Latest entries from heartonastick.blog-city.com

The Communists Who Want to Socialize Your Nazism

J____ — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 21:38:00 GMT

(via, via)

Leave Comment

Where Have All the Quality Heroin Addicts Gone?

J____ — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 03:53:00 GMT

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

What I'm Getting Charlotte Gainsbourg for Christmas: Pants, Lots of Pants.

J____ — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 08:29:00 GMT

Walked out after Antichrist too (shocked? disturbed? apathetic?) numbed to sort the things I liked (there were some of those!) from those I didn't. Perhaps that was Big Lars' desired effect. Before the movie entered its nastiest stretch, I could sigh or laugh away its bad parts. Like the Fantastic Mr. Fox cameo, the relentless acorn hail, or the glorious slo-slo-mo shot of the undulous nutsack. (Non-diagetic insert shot committee, holla.) Even when the ugly stuff first started -- no spoilers! -- what popped into my head was this...

...with the snickering aside, "Well I guess everyone doesn't love a log."

But very quickly nothing was funny at all ever again.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

Black Like Me (‘Manderlay,’ ‘Dogville’)

Question: Is Barack Obama a Hope-Peddling Reptilian Terrorist Hiding Under Cloned Human Flesh Who Plans to Savagely Destroy Our Good American Way of Life?

J____ — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 02:02:00 GMT

Answer: No, Barack Obama is not a hope-peddling reptilian terrorist hiding under cloned human flesh and he does not plan to savagely destroy our good American ways of life.

But it's cool to see that the Visitors have brought with them awesome new big-screen TV technology. How much for underside-of-the-mothership ad space?

Leave Comment

Oh Hey This is Out Now

J____ — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:30:00 GMT

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

For the Win

J____ — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 06:18:00 GMT

(photo by Nick McGlynn, more here)

What's awesome about the St. Louis Rams' first win of the 2009-2010 season -- their first win of all of 2009, for that matter, and their sixth win in their last thirty-four games -- is that it exhibited zero evidence of progress. This wasn't any kind of turning point. The players won't be able to shake the goat off their collective backs and win out the rest of the way. We beat the Detroit Lions, and barely. We only scored the go-ahead TD in the final minutes because of a questionable interference call against Detroit; they wouldn't have been tied with us before that if one of our own players, after having intercepted the Lions deep in our territory, hadn't run backwards into our own end zone and gotten tackled there.

Our first touchdown was scored on a pass from our kicker on a faked field goal attempt; ~~the coach rewarded him by LETTING HIM PLAY THE WHOLE NEXT SERIES AT QUARTERBACK. IN A CLOSE GAME~~. (The second thing was apparently not true! It was a play-by-play and box score error replicated in a couple different places. Totally believable as Marc Bulger was every bit as effective as a place kicker on that series.)

This is not a good team, and I had to laugh when the St. Louis Post-Dispatch suggested that the Rams' 0-7 record had anything to do with the schedule. Games on the road versus teams coming off bye weeks aren't allowed to be factors when your team is losing by an average of ten billion points each week. We have loused opportunities against bad teams (Redskins, Jaguars). The first commenter on that article very rightly pointed out that "As long as the Rams' schedule includes another NFL team, it has been a schedule that has been 'against the Rams.'" This is a very bad team that just happened to barely beat another very bad team. A commenter from Detroit, where I assume the game failed to sell out, said on NFL's Game Center, "I wish this game was blacked out on the radio also."

We had to have this one. Not because it was an easy way to start a winning streak; it was practically our only opportunity to grab air from a sea of failures. Following our bye week we get New Orleans; we will play Arizona twice. Middling teams like Houston, Chicago, and San Francisco are insurmountable opponents for us. Woeful Seattle already beat us by 28 points. I have to think Fisher will have found something right with the Titans by the time we play them.

So even though it doesn't feel good in any way, I'm going to celebrate this lone win. It's always good to be reminded that, on any given Sunday against any one of a very select batch of loser opponents, even the worst teams get the opportunity to feel like someone else sucks more than they do.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

There's No Better Favor You Could Do Your Subconscious

J____ — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 20:00:00 GMT

Leave Comment

Hey Boo Four

J____ — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:56:00 GMT

I was about to post a word of warning, but by now you the drill... the pneumatic drill fast approaching your temple OH NO LOOK OUT thwokthududud schlup snap squishsquishsquish gurgle, gurgle.

End of October, another Nobel Prize-winning Halloween mix.

Play this one in public and people may worry about you. (I'm fine, by the way, thanks.) Sure, there's the mandatory psychobilly, some scattered novelty tunes, a few big names. No thrash, to trash. A happy ending! But it's possible the people you know might want that one Sufjan Stevens song with "Zombie" in its title, or something from the New Moon soundtrack, and what you've got here is bands called "Tentacle Lizardo" and "Tractor Sex Fatality."

You just need to know better people.

Thing starts off pretty mad.

Halloween was built for people you don't recognize, but as Lux left us this past year it only felt right to bring in The Cramps . Other everyday people: The Dolls bring the classic freak anthem from Norton's release of their 1973 demos; The Fleshtones, straight outta Queens; both Screamin' Jay Hawkins and a cover of his anthem (Angola's Os Rocks somehow won a place over Arthur Brown and Diamanda Galas).

