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More updates from the inbox re: some bands I've been talking about over the past few weeks. Full disclosure: I haven't yet had time to listen to all of these or see if the uploads have taken. Check back later if stuff is brokey.
Brooklyn's School of Seven Bells, pictured (reminds me of the trash compactor scene in Star Wars) will be playing on 12/15 at the Mercury Lounge. They just recently did a live session on KCRW's
Something about the holidays and all the old Christmas classics playing in stores makes me sentimental for some verrry cheesy music. I'm talking disgustingly sappy. Example: The Goodbye Girl by David Gates of the band Bread. This is not a proud moment for the blog.
Interesting trivia about Mr. Gates, according to Wiki: His high school band backed Chuck Berry during a concert. How Back to the Future!!
Punk pioneers The Homosexuals are back with a limited edition EP called "Love Guns?"
They've had a host of other names throughout their short and storied career including my favorite: George Harassment.
Newstime!
-Russia's biggest band Mumiy Troll (pronounced MOO-me Troll) will be touring the US between now and March. Wow, 1 million plays. In a town near you:
01/22/09 @ Bell House, Brooklyn, NY
01/23/09 @ The Filmore At Irving Plaza, New York, NY
01/24/09 @ Maxwell's, Hoboken, NJ
01/26/09 @ Middle East Downstairs, Cambridge, MA
01/27/08 @ Mohawk Place, Buffalo, NY
01/28/09 @ Mod Club, Toronto, ON
01/29/09 @ Beachland Tavern, Cleveland, OH
01/30/09 @ Empty Bottle, Chicago, IL
01/31/09 @ 7th Street Entry, Minneapolis, MN
02/02/09 @ Hi Dive, Denver, CO
02/03/09 @ Urban Lounge, Salt Lake City, UT
02/06/09 @ Chop Suey, Seattle, WA
02/07/09 @ Berbati's Pan, Portland, OR
03/03/09 @ The Independent, San Francisco, CA
03/04/09 @ The Independent, San Francisco, CA
03/05/09 @ Roxy Theatre, Los Angeles, CA
03/06/09 @ Roxy Theatre, Los Angeles, CA
Here's the colorful video from 2006 for a song that translates to "brides" according to the You Tube comments. Anyone feeling the urgent need to correct that if wrong, please do so now or forever hold your peace.
How 'bout for a change of pace we cruise the blogroll and see what some of the people I respect are list'nang to?
-This is gorgeous. From B-Town, a previously unreleased outtake of Fleetwood Mac's Songbird. I might have already blogged about my admiration of the clarion quality of Christine McVie's voice and how her coolness was the perfect counterbalance to Stevie Nicks' smoky snarl. Plus, Christine always had that perturbed look on her face like she was tired of getting whipped by Stevie's scarves and would talk some great pointedly British smack about her behind her back.
-Covert Curiosity turned me on to Feedback in the Field by Montreal's Plants and Animals. Do visit their Myspace page and listen to "Bye Bye Bye." No fortunately it is not a cover of the N'Sy'nc' son'g. What it is is is some grandiose, theatrical, almost Queen/White Gold/Darkness, stuff.
The song below brings it down a few notches, a little Midlake Roscoe mixed with (coincidentally enough) Fleetwood Mac's somber brand of late 70s California rock. (Born of Shag carpet regret.)
-The good people of Rock Sellout have Elastica doing the Christmasy song, Kings of Orient Are. The song has just the slightest dash of rockabilly, surf-rock spicing to it. ( the excitable Q approves!!) Trivia: Elastica's fansite is called "Project Elasticated."
-I like Britney's latest 'runny nose wipe' move at exactly 3:06. Post-nasal drip. HOT!
Here's another duo: the highly photogenic Suzanne Santo and Ben Jaffe of HoneyHoney. A cut and paste exchange from their Myspace page:
1. What is your musical background?
Ben: Suzanne learned how to sing from musical theater and was obsessed with Mariah Carey and Disney cartoon movie soundtracks. She sang "Part Of Your World" as her fifth grade choir solo while wearing a fin.
Suzanne: I believe it to be true that Ben Jaffe came out of the womb crying as most babies do, except his crying had rhythm and incredible pitch. In his adolescent years, young Jaffe started off in the percussion realm, playing the drums in various jazz bands and being way too cool for his age. He also had a mentor named Randy Kaye who taught him about the importance of the sounds he was creating.
2.Where are you from?
Ben: She's from Strongsville Ohio.
Suzanne: Ben was born in New York and lived there for a short time before heading off to the great state of Massachusetts.
