Carlin had so many years of crusty brilliance ahead of him. He played in Madison not two years ago and still performed with that fucking scary sharpness, at times wicked, gracious, and cute, and he was still working up new material. I remember driving around with Matt listening to the Classic Gold compilation, and how things from those albums, shit I can't always remember off the top of my head, just effortlessly pops out whenever Matt and I see each other. I remember watching the You Are All Diseased special, and how my dad cringed when Carlin described a guy's armpits as smelling "like an anchovy's cunt."
"If there is a God, may he strike this audience dead."
"If they can make machines to save us labor, someday they'll do our hearts the very same favor." —The Dismemberment Plan, "Memory Machine"
"The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe." —Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
And while we're at it, both of these definitely came out before Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind. Take that, Michel Gondry!
(Cloud Cult, American Music Club, and The Forms, Friday, April 11, High Noon Saloon, Madison)
I never expected to hear a phrase like "party foul!" used at an American Music Club show. It seemed about 80 percent of the crowd came only for co-headliners Cloud Cult, a band that deserves the popularity and grabs a nice chunk of the college crowd, especially here in Madison. It wasn't surprising that the Cloud Cult part of the bill seemed to be selling it a lot more than AMC, the senior band and also the one that takes a little more patience and nerdiness.
Still, maybe these fans of Craig Minowa's songs would find some sympathy in Mark Eitzel. Minowa yearns for something greater within the great tragedy of his own life. Eitzel treats all that like a sorrowful burden, though not without humor or redemption. Both of them skin the experience clean and leave it dripping with wonders and terrors, and both apparently create a fine mood for making naive miscalculations. It'll take forever to really beat this into my head, but it's true: Most people don't come to a show like this to explore, even if they've come to see something that's already unusual. (Before I get deeper into this rant, I should note that both headliners played solid sets; openers The Forms put out a decent record last year, but I think they're still fumbling for a good live sound. None of the shit I'm about the nitpick about was enough to put a damper on the general awesomeness of the show itself.)
Behaving well at a show isn't much different from behaving well anywhere else, but the people who aren't used to concerts always seem to make themselves conspicuous. Sorry if that's a snobola remark, but it's impossible not to notice that kind of thing. I am by far the most socially inept person I know, and I usually manage, so I think pretty much anyone else should be able to. I do have one theory about this: So many Americans, even modestly middle-class ones, get used to being waited upon and cleaned up after, everywhere from the five-star steakhouse to the crummy supermarket, that they've decided it's OK to act like slob-ass morons in public. Wherever they go, someone will have to smile and put up with their shitheadedry just to keep the wages and tips coming. ("Perhaps you would like me to wash your dick for you... you little shit.") Answer my dumb questions, help me find stuff I could track down myself if I wasn't such a lazy swine, tolerate my Egg McMuffin breath and irrational temper, and thank me—FUCKING THANK ME, YOU LUCKY PRODUCT OF MY EVER-FLOWING GENEROSITY WHICH HATH MADE THE EARTH BURST WITH GOODNESS—for paying your salary. I am the Customer, auditioning for the role of Caligula.
I've worked a few retail jobs (though not for very long, and my upbringing wasn't exactly blue-collar, in all honesty), and I grew up near Walt Disney World, so I'm not just laying this on college kids. This is for more or less everyone beyond puberty: Grow the fuck up, extend a little more graciousness, take more responsibility. It'll make your days a lot more satisfying. We've all been guilty of asshole-consumer behavior. Only we can redeem ourselves, and it isn't even that hard.
During Cloud Cult's set, someone did indeed party-foul us. Actually, he just spilled a drink down the bar from us, a little thing that could happen to anyone, but when someone describes it as a "party foul," he's really saying, "In retrospect, I was asking for it, broseph!" It wasn't even a particularly messy crowd, but still: Until they get the specific thing they've paid for, the thing that's already won them over, folks can often come off antsy, ungrateful, and eventually, spiteful.
