridge starting at 2:10 gives you the groove with no tongue in cheek. In come the cosmic Kraftwerk synth swells. Enter artificial handclaps like some Neon god dancing to "Day Man" (here @ 0:48). The verbal dessert devotion returns, as does another round of living, breathing clappers to bring us to the finish. By then, they're just sugar based color paint for the single serving cake-like treat.

For now, you cannot purchase the music of Die Regenbogen Jugend, it can only be given to you. However, you too can be John's dear friend from high school (on MySpace). Go here for more multi-hued Germanity.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 03:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

The early demise of Welsh power trio Mclusky was unusually depressing, not so much because they were great, but because it seemed like they were just about to be. The band's breakthrough album, Mclusky Do Dallas (produced by Steve Albini) was funny, mean, and heavy. In direct contrast from the week kneed strain of indie rock perpetually spilling through the tubes, it drew more heavily from the flaming wreckage of the Jesus Lizard than it did from Pavement's melodic irony. Beavis and Butthead would have LOVED that album. It's successor, The Difference Between You and Me is That I'm Not on Fire, was initially treated as a minor step back, but recent listens have revealed it to be severely underrated. The band had shed a bit of their raw heaviosity by substituting complex and catchy vocal patterns, without losing a spot of acid wit. It was overlong and patchy still, but the jigsaw pieces were continuing to fall into place. When the band broke up (presumably because they were actually the fork tongued misanthropes captured in song) it felt like we were robbed of that one perfect record.

Hope returned when, after a healthy hibernation, lead singer Andy "Falco" Falkous and drummer Jack Egglestone reemerged (without that other guy) as the quite similar, if more synth friendly, Future of the Left. While I'm not ready to claim that the new band's has recorded the LP that fulfills Mclusky's promise once and for all, they did manage at least one optimal moment. For reasons that are almost evenly split between artful and accidental, "Manchasm" is a finer song than Mclusky ever produced.

Future of the Left - "Manchasm"

Defying a band name that suggests political acumen, it's hard to think of a more toxic opening line than, "Mark Foley was right!" Of course, the boys were cryptically referring to a pal of theirs from Cardiff and not the disgraced boy-crazy Republican. But, by the time Future of the Left's debut, Curses, hit shelves in the UK that connotation had been locked in, it's authority cemented with every confused Google search. It resonates beyond a simple coincidence because triumphantly referencing a creep like Foley is exactly the sort of jet black humor Falkous fans have come to expect. This is the man who crafted his last band's most pop perfect moment around the declaration, "Our old singer is a sex criminal" (more on that later). So, with the ultimate page lover firmly in mind, lines affirming "Foley"'s prescient commentary on ghosts, optimism towards medical research, and especially his well earned insight that "there are no barriers for shame" become more bizarre and funny than the originally intended non-sequitur would have . This opening salvo is backed with agressively bouncy synths, and a generally surly bassline. The elements are never quite as abrasive as Mclusky's Albini-honed guitar bursts, but glam and girly it aint.

Then, the song segues into what I guess you could call a chorus, though it's less strident and more dickish than what's come before. "Audience please, every minute matters!" pleads Falkous, apparently trying to quiet the attention of an imaginary crowd he's just awed. He then repeats his plea, again and again, as the crazed synth keeps pogoing in place. Basically they're wasting our time, but disguiing it as a frantic demand that we stop wasting theirs. Clever.

When we return to the Ballad of Mark Foley, We get the first of several deftly double tracked vocals. Instead of just returning to a familiar and enjoyable refrain, the band ups the degree of difficulty by letting the out of synch line readings overlap and interrupt each other. This builds anticipation to the return of their sarcastic plea. Making you desperately anticipate the return of the band telling you to stop wasting their time? Clever and mean.

