Thursday, December 23rd, 2004
It’s always interesting to spin albums that you haven’t heard in ages and listen to them with essentially fresh ears. Case in point – Spiritualized’s Ladies And Gentlemen, We Are Floating In Space. Space-rock being just an awkward shuffle away from the shoegaze which has so possessed my musical urges lately, I’ve been pulling out the J Spaceman discs and enjoying them – but for whatever reason, listening to Ladies And Gentlemen at work yesterday really hit me upside the head. Maybe it was cause I had the volume up louder than I normally do, but even though I’ve listened to this record dozens of times if not more over the years, it all sounded new to me.
The cracked “Only fools rush in” refrain underneath the verses of the title track, the aching orchestral swells of “Broken Heart”, the gospel choir behind “Cool Waves” (which brings to mind the time I was walking to class and was stopped dead in my tracks when I heard it coming out of the PA outside the Mongolian restaurant beside campus), the slow, hypnotic pulse of closer “Cop Shoot Cop” punctuated by discordant horn breakdowns… And on top of it all, the voice. Somehow Jason Pierce manages to make his vocals sound typically narcoleptic and drugged out, and yet raw with emotion at the same time. How does he do it? I don’t know, though a nasty nasty break-up usually helps things along (long-time girlfriend and bandmate Kate Radley had recently left him for Verve front-corpse Richard Ashcroft).
At this moment, I am firmly convinced that this is one of the greatest albums of the ’90s. Hands down. Tomorrow, I may change my mind, but that’s tomorrow. It’s frustrating that since Ladies And Gentlemen, Pierce has been essentially treading water. The follow-up Let It Come Down was lovely, but over-thought and lacked the emotional heft of its predecessor, and last year’s Amazing Grace was a raw, garage record that no one asked for. Still, one remains mildly hopeful that he can find that spirit again, ideally without getting back on the smack or having his heart smashed to pieces again. He’s supposedly taking his current band into the studio this year, so we may have an answer before 2005 is out. In the meantime, the two Complete Works compilations have found their way onto my Boxing Day shopping list. And on a tangential note, check out the website where you can order Spiritualized merch online in North America – more specifically, check out the other bands who have swag available… One of these things is not like the other…
Man, you’d think that with the sort of music I listen to, I’d do a lot of drugs, eh?
And to play six degrees of items in a post, J Spaceman’s old bandmate in Spacemen 3, who now performs as Sonic Boom, collaborated with Luna’s Dean & Britta on this cover of Roger Miller’s (the “King Of The Road” dude, not the Mission Of Burma dude) Christmas ditty, “Old Toy Trains”. Featuring guitar by Kevin Bacon (no, not really).
And as a final segue, if I wanted to get ONE Spacemen 3 record, which one should I get?
Fans of John Vanderslice should circle the month of August on their 2005 calendars – that’s right, THE WHOLE MONTH – for Unfinished reports that is when you can expect to see his next album in stores. The Slice has been keeping a recording diary of the proceedings.
Whether you hate them or love them, you know you’ve been waiting with bated breath for Pitchfork’s 50 Best Albums of 2004, so that you can either feel outraged or validated. It overlaps my own list by exactly one entry, their album of the year (and no surprise to anyone, really), Arcade Fire’s Funeral. One of the other heavy hitter sites, Tiny Mix Tapes, has also weighed in on the year that was and also puts Arcade Fire at the top (no surprise since they’ve been championing the band for over a year now). Make sure you check out the sidebar there for scads more year-in-review articles. And yeah, I know the PF and TMT lists are so yesterday… if you’re not leading the way, you’re in the way! I stay in the box, and I feel shame.
They’d rather dance with you! The Kings Of Convenience are at Lee’s Palace February 17th, tickets $13 on sale now. The cardigan-wearing set rejoices. Myself, I’m not sure how I feel about music so fey that it makes me feel like a brawny lumberjack by comparison. I’d be more interested if they brought along the girls who appear on their album artwork. And Japanese melodic-noise ensemble Mono are at the Drake Hotel Underground April 3, ducats $10.
NOW offers up a series of Toronto-centric year-end lists and Information Leafblower offers up an Information Leafblower-centric look at the past year.
eye thinks I’m a winner! Take that, Mom!
np – Pernice Brothers / Nobody’s Listening
Wednesday, December 22nd, 2004
We’ve been spending so much time lately looking back at the ’04, how about a look ahead to the ’05?
The new Super Furry Animals compilation Songbook – The Singles Volume 1, along with its companion DVD, will be coming out in North America on January 25 (There’s even a website!. Full info here. A new Furries studio album is due out sometime this Spring. The Furries are one of those bands I’ve always felt like I should like more than I do. I have/had a copy of Guerilla that I just couldn’t get into. I think maybe they’re a little too wacky/dippy for my tastes. I like things a little more… bedsit? I dunno.
But what won’t be coming out on the 25th of January is the Fountains Of Wayne b-sides comp. Billboard reports that the album will compile almost every b-side the band has ever released and some new material as well, but has no info on a title or release date, just sometime next year. If it were coming out in a month, they’d have probably confirmed some of that by now. And so we wait.
