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(06/12/03 1:07am)
This New Wave of the New Wave thing, interesting in terms of nostalgia, is basically a genre of subtleties. Like picking from a hat, it's a general rule of thumb that the discovered band will be arbitrary and that there is another one waiting, buried in a shallow grave. It is a group of bands (most based in New York) whose sound recalls the late '70s and early '80s era of CBGBs and amphetamine-driven New Wave, No Wave and Post-Punk bands like the Talking Heads, Television, Wire and Gang of Four. \nThe original was an excitingly new aggregate of Captain Beefheart and the Velvet Underground. The sound of old combined Beefheart's steady, staccato beats and anything goes avant-gardism with VU's moody primitivism and Lou Reed's monotonality. The tenets of dance (not really an antithesis to disco, but a hipper, less trivial version of it) were also prevalent in the heyday of New Wave.\nThese new bands are all direct descendants of this day gone by. What they have in common is good and deep taste in music and the perpetual beat. When involved with rebop and slight undulation, most of these bands can become contenders. Too often though, they become harassing rather than memorable.\nThe Strokes - Is This It? (RCA, 2001)
(06/12/03 12:43am)
Xiu Xiu is a decisively weird, little band from San Jose, Calif. Playing its records for company is like a litmus test for what kind of person is at hand. Responses usually come in the opposed spheres of "what the hell" awe and "I don't get it" disgust. \nXiu Xiu's equally peculiar frontman Jamie Stewart wrote via an email interview, "I never understood why anyone would bother consciously setting out to repeat someone else's feelings and artistic implosions. All of the records that I have loved have been by people who did something new. So while sonically Xiu Xiu might not sound like them (although some we surely do) we very very much want to imitate the spirit (I am not sure of how else to say it) of people who do and have done new things."\nWhat Stewart and his band are doing is something quite different indeed. At once, Xiu Xiu's music is giving personality to the prefab nature of techno and fearlessly updating the inert sounds of folk music. Experimenting with tape loops and programmed beats is one thing, but as the band has progressed and gained a grounding in strong song compositions and uncomfortably personal lyrics it has launched to the forefront of the West Coast art-rock movement. A place it shares with labelmates and sometimes collaborators, the Shaggs-inspired, Deerhoof.\nXiu Xiu takes its name from Joan Chen's 1998 film "Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl." The film is the story of a young Chinese girl who is taken from her home as part of a government program, overworked, lied to, raped and eventually kills herself; a totally dismal affair. \nStewart explained the connection: "That movie is like what the songs we were trying to do insofar as it has no resolution and is totally unsymbolic insofar as it is a direct narrative of events. It is the most depressing movie I have ever seen. It fit in a lot with things going on in that it offers no explanation of how awful life can be or how touching. It just is."\nIn 2000, with friends and former band members from the San Jose vicinity, Stewart, Cory McCullough, Yvonne Chen and Lauren Andrews began to form the germ of the idea. Their debut record, Knife Play, was released in 2002 on the Olympia-based 5 Rue Christine label. It was a bewildering and scattered record, with influences from gamelan percussion (a Javanese style of music centered around gongs), Stewart's goth-like vocals and some straightforward, akimbo post-punk. Knife Play was a wellspring of fascinating moments, but failed in being a fully realized work.\nAfter the idea-heavy, more computerized EP Chapel of the Chimes (also released in 2002); Xiu Xiu came out with A Promise this February, an album of unparalleled originality. Pulling together the disparity of its condition, A Promise is unabashedly sad and modernly poetic. Stewart often refers to specific people, friends and relatives of his, in the songs, making the album feel like an aural diorama of a Hubert Selby novel.\n"A lot of REALLY bad things for some reason happened and continue to myself and members of Xiu Xiu and people over a short period of time and it is a way to stare at them and document them and man I do not know why," Stewart writes of his subject matter. "Life is too much sometimes that there is not a lot else to do. It is not to make people feel uncomfortable, to like freak out the squares, it is just what is up right now."