coast vs coast

Moved!

2010-11-24T18:45:00.001-08:00

Hey everyone - just a heads up that all new mixes will now be posted at my new PodOMatic page, http://damienragsdale.podomatic.com/. Check it out!

October Mix: ALIVE 2010

2010-10-06T19:30:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I'm in love with this one. Born from a passing idea and created over a pretty intense two days of experimenting, this mix is some of my best work to date. Title's a nod to one of the coolest live albums around (Daft Punk's ALIVE 2007) and the mix includes one of its best tracks. The mix also gives a shoutout to LCD Soundsystem, who I saw for the 2nd time a couple of weekends back in Philly with a couple of my best friends and who put on easily the greatest dance party I've ever been to.

So yeah, the mix is about having a transcendentally awesome time. I highly recommend you do that as often as possible. :)

Enjoy!

ALIVE 2010: THE MIX

http://drop.io/alive2010damien

ALIVE 2010: THE TRACKLIST

Holy Ghost! -- "Hold On (Black Mazego Groove)"
Was (Not Was) -- "Out Come The Freaks"*
New Order -- "The Perfect Kiss"
Kele -- "Everything You Wanted (Fred Falke Remix)"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Us v Them"
Daft Punk -- "Television / Crescendolls (ALIVE 2007) (DJ DRAGO SUPER LOOPS VERSION)"

DCD COLLECTIVE NEWZ.

We're continuing our new Blue Monday party in the Gallery @ Le Poisson Rouge this coming Monday, October 11 (Columbus Day)! Come dance your asses off like that centuries-old explorer would have wanted. There's a very good chance I'll do part of this mix live, or a variation thereof.

More details at http://lepoissonrouge.com/events/view/1593.

Keep watch here for more live DCD show updates!

*Hey fun fact. Not sure you know who these guys are? If you ever saw the Super Mario Bros. movie, you totally do.

I Turn 28, You Get A New September Mix

2010-09-21T08:13:00.000-07:00

Yup, that's how it works. :)

I guess this is a mix ABOUT being 28, even though I've technically only been 28 for about a minute as of the time of this posting. But being 28 is awesome so far. So there you go.

28: The Mix

http://drop.io/damien28

28: The Tracklist

!!! -- "The Most Certain Sure"
Michael Jackson -- "Shake Your Body (Down To The Ground)"
Maximum Balloon -- "Groove Me (feat. Theophilus London)"
Talking Heads -- "I Zimbra"
Holy Ghost! -- "I Will Come Back"
Madonna -- "Into the Groove"
The S.O.S. Band -- "Take Your Time (Do It Right)"
Daft Punk -- "Too Long"

DCD News Corner:

Yes HOLY CRAP our party at Le Poisson Rouge last night was so awesome! Thank you for coming! We're doing it every 2nd Monday of each month, here's info on the next one on October 11.

I Made A New Mix Already! Check Out The "Tandem" August Mix

2010-08-09T22:19:00.000-07:00

Ooof. It's been a very busy, random, exhausting, but above all FUN August so far. In the past week, I've scored tickets to see Arcade Fire at MSG from 200 feet away, met my musical idol JAMES MURPHY from DFA / LCD Soundsystem, had a very honest conversation with the Pillsbury Doughboy, and danced my ass off at a DFA afterparty at a very cool Brooklyn bar.

So cool, in fact, I named this mix after it. :)

I'm back on my dance tracks with a vengeance, having finalized the track list and recorded the mix in the same night. What can I say, I get pretty prolific once I have some time to sit in front of my Macbook.

Dance yrself clean to this:

Tandem: The Mix

http://drop.io/tandemdamien

Tandem: The Tracklist

Curses! -- "The Deep End (feat. Nancy Whang) (Holy Ghost! Remix)
Klaxons -- "Echoes"
We Have Band -- "Love, What You Doing?"
Maximum Balloon -- "If You Return (feat. Little Dragon)"
Hot Chip -- "Colours (Fred Falke Remix)"
Yuksek -- "So Far Away From The Sea (The Twelves Remix)"
Local Natives -- "World News (Teen Daze Remix)"

In DCD Collective News:

It is an especially awesome time to be DCD - fresh off of rocking Gerzstock 2010, we'll be rocking a new monthly DCD party in the gallery of the awesome venue (le) Poisson Rouge starting in September, hooked up by NYC nightlife legend Justine D. We're VERY excited for this opportunity and look forward to showcasing nothing but our best skills and getting asses shaking even harder than before.

As always, keep watch here for other gigs we've got coming up. Catch you later.

...and did I mention I met JAMES MURPHY.

Have A "Lucid Summer" With My New July Mix!

2010-07-24T10:00:00.000-07:00

Hey!

Hope you're all having a great summer so far. Definitely flying by too fast - can't believe it's already the end of July. But that just means it's time to pause and rock a new mix!

I've been pretty big on dance-punk and funk lately, so for this mix I wanted to delve into other genres I love. I picked a blend of lo-fi, shoegaze, indie rock, and punky tracks that'll help soundtrack your next beach session or drive out to the countryside (which, coincidentally, is where I am right now).

So kick back and enjoy - summer comes once a year, rock it like you mean it.

The Lucid Summer Mix:

http://drop.io/lucidsummerdamien

The Lucid Summer Tracklist:

Tame Impala -- "Lucidity"
A Band of Bees -- "These Are The Ghosts"
Broken Social Scene -- "Texico Bitches"
Asobi Seksu -- "Thursday"
The Cure -- "In Between Days"
Wild Nothing -- "Summer Holiday"
Dum Dum Girls -- "Jail La La"
Vivian Girls -- "When I'm Gone"

In DCD Collective News...

...we chillin'! We had an awesome time DJing at Hell Gate Social in Astoria last Saturday, and we're playing our first ever show outside of NYC when we head up to Woodstock for the legendary GERZSTOCK weekend. Can't wait!

Keep watch here for some August shows too. :)

Summer's Here and It's Time To Get "FUNKY."

2010-06-22T22:10:00.000-07:00

Yup, that about sums it up.

Been busy this month with DCD Collective shows and (most recently) being pretty damn addicted to THE WIRE, but the mixing don't stop. With quite a bit of dance-punk under my belt lately, and perhaps inspired a slew of emails I've been getting from Professor Bootsy's University, I opted to take it back some and incorporate some classic funk into this month's mix.

And yes, it's called "FUNKY." I briefly considered naming it "DAAAAAAMN!" which you're welcome to call it if you like. Enjoy!

FUNKY. : The Mix

http://drop.io/damienFUNKYmix

FUNKY. : The Tracklist

Maximum Balloon -- "Tiger (Feat. Aku Orraca-Tetteh)"
Funkadelic -- "One Nation Under A Groove"
The Brothers Johnson -- "Stomp!"
Stevie Nicks -- "Stand Back"
Holy Ghost! -- "Static On The Wire"
We Have Band -- "Divisive"
Talking Heads -- "Pull Up The Roots"
Prince -- "1999"

DCD Collective News... and Surprises?

Yup, surprises. The first of which will be dropping soon, either with the July mix or earlier. It's kind of amazing. Get ess-ited.

And DCD has been rocking you all through the month of June, with two shows left before the month's out:

Friday, June 25:

DCD Collective Rocks Fontana's Basement In The Face (LES / Chinatown)

Wednesday, June 30:

(summer in the gritty) @ Public Assembly, Williamsburg

See you there!

Fact Magazine: A "Thanks, LCD Soundsystem" Mix

2010-05-17T20:10:00.000-07:00

What up.

For my May mix, I'm giving props to James Murphy and LCD Soundsystem for getting me interested in mixing and DJing to begin with. Their third album, This Is Happening, is out today (May 17/18) - and since it's likely going to be the final one, I wanted to mix some of my favorite LCD tracks of all time up with some like-minded artists from the past and present.

So thanks for all of the great music, thanks for the inspiration, and thanks in advance for the epic dance party you're going to rock here in NYC on Saturday.

Fact Magazine: The Mix

http://drop.io/factmagazinelcd

Fact Magazine: The Tracklist

LCD Soundsystem -- "Pow Pow"
Talking Heads -- "Moon Rocks"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Home"
Liquid Liquid -- "Optimo"
Lo-Fi-Fnk -- "Want U"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Time To Get Away"
ESG -- "Moody"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Someone Great"
Ladyhawke -- "Paris Is Burning (Cut Copy Remix)"
Holy Ghost! -- "Hold On"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Yeah (Crass Version)"

In DCD Collective News:

...All three of us are going to rock the hell out at this Saturday's LCD Soundsystem show at Terminal 5.

And then we're going to play a whole mess of shows ourselves in June. Check it:

June 5: Hell Gate Social - Astoria Queens (10pm until Question Marks)

June 19: The Barrens and Liquid Light Lab Present RAPID EYE MOVEMENT -- Production Lounge, Greenpoint BK

June 30: Summer in the Gritty -- Public Assembly, Williamsburg BK

And we're totally psyched for all of it. :)

UPDATE (5/24): Holy crap! We now have FOUR shows in June. We're cramming in an awesome midnight basement dance party at Fontana's on Friday, June 25. Come get crazy.

UPDATE (6/3): FIVE SHOWS. Now we've got an afterparty set at Warsaw in BK on Friday, June 11 from 11pm to 2am. For those of you with calendars, we've got at least one show every week this month. WHO'S THE BOSS? (us. we are.)

It's Springtime! Go Out and "Dance, Punk!"

2010-04-11T20:06:00.000-07:00

Yeah, do it!

This is my latest mix, "Dance, Punk!" - a tribute to going out and getting your dance on now that the weather's nice that will definitely make you do just that. It's my funkiest mix to date and touches on some of my favorite tracks from the dance-punk genre and the artists that inspired it. As to why there's no LCD Soundsystem on this one... well, wait until next month. WINK.

Dance, Punk!: The Link

http://drop.io/damiendancepunk8248

Dance, Punk!: The Tracklist

Two Door Cinema Club -- "Something Good Can Work (The Twelves Remix)"
!!! -- "Must Be The Moon"
Talking Heads -- "Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On)"
Blondie -- "Heart of Glass"
Empire of the Sun -- "Walking on a Dream (Treasure Fingers Remix)"
Jackie Stoudamire -- "Invisible Wind"
Hot Chip -- "We Have Love"

In DCD Collective News:

We rocked a cool headlining DJ set at our homebase Fontana's earlier this month and will probably kick some additional ass in May, but we're going to be part of a really cool showcase in June. More details to come, and happy birthday this week to my buddy and DCD Collective-mate DJ CGerzzzz!

The New LoneStar Mix: A Texas Tribute That Probably Has Nothing To Do With Texas

2010-03-07T15:16:00.000-08:00

Hey guys, hope life is rad by you. I'm headed to Texas for the first time ever later on this week (SXSW what what), so I figured I would whip up a new mix to commemorate the trip. I have no idea if DFA-style dance punk / disco and quasi-rave tracks really capture the spirit of Texas or are more suitable for NYC clubs and walking around here at night, but I guess I'll find out soon enough.

The LoneStar Mix

Download:

http://drop.io/lonestarmix

Tracklist:

Anoorak -- "Nightdrive With You (Tesla Boy Remix)"
Holy Ghost! -- "Holy Ghost! vs. Black Van (HOLY MASHOPOLIS)"
The xx -- "Night Time (What Kind of Breeze Do You Blow Extended Edit)"
Coury Palermo -- "Here Comes The Rain Again (Eurhythmics Cover)(Odd Year Edit)"
Annie -- "Heartbeat"
Zoot Woman -- "Lonely By Your Side"
Midnight Juggernauts -- "Nine Lives"

Wow there are a lot of words in those first four song titles. Enjoy!

Oh yeah and on the DCD Collective front: We have a couple of shows coming up in the near future, one of which happens a couple days after I get back from Tejas. We'll be DJing inbetween sets and the afterparty for a lineup the Monumints are putting together out in The Production Lounge in Greenpoint on 3/20, and then on 4/2 we're DJing all night at our home base Fontana's in the LES/Chinatown to kick Spring off right.

More details will be on our page soon, but you really don't need much more detail for the 4/2 show - come by after like 10 and get dancing.

That Was Fast: Say Hey to the NEW StarTropix Mix

2010-02-15T18:43:00.000-08:00

So yeah, a month between mixes turned out to be... a week. Who loves you, babies.

Say hi to my THIRD mix of this month, StarTropix, consisting mostly of songs that I acquired over the course of the past couple of days. This was a lot of fun to make as the songs all came together extremely well and let me try out some cool beatmatching tricks.

The name's a nod to the oldschool gamers out there and is immediately what came to mind when I put together a couple of the sequences in the back half. Someone also kindly put together a YouTube video in case you have no idea what the hell reference I'm making. Pretty much a lot of this mix sounds like tropical dance music with sporadic alien sounds, and is honestly one of my personal favorite mixes to date.

Trust, it'll make sense when you hear it. Enjoy!

StarTropix

Download: http://drop.io/startropix

Cut Copy -- "Future"
Phoenix -- "Fences (The Poindexter Remix)"
Caribou -- "Odessa"
Miike Snow -- "Song for No One"
Yeasayer -- "O.N.E."
The Tough Alliance -- "A New Chance (Tanlines Remix)"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Us v Them"

As always, keep up with DCD Collective's gigs, mixes, ramblings, and what have you over here. And a special Happy Birthday wish this week to my amazing friend and DCD-mate Debbsnake!

Choose Your Own Mixventure Volumes 1 & 2 (DOUBLE-MIX)

2010-02-09T21:47:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone, welcome to February. It's been a GREAT year so far, with our Benefit for Haiti raising over $1000 for Doctors Without Borders and our subsequent DCD gig at Beauty Bar resulting in some pretty outstanding interpretive dance moves.

In preparing for both, I happened to store up a big surplus of songs, several of which I haven't tested out live yet. So I decided to make two mixes out of them - the first rock/punk-oriented, the second dance - and then make group them under a name that's a take on an awesome book series I liked as a kid.

Yup.

So here's my first "Choose Your Own Mixventure" double-mix. This will happen whenever I have a surplus of songs, which is to say randomly. Enjoy!

Choose Your Own Mixventure #1: Secret of the Ninja

Download: http://drop.io/CYOMsecretoftheninja

Bloc Party -- "Cain Said To Abel"
Les Savy Fav -- "What Would Wolves Do?"
Mission of Burma -- "Academy Fight Song"
Beck -- "Profanity Prayers"
Datarock -- "See What I Care"
Billy Idol -- "Dancing With Myself"
Cut Off Your Hands -- "Expectations"
Jay Reatard -- "See/Saw"
Pixies -- "Alec Eiffel"

Choose Your Own Mixventure #2: Gorga The Space Monster

Download: http://drop.io/CYOMgorgathespacemonster

Thom Yorke -- "The Eraser (XXXChange Remix)"
Lykke Li -- "Little Bit (Gigamesh Remix)"
!!! -- "A New Name"
Passion Pit -- "Folds In Your Hands"
Cut Copy -- "Out There On The Ice"
Digitalism -- "Pogo"
Vampire Weekend -- "Giving Up The Gun"
Datarock -- "Amarillion"

New mix next month (or earlier if I feel like it)! In the meantime check out our DCD Collective Facebook fan page for news on upcoming gigs, mixes from my collective-mates, deep thoughts about bacon, and so on.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/DCD-Collective/208011443772?ref=ts

New Year, One-Ear, New Mix

2010-01-05T20:14:00.000-08:00

Happy 2010, babies. I'll save the hoverboard joke for 5 years from now and just launch into the backstory behind this here new mix.

I rang in the New Year at a CRAZY fun party hosted by my buddy Eric in Brooklyn, at which I rocked a nuts 6-hour DJ set with Chris and Debbie to herald the coming of our new DJ supergroup, The DCD Collective. After minds were thoroughly melted, I awoke on New Year's Day with a feeling of awesome accomplishment... and a gradually increasing pressure on & muffling of my right ear.

A pretty terrible afternoon, a splitting headache, and a quick trip to emergency care later, I was diagnosed with otitis media in said ear - also known as an ear infection - for the first time in my life. The antibiotics I received took care of the pain, but after a couple of days of the muffled feeling not going away, I was wondering how long it would take before I could ear at 100% again.

...But then I was like "SCREW THIS," slapped my new DJ headphones on, and made my first mix of the year. It's called "One-Ear," and the link and tracklist are as follows:

Listen To One-Ear

http://drop.io/oneear10

Read About The Things You're Listening To

Friendly Fires -- "On Board"
Mylo -- "In My Arms"
Young MC -- "Know How"
Shinichi Osawa -- "MAIN STREET ELECTRICAL PARADE"
Delorean -- "As Time Breaks Off"
Animal Collective -- "Brother Sport"

I guess there's a larger lesson one could extrapolate about following your heart and doing what you love no matter what stands in your way... but honestly, I was just pissed off at an ear infection and wanted to make a damn mix. But hey, go for it, kids!

Thankfully, in the process of making this mix my hearing in my right ear has gotten significantly better and should be back to normal within a few days. Special thanks to God, music, and antibiotics for that.

And if you read through that much backstory, The DCD Collective has another gig (our first official venue gig!) at Fontana's on 105 Eldridge St. in Manhattan on January 30 at 10pm. We'll be spinning a dance party downstairs following another great set brought to you by awesome friends The Barrens. Come onnnn down!

Last Mix of 2009: "Boxing Day"

2009-12-09T19:00:00.000-08:00

Hey. So this is my last mix of 2009, and in my opinion one of my best to date. Thanks for listening to all of my experiments this year. Pump it up, dance around, enjoy.

The Boxing Day Mix

http://drop.io/boxingdaymix

The Boxing Day Tracklist

Deerhunter -- "Nothing Ever Happened"
Cut Copy -- "Nobody Lost, Nobody Found"
New Young Pony Club -- "Hiding On The Staircase"
Hot Chip -- "One Life Stand"
Passion Pit -- "Seaweed Song"
Priors -- "What You Need (Hey Champ Remix)"
Zoot Woman -- "Saturation"
Papercuts -- "Future Primitive (The Go! Team Remix)"

SPEAKING OF DANCING, HOWEVER. I'm going to be DJing my buddy EGerz's inevitably epic New Year's Eve party in Brooklyn with my friends in our new group, the DCD Collective. The name may change to involve Oprah, but for now that is what we're called. Come on by!

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=202206604680&index=1

Back At It: New "Return to Cheddar Biscuit Mountain" Mix

2009-11-12T20:04:00.000-08:00

Yeah, you read that correctly. This mix is called Return to Cheddar Biscuit Mountain, and it's just as awesome as the image that phrase conjures up.

I'm especially proud of the work that went into this one, but I'll save the backstory for a future VH1 Storytellers special and let you get to rocking it. Enjoy!

Return to Cheddar Biscuit Mountain

http://drop.io/returntocheddarbiscuitmountain

The Tracklist

Noah and the Whale -- "Blue Skies (The Twelves Remix)"
Quantic -- "Not So Blue Skies"
Thom Yorke -- "Hearing Damage"
Jazztronik -- "SAMURAI (Redsoul Mix)"
The Hood Internet -- "Sticky World Tour (Wale vs. Black Moth Super Rainbow)"
Franz Ferdinand -- "Live Alone (Delorean Remix)"
Catcomplex -- "Love Gemma"
The Juan MacLean -- "Happy House"

Dedicating the closer to Jerry Fuchs - thanks for the great music, man.

Rage Against the Machine With the New "8-Bot" Mix

2009-10-08T16:34:00.000-07:00

What's good party people? Welcome to Fall, when the nights get a little bit cooler, the leaves get a little bit more orange and on the ground, and there's a day devoted to dressing up in cool costumes and drinking a lot.

You know who doesn't care about any of that though? ROBOTS.

Robots can apparently sing now, so it's really only a matter of time before they learn the dance moves we humans bust out in the club. And fatigue and colder weather aren't going to stop them in the least.

With that in mind, I put together a new "8-Bot" mix that will help you keep up with those cybernetic bastards in the upcoming robot / human dance wars. Not really though. I heard a lot of cool songs and remixes this past month that vaguely sounded like they blended rock, hip hop, and electro with the synths from Super Mario Bros 3 and made a mix out of them. If it does help you to outdance a robot, however, then you're completely welcome.

This is 8-Bot.

http://drop.io/the8botmix

This is the Tracklist.

Munk -- "Back Down (Cut Copy Jackmaster Remix"
Animal Collective -- "My Girls (Gigamesh 'Proper House' Remix)"
The Hood Internet -- "Cult Logic Forever (Drake vs. Miike Snow)"
Dizzee Rascal feat. Calvin Harris -- "Dance Wiv Me (Shazam Remix)"
Delorean -- "Deli"
Reverend & the Makers -- "Silence is Talking (Alex Metric Remix)"
Radiohead -- "Reckoner (The Twelves Remix)"

That closing track is a birthday shoutout to THOM YORKE, who has recently been jamming with a Nihilist and will be releasing a new album with my favorite band next year. Happy birthday and thanks for the life-changing music, Thom!

Jump On It: The New Amurrica Mix

2009-09-03T17:28:00.000-07:00

Oh hey check it out, it's your man EastCoast just bringing you the hot freshness. You've got some lucky ears there.

Like I mentioned in my previous post, I was working on more mixes when I dropped my first Primer Megamix, which wrapped up my spring / summer '09 mixes in one nice rock-blocking package. Now that we're in September (Baller Appreciation Month) and we've got Fall chilling out in our lobby, I wanted to help you kick off your Labor Day weekend in style with this new AMURRICA mix.

I pretty much just named it "Amurrica" because I really like this movie , but like just about everyone else in this country I'm excited to kick back this holiday weekend on some delicious burgers with some amazing people.

One love, America.

The Goods.

http://drop.io/damiensamurricamix

The Tracks.

Claudja Barry -- "Dance Dance Dance (Tangoterje Remix)"*
Yeah Yeah Yeahs -- "Soft Shock (Them Jeans Acoustic Remix)"
Futurecop! -- "N.A.S.A. (Cryptonites Remix)*
Ra Ra Riot -- "Can You Tell (The Kids Are Radioactive Remix)"
Radiohead -- "Everything in Its Right Place (Gigamesh / DiscoTech Remix)"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Disco Infiltrator (DJ CGERZZZ REMIX)"
The Hood Internet -- "Free Control Ocho (Kid Sister feat. Pitbull vs. Phonat)"
Pixies -- "The Thing (Allez-Allez Bootleg)"
Bag Raiders -- "Shooting Stars (Kris Menace Remix)"

Why is track #6 in bold? It's my good friend DJ CGerzzz's first-ever original remix, and I thank him for the dopeness. You can check this and his other podcasts out at http://www.podomatic.com/profile/djcgerzzz, and on September 9th you're definitely going to want to hit up The Barrens' website at http://www.barrensmusic.com for two brand-new singles.

Enjoy it all, and have a great holiday!

*America is also about some dirty, dirty bass.

Hell Yes I Did: Introducing The Primer Megamix

2009-08-20T14:40:00.000-07:00

What’s up kids. Did you feel the awesomeness in the wind the past couple of days? Were you not able to shake the idea the idea that your face was gonna get rocked this week?

Well congratulations, you were totally right. We’ve reached the home stretch of summer, and I figured I'd wrap up the best tracks from my last five mixes into one big warm weather megamix while I work on some new goodness to drop on you all. Appropriately titled "The Primer," it'll catch the newbies up on the best of what I've put out during the spring and summer of '09 while giving those of you who have heard my mixes before (thanks!) a cool re-imagined all-star set of my favorite tracks, pretty much equally selected from all of my past mixes.

