The printed word

In a move to counter the decline of printed music writing *, tomorrow will see the release of a fanzine-inspired magazine simply named FAN (wordplay, indeed), to which I'm a contributing writer. My first conrtribution concerns Arfican-American punk and "indie" rock, in some ways a commentary to the argument that modern rock has become the domain of white middle class boys/men. It's true, admittedly, but then again most areas in culture, popular and not, are dominated by white middle class boys/men. I attempt to argue that that's no reason to forget the contributions to punk rock from people with different backgrounds, and that using background as a sort of meassure of quality is problematic, to put it mildly. Anyway, here's the cover of the above-mentioned magazine.



* Since the question's been put to me; yes of course that line was intended to be a bit tounge in cheek.

Miranda Lambert's "Dead Flowers"

The new Miranda Lambert single was released last week (and today world wide), at least digitally (iTunes link). Not sure what to make of this yet. It's certainly no "Famous In a Small Town" or "Guilty In Here". The consensus, though, seems to be that using "dead flowers" as a metaphor for a relationship passed it's prime is beneath a songwriter of Lambert's talent. Agreed.

Music of the Weeks 18+19/09

• Sonic Youth: The Eternal (Matador)
• Wussy: Wussy (Shake It)
• DJ Paul: Scale-A-Ton (Scale-A-Ton/Hypnotize Minds)
  
• Pretty Reckless: "I Really Fucking Love You" (single, unsigned/Uniersal?)
• Gallows: "Black Eyes" (Grey Britain, Warner Bros.)

Singles Jukebox

One of my favorite features of Stylus Magazine, an online music and pop culture zine that closed down just over two years ago, was the Stylus Singles Jukebox. I discovered last week that the feature has been relaunched as a separate website/blog, which you can find here (or by clicking the pic). Many of the "old" contributers are frequently in the panel, including Matos and Frank Kogan.

EMP wrap-ups

More thoughts on the EMP Pop Conf '09 from the interweb.

• Robert Christgau
• Oliver Wang
• Carl Wilson part 1 + part 2
  

Plus, Matos has posted his paper here.

Music of April/09

I keep effing up the weekly updates, so I'm starting a-fresh as of now. Probably won't help, but here we go:

• So So Glos: Tourism/Terrorism (Green Owl) (Yeah, still digging this)
• UGK: UGK 4 Life (Jive)
  
• Conor Oberst and The Mystic Valley Band: Outer South (Merge)
• Grizzly Bear: Veckatimest (Warp)
• Revolutionary Ensemble: Beyond the Boundry of Time (Muteable Music)
• The Baseball Project: Volume 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails (Yep Roc)
• Japandroids: "Young Hearts Spark Fire" (Unfamiliar Records)
• Peaches: "Talk to Me" (Beggars)
• Sonic Youth: "Sacred Trixter" (Matador)
• Girls Can't Catch: "Keep Your Head Up" (?)
  

Charles Mingus birthday broadcast

All day today at WKCR. Highly recommended.

Shiver me timbers, or piracy and record sales

The validity of the recent BI study that claimed pirates buy more music is being questioned by Maura @ Idolator and cohort Eric Harvey, and rightly so. The soon to close Dotshop, a connoisseur's internet shop of sorts, may well be in the right when they claim that they are victims of illegal filesharing.

Thing is, though, I have in fact bought more music because of the availability of free music on the internet, from the simple cause and effect that more music has been more easily available for me to hear before I buy the damn thing. Now while I do not claim to be a typical consumer, whose to say I'm only one in a million? Furthermore, most music fans I know prefer the physical LP or CD to mp3/FLAC/what have you, but this is a banana skin on par with the Nixon "qoute"; I don't know many people and other people may not give a toss or two about what format they listen to, much less how they obtain it. Those people do in fact hurt sales.

Thankfully, the likes of Spotify and their increasing libraries of music may make illegal filesharing for the sake of "getting a taste" increasingly redundant. They are the listening posts of the future, me thinks.

