ROOM NOW CLEAN!!!

CORRECT TIME AND DATE FOR DRUM CORPS!!!

2006-08-17T00:05:00.000-07:00

There you go! Time and date are correct! Don't you freaking miss it!

I can't tell the difference anymore...

2006-08-08T22:53:00.000-07:00

Which one is Sam Beam of Iron and Wine and which one is comedian Zach Galifianakis?
All I know is that I can spell both of their last names properly!

Oh, and here's a picture of me rueing the day that I didn't go see a major music festival this year AGAIN. Not Bonnaroo, not Coachella, not Intonation, pitchfork or Lollapalooza! And I had FREE TICKETS to Intonation, too! I don't think Lisa would've gone for Ghostface as much as I would have. (That and we don't yet have solid connections through which we could drop in and sleep on couches in Chi.)

For the music geek I profess to be, I haven't been able to travel outside of Madison for a good concert (save drum corps shows). ALMOST saw The Roots and Talib Kweli in Milwaukee a few weeks ago, almost saw Queens of the Stone Age last Monday - I have the funds but I'd rather go WITH people than by myself. Help a brother out, Madison area friends (that means you Lisa, Aaron, Mike and Dubuquers!)! But I have seen Tapes n Tapes, His Name is Alive, The Plastic Constellations, Youngblood Brass Band, Decibully and the last two songs of Ben Lee's set in town so I'm not totally missing out here. AND I saw an INCREDIBLE set from the Eels last week! (I hope you Lollapalooza goers stopped by their set!) I'll post some crappy cell phone pics from that show soon. God I need a digital camera...

"I hope I'll never get hit....in the rear again..."

2006-08-07T12:50:00.000-07:00

This is the first one of the series of three (the others being Little Richard and Charo, of course) but this one is by far the oddest and funniest. I had been waiting for weeks for this one to be posted somewhere.

ALSO - I have a crapload of drum corps-related posts and videos up on my other blog, Life of Chadams . DON'T NOT CHECK THEM OUT!!!!!!!!

Tell your parents to stop buying crappy music.

2006-08-02T14:56:00.000-07:00

Though this is not the actual album cover, their newest album debuted at #2 on the Billboard charts last week. If your parents contiue to buy this crap, radio stations will play it and Maroon 5 and Franz Ferdinand will have to do another crappy en masse performance of said song at the Grammys next year. I guess those two bands owe it to us for not being very good either.

But if we dont act now, Los Lonely Boys will see YOUR parents (and their horrible dancing skills) at your local state fair!

A summer full of CRAP.

2006-08-01T21:41:00.000-07:00

Can I just reiterate how HORRIBLE Fergie's "London Bridge" is? Why have pop songs in the last handful of years veered towards this carnival-sounding shit that sounds like it's been written by a team of sugar-filled hyperactive 6-year-olds and whore-bag teens? Her voice is so fucking grating and for someone who's norm is pop music for the grammar school crowd, needs to remember that she's the FARTHEST thing from "gangsta". (As if all of the posturing and rough-chick talk wasn't obviously fake enough.)

And I know I harped on Nelly Furtado, but I think the real criminal of summer pop music is Timbaland - having produced not only "Promiscuous" but "sexyback" as well. Are we to think that after Aaliyah's "Try Again" or multitudes of classics done with Missy Elliott that Furtado's or Timberlake's new singles are worthy to be considered alongside of Timbaland's far superior other work? Or are we also to think that either song belongs in 2006? They sound like bad rejected singles from 1992. I think with Fergie's song or Nelly and Justin's new stuff, pop music makers (and pop music sellers) confuse (in part due to the insurgence of gossip blogs/related celebrity schadenfreude fascination) what people will want to listen to due to curiosity and what people shouldn't have to be subjected to simply because it's a Justin Timberlake song. I mean "sexyback" is definitely a step down from his first album and like I said, Timbaland is phoning it in like he was on a conference call. (Is that a viable hip-hop-style simile? Probably not.) At least there's Gnarls Barkley to save us. More on them later.

Let's never forget how great this album is.

2006-08-01T21:16:00.000-07:00

So, I'm assuming a crapton of you have seen Ok Go's "A Million Ways" video already, but have yet to truly delve into the power pop gem that is last year's "Oh No". If there were ever any reason to pick up this album RIGHT NOW, it would be that their new video, "Here It Goes Again" is (dare I say) better, funnier and definitely more expertly executed. Two too good videos supporting two great, hook-filled songs. And there's more on that album that rival these two ass-kickers.

Let's see any of the MTV Video Music Award Nominees compete with that.

But who cares?

2006-07-27T00:20:00.000-07:00

What an amazing combination of music video and live action. And one of my very favorite songs off of St. Elswhere.

You're damn right it's Band of Horses!

2006-07-25T22:01:00.000-07:00

I just found their appearance on Letterman playing one of my favorite songs right now, "Funeral".

Here's their music video for the same song. Haun-ting!

Enjoys!

what is referred to as "selling out"

2006-07-24T01:12:00.000-07:00

This is Nelly Furtado circa 2000 - when she was good. She resembled that cute co-ed that headed up the diversity/amnesty int'l. committee on campus who could break out a guitar and have one good song (written or cover) in her repetoire that she could make work to her advantage. Nelly had an album ("Whoa, Nelly!") that was uniquely poppy but not sugary - it had a depth unseen in most overplayed radio hits (not to mention catchy hooks). Look at how cute she was!

This is Nelly Furtado circa 2006. Her catchy hooks have been put to sleep in favor of flashy accoutrements such as Timbaland production (Timbaland, who has seen to be better suited for hip-hop and NOT pop production), Paris Hilton ethos and put-ons left and right (see her fake-ass New Yowker accent). This type of selling out is commonly known as a "bid for pop stardom" - an all-or-thing bid for the ubiquity and immortality that Madonna and few, few, few others have gained. She doesn't look as cute here - she looks like she's trying to hard to not look cute. And that's not...cute. Right?

So far, Nelly has achieved a coveted "song of the summer" (I still give that award to Gnarls Barkley, due to my distate for Furtado's new persona) award. But entry into the Pantheon of female pop-stars may be a ways off with the 180-degree shift from her last album (which also held a persona change - except she went feministically, uber-serious straight-faced on "Folklore") and her all-too-quick desire to cuddle up to popularity and all of it's neo-ass-kissing and brainless-Laguna-Beach-acting ways. In a recent interview (possibly "Blender") she called Paris Hilton an "underdog". Nelly, I think you meant "hype-machine" and "soulless self-brander".

Nelly (because I know you're such a fan of Room Now Clean), next time you make the bid for pop-star extraordinaire (on your next album, in which you go "back-to-basics"), please stop trying on personas as if they were new costumes. How am I supposed to believe in an artist if they can't commit to something? Rock bands don't have this problem? They don't go glam after being grunge or jammy or something else different. Consistency helps build something substantial.

And Nelly? Can we work together to prevent the likes of Fergie and her "London Bridge", Gwen Stefani & M.I.A.-biting shit? The world would be such a better place without another pointless pop star who's already rivaling Cher as world's largest pop star/plastic surgery fan?

Now that's some plastic shit. NOTE: Truth be told, that's probably her wax statue, right? But you know she looks JUST LIKE THAT. Just like the wax statue that looks just like her.

Only time will tell...

2006-07-22T01:34:00.000-07:00

I have a brief question: Will we look back on Pete Doherty's tabloid reign and canonize him as a legendary rock star in part for his debauchery? Or will we continue to find him really fucking annoying, as we do day in and day out?

NOTE: I tried to find the least fucked up picture of him. I don't know that I succeeded. but there were way worse pictures. go find 'em and be slightly frightened.

Chris hearts lala.com

2006-07-20T20:58:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! Here's a list of the CDs I have for trade/sale on lala.com. You can post the CDs you don't want anymore and buy the ones you want for $1.

Below is a list of the CDs me wants.

HIGH-LARIOUS!!!!!!!!

2006-07-18T23:55:00.000-07:00

First off, I will not post Yeah Yeah Yeah's new video "Cheated Hearts" because as much as that song is one of my favorites of the year - the video is self-indulgent and makes me dislike all of the bad parts about viral video/homemade stardom all the more.

Here's Black Dwarf. Enjoy them. Because they enjoy performing for you with a straighter face than they rightfully should.

Two videos WORTH commenting on.

2006-07-18T22:27:00.000-07:00

HEY! Hi...you! How are ya?

Are you ready for some videos that I like and don't like. This time I promise some worthwhile thoughts worth readng.

Things I learned from watching Cobra Starship's "Snakes On A Plane (Bring It) Video":
(before I start, here's a cast list:
Lead singer - some guy from Midtown.
Femmy long haired guy - some guy from The Academy Is.
hot swedish female - hot swedish lead singer from The Sounds
rapper - some guy from Gym Class Heroes)

1. There are now two bands with the word "Starship" in their name (except THIS band is a "supergroup". at least they fancy themselves as such.). Both of which produce decidely not good music.
(1a. If Cobra Starship ever decide to cover "We Built This City", they can legally be punished to the fullest extent of the law.)

2. While I'm (quite) glad The Sounds exist, it has yet to be determined whether or not their involvement in Cobra Starship is commendable. Especially with the dancing being of the rap-video ho persuasion.

3. Inclusion of the guy from The Academy Is should be the loudest alarm that all teenage female emo fans may come to exhibit lesbian tendiencies as the rock heroes they worship are extremely womanly (and that said rock heroes think that that's cool).
(3a. Also, said rock heroes probably read magazines such as Seventeen and Cosmo Girl unironically.)

4. Emo-hip-hop can die anytime in the near future as the rap/bridge proves itself to be worthless, devoid of hip-hop (save for a vague rhyming scheme).
(Note to rapper - DUDE, lose the beauty mark piercing. You tried to make it work for guys and you just didn't pull it off. Sorry.)

5. Cameos can be either cringe-inducing (Pete Wentz of Fall Out Boy) or shoulder-shruggingly dull and expected (Sammy Jackson). (You can tell that Sam Jackson is way past the point of getting sick of the Snakes On A Plane hype. Just like you soon will be.)

6. Topic: Are the videos from soundtracks better or worse without the inclusion of scenes from the movie. DISCUSS!

----------------

And here's the part where I puss out and post a link to three videos:
Videos (as of July 18th) on Pitchfork

Knife - "We Share Our Mother's Health"
(oh so creepy, yet inticing - it's creep-ticing.)

Cat Power - Lived In Bars
(love it.)

MSTRKRFT - Work On You
(Proof that techno coupled with japanese sci-fi animation is NEVER as good as it is when Daft Punk does it. Daft Punk should FROM NOW ON, ALWAYS do japanese sci-fi animation videos. I DIGRESS - the video's still a great view.)

Plus, if I don't post the videos on my blog, I look like less of a douche for having copied Pitchfork and posted three videos that they also have posted.

Another hella-terrific video

2006-06-27T09:27:00.000-07:00

"Perfect Day"
This video is a REAL file and wouldn't embed into my post.

I don't know when this was released (nor do I know all the people in it) but have fun watching Bono, Bowie, Elton, Suzanne Vega and a SHITLOAD of others (not to mention good ol' toothless Shane McGowan!) sing Lou's "Perfect Day".

HOLY FUCK

2006-06-27T01:31:00.000-07:00

There will NEVER be another moment in late night variety show-musical act history that will be as amazing as these eight minutes. I'll readily admit to having choked up watching this, and I'm not a huge Springsteen fan at all.

*Jimmy Fallon sat in on the spoons, as did Thomas Haden Church on percussion (Conan's guests that night)

You Tube also has the song that they played previous to this incredible closer.

Two, maybe three hot new videos for you

2006-04-16T23:18:00.000-07:00

Here you are folks - Ben Harper's hot appearance on Letterman last week. I think some of the harmonies aren't the best yet and the live arrangement could use some tweaking, but the song's grown on me and when Ben screams his lungs out, I can't deny it - that's cool. it's what I really like about Ben - his unbridled, though overlooked rock tendencies. That and he's a great singer - especially when he switches it up live.

What do you folks think of the new RHCP? I used to really not like it, and the video's not very good at all. I do like the chorus and can deal with the verses - if I don't pay attention to it and kind of let it seep up unconsciously, I like it better.

Yeah - the whole video concept is really beneath them, but there have been few great videos from the Chili Peppers consistently. For every "Can't Stop", there's a "Californication".

And even though my girlfriend didn't like it, I'll post some Pearl Jam from SNL, since I really like new SNL and am slowly starting to like the new Pearl Jam stuff (I'm still really angry over "Riot Act" for the piece of crap that it was). Here's to one day loving it. The best part is one of my favorite drummers, Matt Cameron, and his terrific vocals. Mike McCready looks like he's having fun too. This is "Severed Hand" - their second performance of the night.

I could go on and post both videos from Sat. night or even some old school videos of PJ on SNL - but I must learn some sort of restraint.

Look for my review of the new Fiery Furnaces album soon - better than "Rehearsing the Choir" but a new entity for F.F. all its own.

Everything wrong with rock and roll in one person!

2006-03-16T09:13:00.000-08:00

This man - Tyson Ritter of The All-American Rejects - needs to go away for ever. Rolling Stone's recent issue's (I know I'm using it as source material twice in a row - I apologize) Q&A page had this fucker admtting that he's only been to FOUR ROCK CONCERTS IN HIS ENTIRE LIFE. If anyone has ever played patsy for a record label it's been this douche. Why couldn't he have become a model instead of a fake musician?

What an uninformed piece of shit! Four rock shows can't tell you how to rock! This dumbass gets his influences from fucking songs off of Willy Wonka and The Wizard of Oz. Theatre nerds can't rock on musical theatre knowledge alone - it's mathematically impossible. GO THE FUCK AWAY TYSON RITTER!!!

