Bon Scott before Three Bulls radio.
Bon Scott after Three Bulls radio.
I had forgotten that I bought Ladytron’s latest, Gravity the Seducer, and in fact had played it quite a bit for a week. These “electroclash” mavens are like a chillier, krautrockier, electronic Lush- but that’s not right either. They put out consistently listenable records that seem infected with something in between iciness and aloofness- you’ll see these words a lot in Ladytron reviews, but it is hard to explain. Their latest isn’t as immediately gripping as their last few, but it has an electronic warmth and softening that differentiates it. I think this is the strongest track and in fact it is one of my fave Ladytron songs at the moment.
This is the first in a series of “Coming Attractions” posts for me, though I suppose in actuality, most of my posts here are in that vein.
This is a Chicago band, so I can never tell if the all of the buzz is local, or indie nationwide, but I know they’ve had some Pitchfork love. I caught a bit of their set at the Pitchfork Festival this year, but I think we were waiting for Neon Indian to start, so we probably weren’t paying attention, and quite honestly, it didn’t sound that great. Also, I don’t love their first album. And of course, you’d be justified in pinning the P4k praise on their willingness to appear at the Festival.
But I gave in to the hype and gave the new album Dye It Blond a try and I was sold about 15 seconds into this track, which leads off the album. I mean, those are some seriously great hooks in that first guitar part. Really all of the guitar work on this album is phenomenal, and the production values are pretty decent, making the whole thing fun to listen to. They sound like a cross between the happy and druggy eras of the Beach Boys.
They get another chance to impress me at the Empty Bottle in a couple weeks. They wouldn’t be the first band I hated at Pitchfork but subsequently loved in a proper venue.
Take your pick. the Smiths? the Ocean Blue? the Cure? Anything else for the late ’80s/early ’90s? Regardless, for those that like music from that period, I’m just happy that people still make music that could have come from that period.
I saw these guys a few months ago, and they weren’t really on my radar much before that. They played a double bill with Surfer Blood. They opened the 7:00 pm show and headlined the 10:00 pm show. Due to two distinct groups of friends, and the fact that a ticket to early show got me into the late show, I stayed through both (I also saw New Pornographers earlier in the day as part of my lunch break, making it a five set day)[PP adds- I worry about Seitz- he is a MACHINE]. Everyone I was with bought tickets for Surfer Blood. Everyone I was with walked away loving the Drums.
There’s an Apples in Stereo song called “She’s Telling Lies”. The Pitchfork review said that song didn’t so much rip off a Beach Boys song as much as it ripped off their whole catalog. I feel that way about the Drums vis a vis the late ’80/early ’90s Britpop scene. That said I love this album and the EP that preceded it. I chose this song a) because there’s a video and b) because I think it best exemplifies their affinity for that period. Enjoy.
[PP adds- I am afraid to listen to this song because I will love it instantly or my soul will recoil from the shameless pilfering of my treasured anglophilia]
Alright, so it has been a while since anyone has posted anything here, so I’m stepping up to the plate.
This is either from my first concert ever, or my first club show ever. Probably the latter, but we’re talking about something that happened 20 years ago, so things get a bit blurry. I saw these guys at the Roxy on Sunset, the only show I’ve ever seen there. In fact, I’ve seen more shows in Chicago this year than I saw in my 25 years in Los Angeles.
That said, these guys put on a great show. They opened for the Jazz Butcher, which is one of those guys/bands that I rarely listened to, but my brother loved.
It might not jump out at you right away, but think Art Brut. Gerard Langley does that “I’m singing without actually singing” thing, in which the lead vocalists just kind of says the words.
In any case, the opening 20 seconds of actual music was about the best 20 seconds of music I had heard when I was a junior in high school. Enjoy the Blue Aeroplanes:
I have an incredibly soft spot in my heart for the retro “girl group” sound. The spiral through time of this sound as it gets more and more derivative reminds me of One Hundred Years of Solitude and how things are slightly different but kind of the same.