First reports from EMP Pop '09

Ned Raggett steps up to the plate (1+2+3+4). Haven't read anything myself yet, but thought I'd post a link here anyway.

EMP Pop '09 - who's blogging?

The EMP Pop Conference kicks off this Thursday, and I know KEXP 90.3 will blog about the goings-on, but if anyone else are doing any form of writing or updates on the thing, I'd appreciate it if you let me know. Btw, Twitter won't cut it, but if there's nothing else...

Coleman to curate Meltdown '09

Got an e-mail from a friend that alerted me to this. Hmmm, London in June. Why not?
More from FACT magazine.

Music of the Week 13/09

• Abdullah Ibrahim: Senzo (Sunnyside)
  
• The-Dream: "Rockin' That Shit/Thang" (Universal)
  
• The Thermals: "When I Died" (Kill Rock Stars)
  
• The Brakes (aka. brakesbrakesbrakes): "Ancient Mysteries" (Fat Cat)
• Bat For Lashes: Two Suns (Parlophone)
  

Blender no more

X-gau's thoughts on the fall of Blender.

RAPHAEL SAADIQ @ LA BELLEVILLOISE, PARIS (30/01/09)

Received this video from Saadiq's show in Paairs in the mail box the other day. Thought I'd post it here.

Edit: Video removed as it messed up the lay out. You can watch it and a few others here.

Music of the Week 12/09

Slight change of format in the hope I can get things rolling on a regular basis. The basics are the same: music I've enjoyed during the past week, sans write-up, just putting it out there.

• Bat for Lashes: "Daniel" (Parlophone)
  
• Death: "Politicians In My Eyes" (Drag City)
• Henry Threadgill (Sextet): Just the Facts and Pass the Bucket (1983, About Time) & Subject to Change (1985, About Time)
  
• Yeah Yeah Yeahs: "Heads Will Roll" (Polydor)
• David Byrne: live in Oslo, 19.03.2009
  

Death - "Politicians In My Eyes"

I wrote a piece on a closed forum yesterday about the incredible proto punk-band Death (no relation to the metal band), and this morning there's an article on Popmatters using almost the exact "headline" as I did. Oh, well. I'm not accusing anyone. The forum is "invite only", so it may be a case of "brilliant minds think alike." Articles about the band have been written a few times already these last few weeks, in the NY Times, the Guardian, and Stereogum to name a few.
Now, Death. A mid-seventies three piece from Detroit who played an energetic blend of P-funk and Stooges-type rock. The meme that has been going around is that they are precursors to the Bad Brains. In some ways that may be true, especially considering the wailing voice of the singer. But the frenetic bassline, skittering drumming, and accentuated guitars in the verse part of "Politicians In My Eyes" (from 1975) sounds more like something the Minutemen would play a few years later, though the refrain and coda is more in line with the "rock-ier" sides of Funkadelic (I've been told that they shared a studio with the Detorit branch of Funkadelic, which may explain some of the influence) and proto-punk bands like Rocket From the Tombs. Hear for yourselves below.



The compltete recorded output of Death, a mere seven songs, was released by Drag City earlier this year as ...For the World to See.

Wilson, Colbert, taste & Dion

In case you missed Carl "Zoilus" Wilson's appearance on the Colbert Report last week the whole episode can be seen here (the interview with Wilson is in the final part of the show).

by:Larm Friday 20th - short version

Three fairly good gigs yesterday, all of them small in scale but not in ambition. Percussionist Thomas Strønen under the name Pohlitz and saxophonist Håkon Kornstad played solo augmented by samples of their own playing, while the minimalist jazz duo Ballrogg balanced between simple chord structures and melodies and the atonal.

That's it.

by:Larm Thursday 19th - uncut version

It seems by:Larm news' proof reader didn't see eye to eye with me, and cut pieces from some of my reviews that he may have regarded redundant, but that I consider important in getting my view of the music across. Since the paper was printet last night, I see little problem in me posting the original (more or less, I had to rewrite parts of one from memory) reviews on this blog in order to save some face.

