Author Archive

They’re Swallowing Me Whole

The Silures “21 Ghosts (Part One)” – I’ve found that the best way to enjoy this song is to think of the lyrics about demonic possession as being a submissive fantasy – being taken over by a corrupting influence, having your will stripped away, losing control entirely. It can’t be any mistake that this song sounds as sexy and menacing as it does, with its harsh textures and intensifying beats dominating the listener as the ghosts sieze control of the narrator. By the time the beats start pounding at the 2:50 mark, you just have to give in. (Click here to buy it from NuLoop.)

Nimbus Coleman “Who Is The Governess?” – I’m not certain if I’ve ever heard a record quite like Nimbus Coleman’s. In terms of structure, it recalls Guided By Voices’ Alien Lanes – many short songs which mostly sound incomplete on their own, but flow together cohesively as an album. That’s where the GBV similarities end, though. Coleman favors very crisp production and clean sounds, and much of the album has a lazy, easy going island sound tweaked by strange song structures and unexpected stylistic tangents. Imagine the world’s strangest island cruise bossanova band, and you’re halfway there. “Who Is The Governess?” opens the album with an opening twenty seconds which comes as close to sounding like Loveless-era My Bloody Valentine as anything I’ve ever heard, but then settles into a soothing bass-and-bongos groove with pleasantly oooooh-ing vocals. (Click here to buy it from Nimbus Coleman.)

You’ll Never Be Discovered

Smoosh “Massive Cure” – I’ve become so accustomed to hearing adults attempt to sound like children that it’s a pleasant surprise to hear a duo of preteen girls make music that sounds more mature and confident than the efforts of most adults. This isn’t just good for people their age, this is good, full stop. Nevertheless, the age factor is impressive – Chloe is a remarkable drummer for someone who is only ten years old, and Asya’s singing voice is a bit like a less excessive Tori Amos. (Click here to buy it from Pattern 25.)

Scala Choir “I Touch Myself” – With a simple piano arrangement and a chorus of teenage girls, the Scala Choir rescue this old Divinyls song from the realm of kitsch by performing it with a heart melting earnestness which evokes the intense, heady rush of young love. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Everybody Singing Along

United State Of Electronica “IT IS ON!” – Ideally, if one were to make sheet music for the USE, every note would be punctuated by at least three or four exclamation points. I was lucky enough to see the band perform twice over the past three days, and as a result, I’ve made the transition from being a casual fan to a devoted fanatic. USE is the most enthusiastic band that I’ve ever seen. When they play live, it seems as though there is no other music on Earth that they love more than the songs in their set. They are relentlessly upbeat, and are intensely focused on a single goal: to make every person in the room dance and have fun. They achieve this with amazing efficiency while still coming off as being loose, spontaneous, and silly. USE are a unique phenomenon, an unlikely fusion of twee indie pop and Daft Punk/Avalanches-style dance music which probably shouldn’t work, but does thanks to the band’s total, unironic commitment and abundance of instantly loveable songs. (Click here to buy it from Sonic Boom Records.)

Fox & Wolf “Youth Alcoholic” – As a service to the new readers coming to Fluxblog this week as a result of the SPIN article, Alex Balk’s NY Times Playlist, and the CMJ panel, I’m going to be posting some Classic Fluxblog songs over the next two weeks in addition to newer material. When I originally posted Fox & Wolf’s “Youth Alcoholic,” the readership of this blog was about one third of what it is now, so I’m sure that this will be new to the majority of you. It’s definitely one of my favorite songs to ever be featured on the site, and I think that in a lot of ways, it’s a good example of the kind of music that I’ve been trying to promote here over the past two years – catchy, upbeat, slightly weird pop music which ought to be huge, but goes almost entirely unheard in the United States due to the insular tastes of the indie rock world and the near total indifference of the mainstream media. I want to live in a world where a song like “Youth Alcoholic” is at very least a modest cult hit rather than a hopeless obscurity from an unknown duo from Sweden who may never tour outside of Scandinavia. (Click here to visit Fox & Wolf’s website.)

A! E! I! O! YEAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!!

First off, don’t say hair-metal, say pop-metal. You can’t hear somebody’s follicles, you CAN hear a band’s willingness to write in a catchy, accessible, inclusive and immediate fashion while maintaing the sonic aesthetic of their subculture. Here’s two fine examples of the genre that I’ve chosen mainly because I get to reference bands that indie folks are prone to respect (or at least openly enjoy).

If you can’t handle the gratitous guitar squeals and the hypersexual, effeminate “ooh ooh” vocal hook found on Warrant’s “32 Pennies,” odds are you’ll never have much love for the scene. But anybody who gets off on the psychedelic lyricism of Love’s Arthur Lee (who used to live in bottles and pretend that they were cans) should adore Jani Lane’s wordplay here. He dances with his shadow but lets his shadow lead. 32 pennies in a Ragu jar is all he’s got to his name, but he loves her and she loves him (but to the pennies, it’s all the same). If you dig this track, definitely check out their debut album Dirty Rotten Filthy Stinking Rich (recently re-mastered and burdened with crappy liner notes that should have been written by Metal Mike Saunders of the Angry Samoans). It’s by far the finest pop-metal album I’ve heard: lyrically witty, playful yet sentimental and always unabashedly foxy. “32 Pennies” isn’t the best track on the album, it’s just the opening salvo – a gregarious ornament on the hood of their flashy ride. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Kix’s later albums, while enjoyable, blatantly aped the template created by the success of Def Leppard’s Pyromania. Their first two releases, Kix and Cool Kids, released in ’81 and ’83, are far less obvious beasts. Major influences on Poison, these guys danced between the AOR-side of new wave (Cheap Trick, the Ramones and the Cars) and more openly hard-rock/metal influences like AC/DC, Sweet and Kiss. In a sense, they’re the missing link between these respected ’70s giants and the underrated hairfarmers that followed: a synthesis that had yet to be sold as a specific niche.