3. How did you meet each other and when?
Ben: Through a mutual friend known as "The Double". "The Double" is a recording engineer I work with doing songwriting for other artists and TV shows. At the time Suzanne was acting and playing solo and “The Double” took me to see her. I thought she was foxy and eventually we started writing together.
4. Why are you a good team?
Suzanne: We're a good team because when we disagree on something, we physically beat the tar out of each other until someone yells uncle. I feel this is a quick and easy problem solver and that most bands should operate this way as it really helps create new vessels of creativity... just kidding. I think we're a great team because we respect the shit out of each other and are constantly trying to find ways to be better musicians and songwriters. We also have a lot of fun making music.
5. How would you describe your music?
Ben: Suzanne would say something along the lines of "Rocktastic" or "Freeky Deeky"
Suzanne: Ben would say that we are basically pop music.
6. What/who are your influences?
Ben: I think Suzanne sounds like a mix of Billy Holiday, Chrissie Hynde, and Jack Black.
Suzanne: Ben's influences are D’Angelo, Gershwin, Randy Newman, Brian Wilson and Satan.
7. What are your goals for being the band?
Ben: I think Suzanne just wants to be close to me. Also to be able to make all her own choices in terms of what she does with her life.
Suzanne: I think that Ben really just wants to keep writing great songs and to be able to sleep with as many women as possible while out on the road. He also wants to use music as a gateway for his professional basketball career.
8. What is the motivation behind your music/lyrics?
Ben and Suzanne (loudly, in unison): To tell a good story.
9. How/when do you write? Describe the honeyhoney songwriting process.
Suzanne and Ben: The honeyhoney songwriting process is as follows: Sometimes we write songs together, sometimes Ben writes songs on his own, and sometimes Suzanne writes songs on her own that she and Ben then work on together.
10. Do you currently have an album out? If so, tell us about it.
Ben and Suzanne: Our debut record entitled First Rodeo is coming out November 4th. We recorded it at Ironworks Studios with Jude Cole producing. Four of the songs are from our EP Loose Boots and seven of them are songs we've been working on and playing since we started the band. We had a ridiculously good group of players work with us in the studio and we feel that all the different ingredients combined to form an unexpectedly delicious rock sauce. We've never been more proud of something we've been a part of.
Kiefer Sutherland directed the video for their song Little Toy Gun. (Probably in like, half a minute, with no bathroom breaks):
I was watching the most unusual video on LINK TV last night as I was drifting in and out of sleep. Starring Natalie Merchant, Stephen Marley, Angelique Kidjo and (the funkiest of them all) Hugh Masekela to name a few, it was an Amnesty International "We are the World"-type project celebrating the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I haven't been able to find the actual video online anywhere to confirm that it wasn't, in fact, a trippy dream.
Not to take away from the message of the video at all (they were also protesting genocide) but it was lit strangely, like one of those lamps with thermochromic layers that fills you with chills as the colors change. Or it might have been the CGI used to paste all the performers from their varied locations on to one ochre colored stage. Some images jumped out to the foreground, almost as if in 3-D, like in "YANA" with Mikaael Jackson and Lisa Marie.
And then at one point it seemed like the group was singing to the U.N. as it was in session and about to vote, when all of a sudden the U.N. (or an audience full of people wearing business wear) started to dance. Which is I don't think is very conducive to voting.
By far the most interesting one to look at was Andrea Eccheverri (below left) of the duo Aterciopelados, whose forehead was bejewelled and painted. Which again, is fine, but just added to the strangeness of the whole affair.
Aterciopelados was representing Colombia and their critically acclaimed album Rio came out in October of this year. Both Eccheverri and her partner, the arranger Hector Buitrago, have been deeply involved in the fight to bring clean water to the residents of all Colombians and (if you scroll down on the Wiki page*) a reworking of their song Cancion Protesta formed the basis for the song "Price of Silence" used in the trippy video that I watched last night.
The song itself is pretty funky. They manage to maintain both an indigenous but modern Grateful Dead sound. Below is the song Rio from their album Rio:
*(A reasonable explanation of the concept of the Link video is given as well.)
Yawns, am extremely tired today. (Mops self up off floor.) Be gone already, Christmas, you wretched slavemaster! And take your shattered ball ornaments and gift wishes with you.
Soo!Pitchfork listed their favorite music videos of the year yesterday..the bulk of them have already been mentioned here on SOG at some point or another. One that I missed was Lykke Li doing Dance Dance Dance with Bon Iver. Li is my favorite girlie (say with Lawrence Welk accent:) 'in the indie rock' right now. She's this crazy mix of sweetly nerdly and fierce.
Bon Iver has a new EP called Blood Bank coming out on January 20th. This is a lovely song, download it now!