You are annoying

2006-03-16T09:06:00.000-08:00

In Rolling Stone's most recent issue, Jewel has this to say about her upcoming album, Goodbye Alice In Wonderland.

"It tells the story of my life from Alaska to being homeless to that little bottle that said 'Drink me,' which was my career."

Christ Jewel, wasn't that forty years ago? I'd suggest you write a memoir of this so you can get your life story out of your system ONE MORE TIME. But we know how things are with you and books...

I'd recite/post a selection, but I ain't even gonna come near a copy of this business.

Pandora.com

2006-03-15T20:48:00.000-08:00

go to Pandora.com and build your own radio station. MUCH better than Launchcast. This website'll kick your ass at how awesome it is.

And go to lala.com and buy some of the worst CDs I own for $1. Please? I don't want them no more.

Thanks!
- Chris

Crimes Against Music - March 2005 Edition

2006-03-15T19:23:00.000-08:00

God - I can't believe I haven't posted since Nov. last year. My apologies. I did plan to post plenty of times since then. I actually posted almost all of my top 10 albums of 2005 until my computer crashed and I LOST THE WHOLE LABORIOUS POST. I was pissed and gave up. I may try it again one day (expect it in 2007).

What you missed out of that was that My Morning Jacket's "Z" was number one and is very amazing. Bloc Party's "Silent Alarm" was number two and also incredible. Beck, Spoon, Common, Talib Kweli, Mars Volta and some others made it onto the list.

The top songs of the year included OK GO and was topped of by Sufjan Steven's incredible rendition of "What Goes On" from the "This Bird Has Flown" Beatles tribute album.

I also wrote a real-time Grammy Awards critique that I may post if I ever feel like finding photos.

Onto more pressing issues - there are crimes aplenty occuring in the world, here are some of this month's offenders.

Goddamn Fall Out Boy! Their performance on SNL was nothing short of the sound that would be by four teenagers farting on their guitars. They tried to be so cool by being loud, which ended up sounding like crap because they were too busy jumping around like dorks. Take some Ridalin, Joe Strohman. And quit with the Hulk Hogan "I can't hear you!" moves. I get it already - you can do a jump kick. Name one emo kid who can't. Your not in an arena full of squealing twelve-year-olds. And it appears (though not from this picture) that Patrick Stump is entering his Brian Wilson phase (girth-wise, that is). Take a look for yourself.

And THESE guys. My Chemical Romance wants to put out a DVD, which will inevitably include live performances. If not for Fall Out Boy, MCR would UNANIMOUSLY be the world's worst live band. it's just a shame that they can actually write good pop radio stuff. Watch them suck, too!

Same on Rolling Stone (more than usual) for actually pretending like MCR are okay to watch in concert. (Or so their live review would have you believe.)

These geniuses are supposedly Hawthorne Heights. They have been commiting musical crime for almost a year - which is probably how long they've been together. At least you'd think that from how immensely horrible their songs are - what with the world's most cloying vocals.

I can't pick which horrible video to put here, plus I'm afraid of putting unspeakable horrible stuff on my blog three times over. The suck factor is overwhelming as it stands.

I mean, what kind of dumbasses write songs like their new single, "So Sorry", which is just the words "I'm sorry" repeated ad nauseam. The world's wost videos (some fucking downright awful visuals) and the world's worst album titles (the newest being "If Only You Were Lonely") - what selling points!

ONE - "If Only You Were Lonely" defines horrible emo today. Sack-less dudes playing pseudo-metal thinking that meaningless high-school relationships should be pored over for the rest of their lives. That's not depression - that's just Hot Topic. Come talk to me, Hawthorne Heights, I've experienced depression (though haven't for a while) - not the kind of "home on prom night without a date" type of depression. EMO/PUNK - Faking on all fronts!

TWO - With Hawthorne Heights' videos, we're seeing the DEATH of music videos. No big names, no concept, no art direction, music videos today have NEVER been SHITTIER. Go to youtube.com and watch the shit I can't bear to post. You'll cry like an emo kid watching them.

And another in the long list of this month's musical violators is Matisyahu. First of all, people need to get over this jam-band rehash. It's good for two songs tops. Having listened to the album for the radio station, I heard one-and-a-half okay rockers and a bevy of horribly noodly, white-boy-beatboxed, ethnic-drum-loving, smoked-out crap that just lilts along with no motion or dynamic to the song.

And when he and his band played on Conan last week, they tried to act like their so cool - but they sucked ass. They're young hippies who can't even be bothered to learn their instruments well enough to not suck. Get this shit out of my eyes and ears!

And don't listen to almost-equally-bad band The Bravery's lead singer Sam Endicott when he calls Matisyahu "The future of music".

Another of this month's contributors to suck-ass musicality? The Liars' "Drum's Not Dead". I don't care anymore. Give me their first album and anything close to it, but the world already has one Black Dice. We don't need another. I'm also not excited to hear The Secret Machines newest - those are some BAD vocals - can't stand Ben Curtis' voice!

What good will come of March though. PLENTY. I can't wait to get my hands on Glenn Kotche's solo album (his performance opening up for Jeff Tweedy was ASTOUNDING!). I've got the new Loose Fur album waiting for me at home - there's another good thing happening in March.

But March will rock the fuck out in two major ways:

Ben Harper's "Both Sides of the Gun" LESS THAN A WEEK LEFT!!! I've heard good things and expect even better. I figure it's good to balance out all the crap videos with something of substance.

And from what I've heard of Yeah Yeah Yeah's new album - I really like. Much more so than their first LP.
Man these pictures, look like shit. Blogger is so hard to edit.

Show Your Bones comes out on the 28th. Believe in music once again. (Just not your younger sibling's music).

I would also give props to The Flaming Lips new album. But it comes out in April and I need to go home and stop blogging. Take care and be good.

- Christopher

A new perception of greatness

2005-11-06T18:26:00.000-08:00

Since I wasn't able to perceive how great Prince was when I was a kid, it was only at the end of high school/early college that I realized that he was a genius and a multi-instrument virtuoso. (Did YOU know that he played most of the drums on Musicology, and every other goddamn release of his? That is where he (and I) started, after all.)

While I enjoy the occasional Madonna song, it was only after watching Madonna's new tour doc (directed by the incredible Jonas Akerlund) that I see how complete her artistic personality is, and that impresses me - being able to take in her entire scope of artistry, via this doc.

It's partly the crazy video-art-aesthetic/stop-go editing of the beginning sequence but it's got a lot to do with how much a part of touring and her spectacle/show have to do with her as Madonna. Sure, I could give a shit about her dancers' interludes, but the behind-the-scenes tour scenes are a bit fetishist of me, having had my former life as a concert promotions guy. Also, Guy Richie drinking and reveling and spending most of his on-screen time singing Irish pub anthems is cool in and of itself.

Next point of business. My Morning Jacket's "Z" - INCREDIBLE. Every year I pray an album does something to me. Last year it was one or two of John Frusciante's albums, Youngblood Brass Band's "Center:Level:Roar", and The Detachment Kit's "..Of This Blood". This year it's been Bloc Party's "Silent Alarm" and to lesser extents, The Mars Volta's "Frances The Mute" and Jimmy Eat World's "Stay On My Side Tonight".

My Morning Jacket's "Z" has the type of production that sounds like a good drunk - sometimes aqeous-sounding and sweeping movements feel sudden and imbalanced. I wasn't a big fan of their previous, "It Still Moves" but "Z" feels like it's made by a more brazen risktaker of a songwriter (Jim James - who has collaborated with a crapload of people as of late: Conor Oberst and M. Ward, among them). "Wordless Chorus" and "What A Beautiful Man" embed themselves in your mind as archetypical greatly crafted rock songs.

I also feel dirty about liking some of the songs off of Tony Hawk's American Wasteland Soundtrack. Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Sense Fail and Saves the Day doing decent versions of some of punk's earliest landmark songs "Sonic Reducer", "Search and Destroy", "Let's Have A War". Give 'em a listen, but don't become a fan - that'd be a tragic loss. That and you don't have braces and black ruber wristbands, you non-emo you.

Say what, homie?

2005-10-09T22:08:00.000-07:00

An excerpt from an interview in this month's SPIN:

"There are so many self-imposed rules in rock'n'roll. Alternative culture even has a certain rigidity.

Billie Joe Armstrong: It's ironic, sine rock is such a liberating thing. It's so white to worry about things like that. Hip-hop guys are so much more dangerous and willing to take risks in music in a lot of ways, because they're not afraid to be successful. It's embraced. You're supposed to be a superstar. In rock'n'roll, and especially alternative rock, it's looked at like, well, you're not supposed to be up there. It's taboo. And it ends up making for conservative music."

I was going to say that he was wrong - but he really is right, solely in terms of major-label pop music. But when you add indie and underground rock, the quote's kind of moot.

Had a bunch more to say, but I forgot what I was going to write last night.

BUT PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT I HAVE TO SAY NOW:

MY MORNING JACKET'S "Z" IS UNWIELDINGLY INCREDIBLE.

holy fuck is it ever. and Jimmy Eat World's EP, "Stay On My Side Tonight" is a bold statement not too be overlooked. Get your ears on these albums fuggin' NOW.

The most important person of the 90s

2005-09-17T00:20:00.000-07:00

I recently received the INCREDIBLE 4-disc DVD set - Directors Label Vols. 4-7 (Mark Romanek, Jonathan Glazer, Anton Corbijn, Stephane Sednaoui).

Mark Romanek is the most important visual artist in recent history. He revolutionized music videos as art and he gave videos life and emotion and created the best videos that will never be topped as the music video art form has become pointless and devoid of anything other than commercial substance-less substance.

Mark's videos have enhanced songs and opened my eyes to many buried truths about modern music and bands today. Here are some:

Kim Deal (or was it Kelley Deal? It had to be Kim Deal), who guested on/in Sonic Youth's "Little Trouble Girl" was VERY hot in the late 90s.

Audioslave, with their first public message "Cochise" was entirely capable of reinventing metal - but blew it by having no focus. Their new song, "Doesn't Remind Me" is THE most horrible thing to ever come out of any artist that once made something that was meaningful and important.

Weezer should've NEVER EVER returned to life after Pinkerton. "El Scorcho" shows them as they were - quirky and young. Any videos from "Hash Pipe" on have been devoid of any artistry or personal stamp of desire to make music. Their indie/underground attitude towards wanting to make music and making it on their own terms was fully witnessable (is witnessable even a word?) in the "El Scorcho" video. The Green Album ushered in the era of Weezer where no longer desired to create music in a way that wasn't of the utmost machine-like process (put chords together, sing words, call it a song).

Nine Inch Nails' "Perfect Drug" is still one of my favorite songs ever.

Lenny Kravitz used to matter and "Are You Gonna Go My Way?" is the music video embodiment of rock - it IS the quintessential rock video. Linkin Park's "Faint" is it's sequel, in this way. (I may not be an LP fan, but that video is so beautiful.)

Mark Romanek, gave music video imagery incredible weight and he truly is responsible for influencing all imagery in the 90s. I'm not lying.

Jay-Z's "99 Problems" - in-fucking-credible.
Red Hot Chili Pepper's "Can't Stop" - amazing and fully supports why I am such a huge fan of them still. Truly a complete representation of who they are artistically.
Johnny Cash's "Hurt" ......... No words
This is my most favorite DVD ever.

Crap rock: in depth

2005-09-07T23:33:00.000-07:00

So the Eagles created drab pop/rock that is so inoffensive that it can cause record companies to try and create as much shlock for its own financial spoils.

FLEETWOOD MAC aren't as bad as the Eagles. It's mainly their hyped-up "break-ups galore" mythology that makes them suck so much, because, well, it's so overhyped. That and the whole Stevie Nicks-as-bewitching, magical frontwoman is such bullshit. The songs of merit that redeem them are "The Chain", "Big Love", and "You Can Go Your Own Way" (<- half credit for being a part of the hyped "break-up" crap). Any other songs are really bad and of no use listening to.

CROSBY, STILLS AND NASH. No Young, No Point (listening to them otherwise). (<- That's a good slogan.)

JIMMY BUFFETT is just a fancy expensive brand of tequila. I think "Cheesburgers in Paradise" and "Margaritaville" were written by ad execs.

JACK JOHNSON belongs in the 70s and has sadly perpetuated the resurgence of crap rock along with DAVE MATTHEWS BAND. You'll notice that BEN HARPER is commonly associated with these two artists, but IN NO WAY SUCKS. BEN HARPER is one of the best artists on the past ten years. He has a masterful sense of rock, REAL blues, and songwriting in general.

JACK JOHNSON and DAVE MATTHEWS BAND have sold tons of records and are pretty damn tepid. What pisses me off most is seeing overtanned girls, who are really loud and annnoying, eating this stuff up like it was Atkins. These are the same girls who emulate (and cause the high ratings of) "My Super Sweet 16", "The Real World" and "Laguna Beach". Seriously, those girls are always out boozing and being dramatic all "Real World Style". And the pseudo-hippie guys are a mockery of any love movement or protest culture that are synonymous with the hippies of years gone by. In the words of a trucker hat I once saw David Cross wear, "Fuck All Y'All." I'm not kidding - fuck ya.

JACKSON BROWNE, JAMES TAYLOR, CAROLE KING and CARLY SIMON are all from the same folkish pop genre as the above artists but are in no way "crap". Never, ever think that they are. Ever.

Will I sum up a genre so acurately ever again? Count on it.

"It's bad you know"

2005-09-04T18:25:00.000-07:00

RIP R.L. Burnside (1924-2005)

RIP CBGB'S (1973-2005)

Fats Domino - good to hear you're doing well and are alive.

