Today's checkout starts with Disgu!se - Pretty varied electronic music sound - at times reminding me of the simple lyrics of early Depeche Mode ("Listen to Me"), vocal stylings of Heaven 17 ("Storylines") and Joy Division or Interpol ("Heirloom"), and still sounding kind of fresh. "Inside Out Of Love" has blues licks in the middle of electronic beats & strings & piano - that's the fresh I'm talking about. "Camera" starts of like Nitzer Ebb lite and then swings into a funk shuffle for the chorus. Decent stuff here. I'd check 'em out if I were ever down Londontown in Old Blighty.
Aw, man! I had a whole post of this written up and linked and everything and it's gone poof. Oh well, that's ok. I get to revisit these artists again and give an opinion based on a couple of different listens.
Next up - Ryan O'Leary. This is decent hard pop. There's vocoder on some tracks, which I find a little unnecessary. It makes me think of Owl City - not that Owl City is bad, but with Ryan's hard guitars, the vocoder is out of place. To me. Anyway, his album The College Graduate (a cheeky nod to Kanye's records) is up on Spotify, the link goes to iTunes - check it out. Any track.
Tai Chi Swayze is the next band I have here to listen to. I see on their Facebook page that they'll be at SXSW in March if you're so inclined to see them live, which I would be. This reminds me of Placebo - maybe it's just the vocals a little bit. The music makes me think of Kaiser Chiefs and other solid UK pop/rock bands. They just have the single "Stumble Home" on iTunes right now, but you can hear more of their songs on Facebook.
The last band in this segment of bands that followed me on Twitter is Clarence Buffalo. The singer is somewhat reminiscent of Eddie Vedder, circa Bad Radio. Oh! Listening to "3 Shot", he drifted into the lyrics to Blondie's "Call Me". That was kind of cool. "Change" is kind of a jammy shuffle song. The chorus is catchy, almost reminding me of Peter Gabriel now. The songs are loose, very fitting for a bar band, which is what I'm assuming these guys are at this point. I don't see any show info on their website, but they're from Arlington, VA. So, if you're around there, keep an eye out.
All right, I'm gonna save this now and quit while I'm ahead. Join me next time for Bands That Followed Me On Twitter.
I'm very anti-censorship, and always have been. So it's no surprise that I'd like to call your attention to the Stop Online Piracy Act, and why it should be stopped. I'll link to the Tucows website, as they have a good breakdown of what's not good about it. I mean, besides the censorship.
So, I'm all for the SOPA strike today, and I'll say (and link) to what we used to say back in the day:
Tell your congressmen - Fuck censorship. This is America.
Poking around on Facebook today, my friend Casey asked "I
want to know your 3 perfect albums. Not your personal favorite albums,
but 3 albums you think are excellent front to back... Song track order,
theme, build..."
I hastily composed my list - perhaps too hastily? - and this is what I came up with:
A decent sampling across decades, I thought. She mentioned that she likes good production & sequencing, and I'm wondering now if I made the right choices. But these are, to me, "all killer, no filler," a statement that will cause many people to disagree with me just over The White Album. I love that record specifically because it is all over the place - it encompassed the past, present, and future of pop music, all on two discs.
The Big Country record I've loved since it was released. I first heard the chiming bagpipe guitars of "In a Big Country" and had to hear more - I may still have the cassette somewhere. I listened to it constantly on my Walkman (along with Rush's Exit...Stage Left and the Police's Ghost In the Machine). When I was working at a small company back in 2003-2004, one of my co-workers happened to be a Big Country fan as well and got me back into their other records. I hadn't given those records much of a listen - I liked the singles "Wonderland" and "Look Away" but for some reason didn't connect with the album tracks until 2003. For the record, I think Stuart Adamson was one of the best rock guitarists, ever. I think I may have already mentioned that in this blog before, but he was.
The Superdrag album I declared the best album of 1998, and I still think so. If you think there's a better album from that year, go listen to Head Trip in Every Key, listen to your album, come back and tell me if you still think your album is better. You might still, but hopefully you'll agree that HTiEK is a great record, too.
Here it is the 2nd of January 2012 and I'm just now posting my year-end music list. It's because I'm super persnickety about not posting a year-end list until the year is over. How do I know I'm not going to find something in the last few weeks that's going to captivate me? So don't expect these until December 31st at the earliest.
And now - my favorite parts of the musical year 2011:
Favorite album cover:Sound Kapital by Handsome Furs. And not from some dopey "heh, check it out, naked chick" leer, either. It's the best album cover because it's challenging, but, when you look at the photo and think about it, it's actually not all that challenging. It's an attractive nude woman juxtaposed with the angular industrial background of what looks like street overpasses.
The photo is by Scott Coffey. He and one half of Handsome Furs, Alexi Perry, discuss the photo & the video for "What About Us"in an article on LPWTF? I first learned about the photo from a Handsome Furs retweet about an article in The L Magazine taking indie music publications to taks for their prudish reactions to the photo.
Matthew Neiderhauser is the photographer behind the images of Chinese men in the insert booklet.
The whole CD package is beautifully thought out and assembled. I highly encourage owning this art.