The Shrag song is great throwback UK femme punk, X-Ray Spex and all that, but it's sold as horror; they're followed by Mrs. Roman Polanski, who seemed an appropriate addition this year. I don't regret the dip into sex and pregnancy, but do apologize for Lenny & Squiggy's sexist remarks. Just because the 70's-pretending-to-be-the-60's was a different era don't make it right.

Remires! is from Chile - I adore that Sonics cover. Los Saicos is from Peru; they might sound awful worked up over that cat, but from what I've heard they get awful worked up over everything. The 1.0 version of The Horrors (UK). Spellbound's Elvis tribute comes from Ireland. The Hunches and Necessary Evils (who collect awesome rip-quotes) are from In the Red, that's its own country, yes it is. Janelle Monae stops in from outer space."Zombie Love" -- yes, there are two rockabilly songs about Zombies and love here, and oh, there are more -- comes from a Canadian compilation that also includes Switchblade Valentines' "Werebitch" and K.C. & the Moonshine Band's "Wolfwoman." I'm holding off on lycanthropy until Shakira's a less risky inclusion. Awooo.

It's Halloween, but it's also Thanksgiving: Due to technological frakkery, I abandoned plans to lace the list with fearmongering interjection from ultra-liberal performance artist Glenn Beck. Without him, The Strange Boys' "They're Building the Death Camps" and Chris Jensen's "Torture" just didn't make sense. We'll settle for having Beck as our MS Paint posterboy, this year, duded up as a Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell server. (Don't these people look way too happy? The economy's bad and all, but that's the sort of glee you get when someone's pointing a rifle at you off-camera.)

Download full mix: Part One - Part Two.

Individual Tracks:

Looking for different shades of weird? Sound Bites went Nouveau Goth; Gorilla v. Bear got creepy.

You know who's in the area? Well, sure, Future of the Left (myspace). And you should see Future of the Left. But! Also:

Where's their goddamned Rock Band?

That's right, Wisconsin's Zombeatles are doing seasonal stops with their alter-egos The Gomers (myspace) at Asbury Lanes in Asbury Park tonight, and someplace called "Bordentown, New Jersey" on Saturday. It's like Weird Al if Weird Al only did Beatles songs and cannibalism puns and played bowling alleys that aren't in New York City.

"When I roll out of bed in the morning, my floor screams 'Oh no!' while my bed yells, 'Thank God!' My suits are made from discarded tarps used to keep baseball fields dry during rainouts. Sweet mother of Christ, I am a fat fuck."

"If I can't look back at my career and course-correct, I am an idiot. I don't have to make s---, but I also don't want to lose people millions of dollars."

Harlan Ellison to finally get his Christmas ornament residuals.

And I'd just been wondering what Lauren Graham and Newt Gingrich might be up to.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

What Am I Gonna Do in a Submarine?

J____ — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 17:06:00 GMT

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

In Three Years, GWAR Will Be Eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

J____ — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:43:00 GMT

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

Two Ways to Approach Classic French Cinema

J____ — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:43:00 GMT

1. Dread the conclusion from the outset. You know at least one person will die at the end. Could be the matter of putting a period on an extended sentence of suffering which a character or a people or you, the viewer, has gone through. Could be a totally random death thrown in to underline how "profound" this film thinks it has been, or how much Film is like Life, or how much Film is a construct, or how hard-up for a thoughtful, original ending the filmmaker was.

2. Look forward to the ending, because someone French is going to die.

(Apologies if you happen to be French. But I've seen two movies that have wrapped with double suicides in the past week. Also: Why doesn't Monsieur Hulot ever get hit by a truck, and then hit by another truck, and then have a giant FIN dropped on to his skull? Comedy = Tragedy + Dead French Guy, that's what I always say.)

Frankie Rose - Where Do You Run To (Demo)(buy)

This has nothing to do with that, obviously, but good gosh yikes is it pretty. This is the demo Frankie Rose (myspace) -- formerly of Vivian Girls, formerly of Crystal Stilts, currently of her own self and maybe sort-of of The Dum Dum Girls -- recorded of the best song on the VG's debut record. Both this and the lovely b-side to Rose's new single make clear how unnecessary the rudimentary surf chug piled on top of too much of this stuff can be. Tide poolls, not wavves.

This track was included with much other goodness on the CD that accompanied Volume Six of YETI magazine.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

"S.W.A.T. Teams Are Pretty Cool" (Screaming Females/Vivian Girls, Court Tavern (New Brunswick NJ), 1-04-09)

Like a Sound of Nature

J____ — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:37:00 GMT

(photo: Chris Christodoulou)

And the viola player was laughing.

I might be might be depriving myself of the opportunity to glutton away at C'fuckMJ, this year -- every band gets its 15 tweets of fame -- but I wasn't going to miss the musical highlight of the week: The broadcast of Gustavo Dudamel's inaugural appearance as the conductor and musical director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Even though It's been a long while since I've paid serious attention to classical music, the noise around the 28-year-old Venezuelan phenom has been unavoidable. His youth and enthusiasm, his New World origins, and his commitment to education have drawn obvious comparisons to Leonard Bernstein. (To play catch-up, try this New York Times Magazine profile or this breezy 60 Minutes piece.)

This program opened with the premiere of a John Adams piece inspired by film noir (nicely rhythmic, rewarding in parts, limp through others), was headlined by Mahler's First.