Continue reading "On "Manchasm"" »

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

photo by Devon Banks

There were many inherent thrills in Of Montreal's set at the Roseland Ballroom last weekend; a giant "Close Encounters" stage bought from better than ever record sales and concert attendance, seeing a giant room full of severely wasted teenagers treating songs like "She's A Rejector" like the instant pop classics that they are, and of course the depicted metaphorical slow motion samurai sword fights fights between front man Kevin Barnes and his dark ninja of self-doubt. But to those of us who've played the band's Hissing Fauna, are You the Destroyer? album near to death, perhaps the most exciting aspect was getting a glimpse into its successor, already apparently finished and dubbed Skeletal Lamping. The two scavenged tracks below predict a 2008 album that's more varied, but no less accomplished than their last.

Of Montreal - "We Can Do it Softcore if You Want" (Live @ Roseland Ballroom, Manhattan)

This recording, made by the avid audio documentarians* known as nyctaper during last weekend's set, sees Kevin Barnes perpetuating the glam alter-ego, "Georgie Fruit," who appeared scattered throughout Hissing Fauna...'s narrative. Recent interviews with Barnes suggested that he might experiment with the ADD mini song suites that he's admired on Fiery Furnaces records. The sexually ambiguous "We Can Do it Softcore if You Want" does have it's share of diversions, but it's primarily the sort of sugar rush glitter ball that you might expect. If there are long from multi-part epics in store, I didn't see them last Saturday. There is some boot fetishism tacked on to the end, though, just for good measure.

Of Montreal - "Feminine Effects" (Live on Minnesota Public Radio)

While Hissing Fauna... was chock full of lyrics about emotional collapse, the music that scored them was often too rambunctiously catchy to really convey true vulnerability. It was as if Barnes was turning his despair into a suit of armor, proudly declaring himself the strongest, hottest mess on the planet. On this second bootleg Skeletal Lamping contender, recorded recently for a Minnesota Public Radio session, feels like a truly naked declaration. The crystal piano notes and vocal undulations put me in mind of tracks like "Lady Stardust" or maybe even "Goodbye Yellowbrick Road." Those comparisons are a bit misleading though, because there was still a proud brave face in those vocal performances that Bowie or Elton couldn't help but give. "Feminine Effects" is even more intimate, wounded, and lovely than that.

* I originally referred to nyctaper crew as bootleggers, which they've gently corrected in the comments.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

In the Western Hemisphere, the dominant cultural identity of Australia still falls into the stereotypical Ocker mode, i.e. Mick Dundee and Foster's beer commercials. To painfully hip and cosmopolitan Sydney residents, this comes as quite a rude shock. The words "Australian music" might instantly trigger didgeridoos more than dance beats, but the brand of upbeat tunes that remind me of that swell locale are about as far from the Outback mentality as New York. A trio;

Kylie Minogue - "2 Hearts"

There's always been something inherently appealing about Kylie Minogue, and returning from her cancer leave with this glam stomping sex bomb isn't likely to decrease the goodwiil. People on the streets on America, when given a multiple choice, would clearly identify Britney as the bigger star than Kylie. But compare this to Ms. Spears' latest and see which stands up better as a comeback single. Slagging off "disposable pop" stars for not providing sole authorship of their own material (this track was written and produced by London duo Kish Mauve) discounts crucial factors of taste, professionalism, and painstaking collaborator selection. There won't be a Britney/Nick Cave duet anytime soon, and I'll be fucking shocked if there's a single near as good as "2 Hearts." Even though drag queens in Sydney are generally about 6' 4", and Kylie roughly 4'2", I'd predict nothing but Marilyn wigs and cat suits on Oxford St, for the next decade.

Midnight Juggernauts - "Into the Galaxy"

On the rising band front, we have Midnight Juggernauts, sure to gain a boatload of interest from their spot opening Justice's North American tour. Like their French patrons, Juggernauts are pretty safely over the top, but using the ornate synth towers of ELO and the booming vocal authority of a hyper serious Bowie tune to fill the dance floor. The above video gives me a chuckle, as the three bearded men rock out intensely in a warehouse, while an art school film grad captures it in tortured, slow pans. Why does this need a letterbox exactly? The song has a similar whiff of dry ice to it, but we all know that late nights and drink specials erase self consciousness, and the band's name will seem strangely appropriate with this leaps at you from club speakers in the proper state of mind.