*******

The host of ABC's "My Kind of Town" scarily looks like Morrissey which is not-so-greatly complimented by the goofy-British-DJ personality. That gets me everytime - American radio DJs are loud, annoying, crass, rude, etc. and British DJs dance goofily and are lanky family friendly white guys - kind of like the American radio DJs of decades gone by. How do we go from dorky to crass in 40+ years time? I guess that's enough time to do so, and we can blame the fact that no matter how it's done - all DJs tell horrible jokes. That, I think, is how we get from Alan Freed to Howard Stern. I think any and all DJs (especially those that look like Morrissey) could benefit from Morrissey's skewed set of emotions. That would be a welcome change.

I forgot to rant about this (plus brief album comments).

2005-09-04T01:06:00.000-07:00

NBC aired an Eagles concert last Sunday night. The fact that the audience was seated the entire time is reason enough to prove how bad the Eagles suck. if that doesn't prove it to you - perhaps listening to the narrow scope of modern country radio and pop ballad songwriting will help make up your mind that The Eagles are the worst thing to ever happen to modern music.

"Take it Easy"? No I won't! Goddamnit, I can't even name all of their horrible sappy ballads. How did this mind-numbing stuff brainwash our parents into buying the shit out of their albums? The Eagles Greatest Hits is still the #1 or #2 best-selling album of all time. Every ballad is so empty, every rock song is watered down and DOES NOT rock.

"Hotel California" is a very, very, very minor saving grace for The Eagles by being an okay song. Glenn Frey has such an indistinguishable voice, Don Henley's voice is grating and horrible to bear for more than two minutes at a time, and Timothy B. Schmidt (is that even his name?) is girly. Straight up femme, dude.

Plus their rich. Front row tickets cost HUNDREDS. If you have sold the most albums ever, do you REALLY need to gouge your fans just because the majority of their listening audience are well-off middle class parents? Not only have most of our parents' favorite musicians "gone soft" (<- an oxymoron in the case of The Eagles), but they want their money. Go illegally download some songs, burn them onto a CD and then destroy it. (Is that a crime to incite illegal downloading? Hope so!)

Instead of "Don't Trust Anyone Over 30" I propose a new one - "Don't Trust Anyone Who Owns Fleetwood Mac's Rumours"

So, The New Pornographers' album I was all about last post? It's definitely one that requires multiple listenings. Which is odd since their previous album, "Electric Version" is full of amazing, catchy, accessible, engaging, enrapturing tunes. This one's a bit more adventurous and requires more from the listener (faith and trust, e.g.) I'm not one who's a big fan of that - an album requiring your trust in exchange for an album to be great at a later date.

Kanye West's "Late Registration" has many things going for it:

1. Less bragging and ego
2. STRONG tracks through and through
3. Great packaging and album art
4. A laidback yet completely assertive feel - like Rolling Stone (who gave the album 5 stars) said, Kanye has an ego but the talent to back it up. (A similar feel to that of Common's "Be", which Kanye produced and appears on.)

I had my reservations about the album but am very excited to finish listening to it and give it a second spin. Listen to this album any way possible (except by illegal download - do NOT illegally download this album. Save that for the Eagles.)

A full last few days music-wise

2005-08-30T22:46:00.000-07:00

Briefly, KLCR is about two weeks away.

For some reason, I'm all-of-a-sudden excited for the new Kanye West album. I haven't listened to the last one for a while (when I do, the songs hold up), but I forgot the promise that it held and just how easily it surpassed those expectations. Plus, with the addition of Jon Brion to the album creation process, hip-hop production finally does simple addition to become something more than the DIY production that it has always been (I say this because of the fact that hip-hop production often is much simpler than miking, room sounds and other band-related production). This is not to say that I find hip-hop production to be in anyway inferior to "normal" production - not in the freaking least do I feel that way.

I should get a hold of the new Death Cab for Cutie album soon - I'm a bit intrepidacious [sp?] about hearing it. The first single, as it does for many, flows through me with little more than an "eh" to say about it after it's over. Which is a shame since "Transatlaticism" is so terrific and their tour in support of that album yielded one of the best shows I've ever seen.

I don't know why I didn't realize this before but the Black Eyed Peas are heirs (and heiress) to MC Hammer's throne. I know this since their eyes lit up like little children at Christmas during his fucking idiotic surprise performance at this year's MTV Video Music Awards!

<>

So DIDDY, unmagnetic as ever (does he only know that ONE shoulder dance?), hosted the world's equivalent of a Greek Life variety/skit show. And under his guidance, we were given two "SURPRISE PERFORMANCES!!!!!" "!!!!!" They were Hammer (performing an awful remix of "U Can't Touch This"), whom Diddy cited as an influence, and My Chemical Romance (vomiting their way through "Helena"), whom Diddy called "his boys" and made allusions to "running around with" or also calling them "his crew" or something dumb of that nature. If you can't top Guns n' Roses reuniting for a surprise performance - don't call it a surprise performance. Hammer getting onstage only cost $10 and that's to no one's surprise.

My Chemical Romance needs to fucking realize that they are annoying live and butcher their own good songs. I think Anthony Keidis should sit them down and tell them that it pays to actually SING their songs live (a lesson Mr. Keidis learned - THANKFULLY).

So we get plenty of cultural low-points to fill a decade once every year (thanks to MTV), let's see if I haven't buried these horrible pictures deep within the recesses of my subconscious and can recall them in list form:
- Jessica Simpson wore something that made her look mentally unstable and incapable of dressing herself. I thought "Dukes of Hazzard" would have allowed/forced her to lay low and not have to appear for a good three years.
- Diddy did a montage that took too long (as did all of his bits) detailing his various glamourous and critically praised name changes.
- The water-themed show (fountains, sprays, downpour, drenchings) coupled with the timeliness of Hurricane Katrina. MTV (in a great bit of schadenfruede) couldn't escape this sad and wicked irony that would look to put them in some spot that some might deem "tasteless". Finally my prayers have been heard!
- The susbequent drenching of Kelly Clarkson during her performance. WTF, y'all.
- MTV showing they're out of touch by adding Shakira and the reggaeton all-stars in such a way that shows they don't even fucking know that reggaeton is continuing to dominate airwaves across America and redifine "urban" radio and music. These performances were added because they figured you can't fill 3 hours with just 50 cent performing.
- 50 cent's post-performance "Fat Joe is a *****n' **** *** **" whatever bullshit beef. Not only are his radio hits SHIT, but he acts like he's back in fucking pre-Biggie/Tupac beef era. Idiotic and rather shameful. (Holy crap, I'm a dead man for player-hating)
- Eva Longoria's newest fashion accessory: her cameltoe.
- Anytime they showed that god-awful Missy Elliot clip. What kind of rap name is Fat Man Scoop? Has every good rap name really been taken already?
- Hillary Duff looks more like a horse than anyone has ever said Hillary Swank does. That's what ephedra does to you ladies - it makes ya look like a skinny horse.
- Paris Hilton (default inclusion)
- R. Kelly didn't have the DECENCY to not lip-synch. Fucker. The only one with a great voice the whole night spent too much time braiding his hair and not doing his vocal exercises. Anthony Keidis should've been around backstage whipping these young know-nothings into shape, I tell ya...
- Jamie Foxx's goatee
- the whole fact that they make a mountain out of a molehill
- MTV showing their slate of craptastic non-music based prime-time shows. Couple that with the fact that some of their new promos contained the slogan "Don't believe everything you hear. MTV. We don't play music" If you say so, jackasses. Couple THAT with the fact that the "Don't Let [Randy] Win. Best Watch Your MTV's" promos deal with bands MTV never has and never will air because they're ceaselessly out of touch: Bloc Party, M.I.A., Doves, among one or two others.

There were very few good things:
- Green Day was around, a bit too omnipresent at times
- R. Kelly DID premiere another delightfully over-the-top chapter of "Trapped In The Closet" Praise be to the Almighty on that one.
- Coldplay doesn't suck live, they just suck on record.
- the set was purty.
- "Beavis and Butthead" promos for viewer's choice award phone numbers? I think so!
- Kanye West's "Gold Digger" live premiere

See? The bad outweighs the good. Stay clear of the poison, lest MTV require you to need a new liver or pancreas.

Long love music people, because MTV sure don't love it.

a horrible album followed by a great show

2005-08-26T22:30:00.000-07:00

The horrible album of which I speak is NOT The New Pornagraphers' "Twin Cinema". I bought this today and cannot WAIT to listen to it. This because I fuckin' love the New Pornographers. There is no other reason why I cannot wait to listen to their newest album.

It's weird that I don't buy many albums any more. Yet I listen to more music - this is my plight as a radio station director. Sad but true.

The horrible album of which I speak is The Dandy Warhols' "Odditorium or the Warlords of Mars" If that isn't the name of the album I could care less.

As we all know, I hate the documentary "Dig!" of which they're half of the subject. A recent post has called the documentary "unnecessary" and "horrible" and "unengaging". (I'm quoting as if those were the actual words I had used.) The Warhols are one of two subjects in this movie. that I could less than a shit about. The other is all of the hype over such a worthless and uninteresting piece. Yes it's a rock documentary, but that doesn't immediately make it a good doc.

I was thinking today(while listening to the Dandys SHIT new album) how there is nothing cool or hip about the Dandy Warhols - except their smug vanity. Who would want to listen to music that has no concept of working and existing in this time period as interesting? The first two songs go OVER six minutes, with hardly any lyrics/verses, and would lose the interest of the most ritalin-ed up child in under a minute.

The man (Courtney Taylor) who said "I sneeze and hits come out" must have been trying to jump start a sub-career as a stand-up comic. And I would've been first in line for such a thing if he was kidding. But no - it's entriely possible for someone to proclaim this and instead make boorish, SELF-IMPORTANT, tossed-off pop song sketches that devolve into jams worse than the String Cheese Incident's (oh no he di-in't!!).

Plus, I get it - you think it's cute that you have a trumpeter on your album. Congrats. You suck a million and ONE time over now. (hint: The Dandy Warhols think many things about themselves that the listening public doesn't understand or agree on. Such as: their caliber of excellence, their hipness/coolness, how humorous they are, etc.)

Now, to matters of music that doesn't blow. Dubuque had a great show tonight, which is a rare occurence. Grainbelt played their last show as Jon (drums) leaves for upstate NY for a year (or so). The Tanks played "Tanks Karaoke" - since Kevin couldn't come up from TX. So all of their little roadies/worshippers (and Seth) traded songs, while Kevin (aka Steve) and Adam played a hot set that was filled with songs that are solidly great and could all be singles on college radio right now.

Temper Temper need to switch places with The Killers. They write better songs than they do, are harder, have a bit of a Head Automatica thing going on (basically meaning their harder and writer better songs). I had not seen such a good band that I hadn't yet heard of in a while. I picked up that album, I'll have you know. Go to Temper Temper's website http://www.tempertemper.net and listen to something. You'll really like it.

Tight Phantomz had been hyped to me and I enjoyed them, but not as much as Temper Temper. Motherfucker can high kick and throw out hot licks simultaneously. The bass player sweared instense notes out of his skin and the drummer was a damn machine gun insane-o. This band should replace every pop-punk holdover from the 90s that is rotting onstage at the Warped Tour.

If you live in Dubuque, stop into Graham's on Main St. next week or Bartinis on Main on an off night (when a DJ's not spinning or there are no dance lessons) and you can hear one of the several mix CDs I've made for both places. I've divided them up genre-wise so it's easier for the people playing the CDs to decide what they want to hear.

The Click Five

2005-08-18T23:37:00.000-07:00

The Click Five are not a sure sign of the death of music (like people see the Crazy Frog to be - and I agree, insofaras that I have not touched that dogshit with my ears), but they're a reminded of when times were rough in the late 90s.

The Click Five were on Conan this past night and their song was a tempo lasting for 3 minutes that was waiting to end. Ever have a song like that? It just exists and pulses from 1 to 2 not doing anything besides existing until after minute 2 where it's waiting around to end for another minute or so.

Another bad thing about The Click Five? They opened for the Backstreet Boys' last tour. (I heard their name refers to anal sex (kidding - low-level internet sarcasm, possibly undetectable))

But the worst offenses are the fact that they rip-off the suits and shaggy hair of the Beatles and use it as if it were a marketing point. Fuck that. That's flat out disrespect to arrogantly and half-assedly have them look like that. It's not a costume - that was a fucking look that DEFINED early Beatles.

The asshole (Lou Perlman, possibly?) who dressed them up as such is (I can only imagine) also responsible for teeling them to pump their fist and twirl their sticks at the right time - these bitchwads probably have chore-fuckin'-ographers. And I can detect Ryan Cabrera's nearby. He seems involved in this shit-scheme somehow. (I do give Ryan Cabrera credit for popularizing Howie Day's tired bit eversoslightly before Howie Day came 'round with his crap.)

Howie Day once stole my beer at a post-show party. He didn't say shit to any of us (us being the promoters of his show) and he and his overly-British skeezy guitarist fella hit on 18/19 year-olds very poorly. This is evidenced itself by the fact that they were hitting on 18/19 year-olds who looked like Olsen sisters. That was fine since I got to flirt with girls my age who I knew weren't looking for that sweet tour bus bunk hook-up. A few weeks later, that whole shit went down where he supposedly locked a girl in his bathroom and threw said girl's friend's cell phone. Drunky could've done it, it seems.

Anyways, The Click Five need a "Clockwork Orange"-style open-eyelidded barrage of good rock music and good footage of bands rocking. Show the Mars Volta in concert and also play some Nine Black Alps for them. I think it'd work and they could walk away never to perform again. Thanks for boy-banding on my territory - trying to imitate and downsize power-pop into a marketable and commercial viable formula. Power-pop relies on formulas (songwriting, namely) but to throw haircuts and uniforms and a fucking overpaid jackass to orchestrate their moves, desecrate the Beatles legacy and DARE to think that something like that could successfully be repeatable deserves some rabbit punches and a few hours of being locked in Howie Day's tour bus bathroom.

brief things

2005-08-17T18:28:00.000-07:00

my girlfriend is awesome for having said this:
"Someone should kidnap all the emo bands and teach them how to shower"
she's awesome for MANY other things but that kicks my ass for being a wonderful observation.

