Soul Mechanik “Never Touch That Switch (Freeform Reform by the Freeform Five)” – The Freeform Five created this mix for Soul Mechanik, but since Robbie Williams covered the sci-fi funk tune on his new album, all plans to officially release this version were scrapped. This is a curious situation given that Soul Mechanik are the authors of the original, but I suppose that Robbie has got some ace lawyers. Unsurprisingly, the Robbie Williams and Freeform Five versions veer off in opposite directions. Williams’ recording emphasizes the woozy vocal hooks and plays out in under three minutes, and this mix stretches out to nearly eight as it bounces along on a bass line that will very likely tempt you to sing “hey Dirt-ay, baby I got your mon-ay, don’t you wor-ray” over the top until the song builds up to an impressive release of tension in its middle section. (Click here for the Freeform Five’s MySpace page.)

Pet Shop Boys “Bright Young Things” – Continuing on with today’s unintentional theme of rejected music, the Pet Shop Boys recorded this song as a theme for the movie of the same name, but it was ultimately cast aside for the fact that its style did not match the period of the film’s storyline, which was adapted from Evelyn Waugh’s novel Vile Bodies. Though its removal from that project is perfectly sensible, I find it very baffling that the Pet Shop Boys did not choose to include the track on this year’s Fundamental, on which it would have been the best selection along with the Eurodisco protest tune “Integral.”

The formal party described in the song may be “a port in a storm” for its young socialite characters, but that does not keep them from slipping into loneliness and desperation as the track shifts from its still, melancholy opening verses into the angst-ridden dance beat of its remainder. The characters hide from themselves and the world around them in ritual and the promise of safety and romance, but they aren’t fooled by their own illusions, and every choreographed gesture looms large in their lives just as it rings very false. The chorus is not the focal point of the song in terms of its composition, but it burns with nuanced yet potent emotion like the all-time best Pet Shop Boys tracks. (Click here to buy it from Amazon UK.)

Velella Velella “Brass Ass” – Velella Velella was pitched to me by my friend as an “indie Funkadelic,” but that’s not quite right –their slick grooves actually sound more like a live band hell bent on simulating the polyglot funk compositions of artists such as DJ Shadow, Luke Vibert, Daft Punk, and Prefuse 73. “Brass Ass” leans heavily on the after-midnight mood of DJ Shadow’s Entroducing, but as with all of the tracks on Velella Vellela’s MySpace page, it’s not so much a direct homage as much as the product of musicians who very likely came to funk indirectly via sample-based music, which is the case for a vast majority of people under the age of 30. Rather than get hung up on untangling the knot of infinite quotation and recycling of their genre in the post-sampling age, the band embrace impurity to tap into something deep by proxy. The vocals can be a bit candy-assed, but thankfully they err on the side of the extremely white soul of Phoenix more often than they drift into the imperialistic tweeness of the Go Team. (Click here for Velella Velella’s MySpace page.)

Jim Jones (featuring Max B) “Bright Lights, Big City” – Jim Jones’ best tracks tend to showcase the subtly plaintive quality of his voice, and deliver his garden variety street lyrics with a tone that suggests fearfulness rather than fearsomeness. “Bright Lights, Big City” sounds like a guy trying to find the silver lining in his paranoia, relishing the thrill of his stakes life as a way to balance out a sense of being trapped and overwhelmed by circumstances. The beat bears down him, and the half-whined, half-sung chorus by Max B reinforces the cycle of rationalizing the environment of menace that pushes him to become menacing himself. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: Oh, Zarf! Is this how you impress Mike Patton?

Also: I don’t mean to spoil things for anyone, but this is what I’m getting for everyone on my Christmas shopping list this year.

Panda Bear “Carrots (excerpt)” – At this point in time, openly aping the Beach Boys is just about the most boring and least imaginative thing an indie musician can do aside from becoming a Dylan-ish troubadour with an acoustic guitar. Even the best faux-Beach Boys songs devalue the currency of Pet Sounds, and every time an artist either mimics the ornate, tacky arrangements of Van Dyke Parks or hires him to do his thing on their records, Smile is made to seem just a little more mundane. That said, it’s sort of amazing to me that Panda Bear has managed to present a vocal performance strongly indebted to Brian Wilson and his partners in the context of an arrangement that otherwise strays far from the Beach Boys aesthetic, thus avoiding the icky reverence that taints the vast majority of music created within this tradition.

“Carrots” begins with a sequence that sounds like Mike Love wandering through the Animal Collective’s sonic wilderness, but the composition eventually shifts into two other discrete sections — a gently galloping groove built up from a piano loop, and a final passage that melds music box samples to a reggae rhythm. The vocal melodies for the latter two parts are gorgeous and carry the listener through the morphing musical landscape of the piece, but they are also presented with a heavy reverb that implies a distance from both the instrumental track and the audience. There’s nothing insincere about the vocals, but they are just one more element of pastiche in a larger composition that is rather forthcoming about its cut-and-paste nature. (Click here to pre-order the Panda Bear/Excepter split 12″ from Paw Tracks, to be released in late January. The Excepter side is pretty damn amazing too.)

Elsewhere: My new Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site, with mp3s from K-the-I, Shimura Curves, and Justus Köhncke (via Michael Mayer).

Wild Beasts “Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyants” – Artistic originality is most often the result of a compelling individual attempting to mimic something beyond their capabilities, and so I can only wonder what stew of influences yielded the singing style of Wild Beasts’ Hayden Norman Thorpe. You can suss out some similarities to other vocalists, but there are no solid leads — everything you can find in his voice is fractured and warped, and may be a mutated version of some other thing. In the chorus of the single “Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyants,” he’s shifting between a faux-operatic falsetto and a cartoonish growl, and sliding from feminine to masculine extremes in the space of a few nonsensical words whilst also conveying some kind of inexplicable thrill. He sounds by turns overwhelmed and overwhelming, and it’s somehow one of the most romantic things I’ve heard all year. The arrangement of the music is just as strange and joyous as its vocal, tweaking familiar sounds and structural conventions from rock and soul into something that is immediately engaging and vaguely alien. (Click here to buy it from HMV UK.)

Elsewhere:

Fluxblog comment box mainstay Pageblank writes a bit about Girls Aloud and feminism and J. Edward Keyes recaps the single worst episode of the Gilmore Girls to date.

Outkast “PJ & Rooster” – Four reasons why it is totally baffling to me that “PJ & Rooster” was not the lead single for the Idlewild soundtrack, or released as a single at all:

1) It’s the only song on the album that comes close to the crossover appeal of “Hey Ya” or “Roses.” It’s a jaunty pastiche, sure, but similar to Prince’s “Jack U Off,” its fluorescent electronic funk keeps it tied to poppy kitsch rather than crusty old-timey reverence. It’s a beautifully constructed song, and Andre 3000 sings it well as he swings from hook to hook with his familiar tossed-off grace. He soft sells the chorus, but only because that element is there to provide a sound structure — you may be humming that part tomorrow morning, but the most exciting bits only pop up once in the composition.

2) It’s one of the few songs to feature both Andre 3000 and Big Boi. This is no small thing since no matter how much you may love either of them separately, their chemistry as a duo is magical and profound. It’s almost sort of amazing that they found each other to begin with — you could search the world over to audition partners for either man, and you’d never find a better compliment to the other’s style. Andre may dominate this track, but Big Boi’s verse on the bridge is a brilliant and lively detour on the way to the climax and outro, which seems energized by his very presence. It’s tragic to see the two of them drift apart as they have over the past four years as they are stuck in a loveless marriage mandated by record contracts and the commercial reality that they both need the Outkast brand name to sell their music, but it would be worse if they never collaborated again.

3) “PJ & Rooster” is the best part of the movie. Idlewild isn’t awful, but its storyline is weak and little more than a loose framework for the grand cinematic ambitions of Outkast and their frequent collaborator Bryan Barber, who directed most of their best-known videos. Even though the three spend the majority of Idlewild stretching beyond their capabilities, they do find time to play to their strengths as Andre 3000’s character performs “PJ & Rooster” in a sequence over the end credits which boasts some rather brilliant choreography, art direction, and cinematography. If only the rest of the movie had been so exciting!

4) “PJ & Rooster” is a better version of the movie. Even if its lyrics are slightly cryptic to those who are not familiar with the film, “PJ & Rooster” conveys the major plot points and themes of Idlewild in a far more compelling and succinct manner than the overlong, meandering screenplay. In the same way that too many trailers are more satisfying than the movies they are promoting, “PJ & Rooster” boils Idlewild down to its essence and replaces the film’s awkward pace with an urgency and economy of language that would be nearly impossible to replicate in cinema. Andre 3000 and Big Boi are musicians and not filmmakers, and so it’s only logical that they would find a better way to express the same set of ideas in their native artform. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Elsewhere: Kicking K tells us all about that new LCD Soundsystem album.

K-The-I “Go-Go Girls” – As he raps a complicated, somewhat conciliatory love letter to a woman who is either already estranged from him or on her way there, K-the-I sounds like a man making his way through a hostile environment on this track. The mood is stormy from the start, but by the middle of the song, it’s as though he’s chasing a beat being blown away by a windstorm, and dodging scratches that come off like downed power lines sparking on wet pavement. (Click here to buy it from Mush.)

Soccer Team “Say Forever” – By nature or nurture, Soccer Team’s Melissa Quinley’s voice bears a strong resemblance to that of Liz Phair, and this song’s direct lyrics and soft-focus lo-fi ambiance only emphasize that impression. Of course, this is no bad thing given that Phair’s first two LPs still stand as two of the previous decade’s best singer-songwriter efforts, and that Phair herself isn’t about to record anything as low-key and intimate as this any time soon. Soccer Team’s debut album overall isn’t nearly so Phair-ish, but it’s a smart, unassuming record that makes a strong case for spare indie-pop songwriting of the same lineage as Unrest, Barbara Manning, and the Young Marble Giants. (Click here to buy it from Dischord.)

Modest Mouse @ Webster Hall 11/15/2006
Paper Thin Walls / Black Cadillacs / Ocean Breathes Salty / Fire It Up / We’ve Got Everything / Float On / The View / Breakthrough / Bukowski / Missed The Boat / The World At Large / Lucky Me (jam?) / Tiny Cities Made Of Ashes / People We Know / Bury Me With It // Dashboard / Dramamine

Modest Mouse “Paper Thin Walls (Live, with bonus rant about “Freebird”)” – Before last night, the only other time that I had seen Modest Mouse perform was back in the spring of 1998 when they were touring for The Lonesome Crowded West and I was only a freshman in college. Obviously, quite a lot has changed for them since then. In addition to that whole sordid fiasco involving Isaac Brock getting accused of rape back in the late ’90s, the band have become one of the most influential and commonly mimicked indie rock acts of the past decade, recorded an unexpected but well-deserved mainstream hit, and have expanded from a ragtag power trio into a highly polished sextet including, somewhat inexplicably, Johnny Marr from the Smiths.

Modest Mouse has always been a strange band for me, probably in part because they were the first band that made me feel a bit out of step with the direction of indie rock in general. Whereas the indie rock of my teenage years was arty, cosmopolitan, colorful, and often self-consciously political, Modest Mouse were unapologetically blue collar and semi-rural, with a body of work that focused on the vast wasteland of depressed middle-of-nowhere towns that make up the bulk of modern America. I don’t directly relate to the places or characters in most Modest Mouse songs, and I don’t find much to romanticize in them either, and so their music has always been slightly uncomfortable for me, though not necessarily in a bad way. Either way, it is easy to see why so many people have connected with Brock’s music, and it’s also not too difficult to understand why his most recognizable vocal tics and songwriting quirks have been aped by a small legion of (mostly quite horrible) new bands.

Modest Mouse were always a tight band, but their current incarnation perform with a slick professionalism that seems at odds with their core appeal. Whereas the performances on their first two albums sounded like the work of some guys who rehearsed constantly for a lack of anything better to do, the band on stage at Webster Hall last night seemed stuck in fixed positions and unwilling to stray into anything remotely spontaneous. They nailed the songs for sure, but I get the impression that I could listen to recordings of every show on this tour and each song would sound nearly identical from night to night, which is quite a difference from that show at the Black Cat in ’98 when it seemed as though they were making it all up on the spot. The most exciting selections in last night’s set allowed the band room to expand on themes and step outside of the album arrangements — the jammy song that flowed out of “The World At Large;” the extended version of “Tiny Cities Made Of Ashes;” the lonely, wandering instrumental passages of “Dramamine.”

I’m not sure what to tell you about the new songs. They were alright for the most part, and a couple of them sounded like viable singles, so it seems possible that they can hold on to a portion of their new audience. (Who mostly suck by the way — I was stuck in front of this terrible couple who insisted on chatting at top volume about inane bullshit through every goddamn song and ignored everyone else’s disapproval for a majority of the show, and there were kinda goony fratboys all over the place.) Also, if you’re expecting the new tunes to sound anything remotely like the Smiths, you’re going to be very disappointed since Marr is either playing music that Brock has written, or adding his own parts in a style that suits Brock’s compositions. (Click here to buy it from the Sony store.)

Love As Laughter “Dirty Lives” – Hey, this is a pretty cool song, right? It’s got a good groove, clever lyrics, and a bit of deadpan humor. It might lead you to believe that Love As Laughter would be a fun band to see live, but as I learned last night, that assumption is totally, totally wrong. Aside from this number, which was played with a weak country-rock state fair sort of arrangement, Love As Laughter did nothing but long, boring, hookless fake classic rock songs that mostly sounded like a Dire Straits album with all the fun and catchy parts removed. Their set was just baffling; leaving me to wonder why the hell they were actively trying to sound like the sort of obscure album cuts that inspire people to hit the bathrooms and concession stands at actual dinosaur rock concerts, and if anyone in the band would have actually broken out with a severe allergic reaction if they were to perform a song with a real chorus. (Click here to buy it from Sub Pop.)

Elsewhere: My new Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site and features mp3s from Colleen, Richard McGraw, and the unfortunately named duo Qwel and Meaty Ogre.

Silver Apples “Walkin'” – I feel silly to say this, but I didn’t realize until recently that the Silver Apples even had a third, unfinished album. For whatever reason, I just assumed that the cd with the first two albums that I bought back in the late 90s was the sum total of their discography, but I’m quite glad to have been wrong about this. Whereas the mood of the first two Silver Apples albums was mostly quite heavy and bleak, there is a lightness of spirit in The Garden that comes across in the lyrics as well as the arrangements. The band sticks with their distinct homemade synth + live percussion template, but the songs are far less dense, allowing the music to either stretch out or float freely through the air. The synths in “Walkin'” sound nearly as carefree and aimless as the cheerful flâneur in its lyrics, especially at a point in its final third in which the lead line simulates the sound of escalating laughter. (Click here to buy it from Turntable Lab.)

Ut “Evangelist” – After more than a decade of seeing Ut used as a reference point for way too much music that I enjoy, it’s good to finally actually hear them thanks to the kind people at Mute who have recently reissued their two obscure, previously out-of-print albums. I’d always assumed that Ut would be sort of weird and extreme, but that’s not quite the case. Perhaps even more so than Evol and Sister-era Sonic Youth, Ut represent the most pop iteration of the No Wave aesthetic that I’ve encountered, and their approach to guitar and vocals bears a striking resemblance to what Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker were doing on the first three Sleater-Kinney records, especially when the sheer force of their passion threatens to break down the fragile construction of their arrangements. “Evangelist” in particular sounds like an act of self-immolation with its wobbly bass line implying a structure about to collapse as it burns from the top down. (Click here to buy it from Mute/Insound.)

Spektrum “Don’t Be Shy” – I love Spektrum because they are so utterly devoid of shyness. Their enormous grooves seek only to overwhelm and dominate listeners with the sheer force of their sound and Lola Olafisoye’s imperious sexuality. They are one of the few acts on the planet capable of making Basement Jaxx seem mild, and they’ve managed to make an entire album of unrelenting electro-funk bangers that either eclipse or come close to matching the intensity of their 2005 single (and opening track) “May Day.” “Don’t Be Shy” is sassy, flirty, and actually sort of filthy, so you may want to consider this track NSFW. (Click here to buy it from Amazon UK. You can also buy it for the normal album price in the US iTunes store.)

Émilie Simon “Never Fall In Love” – There’s a playful cruelty in this song, and it’s at once exhilarating and sort of off-putting, and the balance will probably tip in one direction or the other based on who you relate more to in its lyrics — the callous faux-femme fatale, or the poor dude who has been led on and let down. Simon’s voice has a bratty, youthful sound, and her arrangement skips along on jittery beats, carried along by video game synths and a spy movie theme that makes the track come across like a sequel to Britney Spears’ “Toxic.” (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

The Blood Brothers @ Irving Plaza 11/12/2006
(I’m not great with their song titles, so there’s a few that I didn’t get though they were familiar – if you were there please let me know what those songs were! I think that they did “Trash Flavored Trash” toward the beginning but I’m not certain.) Vital Beach / Teen Heat / ? / ? / Laser Life / Camouflage, Camouflage / Set Fire To The Face On Fire / ? / Peacock’s Skeleton With Crooked Feathers / You’re The Dream Unicorn / 1, 2, 3, 4 Guitars / ? / Love Rhymes With Hideous Car Wreck / Cecilia and the Silhouette Saloon / Giant Swan

The Blood Brothers “Spit Shine Your Black Clouds” – Though it was disappointing that they did not play any of my four favorites from the new album (“Spit Shine…,” “Lift The Veil, Kiss The Tank,” “Street Wars/Exotic Foxholes,” “We Ride Skeletal Lightning”), I was very impressed by the Blood Brothers’ performance, which was about as visceral and exhausting as I had been expecting. The band cater mainly to the kids moshing in the center of the room, but they weren’t exactly shying away from their more experimental numbers. Vocalists Johnny Whitney and Jordan Blilie are sort of fascinating to behold, and not just because it’s so amazing to see that they can keep up with that sort of relentless shrieking for an hour. There’s an interesting contrast between their demeanors on stage — Whitney is flamboyant and prone to stealing moves from Freddie Mercury and Mick Jagger, whereas Blilie skulks around the back of the stage like a sullen teen with bad posture who can’t bare to look at the audience, even when he’s addressing them in between-song “thank you” banter. I had imagined that they would have been more aggro and confrontational, but the incongruity of Blilie’s shyness and Whitney’s fabulousness somehow seemed to emphasize the profound anguish in their songs. (Click here to buy it from Insound.)

Celebration “War” – Celebration’s debut album is a pretty decent record, but it’s not quite adequate in terms of capturing the magic of their live show. The songs have a certain stiffness on tape, but in concert, they are slippery and frenetic jumbles of rhythm and harmony. Everything about their performance sounds thoroughly human and totally alive, as if they are trying to shake an audience full of uninspired, sleepwalking people back into life. Aside from “China,” the best songs in their set were brand new (including a number that brought in Mark Gajadhar from the Blood Brothers as a second drummer), and so I think there’s a good chance that their forthcoming second album may come closer to getting it right. (Click here to buy it from Insound.)

To be very honest, a lot of my motivation for sticking around through And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead’s performance was rooted in a lingering feeling of pity that came after reading this thoroughly depressing Pitchfork interview with band leader Conrad Keely. As I watched the show, I couldn’t help but think about how miserable Keely came across in that feature, and how his band’s grand ambitions almost always led to either commercial or artistic failure.

The band is constantly reaching for grandeur, but aside from the key tracks from Source Tags and Codes, they end up with these sort of pompous, overblown songs that do not earn their emotional weight. Their two most recent albums are like the musical equivalent of Oscar bait — it’s all gravitas for its own sake and unimaginative signifiers of artistic significance propping up mediocre compositions.* When they do write something quite special, such as the Source Tags opener “It Was There That I Saw You,” they go and butcher the song in concert, with Keely’s thin, off-key voice barely poking through the over-rendered mess of guitars and plodding percussion.

The band’s live show gets a substantial shot of adrenaline when drummer Jason Reese abandons his kit and switches to lead vocals on some fierce hardcore numbers, but in spite of his stronger voice and considerable stage presence, it only complicates the band’s obvious and crippling identity crisis. In the Pitchfork interview, Keely seems baffled as to why his band isn’t hugely popular, and the answer is just so incredibly obvious: Aside from having a pretty terrible name, they have no recognizable persona. Keely is a fine guitarist but a lousy singer; Reese is a decent frontman but for a different band; and their new album sounds absolutely nothing like their live show, which itself is going through at least four different identities over the course of an hour and thirty minutes. It is good that the band are willing to try different things, but without some dominant personality or unifying style, they end up sounding unfocused and often quite generic.

* The best song on their new record is a cover of Guided By Voices’ “Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory,” but only by default. In the Pitchfork interview, Keely explains that they recorded their version of the song because he felt that the version on Bee Thousand was “extremely unfinished.” Unfortunately, his band’s overwrought, expensive arrangement tears out the context that made the original so affecting. Much of the beauty of the original came from the way that the fragile, ramshackle tune seemed haunted by the ghost of some arena rock anthem. Trail of Dead’s version is depressingly literal – they simply play it as a straight-up arena rock thing and drain every bit of poetry from the song.

Microwave Background “Many Chosen Few” – Even if this were an instrumental, I doubt that I could hear this gentle, low key song without thinking of the suburbs at night. As the music winds around in a futile attempt to find someplace to go or something to do, the singer sounds lost in a place he knows too well. He trails off at the end of his muttered lines as though he was afraid of boring the listener with his observations, and the music moves in bored, restless circles if just to keep from being totally idle. (Click here to buy it via the Microwave Background MySpace page.)

Elsewhere: My new Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site, with mp3s from Jan Jelinek, Mirah, and my favorite band of all time.

Rex The Dog “Every Day (Could Be Our Last Day)” – As any Prince fan can tell you, fear of sudden, pointless death is a perfect subject matter for dance music. Sometimes you actively want escapism, and other times you have to be told why you actually need the escapism. The lyrical hook in this track is minimal and rather on-the-nose, but you don’t need much more than a slogan when its arrangement gets across its nuance with the emotional vocabulary of synth pop . (Click here to buy it from Juno.)

Black Moth Super Rainbow + The Octopus Project “Lollipopsichord” – I’d rather not think of the maddening internal politics involved in two separate bands arranging and rearranging the other’s work, but somehow Black Moth Super Rainbow and The Octopus Project made it work, since their collaborative album The House of Apples & Eyeballs is a strong, coherent collection of music. For the most part, they submerge their respective identities into a group aesthetic, though this particular song leans heavily in favor of Black Moth Super Rainbow’s sound with its screeching synthesizer hook and winding structure. (Click here to buy it from Black Moth Super Rainbow.)

Amy Winehouse “Rehab” – Amy Winehouse is well known in the UK for her severe public drunkeness, and so it seems reasonable to suspect that this song about refusing to go to rehab for alcoholism is at least semi-autobiographical. The track is a rather fantastic approximation of 60s R&B crafted by producers Salaam Remi and Mark Ronson, who manage to approach the genre with a tuneful subtlety that avoids dreary, bloodless traditionalism or drab pastiche. Winehouse matches their style with a relatively understated vocal that at best recalls the weary yet strident tone of Lauryn Hill, and lends depth to a song that conflates denial and stubborn pride. (Click here to buy it from Amazon UK. Thanks to Laurie!)

The Rapture “Whoo! Alright – Yeah, Uh-Huh (Simian Mobile Disco remix)” – I apologize if it upsets anyone that I’ve come back to the Rapture only a week after posting a review of their live show, but this remix is far too excellent to skip over and if you hear it, it should be rather plain that this is really more about Simian Mobile Disco. Though “W.A.Y.U.H.” is a song comprised of several “best parts,” the chant on the breakdown is the bit that everyone remembers for its rhythm and lyrical hook. The original track takes its time getting to that sweet spot, but Simian Mobile Disco cut to the chase and build their entire remix around that chant from the start. Without the context of Matty Safer’s verses (or even his voice, aside from the “tick…tick…tick…ow!” bit), the uncertain critical dialogue of the song shifts over to a bratty, dismissive rant. Whereas the original version sets up an argument with its audience and comes to the conclusion that “people don’t dance no more” in the hope of convincing them to cut loose via public shaming and/or reverse psychology, this intense house remix presupposes that the listener already agrees with the sentiment, and the chorus is meant to elicit hallelujahs from the people on the floor. (Click here for the “W.A.Y.U.H.” MySpace page.)

Lo-Fi-Fnk @ Fontana’s 11/3/2006
City / Adore / Wake Up / The End

Lo-Fi-Fnk “City” – Lo-Fi-Fnk’s fourth US show was in the basement venue of a bar called Fontana’s, as part of the Brooklyn Vegan‘s series of CMJ day shows. The group only played four songs, and unfortunately “What’s On Your Mind?” and “Unighted” were not among them, but they were fun and adorable nonetheless. The three of them are in their early 20s, but they all appear to be around 16 – the two boys in particular looked as though they were trying out for some European boy band, though given the sound of their music, that’s a bit like being surprised by some random punk band looking like a bunch of punks. (Click here to buy it from Moshi Moshi.)

Kill Rock Stars CMJ showcase @ Hiro Ballroom 11/3/2006

Excepter “Op Pop” – Excepter’s performance was technically improvised, but within a set of parameters that included two additional members on stage — a dark haired woman who read a poem along with the music for the first few minutes of the set but then mostly sat down and witnessed the performance while remaining part of its physical expression, and a blonde woman who sat in on flute and saxophone. The latter player was crucial to the tone of the performance, with her contributions forming a more direct textural connection to the group’s free jazz ancestry, and recurring as a formal element in sampled form when she was not playing the instrument. As with “Op Pop” from their album Alternation, their performance at the Hiro Ballroom suggested lateral progression by mixing textural elements in and out of the sonic muck. The structure of the piece was fluid in a figurative sense, but implied actual liquidity with its sound often mimicking the sensation of hearing loud music while submerged in water. The fact that it was often difficult to discern exactly what the band was doing with their miscellaneous keyboards, gadgets, and mixing boards was greatly beneficial to their performance, making it so that it was never clear exactly how many of the sounds were being generated. Their indistinct movements and activities mystified their music in a way that is not possible with traditional instruments. Unsurprisingly, my eyes gravitated toward the players who were making sounds that were the most easily identified, though in fairness it’s a bit more exciting to watch John Fell Ryan freak out with a megaphone or a gorgeous blonde woman play the flute than to observe a couple guys in the back who appear to be repairing a sampler. (Click here to buy it from Buy Olympia.)

Mary Timony “Silence” – I’ve seen Mary Timony perform in every phase of her career from The Dirt of Luck onward with the exception of her tour for The Golden Dove, and in all of that time and in all of those shows, this was the first time that I’ve ever seen an audience nearly unanimous in their enthusiasm for her music. You could sort of tell that she was surprised and maybe a bit confused at first, but by the middle of the set, she was smiling and slightly talkative, which is maybe of out of the ordinary, at least in the context of the seven or eight shows I’ve seen her play in DC and NYC since 1995. Of course, Mary deserved the audience that she had Friday night, and not simply out of goodwill for her back catalog. Aside from playing “Silence” and “Backwards/Forwards” from Ex Hex, she and her new band focused on new songs presumably written for forthcoming KRS debut, which ought to be pretty fantastic judging by this set. Even more so than on Ex Hex, her new compositions highlight her talent as a guitarist with melodic, sprawling guitar jams that rival the recent work of Stephen Malkmus and Sonic Youth. (Click here to buy it from Sound Fix.)

Erase Errata “Cruising” – Erase Errata performed almost exactly the same setlist as when I saw them back in September, but their show suffered a bit for some persistent technical difficulties involving Jenny Hoyston’s guitar, which was mysteriously buried in the mix for the duration of the set, even before she broke any of her strings. The rhythm section was on and in great form, but the dynamics were way off, which is sort of a problem with songs like “Another Genius Idea From Our Government” and “Cruising,” which need her guitar parts for emphasis. The songs are strong enough to compensate for the problems, but only so much. Hoyston was a good sport, and provided some charming stage banter, but overall, this was a lackluster performance from a great band. We all have our off days and I’ve seen them do better, so I’m not too upset about it. (Click here to buy it from Buy Olympia.)

A Sunny Day In Glasgow @ Sin-E 11/3/2006
C’mon / Laughter (Victims) / ? / A Mundane Phone Call To Jack Parsons / ? / The Best Summer Ever

A Sunny Day In Glasgow “The Best Summer Ever” – If A Sunny Day In Glasgow had gone out on a lengthy sold-out tour in the time since I saw them play their first show back in July, their transformation into the confident, comfortable band that I witnessed Friday night would’ve made more sense, but the truth is that you can still count their number of public performances on one hand. A lot of their improvement as a live act comes from the presence of a live drummer and bassist, but that doesn’t fully explain how singers Robin and Lauren Daniels suddenly seem at home on stage after coming across as very quiet and nervous a little over three months ago. The shift into playing as a full band has altered their live sound, mainly by removing the extreme reverb from the percussion and trimming away the density of the pre-recorded tracks, but the wash of sound remains, as well as the charm of this otherworldly music coming from a bunch of attractive, unpretentious, clean cut suburbanites. (Click here to buy it (and get a free button) from A Sunny Day In Glasgow. Their first full album Scribble Mural Comic Journal will be out in February on NTNF.)

Elsewhere: Maratho

n Packs has a review of the Knife’s show in Los Angeles, and among other things, manages to articulate something I meant to get into in my review regarding the group’s use of physical depth and space in their live performance.

The Exploding Hearts “Throwaway Style (Alternate Mix)” – This is what I had to say about this song on May 23, 2003: This is sort of like a low budget sequel to the Strokes’ “Last Nite” with the original cast replaced with total unknowns. It’s a lot of fun, all the same. The thing is, three years down the line, “Last Nite” sounds more like a big-budget remake full of posh actors that aren’t nearly as charming as the scrappy amateurs of “Throwaway Style.” They’re both great songs (in fact, they are the best song in each band’s discography), but if I had to make a choice, I’m siding with the least lucky band of the decade rather than the pretty rich kids. (Click here to buy it from Insound.)

Blog 27 “I Still Don’t Know Ya” – Thanks to Idolator for this bit of bratty, highly enjoyable Polish teenpop bubblegum. It’s only more fun and absurd if you read the Blog 27 Wikipedia page, which helpfully explains the former duo’s name (“the group’s name comes from their interest in blogging and the date they were both born, the 27th”), their dubious origin (“Tola’s mother has her own record label, called Magic Records…she published Blog 27’s CD after a plea from her daughter…Tola’s father works for an advertisement company and he created Blog 27’s image”), their relationship with thousands of antagonistic Polish kids (“most Polish teens surveyed said that Blog 27 would not succeed internationally”), the recent departure of one half of the group, and a very confusing scandal that is currently unfolding involving possibly fraudulent Japanese chart placements. (Click here for an obviously fake Blog 27 MySpace page.)

Also: If you happen to have a CMJ badge and you are not a Juggalo, please do come see the panel that I am on tomorrow afternoon. It is being moderated by Jessica Suarez from CMJ and Pitchfork, and also includes Pitchfork news chief Amy Phillips, Idolator‘s Maura Johnston, and Marisol Segal from the Independent Online Distribution Alliance.

And: If you are in the NYC area, please do come out for the WFMU Record Fair, which begins tonight and runs through Sunday evening.

The Knife @ Webster Hall 11/1/2006 (early show)
Pass This On / The Captain / We Share Our Mothers’ Health / You Make Me Like Charity / Marble House / Forest Families / Kino / Heartbeats / Silent Shout / From Off To On // Like A Pen

The Knife “Forest Families” – Aside from a brief encore break and a moment at the very end of the show when Karin Dreijer Andersson acknowledged the presence of the audience by giving a brief and sorta creepy wave goodbye, the Knife’s performance had very little to do with the common expectations of live music, and seemed more like an experimental film presented in three dimensions.

In fact, only a portion of the music was actually physically performed as it was heard. There was live electronic percussion and assorted gadget fiddling from Olof Dreijer, and live vocals from Karin, who manually manipulated the sound of her voice with a machine to her side. With or without the electronic filters, her voice is an arresting presence, and from the first time you hear it in person up through the end of the show, it’s hard not to be struck by the fact that she’s actually real as opposed to being some creature out of folklore.

Of course, that’s pretty much what they both looked like as they were obscured by shadows with the contours of their bodies lost under black jumpsuits and their faces hidden beneath masks that looked like BDSM fetish gear as designed by Fourth World-era Jack Kirby. (For comics geeks or people who want to get a better idea of what I mean, I’m thinking specifically about the look of his design for Mister Miracle as reinterpreted by JH Williams and Pasqual Ferry in Grant Morrison‘s recent Seven Soldiers mini-series, but devoid of bright colors. Basically, the eerie glowing trim, but only around the eyes and mouth, the rest of the face rendered as black negative space. Actually, closer to Metron‘s suit, I guess.) The duo were not going for simple gender-bending androgyny – they went further into an abstraction of their own humanity. Karin in particular came across like a lonely alien creature with a voice that changed shape like a glob of mercury, which was especially unnerving when she performed “You Make Me Like Charity” and had to switch between male and female characters at rapid intervals. Whereas most other female artists either play up their sexuality or seek to define or redefine their femininity, Karin inhabited the characters of every song by completely obliterating herself.

For the benefit of readers who may be seeing the Knife in California this weekend, I’m going to avoid getting into many specifics about the staging and imagery in each song, mainly because this is probably the one music show you could ever see in which “spoilers” not involving the setlist are actually a valid concern, but also because some of them are so elaborate and strange that it would be difficult to adequately convey in words. The presentation of “Marble House” was especially haunting and brilliant and will probably be seared into my memory for the rest of my life, but I can’t think of a way to explain what was there on stage without making it sound silly, which of course on some level it actually was. You don’t just have to see it, you actually have to be there to fully understand the experience.

The heart of the performance, of course, was the music. The selections from Silent Shout were presented without any perceptible change in arrangement, though the older songs were played in a style closer to the feeling of that album. (The songs from Deep Cuts sounded exactly as they did in the One Music session, and “Kino” was like a more extreme version of itself, with a stronger dance beat and a darker atmosphere.) Since the music was set in a fixed position, the focus was on the sound of Karin’s voice and the nuances of her phrasing, which generally did not vary significantly from the album recordings, though her profound aura amplified the potent emotions of the songs. “We Share Our Mothers’ Health” alternated between moments of terror and ecstasy; “Forest Families” blended crippling paranoia with affectionate intimacy; “Silent Shout” was a perfect musical expression of stifled anguish. “Heartbeats” was exactly as sublime as you might imagine, and the goose bump magic of that moment was enhanced considerably by the obvious fact that a vast majority of the people in the audience would count it among their favorite songs of all time. As Karin sang the song in her natural voice, there was a powerful sense of reverence in the room, as though everyone was extremely aware that this could be their only chance to ever witness a performance of it by the original artist, and that every second of it must be savored. (Click here to buy it from Sound Fix.)

Bossanova @ Ace Of Clubs 11/1/2006
In The Immortal Words Of You / Calvary / French Accent / I’ll Leave Of My Heart / My First Luau / Rare Brazil / It Felt Like A Weight

Bossanova “French Accent” – This show began a little over a half hour after the Knife’s final song, and though they were an incredibly difficult act to follow, Bossanova were able to deliver a strong set of their classy, romantic pop at the criminally under-attended TeenBeat CMJ showcase. Though band leader and songwriter Chris Storrow made a self-deprecating quip about how the band on stage sees each other about as often as the audience sees them, the group (which occasionally included TeenBeat founder and former Unrest leader Mark Robinson) sounded professional if not always as tight as the music on their underrated debut album. Storrow’s gentle crooning and the overdriven drone of a vintage organ were the most appealing superficial elements, but the quality of the compositions carried the show, most especially the nearly transcendental disco epic “Rare Brazil.” (Click here to buy it from TeenBeat.)

Elsewhere: My new Hit Refresh column is up on the ASAP site, and includes mp3s from Josef K, Beach House, and the Oohlas.

Also: Like Nick says, if you dress as the internet (next) Halloween, don’t forget to wear your anti-intellectual discontent. Also, please remem

ber to take some of the ugliest, most demystifying photos imaginable from your spot in the VIP area of the balcony.

And: If you are curious about what the Knife looked like onstage from the perspective of the audience, you’ll get a fairly accurate feel for it if you look at these youtube clips or this post on Merry Swankster.

Chicks On Speed “MySpace” – There’s only going to be a brief window of time before some of the references in this song sound very dated, but how could you ever write a meaningful song about online culture without doing that? “MySpace” is a gleeful yet ambivalent romp that critiques the ephemeral, amorphous, and often crass nature of the web while also pondering its benefits and acknowledging that the internet can be pretty damn fun. There’s a lot of smirking and irony, but there’s also a great enthusiasm and affection for a virtual space that they somewhat accurately describe as a “big party” where “everyone’s got their interests.” Even when there’s a slight implication of finger-wagging, it’s obvious that the song is basically pro-internet, just the same way that I can say that there are things about and places in New York City that I dislike, but I generally love the place and what it represents. (Click here to buy it with the new issue of Plan B and here for the Chicks On Speed MySpace page.)

Kelly Slusher “Be There” – Split singles only really make sense when the songs on both sides of the disc have a complimentary relationship, and this is very much the case for the 7″ from which this selection is taken. Backed by another tiny, brittle track from Friday Bridge, Portland-based songwriter Kelly Slusher matches and nearly surpasses her colleague in terms of unassuming prettiness and nearly uncomfortable intimacy. Both songs draw the listener into a private place that feels slightly wrong, if not totally inappropriate. Friday Bridge’s song is almost unbearable in the way it simulates the feeling of accidentally reading the mind of some shy, quiet stranger. Slusher’s track feels less like an invasion, and more like someone that you barely know oversharing and spilling their guts in a moment of desperation and loneliness. (Click here to buy it from Surreal Ceremonies.)

The Rapture @ Webster Hall 10/30/2006
Heaven / Get Myself Into It / Sister Savior / The Devil / Out of the Races and Onto the Tracks / I Need Your Love / Killing / Pieces of the People We Love / Whoo! Alright, Yeah…Uh Huh / House of Jealous Lovers / The Coming of Spring / Echoes / The Sound // Down For So Long / Olio

As you can see by the setlist, the Rapture were not fucking around. Fifteen straight bangers, no slow songs, no duds. A solid, relentless block of the best dance punk music of this decade, performed with spirit and intensity by four guys who seem far more comfortable in their skin than when I saw them on an early leg of their tour for Echoes.

The Rapture “The Sound” – A major part of the Rapture’s excellence, aside from simply being a lot more talented, tasteful, imaginative, and intelligent than the vast majority of their peers (let alone their copycats), is that the band have a keenly developed sense of dynamics that comes through in their live performance, but more remarkably, is both preserved and enhanced in their studio recordings. In an era in which too many records (regardless of merit) suffer from flat, matter of fact production that levels out even the most physically stimulating songs, the Rapture have the good sense to work with producers that recognize that the music needs to be recorded in ways that compensate for the immediacy of the band’s presence and enhance the dynamics of the music rather than just imply what you might hear if you happened to be there in the room with them. The Rapture and their collaborators made Echoes and Pieces of the People We Love with the understanding that on some level, the tracks had to have a basic utilitarian effect — they had to demand physical movement by emphasizing every textural and rhythmic shift, to make every moment in every song work with very precise intentions. That’s why “The Coming of Spring” sounds like a matter of life and death; that’s why “Whoo! Alright – Yeah…Uh Huh” drags you by your collar into its climactic reverie; and that’s why the blasts of noise in “The Sound” feel like concentrated adrenaline shot into your body via headphones. (Click here to buy it from Sound Fix.)

Presets “Are You The One?” – Presets, a duo from Sydney who opened for the Rapture last night, illustrated my point about quality sound engineering rather nicely with their set. Their album so badly represents what they are capable of doing live that it’s sort of ridiculous. In person, their songs are urgent and physical, with deep electronic basslines tugging bodies into motion along with heavy beats from both a live drummer and/or a loud, well-mixed drum machine. They clearly understand the dynamics of modern dance music, and they bring it in a live context, like a streamlined though far less flamboyant version of what I saw Basement Jaxx do at the same venue a few weeks ago. However, even the best songs on their album seem a bit hollow, and the beats sound neutered and drained of energy. “Are You The One?” hints at the potency of the live show, but it’s simply recorded all wrong. The song is there, and it’s a good one, but it’s a only a fraction of the feeling. (Click here to buy it from Insound.)

Also:

Dreamdate “Monster Mash” – I have not actively participated in Halloween in about a decade. Well, to be more clear, I have not dressed up since the mid-90s, though I have had awkward experiences at a few events in which most everyone else was in some sort of costume. I don’t dislike the day at all, it’s really been a matter of not being engaged with any social function that would require me to participate like a normal, fun-loving person. That said, I am indeed pro-fun, and I hope that this cute, faithful cover of the Halloween classic “Monster Mash” by a trio of Californian girls can help to psyche you up for whatever festivity you may be involved with tonight. (Click here for the Dreamdate MySpace page.)

Brakes “On Your Side” – The Brighton-based punk band Brakes dress up more than half of their new record in country and western drag, but aside from a few tracks that jump into the deep end of predictability, they mostly play with the genre’s signifiers whilst keeping their identity intact with a brisk tempo and a taste for sharp dynamics that distance them from the alt-country crowd. At its core, “On Your Side” is a simple pop song that could easily be nudged into several styles, but faux-country is the outfit that suits it best, though the genre is mostly just implied by guitar tone and minor instrumental cues. After all, your song can only sound so country if your singer just happens to come across like a friendlier version of Ade Blackburn from Clinic. (Click here to buy it via Brakes’ official site.)

The Good Good “We Go” – Since they don’t seem to be directly appropriating or referencing other works and there’s an implication of depth and contour, the Good Good’s approach to songwriting is closer to decoupage than collage, but in either case, it’s nearly impossible to engage with their songs without an awareness of their process. “We Go” holds together as a somewhat conventional rock song, but the band foreground texture and push the listener to imagine it as a physical work transposed to sound, with its obscured, whispered spoken word passages reading as cut-up diary passages smeared into an illegible blur by a clear gel medium. (Click here to buy it from Midheaven.)

Elsewhere: Dan Beirne’s entry on Said The Gramophone today is one of the best and most creative reviews that I’ve ever seen on an mp3 blog.

And: Sorry that this got up a little late today. It was completed around 10 AM EST, but there were some technical difficulties.

Lismore “Far Off And Away” – “That’s me in the corner, that’s me in the spotlight, that’s me crying by a bus stop in St. Paul…” — The structure of this song is both epic and vaguely disjointed, seeming something like an emotional travelogue tied together with brisk snare hits and a voice that shifts from an enchanting siren call to a bitter sing-song and back again. There’s an implication of physical distance and space, but it all seems to be taking place within one woman’s mind. (Click here for the official Lismore site.)

Imitation Electric Piano “I Mean Wow” – There are three distinct phases in this song. The first being a rather lovely mix of lullaby and slow jam, the second is an up tempo British folk ballad as sung by a woman who sounds as though she dropped in from the English countryside circa 1972, and the third is the part when Simon Johns seems to shrug and say “well, I am a member of Stereolab,” and shifts into a part that could have been on any one of that band’s records from Dots and Loops onward. Nevertheless, the composition comes together nicely, especially in the way that the beat is just a bit too quick and restless alongside the placid vocals of the middle section. The beat seems more immediate and emotionally true, revealing her cool amazement in the lyrics to be quite an understatement. (Click here to buy it from Newbury Comics.)

Elsewhere: Cortney Harding on the thinly veiled conservatism of the Killers’ Brandon Flowers in The Huffington Post.

Also Elsewhere: Rbally, which is unfortunately about to shut down for good, has a wonderful parting gift: A kick-ass Pavement show from Cologne, Germany circa 1994 with very good sound and a setlist featuring rare performances of “From Now On” and “5-4=Unity” as well as pretty fantastic versions of “Hit The Plane Down” and “Forklift.”