The music? Well, I've loved Handsome Furs for years, and this album forgoes the guitar aspect of their music that I love for a pure synth record. In anyone else's hands I'd be unsure, but from the opening track, you can tell this isn't some retro record. It feels more like a more experimental record than most, but it does sound kind of like some old Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark. Well, it actually reminds me of the new OMD record as well. Just check it out.
Favorite record:Maritime's - Human Hearts I didn't even find out about this record until I downloaded it from eMusic on the last day of July. Not sure what I was paying attention to between April and then, but what it amounts to is four months I needlessly lived without this album. Does it have heart-wrenching ballads like "Here Comes a Regular"? No. Does it have life-changing skronk-jazz set to rock beats like "The National Anthem"? No. So what makes it special? Just about nothing except for solid songcraft, deft wordplay, catchy tunes, and, best of all, Davey Von Bohlen's sweet, sweet voice. They wrote the poppiest Cure song of the past 10 years ("Paraphernalia"), the theme song for the A.V. Club's 2011 Undercover ("It's Casual"), and the hookiest song with the corniest pun for a title ("Apple of My Irony"), and that's just three of the ten songs on this amazing record. Now, I've got one of the sweetest sugary pop sweet tooths around, and so when I hear an album like this, I know I'm getting cavities from dipping into the candy bowl again and again and again. And I love it.
Best show attended: tie - Girl Talk - Ogden Theater & Death Cab for Cutie/Frightened Rabbitat Red Rocks. Ok, fine, so I only went to 3 shows this year, but these were amazing shows. Girl Talk was a present to myself for finishing my master's degree and I couldn't find anyone to go with me. The show was sold out, but a good friend got me a ticket and I got there early enough to see the openers Junk Culture and Max Tundra who were odd but fun. Once Girl Talk started, it was packed, hot, sweaty - exactly the show I wanted it to be. I considered leaving at the encore break because I was so dehydrated and tired from standing & dancing. Amazing. I'm looking forward to my next Girl Talk show, whenever that will be.
I usually try to see one show a year at Red Rocks and, in my estimation, the best show happening this past summer was DCFC & Frightened Rabbit. It was great weather, no rain - just a great night in one of the most picturesque venues in the world. I left before the DCFC encore (tired, work, etc) and on my way out, a girl smacked my ass. Not sure what that was about. But while in the parking lot, I heard the start to "Title and Registration" and realized I shouldn't have left. The next day I saw that the last song was "Transatlanticism" and *knew* I shouldn't have left. Oh well. The 20 songs I did see & hear were amazing. I highly recommend seeing them.
Best blog: Mine! Oh, and Super Deluxe Edition. They way they care about the music really comes across in the pictures and text. I've found a few Super Deluxe Edition releases on their website that I didn't know about and am currently saving my pennies to buy, such as Madness & The Art of Noise.
Biggest kerfuffle:Lulu by Lou Reed & Metallica. It seems to me that people are getting down on them for being who they are. Lou Reed writing oddball poetry and delivering in a slack junkie's tone. Metallica delivering plodding, thunderous metal, which is who they are now more than the speed metal Metallica of the 80's. I've heard worse, much worse. The album might not be what *you* wanted to hear from either of them, but that doesn't make it bad. For some perspective from where they sit, check out the interview with Lou & Lars on the GQ website.
Favorite Podcast:WTF with Marc Maron. Ok, it's not music, but it's still a great listen. Turned on to this by my friend Tom, I spent more time listening to this in the 2nd half of the year than most anything else. I've been a humor nerd for a while, but like the mid-late 90's with music, I kind of fell out of it for a while. Now that my kids are old enough to appreciate great humor, I'm getting back into it. Maron's podcasts with comedians & actors talking about the craft is inspiring.
Favorite Post-Rock:Sky Flying By - What's The Farthest You Can See? I've been listening to a lot of post rock - slow, atmospheric rock typically without singing - while working on all the writing I've been doing lately. I do like the genre, and this is an excellent representation. I've met the guy who makes this music (that's right, just one guy), and he's quiet & unassuming but makes wonderful sounds.
Favorite Band Name with the chops to back it up: Ringo Deathstarr. Their record Colour Trip starts with something that sounds like distorted Atari 2600 sound effects and then whooshes into a song that could have been My Bloody Valentine, had they kept making music. The rest sounds like a wonderful combination of Lush, Darling Buds, with a bit of Jesus and Mary Chain thrown in. What Sleigh Bells would sound like if they had a thing for Shoegaze instead of a fetish for beats.
Band I was going to write about but they appeared on every other year end list: Cut Copy. Zonoscope was released this year and I really like the record. It's not as straight-up dancey as In Ghost Colours, but it's still some of the best dance pop with vocals of the past 10 years. Take everyone's word for it.
Favorite Big Rawk Riff Record: Foo Fighters - Wasting Light. You know, I was all set to wrtite about how I wasn't real big on this album. I remembered downloading it when it came out and knowing it had big riffs. And then I listened to it again before writing this and realized that it's a big, musclebound record. Probably the best straight-up rock record of the year.