Midnight Juggernauts - "Into the Galaxy"

During a bout of recent mock bachelorhood, with my girlfriend far, far away, I decided to dig in to the racks and toss a couple of understudied post-punk compilations on the stereo. There's been approximately three jillion such compilations released this decade, and I'm the dream consumer for the boutique labels that keep pumping them out. I'm reluctant to give them open airing as they are always abrasive, and usually only contain one ir two bonafide standouts. But punk impacted small pockets of so many culturally disparate locales that it's always interesting to hear how the amateurs who sprang to action interpreted the music through their own prism of culture. Granted, the Australian environment that gave birth to the artists from Chapter Music's Can't Stop It series isn't so different than the neighborhoods spawning Flying Nun bands in Christchurch, New Zealand. But the difference between those two scenes is maybe even more interesting because of the seeming cultural hegemony. Why would Australia produce a more keyboard centric Euro sound, where the Kiwi kids would basically be inventing lo-fi indie rock? Were the metropolitan islands of my old Sydney home (and it's bitter little rival Melbourne) enough to color the country's output?

Of all the tracks on the second collection, Can't Stop It! II , the one that grabbed me the quickest was apparently also the least thought out. Rob Griffiths, the main man for a Melbourne group called International Exiles (also featuring future Crowded House drummer Paul Hester), claims in the compilation's liner notes to have written this 1980 single it in five minutes, because the band did not yet have a "decent pop song." Well, I guess it's just that easy.

International Exiles - "Let's Be Sophisticated"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 04:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Bats For Lashes - "Trophy"

"Trophy" sounds like a cut left off an imagined acoustic version of the Knife's Silent Alarm,...if Björk produced and sung lead.

Posted by Merry Swankster at 02:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Though I haven't heard much of anything about them since 2005, the Kills were playing near constant New York City gigs in support of 2003's Keep on Your Mean Side and its preceding EP, Black Rooster. I managed to catch two or three excellent sets during that span. Strung out sexpot VV was doomed and striking, lighting cigarette after cigarette in the newly smoke free club scene. Her ludicrously named partner "Hotel' a bolt of spastic frustrated energy. They had the same minimal boy/girl cool that makes Prinzhorn Dance School so appealing now, only channeled in a blues based and sexually charged direction. The band's tense and dirty energy predicted a wider fan base that never fully materialized. A consistent set highpoint during this period was a cover of late nineties flame outs, Jonathan Fire*Eater entitled "the Search for Cherry Red." Shamefully, I had never heard the original version until it popped up on Fluxblog a week ago. Up until now, I was always extremely puzzled thinking the Kills had recorded a definitive song, only to find no place for it on an underwhelming sophomore disc.

JF*E's version, of course, turned out to be thrilling, with it's doomed little rich kid protagonists seemingly sprung from every nihilistic novel I ever loved in college. It was immediately more satisfying than full albums from the Walkmen, who rose from the ill-destined group's ashes. While dealing with the ensuing obsession that this late delivery has caused me, I've re-examined the track I assumed was meant to be the Kills bizarrely lost classic. It's still superb, and an easy peer to the fire eaters' glam/tragic flailings. VV's desperate vocals fight for space with a beat so gnarled and distorted that it sounds like some sort of malfunction. Though it trims down the original's vague narrative from suggestive to cryptic, it also adds enough menace to assure that the dots filled in by the listener are suitably nasty.

the Kills - "the Search for Cherry Red"