Concerts are a social experience, so it's no surprise if a dozen jerks claim their spots right in front of the stage for a good view of one band and talk all through the other's set. "We're just gonna stand up here and act like dicks until the transcendental healing-rock comes up." There's always a dumbass or 50 in the crowd, so why bitch about it now? Because Cloud Cult really does seem determined to open up the best in people, against all odds and obstacles, be that war and famine or everyday chode-ness.
If some Bob Marley fans or David Bowie fans or Broken Social Scene fans or New Pornographers fans out there want to be grumpy pricks, I can live with that, but to see Cloud Cult's insane and childlike hope lost on Cloud Cult fans? That's too damn sad. Idealism in itself deserves to be treated with skepticism. Idealism coupled with results deserves to rub off. And if people don't come to Cloud Cult for that, what the hell are they getting from it? This band could likely be cashing in a lot bigger, but instead insists on self-releasing its records to ensure the CDs and packaging are made from recycled material, and keeps on following inspiration that's earnest, unsettling, abstract, and often morbid. (Not to mention that it's put out some stunningly ugly record covers.)
Not that this immediately translates into CC fans dorking out over a songwriter like Mark Eitzel. For all his rawness, he can be insular and frustrating, though I like that side of him, especially when the band starts the set with "Decibels And Little Pills," which you can stream from the Breakroom Blastbox on the right. How many people out there saw only a 49-year-old dude in a funny hat? I'm not sure, but at least one guy grumbled, "Get off the stage!" So, in effect, it's possible to go check out a group as eccentric as Cloud Cult and have absolutely no curiosity left over to spare on something else.
In "Month In Tunes Administration," World's Biggest Corporation loads music onto USB sticks to be dropped in bulk upon villages in the developing world. Great for whittling, boiling, or experimental nutrition.
March 2008
As the year goes on, it gets slightly more exciting to have middle-of-the-road-to-mildly-odd white-guy indie-rock tastes. In all sincerity.
DeVotchKa, A Mad And Faithful Telling (Anti-):"Transliterator" wins song of the month, the blustery high point of this disc, and one where DeVotchKa gets so on top of its sounds that it gets harder to pick out the different bits. Gypsy, mariachi, romantic old movie scores may all figure in, but it's all swept together by Nick Urata, a much more powerful songwriter than I'd noticed before.
Retribution Gospel Choir, s/t (Caldo Verde): It's the band Alan Sparhawk uses to get away from Low and rock out, but the best moments are still the frail and quiet ones, the gaps in the wonderful sludge. That said, watching him wrangle a huge, messy guitar sound was pretty much the best part of a month full of awesome shows.
Sun Kil Moon, April (Caldo Verde): Maybe the best set of Mark Kozelek songs I've heard yet. But I feel like the jury will always be out on that, because his stuff has a way of blurring together, in a good way. For whatever reason, these songs do more to bring out the definition that's always under the lilt of his voice and pleasant haze of his guitar.
Jim White, Transnormal Skiperoo (Luaka Bop): Jim White comes back to that bizarre, spirit-twisting intrigue, refreshed with a blast of serenity. Instead of just getting old, he captures the feeling of a new start with the benefit of hindsight.
Make A Rising, Infinite Ellipse And Head With Open Fontanel (High Two): When you unfold the CD booklet, it expands into the most obvious candidate for album cover of the month:
During their show here, those two fish got stabbed by another fish. You could probably take it for granted now that more bands are layering on more instruments, opening up their song structures, and blending pop sweetness with weird abstraction, yet Make A Rising fills it with all these eerie crawlspaces, making for complicated music that never quite crowds out the wondrous and stretched-out hooks.
Destroyer, Trouble In Dreams (Merge): Less like Rubies, more like Streethawk, no complaints.