\nIndicative of what A Promise holds in store is the cover art, a photo of a naked Vietnamese boy on a bed holding an upside down baby doll. "I was on vacation in Vietnam and the person on the cover kept pestering me to have sex with him for money, but I offered him the pose instead. He thought it was fine or at least said he did. The photo and whole thing felt so confusing and intense. It was beautiful and exploitive and scary and a little funny and depressing and sad and exciting. I have no idea whether it was right or wrong to do it." \nStewart, a preschool employee by day, is the son of record producer Michael Stewart, whose greatest claim to fame is from his production work on Billy Joel's Piano Man album. Jamie has confirmed that he learned from his father that music could never go too far. Consequently, Xiu Xiu has been praised or damned for its plethoric depictions of the sad and disturbed. Stewart often sounds insanely out of his head, like a drunk and drugged Ian Curtis dangling from his lariat in the kitchen.\nSecuring a comparison to the dead Joy Division singer is the last song on A Promise, a terror-inducing track called "Ian Curtis Wishlist." Over a calming and repetitive cello, Stewart literally kicks and screams a manifesto of love and disappointment. Just before turning into monstrous explosion of sound, he yelps, "'DO YA LUV ME, JAMIE STEWART?!'/Jane S. I am kidding/I'm just KIDDING!"\n"I was super, super, super drunk and super, super, super heart broken," Stewart writes. "I had fallen for the woman named in the song Jane S. and she had been the first person I had liked in four years and she very politely declined and I felt like such an ass for being so unrealistic and excited and for trying. It was a horrible combination of being lonely and embarrassed. I heroically and in keeping with the uber, uber angst party I was in the middle of wrote a poem about it on the bus, got wasted and recorded the vocals. YEAH!!!!!!!! Later on my best friend fucked Jane S. and then lied to me about it. That song never ends."\n"We are just trying to make music that is honest to us and sometimes it works and sometimes it sucks."\nWith a tour with Devendra Banhart this summer, a new limited edition, mini album, Fag Patrol, just out and an upcoming full-length in February 2004, Xiu Xiu is displaying remarkable imagination and prolificacy. Possibly, Jamie Stewart will be defining new parameters of happiness soon. Highly unlikely, though, as dourness seems to be a virtue in his world.
(06/05/03 5:48am)
Ok, so the story is the Apes travel down a river in search of the mystical two-headed butterfly and meet a range of interesting characters along the way. Admittedly, without the trusty press kit and program Frenchkiss sent the IDS, this storyline would have completely gone over my head. The best rock operas (like Prince Paul's Prince Among Thieves) match up great material with a comprehensive and fascinating plot, and even the ones with shaky plots (Tommy, the Kinks' Arthur) can often get by on great songs alone. The Apes' fail to coalesce the story of the mysterious butterfly or to offer up diversity with the music itself. Often compared to Black Sabbath with a church organ replacing a guitar, the Apes' fit the description well, though organist Amanda "Majestic Ape" Kleinman plays as if she only knows one riff. Listening to Sabbath records, it's always surprising to realize just how diverse and truly innovative a band it was. By comparison, the Apes fail to offer up the kind of catchy, powerful riffs heavy metal was founded on and Paul "Count 101" Weil's vocals can't cut through the murky music ala Ozzy. These problems combined with the Western Civ mythology amount to formulaic tripe.
(06/05/03 5:44am)
Nathan Amundson begins his second album with an unaccompanied repitition of the line, "There's an evil in this room." This quote solidifies his place in the camp of indie singer/songwriters made possible by Nick Drake. All of them, without fail, cannot conjure up the demons as effectively or write as interesting skeletal song structures as the legendary, dead Brit. Nate Amundson is no exception, but like the similar sounding Damien Jurado, Will Oldham or Elliott Smith he has talent, a lot of it. Like those early '70s singer/songwriters though, the new breed suffers from homogeneity. Where Amundson is able to surpass such contemporaries as Jurado is with an edgier front, darker chord changes and minor backing music. Rivulets feature several of his Minnesota-based friends, including label-head Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker of Low and the backing vocals by Jessica Baliff. Similar to the slowcore style of Low, the music is literally slow, but unlike the notoriously quiet Duluth trio, the Rivulets' albums fail to build tension. Without bass and drums propelling Amundson's own vocals and guitar, and a failure of diction, Debridement comes out evenly. Though the snippets of lyric that are initially recognizable sound captivating, the pure pleasantness of the music abandons the idea of\ncaptivation
(06/05/03 4:00am)