“Yeah Yeah Yeah,” the finale of their self-titled debut, opens with a riff that might have been from R.E.M.’s Chronic Town (except that EP came out a year later) before suddenly zooming into a musical territory the Georgia quartet could never pull off as authoritatively (check out their b-side “Burning Hell” for proof). The first three minutes are enough to make the band a worthier similacrum of Bon Scott-era AC/DC than the Brian Johnston-led real deal. Then singer Steve Whiteman blows the competition away by whipping out an Elmer Fudd impersonation and launching into a sexually frustrated monologue to the cheers and hollers of an enthusiastic audience (“A big bottle of Jack Daniels, not the little one, the BIG one! And I ALWAYS carry a stash…cuz you never know!”). I’d suggest Karen O and the boys make it their theme song, but I’m not sure they could maintain the giddy, energy level for so long. All the more proof that people who write this shit off are missing out. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Rip Taylor “The Real Rip Taylor” – With the help of Jim O’Brien, “The World’s Funniest Rock Star” (whose repetoire includes “Crack In My Ass” and “I Read It In The Weekly World News”), Rip Taylor, comedy megastar and Fluxblog icon, has finally shot down all the fake-ass Rip Taylors that have crawled out of the woodwork following his rise to fame. The inexplicable acid-rock backdrop makes the track oddly reminiscent of the Kroon Along With Krusty version of “Break On Through.” Laugh! It’s funny! (Click here to buy it at Rip Taylor’s official site.)

Anthony Miccio is freelancer who has written for Blender, The Village Voice, and Stylus.

Take Me Away, Take My Soul

Acen/Aurora/Krome & Time/Terrorize/Psychotropic: “SL2 Megamix” – The early ’90s L.A. dance label Moonshine has long been maligned by post-rave purists, but I’m not one of them. Their early ’90s compilation CDs are a crucial part of my listening DNA; like no other record label, they introduced acres of American mall rats to techno and its offshoots, and the Speed Limit 140 BPM Plus series, which lasted eight volumes before it was buried (there was an abortive attempt to revive it in 2001), constitute one of the greatest compilations ever made, particularly volumes one and three. I was, needless to say, one of those mall rats; when Moonshine came around, I was going to high school and working as, yep, a hologram salesman at the Mall of America, which was right across the street from my family’s apartment. (My mother still lives in the same complex.)

Hit the Decks Volume 1 (subtitle: “Techno DJs Take Control”) was released in 1993, the year I graduated high school; I bought it along with every other Moonshine title that came out at the time at the non-Sam Goody record store whose name I’m forgetting on the first floor. (They had an amazing selection for a mall chain store–nearly every SST title, lots of other punk and alternative stuff, and pretty much every rave compilation there was at the time.) At the time, I was also taping Kevin Cole’s Radio Depth Probe program, which aired midnight on Saturdays, off of the local modern rock station; he mostly played house and techno, with a healthy smattering of industrial and occasional noise and hip-hop tracks. (I have long harbored the fantasy of starting a label to reissue those shows on CD.) One of the tracks he was playing a lot of during my 1992-3 senior year was Terrorize’s “Feel the Rhythm,” which features a convulsive morse-code piano riff, piledriver breakbeats, and a wailing diva who can barely keep in key: “I feel the rhythm in my soul/Whoa-oh-oh-oooh/I let the rhythm take control/Hey-ay-ay-ay/So won’t you take me away/Take my soul.” In other words, it sounds like every other breakbeat hardcore track of the period, which means it sounds like one of the greatest records ever made: immediate, ridiculous, awe-kissed. The thing is, I’ve almost never seen the thing mentioned anywhere. Partly, that’s because I haven’t exactly made a serious manhunt for it, I suspect because I like having the memory of hearing it supercede the experience of playing it anytime I want; partly, no one seems to have noticed it as anything special. And maybe it wasn’t. But Simon Reynolds’ Generation Ecstasy/Energy Flash discography doesn’t mention it, and the only place I’ve ever seen it compiled is on Hit the Decks (there never was a Volume 2), which features six “Megamix”es averaging seven individual tracks and seven minutes apiece. “Feel the Rhythm” figures into half of these mixes, by Two Little Boys, Carl Cox, and SL2. (The other three are by Megabass, Unity, and Krome & Time.) None of them use it for more than the chorus; it appears for less than 30 seconds per mix, and Two Little Boys and Cox use it more thoroughly than SL2. But SL2’s is the best overall mix, featuring Acen’s “Trip II the Moon,” Aurora’s “Spectral Bass,” Krome & Time’s “This Is the Sound for the Underground,” and Psychotropic’s “Hypnosis.” (Click here here to buy Hit the Decks Volume 1 from Amazon.)