A dream triggered by a Mekons song should probably be a little more fucked-up and entertaining, but here's what I got a few nights ago:
I approach a street corner and see a crowd of meek-looking grad students (in the dream, I know that they're grad students) belting out the Mekons song "The Building." In its original form, the song is just Jon Langford yelping into a mic and stomping his feet for about two minutes, and I'm never shocked to see the occasional obnoxious demonstration in Madison. (In the dream, I know I'm in Madison, I guess in the neighborhood near the office.) I figure it must be one of those "general comment on the way things are going in this country" kind of protests, like the "1984"s I occasionally see around town, scribbled on street signs by the most articulate person ever.
As the chant breaks up, I round the corner and discover a huge party spilling out of someone's house. The people there tell me it's just a party for no particular reason. It's not particularly crazy or fun. I wander into a room at the back of the house and find a few people sitting on a couch watching the Eagles on TV. Some live video from their '90s reunion. Naturally, everyone in this room looks mega-bored. I sit down for a bit and meet a nice girl. When she leaves, she refuses to give me her number, but tells me to get in touch if I want to talk about "community projects." The end, at least as far as I care to remember. Considering all the weird imagery you could get from songs like "Prince Of Darkness," "Hard To Be Human," or, say, "Ghosts Of American Astronauts," it's a bit of a letdown.
Mack The Knife: Kurt Weill's Greatest Hits Performed by Boston Pops; Morton Gould And His Orchestra; Boston Symphony RCA, 1973
Musicals have always seemed so stiff and dreadfully forced to me. In fact, I tend to hate them (unless they're as funny and warped as, say, Little Shop Of Horrors), and would probably be more comfortable watching snuff films while resting my feet in a bucket of scorpions. I have never seen or heard Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht's The Threepenny Opera. On this instrumental tribute, it is a relief to hear musical-theater melodies that beg to be spun around with drunken romance and silly violence. On Side A's reprise of several Threepenny numbers, 11 members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra still make it sound, well, a bit stiff, but not forced. More importantly, it's clear the music deserves to be rescued from the context of musical theater, if only for safekeeping.
Stream/download: "Threepenny Finale"
Despite similar flaws, the Boston Pops' version of the title track preserves a mystery lost in, say, the cute-'n'-cocky Bobby Darin version. Alright, so the English-language lyrics are worth keeping around, in all their excessive talk about "a body oozin' life" and "when that shark bites." It's just a bit, you know, stiff and forced when stapled onto this elegantly tawdry tune.
Stream/download: "Mack The Knife"
Along with vinyl packaging, we seem to have lost untold amounts of banal pomposity. Not just about the music—there's plenty of that in CD liner notes, after all. On the back of an LP sleeve, there's always room to spare for the babble of corporate audiophiles:
"DYNAFLEX is the RCA trademark for a new development in record manufacturing that provides a smoother, quieter surface and improved ability to reproduce musical sound. This lightweight record also virtually eliminates warpage and turntable slippage."
In "Month In Tunes Administration," World's Biggest Corporation will sample the music used in our FDA-condemned seasonal-affective disorder experiments.
FEBRUARY 2008
A 30-degree day seems like a treat right now: Stupid people are less irritating; food tastes better; everyone's more attractive. Still, it's been hard to get excited about a whole lot of shit. In fact, the well-circulated "recorded in a lonely Wisconsin cabin" story behind Bon Iver's For Emma, For Ever Ago made it all the more tempting to retreat back into the album when Jagjaguwar formally released it this month. A mega-hyped indie record that sounds like the opposite of mindless chatter: That kind of balances out psychologically, right? So, anyways, February at least provided a few ideal records for being left the fuck alone to. Yay!
Earth, The Bees Made Honey In The Lion's Skull(Southern Lord):This post is late because I got my hands on this pretty late in the month and deserved a few good, slow listens. Seven instrumentals basking in open spaces and some amazingly patient playing.Also, album cover of the month goes to Arik Roper:
Promotional snack tie-in, anyone?