Nathan Amundson begins his second album with an unaccompanied repitition of the line, "There's an evil in this room." This quote solidifies his place in the camp of indie singer/songwriters made possible by Nick Drake. All of them, without fail, cannot conjure up the demons as effectively or write as interesting skeletal song structures as the legendary, dead Brit. Nate Amundson is no exception, but like the similar sounding Damien Jurado, Will Oldham or Elliott Smith he has talent, a lot of it. Like those early '70s singer/songwriters though, the new breed suffers from homogeneity. Where Amundson is able to surpass such contemporaries as Jurado is with an edgier front, darker chord changes and minor backing music. Rivulets feature several of his Minnesota-based friends, including label-head Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker of Low and the backing vocals by Jessica Baliff. Similar to the slowcore style of Low, the music is literally slow, but unlike the notoriously quiet Duluth trio, the Rivulets' albums fail to build tension. Without bass and drums propelling Amundson's own vocals and guitar, and a failure of diction, Debridement comes out evenly. Though the snippets of lyric that are initially recognizable sound captivating, the pure pleasantness of the music abandons the idea of\ncaptivation
(06/05/03 4:00am)
Ok, so the story is the Apes travel down a river in search of the mystical two-headed butterfly and meet a range of interesting characters along the way. Admittedly, without the trusty press kit and program Frenchkiss sent the IDS, this storyline would have completely gone over my head. The best rock operas (like Prince Paul's Prince Among Thieves) match up great material with a comprehensive and fascinating plot, and even the ones with shaky plots (Tommy, the Kinks' Arthur) can often get by on great songs alone. The Apes' fail to coalesce the story of the mysterious butterfly or to offer up diversity with the music itself. Often compared to Black Sabbath with a church organ replacing a guitar, the Apes' fit the description well, though organist Amanda "Majestic Ape" Kleinman plays as if she only knows one riff. Listening to Sabbath records, it's always surprising to realize just how diverse and truly innovative a band it was. By comparison, the Apes fail to offer up the kind of catchy, powerful riffs heavy metal was founded on and Paul "Count 101" Weil's vocals can't cut through the murky music ala Ozzy. These problems combined with the Western Civ mythology amount to formulaic tripe.
(05/30/03 4:00am)
The crowd was small: four random folks, four of my friends and members of the performing bands and their women. Searching for an explanation for the Midstates' frontman Paul Heintz afterwards, I came up with graduation and Memorial Day. The truth is, Midstates should be playing to huge crowds, its sound warrants the ardor and the members' personalities deserve it.\nOpening the show with a shock of new/no-wave, no-rules rock, Mt. Gigantic was clearly a band resolved to the smaller crowds. Not that the Bloomington-based musicians were frighteningly amateurish; they were infinitely interesting and (for Bloomington at least) refreshingly experimental. Guided by Ben Bussel's athletic drumming and Simon St. Sebastian's wild, banshee singing style, Mt. Gigantic is all rhythm and deconstruction. \nThe group, which amusingly was voted the third best hip-hop band by The Pin-Up, only suffers from elements of style over substance. Its songs all seemed about two minutes too long and lacked the presence to accompany the interesting things the individual players were conjuring up. Mt. Gigantic's rhythm was so tight, though, that I could just imagine the white boy dances that might have ensued. What was invigorating about the band was its attack of the music and its sonic assault of Vertigo, albeit an empty club that night. Admittedly, the band's obfuscating nature and dizzying performance leaves adjectives scarce for this first time observer. Not that it was forgettable, just too complex to be explained in one viewing.\nThe second act, Judah Johnson, on the other hand, was so forgettable I feel it is in bad taste to give these folks much press at all. Sounding like a cross between the Wallflowers and Third Eye Blind, its sound would fit seamlessly into any of the modern-rock radio's faceless playlists. Looking more like characters from a Brett Easton Ellis novel than a meaningful rock band, Judah Johnson was style over substance in a much worse way.\nAh, but then the Midstates. Making the trip out to Bloomington from its home of Calumet City, Ill., for the second time in a month, the shoegazing musicians played a wild set of songs from their masterful new record Shadowing Ghosts. Full of catchy choruses, delightful crescendos and unexpected climaxes, Midstates proved to be a remarkable amount of fun for a Friday night. My disappointment in the lame turnout was eased by the playful interaction of the band members. They were having more fun than anyone. From drummer Angel Ledezma's bee-like hands to keyboardists Steve Munoz's inability to remain seated, the group radiated the simple pleasures that this rock and roll thing affords its followers.\nEvery single person I talked to after the show was blown away by the Midstates' performance, and though I felt sorry for them, I felt thoroughly entertained by the end of the evening. I implore Vertigo to keep bringing acts like Midstates and Mt. Gigantic around, if only to give this town some credibility. Eventually, the crowds have to and will come.