I'm not sure if this is an official video or what. It seems a little too well compiled to be a fan artifact, but still strangely cheap. It's like someone had access to a toppling mountain of Kills photo stills and live footage to put together a representative clip that could then be applied to any random Kills track. The live playing could be of anything, and doesn't even pretend to sync "Cherry Red" with the images flickering past. Also, there's the question of why this track, shunned to the b-side of a vinyl only "Pull a U" single back in 2003, would be granted a video at all. Better to concern yourself with repeated listening to the song below.

the Kills - "the Search for Cherry Red"

Farah - "Law of Life"

Nothing about Farah's "Law of Life" sounds Texan, though that's apparently where she spends her days. Like many crush worthy tracks on the After Dark compilation, the stately synth patterns are the handiwork of the Italians Do it Better label's prime creative force, Glass Candy/Chromatics member Johnny Jewel. But where his other gals go for sedated club glamour, Farah calmly rambles in a spooked deadpan. She sounds like the oracle in a nineties film version of an old greek myth, her complex truths made untrustworthy with affected ironic distance. At 3:30, Jewel's active backgrounds simplify, as Farah's eyes roll back and she slips into what might be lines of convincing Latin--her detached delivery casually possessed. From here, the drama escalates further, until a superior (and even icier) groove can take over. The intensity may pick up slightly in the vocals here, gain a little instrumental steam there, but neither disrupt the fine slow burn.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 09:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

[Photo: NY Daily News]

If you could choose how to die, which poison do you pick? A quick, supposedly painless, death - maybe blindsided by a truck before you even had a chance to move. Or do you go the awareness route - fully conscious throughout, wallowing in the slow rotting pain of prolonged misery, like knowing a fully wound haymaker is coming at you and there is nothing you can do except brace for the inevitable. As if in slow motion, waiting for the coming violent collision. If you chose the latter than you very well may be a Mets fan this morning.

If I may for just a moment, drop the royal "we" voice we (see) often use when making general claims, and/or announcements in attempt to tickle your fancy, and let me provide personal declarations that in no way should be construed as the Official voice of Merry Swankster.com. This preface an apologetic necessity in respect to the balance of MS.com authors who either have no interest in baseball matters, do not share my baseball interests (notably the pains, ohhh the pains!), and mostly due to my one brotherly comrade drunk with interest but on the flip side of the equation as it relates to happenings in Flushing, Queens.

My wretched crew of 25 men (non sports fans must overlook any criticisms behind this mysterious principles of shared "ownership" over players by just accepting the horrific cruelty nurtured by intense fandom) reside 90 miles North from a city of winners, and should not be confused with the alarmingly accurate, prophetically referred "team to beat" of the Illadelph. The team who in the same year it commemorated the dubious distinction of being the biggest all-time losers in all professional sports, ultimately and deservedly should (will?) be remembered more for shedding the tag of the Sillies by becoming the real deal yesterday afternoon. All the while their archrivals, and officially sponsored keepers of rhythm to my heartbeat during the months of April through September - the New York Metropolitans - completed construction on the coffin they have been building with admirable effort over the last 3 weeks by finally driving in that last stubborn nail. As with most doom & gloom projects originating in Queens, this one was union built by the Orange & Blue with tears and sweat (i.e. errors, passed balls, blown leads, hit batsman...) as sealant caulk between the project's essential raw materials: devastation and monumental collapse.

Over the past month, the Phillies' allegedly big, bad rivals, played a sport still technically called MLB baseball, though most of the time it seemed a re-brand to EPM baseball (Errors and Pitching Meltdowns) could be a more adequate moniker for what was unfolding in Flushing. This should not be misinterpreted as a request, however reasonable, for a mercy killing exception removing the 2006 Mets from the baseball annals. For myself and millions of other Mets fans it hurts bad, really bad. However its this taste of bitter defeat that allows the eventual winning to taste that much sweeter. That said, sports are irrationally cruel. My first apology to any future children will be a soft heartfelt speech into their tiny infant ears admitting regret for inheriting the pitfalls and heartbreak of their father's teams. If there is any justice in the world, they'll immediately puke on their cute little Mr. Met bibs.