Spires That In The Sunset Rise, Curse The Traced Bird(Secret Eye): If Earth's latest recalls a gauzy sunset over a canyon, Spires That In The Sunset Rise recalls, say, a fever with a side of fleas. Ghastly, beautiful vocals scratch up against the sounds of mbira, spike fiddle, and abused banjo. Eastern-folk sounds unravel into free-flowing disorientation. Vid Libert, A Return To Mayaguez(s/r):Vid Libert is a Madison singer-songwriter. When he pokes his head out, he's arguably the best in town. Here's the intro from my local A.V. Club feature on him:
Vid Libert’s new album, A Return To Mayaguez, dips into an isolated seam between his own little world and the real one. Following up on 2005’s Mayaguez, the Madison singer-songwriter filled his eight-track recorder with his own unassuming voice, drums, guitars, melodica, percussion, keys, toy instruments, and more, spacing it all out with a dub-inspired ear for warm layering and reverb. It’s a very good record, to borrow phrase from his song “Make No Mistake,” for getting through the day, whether Libert’s calmly philosophizing about fulfillment on “Maybe That’s Enough” or drifting through the glittery instrumental “Oh, Osho.”
Headlights, Some Racing, Some Stopping (Polyvinyl):Reviewed here. Todd Barry, From Heaven(Comedy Central): February got a crucial Valium-powered cheer-up from Todd Barry's latest. It matched not only the pace of life, but also the graying snowbanks. "I challenge you comedically!" "No, honey! Not again! Remember when we went to that play and you wanted to challenge that actor theatrically? You got your ass handed to you!" American Music Club, The Golden Age(Merge): February got a crucial Valium-powered cheer-up from American Music Club's latest. It matched not only the pace of life, but also the graying snowbanks. "Will there be a band? God, I hope not!" Song of the month: MP3: "All The Lost Souls Welcome You To San Francisco" Random-ass surprise: My friend Shelby was kind enough to introduce me to the work of western-swing standby Bob Wills. Despite his talents as a bandleader, it's hard not to giggle (and improvise along) when he cheers on his bandmates in that ridiculous Mickey Mouse voice (see "Quoted"). Also, hardly random, but I didn't get around to picking up St. Vincent's 2007 album, Marry Me, until a few days ago. Same goes for Pissed Jeans' second album, Hope For Men:
"I wish that I could push a button and talk in the past and not the present tense..."
Welcome to Untimely Ript, WBC's little showcase for tunes jacked from just about any damn year. Everything will be lovingly yanked from vinyl and full of crackly goodness. I was initially planning to do this as a separate blog altogether, but then I realized I might as well put some more content on the shitty content-starved blog I already fucking have. Plus, if every annoying jackass in America started up a new blog every time he fell out of bed with some gimmicky new idea, there wouldn't be enough room on the Internet for all the world's over-enthusiastic music bloggers to share buckets of MP3s. Right?
Don't expect a great deal of recent stuff, except perhaps the occasional cool 7". It isn't that vinyl is better, or that the past was better, or any of that crap. It's that what you get in the vinyl bins, especially at thrift stores and used-record places and street fairs and whatnot, makes for so many surprises. It's mediated in a strange, arbitrary, and unpredictable way, but not by distributors.
But before getting into all that, I'll share the opening track from a record I really love, in a non-fleeting, non-kitschy way: "Brilliant Mistake," from Elvis Costello's King Of America. It is one of his best albums. I tried to explain why in this A.V. Club piece, so I'll leave it at that for now. It is also totally worth buying in non-crackly MP3 or CD format.