Dudamel first gained international notice by winning a Mahler conducting competition, and while the world may not be clamoring for more takes on Mahler's symphonies -- especially the relatively short, audience-friendly First -- they can provide an interesting tool to gauge an orchestra leader's personality and ability. Because the composer aspired to capture the whole of the universe in his works -- it suddenly occurs to me that Shiina Ringo's Karuki Zamen kuri no Hana has more than a little in common with Mahler's symphonies -- they are packed with details and given to sprawl. It becomes a matter of which trees you highlight to signify the forest.

Klaus Tennstedt and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra - Mahler Symphony No. 1 in D Minor, First Movement (mp3)(buy)

Mahler enthusiasts are only slightly less annoying than fantasy sports fanatics. Whole collections amassed around a very finite number of compositions provide endless, irreconcilable arguments. (I own six versions of the Ninth on disc after having heard many more than that; (1) I am hardly in the league of the real enthusiasts (2) it is not my favorite symphony.) It gets properly personal.

My horse in the race is one of the slowest. East German Klaus Tennstedt often conducted a weak orchestra, the London Philharmonic, but he always managed to put everything right where it belonged in an inspired, cohesive way. As he got older, his running times stretched -- this live version from 1990 lasts six minutes longer than his 1978 studio recording -- and some listeners find that dull and unnecessary. These things are long enough as is! But I find a contemplative intensity to them absent in more excited interpretations. Tennstedt was sickly for a lot of the latter part of his life, and confronting the death-obsessed Mahler from the downside of health brought perspective. Moments are savored.

This live recording, my #1 #1 (apparently now out-of-print on CD, available on DVD), also gives Tennstedt a better set of performers. Those Chicago horns were spectacular, and through this first movement they're by turns regal, chipper, cruel, heavenly. (I've always found the Mahler of the CSO's resident director, Sir Georg Solti, to be blunt and uninteresting.)

(Tennstedt's studio recordings of Mahler's complete symphonies are available in an 11-CD box set for a pretty amazing price.)

So how'd the kid do?

If not revelatory, Dudamel's First was very convincing. It came out of the gate very flat. The first movement managed to seem stiff without evoking the opening's rising-dew sluggishness. The woodwind bird calls felt awkward and isolated. It came together by the end, goosed by a few swells, but didn't seem to have anything to say.

The second movement changed everything. Dudamel started it with a very pronounced tempo, as if the lower strings were dragging a heavy undercarriage. As the upper strings and woodwinds joined, he'd allow the piece to accumulate a natural momentum; but every time the music returned to the lower strings' procession, Dudamel brought everything back to zero. It's very bracing to erase forward progress like that; it took what's often a simple repetition in the score and imbued it with struggle. It's a section of the symphony that can very easily fly off and be no more than pleasant. By holding pauses and letting the momentum fall as instruments dropped out, it almost became an ode to wholeness. When the orchestration is full, it's playtime. Extremely impressive.

The third movement is a funeral march built on a minor chord variation of "Frere Jacques;" it's interrupted by outbursts of folk music. The two parts can be played to co-mingle, so that one rises out of the other. Dudamel emphasized the steadiness and solemnity of the former by putting his spirit into the latter. He pursed his lips and rose up and came this close to doing a jig at the head of his orchestra.

While conducting, Dudamel seems less a method actor than a grown-up making faces at children in an effort to get them to react. Through the ticktockier portions of the Adams piece, he tightened his joints and almost popped into The Robot. But one of the great things about this kid is that, for all the energy and attention, he's not (despite this flash version of Dudamel Orchestra Hero) there to play rock star. A lot of the last movement of Mahler's First is rock and roll, big whamboombammy stuff, and Dudamel rocked that. But a lot of that last movement is also the tormented, dreamy syrup the composer dunks you in when you've earned both his worst and best. And, as he had every element since the end of the first movement, Dudamel navigated his players through that very surely.

He's there to communicate the full joy of this music and seems wholly capable of doing so. After the conductor flashed one of his peculiar expressions, the camera showed one of his viola players laughing. I can only imagine he thanked her afterwards and held her up as an example.

In New York, Channel Thirteen is rebroadcasting the concert this Sunday at noon. For other digital options and local listings, etc., search the schedule here.

Great Performances' site is streaming a small selection of the program, and they're selling a DVD. Audio of the Mahler performance - not the Adams, unfortunately -- is available exclusively through (ugh) iTunes.

Classical archives is streaming two other Dudamel performances with the LA Philharmonic, Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra and Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique. PBS is offering two mp3s -- looks like the first movement of Beethoven's 5th and the fucking Nutcracker Suite - of Dudamel conducting his old Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra -- for free.

"Review (n.): A form of online promotional activity. A portmanteau word, from "reblog" and "page view", coined mid 00s."

I know this is weeks old and has been everywhere. But even if you were to consider the entire history of Awesomeness as one single Earth year, this would earn its three-and-a-half minutes.

"As I did nothing interesting yesterday I may as well tell you what Batman is up to at the moment. Batman is being AWESOME."

"The first thing you need to know is that the internet is amazing." (via)

"This marks the biggest collaboration between a vaguely transgressive 90s alt-rock star and a Fox sci-fi show since Shirley Manson played a killer robot on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles."