Jens Lekman - "Your Beat Kicks Back Like Death"

Contemplating whether to drown my sorrows in copious amounts of liquid substances or play chicken with a brick wall, I faced a dilemma. Notably, Colorado laws do not allow the sale of alcohol on Sundays and I was not stupid enough to initiate real, physical pain. I was fighting the anger from further spiraling downward with the paralyzing sense of profound disappointment at what could be, what is, and what will always be. Enter Swedish prince of melancholy pop and his SC100 commissioned cover of a Scout Niblett song. Fitting I thought, terribly depressing, but fitting. Hearing "We're all gonna die" sung so beautifully was a reality check for perspective keeping.

Maybe someday someone else will feel as shitty as I do, choking in the wake of ticker tape following a Mets' October celebration. I'll post a fucking Polyphonic Spree song in order to match the bright beam of my positive pride. Until then...I'll embrace the tiny sliver of consolation I got from the Giants victory over the Eagles. Knowing that even in the face of such triumph (however meaningless at this point), some resemblance of consternation still exists in Philadelphia sports. If nothing else, I'm comforted by reliability.

And now..back to your regularly scheduled programming (go Rockies!)...

Signing off from Awful-Town - Merry Swankster

//Various Artists - SC100 (Secretly Canadian compilation) - buy

Posted by Merry Swankster at 01:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Caribou - "Sandy"

Luscious arrangement of sounds include a rolling marching band percussion, flutes and flute-like synths along with the disjointed vocal harmonies that seem cherry-picked from a time traveling singing hitchhiker from the summer of love. The cool kids love Brian Wilson and it all seems to be working very well. Simply gorgeous.

Caribou - "Niobe"

Andorra's longest track clocks in just under nine minutes, an epic in length possibly attributed to the tragic mortal from Greek mythology who turned into stone after having all her children killed by furious sibling duo Apollo and Artemis. The twins did the deed to uphold their mother's, goddess Leto, pride after Niobe gloated publicly about her fertile loins ability to bear fourteen children over to just two by Leto. Legend states Niobe turned to stone while mourning her dead kids. Attempting to claim superiority over a god is a big no-no.

Here the music sounds like an anthropological sample of robots conversing, discussing, campaigning and arguing, bottled up for study by future scientists. The changes taunt an impending disaster before reseting, as if to imply a clearing of the slate, cleansing history and starting over. Those flute loops appear again and invite you to walk off track to what no doubt is sure doom, later replaced by stumbling bleeps of alien distortion that seem like left over remnants staying around in spite of the attempts for clearance - the proverbial cockroaches after nuclear war, anomalies that won't go away. It is not until the soft climax of the song that you realize everything stuck around forever, buried in the background like an eternal mourning; or, about nine minutes of slow burn.
-- -- --

Caribou hit the road at the end of this month with Born Ruffians, all dates after the jump.

//Caribou - Andorra - buy
//Caribou - site
//Caribou - MySpace

Continue reading "M.S. Pick - Caribou" »

Posted by Merry Swankster at 02:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Per numerous interoffice memos, we generally don’t attempt many straight-forward reviews of songs of albums here at Merry Swankster, Inc. But every once in a while a track springs forth that is so refreshing and cool that it begs for specific, detailed attention.

In its secretly hilarious glorification, Okkervil River’s The Stage Names is quickly becoming one of my favorite albums of the year, something they’ve accomplished before, albeit in a tree-falling-in-woods sort of way. Their latest album exists as a kind of analysis of how we, the music listening public, consume, attach ourselves to, and ultimately forget about, art. Specifically, this go-round, lead man Will Sheff’s lyrics focus on how we create personal meanings for songs that really have nothing to do with us. The album follows a typical, bell-curving plot arc, the centerpiece being the melodic, if not schizophrenic, “Plus Ones”.