"Every time you eat a steak, a hippie's hacky sack goes into the sewer." —Patton Oswalt
Two instances, all in a Sunday afternoon's strolling:
1. Browsing in a bookstore. There's a poetry reading going on in the middle of the place, and you kind of have to maneuver through the audience to get from section to section. Lots of middle-aged faces knotted up into dazed smiles that say, "Isn't poetry just delightful? Wow, what a wonderful world unfolds for me every time some other fellow steps up to the podium to declaim! Now if only I could track down a taste bud-sizzling bowl of farina..." Still, easy enough to ignore, until one fellow starts cranking up the discomfort, belting out some half-assed satirical rhyme about (I'm paraphrasing here) fossil fuel-burning Bush and his grand greedy schemes. Chuckles and claps after every zinger. The performance ends with a booming cry of "...American GREEEED!" So, there you have it. A little slice of intellectual life in America, and maybe a clue as to why the left seems just a little bit helpless against the reign of Fuckface. Since that encompasses half of my adolescence and all of my adult-ish life so far, I gotta wonder why I don't respond better to the blind anger and mockery it has inspired. Maybe because that shit starts to sound pretty damn dull and useless in its eighth fucking year?
2. Catching up with my pal and his girlfriend in a shop around the corner. My friend, definitely better than I am at stirring up conversations with strangers, has the clerk on a roll about her book in progress. She's got a slightly challenging idea about sexism, gender, and, in short how men have it tough these days. At first I want to lump this in with the previous experience, but it's nice to see some actual effort going on in someone's head, and maybe a bit of modesty too. And then it's time to goof off for the rest of the afternoon. Yay!
Here is an Arrested Development-inspired band name: Dad Likes Leather. It is up for grabs. No need to thank me.
Hell Date: This godless piece of teleshit isn't nearly tough enough on its victims. OK, the dwarf in the little devil suit popping out to deliver the news that, yep, "You're on Hell Date!" is pretty fucked-up, but the meat of the date adds up to rather mild discomfort, at least when one considers the scope of human suffering. Seriously, has anyone on this show ever genuinely feared for his/her life? Better, more deeply fucked ideas to follow.
Readers of 2008, let me tell you a bit about yourselves. 45 percent of you believe in elves; at least three of you are reading this in sweaty socks that rise up too high and emphasize your calves, which is funny because your calves are flabby and do not need to be shown off or further insulated; you represent five legally recognized counties; all of you were involved in extracurricular activities and/or sports in kindergarten; and you'll all get kick-ass reader-appreciation gifts if the current season of Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew ever comes out on DVD.
Once the USB turntable is all set up at WBC headquarters, we'll commence acquisition of audio for Untimely Ript, a blog celebrating random garbage from the bog of forgotten vinyl. More crude stick-mutants and whatnot once outside logistical consultants finish work on our scanner.
In "Month In Tunes Administration," World's Biggest Corporation will sample the music we virally market to our own employees via disposable Zunes issued in our 2,000 break rooms across the globe.
JANUARY 2008
We at World's Biggest Corporation didn't suck up a ton of records this month, due to the unexpected clusterfuckery of daily operations, the shit-ass Wisconsin weather, deteriorating attention spans, re-allocation of resources, and that pesky competition.
Hell, at one point early in the month, this place even had some guests: Louisville, KY band People Noise got caught in a bad pileup on the way into Madison, made it to the venue that night, and played a solid set for about, oh, 20 people. They crashed here while awaiting repairs and were very friendly, then made it out in time to bolt to a gig in Minneapolis. Last year's Ordinary Ghosts is a fine debut, slathered in glistening keyboards and mega-fuzzed guitars. Currently, the band has to sample the keys live, but that somehow doesn't make things stiff or awkward.
Dead Meadow, Old Growth(Feb. 5, Matador): Who knows, maybe this one will fall to the side after a couple weeks. It's a battle between how blatantly this band reaches back to all manner of olden psychedelia and blues-rock, and how sweet and earthy it all sounds.
Which brings us to...