Some other noteworthy releases coming in the first few months of 2005 (from my POV, anyway):
Low / The Great Destroyer – Jan 25
Matt Pond PA / Winter Songs EP – Jan 2005
Bettie Serveert / Attagirl – Feb 1
The Wedding Present / Take Fountain – Feb 15
M Ward / Transistor Radio – Feb 22
The House Of Love / Days Run Away – Feb 28
Spoon / The Beast And Dragon Are Adored – Feb 2005
Doves / Some Cities – Mar 1 (see artwork here)
Kathleen Edwards / Back To Me – Mar 1
Ivy / In The Clear – Mar 1
Idlewild / Warnings/Promises – Mar 8
The Decemberists / Picaresque – Mar 22
Aimee Mann / The Forgotten Arm – Mar 2005
Pernice Brothers / untitled – Mar 2005
Josh Rouse / Nashville – Mar 2005
Teenage Fanclub / untitled – Mar 2005
Of course, these are just the known quantities – the artists whom I can generally expect to put out a good record. There’s certain to be any number of records by artists whom I’ve never heard of (for the moment, at least) who will spin my world around. Hopefully.
Glide asks a wide variety of musicians, including Drive By Trucker Patterson Hood, to put together their own year-end lists.
Our friends from across Lake Ontario, Mystery & Misery, compile a bunch of ’04 lists. I’m flattered to be on the Favorite Music Websites list. Heavy Black Frames also lists off and inflates my ego.
Go here for a complete Nellie McKay concert at the Aldrich Museum in New York this past August. New songs in the set, even! Via Achtung Baby.
Pop (All Love) recounts a lovely little tale of people falling in love over Stars.
np – Doves / The Last Broadcast
Tuesday, December 21st, 2004
The indie rock blogosphere weeps today as New York’s Sea Ray announced yesterday that they are disbanding after a farewell show next month. The usual reasons are cited – the strains of being a touring band on personal lives and a general overall broke-ness. Being one of my favourite new band discoveries of the past year, to say I’m rather disappointed in this news is an understatement. At least I have my much-cherished copy of Stars At Noon, a t-shirt and memories of being one of the dozen or so people in attendance at their only ever Toronto show this past June (photos here). If you never heard their lush blend of shoegaze, space rock and chamber pop or saw their trippy live show, man you missed out. I mean, I lobbied (albeit very unsuccessfully) to get people out to the Toronto show – you can’t say I didn’t try. This certainly ends 2004 on a bum note. Thanks, Sea Ray. Here’s a going away present:
Sea Ray – “Sister Gone” (live at the Earl, Atlanta GA – October 29, 2004)
Update: MP3 removed as apparently the band is unhappy with that particular recording. I’ll put up another one tonight/tomorrow, or check with Information Leafblower later today as he’ll have some up as well. In the meantime, you can check out the studio version here.
Update 2: Thanks to ILB for providing the live “Sister Gone” from Atlanta, which is now online for your enjoyment. Kyle will also have “Nicholas Ray” form the same show online later today.
KCRW has audio and video of a performance in their studios by American Music Club last month.
The thing about Christmas songs is that you can really only play them once a year – which is why I’m linking directly to Bradley’s Almanac, who has a couple of mp3s of The Cocteau Twins doing Christmas carols rather than squirrel them away for me to post next year.
Stylus is spending this week rattling off their top albums of the year. Nice to see American Music Club make an appearance, but behind Courtney Love? Puh-leaaase. Meanwhile, Pitchfork runs down their top single releases of aught-four.
Cinescape reports that they’re moving ahead with a film adaptation of The Flash. It’s likely be the Wally West version with Ryan Reynolds tipped to don the red tights. I dunno, he could certainly do Wally’s smart-ass personality, but he’s a little… big for the Flash. I always thought the Flash should be more graceful, for lack of a better word. Reynolds is a big boy, isn’t he? Anyway, whichever way they go, hopefully it’ll be better than that short-lived TV show in the early 90s starring Dawson’s dad dressed in velour.
Toner Mishap remembers the days before movie deals when super-heroes had to supplement their incomes with product endorsements. Like Hostess pies!
Filter talks to Noah Baumbach, co-scribe of the forthcoming The Life Aquatic. Reviews have been modest, but I’m looking forward to it when it opens Christmas Day.
Video caps from the set of Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy. Zaphod seems to be missing a head.
And check out the first Sin City trailer here – yeah, you have to install some crappy plugin, but it’s worth it. Check out the credits at the end – holy shinola, there’s some star power in this flick. Mickey Rourke AND Nick Stahl? In the same picture? Oh man, someone call the Academy. I’m kidding – I’m very much looking forward to this, and it looks GOOD. Update: Here’s the trailer in a much friendlier Quicktime format.