Okkervil River - "Plus Ones"

The break down of the song is pretty easy to grasp, embarking on lyrical play with enough well-known number songs to make David Klein blush. The track’s title comes from Sheff’s adding one to each quantity mentioned. He does this to again make some sort of point that might be intensely specific, yet will always be defended as purposefully vague (a la “the President’s Dead”). The effectiveness in which Sheff manages to drop so many names while his tongue remains firmly in cheek is impressive, but what’s essential to this track is that the song manages to remain charming enough while falling just short of being embarrassingly cheesy. (To hear each of the songs listed, check out this well done post by Blogs are for Dogs.)

Continue reading "On "Plus Ones"..." »

Posted by Randall Monty at 07:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Thank you for your kind letters of concern, but no, we the collective editors of MS have not fallen down a well. it just seems that with various minor surgeries, new children, and shortage of damn hours in the damn day, we needed sort of an unofficial week off. Our regular posting vigor will return next week, and this weekend, I fully intend to give you details on the next Neon Lights show, happening very very soon (if you followed the link, you know already...).

Now, if it's a dose of crit. you need, may I direct you to this fawning write-up of Chromatics' gorgeous cover of Kate Bush's 1985 hit, "Running up That Hill." A picture above for reference, an mp3 below for ease...

Chromatics - "Running Up That Hill" (demo)

I'm rather ashamed that I've slept so soundly on a band from my beloved home state city of Portland for so long, so I'm also providing the video and mp3 for an original gem of theirs released earlier this year. Both are well posh. Later.

Chromatics - "In the City"

Chromatics - "In the City"

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 07:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Our late summer doldrums are about to morph into crisp fall sharpness, but I feel like we've been a bit preoccupied with our various sponsored festivals and Olympic quality sweating to really focus on the newest and brightest tracks that may have been floating around the internet's seedy underbelly during these dog days. Let it not be said that our fine site is all wind and no heat!

Here, for your Labor Day drive/train/boat/plane ride, or your mythic, eclectically soundtracked art-pop BBQ, we give you a heaping helpin' of Swankster approved tracks. Newly released or soon to be, well circulated or painfully obscure, we're interested if it's interesting.

Just this once, in the grand tradition of honoring hard work by slacking off, the tracks will be presented in an abbreviated "less talk more rock" manner. Enjoy the three day, friends...

M.I.A. - "Paper Planes"

Album of the summer? Certainly. Song of the year? Maaaaaaybe. Has there ever been a chorus that's this catchy and as completely impossible to sing along to? Name it.

Telepathe - "Chrome's On It"

The ethereal experimentalists young ladies that comprise Telepathe (pronounced like mind reading) have expanded their sound past the whispering melodies and free form background of initial recordings to encompass record stunning and ghostly shoegaze already. Now they bring us hip-hop tinged who knows what. An album mixed by Spank Rock's Alex XXXChange should arrive early next year and trigger a hype-nami shortly thereafter. This is our first taste from said record.

the Fiery Furnaces - "Restorative Beer"

Perhaps the most clean and self contained composition on the forthcoming Widow City, features one of those great, desperately breathy vocal melodies that Eleanor always completely owns. Also, and I might be at a severe handicap by not knowing much about mainstream country music, but there doesn't seem to be enough songs about the head clearing properties of a nice, tall cool one.

Clockcleaner - "Caliente Queen"

Nasty, ball swinging, gutter punk bravado from "Philadelphia's Most Hated Band."

Liars - "Protection"
Liars - "Mimic the Hurricano"

A couple years ago, we would have never expected Liars to be capable of a song as pretty and sentimental as "Protection." Last year I'd never have wagered that the band would never again come close to anything that resembles their old dance punk style as much as b-side "Mimic the Hurricano" does. Following my instinct to avoid predicting where they'll go next, as it will clearly be something that seems highly improbable now.