REVOLVER! - Mono, Thursday Feb. 19. 18:00

Since much noise and improvisation is based on the physical aspects of sounds rather than musical patterns that more easily appeal to the mind, the music often works better in live settings, where the physicality of the sounds comes more to the fore, than on record. That being said the duo REVOLVER! reveal themselves as no ordinary noise makers. Sure, guitarist Kim Johanessen scratches and pulls the guitar strings in ways that create a wide variety of sounds and noises, though at times it seemed a bit forced. Maybe that is a bit unfair because often enough the sounds he did get out of his instrument were quite riveting. Drummer Fredrik Kirkevold has great chops, variation and drive, not unlike renowned Norwegian jazz and impro drummer Paal Nilssen-Love, and may be a star in the making. When the duo lock together, they create purposeful grooves, at times both jazzy and heavy, and seeing as they are not afraid to slow things down, their music has great range and possibilities.

Bellman - Christianiasalen, Thursday Feb. 19. 20:30

Bellman played a packed Christianiasalen on Friday, which suggests that quite a few had been eager to hear his slightly orchestrated pop with a leaning towards sad beauty, elements that tend to go down well among many Norwegian music fans. Bellman's distinctive voice, high pitched and more than a little androgynous, coupled with the ambient feel of the music could easily be likened to Iceland's Sigur Rós. Bellman's music is more rooted in melodic pop, however, but it follows a similar pattern: slow to mid-tempo songs, where instruments are added as the songs progress and build up to crescendoes often exemplified by ringing guitar tones. The sadness of the songs are underscored by Bellman's singing, along with lyrics like «baby, I'm losing my way» and the telling title of his final song, «Requiem». Still this focus on sadness makes the music seem emotionally one dimensional, but to those more inclined towards the melancholy Bellman may be one of this year's stars of by:Larm

Zanussi 5 - Christianiasalen, Thursday Feb. 19. 22:30

Calling Zanussi 5's music «free jazz» is not entirely wrong, since they play free of the harmonic structures of traditional jazz. In terms of sound and attitude, though, their music has more in common with New York's Down Town music scene of the late 70s and early 80s that mirrored the varied culture of the area with a mix of jazz, funk, folk music, and punk's attitude and energy. Think Lounge Lizards, Last Exit or even James Chance and you are on to something. Zanussi 5 are no traditionalists, however, a point made clear with their closing number, a punkish and playful Balkan-inspired piece. Main man Per Zanussi played an electric bass instead of his acoustic on Friday (he didn't see that, should've been Thursday) , and the addition of Stian Westerhus on electric guitar has added power to their sound, while the interplay between the guitarists, the two sax players and the drummer was frenetically groovy. Zanussi 5 are normally one of Norway's best live bands. Last night, they played like the greatest working band in the world.

Carl Wilson on speech & music, plus rare Air recordings.

Fantastic post by Carl Wilson (Zoilus) where he goes through some of the most notable efforts made by musicians to transform the human speech into music (or connect human speech and music). He has also posted some videoes and sound bites for further insight. It's like the blogging of old, when we had had the time and took the effort to write longer posts on interesting themes.

Not completely unrelated, the other week I came across some rare rocordings of Air with the poet Amiri Baraka (thanks to the Rare Music Curator) made by German radio. I've been able to separate those recordings from the podcast and have uploaded them for your listening pleasure. In my opinion, they represent a fairly successful marriage of poetry and jazz, much due to Baraka's reading, since he seems to be in tune with th music, raisng his voice and tempo according to the music as well as the words (much like a singer would, mind you, althoug Baraka does not sing).

Air (Fred Hopkins, Steve McCall, Henry Threadgill) feat. Amiri Baraka, 20. March, 1982 Koln, Germany, WDR radio broadacast:

"I Love Music"



"Against Bourgeois Art"



"Class Struggle In Music"