I agree with this because emo doesn't use inherent dirtiness to it's advantage - and that advantage would have to involve making overarchingly good music to make the genre better.

Why do I not dislike Fall Out Boy? They preen and they do the guttural/hardcore yell that pop-punk/emo bands think they can call their own. But they've made me realize emo is getting better through not being ironic about ironic things. They're lyrics lean towards irony and wit instead of simultaneously being piss-poor, overwrought and overdone to death. And the whole thing with emo having bands like Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance is that they do emo a service by providing definite archetypes that include things that can be good about rock (and are good in the case of emo): FOB's snarkiness and MCR's over-the-top-ness, Head Automatica's solidly poppy and soulful songwriting, to name a few.

I find great displeasure in the genre (as we ALL know) due to the bad choices that have been made in the past (bleeding heart crybabies not being able to mesh primal scream therapy with mid-90s pop-punk pablum [sp]), but it shouldn't surprise people that the most popular bands are the ones that are coming from the underground emo scenes having been orginal and have stood out from the glut of bands that sound the same. Pick up an issue of Alternative Press and you will see just how fucking many emo bands there are - there are millions. It's easier to make a demo and send it to a small label, but promoting a band has become just as easy.

That's about it - just wanted to say that popular emo bands are good and better than unpopular ones. This is an interesting reversal since we know that EVERYTHING else that's popluar isn't better anything less popular. I'll be damned if the universe won't turn itself inside out soon.

Also I'm sorry for the extremely-Lefsetz-ish post ("The arcade fire vs. the iPod") i think he may have written something similar and i hope you guys didn't get the idea that i don't know my shit. i don't generalize very well, even though i like big generalized arguments such as that one. it's an interesting juxtaposition.

angry, but more saddened really....

2005-08-10T23:02:00.000-07:00

So I'm reading Chuck Klosterman's "Killing Yourself to Live".

I hate to rag on the guy (I don't know why), but motherfucker can't write and his love for music sits shotgun to whatever immature girl problems he's got.

This should be obvious to anybody who picks up the book, but over halfway way through it NO ARGUMENT OR COHESIVE STATEMENT ABOUT ROCK STAR'S DEATHS HAS BEEN MADE. Also by halfway the book he's only PASSIVELY made any mention of the sites he's visited. He doesn't care about this journey, has cut his trip short because he's so damn caught up with his girl woes.

Get a new fucking job, C.K. If you're so burdened by this horrible task of writing a book about an interesting job and can't write it about the subject it claims to be about - DON'T and I mean DON'T dare hand me some crap I could've read on your blog (if you have one). $24.95 does not a book make if it consists of diatribes stating, and I quote "wah wah - I love girls who don't love me".

Seriously! I'm not kidding when I say that the book ADVERTISES on it's jacket about being a road trip to sites where rock stars died. That intrigues me, GREATLY. But reading immature woes about girls that I've been over and done with for months/years instead of grand rock star deaths and some terrific linking universality to them all isn't my idea of settling for something I wasn't expect.

Just try. At least try to write a book about it, instead of shit on out over the course of two weeks.

I'm saddened and angry - I enjoy Klosterman's one-page monthly Spin column. But not enjoying his Esquire column at all should have told me something. I don't feel diametrically opposed to him politically, but I feel like there's some haughtiness and know-it-all sense to his writing that implies knowledge of whatever subject he's writing - but once you do read his stuff you see he's just farting words. It's all smoke and mirrors and an empty spotlight on an empty stage once it all blows away.

Klosterman has a lot resting on his shoulders by publishing books and writing for Spin - and an enthusiasm for rock that he may have once had has waned to such a point that someone else needs to come up and show their fervor for rock music AND back up their love for rock with their knowledge of rock.

Ahem. Knock knock.

Musical semi-epiphanies

2005-08-06T02:51:00.000-07:00

First off, I'm watching VH1's top 20 countdown. I've seen Black Eyed Peas' new video (we can just figure that it has no relevance to music and has more in common with kidz bop, radio disney and commercial jingles). Weezer's "Beverly Hills" video was on, much to my surprise as Weezer is a culturally moot band that died before the green album. End of that discussion. This video for a song called "Breathe" by Anna Nalick came on. I recognized the song as something I've heard on radio and remember hearing THE SINGLE WORST SONG'S WORTH OF LYRICS EVER. Something about "it's 2 AM and if i ever finish this song it's no longer within me", but with a better rhyme scheme in which you can predict the rhyme four lines ahead. On top of that the video offers nothing, she's blandly attractive - I didn't think pop music could offer so much banal, all-encompassing, catch-all, advertising-driven material, but I guess it can.

Now they're showing R. Kelly's "Trapped in the Closet [Part 1 of 5]" YES! The first part was funny, but the next four really kind of scared me and frightened me on sheer effect of overkill. "She said no - I said wait - she said shut up - I said uh - she said stay there - I said there's some shit goin' down! I'm trapped in the closet! I'm all up in the closet! Up in the closet!" That's an amalgamation of the best lyrics from all five parts. I wonder what the hell the next five parts are going to consist of, considering Kells promises five more parts.

The video before R. Kelly was Beck's "Girl" I liked the video for "E-Pro" but the video for "Girl" mirror's many of Beck's old videos, namely "Dead Weight". Tons of people liked Beck's new album "Guero" - but I still stand by my original view of the album as not very good at all and a total retread of his previous material. Beck pigeonholed himself as someone who needed to constantly reinvent. "Sea Change" was very different from "Midnight Vultures" was different from "Mutations" was different from "Odelay!" which expanded upon the sly eclecticism "Mellow Gold" hinted at.

Top 40 pop I'll let enter my ears: Natasha Bedingfield's "These Words" Odd how she WAY more perfectly captured everything bland ol' Anna Nalick spelled out with only a bowl's worth of Alpha Bits letters.
And Kelly Clarkson's "Behind These Hazel Eyes" partly because I always loved the Strokes' rip-off at the beginning of "Since U Been Gone" for being smart for including that in a Top 40 hit.

Okay, now that I'm tired of writing all of that unimportant crap, I'm going to pare down what my semi-epiphany was:

In roughly three years time, we will have the next Nirvana. Okay, maybe not the next Nirvana - but we will have a rock band mean something again, cause a paradigm shift, and revolutionize radio, MTV and have another short-lived dominance of good rock.

Sadly (because I didn't like the album), I think this will be The Arcade Fire. The 100% across-the-board glowing press for every small move they make in small part influences my prediction.

However the equally 100% across-the-board glowing reviews of Green Day's "American Idiot" (along with the media glut of their video and radio singles) having a role in their full-on inclusion into the classic rock pantheon and simultaneous coronation as the World's Biggest Band Right Now may offset this new great rock band from materializing. Counter in the fact that Maroon 5 have become one of the first pop bands to dominate radio and MTV since before MTV's invention (let's look back to the Eagles for a good comparison) and the Foo Fighters presence placing them as second-in-line for classic rock pantheon induction. Those could all prevent any new band from catching anyone's attention from those paying close attention to Green Day ascending to super-super-stardom.

AND! AND! AND! Let's not forget that emo DOES NOT, I repeat DOES NOT, allow for one band to rise up and unify a whole underground to compel a band like Nirvana to revolutionize how America consumes music. Emo is all about liking cool bands before other people and not liking them once other people do, and it's all about liking MANY bands. The Warped Tour offers five stages (and festivals like Coachella and Lollapalooza) for fans to listen to many of their favorite bands instead of having one or two festival stages culminate in one performance in which everyone sees that one awesome band perform last. BUT, The Arcade Fire is the one cool band everyone can agree on and the one band the whole festival's worth of attendees everyone wants to see.

iPods and digital music have taught us to increase our attention spans and include tons of bands as our favorites and employ an intricate roster of bands and artist as "our favorite music" - unless The Arcade Fire overcome this and become the next Nirvana, we will never have one band come to revolutionize how we listen to music. One band cannot do this, but one mp3 player, or one means of purchasing music can do this.

Stay tuned and see how The Arcade Fire vs. the iPod turns out. Not to this blog, per se, but stay tuned to the larger music critic media canon to see who's winning.

P.S. I'm more interesting and less frustrating to read than freakin' Bob Lefsetz. He has more insider biz savvy, but that only makes something interesting to read once or twice before freakily cryptic posts scare you from reading his stuff ever again.

Good lord I'm in need of sleep, hopefully I crash before VH1 interviews Anna Nalick on their Top 20 Countdown which they are threatening to do. RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!

KLCR Update and random music, movie thoughts and politically-influenced fervor

2005-07-29T14:10:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody,

KLCR Radio is now gearing up for the fall. Since the professors are back and I can get a hold of them more often, I'm working with them to finally put the station back together. I'll have a few directors rght when school starts and a week or so in, should have a school-wide meeting to recruit DJs. It's going to be nice, because KLCR will run day-to-day without much involvement from me which will let me concentrate on trying to get an episode of KLCR TV out once a month. KLCR TV will be alternatingly tough and easy. The videos will be easy to get, the interviews, not so much. As of right now - there don't appear to be many good small/middle-sized acts to interview that will be coming to Iowa City.

I don't know much about Madison, WI and the acts travelling through there - but I don't feel like messing w/ Mad-town too much. Dubuque should have a good act coming through every once in a while to interview (the type of act that would normally come through Iowa City). But Des Moines, IA is VERY rapidly taking the touring business away from smaller venues in Iowa City and could potentially harm some of the mid-sized venue biz (by this I mean, the biz that occurs at the University of Iowa - I have faith that they won't be affected too much by the larger amount of D.M. biz).

I'm still trying to figure out if we're going to have our own streaming audio broadcast (the preferrable choice) or if we're going to sign up to live365.com (the second choice). Both are going to be a great way to adapt KLCR to the laptop campus of Loras.

Anyways - I've mentioned this all before, multiple times - but I'm going to get a go-ahead on our preferred choice, otherwise we'll go with choice no. 2. Securing a computer to assist the broadcast is also just a meeting away.

I was going to interview some records, but I don't have any in mind to interview, really. I've been listening to The Mars Volta's "Frances The Mute" and Youngblood Brass Band's "Center:Level:Roar" I'm still trying to figure out how The Mars Volta CD works: There are 5 "movements" to "Frances The Mute": "Cygnus...Vismund Cygnus", "The Widow", "L'Via L'Viaquez", "Miranda, That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore", and "Cassandra Geminni". Five pieces that include portions that appear in more than one song, and have "submovements" within each movement. If that weren't enough to try and figure out track 1 is not divided up into separate tracks by submovement, but tracks 4-7 are submovements of "Miranda" and 8-12 are submovements of "Cassandra". I always thought track 4 was just one song and tracks 5 was another. Confusing.

It's great to go back into my massive CD collection and return to some of my recent favorites, especially as I whiddle down the unneccesary CDs, rip the tunes onto my computer and sell my CDs. This could be inspired my continual whiddling down of the songs on my iPod - who needs to hear songs you don't remember or care about as much as other songs you care about or remember - it'll only work to heighten my listening pleasure. Why you need to know this is beyond me.

Okay, so no music reviews, but I will say that along with Batman Begins, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is one of the summer's only good movies thus far. I thought it wasn't going to be good, but I went to see it on a fluke and the story is really good and the joke's come across terrifically. Tim Burton has semi-restored my faith in him after that cheese-fest, Big Fish. If you're thinking of seeing either, say, Wedding Crashers or Fantastic Four - don't.

Wedding Crashers is just not as good as a movie with Owen Wilson or Vince Vaughan should be. That's the thing - Old School and Anchorman are great movies that are going to cause people to want to make like-minded movies with undeveloped ideas leaving little to go on. Fantastic Four was just another one of those Marvel Comics moves that had a shit story (Daredevil, Elektra, Punisher) - horrible.

Here's my last point of business - Sony Records was recently found guilty of payola. Fucking bitches! (Not that I'm surprised by any means) As if terrestrial radio weren't unsalvagable enough already. I know this isn't an international crime or important to middle-eastern relations or anything but, art and commerce have once again proven to not be equal partners. I think the worst thing is that Sony's punishment (as determined by them to some extent, I think) is to pay $10 million to charity. That's it. Granted payola can't necessarily be reversed, but it's not hard to jail somebody for this or offer free promotion to a smaller label that's charting against Sony.

Blender magazine (and this may shock you) has an insightful article about the ruining of rock radio. Essentially, and this is partly because of a fear of having to retool advertising plans to promote products that would coincide with a less aggressive male macho nu-metal rock radio format. But one of the stupidest things is that rock radio will hardly bother to budge to accomodate successful artists into their playlists. The reliabilty (however fast it's fading) of shitty hard rock (Mudvayne, Breaking Benjamin) is too much to allow for diversity that would WITHOUT A DOUBT provide radio stations with the ability to advertise to more than just one demographic (the dominant male 18-40 category), let alone prevent programming from becoming stagnant and DIE. The male 18-40 (i don't know if it's 40 or higher or lower) demographic is the most coveted and provides the most profitability in regards to rock radio but the format will die in ten years, is already being subject to format changes by its owning companies (rock stations being changed to hip-hop or latino stations), pushes horrible product that makes tons of money, and is responsible for fucking idiotic redneck, steroidal, Ozzfest, male mindsets. Ever see footage of assholes at arena concerts screaming their lungs out, throwing devil horns, moshing and beating people up because they think it's normal and acceptable? Yeah, that's what today's rock radio is all about. Not to mention annoying DJs - who though that was a good way for radio to go?