May Irwin: “The Bully” – I haven’t checked this with Perpetua yet, but I’m fairly confident this is the oldest song ever posted on Fluxblog. According to the Allen Lowe-compiled 9CD box, American Pop: An Audio History, from which I got this song, there are two possible recording dates for it: either May 20, 1907, or February 1909 (no specific date). It’s a ballad, a story song, and it’s certainly jauntier than the parlor-room ballads of the period, so maybe it’s a cakewalk; I’m a little iffy when it comes to discerning early 20th century musical styles. And oh yeah–it’s an extraordinarily violent revenge tale sung from the vantage of, and I quote, “a Tennessee nigger,” by a white woman who, in all, drops the N-bomb nine times in three minutes. I’d facetiously call this the first gangsta rap record if it weren’t so many other things, not least a glimpse into real live as it existed minstrelsy, and a record that can still startle you nearly a century after it was made. (Click here to buy American Pop: An Audio History from Amazon.)

Michaelangelo Matos is the music editor for Seattle Weekly. He recently completed a book about Prince’s Sign O’ The Times album for the The 33 1/3 Series.

Here Comes Love Forever

Scritti Politti “Jacques Derrida” – R.I.P. Jacques Derrida. Fear not, you won’t need to know anything about literary theory or deconstruction to enjoy this song. Like most everything in the Scritti Politti catalog, this song is as slick and poppy as it is literate and brainy. The song concludes with a somewhat cheesy rap by Green Gartside which includes what I believe to be the best usage of the word “rapacious” in the history of pop music. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

LiLiPUT “Might Is Right” – Here is another old family favorite. This song was one of my staples back when I still made a lot of mix tapes and cds. I almost always sequenced it after the Silver Apples’ “Program” and immediately before Royal Trux’s “Back To School,” so now whenever it ends I expect to hear Neil Haggerty’s spacey guitar. “Might Is Right” has a distinct nostalgic quality to it which brings to mind vague images of the countryside and sense memories of things I’m not even sure that I’ve ever experienced first hand. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Emotions, Books, Outlooks On Life

Sonic Youth @ Irving Plaza 10/13/2004

I Love You Golden Blue/Stones/Pattern Recognition/Unmade Bed/Skip Tracer/White Cross/Mariah Carey/New Hampshire/Paper Cup Exit/Drunken Butterfly//Expressway To Yr Skull

This was just a good Sonic Youth show, nothing particularly amazing, but fine enough. I’ve seen SY enough now that they need to really be on fire to knock me out(Webster Hall ’04, Central Park ’02). I wish that they had played at least one song that I hadn’t seen before, but I certainly can’t complain about “Skip Tracer,” “White Cross,” and “Expressway.” But c’mon, please, just one show without “Drunken Butterfly”! Please!

Gang Gang Dance were like the most incomprehensible glam goth band in the world. If I was going to make a Star Wars movie, I’d have them supply the music for an alien band.

Saul Williams was very impressive and charismatic. He played a tight, quick set with his band which was well received by the audience, though it was kinda weird to see an extremely white crowd respond when he shouted “where are my niggaz?” in “African People.” “Grippo” was excellent – the Chrome sample was played live on viola and violin.

The Moving Units were awful. It was like Rapture with all the catchy bits removed. No thank you.

The Head Set were mediocre, but had a few somewhat catchy songs at the end of their set. Someone needs to tell them that they’d be better off if they weren’t going so far out of their way to ape The Strokes and The Walkmen. That singer guy needs to stop with that affectation, right away. Playing less trad rock arrangements should be the next step after that.

I Thought You’d Fallen Off The Edge Of The World

Kylie Minogue “I Believe In You” – This is the long-awaited Kylie/Scissor Sisters collaboration. It’s not quite what I was expecting (I was anticipating something much more flamboyant with vocals by Jake Shears), but it’s excellent nonetheless. This is Kylie at her most elegant: a swooning disco ballad augmented by mellow synths and simple, understated strings. (Click here to pre-order it from Amazon UK.)

Cosmetique “Lady Di, Why Did You Have To Die?” – I acquired this rare, out-of-print circa-2000 promo 7″ thanks to Anfunny, my #1 tipster. This song was never commercially released, probably because they couldn’t get the sample clearance for Laura Brannigan’s “Gloria,” which is the basis for this track. As you can imagine, this isn’t the most tasteful song in the world – the lyrics are mostly salacious tabloid speculation, and the backing track is somewhat crude and overly filtered. Nevertheless, this song is very fun and strangely compelling.