I don’t know who first pushed the fuzzed out 60s retro sound, but I think that Suicide’s first album had the feel and sound and warping that must have influenced the giants coming next.
Suicide-Cheree
The Jesus and Mary Chain-Just Like Honey
But of course we are most in love with the next wave, that mix the above aesthetic with the Ramones speed and pop, but the fuzz and scuzz of above. Later Primitives recordings went the cleaner, shinier route.
The Primitives-Stop Killing Me
Hugely on the music snob radar now that their particular blueprint is being used for mechanized girl group indie fuzz pop destruction, Blac Tambourine really establishes perfection here. Untouchable.
Black Tambourine-Through Aggi Off the Bridge
Here is a forgotten track from cleaner retro proprietors, Adventures in Stereo.
Adventures in Stereo-Running
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Now we have the new new retro retro wave. As the world should know, I love The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. This particular selection is not fuzzed out, but organ plus beat plus chimey is straight down the road of what we are discussing today. I note that many of the songs on their self-titled are fuzzier.
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart-The Tenure Itch
This next one is all over the web. Amanda had it at Pandagon, and Tbogg has it as his “gone fishing” video* *no comment? It is so good that I can’t fault its extremely derivative third or fourth wave nature, but I feel odd about the meta nostalgia for the first and second waves of nostalgia. What I enjoy is that certain pop songs that were once revolutionary, once invented, become timeless. Instead of being the new innovation on the block, they’ve become like selling vinyl to the kids, kind of like Coelacanth ear candy, living fossils.
Dum Dum Girls-Bhang Bhang, I’m a Burnout
AC Newman name dropped this band in a Pitchfork guest list, which they’re apparently doing by podcast now. That’s a good thing, because they played part of the track in background, and it sounded pretty good, so I sought it out. I’m not sure if I like the whole album yet, but this song hit me pretty much right away.
So far the best descriptions I’ve read are “Built to Spill teaching Grizzly Bear to jam” and “Like the xx raised on a diet of Built to Spill and the Shins”. I’ll admit that Built to Spill was the first band that these guys brought to mind, maybe because of the high pitched voice. This is another band out of Southern California. Long Beach this time, instead of Silverlake, and they sound a bit more beachy than bands like Foreign Born and Local Natives. More San Francisco-y. They also kind of remind me of Generationals (who are awesome, by the way), in that it’s a updated version of a fairly classic or oldies sound. Enjoy.
I’ve been wanting to post this song forever, but there has never been an acceptable version on Youtube (or any version for that matter). This version is from a live broadcast. I’m pretty sure the strings are piped in, as I can’t see an orchestra in there, but I don’t have a problem with that. They haven’t played this live at any of the shows I’ve been to. For a live recording, the sound is actually pretty good.
More importantly, they do a decent job of capturing the best part of this song, which are the strings arranged by the High Llama’s Sean O’Hagan. The guy is really a genius when it comes to string arrangements, and while I’ve only scratched the surface of his output, this would be his “masterpiece” from what I’ve listened to. I think my favorite part about the string arrangement in this song is that I probably listened to it 10-15 times before I finally realized how important the strings are. Just not something I focused on in those initial listens. But as often happens in music, one listen changed everything, and now I can’t not hear them as the dominant factor. The best part of the song, in my opinion, hits at about the 3:30 to 3:50 mark.
Unfortunately, now that I’ve talked them up, it will almost be impossible for anyone new to this song to have the same experience, but that doesn’t make the song any less wonderful. It’s hard to choose just one song from their years of output, but this song is definitely in my top three or four SFA songs (Herman Love Pauline, Ice Hockey Hair, and maybe another).
30% late period Catherine Wheel + 30% Low + 2% Toto + 4% Alan Parsons Project + 34% magical sauce = Besnard Lakes.
Here are the opening two tracks of the very, very listenable new album. Apparently they just blew the doors off of SXSW. Figures. I was probably falling asleep to a rerun of NCIS or eating a tater tot. Sad.
I am deeply in love with this album, but it just so happens that I know this feeling will end so I am going with the flow and will play it into the ground until it does.
