I don’t want to oversaturate you with too much from one band, especially since I’ve already done a concert review (read here) and have an interview with Headlights scheduled in about a week, but I do want to share this awesome video I shot of them playing TV at the Pygmalion Fest. The Of Montreal review is coming soon!
MP3 TV
Headlights @ Pictures For Kids Who Can’t Read Good
Yesterday, I got an awesome pacakge from up-and-coming band D.C. band Middle Distance Runner. Not only did they send me their CD, and a hilarious personalized note, but also a slightly used pack of Dentyne Ice Arctic Chill (because in their words, “Apparantly nothing is colder then ice, dentyne ice”). As it turns out, I found both the gum and the album to be extrememly fresh and satisfying.
The album starts off with the wonderfully catchy “Naturally”, and the handclaps draw you right into the album. Garage-rock “Man of the People” is the next track that caught my attention and it has a pretty rockin’ riff that would make Jet jealous. They also manage to fit in some handclaps into this song (is that the MDR trademark?). “Out of Here” is an atmospheric rock song that may draw a few Radiohead comparisons, the guitar solo at the end really wowed me here. But all of those were just preparing you for the best song on the album, “That’s A Lie” which builds up to a triumphant “wall-of-sound” finish. It’s the perfect song to end the album.
Middle Distant Runner’s album “Planes In Flames” is an extremely impressive debut. They’re looking for a record deal, and I know that if I had a label I’d sign them right away. If not for the music, but for all the free Dentyne Ice that I would expect from them. These songs are all personally recommended by me. Don’t leave without listening to them!
MP3 Naturally (left-click to download)
MP3 That’s A Lie (left-click to download)
MP3 Man of the People
MP3 Out of Here
I got the The Cars Unlocked DVD/CD set in the mail today after watching the DVD, I’ve come to a few conclusions. First and foremost, Greg Hawkes is by the far the most awesome keyboardist of the 80’s. He’s absolutely hilarious in every scene that he’s in. (I guess I should explain that as well as having 14 live performances there’s a freakin’ ton of backstage footage on this DVD, and most of it is surprisingly good). In one very memorable scene, Greg is explaining the different food groups that are provided backstage and while he’s doing it he begins throwing the food all over the place and shouting things in a Italian (see pic above). That’s what I call rock n’ roll. In another scene Greg and guitarist Elliot Easton torture a interviewer from the Denver Post until breaking point. Very funny stuff and something I’m sure Cars fans will want to see.
The live shows are nice to have even though, from technical standpoint they’re pretty poor quality. But since these were ripped from 80’s videotape recordings you don’t expect the picture quality or sound to be perfect, and it gives you a sense of 80’s nostalgia in the same way that watching VH1 Classic all the time does. The song selection on the DVD covers everything that I’d want to see from the band besides maybe “Hello, Again”. It’s interesting to note the different hair styles that the band goes through from 1978-1987 and the range on the DVD of the band playing at small clubs to stadums to huge outdoor festivals. If you’re a Cars fan or just enjoy old 80’s concert footage go to Docurama to buy the album. The DVD can be summed up with a quote from Elliot Easton – “The kids were great, they were funny, they threw glass at us, they spit, they puked, I’m glad!”
MP3 Just What I Needed
MP3 Shake It Up
Official Site
Trailer: Quicktime / Windows Media
Boris Yeltsin was the president of Russia between 1991-1999. In fact, he was the first president of Russia. He also holds the Guinness Record for being the most hospitilized world leader. For some reason, a few college students decided to give the man some love and Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin was formed. The band released their debut album, Broom, in 2005 and through a rollercoaster ride of blog mentions and a O.C. music appearance the band landed on Polyvinyl Records this year.
They opened up the Poyvinyl 10th Anniversary Party, and they rocked the house with a variety of songs from their debut and new unreleased songs. Other than a wierd statement that they would kick Sufjan’s ass if he wrote a song about Missouri, their set came off very well and they seemed to have a lot of fun onstage. If you haven’t heard the band yet, give these songs a try and I guarantee that you too will proclaiming your love for Boris Yeltsin.
MP3 Oregon Girl
MP3 Yr Broom
The Deadly Syndrome are a very new band (they just started playing shows last month) from the L.A. music scene. Somehow they must have gotten my address because they sent me their demo last week, and it’s really good. Lots of different styles are represented between the four songs, “The ship that shot itself” is an acoustic folk song with a nice little melody progression. “I hope I become a ghost” is a jazzy Spoon-like piano rock song with a really interesting tempo change in the middle of the song. “Emily Paints” is a dance electronica song that shares some characteristics with New York scene bands like Clap your Hands Say Yeah. “Eucalyptus” is also a bit dancey, but I’d compare it more to Seattle bands like Wolf Parade.
The band covers a lot of genres/music scenes in one short demo (as the cliche goes “there’s something for everyone”), it’ll be interesting to see where the band goes from here, as it seems like they have a lot of options for which direction they want to take their music. Here’s all four tracks (as provided by the band):
MP3 the ship that shot itself
MP3 i hope i become a ghost
MP3 emily paints
MP3 eucalyptus
Murder By Death is a band that I just recently got into and I was only really familiar with the material from their latest album, In Bocca al Lupo. Basically, I didn’t know what to expect when the band hit the stage, but from the murmurings from the crowd you could sense the anticipation and excitement for the show, especially with it being the last show on Murder By Death’s tour. The band immediately tore into some of their older material, which was obviously favored by a crowd made up of mostly die-hard fans. Whereas during Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s set, the percussionist was the funnest member to watch, during this set it was easily the celloist who caught most of my attention. Whether she was fiercly playing the cello or banging on the piano she never lost her intensity during the set.
At one point, Murder By Death’s lead singer, Adam, asked the audience if for the next song, he should play a regular guitar solo or a wanky, horrible sounding guitar solo. The crowd all yelled “wanky” and the band went into “Brother”, which was probably my favorite song on their set (the guitar solo was pretty wanky). During “Boy Decide” the bass player layed out on the ground while Adam stood over him shredding his guitar and yelling to the ceiling (see picture above). The set was full of moments like these. For the encore the band played a few requests from the crowd, the one I remember most being “Intergalatic Menopause”. If you’re a hardcore fan of Murder By Death, you’ve probably seen them live a dozen times and know how great they are. If you aren’t, maybe it’s time for you to join the ranks.
MP3 Brother
MP3 Intergalactic Menopause
View the rest of my pictures from this show at Pictures For Kids Who Can’t Read Good.
Margot & The Nuclear So and So’s was the first band that I saw at the Pygmalion Fest for which I had a lot of built-up excitement. Their live show has been much hyped on blogs, so I went in with high expectations and they were not only met but exceeded. As much as I love the warm folk-pop of “The Dust of 
Our Retreat” in a live setting their songs rocked at least three times harder, and i made the show that much better. The band was short one member (the celloist), but I didn’t think it made too much of a difference, especially when there was none-too-small seven people on stage. What had everybody after the show talking was the energy of the band, and especially of Casey the ancillary percussionist. Best dance moves I’ve seen at an indie show since Belle & Sebastian came around earlier in the year. Due to this and Casey’s occasional primal screams at the audience (see pic on right), the crowd totally got into the performance.
The songs I were looking forward to the most were “Skeleton Key”, “Vampires in Blue Dresses”, and “Quiet as a Mouse” and each of them were performed extremely well. What really stood out though was the incredible ending song, “Barfight Revolution, Power Violence”, which had members of the crowd running on stage and grabbing random instruments to play. Whatever you do, don’t pass up a chance to see Margot… play live, it’s a wonderful concert experience and one I won’t soon forget.
MP3 Skeleton Key
MP3 Quiet As A Mouse
Go to Pictures For Kids Who Can’t Read Good to see all my concert pictures.
While I’ve never seen a full episode of Grey’s Anatomy (I get all the drama I need from Project Runway), I do know that they have great music on the show. A number of artists that I’ve featured or talked about on this site have made it onto the show’s soundtrack and like “The O.C.” even though the show might be unbearable to some at times, the music picks are pretty consistently good. For these reasons, I was really excited when I heard that a song from Sleeping At Last’s new CD, Keep No Score, was going to be featured on the season premiere.
The song that will be played is “Quicksand” which is a song that start’s brilliantly with a minor chords played on a piano and Ryan’s haunting voice and then grows into a triumphant strings-filled ballad. During the last minute of the song, the song takes an interesting turn as the piano again takes center stage the drums take a marching beat. Here’s an MP3 of the song:
MP3 Sleeping At Last – Quicksand
Here’s a few more songs that I like that have been featured on Grey’s Anatomy. After you watch the premiere of The Office tonight, make sure to tune into the season premiere of Grey’s Anatomy at 9/8 central. You can buy Sleeping At Last’s album on the iTunes Store (link).
MP3 The Chalets – Sexy Mistake
MP3 Inara George – Fools In Love
MP3 Wilco – Hummingbird
MP3 The Weepies – World Spins Madly Around
MP3 Maria Taylor – Song Beneath The Song
I’m going to be at Pygmalion Festival starting today. I’ll have a update for you from the fest on Saturday.
In the Shearwater interview that I posted a couple days ago the band’s drummer mentioned that an artist he was listening to named Anni Ross from Chicago, who “plays viola and sings these strange sort of fragile songs”. I was intrigued so I visited her myspace and downloaded a few of her songs. One thing I noticed right away was the similarities in voice and performance who’s recently captured the hearts of nearly every blogger and indie kid out there (including myself), Joanna Newsom. Replace the harp with a viola, and you’re getting an idea of what she sounds like.
There’s a number of lo-fi folk pop songs that Anni Rossi has been rotating on her myspace and I’ve enjoyed all of them. The songs feature some interesting tempo changes, lyrics like “swinging crazily like the stock exchange”, and they are like Thor said, both strange and fragile. Although, I like all her original complositions (“Machine” is especially good), the song that I’ve listened to the most is her cover of Radiohead’s “Creep.” Her voice is a perfect fit for this song – Shaky, delicate, and sometimes just eerie. The best part of the song is at the 1:50 mark, where she goes from soft viola-plucking to complete viola freakout mode. A very interesting and unique take on a classic song. Here’s a few of my favorite songs of hers:
MP3 Creep (Radiohead Cover)
MP3 Machine
MP3 In The Flatlands (left-click to download)
MP3 Pondsnakes (left-click download)
Now It’s Overhead has alot going for them in my book. First, they’re from Athens, Georgia, a town that literally breeds good music. The Athens scene brought us In The Aeroplane Over The Sea, Widespread Panic , Automatic for the People, 1/2 of Gnarls Barkley, and “Rock Lobster”. Secondobly, the band just was signed to Saddle Creek Records who have put out some of my favorite music in the last decade. Thirdly, the members of Azure Ray (Maria Taylor and Orenda Fink) significantly contributed to this album, singing back vocals as well as collaborating with the band on the album’s compositions. Now It’s Overhead lives up to it’s potential here with the satisfying and well-constructed album, Dark Light Daybreak.
The album starts off with “Let The Sirens Rest” which features some washy electric guitars and a nice consistent beat throughout the song that builds to include a sea of background voices near the end of the song. The songs explore a lot of interesting chord progressions and focus on minor chords much more than you’d expect in an pop-oriented record. The acoustic guitars on this album have a very nice sound (or timber if you want to get technical) which you can hear throught the album but takes center stage in the songs “Meaning to Stay” and “Let Up”. Dark Light Daybreak is a good listen and one that I’ll probably go back to multiple times.
MP3 Let The Sirens Rest
MP3 Let Up
MP3 Walls
Bonus: songs from the band’s previous album (courtesy of Saddle Creek):
MP3 Wonderful Scar
MP3 Hold Your Spin
Music For Kids Who Can't Read Good 