Favorite Morrissey-esque Singer whose record came out in 2010: Philip Benson from Magic Bullets. I come at some stuff late, and I hadn't heard of these guys until I saw them in Surfing Magazine. The description sounded interesting, and I finally got around to listening to them this year. I got into a lot of guitar pop recently - These guys, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, Surfer Blood. All different, but so fun to listen to. The standout track on this record for me is "They Wrote a Song About You"
Favorite Rap: Theophilus London. Ok, I don't listen to a lot of rap. I'm sure the Kanye/Hova album was great. I haven't heard it. But it's my blog, and it's my best of, and this is the kind of rap that I like. It might be telling to explain that I first heard of Theophilus London from a mini-interview in GQ magazine, showing his style and talking about being a Morrissey fan. Well, that hooked me right there. I listened to his new songs on the Lovers Holiday EP this past summer and really liked the tunefulness of the songs. Listening to "Why Even Try," I was reminded of older songs like Malcom McLaren's "Madam Butterfly," P.M. Dawn's "Set Adrift On Memory Bliss," and, by extension, Spandau Ballet's "True." I made a playlist of those 4 songs, and they all fit great together, and made for great, chilled-out summer listening.
Favorite Band You've Never Heard Of: Boy + Kite - Go Fly. The music really reminds me of good 90's boy/girl indie, like Pixies or Sonic Youth, but also stuff like Seam and early Breeders, with engaging guitar interplay. Try "Neighbors" or "Isometrics", but the whole album is really good.
Just Another Good Record: The War On Drugs - Slave Ambient. Reminds me of Mazzy Star in its heroin haziness. Definitely descended from the The Velvet Underground, some of the songs have that unchanging beat with no fills, but they mix it up with higher tempo tunes ("Your Love Is Calling My Name" and "Baby Missiles" have a little bit of that fast train-shuffle). There are the "ambient" pieces as well, wordless jams and drifting sonic meanderings that are dotted amongst the "proper" songs. But none of the "proper" songs have choruses as such, they're more like poems or stories set to guitar and drums. His voice at times reminds me of Ian McCulloch, at times a intelligible Dylan. Check "I Was There" to see where I got that comparison.
Favorite "We're gettin' the band back together": The Stone Roses - Runner up: The Promise Ring. Are you kidding me? The Stone Roses? This was like the holy grail, the ark of the covenant, the...other stuff that's considered a lost artifact. Is Ian Brown's voice great? Not really - well, not live, anyway (but it's better than John's). But to have John Squire playing guitar again…a dream come true for me. And the vocals on a song like "Fools Gold" aren't really the point, although the lyrics are a great part of that song. I really liked both albums of the Roses, but obviously their first album is their calling card. I don't know if their new music will be as good, but I'm excited to hear it. As for The Promise Ring, I'm just hopeful that they'll play more than just the two shows they have right now.
Best Band Breakup: R.E.M. Classy. Who knows if they stayed around too long - I actually liked their most recent record - but this seems to be a case where they had said what they had to say, and stopped. I wonder if other, older bands will follow suit.
Favorite Last-Minute Addition: The Head and the Heart. I literally just heard their album on December 29th or 30th and really liked it. Rock with a somewhat folk feel, akin to The Avett Brothers or Okkervil River (damn, that's another band that I meant to write about for this year). Definitely looking forward to hearing more from TH&TH.
So, I think that's probably about it. Happy New (Gregorian calendar) Year, everyone. I'm looking forward to our year in music.
Ok! So, Your Older Brother must be too cool for Christmas music, right? That's just kid stuff. Right?
Wrong! I have a long list of favorite Christmas/holiday/winter songs that's much longer than this, but this is pretty close to my essential list. Most of the links point to the iTunes Music Store for easy purchasing.
I present to you Your Older Brother's Five-Star Christmas music list:
Just For Me: Straight to Hell - The Clash - I got Combat Rock for Christmas one year, and while the whole record kind of reminds me of Christmas, this song does most of all. I mean, nothing says Christmas like tales of suffering. (Just Like) Starting Over - John Lennon - I vividly remember hearing the news, live on the radio on December 8th, 1980, that John Lennon had been shot and killed. I had colored lights up in my room and I heard the news and even at 10 years old, knew the world had lost a very important person. The DJ broke the news and then played this song off John's new record, released not even a month prior. It starts with chimes - it sounds Christmas-like, but they also remind me of his death.
Beatles Christmas singles - My friend Adam is a huge Beatles fan and first introduced me to these Christmas messages from the Fab Four. They start out just sort of goofing around, and then they get weird. This YouTube video has them all strung together for maximum effect, 1963-1969.
And last but not least - one last remix, mixing LMFAO with Brenda Lee - "Party Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree". I listened to LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem" so much this year with my kids that this is a natural must-have. :) The other songs on the Santastic Six mashup are of varying quality, but this one stands out. So that's my list. I hope you enjoy Christmas music as much as I do. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, May your holiday be blessed, Happy Kwanzaa, festive Festivus, Cool Yule, Spectacular Saturnalia, Joyous Solstice, Happy Bodhi Day...and so forth.