(Thanks to Hipster Runoff for the graphic.)
Completely unrelated: Wall-E Bento (via Maura: Defamer)
Amazing!
-A few new entries on What the World Needs Now.
-Courtesy of Aquarium Drunkard, a picture of Sufjan Stevens holding a possessed inflatable Santa (above) that will haunt me the rest of my days. Oh and a terrific singalong song with an intro that *might* have been stolen from the theme song to How I Met Your Mother:
-Holy moly there are some great concerts in the weeks to come for those in the L.A. Area. Who gives a flying mug of eggnog about loved ones and their stupid need for Christmas gifts when you got:
And last but not least:
Presale tickets are now available for Slipknot with Coheed and Cambria, March 7th @ the Forum. Password: PSYCHOSOCIAL.
I will reserve comment.
-Top 10 New-ish Bands I Am Thankful For In 2008.
-Wow, the girls of School of Seven Bells are pretty in a polished browneyed Norah Jones kind of way. Warning: This song might make you poplock: (Recommended!)
-Let's Boogie to the Elf Dance, Part 2: Via Soupsoup, Q-Tip held court at the Hard Rock Cafe in Las Vegas when, like a mouse coming out of the wings in the Nutcracker, special tiny guest Prince arrived. (The height difference between Tip and Prince is roughly equal to that of Sufjan and Satan's Santa above, scale-wise.) That has got to be unnerving for a musician when a thousand cel phones go up in the air while you're playing.
Many moons ago I went to see M.I.A. @ Terminal 5 and during the show Ms. Arulpragasam brought out Rye Rye. I remember at the time being less than impressed, mostly because the audience was all "pfft" and doing that deadeyed stare & sigh that audiences do when watching a performer take time away from the performer that they paid money to see.
All of this is neither here nor there but today, many moons later, I found myself searching Songza for a song to scratch a certain ear itch, thinking it was Santogold when in fact it was Rye Rye. You win again, M.I.A. Seagrams.
Rye Rye will be releasing her first album sometime next year on M.I.A.'s new N.E.E.T. label and is only 17!
Dude, I have been busier than all git-out lately!! I can't take much more. Time for a coffee/sanity break with oreos. But not just any oreos: Joe-Joes.
No, not that Jo Jo.
ANYWAY! I don't mean to keep posting about Beyonce because she's overarseposed as it is..but I swear she is everywhere you turn. Did you know she does a version of Rose Royce's Wishing on A Star (a song that I become obsessed with every 2-3 months..check the archives)?? You can hear a short sample of it here:
The song was featured as part of the Roll Bounce Soundtrack
How did this funlookin' movie pass me by? Oh Nettttflix!!!
++ More rambling: from the Inbox: Mexican Summer is a limited edition vinyl and digital only label (and music subscription service) that launched in September of this year. Some of the artists they've featured include Dungen*, Marissa Nadler and although you can't see it here, in December the label will be releasing two new cuts from Stopokaygo Sweetie Pie Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffitti. Only 500 copies are available so get in where you fit in!
++A couple of weeks ago I wrote about Ingrid Michaelson and her song Be OK. The song has become an anthem of sorts to cancer survivors who have put together a "photage" video with the song's name and message printed on their cheeks. Have a peek:
(*Was Dungen's name once prophesized by Chuck Klosterman? I'm too lazy to look it up. Said CK while watching a Led Zeppelin video: "It also dawned on me (during Jimmy Page's solo) that some yet-to-be-invented band should make an homage to early 70's psychedelic acid-rock videos that transpose live performance with still photography. And this band should come from Scandinavia and be called "Dungen." Must research this.)
This is kind of cute, from the inbox: Austin's Honey Claws are launching the "Bathroom Breaks Series." It's a series of mashups that are made for DJs, who need songs long enough to leave the decks to use the restroom. From the press release:
The first installment, Words, can also be listened when you are not in the bathroom. I think I hear a little bit of Of Montreal in there...
Blur's Damon Albarn has been receiving glowing reviews for his work in Drifting and Tilting: The Songs of Scott Walker. The show (which has ended its run) featured 8 of the reclusive Walker's songs, as performed by Albarn, Jarvis Cocker, and Gavin Friday and played to packed crowds at London's Barbican Theatre.
I confess that I'm not entirely familiar with Walker's oeuvre so I'll let the pictures, quotes and videos speak for themselves:
A trailer from 2006's, 30 Century Man:
-"Modern art-like dark set designs,
evocative lighting and unnerving projections all added to the dark, David Lynch-like ambience of the show."
-Conceived by Walker himself.
-Amazing pictures of the show and of a jubilant Albarn taking a final bow.
And songs from those involved:
