Archive for 2007

Dragonette “I Get Around (Midnight Juggernauts Remix)” – The first time that I ever heard Dragonette was when they opened up for New Order at the Hammerstein Ballroom a few years ago, and my immediate impression of them was that they came across like a mash-up of every cool song that could’ve been played at a high school dance in the mid-80s, but that everyone in the band was a bit too young to have actually been a teenager at that time. This remix by Midnight Juggernauts pulls the song closer to their particular dayglo dance pop aesthetic, but also exaggerates the sense that this music is a sort of false memory by endlessly pounding its sparkling hook over and over. You know how you can kinda half-remember an old song and only recall its most obvious hook, to the point that if you hear the actual song you can be surprised that there was actually more to the tune? This track is mostly just the part that you’d remember twenty years from now. (Click here to buy it from Kitsune.)

Also: I didn’t really ask for this, but there’s yet more arguing about the demise of Oink and the rampant entitlement of its users in the comments box. If you’re interested in that sort of thing, have at it, but be aware that I’m getting really tired of arguing with people about this at this point.

Lil’ Wayne “Put Some Keys On That” – You know what? I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that I really doubt that Lil’ Wayne is being at all sincere when he says that he “just realized” that people can’t fuck with him at the start of this track. Actually, I’m fairly convinced that there probably hasn’t been any time in the past few years when Wayne has not been totally aware of his often exasperating skill level as a rapper. “Put Some Keys On That” is the work of a guy totally thrilled by his own talent — there’s just no hiding the pleasure he takes in stringing together his lyrics, or how he often seems surprised and amused by his own tangents. There are so many moments in the track where his rhyme threatens to either collapse or grow repetitive, but he keeps fearlessly pushing onward, as if he’s hell bent on finding something brilliant buried in the back of his head. (Click here to get it from Mix Tape Pass.)

Archers of Loaf “Let The Loser Melt” – The Archers of Loaf’s 1995 album Vee Vee overflows with skepticism and resentment, mainly directed at a music culture focused on consuming artists alive in a greedy, self-serving hype cycle that reduces art and youth culture to a cheap, disposable commodity. The record comes from the perspective of an indie punk band who seem proud to speak for non-careerist “underachievers,” sarcastically lament the passing of “the world’s worst rock and roll band,” and toss the word “overrated” around like a dart intended to puncture the bloated ego of anyone involved in celebrating mediocrity. Twelve years later, Vee Vee sounds more relevant than ever before; a bitter testament to the old cliché: The more things change, the more they stay the same.

The thing is, Vee Vee may now seem like a prescient album, but it’s very much of its time. People complain endlessly about today’s internet hype cycle, but the only thing that’s really changed about fan culture in the past 20 years is the speed at which it progresses. The internet is simply a medium that accelerates a process that’s been going on ever since anything that can considered “indie” or “punk” or “alternative” became a marketable commodity.

The Archers of Loaf wrote Vee Vee while the record industry was still in the midst of the gold rush to find more Nirvanas, and A&R people were desperately snapping up cult bands and indie acts in the hopes of scoring a fluke hit. In this era, the stakes are much lower — no one is expecting to pull Nirvana numbers, that’s for sure — but more people than ever are looking for a way to stake a claim on artists who could reach…well, ANY… level of success.

It’s not just about directly making money off an artist’s work now; the new music market is increasingly driven by a sort of reputation economy based on building a portfolio of acts that read as part of a publication’s “brand,” and then doing everything possible to pump up the audience’s awareness and expectations in order to make them seem like a success. It’s almost irrelevant whether or not those people actually sell records — it’s not a magazine, television show, radio program, or blog’s concern to move units or make an artist money, it’s just about perpetuating the notion that THEY are the ones out there discovering this HOT NEW MUSIC. “Taste makers” have to constantly build their brand if they hope to parlay what they do into a career, and so there’s an ongoing need to dig around for something new to push, even when the underground is overcrowded (ha, see what I did right there, Archers fans?) with rival taste makers and unremarkable musicians.

It’s not just the writers, though. The audience is full of people doing the same exact thing on a smaller scale, and while they might follow blogs, webzines, and college/public radio DJs so far, they often need to establish their own identities by ostentatiously rejecting consensus-builders like Pitchfork and Stereogum. This has always been the case — rewind to the Archers’ era, and it’d be people bitching about Spin or 120 Minutes. (Fun fact: I found the Archers of Loaf via MTV, I think it was actually on an episode of Alternative Nation.)

When it comes to art that is practically defined by it falling on the outskirts of the mainstream, the audience is almost always going to be comprised of people just waiting for the right moment to get into backlash mode. They kid themselves into believing that they sincerely care about the art, but what they really love is the social capital of hipness, and can’t afford to put too much of themselves into something that may become unfashionable. This is the real problem, if we’re going to be very honest — at the root level, indie/alternative/college rock/blog rock/whatever you want to call it is poisoned by the vanity of its audience, and as a result, the industry built around it will always be unstable, and the culture around the music will be dominated and debased by swarms of self-styled experts attempting to one-up one another. As a wise man once said: “This ain’t a scene, this is a god damn arms race.” (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: It might only be up on the WFMU site for one week, so please do check out the archive of my appearance on Trent Wolbe’s Safe and Sound show while you can. We talk a bit about my Pop Songs 07 site, and play about three hours worth of R.E.M. songs. Not to be all Jarvis Cocker about this, but I suggest that you refrain from looking at the playlist whilst listening to the show.

M.I.A. @ Terminal 5, 10/18/2007
Bamboo Banga / World Town / XR2 / Pull Up The People / Sunshowers / 20$ (with “Blue Monday” sequence) / Jimmy / 10$ (with “Sweet Dreams” sequence) / (Ry Ry performs “Shake It To The Ground” in full with DJ Blaqstarr) / Bucky Done Gun / Bird Flu / Hussel (with Afrikan Boy, who becomes a hype man for the rest of the show) / Paper Planes / Boyz / Galang (with a bit of “Lipgloss”) // Amazon / URAQT

M.I.A. “Boyz (Live on KCRW 8/2/2007)” – The venue was overcrowded and uncomfortable, everything smelled like wet paint, and M.I.A. went on way too late after the doors opened, leaving most of the audience just kinda standing around while a DJ played for several hours. But aside from that…wow! Wildly enthusiastic crowd, great performance, brilliant video art designed for each song. I really wish that I could’ve been down on that packed floor to get the full effect, but once I managed to get into a position where I could actually see what was going on, it was all good.

The most notable and exciting part of the show came when M.I.A. brought about 100 people from the audience on stage to dance along with “Bird Flu.” It was pretty crazy — people just kept coming up, to the point that it was hard to spot her on the stage. They were forced to make them all leave after the song was over, resulting in a slightly awkward gap between songs, but it was certainly worth it for the spectacle. It all seemed rather unrehearsed, and they didn’t seem to be prepared for the ramifications — I’m assuming that she doesn’t do this sort of thing very often, or at least not with so many people?

I rarely post photographs from concerts — mainly because they almost always look so incredibly dull — but a few of my friends shot pictures at this show, and I think they get across the sheer bonkersness of the “Bird Flu” sequence than anything I can say right now since my mind is still a bit fried.

(photos by Trent Wolbe)

(photo by Chris Conroy)


(photos by Mark Jones)

(Click here to buy Kala from Amazon for $7!)

Sissy Wish “Beauties Never Die” – It’s not necessarily our responsibility to make sure that our partners and loved ones are happy, but it is often what we desire and set out to accomplish. I mean, that’s what love really is, right? Support, affection, being there. That’s what this song is about — “it takes some time to build you up and make you happy every day.” It’s effort, it’s perseverance, it’s the emotional investment. It’s the disappointment of feeling like you’re failing someone even when there’s only so much you can do to lift someone up if they’re depressed, stressed, sick, or otherwise troubled. There’s no self-pity in this song, no sense that the singer feels martyred or put-upon. It’s all love. Quiet, gentle love. (Click here to buy it from House of Telle.

Elsewhere: My penultimate Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site with mp3s from Iron & Wine, Anna Järvinen, and Grizzly Bear.

Hot Springs “38th Adventure” – True to its title, “38th Adventure” is filled with romance, excitement, and danger, but from the perspective of its eccentric character, it’s just everyday life. It’s hard to get over the singer’s sense of awe in this song — she seems so impressed by this strange bohemian quasi-hobo girl, and not necessarily in a condescending “oh, you live closer to the earth, you’re the one who has really got this figured out” sort of way. It’s more like she just envies the courage it takes to live a life of constant risk, and is taking inspiration from her rather than getting down on herself, or seeking to directly emulate this woman’s lifestyle. The song itself is rather odd, sounding somewhat like The Strokes fronted by a drunken woman doing a slightly-off Bjork impression. It maybe shouldn’t work, but it falls together nicely. (Click here to buy it from Aquarius Records.)

Elsewhere: Mike Barthel presents a pictorial review of Anton Corbijn’s Ian Curtis biopic Control.

Malcolm McLaren “Love Will…” – I went to see Anton Corbijn’s Ian Curtis biopic with a few of my friends over the weekend, and we all came out of it agreeing on three things:

1) Despite co-writing exactly one great song (“Love Will Tear Us Apart”), being an epileptic, getting married at a very young age, and committing suicide at 23, Ian Curtis was a dreadfully dull human being. Maybe that’s an overstatement, but there’s certainly not enough in his brief life to support the plot of a feature-length film.

2) We would have rather seen a movie about Bernard Sumner, who is at least twice as fascinating and about twenty times more talented than Curtis. Seriously, why do we need another iteration of the TRAGIC YOUNG ROCK STAR story when we could instead explore the inner workings of a dorky weirdo like Sumner? Or hell, what about Peter Hook? That guy is more interesting too. Even another movie about Tony Wilson would’ve been better.

3) The film is just awful; basically a pretentious tv movie. Granted, virtually all biopics are terrible — how could they not be when they are nearly always super-linear hagiographies with no real narrative momentum — but Control is an embarrassing mess of cliches, on-the-nose musical cues, and trite sentimentality. Really, don’t bother, even if you totally love Joy Division.

The B-52’s “Dance This Mess Around” – So what would be a better biopic? How about something that doesn’t attempt to force someone’s history into a neat arc? How about a movie that attempts to either express a thought about or emulate the feeling of a subject rather than provide a slanted history lesson? For example, imagine a film that captured the feeling of the B-52’s music and would put you in the context of their early career, as if you’re just a fly on the wall at one of their early gigs. No mythologizing, no attempts to tug at the viewers’ heartstrings by bringing up Ricky Wilson’s eventual AIDS-related death, but instead a celebration/investigation of a singular aesthetic, and of a time and a place. Maybe the world needs a movie that challenges its audience to reject the notion that misery and tragedy is what defines a great artist, and makes a case that eccentric, party-loving, ultra-kitschy, queer oddballs from the south capable of making a lyric like “I’m not no Limburger!” seem urgent and crucial have just as much (if not a lot more) to offer us than any given suicidal sad sack. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Of Montreal @ Roseland Ballroom 10/13/2007
So Begins Our Alabee / Rapture Rapes The Muses / The Party’s Crashing Us / Gronlandic Edit / Suffer For Fashion / Forecast Fascist Future / Exquisite Confessions / Lysergic Bliss / We Can Do It Softcore If You Want / She’s A Rejecter / October Is Eternal / Oslo In The Summertime / Mingusings / My British Tour Diary / Bunny Ain’t No Kind Of Rider / I Was Never Young / Heimdalsgate Like A Promethean Curse // Requiem For OMM2 / Faberge Falls For Shuggie / The Repudiated Immortals

If you’ve never been to the Roseland Ballroom, you need to know that it’s a very large venue, and it’s kind of a big deal that Of Montreal sold it out, and that the overwhelming majority of the people on the floor were dancing, singing along, pumping their fists and flipping out for the duration of their set. It’s also worth noting that a large number of the people in the audience were very young — teenagers, college undergrads — and their excitement for the show and emotional commitment to the songs was obvious, intense, and beautiful. The band have a new, more elaborate stage set for this tour, and though it didn’t stray too far from the thrift store surrealist spectacle of the previous round of touring, it was a clear sign that they’d come up in the world since Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer? was released back in the early winter. There was a potent feeling of triumph to this show, but it wasn’t just about the band — the success of the record is so tied up in how people identify with it that it was also about the audience, and the commiseration and validation of this communal experience. “Let’s all melt down together,” indeed.

The three new songs were absolutely fantastic, by the way. They aren’t too far off from Hissing Fauna in style and substance, but it’s all a bit more glittery and extreme. Kevin Barnes has got his Georgie Fruit on, and there’s no question that it will get the crispest possible endorsement from the C.C.A.A. Booty Patrol.

Of Montreal “She’s A Rejecter” – “The girl of my dreams is probably God, still I want you.” That’s the climactic epiphany of Hissing Fauna, the moment of clarity that makes sense of the emotional chaos. The phrasing is very key — he’s not saying “I want you, but the girl of my dreams is probably God,” he’s not implying that she’s second best. Even if she’s a flawed human being, she is superior to whatever he can define as perfection. He’s basically admitting that his imagination is too flawed and limited to come up with something better than her, and if he’s managed to alienate her, then he’s fucked for life. (Click here to buy it from Polyvinyl.)

Also: You can get a recording of this concert via NYCtaper, but be warned: You have to deal with some .flac bullshit.

Cristina “Mamma Mia” – Cristina Monet and August Darnell throw the listener headlong into a world of sparkling fabulousness within the first few seconds of “Mamma Mia,” but they quickly raise the stakes, pushing the song to delirious heights of ecstasy and glamor. Monet’s second album was mainly concerned with portraying its wealthy characters as decadent, miserable creeps, but this is not nearly as dark or cynical. It’s good-hearted fantasy of ritzy elegance, and though the song is knowingly kitschy, its enthusiasm and awe is entirely genuine. This isn’t about money, it’s about limitless pleasure. (Click here to buy it from Ze Records.)

Ludus “Breaking The Rules” – …and this one’s about the limits we place on our pleasure. I’d say that “Breaking The Rules” makes a better case for a combination of romantic commitment and bisexual polyamory better than any song I’ve ever heard, but I can’t think of any other tunes that cover the same lyrical territory, much less anything so cheery and danceable. It’s not pushy or didactic, but rather open-minded, generous, assertive, and eager to balance its pursuit of excitement and expression with stability and a political agenda. (Click here to buy it from Crippled Dick Hot Wax.)

Elsewhere: My new Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site with mp3s from Architecture In Helsinki, Alter Ego, and Plastique De Reve.

Also: My opinion of Rilo Kiley’s new material is exactly the reverse of Kate Richardson’s, but either way she is correct: There is clearly a connection between how much leg Jenny Lewis shows and the quality of her music.

And: Kate Richardson is having a moment — she also commissioned a video for Tiger Tunes’ “Pancake America.”

PJ Harvey @ Beacon Theater 10/10/2007
To Bring You My Love # / Send His Love To Me # / When Under Ether % / The Devil %+ / White Chalk %~ / Man Size # / Angelene #* / My Beautiful Leah *&! / Nina In Ecstasy & / Electric Light & / Snake # / Shame # / Big Exit # / Down By The Water @* / Grow Grow Grow @ / The Mountain % / Silence % // Rid Of Me # / Water # / The Piano ^/ The Desperate Kingdom Of Love ^ (# = electric guitar, % = piano, @ = autoharp, ^ = acoustic guitar, * = drum machine, & = synthesizer, ! = ride cymbal, ~ = harmonica, + = metronome)

PJ Harvey “Nina In Ecstasy” – I left PJ Harvey’s concert in a state of awe, completely blown away by what may have been the single best show I’ve ever witnessed in terms of vocal performance. (I’ve actually seen her play once before; I don’t recall being nearly as impressed.) She was on stage alone, dressed in a gown similar to the one she wore on the cover of White Chalk. She moved from one instrument to another throughout the evening, occasionally accompanied by a mechanical rhythm that only emphasized the spareness of her live arrangements. In most cases, there wasn’t much of a difference — Harvey has always favored skeletal simplicity on her records, and she hardly needed a rhythm section to pull off the severe intensity of “Man Size” and “Snake.” Her setlist pulled a song or three from each of her major works and quietly made a compelling case for her consistency, stylistic range, and ability to expertly tailor her voice to the character of each piece. Harvey’s voice is an astounding thing, both in terms of technical prowess and expressive power. She sang and played every selection with incredible precision, but her performance never seemed even slightly rote. In fact, I cannot recall the last time I saw a performer so fully committed to inhabiting their work on stage.

PJ Harvey “My Beautiful Leah” – The lurching, relentlessly grim “My Beautiful Leah” was perhaps the most dramatic selection of the concert, and not simply because it allowed for some theatrical flair when the song called for her to bash a ride cymbal for a few measures. Even more so than on the album recording, Harvey conveyed the heartbroken regret of the narrator as her music expressed the flat hopelessness of the severely depressed title character. Harvey’s voice struggles against the pull of the Leah’s nihilistic misery, seduced by her beauty, and perhaps also the purity of her sadness. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

PJ Harvey “Grow Grow Grow” – Joshua Klein’s lukewarm review of White Chalk on Pitchfork has been bugging me for the past few weeks, not simply because he horribly underrated one of the year’s finest records (sadly, this is to be expected in a year in which Pitchfork has consistently given female artists aside from M.I.A., Feist, and Joanna Newsom lackluster, unexcited, clueless, or needlessly harsh notices), but because his major point comes down to: “You might not be in the mood for it all the time.” Really, Joshua? You mean, like every piece of art ever?

Of course, this is a time when many music critics are seemingly unwilling to engage with art, and instead attempt to act as a twisted sort of consumer advocate. Is it a shock that a majority of records acclaimed in internet circles are most often some form of innocuous, neutral music that does not pose any sort of aesthetic challenge, and recedes into the background so as not to distract the listener from other activities? White Chalk is a mood piece for sure, but it’s also a careful, nuanced work that rewards close listening. Klein may be correct that it is not suitable as all-purpose background noise, but he fails to realize that this is in fact an indication that the album has succeeded on its own terms. The point of White Chalk is to transport the listener into the world of Harvey’s characters, and it is remarkably effective in doing so. It’s meant to be a window into other lives, not yet another mirror to gaze upon ourselves, or a blanket of ambient sound to keep us from feeling uncomfortable in silence.

Also: Remember a few months ago when I interviewed Rob Sheffield, and we were talking about how people used to take 90 minute cassettes and pair two complementary albums for each side? The technology may be outmoded, but please consider this pairing: White Chalk and In Rainbows. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: “I know I’m biased, but really, has anyone done more for Blues music than PJ Harvey? I’m not talking wack-ass Eric Clapton retreads, I’m talking updating the sound of lamentation so that it sounds powerful and alive. She is so thrillingly in the moment of her songs that it can be a little off-putting to people not used to such passion in their music. Or if they are, it’s a different sort of passion, the flowery kind that’s more about me! me! me! than trying to tell a story. She makes you feel her belief. When she sang “You know he’s gonna be there…” and stretched the last vowels into a dry death rattle, it wasn’t pretty, it was captivating.”

Janelle Monáe “Violet Stars Happy Hunting!” – Janelle Monáe’s playful, hyperactive version of modern R&B would be strange and exciting enough if her lyrics were ordinary, but the batshit sci-fi mythology that unfolds throughout her first EP puts her in a whole other realm of pop eccentricity. Monáe is utterly unafraid to seem ridiculous, which is a deeply underrated quality in pop music, and her total commitment to her own weirdness allows her to pull off an extraordinarily kitschy concept record that dares the listener to become emotionally invested in a storyline about an android “cybersoul” star who falls in love with a man, and is hounded by “bounty hunters, robokillers, the droid control, and the Wolfmasters” for breaking “THE RULES.” “Violet Stars Happy Hunting!” bears some resemblance to some of Andre 3000’s post-Stankonia music, and seems to deliberately ape/parody the “lend me some sugar, I am your neighbor!” section of “Hey Ya!” when her male guest takes over on the breakdown before the final round of choruses. (Click here to buy it from Janelle Monáe.)

Imagine for a moment that you are Superman. Your sense of hearing is so powerful and precise that you can hear everything in the world at once, or effortlessly focus on just one sound anywhere on the planet with perfect clarity. Think about how many people are listening to In Rainbows simultaneously over the course of this day, and how at any moment, someone is certainly listening to one of the ten tracks. Imagine honing in only the speakers scattered around the globe playing the record in perfect unison, and then shifting your attention to the sound of it overlapping, clashing, and falling in and out of phase on other stereos, headphones, and computers. Its arpeggiated melodies turning into tangles and then into knots; a record with so much negative space piling up on itself until it is nothing but thick, undifferentiated noise.

White Williams “Headlines” – The sort of shocking thing about White Williams is that the sophisticated, strangely ageless music contained on his first record was in fact written and performed by a 23 year old guy, and not, say, someone about two or three decades older. Or maybe someone from two or three decades ago? Williams’ music is often built upon scraps of familiar tunes by old family favorites — Bowie, Eno, T-Rex, and Neu! are all interpolated and integrated, and he straight up covers Bow Wow Wow — but Smoke is more than just another retro pastiche. The music seems as though it dropped out of time fully formed, as if it could’ve been written and recorded in 1977 just as easily as 2027. The deliberate nods to famous songs is obviously a self-conscious move, but the record’s loose, lucid, languorous tracks seem weirdly indifferent to both the past and the future, opting instead to zone out and groove along in the present tense. (Click here to buy it from Tigetbeat 6.)

Elsewhere: Prompted by my LCD Soundsystem post from yesterday, Mike Barthel wrote a nice long thing about “North American Scum,” and in giving it a fairly close reading manages to cover a lot of the things I either wanted to say or wish I’ve said about the song. I’m not especially happy with my post, honestly — I’ve been thinking about that song for months, and it didn’t really come out right, in part because I was too busy to really give it the time it needed. But, you know, a lot of the reason I wanted to write about it several months after its initial release in the first place was to push people to give it as much thought as “All My Friends” and “Someone Great,” and Mike certainly went above and beyond in his post, so I suppose it was a success in that way.

And: Once again, I will be filling in for the day on New York Magazine’s Vulture blog.

Arcade Fire @ Randall’s Island 10/6/2007
Black Mirror / Keep The Car Running / Laika / No Cars Go / Haiti / I’m Sleeping In A Submarine / My Body Is A Cage / Cold Wind / Intervention / Antichrist Television Blues / The Well and the Lighthouse / Tunnels / Power Out / Rebellion (Lies) // Headlights Look Like Diamonds / Wake Up /// Kiss Off (Violent Femmes song performed off to side of stage after show, acoustic and barely audible even from 30 yards)

Arcade Fire “Keep The Car Running” (Live @ Judson Memorial Church, 2/17/2007) – Of the three Arcade Fire shows that I saw in 2007 — the only Arcade Fire shows I’ve ever seen — this was the one that really seemed as though the band were really fired up and hitting the stage with full power, which I think has everything to do with the fact that it was a fucking ENORMOUS show on a giant stage. Though it was nice to see them in a church and a large theater, it’s pretty obvious that they were hemmed in by the scale, and the sound was too muddy and quiet to really get across the scope of the material. This set at Randall’s Island was as loud, overwhelming, and theatrical as you’d want them to be, and maybe a bit more so, since they were egged on by the sheer size of the event, and the fact that they had to get on the stage after LCD Soundsystem.

At each of the three Arcade Fire shows that I saw this year, it was hard for me not to be acutely aware of the fact that even though I do like them, the songs from Funeral just don’t mean very much to me. Everyone flips out for them, but aside from “Rebellion” and “Wake Up,” I just nod along and wait for the Neon Bible tunes. The band’s music thrives on an emotional connection, and without it, the songs can seem a bit hollow and overblown, even if you’re into it. I definitely see why so many people care deeply for “Tunnels” and “Power Out,” but I just can’t feel it, they simply do not resonate with me in the way that the Neon Bible material does. “Intervention” and “Black Wave/Bad Vibrations” me feel like I’m getting hit in the soul; “Antichrist Television Blues,” “The Well and the Lighthouse,” and “Keep The Car Running” have crescendos that are absolutely thrilling to me, like getting a tiny, terrifying taste of freedom in the form of a pop song. You simply cannot meet their music halfway, and you can’t be skeptical of the band’s motivations. You either submit to it and take what it has to give you, or you just get a big noise. (Click here to buy it from Merge.)

LCD Soundsystem @ Randall’s Island 10/6/2007
Get Innocuous! / Us V Them / Time To Get Away / North American Scum / All My Friends / Someone Great / Tribulations / Movement / Yeah / Throw / New York I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

Needless to say, LCD Soundsystem were as tight and engaging as ever, but Randall’s Island is just too sprawling for their music to have its full effect, though the epic quality of “All My Friends” and “Someone Great” worked rather well in this context. Even up in the front, the setting just wasn’t conducive to dancing — you could move, sure, but it’s hard to really get going when seven out of every ten people in the audience is intent on standing still. That said, things did get slightly rowdy for “North American Scum,” “Tribulations,” and “Yeah,” but how could they not — those three are pretty much forces of nature.

LCD Soundsystem “North American Scum” – A lot of people have been writing very heartfelt, thoughtful things about “All My Friends” and “Someone Great,” and though I think those songs are brilliantly crafted, emotionally profound pieces of music, they haven’t had much utility in my life this year, though I’m sure they will at some later date. “North American Scum,” on the other hand, is the one that hits me hard and makes me move right now, even when I’m just listening to it on headphones walking down the street. (To clarify, I’m not actually dancing in the street, it just makes me walk much faster.)

I can’t take the lyrics too literally — I haven’t left the country since this time last year, and given the current state of the US dollar, it’s looking unlikely that I’ll be able to afford doing anything like that again any time in the next several months — but the spirit of the track fits nicely with my prevailing mood in the 2007s. It’s agitated and defensive, but eager to puncture the self-righteousness of its imagined rivals. It’s THE song if you despise what your country has become, but have no desire to call any other nation your home. It’s THE song if you love New York City, but hate the way it is nearly impossible to live here without becoming obsessed with money and status, whether you have it or not. It’s THE song if you’re ambivalent about being part of a hegemonic culture, but secretly fear a shifting international status quo that may increasingly marginalize you and your experience over the rest of your life. It’s THE song if you want to fight, argue, and create, if just to prove people wrong about you and your people. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Revl9n “Walking Machine” – “Walking Machine” is ostensibly a dance pop song, but its beat seems nervous and agitated, as though Revl9n are attempting to simulate motion sickness rather than stimulate physical motion. The icky discomfort is contrasted with some melodic and dynamic sweetness, but you just can’t shake the dread — it seeps into every lyric, note, beat, and flourish. The singer distances herself from a masochistic acquaintance, but she does seem to agree with the notion that pain brings us in touch with our humanity, and keeps us from becoming dull, unfeeling automatons. (Click here to buy it from Amazon. This song was originally posted back in July of 2004.)

Elsewhere: If you email a request to the people at 33 1/3, they will send you a PDF of the first two chapters of Carl Wilson‘s Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste. I’ve only read those two chapters, but so far, it’s as good and interesting as I had expected.

Also: The Very Last Fucking of Steven Tyler.

Muscles “Lauren From Glebe” – One of the things that I like about Muscles, aside from obvious things like his hooks and beats and knack for layering his own voice into dense harmonies, is how his lyrics are peppered with incredibly specific details that neatly complement his broader sentiments. His music always has this wonderful sweet and sour quality, as though he’s doing his best to include hints of the sadness, loneliness, and frustration that compel us to seek out moments of pure pleasure. His synths often sound like the work of a guy who has several pages worth of Happy Hardcore compilations in a big cd binder with each album cover tucked neatly behind the disc, but he can’t help but include a melancholy melodic undertow in all of his tracks, or sing without sounding as though he’s pleading or forcing a grin. (Click here to pre-order it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: My new Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site with mp3s from Electric Six, Coin-Op, and Linfinity.

Also: I will be filling in for Dan Kois on New York Magazine’s Vulture blog today.

Theya Hermann “Champagne and the Starlite” – This song is so deeply obscure that it’s like the only evidence that Theya Hermann ever existed. Who is she? Did she record other songs, and did they also sound as though they ought to be covered by the Scissor Sisters? (Like, RIGHT NOW, Scissor Sisters!) “Champagne and the Starlite” may very well be the most cheerful and romantic song ever written about the gas crisis or any other sort of shortage of consumer goods. It’s peppy, effervescent, and adorably flirtatious, especially when Hermann reassuringly declares “don’t despair, cutie baby loves you and she’s always gonna be there!” on the giddy lead up to the chorus.

Michel Polnareff “Fame a la Mode” – It’s usually a bit tedious to listen to pop singers complain about the pitfalls of their profession, but Michel Polnareff’s “Fame a la Mode” successfully avoids getting sent off to the Dept. of Tiny Violins by contrasting its melodramatic moments with jolly bits that convey the singer’s love of performing, and the repeated admission that “when you are the show, then you know the show must go on.” If anything, Polnareff just makes the melancholy and feelings of isolation seem sexy and glamorous, almost encouraging the audience to fantasize about rescuing him from himself.

Von Südenfed “The Rhinohead” – Mark E Smith has a tendency to dominate the flavor of any song he sings, but “The Rhinohead” is a rare exception, a track with a bounce so aggressive and gleeful that it keeps pushing Smith out of its way. Smith’s voice can be heard throughout, but his words seem shattered and scattered by Mouse On Mars’ stomping beats, as though he’s too distracted and overwhelmed to form a coherent thought, much less utter a comprehensible sentence aside from the distant and tentative exclamation “I was feeling…fascinated.” (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Boys Noize “Oh!” – All of the songs on Boys Noize’s first full-length sound more or less the same, and though that can be a bit numbing if heard from start to finish, the quality of the non-stop onslaught of riffs is terrifying consistent. I really need to emphasize the word “riffs” — every song is based on a motif that sounds like a badass guitar hook transposed into computer error signals, electronic screeches, and synthetic noise. This isn’t far off from what Justice and the rest of the Ed Banger crew have been up to recently, but it’s more obsessively focused on achieving an overwhelming heaviness. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Elsewhere: Sharon Jones reads passages from Douglas Wolk’s Live At The Apollo book from the 33 1/3 series.

Also: Mark Pytlik interviewed Daft Punk for Pitchfork.

And: Drive XV, Stereogum’s tribute to Automatic For The People, launched today, and you really ought to check it out. In addition to free mp3s of covers of every track on the record by a range of indie rock acts, the mini-site includes an essay about the album written by myself, along with comments from Mike Mills on each of the songs. I conducted the interview with Mike last week, and a longer Q&A about the new live dvd/cd set and the forthcoming album will appear on Stereogum in a couple weeks. A big thank you is due to the guys at Stereogum for making this happen, and to David Bell, Bertis Downs, and Mike Mills for being so great about getting that interview together.

Jonathan Fire*Eater “The Search For Cherry Red” – Like a lot of people who grew up with modest means, I have an attraction to stories about very affluent characters. I suppose that the reason for this is the same as why people write about wealthy people to begin with, or why any of us would desire to be rich ourselves — an absurd surplus of funds gives a person license to pursue most any whim. It’s not true freedom by any stretch, but it sorta seems that way from a distance, or in certain types of stories.

It’s not exactly a surprise that Wes Anderson is constantly making films about rich people. Above all other things, Anderson is obsessed with aesthetics, and logically, his taste in scenery limits him to stories in which his characters must either possess a lot of money, or enter the context of wealth. Unlike a lot of artists and producers in this decade, Anderson’s fixation on wealth has little to do with the glamor of expensive objects and tacky nouveau riche style — think about this year’s MTV awards, Entourage, The Hills, Kanye West — but rather the tossed-off everyday comfort of having no major financial limitations. You can’t buy the lifestyle Anderson is selling — you have to be born into it. You can try to talk your way into it, like Max Fischer or Eli Cash, but it won’t work out. You can work hard, make a lot of money, and enter a higher tax bracket like Herman Blume or Royal Tenenbaum, but your drive and working class roots will always set you apart from those whose ambitions have been stalled by the inertia of excessive comfort.

The three main characters in Anderson’s new film The Darjeeling Limited are the sons of a successful businessman, but their wealth is mostly downplayed throughout the film despite the fact that it is crucial to the context of their story. On one hand, Anderson and his collaborators are making an effort to make it easier for audiences to like and relate to the characters as human beings, and on the other, it is a very effective way of showing how rarely their characters think about their privilege, either because they’ve simply taken it for granted, or don’t believe themselves to be as rich as other people they might know, or are just lost in a haze of self-absorbed oblivion. Their tastes are not extravagant, but they are very whimsical, affected, and every so slightly toxic in their entitlement. The prequel short Hotel Chevalier depicts the youngest brother living in a Parisian hotel room for at least a month while sulking through a pathetic bout of depression, and the film proper follows the boys as they take a trip through a foreign country and mostly just stroll through the scenery whenever they aren’t half-heartedly taking in some “spiritual” destination or forcing nameless faceless others to — literally — carry around their emotional baggage.

It’s worth noting that Wes Anderson co-wrote The Darjeeling Limited with Roman Coppola and Jason Schwartzman, which goes a long way towards explaining why the film essentially plays out like the dude version of Sofia Coppola’s Lost In Translation. What is it about the Coppola family that compels them to make highly stylized films that beg the viewer to take the emotional pain of extremely privileged young adults very, very seriously? Is this simply narcissism in the form of self-critique? Schwartzman’s character in Darjeeling is an author who is amusingly incapable of writing a story that isn’t a very thinly veiled version of his own life — are we meant to take that as a sort of self-deprecating joke? It certainly seem as though both films drop their whiney leads into a country that they fetishize but do not understand as a way of deliberately highlighting the way both the characters and the filmmakers value aesthetics over content or human connections. The weird tension of The Darjeeling Limited comes from how Anderson’s restrained enthusiasm and deadpan melancholy clashes with the self-pity and disengagement of the Coppolas, resulting in some of the film’s most appealing moments, but also a larger feeling that Anderson has reduced all of India and its people to a cutesy diorama playset to accompany the Coppolas’ sullen miniatures.