And speaking of things which are strangely compelling…

David Boyle “George W. Pussy” – This was sent to me just the other day by Mr. Boyle, who included a note along with the mp3. This could very well be the strangest song that I post all year. He explains:

In late August, I recorded a rap song called “George W. Pussy”, a copy of which I’m attaching to this mail in MP3 form, and lyrics pasted in below. No, there’re no obscenities in it really, just some “meowing” sound effects off the keyboard, etc., so there’ll be no FCC problems. I borrow the riff from “Super Freak” (R.I.P. Rick James; I went to his 8/14 funeral service in Buffalo NY, touched his hand). There may even be subtle Sex Pistols references worked in…I wonder if the song or a video of it could even influence the 2004 election; there’s no really memorable “Bush stinks” music out there, so that “George W. Pussy” could be the “Fahrenheit 9/11” of music (or even the “October surprise”?!)…..there’s even the Rick James nostalgia factor, believe it or not! Use of the “Super Freak” hook made a #1 hit for M.C. Hammer, and “George W. Pussy” is far more controversial/ hypertopical than “U Can’t Touch This”, so should be able to do even better….. Though I’ve no distributor or promoter yet, so am looking around. I’m already working on storyboarding for the video, much of which involves Bush running around in a flight suit with the word “AWOL”, “W” much bigger than the rest of the letters because he’s “W” himself, on his chest, as he’s running away and crying. I think that should get the message across pretty clearly, since people have to graphically be shown the truth: the truth that Bush is America’s biggest sissy, the Coward-in-Chief.

(Click here to visit David Boyle’s website.)

Champagne And A Chocolate Ice Cream Cake

Cristina “Mamma Mia” – Cristina Monet was the product of an extraordinarily glamorous lifestyle – a beautiful, Harvard-educated rich girl who made the scene in New York, London, and Paris in the late 70s and early 80s. She was the girlfriend and eventual wife of Ze Records owner Michael Zilkha, who released her two albums and a handful of singles on his label between 1980 and 1984. “Mamma Mia” is a selection from her self-titled debut, which has now been retroactively retitled Doll In The Box as a cd reissue. The record is a campy, cabaret-flavored disco masterpiece, produced and written primarily by August “Kid Creole” Darnell, who would go on to become Ze’s house producer. I can’t recommend Doll In The Box highly enough; it’s by far one of the best albums that I’ve heard in months. It’s the sort of record which maintains an unusually high level of quality from start to finish and is not even slightly diminished by the addition of bonus tracks from period singles, such as her distinctive versions of Peggy Lee’s “Is That All There Is?” and The Beatles’ “Drive My Car.” (The latter of which can be downloaded from this Cristina website.)

Cristina “What’s A Girl To Do?” – On her second and final album Sleep It Off, Cristina left disco and Kid Creole behind to make a punky new wave album with Don Was. Unlike the first record, Cristina wrote the majority of the lyrics for Sleep It Off, resulting in an album of wry, ironic, self-deprecating songs about upscale decadence and jetset sleaze set to Was’ bouncey new wave pop. Fans of Ladytron might recognize “What’s A Girl To Do” from their recent mix compilation Softcore Jukebox, though for some reason I did not, which is sort of amazing given how immediately memorable this song is. (Click here to buy Doll In The Box and/or Sleep It Off from the Ze Records Shop.)

Elsewhere: Kylie fans ought to check out Enthusiastic But Mediocre, which has her latest single “Giving You Up” available as an mp3 for a limited time. This song is the obligatory new single on her newest greatest hits collection, and will probably not be released in the United States, so snap it up now unless you’re eager to pay through the nose for the import.

Contest Winners!

Thanks to everyone who sent in answers to the survey. Since I might not be able to do all of the math necessary to make sense of the results until next week, you can feel free to send in top ten lists to fluxblog @ gmail.com if you haven’t already, but the contest is over. I will contact the winners via email for mailing addresses, etc.

The winners are:

Remote #4: Scott Arthur

Sumosonic 29: Chris Clark

Sumosonic 28: Heather Young

Maxi Geil & Playcolt: Caroline McKusick

It’s Almost Too Much

Kiki “So Easy To Forget” – Video treatment: As the song begins, the screen is all black, save for little glimmers of light which blink in time with the high pitched keyboard sounds. As the keyboard washes enter the mix, we see more lights, and the visuals gradually become busier as the camera pulls back. When the vocals come in, we see that what we’ve really been looking at is city lights outside the window of a moving car. We watch the passenger watch the city glide by his window. (Click here to buy it from Bpitch Control.)

Racine “Grease Monkey” – This song is all simmering intensity and barely restrained lust without release – so obviously, it’s pretty hot. I appreciate that the lyrics are somewhat timid – it’s all about anticipation and waiting for the other person to make their move. (Click here to buy it from Amazon UK.)

Also: I’m going to keep the polling open through Monday morning. I’ll announce the winners in Monday’s entry.

Elsewhere: I am quoted in an article in today’s issue of the Christian Science Monitor about marketing music on the internet. The article also includes a quote from Largehearted Boy proprietor David Gutowski.

Dear Fellow Citizens

Gustav “We Shall Overcome” – In spite of a fairly minimal arrangement, this song implies the epic sweep of a U2 anthem while sounding more like Bjork circa Homogenic. Without ever seeming trite or condescending, the song expresses sincere hope and optimism in the face of a world with an ever-darkening moral grey scale. Like most ethical informed people, Gustav struggles with the guilt of complicity and the frustation of endlessly compromised idealism, but refuses to give in to despair. The song has a rather beautiful sentiment, and is exactly the kind of stump speech that a lot of us need to hear these days, especially here in the United States as Election Day looms, and four more years of the Bush administration becomes a very real possibility. (Click here for Gustav’s bio on the Mosz label site and here for her official site.)