Irrefutable proof of how horribly monotonous and unoriginal the people who run radio are can be seen by comparing the modern rock charts and the mainstream rock charts at http://www.billboard.com. They're virtually the same chart. Again, commerce wins over art. New bands that break through to these charts and MTV are started by emulating commercial musicians, and not artists. I fucking hate industry professionals - there's no idea of having substantial product worth the time to promote, the same shit gets run into the ground year after year with no change.

Festivals, which I forgot I mentioned a couple of posts ago

2005-07-25T22:37:00.000-07:00

This past weekend was Lollapalooza - and the weekend before gave us Intonation (curated by Pitchfork Media) in Chicago and Village Voice's Siren Festival on Coney Island.

Go to http://www.pitchforkmedia.com and the middle of the page (on the right) show reveal some terrific photos and commentary on what I really should have given thought to having witnessed. The scrapped Lollapalooza '04 tour attempted this (but overextended by trying to offer two days here and there, when the two-day concert format has become cemented in concertgoers' minds as a one-city, one-time-a-year ting) when they tried to take the Pixies, String Cheese Incident, Morrisey, Modest Mouse, Sonic Youth, the Walkmen, TV on the Radio, etc. out on tour last year. I really would've gone had it not been for me constantly thinking that a Chicago concert is too far to go. A Chicago festival, however, is not.

It's a great thing that Lollapalooza was a really high-profile festival IN THE MIDWEST. I always say I want to go to Coachella - but many pictures since then have revealed it to be an L.A. infested thing (which shouldn't surprise anybody), but next year I will definitely go to Intonation. Lollapalooza had many overexposed acts (cough, cough, Dashboard Confessional, The Dandy Warhols, Kasabian, Weezer, Louis XIV, The Bravery, Liz Phair, etc. etc. etc.) and relatively few decent smaller artists (Spoon, Blonde Redhead, Saul Williams) and few decent middle-sized acts (Death Cab, Trail of Dead).

Intonation has amazingly made it's mark as an impressive, smart and extremely artist-centric, positive and successful festival for underground artists. They even (much to Pitchfork's retrospective chagrin) tried their hand at creating a live music format (or at least giving it a bigger exposure) - the live mash-up. James from Yo La Tengo and El-P of Def Jux Records, and Jean Grae and Will Oldham pair up for live DJ sets, which definitely were what they were: experimental and offering up mixed results. Still kudos for the decision to allot time in the DJ tents. Nevertheless, Intonation, like I said, has staked its claim within the festival circuit as an exemplary alternative to every other festival possible.

Except for Siren Fest - the best festival line-up of the year. Holy shit - consistently awesome. Too bad MTV2's Subterranean only gave me a taste and provided me with as little good stuff as possible.

Someone should knock down MTV's doors because their Live 8 coverage made it abundantly clear that no one wants to fucking see their horrible VJs do a shitty job ad-libbing. Fucking hell - who thinks that kind of coverage of a live show is worth watching? Oh yeah, the same people who air shows like Laguna Beach and My Super Sweet 16 for hours on end. Again, people with money who don't know what music actually sounds like. Seriously - it's one cable channel that's caused music to become so narrow and disapproving of variety in modern music. Had they not existed, hip-hop would've been an incredible art form that would have never needed to create an underground movement that exists as counterpoint to materialistic MTV non-hip-hop advertising. Thanks for reading my slightly detailed and insightful critique of a problem that's existed for years.

Along the same lines of MTV sending hip-hop into the direction it went for almost 20 years, MTV has created the need for underground rock to exist. At least you can still share an intense experience with other humans at a small club without their involvement, or Clear Channel's for that matter.

Anyways, I wanted to come on here and write how Intonation is good and is set to become an important musical event (more so than the overblown Bonnaroo, and the potentially dying Coachella - pray it doesn't succumb to rich hipsters, leave it for the poor hipsters like me!). And pray that Lollapalooza keeps doing two day festivals but gets fewer crap rock bands on the bill and more of everything. If they could just remember how good their line-up was to be for their '04 tour - but NO! They've partially blocked that out due to their embarassing cancellation of their whole tour that year.

'nuff said 'bout that,
- "Wait'll you see my" Chhhhhhhhh

Just a quick entry (with plenty of empty promise of more soon)

2005-07-21T21:31:00.000-07:00

I'm watching Elvis Costello and Emmylou Harris do a cover of "Love Hurts" (Bad Company) on Letterman right now. Goddamn, E.C. can do no wrong. Except his leather fringe jacket, aviators and stetson. Those aside, this performance was damn good. She's on tour with him right now (which is awesome since she did some dueting w/him on his newest The Delivery Man) - go see 'em if you can. (Or check out his newest live DVD, with her on it of course.)

Hopefully you ALSO caught Conan rerunning the Joe Jackson/Todd Rundgren duet (accompanied by the most rocking string quartet EVER) of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps". (This was reran a week or two ago.) I was also fortunate enough that same week to see the live performance that Trio occasionally runs of Joe Jackson. I think it's a 25th anniversary tour of some sort. It's a little adult-contemporary, but it's still great. Ben Folds fans are (most likely) missing out on Joe's piano-based pop-punk that's directly connected to Elvis via same time period, location - same everything, pretty much.

Anyways, Todd and Joe killed it on Conan. They toured performing Beatles songs sometime last year and I sadly don't think they recorded or captured any of their shows. I've been a Joe fan for a few years now and seeing him on TV has NEVER disappointed. That's not easy to accomplish AT ALL. He appeared on Leno (and a few other places) last year when assisting William Shatner and Ben Folds on their cover of Pulp's "Common People". Still furious and frustrated. Even more so than Elvis, if you can believe it. Don't buy Shatner's album, just grab "Common People" online.

More soon people. Going to write in the daily life blog now. Check it. Respect.
- C

Two word album reviews and a three word obituary.

2005-07-01T21:24:00.000-07:00

Esthero - Wicked Lil' Grrrls (Reprise).
The first track is REALLY good, the rest of the album is horrible, Black Eyed Peas-ish maudlin genre-ruining exercises. Dumbed down jazz, funk and hip-hop makes her no less a Christina Aguilera or Pink imitator. She still makes lovely cover art material by looking cute.

Jack's Mannequin - Mixed Tape (single)
not bad, Something Corporate (Andy McMahon's main band) has written a few good songs and is a songwriter who, while stuck in pop-punk/Alternative Press purgatory, is developing into someone who could mature not unlike Ben Folds has. (Same with The Early November's Ace Enders). (<- I hate having just lauded crappy, Drive-Thru Records pop/punk, that's the BIGGER benefit of the doubt I've EVER given. Still they write pretty okay songs, those two).

Kinski - Alpine Static (Sub-Pop)
Man, the packaging on this album is really BEATIFUL. But Christ was my patience tested with ho-hum retro-metal instrumental rockers and 3+ minutes of ambience per track. Track 7 was okay. Pick up a Darediablo album instead - they're much better and less pretentious than Kinski.

Finch - Say Hello to Sunshine
Damn. Four songs in and I'm enjoying it, unlike what I thought my reaction was going to be. I used to hate Finch as they near single-handedly brought overwrought screamo to the mainstream. This album shows a high degree of maturation and their songwriting has expanded exponentially. Reminiscent of Glassjaw and Sparta (if they desperately wanted to be the Mars Volta). They sport Mars Volta's adventurous nature (in a very fetal form) and Glassjaw's mastery of sitting just outside of their abhorrent genre's parameters/rules & regulations, meaning Glassjaw and Finch let melody override the need to scream and act all emotionally torn to bits (for one, GJ and Finch exhibit many more examples of being superior bands to...we'll say Stutterfly, a safe example of trickle-down musical imitators). By the way, Stutterfly is a band's CD I received for KLCR and have not yet (nor will I ever) listened to. I did, unfortunately, see their video on Fuse- the home of emo. (I still credit Fuse for being such a strong alternative to MTV and a better gauge of what kids actually listen to today - something radio and MTV can't figure out after TWO YEARS of Fuse being able to effortlessly get it right.)

Shit, I'm tired. No more reviews tonight.

Let's end with giving Luther Vandross and his family condolences. L.V. died at 54 this evening. He started his musical career as Soul/R&B was slowing down to a halt. His output in the 70s is impressive. Guy used to be in Chic! Thanks, Luther. Good Times, Luther. (Note: Luther left Chich before "Good Times" was recorded. I read that in Blender this past week.)

ONE LAST THING: The Andy Milonakis show on MTV (Sundays 10:30/9:30) is really good, suprisingly enough. Better than Tom Green ever was. Probably helps that he's twelve. Damn is it good. Watch it!

Peace and Vandross,
- Christopher

random near end of June post

2005-06-27T22:00:00.000-07:00

goddamn, June's almost over. double-you tee eff, right? that's what I think.

let's see. Something that really sticks out in my head as sucking is the fact that I don't like anywhere near NYC to see this year's Siren Festival at Coney Island. Spoon and Brendan Benson are headlining with Saul Williams and the Detachment Kit playing earlier in the day. I think out of all the summer festivals this is one of the top five, if not the best. Bonnaroo is still overcrowded with hippie shit (despite diversifying at a slow pace), Lollapalooza is fond of bloated, meaningless, faded acts (Weezer, Dashboard Confessional, Louis XIV), and Coachella seemed kind of stiff and WAY-TOO older-hipster-ish this year (M.I.A., Bauhaus, Coldplay, Arcade Fire). Sept's Austin City Limits festival is still okay, a little too many alt-country holdovers for me (any act in their line-up that's one guy or girl), and Chicago's Intonation Festival next month (curated by Pitchfork Media) looks good, but not as good as the Siren Festival.

Side notes - another thing that annoyed me is that the following bands are playing every festival under the sun: Kasabian, Weezer, Louis XIV, The Arcade Fire, Widespread Panic, LCD Soundsystem, a handful of others. And only one of those bands is good (LCD Soundsystem) the others define overhyped.

I may have left Bob Lefsetz's e-mail blog that I hyped in my last post (due to too many cryptic self-important posts), but not only are ad campaigns pushing horrible albums left and right, year after year, but hype machines themselves (magazines, web pages and word of mouth), while for the most part good and better ways of hearing about an album than bloated ad campaigns, have given way to many of the horrible artists I just listed. I take the cynical ways of how an album gets your attention from ol' B.L.

So if your in NYC - GO SEE SIREN FEST! If you're in Chi. - GO SEE INTONATION FEST! They're cheap (FREE in the case of Siren Fest) and chock-full of some today's best artists (Detachment Kit and Saul Williams DID make two of last year's BEST albums, after all).

Here are some other tour dates of note for the Iowa crowd:
July 17th - Head Automatica - Reverb - Cedar Falls
July 24th - The Von Bondies/Morningwood - Gabe's - Iowa City
Oct. 19th - The Coup - Gabe's

The Coup is excellent live hip-hop like you wouldn't believe. Better than any "Gabe's-sized" live hip-hop act out there - really terrific and crowd-pleasing as hell. And there are a good handful of them. Trust me - I've seen them and some of them ain't pretty. And many people know just how much I loved Head Automatica's debut album, Decadence. H.A. doesn't happen too tour frequently so SEE THEM WHEN YOU CAN.

Haven't heard much new music lately. I'm busy tinkering with my iPod, decreasing the amount of music I have on it (getting rid of mediocre songs or songs that just don't hit me), and making it more appealing for me to listen to everytime.

I did however get the new album by World Leader Pretend today in the mail for KLCR. I heard the first two tracks and really like it. It's swoony-croony pop-rock that's really reminiscent of Elefant (another great album from last year, "Sunlight Makes Me Paranoid"), and to a lesser degree, Powderfinger. What confused the shit out of me was the tossed-off inclusion (complete with wrong lyrics and tongue-in-cheek) of part of a Sugar Ray song's chorus, "So far, so long, so far away". Yeah - odd, isn't it?

I watched the most of The Flaming Lips documentary "Fearless Freaks". I liked it, didn't love it, but there's great live footage, great stories of Wayne Coyne's and Steven Drozd's childhoods/families. The band's timeline is pretty secondary to the rich stories told, but I'd still recommend seeing it. Especially if you liked "Dig!" - the worst rock and roll documentary ever.

Have I ever gone off about "Dig!"?

First off, who gives a shit about either The Dandy Warhols or The Brian Jonestown Massacre? The D.W.s are some mediocre major-label band who'll only ever be remembered for the lead singer's pretty pout (Courtney Taylor) and The B.J. Massacre are a fairly good retro-garage-y indie pop-rock collective with a drugged-out lead singer (Anton Newcombe). That's entertaining but also sad and tiring to watch after you've seen the first 30 minutes of his shtick. Second-banana/sidekick (Joel Gion) is one of the few redeeming things about the documentary. J.G., however would have made a better comedian than a tambourine-jangler. In telling stories to grandkids or filling out applications for future jobs, Joel Gion can put under occupation, tambourine jangler. Serious.

Secondly, the doc's fucking long. With NO plot development. The Dandies enjoy mild success and The Massacre get high and fight. THAT'S IT. Over two hours of just that. This is poor, poor shit. Don't listen to hype machines or ad campaigns that say anything good about this rock-doc. Here's recent doc subjects worth checking out: The Flaming Lips (Fearless Freaks), Jandek (Jandek on Corwood), The Ramones (End of the Century). Unimportant bands do not suddenly make interesting subjects.

I'm out.
Lot of love,
- Christopher

White Stripes "second take"

2005-06-18T19:41:00.000-07:00

So now I got through most of the second half of "Get Behind Me Satan" and that is where the real good tracks lie. The first half didn't do it for me so much. Blue Orchid's the first song - that soured my view of the album right there.