(05/30/03 2:51am)
The crowd was small: four random folks, four of my friends and members of the performing bands and their women. Searching for an explanation for the Midstates' frontman Paul Heintz afterwards, I came up with graduation and Memorial Day. The truth is, Midstates should be playing to huge crowds, its sound warrants the ardor and the members' personalities deserve it.\nOpening the show with a shock of new/no-wave, no-rules rock, Mt. Gigantic was clearly a band resolved to the smaller crowds. Not that the Bloomington-based musicians were frighteningly amateurish; they were infinitely interesting and (for Bloomington at least) refreshingly experimental. Guided by Ben Bussel's athletic drumming and Simon St. Sebastian's wild, banshee singing style, Mt. Gigantic is all rhythm and deconstruction. \nThe group, which amusingly was voted the third best hip-hop band by The Pin-Up, only suffers from elements of style over substance. Its songs all seemed about two minutes too long and lacked the presence to accompany the interesting things the individual players were conjuring up. Mt. Gigantic's rhythm was so tight, though, that I could just imagine the white boy dances that might have ensued. What was invigorating about the band was its attack of the music and its sonic assault of Vertigo, albeit an empty club that night. Admittedly, the band's obfuscating nature and dizzying performance leaves adjectives scarce for this first time observer. Not that it was forgettable, just too complex to be explained in one viewing.\nThe second act, Judah Johnson, on the other hand, was so forgettable I feel it is in bad taste to give these folks much press at all. Sounding like a cross between the Wallflowers and Third Eye Blind, its sound would fit seamlessly into any of the modern-rock radio's faceless playlists. Looking more like characters from a Brett Easton Ellis novel than a meaningful rock band, Judah Johnson was style over substance in a much worse way.\nAh, but then the Midstates. Making the trip out to Bloomington from its home of Calumet City, Ill., for the second time in a month, the shoegazing musicians played a wild set of songs from their masterful new record Shadowing Ghosts. Full of catchy choruses, delightful crescendos and unexpected climaxes, Midstates proved to be a remarkable amount of fun for a Friday night. My disappointment in the lame turnout was eased by the playful interaction of the band members. They were having more fun than anyone. From drummer Angel Ledezma's bee-like hands to keyboardists Steve Munoz's inability to remain seated, the group radiated the simple pleasures that this rock and roll thing affords its followers.\nEvery single person I talked to after the show was blown away by the Midstates' performance, and though I felt sorry for them, I felt thoroughly entertained by the end of the evening. I implore Vertigo to keep bringing acts like Midstates and Mt. Gigantic around, if only to give this town some credibility. Eventually, the crowds have to and will come.
(05/29/03 4:00am)
Continuing a complete overhaul of his goofball persona, "Bruce Almighty" finds Jim Carrey getting comfortable in his restrained starring roles in family comedies. Like in his previous film, "The Majestic," Carrey not only seems desperate to become lovable, but to become a pillar of moral integrity much like his "Bruce Almighty" co-star Morgan Freeman, or more obviously, Jimmy Stewart. Those actor's roles aren't forced, and Carrey's attempts not only feel disgustingly fraught, but wholly condescending.\n"Bruce Almighty" is the tale of a fellow, Bruce (Carrey), who has it all: a fancy urban apartment (in the incredibly quaint looking town of Buffalo), Jennifer Aniston as a girlfriend, a sleek sportscar and a job as a network news correspondent. Unfortunately, the misguided guy thinks he has nothing to show for himself. Following an on-air breakdown, the standard firing, a beat down after helping a hobo and a fight with his woman, Bruce takes to the streets to shout at God, "the gloves are off!"\nGod (Morgan Freeman) was listening, though, and in order to show Bruce the path to righteousness, He bestows on Bruce all His powers. What follows is the typical laugh riot as Bruce romps around Buffalo, righting the wrongs he perceives his life to hold and having a little fun on the way. But he is selfish, and God cannot only look out for Himself, He has the world to think about. Bruce's actions leave his personal life and the city of Buffalo on the brink of destruction. Not to worry though, everything gets fixed in the end in the seamless world of Hollywood film.\nIn many ways, "Bruce Almighty" is Carrey's most self-reflective film to date. Early on he whines to Aniston, "I have no credibility." To which she replies, "what's wrong with just making people laugh and making them happy?" Basically, the story is a heavy-handed answer to that question; of course that's a noble thing. \nIf the Capra-esque "The Majestic" or his spot-on impression weren't enough, "Bruce Almighty" intends to make everyone aware of Carrey's Jimmy Stewart connection. To Aniston, he fulfills the promise Stewart made to his wife in "It's A Wonderful Life" by lassoing the moon and pulling it down for her. Just to make sure nobody missed the reference, the original scene turns up on Aniston's television later. What Carrey is missing however, is Stewart's intelligence, acting chops, vulnerability and choice in directors. Tom Shadyac ("Liar Liar," "Patch Adams," "Nutty Professor") is no Alfred Hitchcock.\nThe trend in Carrey's career has been a steady calming curve. The curve has dipped so much now that he seems comatose, his comically rubber face now seeming plastic as he goes through the motions and gags that once seemed nearly inhuman. \nThe major problem of "Bruce Almighty" is the complete lack of compassion for the intelligence of the public. Issues and themes are reiterated throughout in order to encompass the lowest common denominator. Subtlety is a virtue in film, and individual interpretation is outlawed by this sort of movie. "Bruce Almighty" is destined to be a minor Carrey movie and taught by future generations of Communist film profs as an example of the evils of the Hollywood process.