Perfectly baroque new wave guitar pop dominates Julian Casablancas’ semi-ignored debut Phrazes for the Young. The album itself comes across as perfectly harmless and songs are relatively, but effortlessly bouncing in and out of different ideas. This one comes across as a country/New Wave hybrid with some cleanly Strokesy guitar- guitar that was never punk or new wave, but almost pop metal. One of four or five really good songs on the album (River of Brakelights, 11th Dimension, Tourist, Left and Right in the Dark). I’m glad I finally got it.
Generationals are a band out of New Orleans who will be touring this Spring with the Apples in Stereo. Their tour mates will probably give you an idea of what they’re going to sound like. Hooks and melodies so sweet they make your teeth hurt. But in a bit of twist, they’re also totally retro. This song has sort of a late ’50s Motown feel to it. Pinko ought to love this stuff.
I’m including a link to their Myspace page because, while I’m loving this album, I think the first song “Nobody Could Change Your Mind” is probably my favorite, and I can’t find a good embeddable version. So click the link and go listen that one too.
They’ll be at Lincoln Hall in Chicago on April 30th. Really looking forward to this show, even though it will be the second show for me in the same night. Never pulled that off before, but Los Campesinos! starts at 7:00, and this show doesn’t start until 10:00, so I should be able to swing it.
As I mentioned at the 3B!, I was simply astounded that this song was playing in the entryway Korean Market in sprawling Big Texas Megalopolis. My experience with the Korean Market soundtrack is that it tends very much to Asian or American ultra light Adult Contemporary, so this was incredibly surreal. I had to get out of there before they blew my mind with Capt. Sensible or something.
I think we all agree that XTC deserves more space that we currently give in on our collective zeitgeist hard drive.
Growing up in Deseret we had the ol’ new wave/modern rock station that played on occasion:
Generals and Majors
Making Plans for Nigel
Senses Working Overtime
Towers of London
Life Begins at the Hop
No Thugs in Our House
Love on a Farmboy’s Wages
King for a Day
Dear God
Mayor of Simpleton
Ballad of Peter Pumkinhead
And it wasn’t as if they were all that popular, but it of course was the time when you felt like you could play more that two songs by a band. I don’t think Talking Heads, who got much more play, had as many songs that would get pulled off the shelf.
UPDATE:
I think I must have also heard “Respectable Street” too
Don’t know too much about this band (Seitz???), but I like the happy retropoppy feel of what I’ve heard. I think the sound is probably closest to Los Campesinos, but I do alert the readers to the super awesome organ at the beginning of this song, and the almost sense that they are going to be doing an extended Boy with the Arab Strap outro. This is super fun music. I would probably want to dance to this, especially the parts that get more into Arcade Fire territory.
[PP Ed note- I also kind of love this song from back in the day, and even if Pitchfork uses this to pigeonhole the shit out of us, I don't care- we have editorial freedom at 3B. Date us away. Make fun of the flannel we never wore!]
A radical departure from El Seitzo at SOTD. For once I’m not posting a song from a recently discovered artist/artist of the moment. This is from an album I bought at some point in the early 90s. In fact, I may have had this on cassette, and then later picked up a copy on a used CD, but to this to day it is one of the most underrated albums I own (along with probably Chance from the Rave Ups). I think I got it at a used CD fair at UC Riverside at some point after my freshman year.
This album kind of sounds like a combination of Violent Femmes (contemporaries) and Art Brut (just kids at the time), one of which I like, and one of which I love like few others (that would be Art Brut).
This is the best of a bevy of fantastic songs. The album is chock full of great stuff from art rock, to Dick Dale style surf guitar, to power pop. Unfortunately, they tried to get serious for their second album, it wasn’t as good, and that was pretty much that. Rob Zabrecky is now a magician performing at the Magic Castle. But every so often I cue this album up in the ‘ol iTunes, because it’s really pretty fantastic from start to finish. Standout tracks include Nerves, In Buildings, Regina, and Elevators, in addition to the track below. Especially Regina and Elevators. But this song is just a terrific straightforward pop song. Enjoy!