Enjoy, yo!

http://drop.io/damientheprimer4533

Tracklist / Mix of Origin

Animal Collective -- "My Girls" / Spring '09 Mix
The Go! Team -- "Milk Crisis" / Spring '09 Mix 2: Electric Boogaloo
The Hood Internet -- "Comfortable Up Here (Lil' Wayne vs. Royksopp)" / Spring '09 Mix
MSTRKRFT feat. John Legend -- "Heartbreaker" / Lost in Translation Mix
Mondo Grosso -- "SHININ'"/ The 38:10 Mix
Cut Copy -- "Hearts on Fire (Knightlife Remix)" / The Almost Entirely Remixes Mix
Ladyhawke -- "Paris Is Burning" / Spring '09 Mix 2: Electric Boogaloo
Dizzee Rascal feat. Armand Van Helden -- "Bonkers" / Spring '09 Mix
Deadmau5 feat. Kaskade -- "I Remember" / The Almost Entirely Remixes Mix
Frankmusik -- "Confusion Girl (Russ Chimes Remix)" / The 38:10 Mix
Friendly Fires -- "Jump In The Pool (The Thin White Duke Remix)" / Lost in Translation Mix
LCD Soundsystem -- "All My Friends (Franz Ferdinand Version) / Hot Freshness

About my choice of closer: it didn't appear on any of the previous mixes, but I found it in my library and thought it was both a fitting end to this megamix - as well as a good shoutout to YOU, the friends who have dug my previous mixes and encouraged me to make more. You guys rock, and I hope above all else this gives y'all some Good Times.

ONE.

I Am A Mixing Machine: Check Out This "38:10" Mix, You Guys

2009-08-07T07:40:00.000-07:00

Sup kids, looks like I'm getting MUCH faster at pumping out these mixes. Here's a new one pretty much exactly two weeks after the last - best part is, it came together in a couple days and wasn't even the one I'd intended to put out next (a full-on country music remix comp... just kidding... or am I).

So you know the drill by now: I drop the link and track list and kill a little time with commentary, then I throw out a list of shows that I intend to go to unless they're rained out. Or, in the case of TV ON THE M-F'IN RADIO at Prospect Park, will attend even if I have to rock a poncho.

Here's my new 38:10 mix then!

http://drop.io/damiens3810mix

The Tracks

Kid Sister -- "Right Hand Hi"
Mondo Grosso -- "SHININ'"
Frankmusik -- "Confusion Girl (Russ Chimes Remix)"
Daft Punk -- "One More Time (Bazz Weasel's One More Tune Remix)"
Bloc Party -- "One More Chance (Alex Metric Remix)"
Gossip -- "Heavy Cross (Yuksek Remix)"
LCD Soundsystem -- "Time to Get Away (Gucci Soundsystem Remix)"

Track #7 is dedicated to Debbie "Huge LCD Soundsystem Fan" Chou because she suggested the original as the closer track. Along with a bunch of my other friends, she is in this really kickass band called The Barrens that you should check out if you enjoy awesomeness and rocking.

The Banter

So does the inclusion of that LCD Soundsystem track as a closer make my choice of mix title make more sense now? Yeah music nerds, the title 38:10 is a hat tip to my guru James Murphy's 45:33 mix from back in the (relatively recent) day. While not nearly as continuous or, as P4K puts it, space-disco-ey, I feel like this is something you can dance to and probably also jog to if you felt like it (BPM's just about the same for all the tracks throughout). Joggers, let me know how that goes.

In related news from that same P4K link, a 45:33 remix album is coming out next month, and a proper new LCD Soundsystem LP is coming in 2010! Can't wait for either!

Here Are Some Shows

8/9: Simian Mobile Disco / Fiery Furnaces (free!)

8/11: TV ON THE RADIO @ Prospect Park (sequel to a legendary show)

8/13: Yeasayer / Amazing Baby @ Pier 54

8/14: SCHOOL OF SEVEN BELLS @ South Street Seaport (free!)

8/16: Del tha Funkee Homosapien @ East River State Park (free!)

8/23: GIRL TALK!!!! @ East River State Park (free!)

8/28: REFLECTION ETERNAL!!!! @ B.B. Kings (not free, but HOLY CRAP GO)

9/9: N.E.R.D. @ Governors Island

9/12: MOS DEF @ Governors Island

Hey I Made A New Mix Already: The "Almost Entirely Remixes" Mix

2009-07-24T07:55:00.000-07:00

Hot on the heels of my dance mix that was also an art project comes this dance mix that doesn't actually double as anything else. Produced in (for me) a record time of under two days, this is a straight-up compilation of mostly remixes that I heard for literally the first time this week.

So yeah, taste the freshness. With your ears.

http://drop.io/thealmostentirelyremixesmix

Tracklist:

Phoenix -- "Lisztomania (Alex Metric Remix)"
Duck Sauce -- "aNYway"
Cut Copy -- "Hearts on Fire (Knightlife Remix)"
Luther Vandross -- "Never Too Much (ODahls K-Love Remix)"
FACT -- "Los Angeles (MSTRKRFT Al-P Remix)"
Deadmau5 feat. Kaskade -- "I Remember"
Daft Punk -- "Face to Face (Night Drugs Rework)"
Elan Mehler -- "New Breed (Dobie Remix)"

I really like how this one turned out, and feel like you could easily drop this at a late-night hipster dance party if you wanna go take a 45-minute break from DJing without anyone noticing. Maybe grab a couple drinks or run some quick errands. You may want to stick around to catch those "wait is that Luther Vandross?" looks though, that'll be amusing.

Here's my latest list of shows too, I can't believe it's already the end of July:

8/2: Dan Deacon / Dear Hunter / No Age @ East River State Park (free!)

8/8: BIG DADDY KANE @ Prospect Park (for free!)

8/9: Simian Mobile Disco / Fiery Furnaces (free!)

8/11: TV ON THE RADIO @ Prospect Park (sequel to a legendary show)

8/13: Yeasayer / Amazing Baby @ Pier 54

8/14: SCHOOL OF SEVEN BELLS @ South Street Seaport (free!)

8/16: Del tha Funkee Homosapien @ East River State Park (free!)

8/23: GIRL TALK!!!! @ East River State Park (free!)

8/28: REFLECTION ETERNAL!!!! @ B.B. Kings (not free, but HOLY CRAP GO)

Going camping this weekend, get dancin' while I'm gone. Peace.

Getting Artsy With It: EastCoast's "Lost In Translation" Mix

2009-07-06T07:55:00.000-07:00

What's good kids. There's actually a new post up, which means one of two things: either a member of Radiohead just sneezed, or I made a new mix.

...Yup it's a new mix. But hang out for a bit, Radiohead Sneeze Watchers, there'll be something for you too!*

Summer's been in full swing for a couple of weeks now, so it was definitely about time to drop a mix that had been clinically tested to induce ass-shakin that registers on Richter scale readings up to 8 states away. So it's with great pleasure that I officially drop my latest mix entitled "Lost In Translation" by copy/pasting the link below and then writing out the tracklist right below that.

http://drop.io/damienslostintranslationmix

Tracklist:

Hot Chip -- "Take It In"
N.A.S.A. -- "Gifted (The Alston Shuffle Remix)"
MSTRKRFT feat. John Legend -- "Heartbreaker"
Grizzly Bear -- "Two Weeks (Fred Falke Remix)"
School of Seven Bells -- "Half Asleep"
Friendly Fires -- "Jump In The Pool (The Thin White Duke Remix)"
Shinichi Osawa feat. Au Revoire Simone -- "Star Guitar (Chemical Brothers Cover)"
Beirut/Realpeople -- "My Night With The Prostitute From Marseille"

It's also worth noting that track #6 is my favorite remix of all time, ever.

Even though this wound up as a summer dance mix, my original intent behind it was something else entirely. Here's the part where I get pretty artsy-wanky, so skip the next couple paragraphs if you're just here to groove and don't care much about why I did this. I'll even put up markers so you know when to start up again.

::BEGIN ARTY EXPLANATION::

Cool, so now that the plebes are gone, I can discuss the meaning behind this mix. It's the first time I've done something centered around a particular visual or artwork as a theme, so this was even more fun than my previous "hey it's spring let's rock out" mixes.

For the past month and change, I've been really fascinated with tilt shift lens video and photography art, especially the Japan-based works seen on the UNIQLO Calendar and mockmoon's Vimeo page. Not only are they awesome artistic displays, they simultaneously tapped into my love of both Japan and cityscapes. This mix essentially began as my personal soundtrack to the UNIQLO calendar - not that the preloaded music wasn't cool or anything, I just wanted to throw on some cool songs to go with the visuals.

The arrangement of the mix itself, though, came about when I took a closer look at the distanced perspective of the calendar shots and the super-fast time lapse action going on. Seeing all the tiny people rush about reminded me of one of my favorite concepts, that of urban personal disconnection via sustained over-connection to a larger entity (there's probably an actual term for that, but I like this explanation better).

So up until the Grizzly Bear remix, the initial tracks are from the micro-perspective of one of these people rushing around on the street with the associated industrialized beats and minor key melodies representing that level of insularity and concern with one's own life. From then on, the beats and melodies in subsequent songs get lighter and more ethereal as you pan out to see how everyone in these clips melds into the macro pulse of the cities themselves, with all these personal concerns subsumed by the much bigger flow of the society in which these people live. This whole theme, interestingly enough, is also reflected in the official videos for two songs on the mix, School of Seven Bell's "Half Asleep" and The Chemical Brothers' "Star Guitar", with the latter video directed by Michel Gondry and the song covered by Shinichi Osawa and Au Revoir Simone.

::END ARTY EXPLANATION::

So yeah everyone else, blah blah art project blah blah. But I should mention again that that Thin White Duke remix of Friendly Fire's "Jump in the Pool" really is one of my favorite tracks ever.

And here's my show schedule for the next couple of months:

7/9: Matt & Kim / Flosstradamus @ Pier 54 (free!)

7/23: TED LEO + The Pharmacists / Radio 4 / Extra Golden @ Pier 54 (for free!)

7/23: Slick Rick @ East River Park (also for free! I WILL pull this off somehow)

7/31: Beastie Boys / Yeah Yeah Yeahs / Q-Tip / Flying Lotus @ APW

8/2: Dan Deacon / Dear Hunter / No Age @ East River State Park (free!)

8/8: BIG DADDY KANE @ Prospect Park (for free!)

8/9: Simian Mobile Disco / Fiery Furnaces (free!)

8/11: TV ON THE RADIO @ Prospect Park (sequel to a legendary show)

8/13: Yeasayer / Amazing Baby @ Pier 54

8/14: SCHOOL OF SEVEN BELLS @ South Street Seaport (free!)

8/16: Del tha Funkee Homosapien @ East River State Park (free!)

8/23: GIRL TALK!!!! @ East River State Park (free!)

Feel free to check out my earlier mixes too, they're in the last two posts respectively. Cheers.

*By the time you've read up to this point in the post, one of the members of Radiohead has more than likely sneezed. Told you I'd hook you up.

Making This A Thing: Yet Another (Better) Spring Mix & More Concert Dates

2009-05-14T19:40:00.000-07:00

Whoa, a slightly-earlier-than-usual blog post! Rare that I can say that.

But hey, you can't fight the forces of Inspirado. Over the past couple of weeks, I've received a really great response to my original Spring '09 Mix from my friends, some of whom have also inadvertantly exposed me to new/old songs that I've been bumping since. That combo of outcomes resulted in me getting the mixing software back up and threading together a follow-up mix, which you can check out here:

http://drop.io/damienspring09mix2electricboogaloo

It's pretty much a rule / eternal joke of mine to name the first sequel to anything after one of the greatest movies of all time*, so you're not missing out on any deep meaning in that title. I'm really proud of how this one turned out - it's leaner, tighter, and ass-shakier than its predecessor, and I have a lot of you to thank for some great inspiration on it. If you need me to DJ your parties, I will happily come over and throw both of these mixes on, press play, and then go drink your beer while hitting on your friends.

Oh yeah, tracklist. This should be right, I'm already starting work on the next one. :)

"The Reeling" -- Passion Pit
"Weekend" -- The Sea & Cake
"Paris is Burning" -- Ladyhawke
"Milk Crisis" -- The Go! Team
"The Village Green Preservation Society" -- The Kinks
"Casa Bey" -- Mos Def
"His Girl" -- The Budos Band
"Interesting Drug" -- Morrissey
"Young Adult Friction" -- The Pains of Being Pure at Heart

Since last time I wrote, I've since learned that I'll be going to 8,000 more concerts within the next couple of months than I originally thought. Let's try to list them out here, eh?

5/18: Passion Pit @ Rocks Off Cruise (HIPSTERS ON A BOAT!)

5/27: BLK JKS @ The Bell House

5/29: GRIZZLY BEAR / Here We Go Magic @ Town Hall

5/30: BLACK STAR (YEAH I KNOW!) @ Nokia Theater

6/3: BLK JKS / FEMI KUTI @ Knitting Factory (which reopened, I guess?)

6/6: TV ON THE RADIO @ Central Park Summerstage (if I'm in town)

6/8: DAVID FUCKIN' BYRNE @ Prospect Park (for free somehow!!)

6/18: Plus/Minus & VERSUS! @ Mercury Lounge

6/26: Blonde Redhead @ Prospect Park (for free!)

6/27: The Most Serene Republic @ Union Hall

7/9: Matt & Kim / Flosstradamus @ Pier 54 (for free!)

7/12: MISSION OF BURMA / Fucked Up / Ponytail @ Williamsburg Waterfront (uh, free!)

7/23: TED LEO + The Pharmacists / Radio 4 / Extra Golden @ Pier 54 (for free!)

7/23: Slick Rick @ East River Park (also for free! I WILL pull this off somehow)

7/31: Beastie Boys / Yeah Yeah Yeahs / Q-Tip / Flying Lotus @ APW

8/8: BIG DADDY KANE @ Prospect Park (for free!)

8/11: TV ON THE RADIO @ Prospect Park (sequel to a legendary show)

8/13: Yeasayer / Amazing Baby @ Pier 54

Uh, yeah. And it's not a show per say, but I will also be attending a Purple Rain Sing-Along @ Prospect Park on 8/6.

My head hurts from the awesomeness of the near future. Peace.

*Damn right I have that on DVD.

Oh Hey I Made A New Mix + EastCoast’s Spring Concert Tour ‘09

2009-04-26T21:59:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

Long time since I’ve written anything here – it always is, time flies when you’re being awesome – but this time I’m using this space to give you a little gift instead of just using it to tell you how cool the things I like are.

Presenting: my NEW SPRING ’09 MIX!

http://drop.io/damiensspring09mix

So as background to keep you occupied as you listen: I’ve been hearing a lot of tracks over the past few weeks that have had crazy catchy beats that warranted multiple listens. So in honor of the great spring weather that’s finally arrived in NYC as well as in honor of me feeling like it, I pulled 10 of the best tracks that I’ve heard recently (but weren’t necessarily created recently) into a dance mix for you to shake your asses to at parties or randomly on a sidewalk.

…Yeah that sums up the rationale. That only took 5 seconds to read? Ah, well I’m sure there are some other websites you can pop open as you listen. Internet’s cool like that.

Here’s the tracklist too in case you’re curious as to what exactly you’re shaking your ass to:

1. “If I Ever Feel Better” – Phoenix
2. “My Girls” – Animal Collective*
3. “Comfortable Up Here (Lil Wayne vs. Royksopp)” – The Hood Internet
4. “Bring on the Night” – The Police
5. “Roof (DJ Ayres Remix)” – Wale
6. “Addiction” – Kanye (Gayfish) West
7. “Comet Course” – Flying Lotus
8. “Day ‘N Nite (Jori Hulkkonen Remix)” – Kid Cudi
9. “Bonkers” – Dizzee Rascal feat. Armand Van Helden
10. “Everywhere” – Common feat. Martina Topley-Bird

Cool? Cool. Hope you like it!

Oh yeah, and since I’m likely not going to write anything else here for another while, here are the shows/locations/dates for my upcoming Spring / Early Summer Concert Tour, a.k.a. “These Are The Bands I’ll Be Checking Out Live While Drinking Booze For the Next Couple of Months”:

4/29: MOGWAI @ Music Hall of Williamsburg

5/7: Wale / Colin Munroe @ Le Poisson Rouge

5/11: Clipse @ The Studio at Webster Hall (for free! somehow!)

5/29: GRIZZLY BEAR / Here We Go Magic @ Town Hall

5/30: BLACK STAR (YEAH I KNOW!) @ Nokia Theater

6/27: The Most Serene Republic @ Union Hall

This probably only represents half of the shows I’ll really wind up seeing as life is full of awesome surprises like that, but you get the idea – spring and summertime in NYC = musical goodness. Get out and enjoy it!

*I still think Animal Collective sound like they're just tripping on shrooms and banging against whatever's around most of the time, but damn if this isn't a catchy track. Well played guys.

Completely Random Twitter Experiment: Top 5 Songs of the 90s

2009-02-25T14:51:00.000-08:00

So!

I clearly haven't blogged recently. Probably a bunch of reasons behind that, the most important of which being: I haven't felt like it? My blogging / creative writing style can best be described as "completely erratic and knee-jerk," and neither of those adjectives convey a sense of consistency. I'd consider apologizing, but that's how I roll, and nuts to you if you want that to change. :)

Anyway - if you're still here - I'm kind of a Twitter fiend these days, and I felt like capturing a really cool exchange I had with my friends on it today. It's a lot of copying and pasting of content that's already written, which is also really my preferred type of blog post - multiple wins! I've changed some of the handle names because you don't need to know what mine is (even though pretty much everyone who reads this already does) and to help the story flow (somewhat).

Enjoy!

(also: @ = replying to someone, for the Twitter n00bs)

---

eastcoast (me): kinda diggin on the cranberries this morning. @westcoast would be proud.

westcoast: @eastcoast IN YOUR HEAAAD IN YOUR HEAAAAAAD ZOOOOMBIE ZOOOOMBIE ZOOOOMBIE IE IE best song to come out of the 90s? Possibly.

eastcoast: @westcoast nice rendition, chief. and now i'm fiending for a "best song of the 90s" debate / monkey knife fight.

westcoast: @eastcoast preliminary top 5: zombie, glycerine, disarm, everlong, and amazin'

eastcoast: @westcoast good stuff. my prelim top 5: paranoid android, mayonaise, smells like teen spirit, everlong (agreed!), and one

(this is when I start getting social and post this to my Twitter feed and GTalk status)

eastcoast: having a "top 5 songs of the 90s" debate with @westcoast - send your picks over too!

Arnab: basically any 5 of the songs from weezer blue album....according to combinatorics that'd be 10C5 possibilities, which is 252 lists.

theguardattacks 1.MBV-only shallow 2.radiohead-let down 3.built to spill- velvet waltz 4.ride-vapour trail 5.Weezer-y bother

eastcoast: awesome!

Lilly (@lilly): poison. bbd. you know it to be true... every moment is a bbd moment

eastcoast: now THAT's a plaque-worthy statement.

sosodeformed: @eastcoast see I didn't know if you meant 90s songs from my favorite bands or ridiculous tunes from, well also my favorite 90s "bands"

eastcoast: @sososdeformed whatever you want i guess. i do reserve the right to laugh your list if it gets all buzz ballads on me. :)

sosodeformed: @eastcoast I think you've reserved yourself the right to laugh at anything about me since the day we met

eastcoast: @sososdeformed perfectly stated. so where's your list at?

sosodeformed: @eastcoast alive - pearljam, supersonic - oasis, fake plastic trees- obviously, miss world - hole, awake - letters to cleo. singles ost

eastcoast: @sososdeformed nice! and i didn't even make fun of you for hole. :)

Nucknfutz6: Top 5: Black, Interstate Love Song, Disarm, Champagne Supernova, Lightning Crashes

eastcoast: @Nucknfutz6 nice, bro! no soundgarden tho?

westcoast: @Nucknfutz6 my eyes definitely paused at throwing copper this morning

(After an undetermined amount of time for deep reflection...)

eastcoast: hey, i liked that thing we did earlier where we talked about cool songs from the 90s. let's do that again sometime, only slightly different!

sosodeformed: @eastcoast a britpop one!

eastcoast: @sososdeformed eastcoast: "name your favorite blur songs" sosodeformed: "ALL OF THEM" eastcoast: "shocker!" ;)

(I'm such a good person.)

For real though, that was a lot of fun. Thanks to my music dork friends for participating, and thanks to Twitter for allowing us to get nostalgic in 140 characters or less. I do plan to do that again at some undetermined point in the future - you should get on Twitter and join in.

The Top 10 Albums of 2008: EastCoast Edition

2009-01-01T09:05:00.000-08:00

So yeah - happy New Year, babies! Do you remember what day it is? Are you eating a Domino's philly cheese steak sandwich and nursing mad amounts of Gatorade right now after doing vodka shots chased with German pop rocks last night in someone's kitchen in Brooklyn? Does it still feel like it's too early for pants?

Great, now you're ready to celebrate Music Dork Christmas, a.k.a. the birth of the Top 10 Albums of 2008 List. If you read the whole thing, your raging hangover will be magically cured!

2008 was a pivotal year for a wide variety of reasons (the introduction of the world to this guy clearly being chief among them), but at its outset there were tons of people who claimed that ’08 wouldn’t be nearly as awesome musically as 2007 was. Granted, 2007 DID totally kick ass in that regard – it’s not every year that Radiohead simultaneously drop one of the best albums of their career and shake up the music world by bringing attention to the pay-what-you-want-for-our-album-online business model. But someone forgot to tell these armchair Nostradamuses and Miss Cleos that musicians always find ways to build upon the past and put out outstanding works of art every year that then become the benchmark against which to judge the heights music can really achieve.

Yeah, and a lot of THAT happened in 2008, which made putting together a list of the top 10 albums of the year both a pleasure and a total pain in the ass. Windows were stared out of blankly on rainy nights, smooth pebbles were skipped across placid lakes, clichéd activities associated with deep thought were written on my MacBook. And after all that, 10 completely kickass albums were chosen, ranked, and listed out on this here blog. By me.

So check it!

#10: Sigur Ros - Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust

...And what better way to kick off a top 10 than with an album cover that features naked people running across a road? While it's fine if you were never able to actually PRONOUNCE the name of Sigur Ros' latest epic of an album (it translates in English to "With Buzzing in Our Ears We Play Endlessly"), it'd be a damn shame if you didn't get a chance to check this album out or see Sigur Ros perform its tracks live on tour this year. Beautifully orchestrated and lush, the album comes out strong with "Gobbledigook" and "Inní mér syngur vitleysingur (Within Me A Lunatic Sings)" before embarking on a peaceful, meditative journey in its remaining tracks. This is an outstanding chillout album that deserves the high-quality-headphones-on-your-couch treatment.

Standout Tracks: "Inní mér syngur vitleysingur," "Gobbledigook"

#9: Flying Lotus - Los Angeles

While it pains me as a New Yorker to vouch for an album named after a city that's not nearly as awesome as NYC is (sorry dudes! it's true!), I've gotta admit that Flying Lotus was easily one of my best musical discoveries of this past year. If you're a fan of Adult Swim and were ever wondering where some of those badass beats they play during interstitials came from, look no further - FlyLo is the mastermind behind those tracks, and the interstitials only give a glimpse of freshness he drops on his albums and in the many kickass remixes he's put out. Los Angeles is a fuzzed-out, engrossing mix of tracks that run the style gamut from electronica to hip hop to Brazilian, all the while showcasing a style that's uniquely FlyLo. The man's been called the successor to the legendary J Dilla, and with this album it's easy to see why.

Standout Tracks: "Orbit Brazil," "Parisian Goldfish," "Golden Diva"

#8: Girl Talk -- Feed the Animals

Haha fuck, does this even require an explanation? Really? Explaining WHY Girl Talk is amazing seems pretty pointless - kind of like explaining why bacon is delicious. I spent a good two or three weeks listening to nothing BUT this album, and even now as I'm listening to it to write this, I'm finding new things to love about Feed the Animals. Yeah the mashup process is clever and interesting, and Greg Gillis' use of the pay-what-you-want distribution system to get it out was cool too... but the whole point is that this is just outstanding party music to let loose and dance to without overanalysis. And if you've never seen him live, GO. NOW. To his HOUSE if he's not doing a proper show at the moment. Sure he'll be cool with starting the pary right there.

Standout Tracks: The whole damn thing, but these three especially.

#7: Deerhoof -- Offend Maggie

Yeah, it's not a top 10 list without an appearance by the adorable Satomi and her weird band of minstrels. Offend Maggie continues Deerhoof's proud tradition of being simultaneously awesome and confusing, with tracks that contain both amazing riffs and lyrics about basketballs. Just go with it - it's completely worth the ride.

Standout Tracks: "Offend Maggie," "Fresh Born," "Eaguru Guru"

#6: Delta Spirit -- Ode to Sunshine (Reissue)

Yeah I know this originally came out in '07, but since I was only introduced to Delta Spirit this year (thanks Ed!) and the album was reissued this year with a reworked track, Ode to Sunshine makes the list. Sup loopholes! For real though, Delta Spirit sound like what would happen if Spoon were younger, raspier, and the house band at a speakeasy: totally badass. This album oozes with folky swagger and comes very close to capturing the intensity of their live shows (fact: they DO actually beat a trashcan lid on the song "Trashcan"). Delta Spirit were also one of my favorite musical discoveries of aught eight, and you'd be doing yourself a favor to check them out too.

Standout Tracks: "Children," "Trashcan"

#5: The Dodos -- Visiter

Who knew a random viewing of a program on MTV would actually lead to one of my biggest musical "WTFwow!" moments of the year? Thanks to the video for the lead single "Fools," I developed a pretty big obsession with The Dodos. The fucking primal ferocity and almost military precision of guitar-and-drum combo (I think there's a xylophonist now too) that they displayed in "Fools" appears all throughout Visiter, making for a unique and thoroughly engaging listen (or several). Definitely another band you need to see live as well - it's not a studio trick, they're THAT good at rocking out.

Standout Tracks: "Fools," "Red and Purple," "The Season"

#4: +/- {Plus/Minus} -- Xs on Your Eyes

When I write a glowing review of your newest album complete with a random Street Fighter 2 picture, you know you're going to end up with a high rank on my top 10 albums list. :) Congrats, Plus/Minus - Xs on Your Eyes is even cooler to me now than it was when I first repped for it, and it was awesome to hear my favorite tracks off of it performed live at their holiday show / album release party in Brooklyn a couple of weeks ago. And James - thanks for checking out our blog, too!

Standout Tracks: "Tired Eyed," "Snowblind," "Subdued," "The Hours You Keep"

#3: Q-Tip -- The Renaissance

"What good is a ear if a Q-Tip isn't in it?" questions the legendary MC on the opening track of The Renaissance, "Johnny Is Dead." A damn good question, man - one that everyone who came to love hip hop thanks to A Tribe Called Quest back in the day has been asking during the 10 years between this album and Q-Tip's last solo joint. We missed you, Q-Tip, and The Renaissance showcases exactly why: top-notch production combined with the illest flows and best beats around. This is easily my favorite hip hop album in years and hope it's only the beginning of the new goodness Tip's gonna put out.

Standout Tracks: All of 'em. Seriously, throw this album on and you're bringing the party wherever you go. "Gettin Up," however, is literally Perfect.

#2: Tokyo Police Club -- Elephant Shell

HA! Honestly, half of the reason I write these lists is to totally throw people off with my #2 album of the year. I'm going to go ahead and assume you didn't know I liked Tokyo Police Club this much. The reason why Elephant Shell is this highly ranked is pretty simple, actually: since the album came out in April, I've kept just about all of its tracks in active rotation on my iPod. And I don't normally do that with any album. It's just so fucking CATCHY, and nearly all of the tracks are perfect bite-size servings of solid, awesome indie rock. Elephant Shell is proof positive that your album doesn't need to feature a monkey playing a theremin or a sample from an obscure French film to be highly regarded on a music blog - you just have to rock the fuck out, and Tokyo Police Club make that happen.

Standout Tracks: "In A Cave," "Centennial," "Nursery, Academy"

And EastCoast's #1 Album of 2008 is...

#1: TV on the Radio -- Dear Science

Yeah I know. I clearly didn't say that already. There's really nothing more TO say, aside from quoting Wikipedia:

"Dear Science was named the best album of 2008 by Rolling Stone, The Guardian, Spin Magazine, Consequence of Sound, MTV, Entertainment Weekly, [and] Pitchfork Media's readers poll."

Thanks for agreeing with me, established media outlets!

Standout Tracks: Once again, all of them.

-----------

Usually by this point in the annual list, I'm too tired to continue writing more stuff. But I'm on vacation and have some time to kill before the Rose Bowl, so let's throw some more quickie awards in here!

Album I Already Ranked #1 in 2007 But Could Technically Rank #1 Again in 2008 If I Felt Like It:

Radiohead's In Rainbows. Duh-hooy.

Album That Probably Would Have At Least Gotten #2 in 2007 if It Had Fully Clicked With Me Prior to 2008:

Beirut's The Flying Club Cup. Seriously, that album is amazing. And I'm seeing Beirut in a damn opera house in February! Yeah, get jealous.

Bands Whose '08 Albums ARE Probably As Good As Everyone Says But I'm Not Checking Out Further Until All The Damn Hype Subsides:

Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes, and Deerhunter. Definitely not the bands' faults - I'm sure they put out outstanding albums that really are worthy of high ranks on top albums of the year lists the world over. But the WORST way to get me to check something out is to talk about it constantly. I'm suspicious enough of stuff in general, and too much discussion of any one thing's merits makes me that much more likely to call bullshit. So once everyone has moved on to their next band/artist of the minute, I'll come back and share my thoughts on these albums once I'm certain that they're MY thoughts and not just something I may have read somewhere else.

Best Song of 2008:

Q-Tip's "Gettin Up." I wasn't kidding when I said this was a Perfect song. :)

Best Show of 2008:

Radiohead at All Points West - August 8, 2008. Naturally. I'm pretty sure I mentioned this, but I have an intense personal connection to Radiohead's music, so any night I can hear their music live is easily the most transcendent night of the year for me.

A couple of runner-ups, however, are Girl Talk at Terminal 5 and Kanye West at MSG. The former because any concert that gets thousands of people to simultaneously LOSE THEIR SHIT to a Kelly Clarkson sample is among the best of the year, and the latter because Kanye West, for all his arrogance and newfound affinity for AutoTunes, is an AMAZING live performer. Dude has earned his swagger.

Aight, Rose Bowl is starting - leave comments, write your own lists, and let's cross our fingers for more amazing music in 2009!

New Beirut Album in February 2009!

2008-11-18T12:11:00.000-08:00

Oh hai! How's it goin' errbody!

I'd apologize for the absence of new posts here recently, but then I remembered I don't have to because our posts (or at least mine) are contingent upon three critical things happening simultaneously: (1) something really, really cool happening in the music world, (2) me remembering that we HAVE a blog, and (3) me feeling like writing something in it.

But oh baby, have the stars aligned today - thanks to the announcement that there will be a NEW BEIRUT ALBUM DROPPING ON FEBRUARY 16, 2009!

Drowned In Sound was cool enough to post up the press release about it, which is as follows (warning: it is extremely long and awesome):

"The full-length album entitled March Of The Zapotec is comprised of two EPs. The first, an album namesake, is a foray into Mexican folk music with the help of an obscure small-town Mexican funeral band. The second is Holland, a bedroom electro-synth pop wonder, originally an idea for Zach’s previous incarnation before Beirut, when he went by the name of Realpeople.

For the past year, Beirut has alternated between touring and writing new material. With no sense of a release in mind, Zach recorded in any style which struck his fancy. Some early discussions about doing some soundtrack recording for a film being shot in Mexico morphed into a new idea. Through researching music for the film soundtrack, Condon came across players from martial sounding funeral bands from small towns around Oaxaca.

First Zach had to find the band. Difficult enough, you might think. But then he needed to explain to the band what he wanted to do… He managed with the assistance of a translator, who had to be able to speak not only English and Spanish fluently, but also Zapotec – the band members' native language. He flew down to Oaxaca and travelled out of town to the tiny weaver village of Teotitlan del Valle, where he met the nineteen members of The Jimenez Band. The ensuing weeks of recording, rewriting and relating are documented in a series of short films which will be available online prior to album release.

After a 30 second instrumental intro of a crazed sounding street circus band, we’re introduced to ‘La Llorna’, the horn section meshing with Zach’s soft vocals floating and layered over the trumpets and tubas. The song turns into a clash of horns and cymbals, introducing accordions and strings along the way. ‘The Akara’ starts with a dramatic horn section, playing morose, wilting chords. A light acoustic ukelele skips in, followed by stomping snares and Zach singing like he’s the last in line at a funeral march, with melancholy lyrics and sighing trumpets. The fusion of both worlds in nigh on perfect, with neither treading toes. ‘On A Bayonet’, which features alto and tenor saxophone by Chris Taylor of Grizzly Bear, is a short instrumental song laden with heartbreak and mournful horn section from an imaginary Ellington Suite tripping over the southern part of the border.

The last of the March Of The Zapotec collection, ‘The Shrew’, is lighter in mood. Set to a three-step waltz it starts as a beautiful rolling ballad singing of a lost love; “How long she’s been gone? / I sighed…”. It soon gathers pace and crescendos into a full blown frenzy of horns, drums, accordions and strings only to stop, and slow down to its original pace. A wonderful example of how this small folk combo, Condon’s incredible flair for musical composition and fresh artistic expression united as one.

As opposed to March of the Zapotec, the second part of this double release, _Holland, collects a series of songs conceived and completed at home. ‘My Night With a Prostitute From Marseille’ was on the Big Change digital-only, charity compilation on iTunes (compiled by Natalie Portman). It is with this track that Holland begins, all digital future-synth and drum machine, Condon is let loose writing his version of 80’s sounding pop. Bridging the gap between the intelligent songwriting and unabashed pop fervour, it’s clear Condon is having fun with this second set of songs yet also letting us into his very own private world of songwriting and personal history.

‘Venice’, which previously appeared on a compilation by The Believer magazine, begins with the ambience of a Boards of Canada track as if in tandem with Ryuichi Sakamoto, with the ghostly horns briefly gliding back into view. ‘My Wife, Lost in the Wild’ layers multi-tracked vocals with strings and a continuous beat with forceful keys. Holland closes out with an insanely catchy instrumental ‘No Dice’ reminiscent of early 90s house, littered with smiling synth. It serves as a marvellously joyful send off to a most thoughtful two-for-one. [SNIP]"

I shouldn't have to explain this, but if you saw the video for "In the Mausoleum" I posted above before writing/copying/pasting words, you should have a sense of how great this news is.

Hmm... what else have I been up to? Uh... I went to see TV on the Radio and Girl Talk (both amazing) and I found out that Levar Burton from Reading Rainbow and Star Trek: TNG has the greatest Twitter Feed ever.

So yeah, great month. :)

Album Review: + / - [Plus Minus] -- "Xs On Your Eyes"

2008-10-22T18:07:00.000-07:00

OH SNAP HERE COMES A NEW CHALLENGER!

I kind of love it when this happens: I get really hyped up by a certain completely awesome album (Dear Science) near the end of the year and proclaim it Album of the Year, only to get kind of blindsided by a single from another great band that appears a little later on in the year. +/- [Plus Minus]'s song "Snowblind" is both a kickass song and, a couple days ago, a reminder that the band's fourth full-length album Xs On Your Eyes was dropping.... yesterday.

My expectations have been pretty high for this new material since late in the summer, when they kicked my head's ass at their one-show-a-year at Mercury Lounge. Having seen a good chunk of it roadtested (to Chris Deaner's ridiculously amazing drumming... more on that later), I KNEW Xs On Your Eyes was going to be an outstanding disc.

And I was right.

Plus / Minus (dropping the +/- off here because that'll become a pain to write both) have always been great, but Xs On Your Eyes sees them at their most consistent and confident stage yet. That's evident from the first track, "Tired Eyes," on which they layer a tight mid-song burst of guitar and drums over a detached, floating introduction just about flawlessly. The song ends with a precision collapse into "Snowblind," on which a duo of programmed and drum kit beats drives smoothly under clashing guitars. This album exudes instrumental excellence - James Baluyut and Patrick Ramos are both enviable lyricists and guitarists. And dammit, Chris Deaner. Your drumming is, as stated before, ridiculously amazing.

Another standout track, "Subdued," was among my live favorites and sees Plus / Minus steadily build a wave of acoustic and electric guitar up to meld with sharp strong jabs of percussion and wailing vocals. Most of the other tracks, like "Queen of Nothing," "The Hours You Keep," and the title track "Xs On Your Eyes" kick off with tight beats and swell to their own individual operatic choruses - Plus / Minus has a talent for creating musical fireworks - while "Unsung" somehow manages to be the chillest song of the summer even though it was officially released in October. "Flight Data Recorder," the longest and final track of the album, is a nice cool ballad with a bridge that strongly reminds me of (good) Weezer.

Some songs, however, just didn't really click with me - the keys in "Halos" are harsh against the light lyrics for most of the track, and the guitar kicks in a little too late to feel integral to the song. "Marina" is kind of a meandering countryside trip that just fades out at the end. "You'll Catch Your Death" is an interesting concept, but has a couple too many sharp twists initially that make it hard to follow to the really cool Grizzly Bear-ish second half of the song.

Like I said, Xs On Your Eyes is an outstanding album that, much like the karate masters in the Street Fighter picture I put at the top of this randomly, will continue showing me increasingly cool stuff the longer I play it despite the couple of times it gets hits with a fireball. Can't tell you the place yet, but it's definitely made my year-end list.

And if you happen to be in Japan or the Philippines before the end of the year, you can get your head's ass kicked at one of their shows!

10-24 Tokyo, Japan - O-Nest *$
10-25 Yamagata, Japan - Sandinista *^
10-26 Tokyo, Japan - O-Nest *^
10-28 Matsumoto, Japan - Alecx *^
10-29 Nagoya, Japan - Tokuza *^
10-30 Kyoto, Japan - Metro *^
11-01 Kaohsiung, Taiwan - ATT ^$
11-02 Taipei, Taiwan - The Wall ^$
11-07 Quezon City, Philippines - Trinoma Park (early show)
11-07 Makati City, Philippines - Warehourse 135 #
11-08 Makati City, Philippines - Mag:net Bonifacio High St. #

* with Versus
$ with Bloodthirsty Butchers
^ with Moools
# with Versus (solo)

(thnnnks Pitchfork)

Top Five Songs To Bike On The Beach To

2008-10-15T17:39:00.000-07:00

I am answering your earlier challenge but slightly altering the challenge, and then answering that. Which is to say, I am not answering your challenge at all. Rather, I am challenging your challenge. Challenge, challenge, challenge. Does that word still mean anything? No? Good.

See, the problem is that nobody walks in Los Angeles. If you're walking, it's to or from your car. I could do a Songs To Drive To list, but really it'd be a Songs To Hold Onto Your Sanity While Sitting In Traffic list, and that's not super fun. But you know what people do do in Los Angeles, especially in Santa Monica? They bike. I'd forgotten how much damn FUN it is to ride a bike until I got one a few months ago. Now I can ride to work, the beach, and even all the way down to Venice. If I was really ambitious, I could go all the way down to Long Beach. It would be the hotness. Literally, hotness, as in shvitzing my balls off. But the Venice trip is deliriously relaxing, and the beer you grab while you're down there makes the ride back oh-so-much better. So here is my Top Five Songs To Bike On The Beach To:

Broken Social Scene - "Pacific Theme"

Duh-hoy. Considering BSS is from Toronto, which is nowhere near anything resembling a real beach last time I checked, they really nailed a theme for gazing out over the Pacific Ocean. It's relaxing, yet driving enough to keep you pedalling. I can feel the wind in my hair just listening to it.

Vampire Weekend - Campus

The band we all want to hate, but can't. "Campus" starts out with a steady kick and a walking bassline that almost screams "bicycle". "BICYCLE!" It's playful, both musically and lyrically.

Then I see you, you're walking cross the campus
Cruel professor studying romances
How am I supposed to pretend
I never want to see you again?

Aww, how cute. Them ascot-wearin' college boys is gonna get thems asses beat later, but we won'ts be ables tos catches thems on thems bikes.

I apologize for that last sentence.

Cardigans - Over The Water

I tend to repeat myself, but then again, I tend to repeat myself. The Cardigans are one of the most underrated bands of all time. "Over The Water" has great instrumentation: an flirtatious little flute riff, a subtle swell of horns, and again a light but driving drumline. Not to mention Nina Persson's voice, which is as sweet as a papaya.

Belle and Sebastian - Another Sunny Day

The band I do hate, and everyone else seems to freaking love them. BUT, even I have to admit that the album "The Life Pursuit" is really, REALLY good, and "Another Sunny Day" is a fantastically catchy little ditty. Is it redundant to talk about the beat? It's pretty similar to other ones. That shouldn't be surprising. Another upbeat head-bopper entirely conducive to speeding along without a care. The video below is NOT any sort of official video, but I thought it was pretty neat.

The Breeders - Cannonball

I believe this is the only song on my list that I haven't actually listened to while riding on the beach, because I only just put Last Splash on my ipod just yesterday. As much as this song annoyed you in 1993, you know it was because it was getting stuck in your head. Because it's awesome. Just admit it.

The bong in this reg-gae sonnnnnnnnnnng

So there you go. It's probably not a coincidence that the songs I chose all have a tropical flavor to them, but what do you expect? I like this top five list idea, and as much as we say "hey we should post stuff like this more often", and then clearly don't follow up on it, hey we should totally post stuff like this more often! I am travelling to the (inferior) East Coast tomorrow, to New York City itself. Neeeeeeewwwww York Ciiitaaaaay?! Thus, I will try to come up with a list of songs to walk around NYC myself, and also a list of songs to fly to. The flying one should be easy, because there are a few I always go to. Don't think for a moment that you won't see a Mogwai song about travelling on there.

The 2008 Walking Badass Awards! (EastCoast Edition)

2008-10-13T16:04:00.001-07:00

So right now I can point out the moral of this post: sometimes we DO listen to your suggestions for post topics and actually write posts based around them! It generally helps, however, if said suggestions are pretty random, let us make references to old videogames (more on that later), and inspire us to take really long walks with our iPods on nice days.

My buddy Ben achieved this rare trifecta earlier today when, in responding to one of the many links and references I throw out onto the W-W-W on a daily basis, he suggested that WestCoast and I list out our respective top 5 songs that make us want to strut around our respective cities. Respectively.

And that was all the justification I needed to throw on my earphones and road test some of my favorite jams while also passing by (and securing!) some Taco Bell. Here's my list:

5.) LCD Soundsystem -- "Yeah (Crass Version)"

PROS: Easily one of my favorite LCD Soundsystem tracks of all time, "Yeah (Crass Version)" builds over the course of 9 1/2 minutes (yeah it's much longer than that video) from a slinky, subtle 70s groove to an insane party jam in which the percussion just blasts your uncool ass in the face.

CONS: Like I said, it's a really long song, so this is one that you pop on while you're walking a pretty long distance to an event that will require you to be as awesome as possible.

THE ROAD TEST: I didn't have anywhere particularly kickass to be while I was listening to this song on my walk, but by the 4-minute mark it was all I could do to not start a one-man dance party in the street. The best way to describe it is... with an oldschool video game reference. Remember that game Space Channel 5, in which you could get your enemies (and Michael Jackson, and maybe even a bear) to follow you around in a big-ass conga line if you did really well? Yeah, road testing this song felt like THAT.

4.) The Smashing Pumpkins -- "Perfect"

PROS: Absolute classic of a song, for starters. And lyrical content notwithstanding, the chord structure and driving beat of the song has always made "Perfect" feel like the, well, perfect song to listen to while wandering around and thinking to yourself.

CONS: Yeah, but you can't really ignore the lyrics for long before you start feeling some EPIC nostalgia.

THE ROAD TEST: It was refreshing to walk around bumping this song in the reasonably cool autumn air, and sure enough before long I found myself staring off into the distance and thinking about life 'n junk. Very good road song for when you just want to have some stone-cold you time outside.

3.) Q-Tip -- "Gettin' Up"

PROS: It's a new Q-Tip track off his upcoming album The Rennaissance and it was produced by J Dilla. I start off like 90% of my mornings with this song nowadays. Need I say more.

CONS: Unless you can't handle bass lines that are this beefy or are worried that this track might put TOO much swagger in your step, I don't have any cons for you.

THE ROAD TEST: Pictures are worth a thousand words each, so check out panel 10 of this classic Achewood strip to get a sense of how the road test for this track went.

2.) Isaac Hayes -- "Theme from Shaft"

PROS: Yeah, did you watch that video?

CONS: No seriously, did you watch that video?

THE ROAD TEST: This song made me feel like my hair instantly grew longer and a badass brown leather duster magically appeared on my body. Isaac Hayes and Richard Roundtree made this song into swagger incarnate.

And the winner of the 2008 Platinum Walking Badass Award is...

1.) The George Baker Selection -- "Little Green Bag"

PROS: Even before the RZA stepped in to score his movies, Quentin Tarantino knew how to make a scene completely badass through the use of music. I just happen to be one of many, many dudes in their 20s or 30s who would jump at the chance to don a crisp suit and swagger across a parking lot to The George Baker Selection's "Little Green Bag," taking measured draws from my cigarette before flicking the butt into Steve Buscemi's face.

CONS: You're not nearly cool enough to pull off walking around to this song.

THE ROAD TEST: Perfection. I had the swagger of a king who just beat up 9 other kings.

So there you have it. What's in YOUR list?

Album Review: TV on the Radio's "Dear Science"

2008-09-29T16:13:00.000-07:00

You know what? I'm not going to need another 900,000 words to describe TV on the Radio's latest album, Dear Science. A bunch of other people have already put out several million good ones, to their credit, but any social studies or musical theory dissertation I could present here would be far less useful than just summing up my opinion of the album in five words:

ALBUM OF THE FRIGGIN YEAR.

It's really one of those "picture is worth a thousand words" deals, but replace "picture" with "actually listening to and getting rocked in the face by the album" (which you can do over here) and multiply that experience by another thousand. Dear Science easily lives up to the very high standard set by Return to Cookie Mountain and finds TVOTR delivering their most accessible and musically upbeat work to date.

After a few listens, it also dawns on you how damn expansive this album is and how much it captures in its 11 songs. You want some legit gems of post-punk, funk, and soul goodness? Done, done, and done. Outstanding lyrics? Just say when. A song that sounds like a way more badass version of R.E.M.'s "It's the End of the World As We Know It"? Of course.

Would you like some horns as well? Because baby we have got so many damn tasty horns for you on this album.

And on a personal note: my favorite track on the album is "Love Dog," which I am *SURE* I first heard over two years ago during Tunde's solo show at Tonic in its formative stages. It was impressive back then, but I'm all the more impressed to hear it grow into such a heart-wrenchingly lush and beautiful epic of a song. It also contains one of my new all-time favorite lyrics: "Curse me out in free verse / Wrap me up and reverse this / Patience is a virtue / Until its silence burns you."

To herald the release of this album, TV on the Radio have unleashed a few videos already, from the awesome yet kind of... dancing cop-py video for "Golden Age" to the cool Picasso-on-crack stylings of "Dancing Choose":

... a song which they also performed on David Letterman's fire escape last week, thereby kicking that fire escape's ass:

...Yeah, why are you still here? Go buy your tickets and see these cats live NOW.

Street Scene, San Diego, 9.18.08

2008-09-22T16:25:00.000-07:00

Street Scene had a pretty fantastic lineup this year.

Hot Chip is damn near the funkiest a band comprised entirely of super duper white guys can be. The lead dude looks like John Hodgman, a.k.a. the "I'm a PC" guy. I mean, that's pretty white. Whiter than me, and I look like I ain't seen the sun in quite a while. But man do they bring the funk, and plenty of it! They were the first of many entirely danceable bands we saw that day. Also, I am now pretty sure that we DID see them at Coachella last year, and that we did in fact enjoy them. I mean, just playing the odds of course.

After that, we headed over to catch the end of Foals. I had never heard them; only read their description as a featured artist in the street scene booklet. I gotta say, I was VERY impressed with them, and that is pretty hard to do, what with being a completely unheard of band. They sound like Bloc Party + The Cure + Battles. And now that I am listening to their album, Antitidotes, I am realizing there seems to be a strong DC dance-punk influence, like Q and Not U and Supersystem. They're a lot like Bloc Party, but drearier and better. My only two complaints about them were that they NEVER faced the audience--they faced each other the whole time, one dude had his back to me the whole time--and that I missed their Los Angeles show the day before. They're now on tour in Europe with Maps & Atlases, which is a pretty damn good pairing of bands. So good a pairing, in fact, that I am now going to go lookup the third band on that tour, Wild Beasts.

Next up was The New Pornographers. Such a solid band! They never disappoint me except in their refusal to play "Centre For Holy Wars". A couple of random girls agreed with that the request would be awesome, but we failed to get Carl Newman's attention. Small complaint, though. He decided to ramble on about how much he hates Sarah Palin for quite some time, to the point that the drummer felt bad for her and apologized. Neko and Dan Bejar weren't there, but again, small complaint. The rest of the band are also entirely talented, and deserve a HOLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. And Newman's niece, whose name I have completely forgotten, has a great voice and I totally have a crush on her. Fortunately I have seen the New Pornographers a few times, so I didn't feel bad leaving their set early to go see...

TV ON THE FUCKING RADIO. Holy shit were they good. Got there right in the middle of "Wolf Like Me", which is my favorite TVOTR tune. Gigantic crowd going nuts, and we pushed, shoved, and followed pushers and shovers way way way into the front and center. I know I should feel a little bad about doing that, especially since there were about a dozen 14 year old girls right behind us that were all AWWWWWWWWWWW, but they were eventually clobbered in the mosh pit that erupted behind us, so OH WELL FOR THEM. I was wishywashy about going to see them in LA in November, but I think I may just pony up the cash to do so now. I have been converted! And I'm really looking forward to hearing the new album, which EastCoast has not sent to me yet (which I of course will buy upon previewing, suck my dick RIAA). NOR HAS GRACE. WHAT GIVES, WOMAN. I thought we were cool?

After TVOTR, the GZA was a no-show. He should've been a half hour into his set by the time we got there, but there was jack shit going on. What the hell, rappers? We were there. Fuck Kanye West.

Saw a large chunk of Spoon's set from the beer garden. They are a very solid band that I'm simply not that into. Catchy tunes, very upbeat and head-boppy, but I guess just not interesting to me personally to voluntarily turn on. Maybe one day?

Saw the end of Cat Power. I wish I had something more interesting to say about her than that she's hot and has a great voice. But I don't. So there you go.

Let's talk about Justice for a moment. It's pronounced jus-TEESS, not "justice". They're French, and clearly the best thing to come out of France since... I was going to say Stereolab, but Stereolab is actually from the UK. Let's just say since baguettes. I saw Justice play last year at Detour, and they didn't really wow me. Don't know if it just wasn't as good a set, or if the crowd and energy just weren't there then, but they kicked a whole lot of ass this time. They had a RIDICULOUSLY gigantic crowd dancing their asses off, yours truly included. They have more electronics than Japan-- surrounded by two 3x3 Marshall cabinet stacks, and a whole giant stack of blinking doodads and thingamajigs that looked more appropriate on the control deck of the Death Star.

Vampire Weekend sounds just like their album. Everyone loved "A-Punk", and then left afterwards to go see Beck.

Beck was pretty rad. He played "Minus"! That's actually my favorite Beck song, sort of an obscure one. It's at the end of Odelay, and obviously never got any airplay. A decent mix of old and new stuff. Merriment was had by all.

It's getting late. You can tell how much less effort am put in words to make good sound or sense done. More pictures are better for words available at flickr.

Q: What's going on on the West Coast?

2008-09-16T17:03:00.000-07:00

A: A whole fucking lot.

I've got a blitz of shows to go to over the next few weeks, so I thought I'd brag about them.

1) Mogwai @ the Wiltern. This was a week ago, and I'm a terrible person for not having written about this. Mogwai was incredible. They played an almost entirely instrumental set (unsurprising since their ouvre is mostly instrumental), and they played it LOUDLY. REAAALLLLLY loudly. They might've been the loudest band I've ever seen. Second place goes to The Go! Team. It's amazing how progressive their music is, yet not "proggy". A number of songs started very quietly and constantly swelled until they were melting your face and you didn't even realize it was happening until it was too late. "WHAT? WE WERE JUST HAVING A NICE CONVERSATION AND SUDDENLY I REALIZED WE ARE SHOUTING AT EACH OTHER! THIS IS AWESOME!" It's also interesting how massively epic the music is, as long as you don't actually look at the dudes on stage, standing there impassively. My only complaints are that there was no encore, they didn't play "Travel is Dangerous" (my favorite Mogwai tune), and between every goddamn song some idiot screamed "I CAN'T BELIEVE I'M AT THE MOGWAI SHOW!" Me neither, idiot.

2) Street Scene Festival, San Diego, 9/19 and 9/20. I am seriously considering taking a half day on Friday and hitting this up. Let's see who's playing: Beck, Spoon, Justice, TV On The Radio, Hot Chip, Vampire Weekend, Cat Power, The New Pornographers, MGMT, Devotchka, GZA, Diplo. And that's just on Friday. Pretty damn good! And because of (3), I can skip Beck, Spoon, and MGMT and still have a great time. But also because of (3), I can't go on Saturday and see: The Black Crowes (who I honestly kind of dislike, but other people like them I guess), X, The Hives, Spiritualized, The National, Tegan and Sara, Cold War Kids, Atmosphere, Ghostland Observatory, Del Tha Funky Homosapien, and Tokyo Freaking Police Club. Damn that's a good lineup.

3) Beck, Spoon, and MGMT @ the Hollywood Bowl, 9/20. I may have misjudged my interest in this show a few months back when I got the tickets with everyone else, but you know what? Bowl shows are fun as hell. You go early and picnic, get drunk on whatever shit you brought, and get stoned way out in the open.

4) Lagwagon and MxPx @ House of Blues, 9/28. Lagwagon!! I ain't listened to Lagwagon since early college. Great, great, great punk band. And MxPx used to be pretty good too, if memory serves, though I wasn't so into them back in the day. "Let's Talk About Feelings" is still a fantastic album, start to finish.

5) MY BLOODY VALENTINE @ Santa Monica Civic Center, 10/1 and 10/2. HELLO PEOPLE IT IS MY BLOODY VALENTINE. THEY ARE NEVER GOING TO TOUR AGAIN WHY ARE YOU NOT GOING ALREADY?

6) Deerhoof @ Avalon, 10/3. Choo choochoochoo beep beep! Any praise I heap upon this band will be redundant, as I rarely get it up enough to write a blog entry that isn't about them. The best part is that they will have a new album available entitled "Offend Maggie" for sale at that show, and I am going to buy the shit out of it. Also, they will probably play new material, which is pretty rad. Usually when you see a band play material you haven't heard yet, it's a weird, ambivalent experience. However, with Deerhoof's recent trend of getting better and better with every album, I'm expecting to love them even more afterwards.

7) Rival Schools @ the Echo, 10/9. I've already ranted about this. I'm very excited about this show. I think its going to be moshtastic.

8) Lisk Fest, Irvine, CA, 10/11. Call this the Little Festival That Could But Then Couldn't But Now Maybe Can Again. It was temporarily cancelled due to poor ticket sales, but is now back on with new sponsorship. Why do you want to go? Originally, it was because Rival Schools and Pennywise are playing. Also, Gorilla Biscuits, if you're interested. Why are you interested now? Because they have added Strung Out to the lineup. Another Lagwagon-listening-era punk band. What's with all this high school music popping up recently? I also saw Reggie and the Full Effect a few weeks ago, and they totally fit that bill. Also recently added to the Lisk Fest lineup is H20 and The Vandals. I think I might have to go check this out.

and finally,

9) The Notwist @ The Fonda Theatre, 10/29. Remember the Notwist came out with that new album earlier this year? I don't think I really listened to it. Maybe I should. I mean, I love all their other albums. I'm just glad they're touring as themselves, and not as 13 & God, which was, confusingly, the Notwist and Themselves.

Kisses!

OH. MY. FUCKING. GOD: Radiohead Have Already Started Working on a New Album

2008-09-12T18:10:00.000-07:00

OH. MY. FUCKING. GOD.

From Pitchfork:

"With yet another grand scheme to win the Mercury Prize foiled, it's back to the drawing board for Radiohead. Bandmembers Colin Greenwood and Ed O'Brien revealed to the BBC this week that Radiohead have been writing their In Rainbows follow-up while taking a break between a recently wrapped tour of North America and an upcoming jaunt in Japan. Details are typically lacking, but apparently the band intends to return to the studio "in the near future," according to the BBC. Quoth O'Brien: "We're still talking about doing some stuff and we're really excited about it. First we came off tour to do some writing and we wanted to just carry on doing it because it was so brilliant." Radiohead: excited and doing stuff."

YES.

YES.

YES.

YES.

YES.

OH GOD.

YES.

...aight cool, now go make me a sandwich. :)

New Bloc Party Song/Video/Awesomeness: "Talons"

2008-09-10T17:42:00.000-07:00

Now THIS is a smart move.

Remember how Bloc Party announced and released their new album "Intimacy" digitally in a little under a week? And how they mentioned that there would be bonus tracks on the full, physical version of the album (due out 10/27)? Well it looks like they're going to be giving us a taste of those new tracks as singles prior to the end of October - and if "Talons" is any indication, said tracks are going to be AWESOME.

Check it:

(or go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTwFE_8v8Bc)

So we just learned two things:

a.) This song kicks ass, and
b.) The video looks like it used the same parking garage Jerry Bruckheimer uses in his movies. And I mean that as a compliment.

"Talons" is a great example of where Bloc Party are going / have gone with their new sound - a slick fusion of electronica and rock that will make you throw your fist in the air and ball out the next time you see them live... which, if you live in NYC, will happen in 8 days. For FREE.

I'll be seeing Mogwai that night. But still, great stuff guys!

TV on the Radiohead: The Greatest Idea Ever...

2008-08-28T15:31:00.000-07:00

...that we may have stolen from Sherrie. We'll let the courts decide, baby!

Anyhow, our official story is: WestCoast and I were discussing how fucking great it would be if (wait for it) TV on the Radio did Radiohead covers during their tour this fall .

Seriously. Think about it.

How much ass would that kick?

Answer: an infinite amount. In fact, we can't think of a band that could cover Radiohead BETTER than TVOTR. The vocal ranges match up perfectly, and think of how damn funky those covers would be. Granted, TVOTR will already be rocking us with new tracks off of their upcoming album, Dear Science (two of which you can hear right now)... but seriously.

Reckoner.

Bodysnatchers.

Paranoid Android.

BANGERS & MASH.

The list, she goes on.

...which is why WC and I decided to become the Internet's #1 source for "TV on the Radio doing Radiohead covers" rumors. We're already #3 on Google due to our accidental "tv on the radiohead" tag from back in the day - The Quietus, Nylon Magazine, you've been warned: we're coming after your asses.

Let the unsubstantiated but completely awesome rumor mill start churning!

Album Review: Bloc Party's "Intimacy"

2008-08-23T07:56:00.000-07:00

...Right then. Since WestCoast has apparently taken his DeLorean back to the days when Will Smith's "Gettin' Jiggy With It" was tearing up the charts and The Big Lebowski could still be seen on movie screens, let's get back to talking about a band that's relevant TODAY: Bloc Party.

This past Thursday, as I happily reported earlier, those crafty Brits dropped the digital version of their long-awaited third full-length album, Intimacy, after having only announced its completion three days earlier. Pulling a Radiohead (/NIN/Girl Talk/etc) and offering a relatively controlled digital launch of the new work was not only completely awesome, but it brought about a resurgence in speculation as to what exactly the new Bloc Party would, well, SOUND like.

Bloc Party has become one of the more interesting modern bands to watch, due largely to the fact that it's never entirely clear where they're going to go with their sound. That has worked to both their advantage and disadvantage - Silent Alarm was easily one of the strongest and most consistent debuts of the decade so far, but Bloc Party's shift to more anthemic rock based around a fairly strict thematic concept on A Weekend In the City alienated initial fans who were expecting a Silent Alarm 2 full of the dance-punk sound they thought defined Bloc Party. Kinda unfortunate, since AWITC still stands in my mind as one of the most underrated gems of recent years - people just don't like listening closely to albums anymore, I guess.

The general confusion was only heightened by BP's very open foray into electronica, apparent on a few tracks on the second album and obvious on the post-AWITC single, "Flux" (a track which I actually liked from the start). And, as it is with pretty much every band who experiments musically in an effort to evolve their sound, the anti-Bloc Party backlash grew among the kids who just wanted to listen to dance-punk while drinking PBR and not smiling. For the rest of us, we waited with mixed- to high hopes that the band would use their experiments to create a new album of songs that represented an organic growth of their sound that would both rock us and get our asses shaking.

Let's see how they did, track by track. :)

Ares

So here we go, the first song off of the Intimacy album is... ironically enough, easily the most wholly experimental track of the lot - meaning that if you weren't a fan of some of their latest experiments, you're probably NOT going to like this right off the bat.

Too bad for you though, because within a couple of listens, "Ares" transforms from confusing to pretty damn addictive. An initial calm hum is broken by screeching guitar drones that quickly team up with tight breakbeats and Kele's yelps, which in turn build in cacophony and urgency over the next minute and change into a surrounding dome of sounds coming at you from all directions. Another quick melodic eye of calm disintegrates into the storm of noise, but within the chaos you discern a familiarity akin to a night at a sweaty, packed rave - you may not have heard the beat before, but you definitely want to dance to it.

So it's kind of like a Chemical Brothers track, only noisier and more condensed. And awesome.

Mercury

And now we move on to one of the most divisive singles I've ever heard. Out of context, it sounds almost nothing like a Bloc Party track, save Kele's vocals (minus the self-sampling), and Matt's kickass drumming. But like "Ares," "Mercury" rewards repeated listens - I friggin' HATED this song when I first heard the single, but seeing the live performance from Lollapalooza slowly brought me back around. Now I can hear the song for what it is - an awesome club track driven by Matt Tong's drumline beats (seriously, he should have been in that Nick Cannon movie) designed to make you shake your ass to lyrics about modern young adult confusion and the fleeting nature of our interactions.

Halo

Think you've pinned down the new BP sound based on the previous two tracks? Think again, guessypants. A brief, soft swell is interrupted by a sudden guitar peel that explodes into a building guitar line set over pummeling drums that then breaks into a riff that gives a very clear nod to At the Drive-In's "One-Armed Scissor." "Halo" is dance-punk minus that "dance" part - Bloc Party is fucking ROCKING on this track like never before over Matt's military-precision drumming, Gordon's dirty-ass bass runs, and guitar lines that will bite your damn ears. The grittiness isn't just in the instrumentation - Kele screams in the chorus, "Paralyse me with your kiss / Wipe those dirty hands on me / Maybe we're looking for the same thing / Maybe you're the one who'll complete me," searching for a meaning or connection in the midst of chaotic drunken hookups.

Seriously though: if you don't like this song, you don't like rock 'n roll. And what the hell is wrong with you.

Biko

"Biko" kicks off what I feel are the two parallel (but not at all disparate) conceptual lines of this album. What "Halo" revealed as intimacy in the form of carnal interactions is counterbalanced here in the form of intimacy as a measure of devotion, concern, and shaken optimism in the face of a trial - in this case, the disease (cancer) Kele's loved one is suffering through. He sings about writing songs and leaving blueberries for his partner as among "the little things that [he] can do," as the faint guitar loops, vocal samples, and drum beats build and are joined by Gordon's underlying bass line into an impassioned cry of "Resist!"

Great, haunting minimalist track.

Trojan Horse

And now back to the rocking. Or, more accurately, to the usage of comparatively more straightforward rock as an expression of the darker, meaner side of Intimacy (both the album and the theme). This time, however, a crackling guitar intro also signifies a new, organic union between BP's electro experiments and their previous rock style. Here, the electronic flourishes build on the oldschool Bloc Party instrumentation to greatly enhance what would otherwise be a standard rock track. Kele confronts the breakdown in his relationship as the instrumentals grow frenzied and then burst into a fucking CHAINSAW of a guitar / bass / drum attack. An atmospheric break set over Russell's itchy guitar flits out briefly before falling prey to an even stronger chainsaw, bringing an end to one of Bloc Party's rawest songs to date.

Signs

Meanwhile, back on the soft parallel thematic track, "Signs" brings us into the emotional core of Intimacy. Kele's loved one is now gone, and over the frozen tinkling of xylophone keys, rising synths, and quiet driving beats he describes all the tiny signs he sees that remind him of his partner. As the song tapers off, he hopelessly whispers "I'd believe in anything that brings you home back to me."

I love the rock tracks, of course, but this is a standout track on Intimacy due to its sheer simplicity and its ability to stir a quiet sympathy inside me. Very well done.

One Month Off

Back to more heated intimacy, "One Month Off" starts with some ninja-speed drumming and... whoa, what does that off-beat sound in the background remind me of? Did you hear it too? It's like... a futuristic version of that guitar peel on "Helicopter" from Silent Alarm! And when they do the off-beat "Oi! Oi!"s later in the song - what a randomly awesome homage!

Regardless, this is another demonstration of the natural fusion of their new and old techniques, resulting in a sound that combines and surpasses what we'd heard from Bloc Party before this album. And Kele is getting downright nasty in this song with lines like "Translucent and sun-bleached skin / Yeah, when did you get so L.A.?" (ha ha Los Angelinos) and "I can be as cruel as you, fighting fire with firewood." Nicely done, and a great look at the direction BP has taken musically.

Zephyrus

Gotta admit, this one still needs to grow on me. "Zephyrus" defies the softer parallel theme you'd expect this song to fall into and instead turns to a mini-opera set to trip hop syncopation. It's an interesting attempt, but having heard the album a few times now I tend to skip it on my iPod whenever it comes up. I could see it being AMAZING live, mind you - just not really as a studio track. I say give it a spin and see what it does for you... maybe I'm being retroactively harsh on it because I know about...

Better Than Heaven

You'd think this would be a pretty presumptuous name for a song... until you actually hear the song. "Better Than Heaven" comes in on a very sinister, Depeche Mode Violator-era vibe, with Kele slinking through lyrics before screaming "You get sadder the smarter you get / And it's a bore." The vocals get faster, more carnal, and more impassioned until the dam fucking breaks into what is easily the most ripping, vicious instrumental break you never saw coming. Epic, dominant, and unequivocally amazing - "Better Than Heaven" knocks your damn head off your shoulders.

So how do you follow that up?

Ion Square

...With one of the best album closers I've heard out of a modern band, that's how.

"Ion Square" resolves the seemingly disparate harsh and soft definitions of Intimacy (once again, both the album and the theme), building from anxious synth keystrokes across steady drums and bass, piling layer upon layer instrumentally with each passing bar as Kele quietly reflects on the simple peace that the unbroken happiness of true love can bring. As his voice rises with the swelling tide of sound beneath him, he reaches upwards and sings:

"So let's stay in, let the sofa be our car
Let's stay in, let the TV be our stars
I've found my dancing shoes but they don't fit
All the bright lights do is bore me
They bore me."

That line reflects what I feel represents what Bloc Party have done with Intimacy: showcase a maturation from the chaotic flirtations with imagined love and old, childish tendencies to a more fully realized self-awareness , in terms of both their personal lives and as musicians. They've married electronics with rock and wild partying with a realization of what true happiness can be, and in so doing have introduced us, once again, to Bloc Party.

Concert alert: LA-style

2008-08-22T10:34:00.000-07:00

Enough of this Bloc Party fanboypantscreamery. Let's move on to bands that are ACTUALLY good:

Reggie & the Full Effect with MC Chris at Avalon!! (Tuesday, 8/26)

This is blowing my mind. For the unfamiliar, Reggie and the Full Effect is a real fake band (or a fake real band, depending on your perspective) started by James Dewees, formerly of The Getup Kids. The "fake" part comes into play in the wild story surrounding their creation.

From AllMusic.com:

Reggie and the Full Effect is "the tale of a bluesman named Reggie who vanished at the height of his career, and whose lost 'White Chocolate Studios' recordings were recently unearthed and dropped at the doorstep of a couple of independent record labels."

From Vagrant Records:

Reggie and the Full Effect have always been a mystery. Who are they? What do they want? Where do they come from? There have, of course, been explanations. Studio fires, faked deaths, cryptic bios and tall tales of many sorts were countered by rumors that James Dewees—keyboardist for rock heroes The Get Up Kids’ and drummer for seminal metalcore act Coalesce—was somehow behind all the crazy characters taking credit for Reggie and the Full Effect’s synth-rock goodness. First there was the enigmatic Reggie, the band’s apparent namesake and protagonist in a strange musical tale beginning with the release of the band’s Greatest Hits 1984-1987 in 1998, followed closely by Promotional Copy in 2000. Then there was the mustachioed frontman Paco, who came to the fore on 2003’s Under the Tray, and album which also featured an ever-growing cast of characters— Finnish metal band Common Denominator, English synth-pop god Fluxuation, death growler Hungary Bear, the ubiquitous Drunk Guy at the Get Up Kids Show —increasing both the band’s popularity and perplexing mystique.

Oh that's right. They're not just one fake band, they are actually SEVERAL. And the very first track of the album Promotional Copy starts with Reggie being murdered:

[reggie:] No, so I was like if you're gonna wear the uniform you gotta sell the cookies, right? 'Cause if you don't there's no point for you to come over to the house. No, but if you wear the uniform you gotta sell thecookies that's what I was saying, ya know?

[gunman:] Hey yo yo which one of you all is Reggie

[reggie:] That's me

[gunman:] Yeah I got a message for you from A.C. Lerok Philadelphia. Yeah he wrote it down let me read it to you. it says:

[BAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAM]

[reggie:] I got shot

[reggie's friend:] Reggie you just got shot

[reggie:] I got shot

[reggie's friend:] Reggie you got shot

[reggie:] I got shot

[reggie's friend:] You got shot Reggie

Love Promotional Copy. Great album. And I hear they are a really fun band to see live. AND did I mention MC Chris is going to be there too? Fuck yes. FUCK yes.

ALSO: Rival Schools is adding more tour dates. More specifically, they are adding a date THE ECHO on October 9th. Screw you, Lisk Fest. I ain't need to see Pennywise THAT badly, but I still might go to see Rival Schools twice. I am like a post-hardcore squirrel, and winter's a-comin'! I need to stock up. Thanks, BrooklynVegan!

And finally: don't forget to check out the Sunset Junction Street Fair this weekend. There are some decent bands playing, including !!!, Gram Rabbit, Kinky, the Germs, Black Keys, Cold War Kids, and Broken Social Scene. Since I couldn't get it together to go up to San Francisco for the Outside Lands Festival, I will be taking Broken Social Scene as a consolation prize.

UM WHAT NEW BLOC PARTY ALBUM THIS FRIGGIN WEEK WHAT

2008-08-18T15:28:00.000-07:00

I really ought to pay more attention to my emails... because apparently these days all they contain are SURPRISE ALBUM ANNOUNCEMENTS FROM BANDS I REALLY LIKE.

According to the press release (thanks Stereogum):

"Bloc Party's third album, 'Intimacy' will be available August 21. It can be pre-ordered now via the band's website: http://www.blocparty.com.

The album will also be available as a CD which will be delivered from October 27 and feature additional songs. Anyone pre-ordering the CD will also receive the digital album from August 21...

The album produced by Paul Epworth (Silent Alarm) and Jacknife Lee (A Weekend in the City) was recorded in Kent and London. Some songs are Bloc Party at their most wildly experimental, while other tracks are simply classic Bloc Party, fitting in seamlessly amongst fan-favourites 'Helicopter', 'Banquet' and 'So Here We Are'."

DAMMIT IT'S THE BIG ONE I'M COMIN' LIZBETH

Sanford and Son references notwithstanding, I'm really looking forward to this album. I'm one of the 5 people in the world who really liked their first single, "Mercury," although it did take me awhile to warm up to it. No matter, Bloc Party has never let me down before, so even if it turns out to be an album full of growers, I'll still wind up loving it.

Did I mention that my top 10 album list for this year is going to be REALLY fucking difficult to put together? Just thought I'd bring that up.

Damn you crafty Brits!

RADIOHEAD @ All Points West, 8/8/08

2008-08-10T17:44:00.000-07:00

What can I say.

I honestly didn't even want to write this much.

What can I say about seeing the best band in the world, the band that completely changed my perspective on art and music and life overall almost exactly 7 years ago, perform again in the shadow of the best city in the world?

You can find the set list(s) anywhere else you want on the Internet. You can read in detail how other people have tried to sum up the experience.

Don't do that. Not if you're planning to see them again soon. And especially not if you're planning to see them for the first time.

Only Radiohead can show you how truly amazing Radiohead is.

And all I can say to them is... thank you. Thank you so much.

Rival Schools are reuniting, I flip out

2008-08-07T10:00:00.000-07:00

I discovered Rival Schools after a Pompano Beach Warped Tour, which I got into for free in exchange for doing street team with a couple of friends for a radio station (I think it was a radio station). We spent about an hour handing out free stickers and such for bands we'd never heard of, and obviously kept a bunch for ourselves. One of those pieces of shwag was a roll of Rival School stickers. "Cool sticker, great name, named after a great game," a young Me thought. "Maybe this band is awesome."

LITTLE DID I KNOW THE AWESOMENESS THAT AWAITED ME.

Rival Schools is a post-hardcore supergroup, featuring members from Gorilla Biscuits and Civ, among others. Their lone release, "United By Fate" (also the subtitle of the eponymous video game) is one of my all time favorites albums, and "Used for Glue" and "Travel By Telephone" are two of my favorite songs. Here's the video for "Used for Glue":

Love it.

The band split in 2003, and I thought they'd forever be relegated to The List Of Bands I Wasn't Cool Enough In Time To See.

But here we are, five years later, and the band is not only getting back together, but they are touring. Not only are they touring, but they are also recording a new album AND playing somewhere I can get to: Lisk Fest in Irvine, CA. That's like an hour down toward Orange County. BARELY an hour (*cough* sherrie *cough*). In addition to Rival Schools, Gorilla Biscuits and Pennywise are also playing, which means that this kid is DEFINITELY going. Pennywise! That's pretty fucking rad. I'm stoked.

THE ALL POINTS WEST FESTIVAL TIMES HAVE BEEN POSTED!

2008-08-01T10:52:00.000-07:00

Thanks to BV and everyone else on the Internet who read the email before I did.

It's so ridiculously close now I can taste it... er, hear it. Seeing Radiohead in Liberty State Park pretty much exactly 7 years ago was one of the greatest nights of my life, so sincerest thanks in advance to all the friends (old and new) who will be there with me on Friday as I do it again.

Cheers.

http://www.apwfestival.com/event/settimes/

I didn't forget you Saturday kids either...

I'm not posting Sunday's, though. You can go to the site for that. We've said it before and will say it again: Jack Johnson Is A Douche.

Man I love that tag.

Charles Barkley!!

2008-07-28T11:11:00.000-07:00

I f'ing love shows at the Hollywood Bowl. Is there another venue in the whole country that says, upon rolling up to the ticket takers with a cooler full of bottles and a halfie in hand, "Have a good evening!" ? Honestly. Most chill place ever. I was pondering why its such a great venue, and I dont think it's just the BYOB policy. I think what really makes it a FUN place to be is the fact that there aren't individual seats; there are benches. Thus, less division between people, more camaraderie, more better for relaxing.

Also they don't harass the smokers in the crowd. That too.

I'm pretty sure I've now seen Deerhoof more times than any other band. Only caught their last song --"Wrong Time Capsule"-- and that was actually enough. They know I love them. I know I love them. I think that's enough.

In related Deerhoof news, their new album, Offend Maggie, will be hitting stores October 7th. If you can't wait for that and happen to be at one of these places before the 7th, they will indeed be selling it. Thanks to Greg for personally confirming that!

10/03 Los Angeles - Avalon with Okay, Happy Hollows
10/04 San Francisco, CA - Great American Music Hall with Okay, Happy Hollows
10/06 Portland, OR - Wonder Ballroom with Experimental Dental School, Coconut
10/07 Seattle, WA - Neumo's with Experimental Dental School, Coconut
10/09 Salt Lake City, UT - Urban Lounge with Experimental Dental School, Coconut
10/11 Denver, CO - Bluebird with Experimental Dental School, Coconut
10/13 Omaha, NE - The Slowdown with Experimental Dental School, Au
10/14 Minneapolis, MN - First Avenue with Experimental Dental School, Au
10/15 Milwaukee, WI - Turner Hall with Experimental Dental School, Au
10/16 Bloomington, IN - Buskirk Chumley Theater with Experimental Dental School, Au
10/17 Chicago, IL - Metro with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/18 Pontiac, MI - Crofoot Ballroom with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/21 New York, NY - Spiegeltent 10/22 New York, NY - Irving Plaza with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/23 Cambridge, MA - Middle East with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/24 Northampton, MA - Pearl Street with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/25 Philadelphia, PA - Starlight Ballroom with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/26 Washington, DC - 9:30 Club with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/28 Carrboro, NC - Cat's Cradle with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/29 Asheville, NC - Grey Eagle with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/30 Nashville, TN - Mercy Lounge with Experimental Dental School, Flying
10/31 Athens, GA - 40 Watt Club with Experimental Dental School, Flying
11/01 Orlando, FL - The Social with Experimental Dental School, Flying
11/02 Tampa, FL - Crowbar with Experimental Dental School, Flying
11/05 New Orleans, LA - House of Blues with Experimental Dental School, Flying
11/06 Houston, TX - Numbers with Experimental Dental School, Flying
11/07 Dallas, TX - Granada with Experimental Dental School, Hawnay Troof
11/08 Austin, TX - Fun Fun Fun Fest
11/10 El Paso, TX - Club 101 with Experimental Dental School, KIT
11/12 Tucson, AZ - Club Congress with Experimental Dental School, KIT
11/13 Tempe, AZ - The Clubhouse with Experimental Dental School, KIT

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/news/142471-deerhoof-reveal-fall-us-tour

You know what the best shows are? The ones where you realize a few songs in that you need to listen to more of that particular band. This revelation came to me during Gnarls Barkley. They're just ridiculously good, and nobody sounds like them. And I think one of the reasons I like them so much is the same reason I like Fujiya and Miyagi-- they're not all up in my grill. Lots of their songs have hooks, but the music is always very laid back.

Also, hollaaaaaaaaaa to everyone that *tried* to lift that VW in a stacked parking rescue effort. Who would have thought a Passat could be so heavy?

Whoa Whoa WHAT?! New TV on the Radio Album in TWO MONTHS??!!

2008-07-21T12:54:00.000-07:00

:-O

:-O

:-O

X-O

Yeah I guess I could have used this post to talk about how awesome Siren Festival was (it really was, AND I got a free fan from DeVry College keep me in icy-cool comfort all day!), but HOLY SHIT THERE IS GOING TO BE A NEW TV ON THE RADIO ALBUM THIS YEAR.

From P4K:

"Over two years since their astonishing 2006 album Return to Cookie Mountain, New York avant garde standard-bearers TV on the Radio have announced the title and release date for their third album. Dear Science, is due September 23 on Interscope and yes, the comma is indeed part of the title. (UPDATE: 4AD will release the album on September 22 outside of the U.S.)

Sweet!"

I kind of never expected any Pitchfork article to end with "Sweet!" - but really, there's really no academic translation that really captures how amazing this is better than that interjection.

To go all music dork on you (further): I've been dreaming about what the follow-up to
my favorite album of 2006 would be ever since I wrote that 9-billion word review of the import copy I picked up. Return to Cookie Mountain was, and still is, one of the best albums I've ever heard, and it represented such a complete "level up!" from their previous material that I honestly could not picture listening to whatever future albums TVOTR put out without my head exploding, at least slightly.

So basically, I now hold new TVOTR albums to a ridiculously high standard that I normally reserve for, say, Radiohead. But they're also ridiculously talented and cool guys (in case I never mentioned it 8000 times, I was in the music video for "Wolf Like Me!" And Tunde says hi to me when I run into him in public!), so I'm sure that Dear Science, will be another friggin masterpiece of an album.

MAN my "Top 10 Albums of 2008" list is going to be hard to put together!

P.S.: Something hilarious about Jessica Simpson, brought to you by Sherrie

UPDATE, 7/29:

Thanks to Debbie and BV, I'm happy to update this post with... a full list of tour dates!

TV on the Radio - 2008 Tour Dates

Sep 5 - Roseland Portland, Oregon
Sep 6 - Showbox Seattle, Washington
Sep 7 - Commodore Vancouver, British Columbia
Sep 9 - MacEwan Ballroom Calgary, Alberta
Sep 10 - Starlite Room Edmonton, Alberta
Sep 12 - Big Easy Boise, Idaho
Sep 13 - In the Venue Salt Lake City, Utah
Sep 14 - Red Rocks Amphitheater Morrison, Colorado
Sep 19 - Street Scene San Diego, California
Sep 20 - Treasure Island San Francisco, California
Oct 10 - Electric Factory Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Oct 11 - Lupos Providence, Rhode Island
Oct 13 - Wilbur Theatre Boston, Massachusetts
Oct 14 - Masonic Temple Brooklyn, New York w/ The Dirtbombs
Oct 15 - Masonic Temple Brooklyn, New York
Oct 18 - Bogarts Cincinnati, Ohio
Oct 19 - Vogue Theatre Indianapolis, Indiana
Oct 20 - First Ave Minneapolis, Minnesota
Oct 21 - First Ave Minneapolis, Minnesota
Oct 22 - Riviera Chicago, Illinois
Oct 24 - Voodoo Festival New Orleans, Louisiana
Oct 25 - Tabernacle Atlanta, Georgia
Oct 26 - Bijou Theatre Knoxville, Tennessee
Oct 28 - Lakewood Theatre Dallas, Texas
Oct 30 - Stubbs Austin, Texas
Oct 31 - Diamond Ballroom Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Nov 6 - Wiltern Los Angeles, California
Nov 8 - 4th and B San Diego, California

...and and AND, thanks to Drowned in Sound and some poster on BV, we now have a tracklist!

‘Halfway Home’
‘Crying’
‘Dancing Chose’
‘Stork & Owl’
‘Golden Age’
‘Family Tree’
‘Red Dress’
‘Love Dog’
‘Shout Me Out’
‘DLZ’
‘Lover’s Day’

This Just In: Radiohead Keeps Doing Awesome Things (Also: Deerhoof and Siren Festival Briefly).

2008-07-14T10:27:00.000-07:00

...oh right, I should explain a bit. Or at least copy and paste the description from the Google Code page (thanks Colin via Debbie):

"Radiohead just released a new video for its song "House of Cards" from the album "In Rainbows".

No cameras or lights were used. Instead two technologies were used to capture 3D images:

Geometric Informatics and Velodyne LIDAR. Geometric Informatics scanning systems produce structured light to capture 3D images at close proximity, while a Velodyne Lidar system that uses multiple lasers is used to capture large environments such as landscapes. In this video, 64 lasers rotating and shooting in a 360 degree radius 900 times per minute produced all the exterior scenes."

See, this is how great Radiohead is. When they want to create a new music video, they don't fuck around with "cameras" or "lights" or all that other crap lesser bands use to make it happen. Oh no sir - they tap relatively obscure data visualization technologies and use straight-up math.

The result, obviously, is nothing short of amazing. And to be honest, a little bit creepy. If I were watching this alone in my apartment in the dark (which I can't because I still don't have a working laptop - not bitter), I would probably wind up sleeping with one eye open to ensure that Thom Yorke's data-visualized head didn't emerge from the computer to drag me back into the vast chaos of the Interweb.

BUT OH WAIT THERE'S MORE

Also from the Google Code page:

"Explore data visualization through a 3D viewer and use your mouse to further manipulate the data and create your own visualizations.

Download the data and instructions on how to create your own visualizations.

If you manage to create a data visualization that you'd wish to share, the band would love to see it. You can share your videos on the House of Cards YouTube group."

So there you have it - make your own beautiful yet vaguely creepy renditions and show 'em to Radiohead! Yet another awesome paradigm shift by the best band ever concerning how music videos are created and enjoyed! No big deal!

END RADIOHEAD NEWS / BEGIN FREE SHOW GLOATING

Right so hey. I had a pretty great weekend that ended with me seeing THE BREEDERS perform "Cannonball" in the middle of a big (soon to be not) empty pool in Brooklyn. For FREE. Which prompted me to remind you (or gloat if you can't make it) that DEERHOOF will be playing at the Prospect Park Bandshell this coming Friday, 7/18. Also for FREE.

Oh and you know what else is going to be free the day after? SIREN FESTIVAL. Bask in the glow of this outstanding lineup and remind yourself that it will cost you $0 to get in. You'll also want to wave to TED LEO as he DJs the Main Stage all day. Also for FREE.

So yeah. East Coast > West Coast, at least for two days. :)

Lett's Do A Geeky Music Blogger List Thing! (part deux)

2008-07-09T11:29:00.000-07:00

After MUCH deliberation, here's my one-album-per-year list, which EastCoast posted just the other day:

1981: Mission of Burma: Signals, Calls, and Marches
1982: Michael Jackson: Thriller
1983: U2: War
1984: Weird Al: Weird Al in 3D
1985: Weird Al: Dare to Be Stupid
1986: The Police: Every Breath You Take - The Singles
1987: Aerosmith: Permanent Vacation
1988: Pixies: Surfer Rosa
1989: Pixies: Doolittle
1990: Pixies: Bossanova
1991: My Bloody Valentine: Loveless
1992: Green Day: Kerplunk
1993: Smashing Pumpkins: Siamese Dream
1994: Weezer: Blue Album
1995: Smashing Pumpkins: Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness
1996: Beck: Odelay
1997: Radiohead: OK Computer
1998: Alkaline Trio: Goddamnit
1999: The Ataris: Blue Skies, Broken Hearts... Next 12 Exits
2000: TIE! Deltron 3030: Deltron 3030 and Q and Not U: No Kill No Beep Beep
2001: Thursday: Full Collapse
2002: Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
2003: The Shins: Chutes Too Narrow
2004: Tegan and Sara: So Jealous
2005: Wolf Parade: Apologies to the Queen Mary
2006: Silversun Pickups: Carnavas
2007: Deerhoof: Friend Opportunity
2008: Islands: Arms Way

The only tie I could not break was between Deltron and Q and Not U. Both of those ridiculously awesome albums represent a huge shift in my musical taste.

And let's talk about the elephant in the room: Weird Al Yankovic. I basically owe my interest in contemporary music to Weird Al. I wasn't listening to shit before that, unless it was Rick Dees/Casey Kasem Top 40s that my moms put on the radio in the car, or classic rock that my pops put on in the car. Not that there's anything wrong with classic rock (which I cannot say for Top 40s, MOM), but it wasn't MINE, you know? And then Weird Al came along and showed me a whole new world.

A WHOLE NEWWWWW WORRRRLLLLLLLLLLLLD! A dazzling place I never knewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

Besides, how many songs start "Put down that chainsaw and listen to me"? Dare to Be Stupid == great song, great album.

Let's Do A Geeky Music Blogger List Thing!

2008-07-07T13:08:00.000-07:00

Awesome. So when I actually WANT to blog, I don't have a laptop to do it on. $310 to fix a power cord jack my fantastic ass... as an aside before I actually get into the topic of this post, if you're in NYC and know of a place that can fix laptops really quickly and cheaply (i.e. considerably less than $310, but possibly for the price of several beers), please let me know.

Anyway.

So I was doing some post-long weekend rocking of the Google Reader when I came upon an interesting yet very music dorky challenge on The Onion's A.V. Club blog. Rather than explain it myself / yaddayadda, I'll copy Steve Hyden's description (thank you Steve Hyden):

"Here’s something I saw recently on Idolator that’s apparently been making the blog rounds lately: You’re supposed to pick a favorite album for each year you’ve been alive. You can pick a record based on what you like now, or what you would have picked that year assuming you were old enough to care. It sounds simple, but this damn list pretty much dominated my spare thoughts all of July 4th weekend. Now, hopefully, it will speed along the dreaded post-holiday-weekend Monday."

The gauntlet, she has been thrown. Steve put together a nice list, I thought, but being a narcissistic music "blogger," I thought to myself: "What would I think are my favorite albums from every year I've been alive? Well, if I'd literally been listening to cool music since day one."

And that was all the reasoning I needed to slap together the following:

1982: Michael Jackson -- Thriller

1983: New Order -- Power, Corruption, and Lies

1984: The Smiths -- The Smiths

1985: The Smiths -- Meat Is Murder

1986: The Beastie Boys -- License to Ill

1987: U2 -- The Joshua Tree

1988: Sonic Youth -- Daydream Nation

1989: The Cure -- Disintegration

1990: Depeche Mode -- Violator

1991: Nirvana -- Nevermind

1992: R.E.M. -- Automatic for the People

1993: Radiohead -- Pablo Honey

1994: Beck -- Mellow Gold

1995: Radiohead -- The Bends

1996: Weezer -- Pinkerton

1997: Radiohead -- OK Computer (also the best album ever)

1998: Mos Def and Talib Kweli are... -- Black Star

1999: The Roots -- Things Fall Apart

2000: Radiohead -- Kid A

2001: The White Stripes -- White Blood Cells

2002: Wilco -- Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

2003: Radiohead -- Hail to the Thief

2004: Arcade Fire -- Funeral

2005: Bloc Party -- Silent Alarm

2006: TV on the Radio -- Return to Cookie Mountain

2007: Radiohead -- In Rainbows

2008: hmm... based solely on what's been playing most often on my iPod lately, and even with stellar albums from The Dodos, Sigur Ros, and Girl Talk in consideration... at the moment, I'm gonna have to go with Seeing Sounds by N.E.R.D. And unless you've given it a spin, don't say a damn thing about it. :)

So whatchu got, kids?

Bonnarooooooooooooooooo 2008

2008-06-20T18:06:00.000-07:00

So... I think last time I blogged was actually last year's Bonnaroo. Awesome!

So here's what happened this year:

Wednesday

Flying in early is a great idea. Flew into Nashville, met up with two friends, drove down to Chattanooga. We stayed at the Chattanooga Choo Choo, which is actually an old train station, complete with actual train cars to stay in. When asked how to get to Walmart, Nadine (a short balding woman) helpfully replied "Oh its easy to get to, I work there too." I'm not trying to judge her or anything, but hearing that depressed me a bit. And then she gave us directions to the wrong Walmart, because there are thirty in the greater Chattanooga area.

Thursday

Let's start yelling at each other! Got woken up two hours later by the maniacal ravings of a friend that had been driving from south Florida for 12 hours or so.

omg bands! Saw MGMT, Battles, some of The Sword, and Vampire Weekend. All excellent. I wanted badly to stay up and see Lez Zeppelin, but I was fading fast. I heard they were really, really great though.

Friday

Ahhh, Friday. That first time you wake up at 6:30am, sweating your junk off, dreading having to shit in something that don't flush.

Sad I Missed: Tegan and Sara and Minus the Bear

So Far Off The Hook That The Hook Called To Make Sure We Were Still Friends: M.I.A. I had never even heard M.I.A. before, and she rocked the fucking house. LOUD beats, crazy dancing, thirty lady fans crowding the stage.

Cracked My Shit Up: Chris Rock on a gigantic stage, and Zack Galifianakis at the comedy tent. Chris Rock being on the big stage was great because it was just so accessible for everyone. You could go whenever you want, leave whenever, and laughing with 50,000 people in a field is a pretty unique experience. Zack NotGonnaSpellHisLastNameAgain was excellent as well, and the guy on right before him

Did Not Disappoint Me: Metallica. Let's face it, there was a lot of room for disappointment. Metallica are not the least douchey band in the world, and they've got undeniably douchey "legendary" status to live up to, and their fands are not the least douchey people in the world. However, I wasn't going to miss them (especially after regretting not seeing Tool last year), and they fucking rocked. I went just for the second half of their set, and got to see them play Nothing Else Matters, Enter Sandman, One, and Master of Puppets. That right there is a pretty tight mini-set! Master! Master!

Saturday

I Wanted To Die While standing way up close in the middle of Jack Johnson's set. Jack Johnson fans are some of the lamest people on the planet. They love him. LOVE HIM. I don't understand it. At best, the music is inoffensive but lame. Pleasant, even, but not worthy of anyone freaking out about. Why? Why would I subject myself to such a thing? Well, for one if gives me an excuse to use our "jack johnson is a douche" tag, but mostly because:

Pearl Jam Fucking Rules! They fucking RUUUULE. And suffering through Jack Johnson's set allowed us to be pretty far up front for the real bands. They threw a guitar solo into every song, which was in the Bonnaroo / go-ahead-and-jam spirit, but I personally would have preferred more songs to longer songs. Also Eddie Vedder tried to get all preachy at us four times, but mumbled incoherently each time. I don't think he uttered an entire complete sentence during his two hours on stage.

You Probably Heard About The Biggest Douche On The Planet: Kanye West. MAN did that guy fuck up. First he was scheduled for like an 8 or 9pm spot. Then he was moved to 2:45am on the big stage. Fair enough, it's a whole glow in the dark thing. 2:45 rolls around, and the big signs change to 3am. 3 rolls around, and the signs say 3:15. At that point we left, muttering "Fuck Kanye." Word on the street is that he finally went on at 4:30am, without having come out even once to at least apologize, greeted to a chorus of boos and thrown glowsticks. For the rest of the 'Roo, you'd hear fans yelling "FUCK KANYE!", or hear other bands or comedians cracking jokes about how THEY were there on time. Fuck that guy.

Awesome New Band Alert! Stephaniesid. Just happened to be walking past one of the smaller tents and we were drawn in by this band. The music is indie pop rock, fronted by a chick that sounds like Bjork + Karen O. It's a rare occasion where I fall in love with a band never having heard them before, but here I am. These guys were AWESOME.

Sunday

Two Great Sets By Broken Social Scene. I love that band. Saw them play some of my favorite songs from You Forgot It In People on a very small stage, and then again on a bigger stage where they played for hours. I left a few songs into the second set to wander around, and they were still playing when I was heading back to my campsite. Awesome! Also they made us all sing a very silly political song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVywDwPBuZo

Check Rad Out the Poster I Bought:

See you all there next year? EastCoast, Robot-- I'm looking at you.

HELLO BLOGGING PREASE: Here Is A New Post About Some Things!

2008-06-08T18:27:00.000-07:00

Gangstas!

Long time no see. Hard to believe it's been almost a month since we last posted... but, you know, between WestCoast launching a sold-out world tour with his new band Broken Ocean (instrumental demos are over hyah) and me going on, uh, adventures, we haven't had much time to uphold that sacred Internet law about real bloggers being required to post (even semi-) regularly. Actually, scratch that - we done broke the law. Because we're straight-up Internet rebels.

But yeah, since you demanded it, here is a new post about some things. Some awesome things, in fact - awesome enough for me to take notice, sit back down on my ass, and write about them.

You're quite welcome.

Cursive Is Recording An Amazing New Album, Melting Faces Off With Live Shows

Omaha's favorite sons are back (yeah eat it Conor Oberst)! Tim Kasher and company have recently been in the studio recording the as-yet-unnamed followup to 2006's Happy Hollow, and this past Tuesday they came up to NYC to road-test the whole damn thing for a roomful of lucky fans at Mercury Lounge.

The verdict? A++ JOB WELL DONE YOU GUYS

To be honest, the only downside to seeing them perform the new traxx is that I've basically been jonesing for the new album like a crack monkey ever since. It's easily going to be among the best of the year - strong words, considering this year isn't even halfway over yet (and even stronger words if the album winds up coming out in 2009). Special thanks to Edwina for using what can best be described as "mad skills" to send me the link to the Daytrotter sessions of two of the new songs ("Let Me Up" and "Donkeys"), as well as the following video of "What Have I Done," an epic track that is destined to be a perfect album closer.

Fuck yeah, Cursive. Fuck yeah.

...Oh Hey Deerhoof's Got A New Album Coming Out Too!

Meanwhile, everyone's favorite tiny Japanese indie rocker lady and her friends are staying true to their apparent "release at least one new album per year all oldschool-style" plan with Offend Maggie, set to be released here in the States on October 7th. They're headed off to Japan to play a few undoubtedly awesome shows before returning to this side of the world to rock Brooklyn, Hollywood, and... Halifax, Nova Scotia. Because why not rock Nova Scotia.

It's also worth noting that the Brooklyn show is not only FREE, but is taking place a day before the Siren Music Festival on Coney Island (also FREE) sports one of its best overall lineups in recent memory. Not to get all cocky or nothin', buuuuut... NYC > LA that weekend. For serious.

UPCOMING SHOWS:

Jun 14 - Tokyo, Japan - Liquidroom (Kill Rock Stars showcase w/ Xiu Xiu, Mika Miko, Panther)
Jun 15 - Osaka, Japan - Shangri-la (w/ Xiu Xiu, Tenniscoats, Shugo Tokumaru)
Jun 16 - Nagoya, Japan - Club Upset (w/ Xiu Xiu, Tenniscoats, Shugo Tokumaru)
Jun 18 - Sapporo, Japan - Bessie Hall (w/ Tenniscoats)
Jul 18 - Brooklyn, NY - Prospect Park (w/ Metropolis Ensemble)
Jul 19 - Halifax, NS - The Marquee Club for the Halifax Jazz Festival
Jul 27 - Hollywood, CA - KCRW's World Festival @ The Hollywood Bowl (w/ Gnarls Barkley)

(thx BV)

Good God You Know Who Else Has A New Album Coming Out? MOGWAI.

Yeah so I guess while we're talking about inevitable Best Albums of 2008, I should mention that friggin MOGWAI are also putting out a new one on September 22, a.k.a. the day after my birthday (hint hint post-birthday present hint). Called The Hawk Is Howling, the album is already on its way to winning the Most Badass Album Title of 2008 award. The Scots are also headed out on a summer / early fall tour, stopping by NYC to destroy the city's worst venue with pure Rock Action (see what I did there?).

Mogwai - 2008 Tour Dates
Jun 28 - Sled Island Festival Calgary
Jun 30 - Phoenix Concert Theatre Toronto (tix)
Jul 4 - Roskilde Festival Roskilde
Jul 13 - Ilosaarirock Festival Joensuu
Jul 18 - Summercase Festival Madrid
Jul 19 - Summercase Festival Barcelona
Aug 6 - Oya Festival Oslo
Aug 11 - Belsonic Festival Belfast, Northern Ireland
Aug 30 - De Beschaving Festival Utrecht
Aug 31 - Rivierenhof Antwerp
Sep 04 - Showbox SoDo, Seattle, WA (tix)
Sep 18 - Terminal 5, NYC (tix)
Sep 21 - ATP - New York Catskills, New York
Oct 21 - Corn Exchange Edinburgh, Scotland
Oct 23 - Manchester Academy Manchester
Oct 24 - Hammersmith Apollo London, London and South East

(thx BV)

Psyched for all this? Yeah you bet you are. Let us know what other new hotness you're looking forward to this year, or go stream the whole new My Morning Jacket album, Evil Urges, on their MySpace page. Or pop open another tab on your browser and do both, lazy.

Rick Astley

2008-05-14T12:17:00.000-07:00

Delusions of Grandeur

2008-05-08T15:05:00.000-07:00

I don't want to shit all over someone's dreams, but I really cannot tell if this dude is serious or not.

HE IS A SINGER AND A PRESENCE.

http://www.myspace.com/joeylinello

Fark's link to this guy was "Worse. Musician. EVAR."

RADIOHEAD: IN UR BASEMENT, PLAYING AWESUM SONGZ

2008-05-04T15:32:00.000-07:00

Wow. So I guess I can't make fun of VH1 anymore, huh.

Not to be outdone by, uh, CurrentTV (pretty low bar, but still), the music channel that is normally home to such fine shows as "Celebrity Flavor of Rock of Love Fit Club 3" actually managed to do something both cool AND music-related by broadcasting Radiohead_In Rainbows_ From The Basement last night. Yeah, that's right: Radiohead was on TV again, kicking untold amounts of ass. Remember when they weren't on TV every couple of weeks doing that? I do, but I really don't want to.

Unlike Scotch Mist, this new Radiohead special saw the best band that has ever been step out of their Oxford, England studio and jam out in front of a more professional camera setup in Nigel Goodrich's extremely cushy-looking basement (that could, and probably does, easily double as a very classy porn movie set). Also unlike Scotch Mist - and contrary to the title of the special - Radiohead mixed in performances of tracks from Kid A and Hail to the Thief along with live renditions of most of the tracks off of In Rainbows.

And DAMN was it good.

While it was kind of misleading that In Rainbows wasn't performed in its entirety, the Kid A / Hail to the Thief songs ("Myomatosis," "Optimistic," and "Where I End and You Begin") were not only a welcome addition that showed how Radiohead's latest album draws together the strongest elements of their previous works... but they were also funky as hell. For real: if you've never seen Radiohead live (or heard live recordings of their songs), they ratchet up the tempo on songs with normally slow grooves in such a way that they make you think their next album is going to be the soundtrack to Samuel L. Jackson's upcoming film, Shaft 2: Electric Boogaloo.

Por ejemplo: "Optimistic"

This special should have been called Radiohead_Gets Mad Funky_In A Dope Basement

They're replaying it next weekend at midnight on 5/12 I think, but you can also just watch the videos at http://www.vh1.com/video/play.jhtml?id=1586639&vid=230406 free of all the lame "Celebracadabra" commercials that appeared in the TV version. Big ups to Colin and Debzies for tipping me off to this - it is rad when my friends tell me rad things.

Anyway, what else happened recently?

Tickets to both Wolf Parade and Bloc Party summer 2008 shows went on sale recently, but if you didn't already know that then you're probably not gonna be able to get one.

Cursive is playing a show at Mercury Lounge on 6/3! They'll be playing mostly new stuff! But I heard the new stuff sounds a lot like the old stuff, so that's cool! I will still be that dude in the front yelling for them to play "A Gentleman Caller" though!

I made my first-ever themed mix! It's called "sunset to sunrise," which should hopefully give you enough information about its thematic structure and when it would be best to listen to. I'll probably change it up every month / whenever I feel like it, but it would be cool if you gave me suggestions for new songs and themes to keep me all creative 'n stuff.

Are you going to be in Los Angeles this coming Thursday? Then you should go to The Derby at 9pm to see this band Broken Ocean. It's their first-ever gig, and shaky YouTube clips of the performance will probably be used 30 years from now in their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame exhibit. Some dude I know who calls himself WestCoast is in that band too, I heard.

OK, time to stick to my new tradition of "classy man Sunday nights" by going out for dinner and dranks. See you whenever!

Things That Make East Coast's Head Explode: Prince Covering Radiohead at Coachella

2008-04-27T19:12:00.000-07:00

To quote Dante Hicks from Kevin "Better Than Steven Spielberg" Smith's epic film Clerks -- I'm not even supposed to BE here today.

Yeah really, I wasn't gonna post tonight. I know this will be the first time I've admitted it, but I am a LAZY man. Especially tonight, when I'd planned on spending the next hour or so playing videogames and listening to Midlake's The Trials of Van Occupanther because the DJ at the opening night of the new bar that's next to my friends' place in Brooklyn did an AMAZING remix of "Young Bride" and I've been watching the music video for the original all dang weekend.

And yet, here we are. Which might prompt some (none) of you to ask, "Wuh happun?"

My friend Viv tipped me off to an occurrence that at first sounded, well, too fucking awesome to be true. Apparently there was this big music festival out in California this weekend called Coachaka? Coacheeky? Coachacho? Whatever, WestCoast probably heard of it.

Anyway, long story short - PRINCE was there. And you know what Prince did? He covered "CREEP." A song originally written and popularized by RADIOHEAD.

Well... "covered" doesn't quite explain it. What Prince did was take "Creep" and make his performance of the song a new rock and roll fucking legend.

A man or lady has earned my eternal thanks for posting a video of the performance up on the YouTube. Say goodbye to your head right now, because it's about to explode.

So now I have only one question to ask: did you HEAR that guitar solo at the end? Did you fucking hear that amazing-ass guitar solo at the end?

THAT's why I love music so much. That right there.

Holy Crap, You Guys: A Whole Lot of Cool Things Happened This Week

2008-04-06T17:30:00.000-07:00

...and, as is appropriate when a whole bunch of cool things happen in the world of music in one week, I'm not actually going to write about them!

Kind of.

Due to a.) a pretty wicked case of the laziness, b.) a pretty epic hangover that is just now getting tired of kicking my head in the nuts, or c.) all of the above, I figured I would collect links to everything I heard about this week and throw them all in one spot for you (yeah, you!) to read. You can also rest assured that all of the news items I'm linking to are 100% awesome - all killer, no filler, word up. You're quite welcome.

The links are in no particular order, but why don't we kick it off with a band that we rarely mention here on CoastVSCoast: Radiohead.

Radiohead Film Exclusive Performance for Pitchfork.tv

(Pitchfork)

Radiohead Fire Up Social Networking Site

(Pitchfork)

Radiohead Rocked The BBC

(Stereogum)

...And EMI Did A Pretty Good Job Picking Tracks for the Unsanctioned Radiohead "Best Of" Album

(Pitchfork)

The Raconteurs Be Tourin'

(BrooklynVegan)

Bjork Put Out A Mind-Blowingly Cool Video for "Wanderlust"

(CoastVSCoast - big ups to WestCoast)

Here Are The Other Things That Will Be On Pitchfork.tv This Week

(Pitchfork)

...And I Guess Stereogum Is Launching A Video Channel On Tuesday?

(Mashable)

There's Gonna Be A Documentary Coming Out About The National's Boxer!

(Pitchfork)

Cursive Is Touring And Tim Kasher Is Awesome

(Pitchfork)

New My Morning Jacket Album In June!

(Pitchfork)

2 Skinnee J's Are Doing A Reunion Show And You Can Pay $25 Extra To "Smack Dat Ass"

(Ticketmaster - thanks Jamie)

Weezer's Putting Out A New Album - Guess What It's Called?

(Pitchfork)

The Dodos Are Great And They're Playing Siren Festival This Year

(BrooklynVegan)

...And So Is The Helio Sequence

(CMJ)
Also, I was rocking the hell out right next to the dude who took the photos for this post at the Bowery show Thursday. GREAT set, and I was also pretty damn impressed by the first opener, The Epochs.

Dang, posting links works up quite an appetite. Time to reward myself with Sunday night nachos - later.

Music videos are cool

2008-04-04T13:02:00.000-07:00

There has been much buzz over Bjork's new video for "Wanderlust". It was shot in 3D! How cool is that. This version here is the regular old two-dimensional version, but it still ought to blow your mind.

Here's a behind the scenes look at how they made the video:
Wanderlust - the making of wanderlust

To say that it's a mushroom trip through nature is no exaggeration. Check out this interview with the creators of the video: http://video.on.nytimes.com/?fr_story=cae6cd1d56ad61cd2686baeba62701d9f7a8d2ae . The interviewer seems all shocked. Shocked! A BJORK VIDEO, INSPIRED BY DRUGS?! Impossible, good lady.

And, so as not to let Bjork hog all the spotlight, the Notwist have a new video for "Where In This World", off their new album The Devil, You, + Me. The album ain't set to drop until late April, but so far it sounds like it's going to be pretty similar to Neon Golden.

SXSW Is Over, So We Can Talk About Music News Again!

2008-03-23T19:25:00.000-07:00

Don't get me wrong or anything - SXSW sounds like Heaven covered in delicious crispy bacon and all, but for the few days it's going on, the world of music news essentially STOPS and every site is full of "hey we're catching all these awesome bands at SXSW and going to sweet after parties and you're on the Internet at work"-type coverage. And I totally could have gone for free this year. Not bitter or nothin'. :)

So there you go: a convenient way to blame a missed week of posting on something other than my own laziforgetfulness. Booyah.

But hey stuff is happening again and I'm going to write some stuff about it!

The Raconteurs Release Their Second Album Suddenly, a.k.a. Jack White Is Actually Really Smart

Okay, so THIS was a great way to get back into the swing of things. Early last week, The Raconteurs (of "Jack White's other band with a good drummer" and "a band that is REALLY awesome live" fame), announced that their second album, Consolers of the Lonely, will be coming out... uh, this coming Tuesday, actually. And not just in digital format on their website either... in vinyl, on CD, AND digitally, in pretty much every on- and offline music store that can move fast enough to get it on shelves.

In a weird new age when everyone from Radiohead to NIN is getting publicity through unique album releases, what really stands out about The Raconteurs' move here is that (supposedly) no one is getting a head-start on listening to the new album -- this release method was designed so that everyone from top-tier press to random dudes with Internet access would get the album at the same time, with no real prior media blitz and a relatively minimized chance of it leaking.

And while it's not quite working perfectly - some online stores have already begun selling the album - it's the kind of idea that makes so much sense that you wonder why it took this long for someone to try it. Put an album out for everyone in pretty much every format legally all at one time, with a slimmer chance of it getting leaked, and allow everyone to listen and judge it for themselves at the same time? Jack White, you are kind of a genius.

Well Dammit - Les Savy Fav Are Releasing A Live Album From That NYD Bowery Show I Should Have Gone To

Yeah now they're taunting me... Les Savy Fav, another amazing live act, are putting out a live album from the New Year's Day show they put on at 3am in my favorite NYC venue, The Bowery. My boy BrooklynVegan even posted a MP3 of them playing "Sweat Descends" from that show. And while they were rocking, I was - as I recall - really, really, really drunk somewhere in Brooklyn. With a skinned knee. Dammit.

HEY SHERRIE - THE VIDEO FOR "MACHINE GUN" OFF OF THE NEW PORTISHEAD ALBUM CAME OUT LAST WEEK TOO

I owe you one for all the Radiohead chatter. You're quite welcome.

HEY STEVE - PEARL JAM AND YES ARE BOTH TOURING

Pearl Jam - 2008 Tour Dates
11-Jun West Palm, FL Cruzan Amphitheatre +
12-Jun Tampa, FL St Pete Times Forum +
13-15 June Manchester, TN Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival
16-Jun Columbia, SC Colonial Center +
17-Jun Virginia Beach, VA Verizon Wireless Amphitheater +
19-Jun Camden, NJ Susquehanna Bank Center *
22-Jun Washington, DC Verizon Center *
24-Jun New York, NY Madison Square Garden *
25-Jun New York, NY Madison Square Garden *
27-Jun Hartford, CT Dodge Amphitheater *
30-Jun Mansfield. MA Tweeter Center for the Performing Arts *

* w/ Ted Leo
+ w/ Kings of Leon

Yes - 2008 Tour Dates
July 12: Quebec City, QUE - Quebec City Festival
July 13: Toronto, ONT - Molson Amphitheatre
July 15: Columbus, OH - Nationwide Arena
July 16: Hershey, PA - Hersheypark Stadium & Star Pavilion
July 18: Chicago, IL - Charter One Pavilion at Northerly Island
July 19: Detroit, MI - Freedom Hill
July 22: Uncasville, CT - Mohegan Sun Arena
July 23: Boston, MA - Bank of America Pavilion
July 25: Atlantic City, NJ - Borgata Event Center
July 26: Wantagh, NY - Nikon at Jones Beach Theater
July 28: Holmdel, NJ - PNC Bank Arts Center
July 29: Baltimore, MD - Pier 6 Pavilion
July 31: Tampa, FL - Ford Amphitheatre
Aug 1: Miami, FL - Hard Rock Live Arena
Aug 2: Orlando, FL - Hard Rock Live
Aug 4: Atlanta, GA - Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre at Encore Park
Aug 6: Kansas City, MO - Starlight Theatre
Aug 8: Houston, TX - Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion
Aug 9: Dallas, TX - Superpages.com Center
Aug 11: Denver, CO - Red Rocks Amphitheatre
Aug 14: Vancouver, BC - General Motors Place
Aug 15: Seattle, WA - WaMu Theater at Qwest Field Events Center
Aug 19: Mountain View, CA - Shoreline Amphitheatre at Mountain View
Aug 20: Anaheim, CA - Honda Center
Aug 22: Universal City, CA - Gibson Amphitheatre

...so yeah, you come to NYC for Pearl Jam and I'll go to Cali for Yes. Cool? Cool.

(thanks BrooklynVegan)

The (New) Smashing Pumpkins Are Still Doing Stuff... Except Putting Out Albums?

Um... yeah. I read about it on The Daily Swarm and... yeah, you should just read about it there. It kind of boils down to sporadic digital releases that aren't technically albums but kind of... are? Yeah.

In other news: I still miss James and D'Arcy.

Entertainment Weekly Puts Out A Top 25 Indie Albums List. Yeah You Read That Correctly.

Proof that you can't judge a book by its cover and, uh, everything you have read in said book up until now: the unexpected indie music enthusiasts at Entertainment Weekly put out a top 25 indie albums from 1984 to 2008 (somehow) recently. And - AND! - it was actually a really competent, well-developed list of albums that "defined" indie music during their representative years of origin, rather than a horrific, paradoxical mess.

Did the indie community just get served by EW? I... I think so! Here's what they said:

1984: The Replacements, Let It Be
1985: The Smiths, Meat Is Murder
1986: R.E.M., Life's Rich Pageant
1987: Dinosaur Jr., You're Living All Over Me
1988: Sonic Youth, Daydream Nation
1989: The Pixies, Doolittle
1990: Fugazi, Repeater
1991: My Bloody Valentine, Loveless
1992: Pavement, Slanted and Enchanted
1993: Built To Spill, Ultimate Alternative Wavers
1994: Guided By Voices, Bee Thousand
1995: Archers Of Loaf, Vee Vee
1996: Belle And Sebastian, If You're Feeling Sinister
1997: Modest Mouse, The Lonesome Crowded West
1998: Neutral Milk Hotel, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
1999: Sleater-Kinney, The Hot Rock
2000: Yo La Tengo, And then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out
2001: The Shins, Oh, Inverted World
2002: Interpol, Turn on the Bright Lights
2003: The White Stripes, Elephant
2004: Arcade Fire, Funeral
2005: Bright Eyes, I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning
2006: The Hold Steady, Boys and Girls in America
2007: Spoon, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
2008: Radiohead, In Rainbows

Not friggin' bad, Entertainment Weekly! Not friggin' bad at all!

Pitchfork.tv, PLUG 2008... This Post Is (Partially) Brought To You By The Letter "P"

2008-03-10T11:35:00.000-07:00

Yeah so you know how I normally post on Sundays? And you know how today is not a Sunday? Blame it on Chinatown, baby. I had me a fierce hankering for Chinese food and obscure imported arcade games that could not be satisfied by sitting at a laptop and telling you about what happened (mostly) on the Internet during the past few days. I'd say I'm sorry, but we've already established that it is the fault of an entire neighborhood rather than my own.

OK, so let's stop talking about that!

(Ed. note: the image-adding feature on Blogger is acting the fool today, so be prepared for what the kids call "mad amounts" of text.)

Pitchfork Announces Launch of Online Music Channel In A Press Release That Totally Sounds Like It Was Written By A Pitchfork Editor

Don't get me wrong - this sounds like an amazing idea. But check out the first two paragraphs of the original announcement:

"The 24-hour music network was such a great concept. What happened? Given music's nearly inexhaustible supply of notable artists and genres, there are no limits to how deeply it can be explored. But despite all the footage we've seen of high-profile rock and pop artists hitting their creative strides, similar documents of independent artists are far less accessible, if they exist at all.

In recent years, independent film networks have dedicated themselves to the respectful and intelligent treatment of classic and underground cinema. But independent music has never had a permanent home. So today, we're proud to announce the April 7 beta launch of Pitchfork.tv, the first-ever music video channel dedicated to documenting independent music as it happens. As a visual extension of the music coverage Pitchfork has provided for more than a decade, and a means of updating and advancing the music television format, the online channel will bring you closer to the artists you love, through original mini-documentaries, secret rooftop and basement sessions, full concerts, exclusive interviews, and the most carefully curated selection of music videos online."

...zzzz-wha? Huh? Mm. Yeah and it goes on like that. But I'm actually pretty happy that the music site that everyone simultaneously loves and hates is moving in this direction and am looking forward to the results, so long as each mini-documentary isn't preceded by a 190-page introduction about Chaucer and Euclidean geometry as they relate to Grizzly Bear.

Now I know what you're thinking, and... Jim DeRogatis already thought of it. He conducted a really interesting interview with Pitchfork founder Ryan Schreiber about the announcement as well as the (arguably) seeming incongruity of launching a music channel (and, uh partially scoring video game soundtracks?) while still running a website based on "indie" rock journalism. I especially like the part where Jim points out how big of a tastemaker Pitchfork is and how influential their ratings have become on a band's success... ::cough::Animal Collective::cough::

Hey, Guess What: The PLUG Awards Happened Again

I devoted an entire post to last year's PLUG Awards, but there's really not much of a need to do that again since I can sum up this year's awards pretty well with a couple lines of shorthand:

PATTON OSWALT = okay but not as funny as David Cross

A COUPLE OF OPENING ACTS = I didn't care about them

ST. VINCENT = surprisingly awesome, actually!

DIZZEE RASCAL = good even when performing for Nick Cave fans

JOSE GONZALEZ = why I came in the first place and he was amazing but only played two songs which is why I'm seeing him again on Wednesday :)

UM WHAT = I feel like some other stuff happened before...

NICK CAVE = pretty cool to see a rare performance but about as awesome as seeing the Washington Monument for the first time (cool but eh, you know?)

That's just about it. It was essentially a Nick Cave show with a bunch of cool openers with short sets and some filler thrown in to kill time. Not bad - just not especially memorable.

New York Times: Brooklyn Is Awesome

Because if a New York-based newspaper is writing about how the music scene in one of our boroughs is one of the best in the world, it MUST be true.

But I agree. Brooklyn kicks ass. :)

The Notwist is doing stuff!

2008-03-05T16:15:00.000-08:00

Word on the street is that the Notwist, indie darlings of... I was going to say Germany, but fuck those guys. Indie darlings to boys and girls of all nations. And creeds. And colors. And smells. And, uh... they're releasing a new album! It's called "The Devil, You + Me", and should be released in late May. You can download track one, titled "Good Lies", here.

I like the song. It's more rock-oriented than Neon Golden, a bit more like the material from Shrink or other previous albums.

What makes me sad is that they are only touring in Europe for the time being.

What really makes me glad about this news, besides the fact that the Notwist are doing anything at all, is that this means 13 & God was truly a side project, and seems to be done. Not that 13 & God was bad, but the Notwist half was better than the Themselves half of that.

Anyone know how to pronounce "Notwist"? I've heard "nah twist" and "no twist", and even "not wist". I prefer "no twist" but I'm a stupid American. What do I know.

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2008/03/the_notwist_rel.html
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/news/49105-the-notwist-announce-first-album-in-six-years

When I searched Google images for "nowtist" that kitten came up. Shrugs!

Not That Much Really Happened This Week!

2008-03-02T12:02:00.000-08:00

Yeah hey guys, sorry - aside from tickets to that local festival at which my favorite band ever will be playing going on sale, not all that much really happened in the music world that was terribly interesting to me this week. A couple cool things did, though:

Tokyo Police Club Releases New Song, Continues To Kick Ass

It's called "In A Cave," it's from their upcoming album Elephant Shell, you can find it here, and you'll probably like it too because we're friends and stuff!

Jamie Lidell Has A New Album Coming Out, Someone Remixed One Of The Tracks On It

Jamie Lidell is back, bitches! His new album, JIM, is out on April 28/29 according to The Daily Swarm - they also posted the LA Garage Mix of one of the album's tracks, "Figured Me Out." It kind of sounds like Jamiroquai from back when I actually liked Jamiroquai.

An aside: the last paragraph of Jamie Lidell's Wikipedia entry reads: "While playing at Bumbershoot in Seattle, WA Jamie Lidell set one of his speakers on fire. Not on purpose, he was just that awesome." This is why I love Wikipedia.

Holy Fuck Is Playing Rachael Ray's Showcase at SXSW

No I'm not kidding.

I was going to say something witty here but then I noticed that Rachael Ray is really hot. So there you go.

Anyway, bye!

RADIOHEAD IS HEADLINING TWO NIGHTS AT THE ALL POINTS WEST FESTIVAL!!

2008-02-24T17:23:00.000-08:00

...plus a metric ton of non-Radiohead news for once, I swear.

but first:

BOOYAH! RADIOHEAD IS HEADLINING TWO OUT OF THREE NIGHTS AT THE ALL POINTS WEST FESTIVAL!

So just when you think I can't get any MORE obsessed with Radiohead... just when you think I'm happy enough with the overwhelming likelihood that they'll headline even ONE of the nights of that music festival that's happening in my (borough's) backyard this August... someone done goes and confirms that they'll be headlining TWO OF THE THREE NIGHTS at the All Points West Music & Arts Festival. Apparently, as they often do, Radiohead will also be making history, as this marks "the first time that a cutting-edge band will headline multiple nights of a major U.S. music festival."

Here's the lineup as of 2/21, with interjections thrown in as appropriate:

Friday, August 8th

* RADIOHEAD (OMFGAHAHAHAOHMANTHANKYOUGODWOO!)

* Underworld (oh hey cool Born Slippy in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty!)

* The New Pornographers (these guys are also rad!)

* Spearhead

* The Go! Team (nice!)

* Girl Talk (oh MAD nice!)

* CSS

* Forro in the Dark

* Juana Molina

* Little Brother

* Andrew Bird (woo!)

* Mates of State

* Duffy

Saturday, August 9th

* Radiohead (see above)

* Kings of Leon (wha?)

* Animal Collective (boooooooooooooooo)

* Metric

* Chromeo (interesting)

* The Roots (cool!)

* The Black Angels

* The Virgins

* The Felice Brothers

* Alberta Cross

* Sia (also cool!)

* K'Naan

* Nicole Atkins

* Your Vegas (seriously?)

Sunday, August 10th

* Jack Johnson (is a douche)

* Cat Power (be my hot recovering alkie girlfriend)

* Rodrigo y Gabriela (awesome!)

* Amadou & Mariam (also awesome!)

* Youssou N'Dour

* The Secret Machines (suck!)

* Black Kids

* Jason Isbell

* De Novo Dahl

* Grace Potter and the Nocturnals

* Earl Greyhound

* Rogue Wave (pretty okay!)

* Neil Halstead

As you can tell, I'm excited enough that I'll get to relive the life-changing experience of seeing Radiohead perform in front of the Statue of Liberty on a hot August night... but you dorks had better back up off those Friday tickets when they go on sale at noon this coming Friday, or there WILL be a reckoning. With a shiv. With which I'mma cut you. That is going to be an AWESOME day.

...oh yeah right, so some stuff that isn't really at all related to Radiohead is still happening in the music world that is also pretty cool. Let me talk about that for once!

Hey Check It Out Spoon Is Going On Tour

Yep, the awesomely tight band behind one of my top albums of 2007 (and the clear winners of my unofficial "Stupidest Album Name of 2007" award) are hitting the road in the coming months with The Walkmen and White Rabbits. Let's find out where they'll be, eh?

Spoon - 2008 Tour Dates

Sat/Feb-23 - Aula Magna Lisbon
Mon/Feb-25 - Scala London
Wed/Apr-02 Kansas City, KS @ Uptown *#
Fri/Apr-04 Chicago, IL @ Vic Theatre *#
Sat/Apr-05 Cincinnati, OH @ Bogarts *#
Sun/Apr-06 Detroit. MI @ Emerald Theater *#
Mon/Apr-07 Pittsburgh, PA @ Carnegie Music Hall *#
Wed/Apr-09 New York, NY @ Terminal 5 (sorry Ben!)
Thu/Apr-10 Philadelphia, PA @ Electric Factory *
Sat/Apr-12 Norfolk, VA @ Norva *#
Mon/Apr-14 Atlanta, GA @ Centerstage *#
Wed/Apr-16 Ft. Lauderdale, FL @ Revolution *#
Fri/Apr-18 Nashville, TN @ Vanderbilt University (Rites of Spring)
Sat/Apr-19 Indianapolis, IN @ Vogue

* = w/ The Walkmen
# = w/ White Rabbits

Minus the Bear Are Touring With That Band I Really Like! (The Big Sleep)

Summed that up pretty well, didn't I?

It really sucks that I didn't get to see The Big Sleep again at their record release show this past Thursday, so if you miss them when they're on tour, I'll... probably just mutter at you or something. Fortunately, I'll get another chance this April when they're touring with Minus the Bear, who made that song "Knights" (see cool video below) and are a great band all around anyway.

Minus the Bear - 2008 Tour Dates

Feb 23 - Pipeline Cafe Honolulu, Hawaii
Mar 9 - Langerado Festival -- South Florida Everglades Big Cypress Indian Reservation, Florida
Mar 24 - Richards on Richards Vancouver, British Columbia
Mar 26 - Warehouse Night Club Calgary, Alberta
Mar 27 - The Starlite Edmonton, Alberta
Mar 29 - Royal Albert Winnipeg, Manitoba
Mar 31 - Blind Pig ** Ann Arbor, Michigan
Apr 1 - Opera House ** Toronto, Ontario
Apr 2 - Club at Water Street Music Hall ** Rochester, New York
Apr 3 - Lupo's ** Providence, Rhode Island
Apr 4 - Black Cat w/ Les Savy Fav and the Dodos Washington, Washington DC
Apr 5 - TLA w/ Les Savy Fav and the Dodos Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Apr 6 - Paradise Rock Club ** Boston, Massachusetts
Apr 7 - Webster Hall ** NYC, New York
Apr 9 - Recher Theatre ** Towson, Maryland
Apr 10 - Satellite Ballroom ** Charlottesville, Virginia
Apr 12 - Bogart's ** Cincinnati, Ohio
Apr 13 - House of Blues ** Cleveland, Ohio
Apr 15 - Blue Bird ** Bloomington, Indiana
Apr 16 - House of Blues ** Chicago, Illinois
Apr 17 - Club 770 - U of W ** Madison, Wisconsin
Apr 18 - Blue Note ** Columbia, Missouri
Apr 21 - Boulder Theater ** Boulder, Colorado
Apr 22 - In The Venue ** Salt Lake City, Utah
Apr 23 - House of Blues ** Las Vegas, Nevada
Apr 26 - Coachella -- Empire Polo Field Indio, California
Apr 29 - Bimbo's ** San Francisco, California
Jun 13 - Bonnaroo Manchester, Tennessee

** w/ The Big Sleep & Portugal The Man

Remember M83? He's Still Awesome, and He's Going On Tour

Remember that song "Don't Save Us From the Flames" that everyone really liked because it was great? The group (or now just the guy Anthony "Probably Not Related to Jose" Gonzalez) behind it, M83, will be touring the States in May and June in support of his upcoming April album, Saturdays + Youth. I heard the single "Couleurs" on WOXY the other day, and it's kind of making me salivate for the new album / to go rave or something when M83 hits NYC.

Tue 5/20 Los Angeles @Echoplex
Wed 5/21 San Francisco @Great American Music Hall
Fri 5/23 Portland, OR @ Doug Fir Lounge
Sat 5/24 Vancouver @ Richards on Richards
Sun 5/25 Seattle @ Neumos
Wed 5/28 Minneapolis @ Triple Rock Club
Thu 5/29 Chicago @Empty Bottle
Fri 5/30 Toronto @The Mod Club
Sat 5/31 Montreal @Cabaret Music Hall
Mon 6/2 Cambridge, MA @Middle East Downstairs
Tue 6/3 Brooklyn @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
Wed 6/4 NYC @Bowery Ballroom
Fri 6/6 Philadelphia @First Unitarian Church
Sat 6/7 Washington, DC @Black Cat

[thx as always to BV for tipping me off to pretty much all of these dates!]

Oh It's On Now: Radiohead Announced The First Half Of The 2008 US Tour, EMI Is Trying To Milk Them Again

2008-02-18T19:25:00.000-08:00

...a.k.a. "We Really Ought To Turn This Into An All-Radiohead News Blog"

So yeah, as everyone with Internet access and great taste in music found out, tickets went on pre-sale on Valentine's Day for the first half of Radiohead's 2008 tour of these United States. The lucky bastards who live in the following cities and managed to get tickets will be able to bask in Radiohead's glowing, warming, warming glow in May:

May 5 - Cruzan Amphitheatre - West Palm Beach, Florida
May 6 - Ford Amphitheatre - Tampa, Florida
May 8 - Lakewood Amphitheatre - Atlanta, Georgia (hope you scored some, Min!)
May 9 - Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre - Charlotte, North Carolina
May 11 - Nissan Pavilion at Stone Ridge - Bristow, Virginia
May 14 - Verizon Wireless Amphitheater - St Louis, Missouri
May 17 - Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion - Houston, Texas
May 18 - Superpages.com Center - Dallas, Texas

The rest of the country will get their faces rocked when Radiohead return to the US after touring the UK and those other countries in Europe early on in the summer. Tickets for THAT leg of the US tour will go on sale soon (oh God oh God oh God I hope this week) - we'll keep you posted on that I'm sure, as this is basically the most important thing going on in the world of music right now.

...which is probably why their former label EMI wants to cash in on the frenzy by releasing a "Greatest Hits" album in April or May.

It's not surprising that they want to ride this pony as far as their legal rights will go - hell, they already re-released Radiohead's first six studio LPs and the live album I Might Be Wrong shortly after the band released the In Rainbows discbox - and it's also not surprising that the members of Radiohead themselves don't have or want anything to do with the release of this compilation. I also wouldn't be surprised if this is being put out by a team of people at EMI who have no idea that Radiohead has at its core never, ever been a "greatest hits"-ready band (as half the beauty of each album lies in the arrangement and flow of each chosen set of songs) and will happily market it to people who only started vaguely caring about Radiohead again when the story surrounding the release of In Rainbows started appearing in major news outlets and subsequently became curious about what's been going on with "that band that made 'Creep.'"

I really do hate to whip out the anti-label snobbery here, but yeah: fuck EMI for making a move that is clearly designed to get a little more cash out of an amazing band and tricking potential new fans into an inauthentic listening experience. I'm out.

I will still out Radiohead post you

2008-02-13T10:10:00.000-08:00

I'm driving home last night after eating some steak and playing some Go, and the dude on npr starts talking about a remix album some other dude did of In Rainbows, and plays one of the songs. I gotta say, it sounded pretty good, and featured a favorite mc of mine, Del The Funky Homosapien. The dude goes on to say that the other dude of course received a cease and desist letter from The Man, which may or may not have included Radiohead personally. After some arguing, some bickering, and then some hot makeup sex, Amplive's Rainy Dayz is available for FREE download right here.

Besides Deltron Z himself, Rainy Dayz features vocals by Too $hort, MC Zumbi of Zion I, Chali2na of Jurassic 5, Codany Holiday. I have no idea who those other guys are, except Chali 2na, whose voice is like a tall cup of black, black coffee.

I ain't listened to it yet (the download just finished), but I will do so today during work and deliver forth my verdict. For I am a wise and delusional leader.

A Lot of Things Happened This Week!

2008-02-10T17:43:00.000-08:00

So hey, I'll write about them - why not!

Tickets for the 2008 PLUG Awards Went Onsale!

Oh yeah, they're back in all of their pretty okay but sometimes kind of fucked up glory - the 2008 PLUG Independent Music Awards are taking place on March 6 at Terminal 5 here in NYC, and tickets went on sale for the event this past Friday (or Wednesday if you knew the presale password). Hopefully they've tightened up the programming some this year, and hopefully Terminal 5 isn't as terrible a venue as, uh, pretty much the entire Internet and my friend Ben have said it is... but I'm sure this is the only place in the world where I'll be able to see Patton Oswalt, St. Vincent, Dizzee Rascal, Jose Gonzalez, and friggin Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds in one night for $15 (after Ticketbastard fees), so I'm betting I'll be pretty damn happy that night overall.

Hot Chip's New Album Came Out!

...and it's pretty awesome! But look at those wacky-ass Brits in the picture above - would you really expect anything less? It was apparently crafted to capture the energy of their live show, and on most levels it succeeds, a.k.a. on the levels that aren't composed of the slower ballads on Made In The Dark. My personal favorite tracks are "Shake A Fist," "One Pure Thought," "Hold On," and "Ready for the Floor" - which has one of the coolest music videos I've seen in awhile:

So yeah, go get it.

The Breeders Are Going On Tour!

HOLY CRAP WOW AWESOME I HOPE THEY PLAY CANNONBALL!

...seriously though this is going to be amazing.

The Breeders - 2008 Tour Dates
Mar 7 - Club Infinity Buffalo, New York
Mar 8 - Canadian Music Week Toronto, Ontario
Mar 15 - Waterloo Park / Mess With Texas party, Austin, Texas
Apr 7 - Vicar Street Dublin
Apr 8 - ABC Glasgow, Scotland
Apr 9 - Metropolitan University Leeds
Apr 10 - Trent University Nottingham
Apr 12 - Leadmill Sheffield
Apr 13 - Academy 2 Birmingham
Apr 14 - Academy 2 Manchester
Apr 16 - Koko London
Apr 17 - Koko London
Apr 25 - Coachella Indio, California
Apr 28 - Canes San Diego, California
Apr 29 - El Rey Theatre Los Angeles, California
Apr 30 - Slims San Francisco, California
May 2 - House of Blues Las Vegas, Nevada
May 3 - Clubhouse Tempe, Arizona
May 5 - Emos Austin, Texas
May 6 - House of Blues Dallas, Texas
May 7 - Meridian Houston, Texas
May 9 - Bottleneck Laurence, Kansas
May 10 - Pops St. Louis, Missouri
May 23 - Richards Vancouver, British Columbia
May 24 - The Gorge George, Washington
May 25 - Berbattis Pan Portland, Oregon
May 27 - The Depot Salt Lake City, Utah
May 28 - Ogden Denver, Colorado
May 30 - First Avenue Minneapolis, Minnesota
May 31 - Metropolitan University Chicago, Illinois
Jun 1 - Magic Stick Detroit, Michigan
Jun 3 - House of Blues Cleveland, Ohio
Jun 4 - Pearl Street Northampton, Massachusetts
Jun 5 - Paradise Boston, Massachusetts
Jun 7 - Toads Place New Haven, Connecticut
Jun 8 - Theatre of Living Arts Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Jun 10 - Webster Hall New York, New York
Jun 11 - 9.30 Club Washington DC, Washington DC
Jun 13 - The Loft Atlanta, Georgia

Did I mention they have a new album coming out in April? Because they DO.

(thanks as always BV)

So Is Working For A Nuclear Free City!

The new crown princes of Madchester, Working For A Nuclear Free City, are making their way to the States soon to rock a LOT of unsuspecting people in the face with live cuts from their brilliant album Businessmen and Ghosts (which would have easily made my top 10 list of 2007 had I, uh, listened to it back then). If you liked The Stone Roses but always wished they were better and less annoying, you'll love WFANFC - check out "Quiet Place" and "England (Part 2)" on their MySpace page, then go see them in the following cities:

Feb 29 2008

8:00P

MEZZANINE

SAN FRANCISCO, California

Mar 1 2008

8:00P

ON THE ROCKS

WEST HOLLYWOOD, California

Mar 3 2008

8:00P

SPACELAND

LOS ANGELES, California

Mar 4 2008

8:00P

CINESPACE

HOLLYWOOD, California

Mar 5 2008

8:00P

SCHUBAS TAVERN

CHICAGO, Illinois

Mar 8 2008

8:00P

MUSIC HALL OF WILLIAMSBURG

NEW YORK, New York

Mar 9 2008

8:00P

DC9

WASHINGTON, Washington DC

Mar 11 2008

8:00P

MIDDLE EAST

BOSTON, Massachusetts

...and so is Colin Meloy!

Hehehe woohoo I guess!

Nah, I like him alright - curious to hear what his new solo stuff sounds like (more than likely a lot like a Decemberists album, I'm betting).

4/7 Austin, TX La Zona Rosa
4/8 Dallas, TX Granada Theater
4/10 Atlanta, GA Variety Playhouse
4/11 Asheville, NC Orange Peel
4/12 Charlottesville, VA The Satellite Ballroom
4/13 Washington, DC 9:30 Club
4/15 Somerville, MA Somerville Theatre
4/16 Brooklyn, NY Music Hall Of Williamsburg
4/17 Brooklyn, NY Music Hall Of Williamsburg
4/21 Chicago, IL Park West
4/22 Milwaukee, WI The Pabst Theater
4/23 Madison, WI Barrymore Theater
4/25 Lawrence, KS Liberty Hall
4/26 Boulder, CO Fox Theatre
4/28 Los Angeles, CA Henry Fonda Theatre
4/29 Santa Cruz, CA The Rio Theatre
4/30 San Francisco, CA The Fillmore
5/2 Seattle, WA Showbox
5/3 Portland, OR Wonder Ballroom

Oh Yeah and Did I Mention the SXSW Lineup Came Out

Holy crap you guys. Go check out the list of showcasing artists. You can come back and read the rest of this post on Wednesday when you've finally finished reading that list.

Once again - holy crap.

There Will Still Be Shows At McCarren Park Pool This Summer!

Hell yeah! It may be the last summer for them though, so be sure to rock extra hard at these inevitably awesome shows mmkay?

Also: please stay home if you're a scenester douchebag who's not into the bands playing and is basically just taking up place in the pool. Thaaaaaanks.

And Because You Should Always End a Post on a Sad Note... Godspeed You! Black Emperor Broke Up

Yeah, sorry... Efrim Menuck revealed in an exclusive interview on Drowned in Sound Friday that Godspeed You! Black Emperor has essentially called it quits due to the Iraq War and directional conflicts within the band itself. While I personally never listened to them as deeply as I feel I should have, I know a bunch of you were and are still huge fans of theirs, so... sorry again, guys.

What else happened this week? What'd I miss?

OMFG BONNAROO

2008-02-06T10:18:00.001-08:00

They have FINALLY announced the official (albeit initial) lineup for Bonnaroo 08:

Motherfucking PEARL JAM, PEOPLE. I will be all over that like mumbling on Eddie Vedder.

Metallica. Already talked about them. Hopefully the non-shit-I-know will be more entertaining than the Police's non-shit-I-know. Low bar.

Why the goddamn hell is Jack Johnson that high up in the billing. At least he gives our "Jack Johnson is a Douche" tag more meaning.

Lots of good acts, but ones that catch my attention: Broken Social Scene, Battles, Iron & Wine, and Vampire Weekend. All hipster acts. And a lot of good old-man acts like Robert Plant, The Allman Brothers Band, Willie Nelson (who was very entertaining at Coachella last year), and B.B. King. I don't really like Ben Folds, but the dude can write a song. Talib Kweli and Kanye bringing some decent hippity hop.

and of course, don't forget Lez Zeppelin, who is clearly the next best thing to Led Zeppelin... I'm kidding, I have no idea if they're any good. But you know what? I think I want to go check out the last part of their set, because maybe Robert Plant will join them. How rad would that be?

2008-02-05T12:12:00.000-08:00

Thanks to blogging.la, I won a couple of free tickets to see Autolux at the El Rey this past Friday. I'm not a huge fan of Autolux, having seen them twice already. Too much noise noodling. You guys, have, like, songs, right? With verses and choruses? But seeing how they are the darlings of Silverlake, I feel compelled to give them another chance. Plus, you know, it was free.