Black Mountain, In The Future (Jagjaguwar): I won't even pretend that I've learned my way around this one yet, but I do think singer Amber Webber is one of the main reasons this record sticks. Whether she's on backing vocals or taking the lead, as on "Queens Will Play," she's got this frightening shudder in her voice--one of a few things that keep the band fresh as it stomps and riffs through some very familiar pleasures.
Drive-By Truckers, Brighter Than Creation's Dark (New West): Another one that's gonna take a few months to sink in, or maybe all year. "Self-Destructive Zones" is gonna have to be WBC's song of the month. If it's got any competition, it's another highlight from this album, "The Righteous Path."
The Magnetic Fields, Distortion (Nonesuch): The Magnetic Fields' habit of packaging albums with gimmicks really strikes me as a form of self-deprecation. "Let's write a batch of solid pop songs and give them a vaguely country-ish feel (The Charm Of The Highway Strip), make sure they all start with 'I' (I), or just release 69 of them for no reason (69 Love Songs)." This time, the band cheeses itself up with buckets of feedback and fuzz, arbitrarily paired with songwriting that, at heart, doesn't seem much different from anything else Stephin Merritt's ever done. "Old Fools" is just a step away from Highway Strip's "I Have The Moon," both unabashedly maudlin and affectionate songs. They're those moments where Merritt isn't afraid to lay down something universal, a little less disposable. If he weren't so self-conscious, kitschy, and clever, his body of work would make people cry themselves to death. (In a good way?) Hell, I know this is beside the point, but I'd almost like to see him do a completely humorless, gimmick-free record, just for the sake of experiment. At any rate, at least two songs on Distortion--"Please Stop Dancing" and "California Girls"--are new Magnetic Fields disposable-essentials, almost up there with "A Chicken With Its Head Cut Off" and "Two Characters In Search Of A Country Song."
Protest The Hero, Fortress(Vagrant): Imagine Dillinger Escape Plan backed up by a choir of magical horseys, and the mystical glitter-dust that implies, but rammed up against the staggering tightness of super-technical post-hardcore stuff. Weirdly enough, the most tricky-sounding shit here--the operatic vocals and classical-inspired guitar flurries on "Sequoia Throne"--adds a dreamy layer of lightness to the crunch and drudgery. Plus, it's really too bad this blog doesn't have a headwear-design award:
Dub Trio, Another Sound Is Dying(Ipecac): I still think New Heavy is better and more well-rounded, but this new one is pretty gratifying, too, especially for those who favor the instrumental band's brutal, smart-assed side. Also, album cover of the month goes to Martin Kvamme:
Wow, I didn't know you could leave them in the microwave that long. I'm here all week, folks...
Future Of The Left, Curses (Too Pure): The only record I heard this month that's snotty, bratty, and scary enough to excite me on that level.
...And it turns out they're a tad boring to look at. I guess I expected someone with more visible bones, and maybe some boils.
Vampire Weekend, s/t (XL): Review here. It's pleasantly underwhelming, I guess. VW's show in Madison this summer was fun as shit. Outdoors on a warm, breezy night on campus, with sailboats in the background--can't imagine a more ridiculously appropriate venue for it.
Random-ass surprise: The utterly perplexing, primal, and enticing Japan-funk of Yamasuki, as unearthed by Soul Sides.
Shows of the month: The Black-Eyed Snakes and Decibully at the High Noon Saloon, Madison, 1/5; People Noise, High Noon Saloon, Madison, 1/6; The Walkmen and White Rabbits, 1/19 High Noon Saloon, Madison; El Valiente, 1/11, King Club, Madison; The Runners-Up and Patchwork, 1/17, High Noon Saloon, Madison; Editors, 1/29, Majestic Theatre, Madison.
Escargot Escarmergency: If you can buy plastic bottles of Perrier by the dozen from Costco, life's other fine luxuries ought to catch up, eh? On the way to the yacht, swing through our drive-thru window to pick up a steamin' platter of snails. Visit us soon, and you'll get those little critters in a commemorative-edition Super Bowl XLII escargot dish (also available at participating Exxon locations). It goes without saying that once this bastard's turning a profit, we'll be rolling out the mail-order wing. If it's your birthday: Enjoy a complimentary appetizer-sized serving of fugu poppers.