"In between assignments, Martha earned WWII pin-up exposure in such magazines as Yank: The Army Weekly."

Summing up the decade in music with mean, mean goodness:

"Early ’00s: Every boy band success story came with three mongoloid cousins in bleached tips. Creed dug up Kurt Cobain’s Eddie Vedder’s corpse, raped it, and spawned hundreds of hhhuruuurrgging monster babies. Heavy rock music became the macho soundtrack to movie sequels about revving motorcycles (that is, except for “real” rock music like the Vines). The Postal Service invented funk and soul for a generation. People convinced themselves they liked Sigur Ros for maybe a day. Mid ’00s: Rock radio became a revolving door of sad, old ’90s bands releasing ballads you’ll maybe hear at your cousin’s wedding. Adult males wore eyeliner. Creed broke up, spawning the double-headed flaccid penis hydra of Alter Bridge and Scott Stapp solo records. Coldplay fucking existed. American Idol presented a sad farce of democracy even less convincing then the pathetic show that the American government puts on every four years. Bloggers got a sad, moronic superiority complex and convinced themselves that they ran the music industry—and they broke world-famous bands like Annie and the Octopus Project! Late ’00s: The music industry and economy turned to dog shit… and then turned into that weird white dog shit. Labels handed out deals to whatever idiot famewhore had the most MySpace friends, and then churned out bloops in hopes that they’d sound good on a cell phone speaker that’s both smaller and worse-sounding than a spider’s balls. Your favorite band reformed as a balder, fatter version of itself, and became your fifth-favorite band. Rappers forgot they had to actually rap on songs. Creed got back together. Indie rock became so successful that Zooey Deschanel somehow found Ben Gibbard anything less than completely repulsive."

(I had trouble pulling quotes from that. It'd be like drawing a dick on the Mona Lisa. Click through , okay?)

'Jessica Alba is really hot. Kind of. I mean, she is. In her face. But the more you learn about her, the less hot she seems. For one thing, she's not very good at acting, which is her job. And that's problematic. It's better when people are good at their jobs. Then they can take pride in what they do, and you can take pride with them. Yay! When they're bad at their jobs, it's just like, eesh. Not that Jessica Alba doesn't have millions of dollars to help ease the pain of her terrible case of The Eeshes. But, you know. And also, I read this interview with her once where she talked about how as a child she was riddled with health problems and how doctors didn't think she was going to live very long? The article was positing this fact as some kind of uplifting story about a girl who triumphed against all of the odds to be hot. "Doctors didn't think she was going to be very hot, but then it turned out later that she was hot. Here is a box of tissues for your tears of awe-struck joy." But the article had the opposite affect on me. Now whenever I see Jessica Alba, all I can think about is a bent over tiny child crippled by disease. I'm always nervous watching her, like she's going to collapse in a heap, phlegm running out of her nose, thin, watery blood foaming at her mouth, and big, watery, yellow eyes staring into the camera as she squeaks out a thin, barely audible plea. "Kill me. Please."'

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

So That Our Hearts Don't Burn to the Ground

NaBr

J____ — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 17:32:00 GMT

It's unsettling how well Washed Out (myspace) flows into Nellie McKay's Doris Day tribute album.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

Urn It

J____ — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 16:08:00 GMT

Renate Kern und das Orchester Kai Warner - Der Wassermann (mp3)(buy)

Contrived hippie anthems just haven't fulfilled their potential until they've been translated into the language of love and peace. So let's raise a quick Prost to the compilers of Funky Fräuleins: Female Beat, Groove, Disco, Funk in Germany 1968-1978 for somehow turning a collection of very wrong-sounding tracks into compulsive listening.

Despite the goodly string of categories in the disc's subtitle, and the stylistic turns the songs take, this is awkward, mock-hip pop. The very concept of German pop music seems flawed to me. Every love song must portray either tragedy or a cross-fingered promise to respect your boundaries. There's nothing light about the language. The frivolous elements of the traditional culture seem as retarded as shoving your dick in a cuckoo clock. Speaking of which, have you seen their porn?! By, like, accident? There's this confusion between "fun" and "cruelty" that could explain way too much. If you're as fiercely fond of stereotypes as I, you'll grant the Germans their darkness and their anger and look the other way when things collapse into coy cabaret or fail straight through to camp. At least the songs will end on time.

(Disclosure: I am half German, from my father's side. One of my father's favorite jokes is: "What's the shortest book in the world? 1,000 Years of German Humor." I have only been to Germany once. Out of curiosity, in one restaurant I ordered something called a "sausage salad." It turned out to be a heap of shaved baloney and onions drizzled with oil. I have only been to Germany once.)

It's embarrassing to think Hair's "Aquarius" might have ever been considered acceptable music. (Disclosure: I am a Pisces) This overbearing, eager-elbows reading doesn't compound the embarrassment; it exacts vengeance on the original. "Der Vasserman" sounds more like an illicit interrogator who has ways of making you squawk. I picture Cheney-as-Burgess Meredith on the old Batman set, standing next to a brightly-colored inclined board.

Compounding the discomfort: After scoring a handful of low-level pop hits in her native land ("Der Vasserman" was not one of those), Renate Kern remade herself as country singer "Nancy Wood." Wood would be (with "Peggy Peters") one of two Germans to land on the American country charts ("Imagine That," #79, 1981). A decade later she would hang herself.