Health, another LA band opened. LA Weekly recently called them "LA's best band", but added a question mark, and I would say with good reason, even if they did cream their pants over them. They were... how shall I put this... like an abortion in my ears. Ok maybe that's mean, but I REALLY did not dig them. Grating vocals, no melodies, and not even good noise. And what is that one dude's job? The dude that plays the... drum pad? Not pads. Pad. He banged on a tom in one song, and then just a lone pad. Didn't sing, didn't play something with more than one note. I guess the rhythm was interesting, but an enjoyable set it does not make.

Autolux played a very tight set, and was all the better for it. Actual songs! Wheee! Minimal noodling. I dig it. I even considered getting their cd, but, uh, didn't. Maybe next time, Autolux.

Trendy LA sighting: Tim "I Love You Too, Honey Bunny" Roth was at the show, being ten kinds of into his camera. Dude loves taking pictures.

I went on an Amoeba-spree on Saturday. Picked up My Bloody Valentine's Loveless, both Hum albums, and They Might Be Giants' Severe Tire Damage. Loveless is such an amazing album, but not one I'd want to listen to every day. I get a little nauseated, with all the swirling guitars, it's a two pronged attack on my brain and my apparently lightweight stomach. But what a masterpiece of engineering. Weren't there something like 30 engineers working on it? Theres like a million guitar parts, all doing their own thing, creating one unique sound.

I always liked Hum. Underrated band, I think. Droning, heavy-yet-spacey guitars. That AND MBV? I guess I was in a shoegazey mood.

I saw the video for Ana Ng on VH1Classic a week or two ago, and it's been in my head since then. Plus this album (which I didn't realize was all live stuff till I popped it in) has Birdhouse in Your Soul, She's an Angel, and a ton of other great songs.

Finally, is the Bonnaroo lineup coming out soon? I heard tonight or tomorrow!!

Lazy Sunday Blogging: Really Fucking Distracted By The Super Bowl Edition

2008-02-03T10:03:00.000-08:00

Yes hello hi etc. I'm going to make this quick because to be honest I am way too amped up for, you know, this legendary Super Bowl matchup happening later today to care very much about thinking about musical stuff to write. It's very rare that I put something ahead of music but here we are.

This Just In: The Helio Sequence Is Still Awesome

It is always rad when a band you've always thought was awesome but hasn't put out a new album in years finally, uh, puts out another album. It is especially rad when that new album happens to be not just awesome, but one of their best. Such is the case with Keep Your Eyes Ahead, the fourth album from Portland's The Helio Sequence. Filled with perfectly interlocking guitar riffs and drum grooves as well as keyboard effects that make me want to bust out a mean Super Mario Bros. 3 session, The Helio Sequences returns to the template set by such outstanding albums as Com Plex and the classic Love And Distance and expands their range to further defy the "indie electronica" tag that they've previously been pigeonholed into by lazy fans and music journalists.

Also: "Hallelujah," the 8th track on the album, happens to be the best song they've ever made.

If you're on the West Coast / are a lucky bastard, you should check them out in the following cities and let me know how the whole drums/keyboard arrangement works. I'm still not quite sure how Benjamin Weikel does it. It is a mystery to me.

Saturday, February 9, 2008
Music Millennium, Portland OR
Free in-store performance--7pm
Monday, February 25, 2008
Howie & Sons Pizza, Visalia CA
Tuesday, February 26, 2008 Spaceland, Los Angeles CA
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Casbah, San Diego CA
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Detroit Bar, Costa Mesa CA
Friday, February 29, 2008
Independent, San Francisco CA
Saturday, March 1, 2008
Satellite Lounge, Reno NV
Friday, March 7, 2008
Crystal Ballroom, Portland OR
Saturday, March 8, 2008
Neumos, Seattle WA
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Neurolux/ Crazy, Boise ID
Monday, March 10, 2008
Kilby Court, Salt Lake City UT
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Larimer Lounge, Denver CO
Saturday, March 15, 2008
SXSW, Austin TX
Sub Pop Showcase
Monday, March 17, 2008
Plush, Tucson AZ
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Rhythm Room, Phoenix AZ
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Velour, Provo UT

Destroyer Is Really Awesome Too, Actually

Speaking of bands/artists I haven't thought about in awhile... Dan Bejar! He's apparently kicking 2008's ass in a big way, with a new (and allegedly excellent) Destroyer album, Trouble In Dreams, coming out in March and a newish side project with his special lady Sydney Vermont called Hello, Blue Roses (thx BV) picking up steam... I forgot where I was going with this sentence.

Oh right. Destroyer is going to be touring, and that makes me happy.

03-14 Austin, TX - The Parish (SXSW)
04-16 Minneapolis, MN - 400 Bar *
04-17 Chicago, IL - Logan Square Auditorium *
04-18 Detroit, MI - Pike Room *
04-19 Toronto, Ontario - Lee's Palace *
04-20 Montreal, Quebec - Club Lambi *
04-22 Brooklyn, NY - Music Hall of Williamsburg ^
04-23 New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom ^
04-24 Philadelphia, PA - North Star Bar ^
04-25 Washington, DC - The Black Cat ^
04-26 Asheville, NC - Grey Eagle ^
04-27 Carrboro, NC - Cat's Cradle ^
04-28 Atlanta, GA - The Earl ^
04-29 Nashville, TN - The Mercy Lounge ^
04-30 St. Louis, MO - Blueberry Hill Duck Room ^
05-01 Kansas City, MO - Record Bar ^
05-02 Omaha, NE - Waiting Room ^
05-03 Denver, CO - The Walnut Room ^
05-13 Edmonton, Alberta - Starlight $
05-14 Calgary, Alberta - #1 Royal Canadian Legion Hall $
05-16 Salt Lake City, UT - Urban Lounge $
05-18 Phoenix, AZ - Rhythm Room $
05-19 Los Angeles, CA - Troubadour $
05-20 San Diego, CA - Casbah $
05-21 San Francisco, CA - Independent $
05-23 Portland, OR - Aladdin Theater $
05-31 Vancouver, British Columbia - The Commodore $

* with Colossal Yes
^ with Andre Ethier
$ with Devon Williams

Hahaha Jesus, Gnarls Barkley Too?

Crap, you guys! This post is apparently a trifecta of bands I haven't thought about in at least two years. But yeah apparently there is a viral marketing campaign underway to promote the next Gnarls Barkley album, which means that by now everyone else but me has already heard the album a dozen times and gotten sick of it. Just kidding - I kind of like Gnarls Barkley when people aren't playing "Crazy" every other song at a party.

OK am I done? Yes. Cool. Back to pre-game coverage bye!

*Actually, weird side note... I swear I just heard songs by Radiohead, Bloc Party, and LCD Soundsystem on Howie Long's Tough Guys. That is both awesome and confusing.

Lucky Dragons & High Places @ The Smell

2008-01-28T16:47:00.000-08:00

There's a hole in the wall, dear Liza, dear Liza
There's a hole in the wall, dear Liza, a hole

It's called the Smell. Seems like this place is rapidly becoming the new cool place to play in Los Angeles, and I'm totally down with that. It's not so much a venue as it is a space between two buildings downtown, with a roof, and no bar, and a PA system. And it sort of does smell. Not bad... but it does smell. But with painted walls, no age limit, lowwwww cover and a punk-rock attitude, it's becoming a haven for weird bands and kids that can't drink yet.

~~Lucky Dragons~~ Disaster is one dude with a sequencer. It's a misleading pluralization. Dibs on "The Erroneous Esses" as a band name. He splices and loops and otherwise mangles songs until they no longer resemble their former selves, and are transformed into... something. It was interesting to listen to, and some of it I really enjoyed, but Pitchfork makes a good point (http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/record_review/42212-widows) when they say he doesn't just let it flow. It doesn't flow. There is a sense that he knows what he's doing sounds cool, but doesn't yet have the sgonwriting chops to put it all together into something meaningful. Contrast this with a band like the Books, who weave scraps of soundbites into a complex tapestry that delivers a sense of, well, a SONG. Not to mention an almost complete lack of stage presence for much of the set. Maybe twice he found a good groove and got up and lip synched, but the rest of the time he was just lying back in a chair, tapping away at his magic electronic box. [Edit: This act I saw was actually a dude that goes by the moniker Disaster. He doesn't appear to have a blogspace or an interhome. The now-void reference to what pitchfork said stands. But still, check out lucky dragons at:] http://www.myspace.com/luckydragons

High Places is a duo from Brooklyn that a magical pixie I know described as the Books + Panda Bear. I think that's pretty accurate. It's like if Panda Bear had way better beats, and didn't suck so badly. Also, if there was a cute quiet-looking girl in a ninety cent sweater singing melodies that flow like the scent of flowers on a warm Pacific breeze. The beats are concocted by the man-half of the duo, and sound like a Samoan tribe getting down with their bad selves. Together, they're like dancey island lullabyes. I really enjoyed seeing them, and recommend checking them out.

Feb 11 2008

8:00P

tba w/ No Age (a Todd P jammer)

Brooklyn, New York

Feb 28 2008

8:00P

Vassar College w/ Lucky Dragons and Pictureplane

Poughkeepsie, New York

Mar 13 2008

8:00P

Upset The Rhythm SXSW w/ No Age, John Maus, Soiled Mattress, Death Sentence: Panda!, Abe Vigoda

Austin, Texas

Mar 14 2008

1:00P

Pitchfork SXSW @ Emo’s

Austin, Texas

Mar 15 2008

1:00P

Stereogum SXSW @ Volume w/ No Age, HEALTH, Blitzen Trapper, Kevin Barnes (Of Montreal) DJ

Austin, Texas

Mar 15 2008

8:00P

Todd P SXSW @ Volume w/ Matt & Kim, Silver Apples, and more...

Austin, Texas

http://www.myspace.com/hellohighplaces

100th Post, You Guys!

2008-01-27T14:25:00.000-08:00

Whoa, check that out! After about 2 years, a lot of witticisms, a LOT of laziness, and a lot of mentions of how awesome Radiohead is, we've finally reached our 100th post on CoastVSCoast! Granted, that's about as many posts as Pitchfork, BrooklynVegan, Stereogum, and... um, pretty much every other music blog/site out there put up in under a month (or a week)... but hey, we have day jobs! Back up off us!

For real though, thanks a lot to our small yet infinitely patient and loyal fanbase (of our friends) who keep coming back to read what we think about indie music. Not just read, either - you make great recommendations and jokes about U2 that make me laugh in my private moments. We're really happy that you guys seem to enjoy what we're doing here, and we'll continue doing it for as long as we have ears, fingers, eyes, and Internet access. And as long as we feel like it. :)

I thought about doing some kind of CVC retrospective here, but then I realized I was far too lazy to look back at our archives and decided to kick off the next 100 posts by doing what we do best: take the indie music news that we think is really cool and put it on our blog for our friends to read. So here we go!

Oh Hey The Most Serene Republic Is Touring Again!

Remember that time I was all pissed off at myself for not catching The Most Serene Republic when they came to NYC late last year? I guess the band behind my second-favorite album of 2007 somehow heard about that and decided to stop by again on a short East Coast tour with Miracle Fortress, who are also rad, and Liam Finn, whose song "Second Chance" has burrowed its way into my head and refuses to leave. Seriously, check out the video for it below:

I've said it before and I'll say it again: no one does sped-up interpretive dance like the Kiwis. And his dad was in Crowded House! If you like the song and have a Facebook account, you can download the free MP3 off of iLike and have your own interpretive dance party in the flower-filled field of your choice.

I digress. This is going to be a kickass tour, and you should definitely see all three of these bands/artists if you happen to be in any of the following cities on the following days:

Mar 17 - The Earl , Atlanta, Georgia
Mar 19 - DC-9 , Washington, Washington DC
Mar 20 - North Star Bar , Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Mar 21 - Mercury Lounge , New York, New York
Mar 22 - Middle East , Boston, Massachusetts
Mar 23 - Soundlab , Buffalo, New York

...and Tokyo Police Club Is Touring Too!

Their debut album, Elephant Shell, is finally coming out in April (about damn time!), so Tokyo Police Club is taking their mastery of crafting 2-minute songs that feel like they last for 30 seconds but are still friggin awesome on the road to rock you in the face... locally.

Jan. 23 - Connexion - Oakville, ONT
Jan. 24 - The Wall - North Bay, ONT
Jan. 25 - Quarters - Hamilton, ONT
Jan. 26 - Nathan Phillips Square - Toronto, ONT
Jan. 30 - The Ale House - Kingston, ONT
Jan. 31 - Algonquin College - Ottawa, ONT (re-scheduled from Jan. 22)
Feb. 1 - Forwell Hall - London, ONT
Feb. 2 - Sleeman Centre - Guelph, ONT
Mar. 18 - Call The Office - London, ONT
Mar. 19 - Birdy's Bar and Grill - Indianapolis, IN
Mar. 20 - Jackpot Saloon - Lawrence, KS
Mar. 22 - Kilby Court - Salt Lake City, UT
Mar. 24 - The Independent - San Francisco, CA
Mar. 25 - The Glass House - Pomona, CA (Pomona's near you LA kids, right?)
Mar. 26 - Troubadour - Hollywood, CA
Mar. 28 - Soma - San Diego, CA
Mar. 29 - The Clubhouse - Tempe, AZ
Mar. 31 - Meridian Red Room - Houston, TX
Apr. 1 - House of Blues - Dallas, TX
Apr. 3 - Club Downunder - Tallahassee, FL
Apr. 4 - Studio A - Miami, FL
Apr. 5 - Backbooth - Orlando, FL
Apr. 8 - Exit/In - Nashville, TN
Apr. 9 - The Spot - Cleveland, OH
Apr. 18 - Barrymore's Music Hall - Ottawa, ON
Apr. 19 - Cabaret du Musee Juste Pour Rire - Montreal, QC
Apr. 20 - Bowery Ballroom - New York, NY
Apr. 21 - Music Hall of Williamsburg - Brooklyn, NY
Apr. 24 - Paradise Rock Club - Boston, MA
Apr. 26 - Pearl Street Night Club - Northampton, MA
Apr. 28 - First Unitarian Church - Philadelphia, PA
Apr. 29 - Black Cat - Washington, DC
Apr. 30 - Big Orbit's Soundlab - Buffalo, NY

Jose Gonzalez New Song Alert: Jose Gonzalez Has A New Song

It's called "Neon Lights," it's a B-side on the "Killing for Love" single, and it's AWESOME. Thanks to my new favorite site RCRD LBL for alerting me to this and making a creepy yet funny comment about it. They also posted the song "Chickens" from Jose's side project Junip for download, and it further proves that Jose Gonzalez is incapable of doing anything that doesn't blow my mind.

This Just In: I Really Like Beirut Now

"So how was your weekend, EastCoast?"

"Pretty awesome, actually! I randomly started listening to Beirut's The Flying Club Cup LP from last year and a couple of their EPs, and I realized that they're a really amazing band that I should listen to a lot and see live the next time they're in NYC."

"Nice. You should write that in the blog you and WestCoast have."

"Good idea!"

Honestly though, Beirut seriously makes me want to become a Balkan gypsy in the late 19th Century, and I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've ever wanted that. After watching the video for "Elephant Gun," how could you not?

For a second I thought Beirut had somehow gotten Johnny Depp to stop by for this video, but surprise! That's just 22-year-old (!!) Zach Condon being kickass.

Anyway, I'm going to go lie on my couch now. Thanks for hanging around for the first 100 posts of CoastVSCoast! What are YOUR favorite CVC memories?

Radiohead does stuff, calls it "Scotch Mist"

2008-01-24T14:07:00.000-08:00

I don't know what the deal with this is, but it's 52 minutes of Radiohead, mostly playing all the material from In Rainbows, interspersed with... Scotch mist?

Thom Yorke I think might be the Wobbliest Person in the world.

found via a friend via the fader.

Coachella lineup announced!

2008-01-22T17:25:00.000-08:00

Ahhh, time to start trying to figure out just how badly I want to spend three days in the hot California deserts! Here's my quick, down and dirty analysis of Coachella 2008:

Friday:
Jack Johnson. Why the fuck is this guy headlining? Seriously, I think all five of the next bands listed could just as easily be headliners, and better headliners at that.

The Verve. I will go see them play "Bittersweet Symphony", aka "That one song those guys did." I didn't realize they were ever big enough to get second billing, so I will have to go check them out sometime. Maybe they're awesome.

The Raconteurs. I have little to say about them. That one song was alright, and Jack White is a talented mofo, so they are on the "will go see if no one better is playing at the same time list".

The Breeders. THE BREEDERS! <3 style="font-weight: bold;">Saturday:
Portishead. Uh, yes, I am excited about Portishead.

Kraftwerk. You know, I've never really listened to Kraftwerk. I have the feeling I'll be bored after ten minutes, but that's ten more than most bands get.

Death Cab for Cutie. ehhhhhhhhhn.

Hot Chip. I listened to the new album today, and it is good. This year I promise to remember if I like them or not.

M.I.A. Another artist I'm not familiar with, but with all the pants-creaming she's received over the past year or so, I have to go see what the jig is. Should be a bouncetacular set.

Cold War Kids. I like them, but I dont think I ever need to see them again. You should, though!

Flogging Molly. I don't get them, which is sorta interesting, because they fall into the circle of bands I might have listened to at the end of high school. Bands that I probably walked by at Warped Tour. It's entirely possible I'm never drunk enough for them.

Turbonegro. Caught part of their act at Deteour, and was pretty impressed, despite never having heard anything by them except that one song. I will go catch them if possible

Islands. I always thought Islands were better than the Unicorns, but really they're sort of the same thing. Will catch them if possible.

Bondo De Role. I have a friend that really likes them. If I'm not mistaken, they're very similar to Brazilian Girls?

MGMT. He's one of the dudes from Death From Above 1979. No idea if he's any good solo, but I am intrigued. [EDIT: I was thinking of MSTRKRFT. He's the dude from DFA1979. I have no idea who MGMT is, but EastCoast says they're good]

Sunday:
Roger Waters, playing "Dark Side of the Moon" in its entirety. That... is pretty fucking awesome. That is a get DESTROYED, find a nice piece of grass to lie down on, and trip balls set. On the main stage, who the f cares where you're sitting?

Love and Rockets. Who is Love and Rockets?

My Morning Jacket. Are these guys really that good? I know "Z" was all over everyone's top ten lists from a couple years ago, but I dont remember being blown away by them. Shrugs?

Gogol Bordello. They put on a pretty awesome set at Bonnaroo, and you should at least SEE them for a few minutes if they're nearby.

The Streets. I like the Streets a lot, even though I don't listen to him much. "Original Pirate Material" was a good album, but that's the last I heard from him.

Autolux. Autolux is a bit of a mystery to me. I've seen them twice live, and was greatly underwhelmed both times, but I know for a fact that I have heard album cuts by them that I really, really liked. I think that means I need to obtain an album of theirs, and ignore the noise-noodling they're going to do.

Les Savy Fav. This is clearly #2 on my list of must-sees. I don't care who they're up against. LSF FTW!

Holy Fuck. #3 on the list of must-sees! They're playing here soon with Super Furry Animals, and I think I might go, just for Holy Fuck. They put on such a rocking set at Wolf Parade that they are.

That's about all the impressions I have. There are a few other acts I have heard of and need to check out (Metric, The Bird and the Bee, Diplo, Adam Feeland), not to mention all the acts I've never heard, and definitely need to check out. Some time close to the event, I will give a rundown of everyone I can.

Now where the fuck is my Bonnaroo lineup?

COACHELLA EAST: Maybe The Best News I Have Ever Heard

2008-01-20T10:55:00.000-08:00

(UPDATE, 1/22: OK, so the name "Coachella East" has now officially been overturned in favor of an even more confusing name: "All Points West." More info here, eventually: http://apwfestival.com/. In the meantime, you can swap the official name of the festival in for Coachella East in this post... using your imagination!)

You see guys, there are some weeks that I get on this blog and post links to random music videos I like... and then there are other weeks that I get up on a Sunday*, stuff some bacon in my mouth, fire up the old music blog, and proceed to blow your mind with two words.

This is one of those weeks, and these are those two words: COACHELLA. EAST.

No your eyes aren't playing amazing tricks on you. This is the definition of "for real real."

And who do we have to thank for leaking this wonderful news? Um... Perez Hilton, apparently.

Let me explain. For a good number of music dorks (your beloved EastCoast included), the murmurs about Coachella East began early this past week when a host of blogs that DON'T make me want to throw up in my mouth reported that Perez Hilton dropped hints that Coachella promoters Goldenvoice/AEG Live were planning to bring a version of the Indio indie rock festival mainstay back east later this summer, all reverse Oregon Trail-style. This news was later supplemented by the announcement that said "Coachella East" (probably not going to be its official name, due to, uh, logic and geography) would be taking place in Liberty State Park in Jersey City, NJ - a huge park known for its sweeping views of the Lower Manhattan skyline.

This, of course, led many die-hard fans of a certain band to make a certain speculation. A speculation that would involve that band returning to Liberty State Park almost exactly seven years after they performed what was arguably the greatest concert(s) ever at which one young blogger's life (mine) was changed forever.

Do you know what I'm getting at? Can you guess which band I'm talking about based on the last 5 posts I've written?

...

Well speculate no longer, true believers.

RADIOHEAD IS CONFIRMED TO HEADLINE COACHELLA EAST AT LIBERTY SQUARE PARK

... OK yeah, so it's as "official" as the credibility of the "high-level source" URB found, but Jesus Christ I gotta believe!

...oh, and Jack Johnson might be there too. But a.) that's not enough to take away from the awesomeness of this news, and b.) who the fuck cares about Jack Johnson.

So thanks, Radiohead. Thank you for whipping out a free surprise in-store gig in London and then making my got-damn dreams come true again in the span of like 3 days. I fucking love you.

I also found out that Aesop Rock is playing a free show at Southpaw on Tuesday, and I'm about to kick back on my couch and watch the AFC/NFC championships for seven hours straight.

To quote Mr. Billy Corgan: today is the greatest day I've ever known. :)

*Yes I switched to blogging on Sundays instead of Thursdays because it affords me time to eat bacon in my pajamas while I blog. Wouldn't YOU?

Bonnaroo 2008 Headliners?

2008-01-17T09:44:00.000-08:00

This is unconfirmed at the moment, but there is talk that LED ZEPPELIN and METALLICA are going to play Bonnaroo 2008. That is fucking incredible. I think I'd shit my pants if I got to see Led Zeppelin. The question will not be "what will they play?" but rather "what the fuck WONT they play?!" I want to hear me some Misty Mountain Hop. I want to hear tens of thousands of people, every goddamn moron, stoned out of their gourd, singing all the ridiculous words to Stairway.

And Metallica. I think we all can agree that Metallica is a bunch of whiny, money-grubbing pussies... but that they are a bunch of whiny, money-grubbing pussies that also know how to ROCK. This article says it'll be a launching point for their new album, so we can expect a decent chunk of the set to be new, ergo sucky, material, but as one of the late night headliners and as one of the biggest rock bands in history, you know they will play a dickload of oldies. I doubt anyone will be disappointed... by their performance... of old stuff.

A colleague just pointed out that there is a good chance they'll play a lot of St Anger tracks. It's a good point, they have an entire album's worth of crap between now and when they had good songs. Three, if you count Load and Reload, but I thought Load had some good songs on it. Of course, when I said that, aforementioned colleague replied "we're not talking anymore." Fair enough. I'm not a diehard Metallica fan by any means. I liked "Until It Sleeps", but maybe I just don't know metal.

Also, at the risk of rambling, we were all excited about the Police last year, and they sucked balls. So I guess we'll see. Still, I think it'll be entertaining, and at the very least, it will provide decent people watching.

http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003680301