853 Woodcrest Terrace: The servers here are hardly servers at all, but nice, hospitable folks sharing the fruits of suburban life on the cusp of retirement. As they bustle about taking care of laundry and calling the kids (all grown up now), they'll occasionally turn to grab you a lemon bar or a beer from the fridge. If you're lucky, one of our hale and hearty "Pop" servers will reach into his special cabinet and share a jolt of that single malt he got for Christmas a couple years back. While the mild-mannered afternoon away with back issues of Reader's Digest, the family's photo albums, and the reassuring hum of the refrigerator (they used to call it "the ice box," you know). If it's your birthday: It's awkward that you'd come hang with a stranger's parents on your goddamn birthday, but we'll do our best to cheer you up.
What better way to convey mankind's wonderment at technology than with an image of a woman in crosshairs, holding up a huge "@" like it's a prized golden pumpkin? This image shows up on the login page of the Baltimore airport's pay wi-fi system. And seriously, it's better than Magic Headache Elixir and Hand-Shoveled Irrigation System combined. Check this shit out, o ye mighty!
Let us now weep for America's children, and the atrocious graphic design--no, shitty old-school Paint work--that gathers to brutalize their eyes. Not to mention all the horrid beige pantsuits they'll have to wear.
I hate making lists. It is now officially out of my system until November or so. In fact, this roundup of "other stuff I really liked in 2007" is still incomplete, and I can even name things that I've left out, but, well, fuck it.
Les Savy Fav, Let's Stay Friends (Frenchkiss): Likable, explosive, sweet, and funny from start to finish. Would've been at least an honorable mention, had I bought it sooner. Plus, who knew that horseback riding could be so sexually charged?
Wolves In The Throne Room, Two Hunters (Southern Lord): You know you're a Slate fan, and a relative metal novice, when you let that venerable web-mag tell you what metal to buy. Then again, Slate rarely disappoints me, so why the hell not? And why is black metal so improbably soothing?
The Zincs, Black Pompadour (Thrill Jockey): It feels kind of detached at first (what with song titles like "Rice Scars" and all). The songs have a way of warming up after a while, and some, especially "Head East Kaspar," turn out to be quite comforting.
Busdriver, RoadKillOvercoat (Anti): The sarcasm is going to drive some people away before they get in the door. But in any case, rap needs a brilliant spazz-clown with a sense of humor and brain-scrambling delivery.
Bear Claw, Slow Speed: Deep Owls (Sickroom): Back in high school my friend Tony and I had an idea to start a band with two bass guitars. We had no idea that at least two awesome post-punk bands (Dianogah and Bear Claw) already had this covered. We still thought Dream Theater was cool. Sigh.
Nina Nastasia And Jim White, You Follow Me (Fat Cat): If I were one to neurotically obsess over past best-of lists, I'd declare myself a toad for not including this one. A toad, I say!
Low, Drums And Guns: See above. Sinners, never forget that Alan Sparhawk ate cake for you!
Saturday Looks Good To Me, Fill Up The Room (K Records): For such a mess of a band/collective/bedroom-pop project, SLGTM has proven remarkably consistent. "Make A Plan" and "Money In The Afterlife" count among Fred Thomas' best songs.
Bat For Lashes, Fur And Gold (Caroline): The mystery wears off after a few listens, but there's solid dark pop underneath. Plus, Natasha Khan actually pulls off the whole exotic-costume thing with some dignity intact. (Take that, Juliette Lewis!) I actually watched people attempting to dance to this song at a club in Orlando recently. Good laughs.
Figurines, When The Deer Wore Blue (Control Group): Merits both sincere appreciation and genuine or sarcastic "AWWWWW!"s.