ESG - "There Was a Time"

Those of us who only came to know and love the music of the Scroggins Sisters because of Soul Jazz Records' fantastic A South Bronx Story compilation have another thank you note to write. A South Bronx Story 2 will soon be in the import bins and digital record booths of these United States. This track, from 1992's angrily titled Sample Credits Don't Pay Our Bills EP proves that the "people don't dance no more" mantra has been thrown down for a solid decade and a half and counting with little progress made.

High Places - "Head Spins"

Brooklyn newcomers combine a clattering alien electronic background with sweet and playful female vocals, and a ever twisting yet ever satisfying sense of song structure. I will take a very strong interest in singing this band's praises to you in the very near future. Hint, hint.

Animal Collective - "For Reverend Green"

Though Strawberry Jam is probably the more conventionally structured album of Animal Collective's career, I have a feeling old Rev. Al won't be playing this on his car stereo anytime soon. for those of who've come to love the Collective on their own terms already, the screeching is as joyous as ever.

Sunset Rubdown - "The Taming of the Hands That Came Back to Life"

First three listens to Random Spirit Lover; Huh? Next five; Oh, OK. Next ten; Holy Hell! It's a creeper folks, don't lose heart. This track is the heart and soul of the record's second side, and it's charms are more initially apparent than some. If you want your socks knocked clean off, though, you should give it some room to breathe. Oh, Krug.

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 06:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

One of my biggest anticipations for the '07 music calendar is the still yet to be announced date that Rare Book Room Records finally ships out their debut release, the functionally (and perhaps still temporarily) titled, RBR 001 compilation. That might not ring too many bells out there, and I don't expect that name dropping label head Nicolas Vernhes will be a bolt from the blue. You are undoubtedly aware of the Frenchman's production and mixing work, however. American Water? Blueberry Boat? Cryptograms? All have passed through Brooklyn's Rare Book Room Studios, in one way or another (although the full list is miles longer than that)...

So now that's he's ready to play mogul himself, St. Nic has a lot of favors to call in. The picture overhead is a partial roster of the expected sprawling two disc set, though it leaves out big name (photo shy?) contributors like the Silver Jews, Black Dice, Fischerspooner, and Animal Collective's Avey Tare. We've already fawned over the Deerhunter contribution in this space, so we now turn our tasteful gaze towards a couple of artists whose rep is not yet cemented...

Palm in the Claw - "Der Koenig"

Long time readers of the site are well aware of our lonely devotion to the early eighties Berlin group, Malaria! Super fans will remember that this love is based solely on the grounds of one song and one song alone, the mighty "Your Turn to Run." Well, finally we have a song that would be fit to follow that masterpiece, not just on a mix tape (which I think I've done already) but on a dusty old vinyl sleeve with our favorite transmutable disease itself printed across the top.

Though not as aggressively sinister as "YTTR," Berlin/New York duo Palm in the Claw's "Der Koenig" has that same magical beat to synth ratio that immediately sets the hairs on your neck to attention. In this case, that's about 7:3, beat. The keys throb elegantly behind the crisp drum sound, giving sonic space for both Nadja Korinth's wild background wailing and ice cool lyric delivery. The subject matter, even when not slipping into intimidating German, seems mysterious and impenetrable. Something about the woods, I gather? That's not really the point, which is that this kind of krautrock menace, this balance between propulsion and restraint, is very hard to come by, even when sifting through a knee deep pile of carefully crafted retrospectives. That Rare Book Room would value such a dark and seductive sound, to the point of making Palm in the Claw their first official signing and first post compilation release, is a pretty fabulous confirmation of taste.