Since I saw The Darjeeling Limited on Saturday night, I’ve been wondering why I feel a bit bothered by its low key depiction of wealthy characters, and I’ve settled on an answer: While I am all in favor of fiction that portrays affluent characters as three dimensional human beings, I chafe at stories that are entirely or seemingly uncritical of wealth. I love Jonathan Fire*Eater‘s dark, stylish songs about debauched rich kids, and the hilariously grotesque Bluths of Arrested Development. I adore the snobby primness of Richard and Emily Gilmore and the gleeful capitalist sleaziness of Jack Donaghy, and I’m intrigued by the promise of creepy decadence in ABC’s new Peter Krause vehicle Dirty Sexy Money. However, aside from Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan and, uh, maybe Batman, I’m drawing a blank on rich characters that I enjoy who are not meant to seem at least somewhat distasteful and untrustworthy to the audience.

Am I being unfair? Is this how my classism manifests itself? Am I really just after stories that are there to tell me that I’m better off and more authentic because I grew up in and will likely always remain part of the American middle class? Why do I need to be told over and over again that money fucks you up? The Darjeeling Limited more or less arrives at that point, but without any sort of certainty or conviction. It just shrugs it off like “uh, I don’t know, maybe, whatever…” and that grates on me in the worst way.

Jenny Hoyston “Send The Angels” – Not every song on Jenny Hoyston’s new solo record strays as far from the sound of Erase Errata as “Send The Angels,” but even the most angst-ridden tracks seem relaxed compared to the non-stop tension of Nightlife. Whereas Hoyston favors sharper, more aggressive tunes with her EE rhythm section, she loosens up considerably when left to her own devices, resulting in a set of songs that occasionally recall the odd balance of emotional distance and musical intimacy found on Liz Phair’s Girlysound tapes. “Send The Angels” is lyrically direct and somewhat warm in tone, but even though it is essentially an apologetic folk song, it seems too ragged and tough to seem soft and light. (Click here to buy it from Southern.)

Bruce Springsteen “Girls In Their Summer Clothes” – Everyone is saying it, and everyone is right — this song sounds quite a bit like the Magnetic Fields, to the point that it’s impossible to imagine that Springsteen wasn’t trying to write his own mid-tempo Stephin Merritt drone-ballad. Nevertheless, he can’t stop being The Boss, and so his rich, hyper-masculine voice lends the piece a chivalrous tone that would seem jarring on an actual Merritt record. Similarly, despite lifting the cold, measured style of the Magnetic Fields, the band still manages to go a bit over the top with the sentiment and the melodrama, resulting in a track that sounds like a lonely, unseasonably chilly late summer night on the Jersey shore. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: Here’s the best thing on the internet this week month year: A clip from Rambocky, starring “Philly Boy” Roy Ziegler and Patton Oswalt.

Also: My new Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site with mp3s from Pistol Pete, Gameboy/Gamegirl, and Freezepop.

Coin-Op “Ex Models” – Though he’s clearly indebted to the likes of Mark E Smith and Andy Falkous, the singer from Coin-Op is not nearly as venomous and antagonistic, and so his songs end up seeming more playful and silly in their punky petulance. It’s a charming mixture — one part bile, three parts syrup — that lends itself nicely to their perky rhythms and understated, keyboard-centric noise. Most of “Ex Models” is based around an insistent keyboard riff, but the piece really hits its peak when it transitions into a clanging mechanical racket on the chorus. (Click here for the Coin-Op MySpace page.)

Michael Ian Black “Satanic Messages” – Even though Michael Ian Black is a somewhat foppish metrosexual type, it’s still somewhat surprising to notice how effeminate he seems when you can only hear his voice. He amplifies and distorts this quality throughout his first stand-up album, and later comments directly on the fact that many of his fans suspect that he’s gay. Black’s routines mainly play on his strengths, i.e., his slick, suave delivery, and a persona that blends smug vapidity with self-aware erudition to the point that the two become weirdly, uncomfortably indistinguishable. “Satanic Messages” begins with a fairly shopworn premise, but the bit goes off on a tangent about PR that somehow concludes with a frighteningly accurate impression of the B52s’ Fred Schneider singing about the Nazi party. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: Jancee Dunn revisits the horrors of the 1975 JC Penney catalog.

Also: “I mean, it was basically, with the Markers writing songs, ‘Let’s let a couple of defectives reinvent the wheel and see if we can make the car go on four squares,'” Ambrogio explains. “It can go, but it takes a lot more power and destroys more.” Plus, she adds, “It was also written out of straight frustration. When you look at most of the vapid, soulless douches currently writing songs and making records, do you not think with even the slightest effort you could do better?”