The second half is really impressive - "Take Take Take" and "Instinct Blues", for instance. Granted Jack White can write the hell out of a song - one of the best popular songwriters around today (which is only made better by the fact that HIS favorite songwriter is Brendan Benson - one of my all-time favorite songwriters. Look for their collaborative project - The Raconteurs - this fall or next year). But he does write very similar songs, which is off-putting, but not to a large degree. "There's No Room For You Here" is one chord short of "Dead Leaves and Dirty Ground" and a lot of the songs from this album and the last album have smiliar chord progressions and a similar swing to them all.

These are things that I can live with but will on some small level bug me. Don't hate me for questioning a band I like. I critique and pick apart bands I like the most, as many do. Ever follow an artist's career and after 3 or albums they sound like they're repeating themselves or starting to suck? If you love a band or artist enough, you should. I'm in no way insinuating the White Stripes are headed down the "rusty career" path anytime soon.

Foo Fighters, on the other hand (as I sample the new album on iTunes), are two albums away from their last good album, "There's Nothing Left To Lose" There's a few good songs on the first of the two albums (I haven't heard the second acoustic album yet) , "The Deepest Blues Are Black" for example. I don't feel like writing much more, I'll give the album another chance before I come down on them. I should change up my style of pre-judging only part of an album before I review it.

Till next segment of time,
- C.

A quick one before I leave for the weekend

2005-06-17T10:48:00.000-07:00

There's small, albeit ACTUAL, demand for more consistent updating of this blog. I'm getting back into the habit of updating my personal one, but I'll start throwing down on this one more often.

Hmmm.... music this summer.... what's up with it.

Well, the biggest album release so far this year I did not expect to like at all - Oasis. Out of the crap delivered by Weezer, Black Eyed Peas's "Kidz-Bop" material and okay efforts from Coldplay, Nine Inch Nails and The White Stripes (pick up their single for Blue Orchid for interesting b-sides - favorite track: 3), Oasis comes out from retirement and reinvents their songwriting and cuts out an incredibly large part of the pompous, overwrought, self-important arena-rock/Brit-pop crap that took up most of their last albums that aren't "Definitely Maybe" or "(What's The Story) Morning Glory?". NOTE: I was a sizeable Oasis fan in junior high - they were one of the first bands I latched onto (like Smashing Pumpkins, Phish and Beck).

Their songs, oddly enough (and quite oddly at that), sound like Ted Leo - if he were a millionaire rocker with a bad case of a sneer. Supposedly Liam's writing more songs (I think lyrics, mainly), which may work to some extent, but I still think Noel Gallagher sounds better on vocals.

It's hard to describe since I haven't listened to the album, "Don't Believe The Truth" for a week or two, but there's a definite humble pop-punk (the good kind, like Elvis Costello and Ted Leo) feel infused into the Brit-pop formula that they initially mastered and subsequently killed. This is truly one of the better "second acts" of the year.

Which brings me to the whole "second act" business. It's the trend of the year. Classify it as a "comeback" in some instances (Nine Inch Nails, Oasis e.g.), if you will, or apply the term to bands like Low and Sleater-Kinney that are getting tons of press for "re-inventing" their sound (or really just turning up the distortion), but it's happening all over the place. It seems to me as though it's a bit of a terminal point for the bigger, overlapping trend of the reunion that took place all last year (The Pixies, Gang of Four, etc. etc. etc.) - which neither bad or great. The indie-band definition of tweaking the sound of their music is obviously the better way to view the second act phenomenon - as the antithesis of the "softening" and dulling of artists as their careers continue (name virtually any major label band, Weezer for example, and that will serve as my point for artists "going soft").

A little note about the White Stripes before I continue my "second act" argument. I picked up White Blood Cells back in the day, I wasn't totally impressed. Picked up Elephant, despite my previous lack of enthusiasm for the Stripes - ABSOLUTELY LOVED IT. Heard Blue Orchid - hated it. Have picked up Get Behind Me Satan and am not floored like I was with Elephant. Rob Sheffield (of Rolling Stone), one of the worst music/rock critics ever, lauds "Satan" as better than Elephant. That totally contributes to my not liking the new White Stripes record a whole lot. Rob Sheffield, who appears on VH1's "100 hottest" deluge of countdown/dos and donts/celebrity gossip/bashing programs often, should be writing for US Weekly, which incredibly sadly, is Rolling Stone's sister publication.

Okay, back to second acts. The other way to view the second act is as a comeback. Which is just a term used by record labels to promote an artists album. "Haven't heard them for a couple of years? WELL THEY'RE BACK!" said the stupid record label exec. Guns and Roses is poised for a comeback and until they find the right combination of prescriptions to correct Axl Rose's Axl Rose problem and finally DO comeback, no artist is capable of a comeback. Unless they've been away longer than GNR, of course. NOTE: I am not, nor have I ever been, a GNR fan. I know - that that's blasphemy coupled with non-blasphemy.

Lastly, as you might be able to tell by my little new-found snarkiness against record industry and music-related media, I've started reading The Lefsetz Letter (www.lefsetz.com). Bob Lefsetz, who appears to be some sort of a music industry insider blogs in e-mail form. I've gotten three from him so far. One that was terrific (weekly sales figures/commentary), one that dealt with The Mars Volta from a pretty similar standpoint to mine, and one absolutely fucking crazy and creepy e-mail about The Who (I think) - goddamn, that e-mail was freaky (and one reason why reading blogs sometimes sucks - overuse of crypticness).

But Bob Lefsetz is the ideal business man (if he in fact is one, which I don't doubt at all). He went into the business of music as a fan, never lost that feeling or reason as to why he went into the music biz, and has come out as an authority on the biz. The weekly sales/commentary e-mail was great - just to read that someone who's in the midst of the business hates the business as it has come to be: artists turning out crap albums just to sell a record for their company, album development over supposed artist development, and the overall acceptance of crap art to be used simply for making profits. This is smart shit - I recommend reading it if business ethics or music (or both) intrest you at all. This man is 50% businessman, 50% fan. I tend to disagree with what he has to say sometimes, but overall he knows his shit more than most people know their shit.

With that I leave you and ask you to always know your shit.

Shit knowingly,
- Christopher

KLCR....TV???? Hu-WHA???

2005-05-20T19:49:00.000-07:00

It's germinating in my brain right now, but I'm hoping to make a few episodes worth in the fall (TIME PERMITTING - it's capped for a reason). It'll give me a better venue for the interviews I'm suggested to be making happen in exhange for free concert tix. I know a few decent (emphasis on "few") good local and I.C. artists that I can interview/shoot live footage of in addition to the interviews I will sometimes be doing (first one will be Maryland's Oranges Band, who are opening for Ted Leo and Aloha - possible interviews footage of both, as well.) The show could be filled with music videos (more record labels I have to call, which is cool and fun) predominantly and could link up with KLCR by discussing top albums of the week and new releases.

This is turning into something very solid (and I just thought of it last night), hopefully I can get some studio time from Craig - my perennial doubter. PK will be able to help as the radio station is under his umbrella. And the really shitkicker of it all is that this is my true dream field of work - music-related TV. Because there's so little offered out there to give even a wider spectrum of music than American Idol and TRL a chance to thrive, let alone be seen. There's less than 1/2 an hour all day when you add up all of the live segments on late night tv.

I always thought there should be a late-night show dedicated to premiering multiple GOOD new bands. and if i can prototypically creat that with KLCR TV and take up the rest of the time with my geekily-music-knowledge-addled-brain to present videos, well then shit - i'll call that a show and sign my name to that.

KLCR TV - LOOK FOR IT JERKS!

F.S.U.,
- Chadams

awesome mix tape # (whatever) and NOT the Grease Mega-Mix

2005-05-16T22:22:00.000-07:00

Raise your hand - who got last weekend's three-part crazy, nasty (in that sexy way that Janet Jackson talks of), awe-striking mix CD. Emily? Yep. Spence? You too. Lisa? Don't tell 'em you got four. Riki? Not so fast.

Second question - who's too lazy not to have me put the playlists on my blog for all to see and be jealous of your awesome mix-owning self/selves? Emily? No. Spence? No. Lisa? PERHAPS.

sigh...

DISC ONE:
Hot Hot Heat - Goodnight, Goodnight
Phoenix - Run Run Run
Morrissey - Irish Blood, English Heart (Live)
Brendan Benson - Spit It Out
Ben Folds - Bastard
Creeper Lagoon - Big Money Struggle
Saul Williams - List of Demands (Reparations)
Elefant - Misfit
Gorillaz - Feel Good Inc. (featuring De La Soul) (<- izzat that new iTunes song? yup.)
Queens of the Stone Age - Medication
Interpol - Next Exit
Fantomas - Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (from a cover album of loosely-horror movie-themed pieces)
Jaga Jazzist - Going Down
Iron & Wine - Jezebel
Head Automatica - Beatding Heart Baby
Guided By Voices - Glad Girls
The Frames - Happy
Low - Everybody's Song
Regina Spektor - Somedays
The Dears - Lost In The Plot
Candy Butchers - Hunker Down

DISC TWO:
Kings of Leon - The Bucket
The Kills - The Good Ones
New Order - Crystal
Kasabian - Club Foot
Broken Social Scene - Almost Crimes
The Peels - Only Son
Q-Tip (aka Kamaal The Abstract) - Barely In Love (The amazing songs I have from this rare sampler were NEVER RELEASED - that's the worst shame ever on this planet...one of the worst shames)
Ted Leo & The Pharmacists - Me & Mia
Phoenix - Everything Is Everything
LCD Soundsystem - Daft Punk Is Playing At My House
Bloc Party - Like Eating Glass
William Shatner (with Ben Folds and Joe Jackson) - Common People
Morrissey - Roy's Keen
Low - When I Go Deaf
Decibully - Temptation
My Chemical Romance - Helena
Queens of the Stone Age - Little Sister
k-os - B-Boy Stance
Head Automatica - At The Speed of A Yellow Bullet
Northern State - Summer Never Ends (featuring Har Mar Superstar)
Brendan Benson - Cold Hands (Warm Heart)

DISC THREE:
Father Guido Sarducci - Intro(from Handsome Boy Modeling School's newest CD, "White People")
Handsome Boy Modeling School -The World's Gone Bad (featuring Barrington Levy, Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand and Del The Funkee Homosapien)
Bloc Party - Helicopter
Kings of Leon - King of the Rodeo
Aloha - Water Your Hands
The Exit - Let's Go To Haiti
Mos Def -Ghetto Rock
We Ragazzi - Forever Surrender 2 U
Jonny Polonsky - Even The Oxen
Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals - Temporary Remedy (Live)
Queens of the Stone Age - Everybody Know's That You're Insane
John Frusciante - Water
Pitty Sing - Radio
The Decemberists - 16 Military Wives
Regina Spektor - Us
A.C. Newman - On The Table
Father Guido Sarducci - Outro

holy crap - that was long. that's what's on there. i could talk a blue streak about each song, and will if prompted to. I will say that I was suprised that so much Queens of the Stone Age's new album made it onto the discs. I guess I did like it after all. Thus proving that I am a one-sided music connaisseur of the worst degree. I give albums one listen at most, unless something hits me incredibly. Like Bloc Party and Regina Spektor's have just jumped out at me (Aloha's album, too). I look for immediate gratification that I can keep coming back to over and over again. The good thing about that is that I always parse it out, never to overload on what I find terrific. But then again, how many people feel guilty about not actively searching out some sort of goodness in every album that comes their way? I guess liking things and not liking things isn't a bad trait - I'll stand by that one.

Here's the other thing I give myself crap about - lyrics. I have yet to connect with lyrics to a great extent. I'm WAY more focused on the music itself, the compostion of the tune. I think that's because I've been a musician for most of my life. I don't love music any less - I anticipate receiving the highest highs any music listener receives... even more most times. The lyrics I like are always either witty or snarkily cerebral. Or screamed. I fear that I can't connect with music on levels most people do, the heart-felt, the lovelorn, the woe-is-me speaker - the opposite end of the spectrum. I always read more about those lyrics than the other kind. Or perhaps I just pick those out and read into the articles as being problematic according to the raves of emotionally-soaring lyrics.

Eh..digression. The blog thrives and beats its empty, lyricless heart to the beat of it. OH SHIT - I can't relate to 'em for shit, but BOY can I write 'em! You fuckin' bet I can.

Lots of Love/F.S.U.,
- Chadams

KLCR takes a holiday before it goes back to work...not that it ever worked before...

2005-05-15T17:28:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

KLCR will be internet streamed this fall and will include a fuller roster of DJs to use that streaming i-net time. I'm really psyched and some of the radio promo. co.s I've talked to are happy to see us back up and operational. My dad is going to do a jazz-themed show and the Loras branches of punk congress and hip-hop congress will have their own show. There are a few other things in the pipeline (other faculty members doing shows and a SLIGHT possibility of a stronger radio signal).

Come on back in the fall and let's see what kinda shit will get stirred up! In the meantime, the same ol' rants and reviews will be here. I'll put some up tonight, possibly.

F.S.U.,
- Chadams

KLCR Playlist (5-4-05)

2005-05-04T11:34:00.000-07:00

Got the new Weezer CD today. Kind of excited - also expecting the worst. Nine Inch Nails came in last week and was okay. The really good songs on their are all swear tracks, so I'll never play them over the air, which is okay because they weren't amazing - only pretty good. Also got Troubled Hubble's new disc yesterday - best disc of their's yet. Looking forward to exposing Loras to those bastards. I'm going to listen to Team Sleep's new one again because it's got an INCREDIBLE cast of players: The Deftones' Chino Moreno, Mary Timony, Hella's Zach Hill, Pinback's Rob Crow... how insanely awesome is that? The album's (obviously) really chill and warped with grandiose metal moments. It'll take a few times to get your mind around it. Rather listen to it than NIN, though. Still in love with the newest New Order record...that one's DAMN good.