Curtis Knight “The Devil Made Me Do It” – This is for everyone who wanted to hear more from the out-of-print Chains & Black Exhaust compilation. “The Devil Made Me Do It” is absolute proof that pop music has never at any point been a meritocracy. By all rights, this should’ve been a smash in the late 60s, the kind of song which pops up nowadays in retro movies and is played ad nauseum on classic rock radio. For one reason or another (probably in part due to the title), the song is hopelessly obscure; lost to generations of people who would probably love it if they ever had a chance to hear it. If we absolutely must have a Lenny Kravitz, can he at least perform a public service by popularizing a song like this? There’s no way Lenny (or most anyone else) could ever touch this recording – especially not the priceless bit at the 1:26 mark with the sassy woman interjecting at the end of the verse – but at least people would know that this song exists.

Also: Thanks to everyone who has responded to the poll thus far, but there’s still a great many of you who have yet to respond. I’m hoping to get at least 10% of the regular audience, and right now, it’s more like 5%. After everything is done, I’ll do the math and post a list of the top ten songs according to the results.

Our Hearts Are Connected

The Projects “If There Are More Of Us” – This seems like it could be the result of a band arguing whether to sound like the Silver Apples or Gang Of Four, and compromising by playing like both bands simultaneously. There’s a strong Stereolab vibe to this as well, no doubt in part due to the presence of former Stereolab member Morgan Lhote on keyboards. The song is a little too busy at some points, but it is still quite effective overall. (Click here to buy it from Track & Field.)

French Disco “Collapse On Sound” – As the Northeastern United States eases into sweater weather, I feel a greater need for cozy 80s-style indie pop songs like this, which conveys a sense of comfort via dreamy melodies and softened guitar distortion. It’s very modest, but self-assured and catchy in a easygoing, casual sort of way. This is definitely the kind of song which will sound pretty good most of the time, but will suddenly seem quite special if you hear it at just the right moment. (Click here to visit the official French Disco site.)

Also: I know that there are a LOT more of you reading this site every day than are responding to my poll from the previous entry. Even if you have no interest in getting a prize, I would greatly appreciate it if you responded. Don’t get too hung up on the ‘top ten’ thing – I just want to know what songs you like from the past few months, and if you’ve purchased anything as a result of finding something here. Here is a text document with a list of everything posted here since the beginning of June, with the exception of selections posted by guest writers.

Note: Though I am glad that a lot of you have gotten into The Arcade Fire via mp3 blogs, I’ve never actually posted anything by that band. In fact, I haven’t even listened to that record. I do believe that you have Sean Michaels to thank for that one.

A Fat Guy In A T-Shirt Doing All The Singing

LCD Soundsystem “Movement” – Though he certainly flirted with The Fall-isms on previous LCD Soundsystem releases, James Murphy fully embraces-UH! Mark E. Smith’s distinctive-TUH! intonation-AH! on this track. The song starts off sounding a bit like a homage to Suicide with its simple, jittery keyboard riff and urgent percussion, but the tension is released when the song shifts into full-on punk rock mode about halfway through. It’s not a landmark recording like “Yeah,” but it is certainly a high quality track which does nothing to mar the band’s small but uniformly excellent catalog to date. (Click here to visit the official DFA site.)

Special Needs “Francesca” – There’s a whole lot of affectation going on here, but it’s all rather charming. Basically, this is a post-Smiths Britpop band playing a faux-Greaser anthem, as if to answer the question “What if Morrissey played The Fonz on Happy Days?” You may want to avoid this song if you are allergic to cheesy melodrama, but even still, this might be too catchy to resist. (Click here to buy it from Rough Trade.)

Getting To Know My Target Demo You: The Contest!

Once again, I’d like to know what you’ve enjoyed the most out of what has been posted here in the past few months. Unlike the last two times I’ve done this, I want to make this a bit more organized, and also give you an added incentive to play along – ie, free stuff.

This is how it’s going to work:

Send an email to fluxblog @ gmail.com with the words FLUXBLOG POLL in the subject line. List your ten favorite songs (the list doesn’t have to be in a particular order, but it would help.) that have been featured on the blog since May of 2004. (You can list more than ten if you like, that’s okay with me.) Also, please let me know if you’ve purchased anything as a result of finding a track here on Fluxblog – a cd, a concert ticket, a dvd, a t-shirt, whatever.

On Friday afternoon, there will be a random drawing of all of the emails sent in (well, except for the ones which do not follow the instructions properly), and four prize winners will be selected. These are the four prizes:

* Remote Issue 4, a (region-free) dvd containing a 49 short films and music videos, including material by Imperial Teen, The Streets, Murs, The Shins, Mad Villain, Liars, Bumblebeez 81, Circlesquare, Crazy Girl, TV On The Radio, and Gravy Train.

* Two separate winners will get a copy of either Sumosonic volume 28 or 29 from the House Of Heavy series. Volume 28 contains material by !!!, Felix Da Housecat, Armand Van Helden, Pink Grease, Prince Po, and Nick Chacona, plus a bonus dvd of animated shorts. Volume 29 includes songs by Mouse On Mars, A Gun Called Tension, Black Strobe, I Am The World Trade Center, Sons & Daughters, The Concretes, and To Rococo Rot.