(05/29/03 4:00am)
It's no surprise that early Cul de Sac shows were performed subsequently with experimental films. Sounding nothing like the early '90s rock moment they came out of, the nearly always vocal-less group feels like an experiment in itself. Death of the Sun finds Cul de Sac interpreting world music filtered through Americana reference points. The album is built on found samples from around the globe including Peruvian rainforest field recordings, Bibayak Pygmies, a Jew's harp from Indonesia and pre-World War II Creole singers. By allowing each band member to compose parts specifically to vibe with the samples, the cinematic quality of Death of the Sun becomes exquisite. Mental pictures from vaguely recollected movies arise effortlessly. The extra spooky "Turok, Son of Stone" moves around in oblivion as moody femme vocals surround incessant, primitive Afro-Asian drumming. Eventually, it is able to recall slick thrillers like "Wild Things," mysterioso Anne Rice stories and British Imperialist movies in equal turn. Cul de Sac should also be awarded a medal for brevity. Too many post-rock instrumental groups get weighed down by their own ideas and a refusal to edit themselves. Death of the Sun is a carefully constructed album, which is actually as fun to listen to as it is to name drop.
(05/28/03 11:16pm)
It's no surprise that early Cul de Sac shows were performed subsequently with experimental films. Sounding nothing like the early '90s rock moment they came out of, the nearly always vocal-less group feels like an experiment in itself. Death of the Sun finds Cul de Sac interpreting world music filtered through Americana reference points. The album is built on found samples from around the globe including Peruvian rainforest field recordings, Bibayak Pygmies, a Jew's harp from Indonesia and pre-World War II Creole singers. By allowing each band member to compose parts specifically to vibe with the samples, the cinematic quality of Death of the Sun becomes exquisite. Mental pictures from vaguely recollected movies arise effortlessly. The extra spooky "Turok, Son of Stone" moves around in oblivion as moody femme vocals surround incessant, primitive Afro-Asian drumming. Eventually, it is able to recall slick thrillers like "Wild Things," mysterioso Anne Rice stories and British Imperialist movies in equal turn. Cul de Sac should also be awarded a medal for brevity. Too many post-rock instrumental groups get weighed down by their own ideas and a refusal to edit themselves. Death of the Sun is a carefully constructed album, which is actually as fun to listen to as it is to name drop.
(05/28/03 11:03pm)
Continuing a complete overhaul of his goofball persona, "Bruce Almighty" finds Jim Carrey getting comfortable in his restrained starring roles in family comedies. Like in his previous film, "The Majestic," Carrey not only seems desperate to become lovable, but to become a pillar of moral integrity much like his "Bruce Almighty" co-star Morgan Freeman, or more obviously, Jimmy Stewart. Those actor's roles aren't forced, and Carrey's attempts not only feel disgustingly fraught, but wholly condescending.\n"Bruce Almighty" is the tale of a fellow, Bruce (Carrey), who has it all: a fancy urban apartment (in the incredibly quaint looking town of Buffalo), Jennifer Aniston as a girlfriend, a sleek sportscar and a job as a network news correspondent. Unfortunately, the misguided guy thinks he has nothing to show for himself. Following an on-air breakdown, the standard firing, a beat down after helping a hobo and a fight with his woman, Bruce takes to the streets to shout at God, "the gloves are off!"\nGod (Morgan Freeman) was listening, though, and in order to show Bruce the path to righteousness, He bestows on Bruce all His powers. What follows is the typical laugh riot as Bruce romps around Buffalo, righting the wrongs he perceives his life to hold and having a little fun on the way. But he is selfish, and God cannot only look out for Himself, He has the world to think about. Bruce's actions leave his personal life and the city of Buffalo on the brink of destruction. Not to worry though, everything gets fixed in the end in the seamless world of Hollywood film.\nIn many ways, "Bruce Almighty" is Carrey's most self-reflective film to date. Early on he whines to Aniston, "I have no credibility." To which she replies, "what's wrong with just making people laugh and making them happy?" Basically, the story is a heavy-handed answer to that question; of course that's a noble thing. \nIf the Capra-esque "The Majestic" or his spot-on impression weren't enough, "Bruce Almighty" intends to make everyone aware of Carrey's Jimmy Stewart connection. To Aniston, he fulfills the promise Stewart made to his wife in "It's A Wonderful Life" by lassoing the moon and pulling it down for her. Just to make sure nobody missed the reference, the original scene turns up on Aniston's television later. What Carrey is missing however, is Stewart's intelligence, acting chops, vulnerability and choice in directors. Tom Shadyac ("Liar Liar," "Patch Adams," "Nutty Professor") is no Alfred Hitchcock.\nThe trend in Carrey's career has been a steady calming curve. The curve has dipped so much now that he seems comatose, his comically rubber face now seeming plastic as he goes through the motions and gags that once seemed nearly inhuman. \nThe major problem of "Bruce Almighty" is the complete lack of compassion for the intelligence of the public. Issues and themes are reiterated throughout in order to encompass the lowest common denominator. Subtlety is a virtue in film, and individual interpretation is outlawed by this sort of movie. "Bruce Almighty" is destined to be a minor Carrey movie and taught by future generations of Communist film profs as an example of the evils of the Hollywood process.
(05/22/03 4:00am)
Hurry up please it's time.\nThe end is coming.\nFlash floods\nDisasters in the sun\n Dogs unleashed\n Sister in the street\n her brassiere backwards.
(05/22/03 4:00am)
El-P's label Definitive Jux is fastly becoming the place to find the best current hip-hop acts. Cannibal Ox, Aesop Rock, Mr. Lif, El-P himself and now Murs have released tremendous albums for the label in the past three years. Murs, who has been on the scene since 1993, makes his solo debut and quickly projects himself as dually learned and as an outsider. In his captivating tale of street terror in L.A., "The Night Before," he begins by saying, "I'm-a lend my speech to all within my reach to tell what really goes on, from the cells to the streets." Despite the chest-thumping on the surface of his persona, Murs becomes endearing and different because of his geeky and playful wit. Has there ever been a black rapper rhyming about "Star Wars" and skateboarding nostalgically or posing on his album cover with action figures before? Even Humpty and his alter-ego Shock-G make an appearance on "Risky Business" to deliver the most creative moment in music this year. Shock-G: "smacking cheeks until they get reddish/to satisfy my fetish/and getting some lettuce," Humpty: "What you mean, head?" The Def Jux signature comes in the innovative production, bringing a new angle to Murs' West Coast, debaucherous humor and storytelling skills.
(05/22/03 1:45am)
El-P's label Definitive Jux is fastly becoming the place to find the best current hip-hop acts. Cannibal Ox, Aesop Rock, Mr. Lif, El-P himself and now Murs have released tremendous albums for the label in the past three years. Murs, who has been on the scene since 1993, makes his solo debut and quickly projects himself as dually learned and as an outsider. In his captivating tale of street terror in L.A., "The Night Before," he begins by saying, "I'm-a lend my speech to all within my reach to tell what really goes on, from the cells to the streets." Despite the chest-thumping on the surface of his persona, Murs becomes endearing and different because of his geeky and playful wit. Has there ever been a black rapper rhyming about "Star Wars" and skateboarding nostalgically or posing on his album cover with action figures before? Even Humpty and his alter-ego Shock-G make an appearance on "Risky Business" to deliver the most creative moment in music this year. Shock-G: "smacking cheeks until they get reddish/to satisfy my fetish/and getting some lettuce," Humpty: "What you mean, head?" The Def Jux signature comes in the innovative production, bringing a new angle to Murs' West Coast, debaucherous humor and storytelling skills.
(05/22/03 12:41am)
Hurry up please it's time.\nThe end is coming.\nFlash floods\nDisasters in the sun\n Dogs unleashed\n Sister in the street\n her brassiere backwards.