Here she is lip-synching along to her recording of Loretta Lynn's "Lyin' Cheatin' Woman Chasin' Honky Tonkin' Whisky Drinkin' You." You will watch it and you will enjoy it!

Leave Comment

Rumpus? Rump You.

J____ — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 23:59:00 GMT

Oh, Spike. The creatures were lovely. The characters were fine, I guess. Though I don't know whose idea it was to turn the Satanic goat-thing into a self-pitying schlub. Casting Zooey Deschanel as Max was probably a mistake; at least she didn't try to sing. But the whole best part of the movie was its first thirty seconds. Everything after that seemed so safe. I did not expect to get stranded on Let's Talk About Our Fucking Feelings Island.

"We'll eat you up, we love you so!" always had this primal, disturbing power. Now it's a sniffy toodle-loo. Boo.

Maybe the opera was better?

Leave Comment

Yeti Don't Dance

J____ — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 21:12:00 GMT

MP3 and vinyl on Tuesday; CD on 11/09. (myspace)

(Apologies to Jerry.)

Oh, the new Flaming Lips is *psychedelic.* While the urge to remake Dark Side of the Moon is understandable, Ummagumma might be more appropriate.

Oh, Wes Anderson directed his animated film via e-mail, "providing short films of himself enacting certain scenes." "...it's a picture for people who would rather drive a 1953 Jaguar XK 120 than a new one ." So, oh, fuck you little people stuck on mass transit.

Oh, witches are *sexy.*

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

We Bring Good Things to Life

J____ — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 19:19:00 GMT

Paramore, "Ignorance"

People keep trying to tell me this band (myspace) is really something, I keep hearing a lot of not much.

In tiny tuneful snatches, they're fine. Paramore has a fine sense of melody and a singer with a forceful voice. Their new record, Brand New Eyes, has a few standout moments. There's a stunning, slurred run in "All I Wanted" that seams unreal (and who knows, might be).

Most of the time, though, their adherence to genre ensures an unexciting jog in place. For all the crispness, how dull are those guitar parts? Even if you're willing to grant the band sarcasm -- and I'm desperate to believe that more than a single thing is ever going on in their music -- how shameful is the audience-baiting in "Where the Lines Overlap:" "I've got a feeling if I sing this loud enough you would sing it back to me" is a refrain, the stand-out line in its chorus is "No one is as lucky is as us." When they back off for a ballad, like "The Only Exception," everything still feels presupposed, regulated. If there's redundant purpose to making the "ba da pa ba da pa pa das" in "Brick By Boring Brick" sound trapped, it feels more typical that pointed. (The album cover is also a literal depiction of a lyric from that song.) Whenever the lyrics don't lock-step, Hayley Williams' phrasing gets awkward. They need the cage.

I'm not saying that Paramore isn't as good as all the male-fronted pop-punk bands out there, but I'm certainly not ready to suck the Kool-Aid out of Williams' hair. "Ignorance" has good punch, is well placed, and if it weren't made less interesting by the whole rest of their record I'd be willing to force it on more people. Right now, this is just a genre band, a two-star Western that might never make its way to DVD.

Magneta Lane - Castles (mp3)(buy?)

Lexi Valentine's voice has such singular purity and controlled emotional range that she can get away with seeming several things at once. She's the sarcastic romantic, she'll dole wizened advice while playing dress-up, she can roll her eyes while still looking straight into yours. She incessantly appends affectionate terms of direct address (baby, darling, dear...) without giving gauge as to how affectionate or direct she's actually being. Valentine drops the most leaden la-de-das since Diane Keaton.

I only saw her band, Ontario's Magneta Lane (myspace), once. This was in April, 2006, an early slot at the Mercury Lounge. (I think their most recent date here was August of the same year, at the same venue; it's possible their only U.S. shows have been in NYC and SXSW.) I'd gone in having heard their excellent EP The Constant Lover (if you have twenty minutes and need to feel like all is right with the world, go stream that) and was desperate to walk away proclaiming a new Blondie. And they were fine, a trio of girls who could've cut third-period algebra to perform. (Valentine can sound like Debbie Harry, but she looks a little like Maeby from Arrested Development). "They're like a female Strokes," I said, disappointed. Someone (Baum, perhaps) said back something like, "That's good enough for me."

It sure is, now. In 2006, Magneta Lane had followed the wow of that EP with a huh of a record. Dancing with Daggers contained some good stuff, but made the weird choice to bury the vocals. It's as if, to emphasize that they were a "rock" band, they had to hide their most distinctive element and become downright regular. But their new record, released a month ago in Canada, sings. Most of Gambling with God puts Valentine's sigh/purr back where it belongs, in the middle, wrapped around the hum of their songs. It's a lovely piece of work.

And it has arrived with almost zero push. It's unavailable, as of yet, in the States. But the band's own label still lists Gambling as "coming soon." The group is not presently touring. Record's at least on Amazon Canada - but not digitally, and no one seems to have bothered to provide the store with the album's artwork. The album's spent three years toiling in the promise bin; the fulfillment is there, the delivery practically invisible.