* A Message To My Audience, the debut album by Maxi Geil & Playcolt.

Please indicate in your email what your first choice would be out of these prizes, so that if you’re the first pick, you get dibs on what you want the most.

Here is a text document with a list of everything posted here since the beginning of June, with the exception of selections posted by guest writers.

Love Comes Dressed In Black

Blackrock “Yeah Yeah” – This is a selection from the out-of-print Chains + Black Exhaust bootleg compilation, a collection of extremely rare black psychedelic/r+b/funk recordings from the late 60s and early 70s curated by a group of mysterious DJs called Memphix. The compilation is easily one of the most frustrating releases in recent years, as the actual packaging includes no information whatsoever aside from the word Jones, which is apparently an entirely fictitious label name. The very title of the compilation is theoretical. Thanks to the detective work of others, I’m lucky enough to know the names of the songs and artists on the record, but that’s about it. This particular track is rather stunning in its grace, with its stately piano, low-key funk, and elegant, soulful guitar solos. If you’re a fan of Hendrix or early Parliament, you’re probably going to adore this.

Stazi “Love Is Lethal” – Similarly, if you’re fond of 80s synthpop approximations of “Northern Soul” and Motown (think: Soft Cell, Erasure, Naked Eyes), this Stazi song will probably do the trick. I’ve been a big fan of this song for several months now, but I only recently realized that I’ve never actually posted it here, though it oftens seems to me that I have. In my little world, this song is already a classic. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

I Know You’re Hot, Won’t You Please Be Cool?

Bugz In The Attic “Booty (La La)” – This is certainly an occasion when my immediate enthusiasm for a song is at odds with my ability to write something about it which does it some justice. The truth is, I’ve barely thought about this song because I’ve been too busy feeling it. I want to share it with you all anyway, because it’s just too good to sit on for a weekend. You need this hotness right now. Basically, Bugz In The Attic are applying Basement Jaxx’s maximalist aesthetic to the broken beat subgenre, resulting in a track which is forceful, busy, euphoric, soulful, and insanely catchy. (Click here to visit the official Bugz In The Attic site.)

Les Georges Leningrad “Supadoopa” – A lot of the punk-funk music that I’ve been hearing recently has been a bit too sterile and oppressive for my tastes, but this song spazzes out with a wreckless abandon that is quite appealing, though not entirely easy on the ears. I suggest that you all play this for your most gullible indie-loving friend, and tell them that it is an unreleased Karen O/Rapture collaboration. They will probably fall for it! (Click here to buy it from Other Music.)

Close Your Eyes And Think Of This

Petra Haden “Armenia City In The Sky” – This is a selection from Haden’s unreleased a cappella cover of the entirety of The Who’s The Who Sell Out. Haden recorded all of the vocals by herself, reinterpreting the sound of the original’s guitars, percussion, and electronic buzzes and drones as vocal parts, resulting in a track which sounds like a psychedelic glee club. If you would like to hear more from this project, three other songs from the record are preserved in real audio as part of this episode of Irwin Chusid’s Gender Bias.

Sandra Lou “Le Banana Split”– This is a fairly straight cover of the Lio classic, but recorded in such a way as to make the intensely peppy original seem sluggish and anemic in comparison. I’ve had a lot of trouble finding information about Sandra Lou in English, so if you happen to know anything about her or this record, feel free to pass it along in the comments box. (Click here to buy it from Amazon Germany.)

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Luomo & Raz O’Hara “Running Away” – On this new single, Luomo and Raz O’Hara jack the bassline from “Smooth Criminal” (and “Billie Jean” on the b-side) and use it as the foundation for an entirely new song. It’s interesting how after a minute or so, I barely notice the familiar melody underneath, as the song takes on a life and mood of its own, separate from the context of Michael Jackson. As one might expect from Luomo, there’s a cool, clean, icy sound to this track; far more smooth than criminal. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Saicobab “Death Valley 69” – This was recorded by Yoshimi of the Boredoms for the recent Confuse Yr Idols Sonic Youth tribute album on the Narnack label. It’s quite an interesting version of the song, as it transposes all of the guitar parts to the sitar, which suits the song’s hippies-gone-evil subtext. Yoshimi sings all of Thurston’s lines through a severe vocoder, rendering those parts nearly incomprehensible and totally inhuman. This cover version evokes a lot of the same feelings of dread and imminent doom that the original conveyed, but it’s almost as though instead of the Manson family playing the role of the villain, it’s some disturbingly mellow android. (Click here to buy it from Narnack Records.)

A Geometric Grid Of Little Squares

Kahimi Karie “What Are You Wearing?” – I wish that I could come up with a clever, catchy word that would be the cutesy Japanese hipster girl equivalent of Blaxploitation, because that would be the name of the subgenre for a song like this. Not surprisingly, this is the work of Momus, who might be indie rock’s leading Asian fetishist aside from Rivers Cuomo. The strange thing about this song is that in spite of itself, it doesn’t sound very Japanese, mostly due to Karie’s bizarre singing voice, which sounds like Elmo approximating a chanteuse. This is not exactly a turn-on for me, but if you’re at all creepy, it should seem pretty hott. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

The Concretes “Chico (Avalanches’ “Wernham Hogg” remix)” – I’m not sure what this remix might have to do with The Office, but it is rather outstanding as it manages to mix together at least seven different genres of loveliness into four minutes while keeping the source material very recognizable. I don’t care what comes first – more Avalanches remixes or a new Avalanches LP – but more, please. (Click here to buy it from Rough Trade.)