Bishop Allen, The Broken String (Dead Oceans): This album's main single isn't its best song by far. The album glimpses at the band's very solid and agreeable songwriting—sometimes enjoyable enough, and sometimes close to greatness:
John Carpenter's The Thing should eventually rank among history's finest horror movies. However, Ennio Morricone's score--a perfect companion to the movie's expanse of cold and foreboding--is a bitch to come by. Luckily, some dude has posted some of the tracks on YouTube.
Doing my second best-of list for The A.V. Club made me neurotic. I stand by it and all, but it's also worth measuring a year's music by the stuff one leaves off lists like this. Case in point, my ballot includes a list of "stuff I haven't had enough time to chew on but would likely give an honorable mention if I had"--was that supposed to get past my editors? So, what the hell, here's a whole bunch of other stuff that'll be worth chewing on in the future.
Dub Trio, Cool Out And Coexist (ROIR): It's dub, swampy instrumental metal, and the surprisingly vast territory between the two.
Tinariwen, Aman Iman (World Village): If it's NPR-approved world music, it does more than just get those turtlenecks undulating and lumbar-supportive Audi seats rocking. Tinariwen, from Mali of all places, restores the blues to its primal, thumping state, yet the guitar work can also get tender and melodic.
The Long Blondes, Someone To Drive You Home (Rough Trade): This album is too fucking long--16 songs, just over an hour--but "Only Lovers Left Alive" makes it worthwhile. It matches its obnoxious howling with the kind of wit that makes me wish I hadn't been such a lame high-schooler.
The Rosebuds, Night Of The Furies (Merge): Generally consistent and lush, but the second song, "Cemetery Lawn," is so catchy it makes the rest of the album a bit frustrating by comparison.
Baroness, Red Album (Relapse): Just getting in my first proper listen as I write this. In short, a meaty, mighty metal group that broods and noodles like a fine post-punk band.
Johnathan Rice, Further North (Reprise): Different on every listen, depending on what you're looking for. At the very least, a singer-songwriter record with some flaws and a bitterly memorable opening track:
Maximo Park, Our Earthly Pleasures (Warp): A brash command of hooks and songs full of sneaky cleverness. Also, Paul Smith is a crazy dude in a hat onstage and a nice-enough, if excitable, guy in interviews.
For some reason, I can't seem to find a clip of this nugget:
Peter: As we all know, Christmas is that mystical time of year when the ghost of Jesus rises from the grave to feast on the flesh of the living! So we all sing Christmas Carols to lull him back to sleep. Bob: Outrageous, how dare he say such blasphemy. I've got to do something. Man #1: Bob, there's nothing you can do. Bob: Well, I guess I'll just have to develop a sense of humor.
Shout it from the turrets of Medieval Times or the temple of the Egyptian-themed Muvico multiplex: In a just world, Maryland's Arundel Mills Mall would be visible from space. According to Wikipedia, it is "the first enclosed mall to feature a Medieval Times." Sounds like society's got some catching up to do, folks! You can actually enter the MT from the mall, and while you're waiting for the tournament to begin, put away a draft of mead (note: more likely Michelob Ultra or something) at the bar. MT is the mall's southern bookend; at the northern extreme, behold the Muvico Egyptian 24.
Of course, Arundel Mills isn't the largest mall in America, and for all I know, plenty of malls far exceed it. It's most notable, though, for its particularly wearying floor plan, basically a very elongated oval, divided up into five "neighborhoods." Theme-wise, it already spans continents and centuries, and walking around it two or three times gives a person the same feeling. It must take quite a few trips around to get one's memory around the place; a point you remembered on the first trip around might seem to be just in front of you once more, but is in fact a few hundred yards ahead. The trek from FYE to Dairy Queen is particularly arduous, each storefront a bayonet prodding one ahead to a destination from which he'll have to move on again soon.