The Shivvers - Please Stand By (mp3)(buy)

Oh, The Shivvers (myspace). While they're probably best known -- when known at all -- for "Teenline," it's this other phone song that gets stuck in my head. The best thing about this little Wisconsin band -- which crumbled when they all knew they were ready for bigger things, and couldn't decide how to pursue them -- was how naturally songwriter Jill Kossoris naturally imbued their power pop with the spirit, and sometimes form, of girl group. Her pinched vocals and relentless longing are as insidious as her melodies. Never leaves your head, you won't want it to.

It's amazing how Hyped to Death's collection of everything the band put to tape (including a live set), Lost Hits from Milwaukee's First Family of Power Pop: 1979-82, plays like a greatest hits compilation. H2D also named its line of comps featuring overlooked DIY power-pop gems after The Shivvers' biggest song. So totally recommended.

Baaba Maal (myspace) is in town! He's at Joe's Pub tomorrow night; his myspace also has him at Irving Plaza next April. He was supposed to be on Fallon the other night with The Brazilian Girls; don't know if their visa issues stopped that or if they got bumped. Hadn't even heard about his new record.

Tom Waits is offering the whole first half of the first CD from his upcoming live set Glitter and Doom for free download. (The second CD is 35 minutes of stage banter, seriously. I'm not sure which disc I'm more excited for.)

Bold as Love is offering Fire in the Dark, "17 tracks from artists who represent the diversity of black rock, Afro-punk, and black alternative music," as a free download through Amazon.

" The crowd was now smaller, but I think it was full of those who were most happy that Hope was back after all these years, and who knew that it might be 2016 before we hear from her (possibly with a mood swing or two) again."

"Andersson sings in an unfiltered voice that favors an avian, hard sound. She also digitally alters the pitch of her voice, making it sound like the voice of male mummy, perhaps singing to himself as he looks through an album of water-damaged photographs."

" I was smiling so wide I could hardly contain it! It felt like the smile was so wide it would rip off the sides of my face and peel backward until my entire skull was exposed in the biggest, happiest smile ever."

"'I know a computer can't make a writer but I think it makes a writer better. Simplicity in writing and simplicity in getting it down, hot and real...' One might think that a computer would lead to a longer line, an increased verbiage, not with Bukowski. The ease of the delete / edit functions was as important as the ability to get one's thoughts down quickly."

'anyway, i'm making a record, as previously blathered about, and this means that my horrible, useless website is getting redone by my friend sonya. i mean, it sucks, which was my choice. i was like "can this look more horrible?" i wish i was kidding, but i happen to like crap. i just do. but she's promised to work with me to make sure it's still unwieldy and awkward, which is good preparation for everything else lcdish, and i promise to be less grumpy about things actually being "useful". it's just that things that are too "useful"... well, i don't entirely trust them. i kind of like useless things... i like dumb meandering things that make me happy and confused, and don't particularly like "effective marketing tools designed for maximum accurate data capture" blah blah blah. it all sounds so sad and functional. i don't like the idea of people sitting in a room talking about the best way to word things to get the right reaction from a base of "users" etc. i don't like thinking that those people used to love to do something, or wanted to be something, and would up measuring the best way to manipulate other people.'

Leave Comment

So Far, The Only Good Thing About the New Melrose Place is How Much Ashlee Simpson-Wentz Cannot Act

J____ — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 02:55:00 GMT

Violet's supposedly got the Andrews sisters' DNA, but Simpson-Wentz' fierce lack of ability reveals the soul of Andrew Shue. She's captivating.

Hey writers: Try punching up the dialogue a little! The Whorin' Lauren Yung story arc is wearin' out its welcome, you've already burned through like five blackmail storylines, and I've yet to hear a single memorable line from anyone. It's a kick to see Tommy Calabro cashing a check, and Ella has some potential when she's given more than clipped second-banana asides. But this is Melrose Place! The water's supposed to sharpen tongues. Locklear will have these dull kids crying for their mommies.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

A Goddamned Guide to All These Goddamned Whale Bands (Part Two, O - W)

J____ — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 16:27:00 GMT

(Jack-o-'lantern pic via RealEstateZebra's Flickr)

(BACK TO PART ONE)

Why "Whale," why now? Does it have something to do with our growing obesity epidemic? Are acts attempting to fight the long tail's fractured constituencies by invoking the planet's largest animal? Who knows, who cares! What matters is that my memory is a finite thing and I've no room in it for all 61 bands I've found hashing this particular tag. As we continue on with our exhaustive (but not comprehensive -- I left out Namu the Disco Whale, just to be mean) guide to contemporary bands calling themselves Whalesomething or Somethingwhale, you could consider harsher judgments as draconian measures made in the face of eroding mental real estate.

Or maybe it's just that my standards don't float. Remember! Every time you start a bad band, God mows down an innocent pedestrian.

Moving on.

Or, The Whale (myspace)

Or, The Whale - Black Rabbit (mp3)(buy)

Who? Overstuffed San Francisco roots-rock band whips out Moby Dick's subtitle. Sometimes rousing, sometimes lovely, often very plain. They like their male/female vocal harmonies. It's a good thing that song up there eventually gets past sounding like "Cortez the Killer."

Choice Lyric: "Your heavy heart was loaded with ache. We've got no time to relive mistakes."

Choice Bio Quote: "The song 'Datura' is a rollicking ode to the hallucinogenic properties of jimson weed, but could just as easily be a description of the band itself."