Here 'tis:
The Decemberists - 16 Military Wives -- Picaresque (Kill Rock Stars) <- (played it off of newest CMJ New Music Monthly disc)
Mary Timony - Hard Times Are Hard! -- Ex Hex (Lookout! Records)
New Order - Dracula's Castle -- Waiting for the Sirens' Call (WB)
...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead - Back in New York City - Worlds Apart [Single] (Interscope)
Nine Inch Nails - The Line Begins To Blur -- With Teeth (Interscope)
Finks - Invisible Cyclops & Ego -- More Songs About Robots And Black Things (Permaculture)
Team Sleep - Blvd. Nights -- Team Sleep (Maverick)
The Blue Van - Revelation of Love -- The Art of Rolling (TVT) <- (from CMJ NMM)
All Hours - Box Office Stud -- In Flagrante Delieto (Hybrid Recordings) <- (also fromCMJ NMM)
Thunderbirds Are Now! - (Aquatic Cupid's) Harpoons of Love -- JustAMustache (frenchkiss)

That's it. Deal with it.

KLCR Playlist (4-27-05)

2005-04-27T11:02:00.000-07:00

You know the drill!

Handsome Boy Modeling School - Sunshine (featuring Sean Lennon, Money Mark, Father Guido Sarducci, Josh Hayden of Spain and Paula Frazer of Tarnation) -- So... How's Your Girl? (Tommy Boy Records)
Spymob - 2040 -- Sitting Around Keeping Score (Star Trak/Ruthless Records/Sony)
Weird War - Girls Like That -- Illuminated By The Light (Drag City)
The Psychic Paramount - para5 -- Gamelan Into The Mink Supernatural (No Quarter)
A.C. Newman - On the Table -- Music from the O.C.: Mix 4 (WB) <- also available on his record "Slow Wonder"!
Low - Everybody's Song -- The Great Destroyer (Sub Pop)
Aloha - Water Your Hands -- Here Comes Everybody (Polyvinyl)
Earl Greyhound - Welcome Back Father -- Earl Greyhound EP (Some Records)
The Dears - Lost in the Plot -- No Cities Left (spinART records)
Pixies - Monkey Gone To Heaven -- Doolittle (4AD)
Regina Spektor - Us -- Soviet Kitsch (Sire)
New Order - Bizarre Love Triangle -- 20 Years of New Order (Reprise)
New Order - Guilt is a Useless Emotion -- Waiting for the Sirens' Call (WB) <- Look! A Twin Spin!
The Hold Steady - Stevie Nix -- Separation Sunday (frenchkiss records)
Carina Round - Into My Blood -- the Disconnection (Interscope)
Pinback - AFK - Summer in Abaddon (Touch and Go Records)
Bloc Party - Like Eating Glass -- Silent Alarm (Vice/Dim Mak)

The New Order album is really great and the Regina Spektor album is also incredible, terrific - both great listens. Ben Folds' Songs for Silverman is okay - better than his really bad first solo album. Goddammit...I have to review on here pretty soon. Getting behind on that.

KLCR Playlist 4-22-05

2005-04-22T11:30:00.000-07:00

Reviewed and threw in quite a few semi-new CDs into rotation today, you'll find most of them below.

Artist - Song Title -- Album (Label)

K-Os - B-Boy Stance -- Joyful Rebellion (Astralwerks)
Jet By Day - Lost in Translation -- Cascadia (Kindercore)
French Toast - Pattern -- In A Cave (Dischord)
William Elliot Whitmore - The Day The End Finally Came -- Ashes To Dust (Southern)
Innaway - "The Strings of North Egg" Remix - Rise [Single] (Some Records)
Family Guy - TV Medley -- Live in Vegas (Geffen)
Evening - Being Is Automatic -- Other Victorians (Lookout! Records)
Des Ark - Jesus Loves You (But Yr Still Comin' Home With Me Tonight) -- Loose Lips Sink Ships (Bifocal Media)
Fantomas - 4/22/05 Friday -- Suspended Animation (Ipecac)
Aloha - Water Your Hands -- Here Comes Everyone (Polyvinyl)
Coachwhips - Human Skin -- Peanut Butter & Jelly Live at The Ginger Minge (Narnack)
Hot Hot Heat - Goodnight, Goodnight -- Elevator (Sire)
The Exit - Let's Go To Haiti -- Home For An Island (Some Records)
Earl Greyhound - Welcome Back Father -- EP (Some Records)
Ben Folds - You To Thank -- Songs For Silverman (Epic)

DAMN that's a lot of stuff from Some Records! But they're a good label and their catalog keeps getting better every year. I might post some reviews this weekend - I'm a bit behind in what I wanted to post. All for now - have a good weekend. Hopefully it's not shitty outside where you are, like it is here.

KLCR Playlist (4-20-05)

2005-04-20T11:15:00.000-07:00

This is the worst day of the year basically because everyone takes note of it being Hitler's birthday, Columbine's anniversary and loosely-affiliated-with-marijuana day. They take note SIMULTANEOUSLY. Who cares? Idiots....

Here's what I played for you idiots today.

Bloc Party - Tulips -- Tulips [Single] (Dim Mak)
Citizen Cope - Pablo Picasso/My Way Home -- The Clarence Greenwood Recordings (RCA)
Nine Inch Nails - The Hand That Feeds -- The Hand That Feeds [Single] (Interscope)
Nic Armstrong & The Thieves - I Can't Stand It -- The Greatest White Liar (New West)
Early Man - The Undertaker is Calling You -- Fuck You If You're Talking To Me! (Monitor)
The Bad Plus - We Are The Champions -- Blunt Object: Live in Tokyo (Sony/BMG)
Beck - Bad Cartridge (E-Pro Remix) -- Hell Yes EP (Interscope)
Des Ark - Yes Sir, Yes Way -- Loose Lips, Sink Ships (bifocal media)
Aloha - All The Wars -- Here Comes Everyone (Polyvinyl)
Coldplay - Speed of Sound -- Speed of Sound [Single] (Capitol)

Coldplay single's not very good. Nine Inch Nails still doesn't kick my ass at all. But Des Ark and Aloha I've been listening to a lot this week and last week. More will be written later, I'M SURE OF IT.

The perfect mix tape? Could it be?

2005-04-18T20:16:00.000-07:00

Doesn't exist - EXCEPT IN THIS TIME AND SPACE RIGHT FREAKING NOW.

I made a two-parter for Emily cuz I saw her last weekend and it was one of the BEST I ever made.

I'm currently tweaking it and making it ever-so slightly better and then will share this one with EVERYONE. Yes, even Megan will get a copy of it.

But like I said, the combination of music I've bought since I moved from Iowa City and the stuff on my computer from KRUI and KLCR has inched my scope of artists open just a slight bit further. I get to listen to more than just hear about more and decide (blindly sometimes) what to purchase. The climate for modern rock is even better than it was last summer with Franz Ferdinand, Modest Mouse, The Killers, et. al. There are incredible pop songs better than "Somebody Told Me" and "Float On" - Hot Hot Heat's "Goodnight, Goodnight" and Gorillaz's "Feel Good Inc." (both of which I can't seem to stop talking about). But on the other side of it, Weezer, Nine Inch Nails and Audioslave are commandeering radio station everywhere with AWFUL, AWFUL singles. I should take Weezer's single out of rotation, I should, I really, really should. NIN I might, also.... Audioslave's didn't even cross my mind as a potential add to KLCR.

This is very similar to my first post, I apologize for that. But to have this summer's first songs be so incredible (for the most part) means that last summer was not a fluke and a genre's resurgence into the forefront is happening, with care taken by the bands to make good music and not to buy into previous decades' stale old trappings. Also, the infusion of hip-hop, electronic music and other hip genres into the playlists (moreso than into the music itself) is a good sign that rap-rock won't be coming back anytime soon.

Speaking of Limp Bizkit is coming out with a new record - without company promotion as per Fred Durst's wishes. Wait, that's how his records sell. Oh well, fuck him and his FINALLY downward sprialing career! (Well, moreso than it was before) Or wait - was that sex video part of his promotion efforts. Shit...he's one step ahead of me - UH-GAIN! Damn you, Durst!

Totally JACKED! from Paul Rust's blog

2005-04-15T08:42:00.000-07:00

1. Of all the bands/artists in your cd/record collection, which one do you own the most albums by?
Ben Harper, John Frusciante, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Supergrass and R.E.M.
(All the ones I could think of that I have more than five records of)

2. What was the last song you listened to?
Fantomas - "04/27/05 Wednesday" (from the album Suspended Animation) All 72 glorious seconds of it.

3. What's in your CD player right now?
Fantomas' "Suspended Animation" is in my CD player at KLCR Studios, and in my car is Citzen Cope's "The Clarence Greenwood Recordings" and Phoenix's "Live! Thirty Days Ago"

4. What song would you say sums you up?
"The Christopher Adams song" should do the trick in summing me up, if it every get's written. And if it does, I would like for David Crosby to write it. Or Jackson Browne. Either of those two, could totally lay down a mellow acoustic groove and write about how different it is to go to the store and buy a soda these days. NOT LIKE IT WAS IN THE 60s, MAN!

5. What's your favorite local band?
The Tanks. Grainbelt is more local to my locale and are also great. (both are easily locate-able on myspace.com)

6. What was the last show you attended? Prom Night Tornado/Navies/A Day In Black in White/The Tanks @ The Hall Mall. With special guest Spider Monkey Lady. I didn't so much attend as played it. Before that show, I saw Tanks & Brian Jones @ The Busted Lift.

7. What was the greatest show you've ever been to?
Shit. This is becoming a top 5 list right....now:
1. Red Hot Chili Peppers - The Mark (Moline, IL)
2. Ben Harper - Oscar Mayer Theater (Madison, WI)
3. The Mars Volta - The Mark (Moline, IL - opening for A Perfect Circle)
4. Ted Leo & the Pharmacists (with Just a Fire) - Gabe's Oasis (Iowa City, IA)
5. Youngblood Brass Band - any time they've come to Gabe's
Honorable Mention (or 6.) Saul Williams, Nikka Costa & Blackalicious (Sno-Core Tour '02)

8. What's the shittiest band you've ever seen in concert?
A Perfect Circle was pretty wretched, but I did go pretty much just to see The Mars Volta. I've seen very few bad shows in my day. OH WAIT! I did work a few horrible ones - NAMELY O.A.R. in IOWA CITY. Fuck that band and all they may emptily stand for. What a fucking joke the existence of that band is. I also worked a country show in Dubuque (Emerson Drive), just about as bad as O.A.R. E. Drive was one of the prettiest bunch of men I've ever seen - it was sick.

9. What band do you love musically but hate the members of?
God that sounds like a stupid Alternative Press/Warped Tour question. "Look at me! I once was just, like, talking to the members of (insert disposable "punk" band here) and they TOTALLY blew me off for some skinny chick with no tattoos! Hmph!"

10. What is the most musically involved you have ever been?
I don't think I can narrow down over ten years of playing instruments into one moment for an answer.

11. What show are you looking forward to?
Gavin DeGraw in Dubuque, The Books, Built to Spill, Prefuse 73 and Battles are ALL coming to Grinnell, and Nikka Costa in Madison.

12. What is your favorite band shirt?
I used to like my Schatzi t-shirt - cassette tape with crossbones underneath. I don't know, though...

13. What musician would you like to hang out with for a day?
Any classic living icon - Iggy, Tom Waits - if it were both I would hope that the conversation would be more lively than that seen on "Coffee and Cigarettes". As far as contemporary people go: Brendan Benson or Blonde Redhead.

14. What musician would you like to hump for a day?
Whoever sings that sexy jingle "pick up the phone" that you see on all the 1-900 number commercials.

15. Metal question-Jeans and Leather vs. Cracker Jack clothes?
I think Spider Monkey Lady would whole-heartedly stand up for Jeans and Leather. R.A.W.! What's Cracker Jack clothes? Is that like a sailor suit or something?

16. Sabbath or solo Ozzy?
Sabbath, I guess.

17. Commodores or solo Lionel Ritchie?
Nicole Ritchie...and I listening to the Commodores. That answers that question.

18. Blackjack or solo Michael Bolton?
I've never heard Blackjack, but knowing that that's Michael Bolton's former band, I'd have to say "No thank you, mister!"

19. Doesn't Primus suck?
Yeah, they pretty much do. You mean you had to ask?

20. Name 3 flawless albums:
Ben Harper - The Will to Live
Brendan Benson - One Mississippi
Blonde Redhead - Certain Melody of Damaged Lemons

21. Did you know that filling out this survey makes you a music geek?
NO FUCKING SHIT.

22. What was the greatest decade for music?
The late 70s and early 80s birth of art-student rock and punk rock.

23. How many music-related videos/dvds do you own?
I'm actually counting right now, give me a second...
Not counting those crappy DVDs they throw in with CDs, I have I THINK eleven. I thought I had more but I'll check when I get home. (I have TWENTY-FOUR music DVDs - concerts, videos, documentaries. P.S. - DIG! is actually a fucking awful documentary. Don't watch it or buy it. Who gives a shit about The Dandy Warhols and The Brian Jonestown Massacre? NO ONE - that's who. So they do drugs, have destructive personalities and have crushingly huge egos? That's documentary-worthy? Give me a fucking break... - ed. (me))

24. Do you like Journey?
I do. "Who's crying now?"

25. Don't try to pretend you don't!
Uh....I didn't.

26. What is your favorite movie soundtrack?
I don't like soundtracks all that much - they're just glorified mix tapes.

27. What was your last musical "phase" before you wisened up?
I notoriously was a jam-band fan in high school and SADLY was into Warped Tour punk in h.s. and a little bit into college. I blame UW-Platteville's horrible radio station.