Elsewhere: John Tofu Hut and Oliver Soul Sides combine like Voltron, and the Soul Hut is born!

For FF fans: Eppy has posted his analysis of “My Dog Was Lost But Now He’s Found”, this time including mp3s of the SBN demo version and the Eleanor solo acoustic recording from East Village Radio along with his notes and observations.

Also: If you happen to be 1) in NYC on October 15th 2) registered for CMJ and 3) available at noon (that should narrow the list down to maybe three people reading this, tops), please come visit the Press Play: Rediscovering Music Journalism Online panel, which will feature Mark Willet, Scott Plagenhoef, and myself along with Sub Pop’s director of publicity Steve Manning and SPIN’s Will Hermes as the moderator.

Put My Head Down, Crumple My Paper

Wu-Tang Clan “Wu-Tang Clan Ain’t Nuthing Ta F’ Wit/Shame On A Nigga (live in San Bernardino, July 17, 2004) – This is a selection from the new Wu-Tang Clan live album which was recorded at a rare one-off show featuring all nine members of the Clan (plus Cappadonna) in California over the summer. It’s exactly what I always suspected a Wu show would be like – shambolic but energetic, intense but fun. The setlist is absolutely brilliant – the majority of Enter The 36 Chambers is included, mostly played at the start of the show, with well-selected highlights from the three other Wu albums, plus classic material from the various solo records. They waste little time on stage, jumping from song to song and skipping verses in order to pack in as many songs as humanly possible within 70 minutes. The structure of the show seems to inadvertantly reveal the hierarchy of the Clan – the more successful members of the Clan (Method Man, Ghostface, Raekwon, Ol’ Dirty Bastard) dominate the Wu-Tang group cuts and get the spotlight on their own hits, whereas poor U-God only pops up now and again and isn’t allowed to perform any of his solo material. Even Wu part-timer Cappadonna gets his own solo tune! (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

The Mogs “Kelly Blame (Ph 606 version)” – The disco beat, breathy French vocals, and acid keyboards are all fine and good, but the mantra-like repetition of the words “I’m in love” is what sells this song. As the words repeat, they become almost entirely abstract, and the vocals approximate the sound of a siren, in both senses of the word. (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

The Fiery Furnaces @ Bowery Ballroom NYC 9/25/2004

Wolf Notes (first half of song, rock version)/Leaky Crystal (alternating lines from Leaky Tunnel and Crystal Clear)/Worry Worry (a verse and chorus)/Blueberry Boat (two verses)/Worry Worry (verse and chorus)/Hurry Worry (2nd half of Smelling Cigarettes)/ Smelling Cigarettes (first half)/My Dog Was Lost But Now He’s Found/Wolf Notes (reprise of first half)/Two Fat Feet (verse and chorus)/Straight Street (a few verses and chorus)/Two Fat Feet (verse and chorus)/Oregon (part of Mason City, “take the Oregon Short Line to Salt Lake”)/Name Game/Chief Inspector Blancheflower (all three sections without outro, ‘Typewriter’ section played as punk song with Eleanor on vocals, Matt sings ‘Jenny’ section with keyboards)/Quay Cur (played dramatically after “you know damn well she ain’t your Jenny no more”, only first two verses and chorus)/Tropical Iceland (full song, keyboard heavy arrangement)/Up In The North (verse leading up to chorus, when she sings “and it went like this,” it shifts to next song)/Nabs (part of Mason City, “geeched that gazoon’s gow” etc)/South Is Only A Home (keyboard-centric ‘disco’ version)/Blueberry Boat (keyboards, verses and “you ain’t never getting the cargo of my blueberry boat”)/Bow Wow (verse and chorus, slow, keyboards)/Birdie Brain/Inca Rag/Asthma Attack (power trio version)/Don’t Dance Her Down (verse, chorus)/Oregon reprise/Chris Michaels (first line only)/Evergreen (starts on guitar, Matt shifts to keyboard for second verse)/Chris Michaels (“Chinese Bird” section – “Tony,” “I’m the little bird…”)/Mason City (first few verses)/Spaniolated (power trio version)/Chris Michaels (“remember that girl…so so stup” —> “Chillum” section, the credit card section cut out/(Matt’s guitar gets screwed up, they pause for a bit til he gets a new one)/Chris Michaels (starts back up with “Chillum” section, when that ends it goes back to the first section, “later at lunch…”)/Wolf Notes (on keyboard, second half of song, showtuney)/Quay Cur (Inuit section, keyboards, played like a stadium anthem)/Quay Cur (final section main theme, chorus)/Wolf Notes (first half over Quay Cur music, ending on “play me a tune!”) // encore: I Broke My Mind/Single Again/I’m Gonna Run

Though it is not always necessary to include a setlist with a live review, this is certainly a case in which seeing a detailed run-down of what the band played is fairly essential in getting an idea of what this show was like. The structure of the set was even stranger than on previous FF tours. Rather than simply playing alternate arrangements and medleys of the songs as they had before, the new set chops up the songs and recombines them. In some cases, this modular approach yields bizarre results, such as the Frankenstein’s monster mash-up of “Leaky Tunnel” and “Crystal Clear,” but for the most part the tinkering appears to be in the interest of steamlining the set and eliminating inertia from the show altogether. It’s almost as though the set was designed for an audience with ADD, skipping from “good part” to “good part,” leaving out every “boring” step in between. I half-expect Eleanor Friedberger to sadistically pout “bored now” as every song section ends, evil Willow Rosenberg-style.