Works: Or, The Whale (Seany, 2009), Light Poles and Pines (Seany, 2007)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Not a bad thing to keep in the back of your mind for when you need this sort of thing. At least until the next thing of this sort comes along.

Pilot Whale (1)(myspace)

Who? Some dude from Springfield, Missouri who has fun singing along to his prerecorded dance music. If James Murphy and Dick Valentine had a baby and named it Jimmy Carter, this would be Billy.

Choice Lyric: "All the sweet sweet girls are makin' dirty dirty love to all the dirty dirty boys in the sweet sweet club."

Choice Bio Quote: " Born in a greasy spoon, raised at a biker bar, and weaned on synth pop and funk, this Pilot Whale will grab your leg and won't let go until you're either dancing or dead."

Works: After a beer or two.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Only to remind yourself what it's all about.

Pilot Whale (2)(myspace)

Who? Cookie-cutter-sounding Orange County Indie Rock band. Formerly called "My Compatriots."

Choice Lyric: "Don't want to be another mechanical robot that rusts and falls to its knees."

Choice Bio Quote: "Pilot Whale is ready and eager to share their music to world with utmost sincerity and passion."

Choice Band Member's Girlfriend's Blog Quote: "This is what a very small portion of the world has been longing for since the day they thought the music scene just about lost its soul. Music is going to be real and powerful again after a long awaited generation has missed the truth about the heart of music."

Works: So far, ninety seconds of promo tracks on their myspace.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? I don't know if there's room on the planet for two bands called Pilot Whale. I don't know if there's room for one.

Pink Dead Whale (myspace)

Who? One-person Ontarian dance music. Feels a step slow to me, which could be either the caffeine in me or the Canada in the tunes.

Choice Myspace Blog Quote: " I get called dead pink whale a good portion of the time anyone says the name but I really don't understand why. Dead pink whale hardly makes sense."

Works: Streaming tracks.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? "This whale is dead, for now."

Prints of Whales (myspace)

Who? Pun-wielding UK hootenanny throwdown.

Choice Lyric: "Listen up people, here's another shit song."

Choice Myspace Quote: "Putting the 'O' back into Cuntry"

Works: Very, very occasionally.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Not while on this side of the Atlantic.

Said the Whale (myspace)

Said the Whale - This City's a Mess (mp3)(buy)

Who? Vancouver quintet that makes amiable, tuneful, but slight indie rock. At least they shift styles. The song above songs like cut-rate BSS, they have a New Pornosish song, they have stuff with more kick and bounce. "Camillo (The Magician)" has an agreeable chug. The two male leads alternate songwriting duties, and I haven't the heart to look into which is responsible for the ones with the miserable lyrics. They sound like sweet kids, but if you're going to write anything like "I've got love handles but I can't handle love," then you deserve all the scorn the world can summon.

Choice Lyric: "That's where the art comes out, that's where the truth of the heart comes out." And that's where the bamboo goes in.

Choice Bio Quote: "Call me Ishmail."

Works: Islands Disappear (Hidden Pony, 10/13/2009), Howe Sounds/Taking Abalonia (Hidden Pony, 2008), assorted EPs

Should You Bother Remembering Them? I think I heard it thusly: Their early songs were all hometown affairs, the new record's songs were written around Canadian towns they encountered while on tour. And I was about to say something like, "Yesterday, Vancouver. Today, Canada. Tomorrow, the world?" when I remembered that I have actually seen this band. I have listened to their two records about five times this week, and I just remembered that now.

Maybe they should just be satisfied with Canada.

Band might be more memorable were they to give "the Whale" something to say. Like "FART!" "Fart," Said the Whale. "FAHHHHHHHHHHRRRRRRT!" There. Remember that.

Sail a Whale (myspace)

Sail a Whale - See You Inside (mp3)(via)

Who? Swedish electronic duo. Likes: Kaleidoscopes, making reading recommendations, mystery, m83.

Choice Interview? Quote: "Most of our personal mythology comes from dreaming. But you already knew that."

Works: So far, two downloadable songs, three videos. Japanese 7" tk.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? It's pretty stuff, but right now they're probably best known for a remix of a song by some guy who's gone through three Tapes/Cassettes names I've managed to forget.

Selfish Whales (myspace)

Who? Shortbus eight-person indie folk group from Indiana University illustrates just how easy it is to rely on bowed instruments and communal yelping. Too embryonic to earn my ire, but there you have it. I don't even know who to blame, anymore. Holy crap, Noah and the Whale is listed among their "influences." Shit's happening exponentially, anyone got a harpoon?

Choice Lyric: "I wrote a song, yeah, this is my song. It's only got five chords, you can probably play along. And I play guitar, yeah, as far as you know. 'Cause the notes all work and the rhythm does flow. Here I am, making music... singing about myself, thinking about myself, talking about me."

Choice Myspace Blog Quote: " We just wanted to tell you that we're in our basement right now setting up to record something! It doesn't smell the best, but it IS free!"

Works: Demos, live recordings.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? What happens in Dogpatch should stay in Dogpatch.

Simien the Whale (myspace)

Simien the Whale - Re-Energized in a Man's Life (mp3)(buy)

Who? Lite-funk duo from Grand Rapids, Michigan. Named after a misheard Rusted Root lyric. They have covered Kriss Kross' "Jump." You will wish they hadn't.