28. What's the crappiest CD/record/etc you've ever bought?
This is painful to admit...one of Everclear's later albums.

29. Do you prefer vinyl or CD's?
CDs. My stereo and record player don't like to work together.

So that's it, I guess. That was fun. Let's do it again sometime.

KLCR Playlist (4-13-05)

2005-04-13T11:16:00.000-07:00

I spent a few hours yesterday, like I said, cleaning the radio station of its shitty library. I've yet to touch the metal section, but that'd be too obvious if it disappeared overnight. I finally took it upon myself to add ALL of the music I had reviewed these past few months. That effectively makes the current music director null and void - which was the way he liked to run things around here. Fuck that noise - thanks for making the radio station a boys club instead of a utility for the school and community!

Artist - Track Title -- Album (Record Label)

Bloc Party - Helicopter -- Silent Alarm (Vice/Dim Mak)
The Dead 60s - You're Not The Law [Single] (Deltasonic)
Doves - Black and White Town -- Some Cities(Capitol)
Phoenix - Everything is Everything -- Live! Thirty Days Ago (Astralwerks)
Fischerspooner - Never Win -- Odyssey (Capitol)
Morrissey - You Know I Couldn't Last -- Live at Earl's Court (Attack/Sanctuary)
Brendan Benson - Spit It Out -- Alternative to Love(V2)
Decibully - I'm Gonna Tell You -- Sing Out America! (Polyvinyl)
Garbage - Bad Boyfriend -- Bleed Like Me (Geffen)
Kings of Leon - Slow Night, So Long -- Aha Shake Heartbreak (RCA)
Kasabian - Clubfoot -- Kasabian (RCA)
Gorillaz - Feel Good Inc. [Single] (Virgin)

The Garbage album is just that...gar-bahge! It got some hype as being "visceral and hard-hitting". After a few listens I'm sure I'll like something about it. However, nothing yet... Kind of angry that Dave Grohl's guest appearance on "Bad Boyfriend" is SO marginalized. It sounds like produce/drummer Butch Vig; Butch should've just played the track himself...nothing would've sounded different.

More albums reviewed...okay just three.

2005-04-12T10:23:00.000-07:00

I'm cleaning out KLCR's in-studio library and moving most of the SHIT (read: pop-punk and emo, bloated major-label artists like Everclear and Incubus, anything else not entering my mighty scope of holy judgement) into the tiny music library room, which already consists of things no one in their right mind would ever throw in a CD player ever again.

Morrissey's live album was good but I'm not all about it. Some songs you'd really have to be a goth in a former life to love. But others (his newer material, I think, is REALLY underrated) really hold up.

SIDEBAR: If the less-reknowned material (latter-day albums, most often) is what you first listen to and use as your gateway into liking an artist, is that a bad thing? Not if you let a negative stigma affect you to the point that you could subsceptibly end up not liking an artist. (Truly though, that's near impossible.) Will you always love the first albums you listen to by the artist? Is it then harder to enjoy earlier material? For me, the answer often is yes.

Anyfucks, Morrissey's live album has possible the worst stage banter. Not that that would make or break the album - but we're talking about the most messianically-thought of artists in music for the past two decades plus. His Jesus/Elvis poses must be pretty good on the DVD to make up for the weak comments.

FISCHERSPOONER - Odyssey
I - for some reason - the guy who exists in a musical realm of guitars and drums and microphones liked Fischerspooner. I was intrigued, as happens with some bands I know little of, by the overt emphasis on live show, video and Fischerspooner's existence as a defined and mysterious entity. They appealled to the kid in me who loved that crazy Phillip Glass-style vocal pieces that didn't sound like music that had been created before (Because at age 3, I had been "there and back" in terms of my musical tastes) - Fischerspooner LOOKED how that music sounded, which is that they looked like debaucherous Victorian art-show cool-whores from the 27th century.

So, the drum machines and synths of their debut, #1, didn't hold up to the prospect of the video and single "Emerge" - widely thought of as the definitive "electroclash" song. Odyssey sounds, in part, more real. More guitar-sounding synths emerge (N.P.I.) and lively drum-machines are brought up in the mix, but the frankenstein monster that I feel dance music is, hasn't been reanimated all the way. More great songs than the very few that existed on #1.

The Boredoms cover at the end of the album harkens back to the first album's sound (which is kind of influenced by that same Phillip Glass music). But with the ice surrounding the music slowly condensating away, the vocals take a weird turn - not as bold as before, but human-sounding. Fischerspooner as definitive electroclash were all about vocal effects and manipulation. Does leaving those tricks behind make Fischerspooner better for leaving the crashed dirigible of that genre behind? Not if they think that solely absolves them of it.

Fischerspooner's upcoming stage show/tour for Odyssey will supposedly look more like their a band. Here's to hoping they don't totally get rid of the dancers, Casey Spooner's odd yet engaging stage presence, crazy-roadie-with-moustache guy, and tons of dessert toppings.

Fuck...that was thorough. I guess the next ones will be quick, somewhat...

FANTOMAS - SUSPENDED ANIMATION.
It would definitely keep me from buying it if I heard this album described as "Looney Tunes death metal.'' That's what it is, but it's a better sound than that description would lead you to believe. Fantomas' death metal isn't thoroughly real - it has always been cartoonish in it's own right; Healthy portions of cut-and-paste/drum-and-bass/jungle electronic music from the past 10 years, hardcore punk and hardcore metal and pure primal vocal tourette's-ish stream-of-subconsciousness comprise their sound.

How Fantomas approach more cartoony sounds and affectations is with the help of the cut and pasted soundbytes from cartoons and influence of quadruple-timed cartoon soundtracks from back in the day - you know, the soundtracks that didn't have a steady tempo, but rather were the soundtrack specifically of the motion, speed, explosion, what-have-you of the characters throughout the cartoon.

The impressive part about the Mike Patton-led group is how much they let themselves be influenced. Two albums ago it was movie soundtracks - Ennio Morricone, Hitchcock, The Godfather, horror movies - all re-interpreted to fit the aforementioned amalgam of Fantomas' sound. Simply subtract the horror movies and add cartoons and advance Fantomas' sound and what they've been listening to by five years and you have Suspended Animation.

LOUIS XIV - The Best Secrets are.....I don't fucking care to finish the album title of:
AN ALBUM THAT STILL SUCKS AND IS SEXUALLY PREDATORY AND FUCKING CREEPY.

Thank you, godnight!

Brief add-on to yesterday's post

2005-04-07T08:45:00.000-07:00

Did I mention how fucking good the new Gorillaz track is? The video is damn sweet, too. I think everyone forgets just how good and unique De La Soul is (I'm sure even De La Soul forgets this from time to time).

I didn't get a whole lot of reviewing done last night, but I did finish listening to the Hot Hot Heat album and started to listen to The Bad Plus' live album and Morrissey's live album. All were very good. Hot Hot Heat's "Elevator" has songs that are very close to being as good as "Goodnight, Goodnight" which is terrific. Their previous album "Make-Up the Breakdown" got a lot of press but "Elevator" solidly solidifies (??) their sound and themselves as one of two of the best bands associated with new-new wave. (The other being Bloc Party.)

The Bad Plus' "Blunt Object: Live in Tokyo" is...well...The Bad Plus live in Tokyo. They sound slightly more adventurous, given the live on stage recording situation. Nothing too shocking outside of their normal interpretation of jazz as inspired and influenced by modern-day electronic artists (easily shown through their cover of Aphex Twin's "Flim" - also found on their debut "These Are The Vistas").

Morrissey's "Live at Earl Court" is no more and no less what the title suggests. That's all you need to know in order to enjoy it. The range of material is the best thing about the album - bookended by Smiths tunes with a run-through one of the most impessively solid bodies of work in the past 25 years. Hell, I'm not even a huge fan to being with, either.

KLCR Playlist (4-6-05)

2005-04-06T11:47:00.000-07:00

All new stuff not yet in rotation (like always).
Artist - Track Title -- Album (Record Label)

The Zutons - Pressure Point -- Who Killed... The Zutons? (Epic)
The Thrills - Saturday Night -- Let's Bottle Bohemia (Virgin)
Weezer - Beverley Hills [Single] (Geffen)
Hot Hot Heat - Goodnight, Goodnight -- Elevator (Sire)
Pitty Sing - Radio [Clean version] -- Demons, You Are The Stars In Cars 'Til I Die (Or Music)
Decibully - Temptation -- Sing Out America! (Polyvinyl)
The Kills - Good Ones -- No Wow (Rough Trade)
Ben Folds - Bitches Ain't Shit [Clean Version/Single] (Epic)
The Like - Bridge To Nowhere -- Like It Or Not. (Geffen)
Matt Pond PA - Champagne Supernova -- Music from the O.C. Mix 4 (Warner Bros.)
Morrissey - The More You Ignore Me, The Closer I Get (Live) -- Live At Earl's Court (Attack/Sanctuary)
Nine Inch Nails - The Hand That Feeds [Single] (Interscope)
Gorillaz (featuring De La Soul) - Feel Good Inc. [Single] (Virgin)
Beck - Earthquake Weather -- Guero (Interscope)
Ted Leo & The Pharmacists - Me and Mia -- Shake The Sheets (Lookout!)

Tons of major label stuff? Yes, but tons of extremely new music? Yes - I can deal with that.

I'm talkin' 'bout what this weeks hot singles AREN'T!

2005-04-03T22:09:00.000-07:00

Hey folks -

sometimes I wish I didn't have to meddle in what's going to be the worst albums of the summer, but then again I am offered a chance to listen to and play slightly less obscure music. I really hated how KRUI only got some of the major label alternative/indie/college radio albums as opposed to ALL - which I'm thankful KLCR provides me with. Every. Last. IMPORTANT. New release.

But with this new greatness, what do I get to listen to? Audioslave. Weezer. Nine Inch Nails - and their new awful singles! I still hold hope for NIN and a bit for Weezer, but Audioslave should tour with Moby and intonate horrible warbling in arenas near you. All this and NO new Hot Hot Heat - which is without a doubt the best single of the year so far. "Goodnight, Goodnight" indeed!

Digression of the week:
Fuck Sin City. Frank Miller... poor guy done let one of the greatest comic series' (that's right, let's not snob it up and call it a "graphic novel" - I can take the negative stigma of reading comic books!) But that's what you get when Robert Rodriguez comes anywhere near your work.

One of the first things I ever read as a film major (long, long time ago) was a pro-guerilla filmmaking manifesto by Mr. Rodriguez. Obviously he was writing fiction when he wrote this, cuz he knows not of which he speaks. Totally dehumanized and spine-defused storyline and ham-fisted acting combined with shit effects making the whole thing look like a bad video game. I'm not bashing the noir-look of the film because that's all that was emphasized and kept intact from the comics.

Yeah, so I fuckin' hated it - stay 10 paces away, a'right? Good.

Man - I'm such a blog-movie-comic-music-nerd now, it's sad. Read it and love it.

Post won

2005-03-31T22:39:00.000-08:00

Whole pile of CDs for KLCR Radio lying in front of me.

Do we get indepth with the analysis right now? FUCK NO!!

(Post gets edited later, okay? So settle down and strap up, chowder...)

All I do right now is tell you about The Like - 3 California girls taking sweet pop music that comes from bands of their ilk (Eisley, Rilo Kiley) and making it more user-friendly and savory (unlike Eisley). Reviewed "like it or not.", 3 song sampler from Geffen, bridge to nowhere -- too late -- what i say and what I mean. Like I said, make syou want more instead of making you want to leave it in the CD library for someone else to happen upon.

Beck's Guero is overrated thus far - very much "Odelay!" redux plus the depresso-schtick. Not boding well. (EDITED on 4-07-05) Listened to the whole thing - still bad. The album just sounds so uninspired considering the world is used to Beck albums that are overly cohesive. The album flows and holds up as a singular piece of work, but like I said: unispired, half-hearted.

Pitty Sing - Demons, you are the stars in cars 'til I die
Thank god - Mansun has returned! The oft-overlooked mid-90s revival of the 80s Brit-new wave that's different from the 80s revival we're experiencing right now. Erasure, XTC, and Depeche Mode play a more vital role in Pitty Sing's and Mansun's DNA (I swear - same band ten years apart, and that'sa good thing). "Radio" - recently on Subterranean (MTV2), take note.

PURCHASED MUSIC:

Brendan Benson - Alternative to Love (V2)
Aptly described everywhere as a cross between "One Mississippi" (one of my all-time faves as all know) and "Lapalco" - caffeine and qualuudes. One of the best one-two song combos on record - "Spit it Out" and "Cold hands Warm Heart" (Benson's "Mississippi" yields a THREE-movement/song rapid-fire piece clocking in at no more than 7 minutes total). The rest of the mid-tempo tunes reveal themselves slowly, the down-tempo tracks (not found on Lapalco as much as they are here) don't pop.

Queens of the Stone Age - Lullabies to Paralyze (interscope)
Josh Homme's hair is getting a lot of attention these days... and dammit this album should've come out either before or after Rated R. And it could've used some screaming on "Medication" or something resembling "Six Shooter" from Songs for the Deaf. (Billy Gibbons does not a goateed bassist replace) Quaaludes and no caffeine.

Bloc Party - Silent Alarm (Vice)
Almost purchased it in London - it's that good. If I were 13 now, I would've been inspired to start drumming by this record - and to be a British black hip-magnate with short dreads.

Mando Diao - Hurricane Bar (Mute)
Listened to too much Strokes to make me want to listen to either artists' albums for a while. Too long, too little like their amazing debut "Bring 'Em In". Sing don't scream, boys - it doesn't look that good anymore, nor does it look good for 40 minutes straight. Cut the album by two-thirds and it could've been a decent follow-up.

How d'you like me now? Pretty good? Goin' on, feelin' strong?

Enjoy it and thanks!
- Chadams