This was my fourth time seeing the Fiery Furnaces live since the end of 2003, and it was by far the best show that I’ve seen them play. They are much tighter now as a band, so when they play their nonstop medley set, the transitions are nearly seamless and the performance is cleaner and more fluid. Though it was thrilling when it seemed as though they were making up their set as they went along, the more premeditated approach serves them well, allowing themselves to appear more confident and deliberate.

The Trumpet Summons Us Again!

George Atkins and Hank Levine “The Trumpet” – Though the concept of making a novelty pop album out of John F. Kennedy’s speeches seems strange and unfathomable, the actual record is even more peculiar than you might imagine. Not content to simply set the President’s words to standard instrumentals, the producers of the record recast Kennedy as a lead vocalist for a groovy pop band, with a chorus of back up singers cheerfully repeating his solemn words as though to mock him. The results are ridiculous and highly inappropriate, especially when the chorus repeats the words “tyranny and poverty, tyranny and poverty” over and over with demented glee like a jingle from hell.

Dan Friel “7Sisters” – In spite of almost exclusively using cheap, semi-obsolete electronic gear, Dan Friel manages to create an impressively massive wall of sound on this track. This basically sounds like a more aggressive Flying Saucer Attack, with all of the lead parts played on overdriven keyboards over droning guitar chords and a chintzy drum machine. For best results, you’re going to want to play this as loud as you possibly can, to maximize the physical sensation of the waves of treble passing over you. (Click here to buy it from Velocirecords.)

Elsewhere: Fans of the Fiery Furnaces should please note that Eppy has posted his analysis of “Paw Paw Tree,” bringing him near to the halfway point on the album.

“This Doesn’t Happen To My Band”

The Dandy Warhols “We Used To Be Friends” – After having seen Dig!, it’s hard not to think of this song outside of the context of the bizarre relationship of The Dandy Warhols’ Courtney Taylor and The Brian Jonestown Massacre’s Anton Newcombe. It basically comes down to this – Taylor is the reasonably well adjusted leader of a band who has achieved some modest success, but is in thrall of Newcombe, a charismatic but clearly insane musician who lacks the basic coping skills necessary to function within the music industry. Taylor and Newcombe become friends shortly after the Dandys play their first show in San Francisco, and the film documents the following seven years as Taylor and his band gradually become more successful, and Newcombe and his rotating cast of sidemen continue on a downward spiral into chaos, madness, addiction, and commercial failure. The film is essentially a Goofus And Gallant story – though the Dandys are in many ways just as debauched as the BJM, they are mature and capable careerists, whereas Newcombe seems unable (or unwilling) to make any rational decisions whatsoever. As Taylor moves up in a world which demands compromise, his admiration for Newcombe’s integrity and relentless productivity grows in direct proportion to Newcombe’s resentment and obvious envy of the Dandys’ good fortune.

One of the most peculiar things about Dig! is that Anton Newcombe’s talents are never at any point called into question. Every single person in the film truly believes that he is a visionary genius, largely based on his prolific output and ability to play several instruments. Taylor and an A&R woman from Elektra rhapsodize about Newcombe’s knack for rewriting and recontextualizing the rock music of the 60s, speaking of this fact as though his project was so much unlike the hundreds of other bands from the same period stripmining the same canon. This willful revisionism only serves to enable Newcombe’s toxic, egomaniacal self-narrative in which he is a misunderstood Christ-like figure who is entitled to abuse everyone in his life because he is a Great Artist. Any armchair analyst will recognize the symptoms of Newcombe’s various psychoses – OCD, sociopathic tendencies, megalomania, paranoid schizophrenia. Every relationship in Newcombe’s life ends in disaster, and his situation only gets worse over time, exacerbated by his addiction to heroin.

At the end of the film, Courtney Taylor tells us of the lesson that he’s learned from Newcombe’s antics – “If it’s good, it’s fun, and if it’s bad, it’s funny.” But at some point in the third act, Newcombe’s behavior stops seeming funny and over the top, like a Best Show character made flesh, and just becomes sad and pathetic. His obsession with Taylor results in stalking the Dandy Warhols at CMJ, and then in sending them a package containing shotgun shells with their names on them as a perverse joke, later on insisting that if he wanted to kill them, he would have already done it. Newcombe’s longterm collaborators finally abandon him; his record deal with TVT ends in profound failure; and he is charged with brutally assaulting an audience member in New York City. As the film concludes, Newcombe seems to be as oblivious as ever to the dire reality of his situation, choosing to cling to his destructive self-mythology to the bitter end, absolutely refusing to learn any lessons from his mistakes.

(Click here to buy it from Amazon.)