Telepathe - "I Can't Stand It"

Telepathe's entry, "I Can't Stand It," is much harder to place on the influence time line. It's elusive all around, really. Completely formless for it's first minute, the song floats along with nothing but female harmonies. When the slow dance beat finally enters, the cloud scatters. We're left with a lone singer, heavily treated, whose nagging half melodies will shape the song from there. As mini shoegaze squalls and peripheral piano notes gather and loop at her back, she peers straight out, open eyed and profoundly disappointed. "Ooooh, you know, it could be so much be-et-ter" she sings, the line barely congealing into a memorable tune on first listen. But it stays there, in your head, burrowing deeper and deeper, with repeat iterations, haunting you. It's transfixing, but not for any real structural reasons that you can pinpoint. It's a lovely puff of smoke.

// Rare Book Room Records - website
// Palm in the Claw - MySpace
// Telepathe - MySpace

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 03:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I'm a little late to the game (this being our first post on Arthur & Yu (in Internets years, I'm Methuselah late)), but the release of their debut album (combined with some outdoor laptop-ing) impels a post.

It will be incredibly difficult to break away from the criticism template on Arthur & Yu - the music is 60s California inflected; they're twee, but badass twee (more like Nico, Velvet Underground), so maybe they're not twee. It's gorgeous, lush - but brainy (briny?), and the pysch flourishes are what save it from saccharine.

I agree with most of that - but the VU comparison is a bit of a reach. Perhaps someone long ago sold themselves on that connection, so they could justify their love for it. I don't know - this is nothing like VU in my opinion, but, then again, I'm a preternatural lover of twee, so I don't need a reason to dig Arthur & Yu.

What Arthur & Yu IS is a harmonzing duo singing/playing wistful pop with dark undertones. 75% Lee Hazelwood and Nancy Sinatra. Like H&S, their voices are a bit unpolished. Like H&S, their pop is imbued by thoughtful soundscapes. It's both complex and carefree. It's divine.

Arthur & Yu - Absurd Heroes Manifestos

More songs on MySpace.

// Buy Arthur & Yu's In Camera
// Arthur & Yu MySpace
// Arthur & Yu Web site

Posted by Keith O'Brien at 02:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

photo by Devon Banks

As much as we strive to earn your trust by being inhumanly up on all things terrific, occasionally a bit of news about one of our collective favorite bands gets stuck in the cushions of the zeitgeist, to be discovered months later. Such is the case with the knowledge that Sweden's finest riot-pop purveyors, Love Is All, had tacked a second A-Side on to the March single release of Nine Times That Same Song cut, "Ageing Had Never Been His Friend." The A-Side in question (which in our own defense, was ignored by everybody) turns out to be a swell pogo cover of a wispy indie cult tune.

Love is All - "Nothing to be Done" (Pastels cover)

This song was originally recorded by Scots mopers the Pastels, and released in 1989 by Homestead Records. The original was the sort of sad and pretty indie duet that will always attract at least a minor following. I'll admit that it's good, but in my eyes (ears?) the Love Is All cover is solidly better. LIA just give their songs so much more restless energy than most of their indie-pop peers and predecessors, that once you've heard their take on the genre, moping through a love struck ditty no longer seems adequate. Warm brass replaces the original's guitar noodles, and head girl Josephine Olausson forcefully makes the countermelody her own. The result sounds richer, still a bit romantically sentimental, but upbeat and life affirming as well.

Love is All - "White Cats" (Live in Melbourne)

Perhaps even better is this generally high quality recording of the band playing a new song on tour in Australia earlier this year. In "White Cats," Josephine inhabits the apparently universal archetype of the crazy old cat lady who lives down the street. "Rumor has it that I killed my man," she sings enthusiastically, "that I whacked him in the head with a pan." Though it's a bum rap, her usual sunny vigour makes the crazed widow character completely unbelievable. She's likable right up to her climactic shouts of "You mind your business, I'll mind mine!" But the fact that it's such a weirdly outgoing defense of agoraphobia, is where quite a bit of the charm lies. To further confirm that J.O. will never be getting gritty character actor work, stay for the post song banter where she sounds like a fuzzy bunny with a head cold.

// Love is All - MySpace

Posted by Jeff Klingman at 02:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)