(05/01/03 4:47am)
Both Voltaire and Kris Kristofferson decried the "best of all possible worlds," claiming that it could never exist. They're pessimists, and I never believed the president woke up, rubbed his feet together and thought about how he could destroy some people's lives. The best of all possible worlds does exist, and it lies somewhere between blissful ignorance and inspired critical thought. \nWe're in a day and age when art forms are all called post-something by the same people who claimed the last days of decadence were upon us in the '60s. Like the fire and brimstone Baptist waiting for the end of the world, the last days never came for those people and they're still trying to justify the reasons why. They are similar to Jehovah's Witnesses, who are bound to toil away their days preparing for the great non-event. We should never underestimate the ability of the masses to organize, but the power in the rhetoric of these camps inevitably comes from whether or not they practice what they preach, or with how much sincerity they believe it.\nWhat was so great about The Beach Boys is that their music was true. Even if four-fifths of the group had never surfed before and if Brian Wilson was scared of the beach like everything else, they sang "Little Deuce Coup" or "California Girls" as if they really believed in California as utopia, just like they eventually believed Charles Manson to be deity or at least master playboy, that the dastardly Maharishi would lead them transcendentally or that cocaine would be a final solution.\nPost-modern music, as transcendental and witty as it can be from time to time, smacks of unoriginality. It is a form based on recycled forms, not as juxtaposition, but to usurp pop culture as the origin of contempo-emotion. As geography, such intertextuality is a necessity; though, when compositions are created on it, it's proof of a mind in traction.\nThus, great rock music most often comes out of an incompetence, whether it is musical or intellectual. Critics scourged Beck's last record because he dropped irony for saccharine frankness. It was his best record because the pastiche style of his former work lacked a voice, which ultimately is the more interesting element. Even if they find the new Beck dull and cliché, he is honest, and the music is pretty too.\nSarcasm is never as endearing as incorruption and ardor. The evocation of lost innocence is such an effective subject matter that the best book and rock album of the 20th century (Catcher in the Rye and Pet Sounds respectively) are revered for their veracious portrayals of the great evil winning over. \nAt this point, I do not intend to sound like a defendant of high art, but want to recognize those things mistakenly artful, like the paracinema of Ed Wood. A musical example of this would be the Innocence & Despair album put out by BarNone in 2001. It was a recording of '60s pop songs from artists like David Bowie, Brian Wilson, Paul McCartney and the Eagles as done by Canadian grade-schoolers from the Langley Schools. Especially in The Beach Boys' songs, the kids' album shines through as the most dramatic testament to Wilson's songs and the virtue of childhood.\nLester Bangs, a notorious thumper for all things "stoopid" and innocent, once wrote, "the whole concept of Good Taste is concocted to keep people from having a good time, from reveling in a crassness that passeth all understanding."\nSome may call "Plan 9 from Outer Space" or Innocence & Despair novel. I question what their notion of pop must be. Pop culture is supposed to be immediate, and the amount of truth in the performances will determine the elasticity of its influence. \nEven more interesting to be found in paracinema and so-called "novel" musics is the lack of self-consciousness displayed in the work. Ed Wood's movies suggest that he really didn't know how to make a film, just as Captain Beefheart's saxophone suggests his ignorance of reeds. To view and listen to this type of work is to hear the performers feel their way through a tunnel, to find something in nothing. The practice is half the fun, and when it executes, the effect is ecstasy. Such "artists" simply do not have the skills to tell a lie.\nAnd so, while the PoMo battles are being fought in jazz clubs and college campuses, it comes down to DIY vs. this dirty capitalist system of hierarchies. Sometimes staying in school too long hurts you. I think I'm going to grad school.
(05/01/03 4:00am)
Three on the Tree's debut album could be a recording of Wayne Coyne and Townes Van Zandt sitting in front of a nighttime fireplace trying to beat each other in a snoozing, country songwriting competition. So, obviously it's pretty music.\nThree on the Tree's songwriters, Zeb Gould and Sam Crawford, croon to the moon together as only suburban kids can, without much motivation, substance or political concerns. Is it too much to mention that Crawford speaks softly and without the syrupy drawl available on the album? Retreatism is a popular feeling these days, and Three on the Tree's brand of it is so earnest and the backing music interesting enough as to beat out any arguments one would bring up about non-action being a corroboration with evil. The only thing that feels contrived is the album's own compressed sound, but that can be blamed on cheap editing tools. It's been common now for country music to come out of urban landscapes, not to mention northern urban. Perhaps an increasingly technological world finds the disenfranchised looking for aural as well as mental safe harbors. Maybe that's science fiction though, and girls and friends are really the most important things in life.