The return of Jason Lytle was almost completely unheralded, but now that I’ve finally listened to his post-Grandaddy album, Yours Truly, The Commuter, I can say that it is a massive norepinephrine rush of nostalgia tinged with post-Pink Floyd sensibility and sprinkles of utter brilliance.
I picked this particular track for Pinko Punko, since it is super Jeddy-like and it evokes Lawn and So On from Under The Western Freeway. Short, sweet, and kind of melancholy. The beginning is so Dark Side of the Moon, I almost laughed out loud, but then it settled into a replica of old Grandaddy and I got really sad for Jed.
Likely a dance punk outfit that realized it would be more fun to be a groove/minimalist funk/space disco band than a rock band pretending to play techno, these guys I might guess are a fun show. I saw this vid at Amandagon, and this particular track makes me want to take fake pills and fake smoke but everything else can be very real. The lead vocalist on this track is only guesting and I haven’t listened to the rest of the album yet, so no info there.
One of the joys of Pandora, is that even with an imperfect algorithm, you will be served up bands that you either never had time for or had never heard of, or had heard of only to the extent that you knew Pitchfork might have reviewed one of their albums at some point, meaning you could assign some probability that they might be an indie rock band. I haven’t had time to full explore Modey Lemon’s 2008 offering Season of Sweets, but I really do love this cut. I loved this song from the first listen, rawish yet clean right down the road indie rock, but really well done and you’d imagine it would be great in a little club. There is so much music out there these days that I feel for smaller bands that just slog through- I hope they know that people appreciate just how good hearing a new, good song makes them feel. I’d put this up there with our previously reviewed Snowden track in the pleasant surprises category.
Pandora served this up to me, and they are available on eMusic. They fit my retro, nostalgic pseudo hippyish bar band longings, while also I realize now reminding me a little bit of Heartless Bastards, another Pandora serve that eMusic allowed me to get into. I suspect this will be enjoyed by Zombies.
Both Richard Armitage and Marc Hogan at Pitchfork note what I picked up on first listen of Neon Indian’s Psychic Chasms, the washed out mix tape sound. What could strike as a cynical, and cheap unearned nostalgia is cleared away by the quality of some of the songs. The songs mine that 80s new wave sensitive emo melancholy. They play as tracks from a sub one hit wonder, but the B-sides of those band’s 12 inches that were just so good that the Saturday night DJ would play them on the request show along with Peter Godwin and Intaferon and the kids would tape it off the radio because you just couldn’t buy it.
God damn I always hated it when the cool kids looked cool in their pre-distressed jeans. That’s this album. The songs aren’t quite so under water on headphones, but it stands out on the old fashioned speakers. MGMT would be Neon Indian if MGMT weren’t completely manufactured shitheads.
I heard this song on XM radio when I was on a Jet Blue flight from Long Beach to Chicago, and it made an impression. It sounded like an American version of some stuff I’ve heard from Broadcast. It’s the opening track from their new album Memoirs at the End of the Word. Interestingly, when you rip this CD and import it into iTunes, the genre tag is “Soundtrack”, which is kind of funny since I don’t think any of these songs appear on any soundtracks. But the whole album sounds like it’s full of songs that could be on movie soundtracks, and this song in particular has a real early James Bond feel to it.
I saw these guys in concert last night with Brookville, which is one of the side projects of Andy Chase (Ivy, Paco). Great show. Only about 50 people there, and Tim Yehezkely, the lead singer for the Postmarks (yes, she’s a girl and her name is Tim, and no, that’s not her on the video/album cover actually, I take that back, I think that is her) was kind of dancing by herself through the whole Brookville set. This was going on about five feet in front of me. It was just a cool atmosphere. I feel guilty at those shows, because I kinda like when they aren’t crowded, but at the same time I feel bad for the bands that more people didn’t show up. And if the crowd is like that for a Chicago show, what’s it going to be like when they play Omaha?
Anyway, this whole album is really good, but this is my favorite song from it so far.
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