According to The New York Times, bloggers are not only dating, but having sex. Wha?!? I must have missed a memo.
np – The American Analog Set / Know By Heart
Monday, December 20th, 2004
Every once in a while I get a taste of some new band that’s exactly what I’m hankering for at that point in time, and I get all obsessive-like. Current title-holder, Athens, Georgia’s Pacific UV, whose website is currently down. They’ve been getting some chatter on The Big Takeover mailing list, so I downloaded a copy of their 2003 self-titled album and am very much digging their blend of warm, melodic, spacey, drone rock with just the right amount of electronic flourishes. It’s just the stuff to make me forget it’s not a million degrees below zero outside – hell, even the band name sounds warm. MP3.com has some tantilizingly brief snippets, if you’re curious. The album is out on The Warm Supercomputer but hopefully since it’s distributed by Touch and Go, it won’t be hard to turn up a legit copy. While the album is decidedly on the mellower, prettier side, apparently their live show is considerably more thunderous. Hope I get the chance to verify that sooner or later.
Splendid chats it up with everyone’s favourite hip kids, The Arcade Fire.
John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats is asked to compile a year-end list. Instead, he writes an essay.
Pitchfork begins their holiday programming with their top 50 reissues of the year. Still to come – best singles and albums. That’s right boys, milk it. Milk it goooooood.
CBC Radio 3 goes all retrospective with their year-end issue and tallies up the best indie Canadian talent with their “Best of New Music Canada” feature. And speaking of best Canaidan music of the year, The National Post’s Aaron Wherry solicited “Best Canadian albums of 2004” lists from a variety of bloggers and music-writerly folk for the purposes of compiling another list – because god knows we need more lists. Here’s the final tally. I forget what my list was, exactly.
And if you’re not all listed out, The Guardian’s music critics has compiled their own lists. From Pop (All Love).
The Toronto Star (BugMeNot: orkillme@hotmail.com/thestar) takes a look behind the curtain at the two lovable scamps at Penny Arcade. I’m not a gamer but I love this strip – there’s enough universal geek language to appeal. Here’s some recent faves, if you’re unfamiliar with ’em.
What’s going on with all the bit torrent sites dying out? Alas poor Suprnova, we hardly knew ye. Update: A Suprnova RIP FAQ.
np – Mojave 3 / Ask Me Tomorrow
Sunday, December 19th, 2004
You say you want a revolution? …Okay, not really – that was for Aaron’s benefit. Har. Moving on.
Next time I go to a show, I read the ticket correctly for the doors time, and don’t show up 45 minutes early (which ended up being an hour by the time they did let people in). But at least I was first one in. But, as it turned out, there was no opener at all which meant even more waiting for the show to start. I had pretty much contemplated the meaning of life and was about partway through the universe when Chris Seligman and some techs came onstage just past nine and heaved his Korg Triton keyboard into place and furiously began patching it in.
It turns out that the keyboard had died an icy death shortly beforehand and they needed an old priest and a young priest to get things worked out, hence the delay. Whether this scotched an opener or not – the stage wasn’t really set up for any other act – we’ll never know. It’s a shame that they had to soundcheck the keyboards during the set, essentially ruining the first half of opener “Your Ex-Lover Is Dead” – you could see the panic on everyone’s faces when they began as the synths were about two or three times louder than anything else in the mix. The band gamely carried on though, and all was sorted out within a few minutes. For there on, it was all smooth sailing.
Touring with a miniature string and brass section and a second guitarist, the band that shook the Mod Club last night was a far cry from the outfit that I saw play Blow-Up four years ago, or even opening for Broken Social Scene last March. Playing a setlist that pulled together the best moments from Heart and Set Yourself On Fire, Stars put on a far better show than I was honestly expecting. Both Amy and Torq have focused their on-stage charisma considerably and their harmonies are just lovely. I find the polished sound of their studio albums really benefit from the extra edge and muscle of the live performance, it gives it that extra necessary oomph.
I gotta say, watching the show last night I was really struck by how much absurdly good music is coming out of this city and country right now. I don’t usually play flag-waver or anything, but MAN. Oh Canada. Les photos est ici. The Mod Club did me a favour by keeping the light pyrotechnics to a minimum, favouring a really nice blue colour scheme for most of the show. Nice.
And that’s it – my last concert of 2004. Barring something cool showing up unexpectedly, that’s it for a month for me. Want some numbers for the past 12 months? 52 concerts. FIFTY. TWO. That’s one a week, dontcha know (though more often than not, two or three in four days, etc). That’s nuts. N. U. T. Z. I gotta get myself a life, no two ways about it.
Starflyer 59 release yet another new album, Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice, on April 12.
Todd McFarlane Productions files for bankruptcy. IT’S CALLED KARMA, TODD. Ha ha ha.
So some readers mentioned to me that I had gotten a mention in Mac-centric music mag Playlist this month, so while finishing up my Christmas shopping yesterday I stopped into a Chapters to check it out. Sure enough, there was an article on mp3 blogs and yours truly was in the sidebar, number three with a tracer bullet. Neat. I considered picking up a copy for my archives, but it really wasn’t worth the $8 to me – I mean, it’s published by Mac. The article on “Best mp3 Players” probably read something like, “iPod! iPod Mini! iPod Photo! You love Steve Jobs!” Blah blah blah.
It’s -15 out? What the hell is that? What the hell what the hell? And I have to go outside today? What the hell what the hell? God, this is gonna suck.
np – Mogwai / Come On Die Young
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