(05/01/03 4:00am)
Xiu Xiu takes on the American pastime of going over the top, being so immediately commercial and recognizable that the emotions expressed are undeniable. It's new album plays in this aesthetic, but with a grain of salt. Though the songs rush up from quiet, folky strumming beginnings to the unadulterated crescendos of techno beats and gizmo flailings, they all include a deconstructive element of what Lester Bangs once called "horrible noise." This punishes the passive listener, leaving only those with the heart and the stomach to deal with the ultimate pain that A Promise is dwelling in. \nAnd that promise -- it's the American Dream, as declared in Xiu Xiu's cover of Tracy Chapman's "Fast Car," to "buy a big house and live in the suburbs." Like the movie the band stole its name from, "Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl," in which a young Chinese girl gets taken from her home, raped, taken advantage of and then dies, Stewart sees the betrayal in inherited ideals. Spliced with equal doses of folk, goth, trip-hop and crooning, Xiu Xiu is influenced from genres where truth and lie are not opposed, but co-exist secretly.
(05/01/03 4:00am)
Both Voltaire and Kris Kristofferson decried the "best of all possible worlds," claiming that it could never exist. They're pessimists, and I never believed the president woke up, rubbed his feet together and thought about how he could destroy some people's lives. The best of all possible worlds does exist, and it lies somewhere between blissful ignorance and inspired critical thought. \nWe're in a day and age when art forms are all called post-something by the same people who claimed the last days of decadence were upon us in the '60s. Like the fire and brimstone Baptist waiting for the end of the world, the last days never came for those people and they're still trying to justify the reasons why. They are similar to Jehovah's Witnesses, who are bound to toil away their days preparing for the great non-event. We should never underestimate the ability of the masses to organize, but the power in the rhetoric of these camps inevitably comes from whether or not they practice what they preach, or with how much sincerity they believe it.\nWhat was so great about The Beach Boys is that their music was true. Even if four-fifths of the group had never surfed before and if Brian Wilson was scared of the beach like everything else, they sang "Little Deuce Coup" or "California Girls" as if they really believed in California as utopia, just like they eventually believed Charles Manson to be deity or at least master playboy, that the dastardly Maharishi would lead them transcendentally or that cocaine would be a final solution.\nPost-modern music, as transcendental and witty as it can be from time to time, smacks of unoriginality. It is a form based on recycled forms, not as juxtaposition, but to usurp pop culture as the origin of contempo-emotion. As geography, such intertextuality is a necessity; though, when compositions are created on it, it's proof of a mind in traction.\nThus, great rock music most often comes out of an incompetence, whether it is musical or intellectual. Critics scourged Beck's last record because he dropped irony for saccharine frankness. It was his best record because the pastiche style of his former work lacked a voice, which ultimately is the more interesting element. Even if they find the new Beck dull and cliché, he is honest, and the music is pretty too.\nSarcasm is never as endearing as incorruption and ardor. The evocation of lost innocence is such an effective subject matter that the best book and rock album of the 20th century (Catcher in the Rye and Pet Sounds respectively) are revered for their veracious portrayals of the great evil winning over. \nAt this point, I do not intend to sound like a defendant of high art, but want to recognize those things mistakenly artful, like the paracinema of Ed Wood. A musical example of this would be the Innocence & Despair album put out by BarNone in 2001. It was a recording of '60s pop songs from artists like David Bowie, Brian Wilson, Paul McCartney and the Eagles as done by Canadian grade-schoolers from the Langley Schools. Especially in The Beach Boys' songs, the kids' album shines through as the most dramatic testament to Wilson's songs and the virtue of childhood.\nLester Bangs, a notorious thumper for all things "stoopid" and innocent, once wrote, "the whole concept of Good Taste is concocted to keep people from having a good time, from reveling in a crassness that passeth all understanding."\nSome may call "Plan 9 from Outer Space" or Innocence & Despair novel. I question what their notion of pop must be. Pop culture is supposed to be immediate, and the amount of truth in the performances will determine the elasticity of its influence. \nEven more interesting to be found in paracinema and so-called "novel" musics is the lack of self-consciousness displayed in the work. Ed Wood's movies suggest that he really didn't know how to make a film, just as Captain Beefheart's saxophone suggests his ignorance of reeds. To view and listen to this type of work is to hear the performers feel their way through a tunnel, to find something in nothing. The practice is half the fun, and when it executes, the effect is ecstasy. Such "artists" simply do not have the skills to tell a lie.\nAnd so, while the PoMo battles are being fought in jazz clubs and college campuses, it comes down to DIY vs. this dirty capitalist system of hierarchies. Sometimes staying in school too long hurts you. I think I'm going to grad school.