Choice Lyric: "Time and time again she floated, assisted by helium, ran a course right through the shadows to merge to a line of Freon." Or something like that.

Choice Bio Quote: " An ode to the lovable losers and journeyman socio-philes in this world, Tory SPeterson and Zach Guy have encouraged the inclusion of wallflowers and would-be prom kings and queens through their mix of indie/alternative and break-beat rock."

Choice Interview Quote: "Maybe Simien exists, y'know, maybe he waits tables in West Palm Beach, Florida, and he's just trying to make some friends in the world. And, you know, he doesn't really shave every day, and really likes Highlights magazines, he hasn't grown up all the way. Just a journeyman sociophile... and then we kinda made up friends for Simien... He does lead a lonely life."

Works: 1982 (2008)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Whatever. Unrelated philosophical question: Say the existence of The Spin Doctors caused some deceased set of musicians to start rolling in their graves. And then, say The Spin Doctors all died and were buried together (BFFRIP), and some band came along that made them start rolling in their grave. Would the two sets of rolling corpses cancel each other out? Or aggravate a fault line? Or make the water in Australia start draining clockwise? This is important, people.

Sleep Whale (myspace)

Sleep Whale - Josh Likes Me (mp3)(buy)

Sleep Whale - Cotton Curls (mp3)(preorder)

Who? Ambient group out of Denton, Texas. Used to be called "Mom." Their EP (stream) provides intensely pleasurable electro/acoustic background music; the two tracks released from their forthcoming full-length err towards less fulfilling psychedelic pop.

Choice Lyric: "There's magic in everything."

Choice Myspace Quote: "beep blip boop... bowed guitar"

Works: Houseboat (Western Vinyl, 11/2009), Little Brite EP (Western Vinyl, 2007)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? If this is your thing these could be your guys. But I thought this town was supposed to be giving us Satan's Fingers and The Hospital Bombers.

TokyoSexWhale (myspace)

TokyoSexWhale - 10 Minutes (mp3)(buy)

Who? Femme-fronted hard rock trio from Ottawa sorta named after the former South African anti-apartheid activist. Points for not promoting themselves with leering photos of their lead singer. The song above is about Astro Boy.

Choice Lyric: "Now you're a bad hangover. Memory of a headache taking control."

Choice Bio Quote: " Audiences looking for a "wall of sound" will be ecstatic after experiencing a TokyoSexWhale show...Guaranteed."

Choice Myspace Band Pic:

Choice Band Blog Quote: " We had our first jamz in about 3 weeks and it was rockin'!!! JP had his gypsy foot was in full effect, Yogi's amps were functioning, loud and he tried some move that he saw somewhere that was quickly dismissed as "emo" (we love you Yogi!), and Julia was rockin' her new black hair despite the battery in her Fulltone dying. She rectified the situation by just plugging in her BigMuff which did the trick just fine."

Sad Myspace Factoid: Apparently, myspace.com/tokyosexwhale was already taken .

Works: Feed the Beast (Last Drag, 2007)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? A memorable band name is one of the few things these guys have going for them...

Tokyo Sexwhale (myspace)

Are you fucking kidding me? (Sexwale seems to have also inspired a fake blog.)

Tokyo Sexwhale - A Shot in the Dark (mp3)

Who? Surfjazzfusion four-piece from Ann Arbor determined to jam all o'er yr nuptials.

Choice Variation on a Theme from an '80s Detective Show:

Are you fucking kidding me?

Bet they're dying to go Post-to-Post with moe. side-project Ha Ha the Moose.

Choice Bio Quote: "Tokyo Sexwhale was born a child of nostalgia, quickly outgrowing it's diapers to don the jumpsuit of a true rock band. Sharpened by the whetstone of improvisation, this four-manimal sets out to make surf rock relevant again by injecting its putrid corpse with liquefied adrenal gland."

Works: Not yet. They do have a shirt.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? I've made an appointment at Lacuna and am prepared to pay whatever they ask.

Tommy and the Whale (myspace)

Tommy and the Whale - The Next Twenty Years or So (mp3)(buy)

Who? Nashville resident Tommy Hans and three other guys who may rotate through each others' bands. Like Noah and..., these guys have scored a car spot; song above comes courtesy Toyota. ("I didn't know you could make money playing music until that happened," Hans said.) Professional, casual, neutered music. A fresh coat of beige paint on an already beige wall. Sometimes brightened by horns.

Choice Lyric: "I open my mouth, no words are coming out."

Choice Bio Quote: " In a city of regurgitated pop-county-CCM-boy bands, Tommy and the Whale have fought back by simply being there and letting the music speak for itself. They have already established an impressive resume that includes shows with some of the 'coolest' bands around these days."

Works: Shoot for the Moon (Esperanza Plantation, 2008)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Who?

Vulture Whale (myspace)

Vulture Whale - Tote it to Cleveland, AL (mp3)(buy!)

Who? Alabaman bar band takes heed from Westerberg and Twain, rocks out all over stylized, colloquial lyrics. Too good to remain a personal favorite. "What Do" might well wind up the best-written song this year, it's that good, you bet.

Choice Lyric: All of them. "Honey, you're really something, you're confusing me so nice. The reflection in the bottle lives inside." "You can bend it with mischief." "I'll let you know when you need old lady shoes." "I get excited when a nun rolls up her sleeve." "Lord in Heaven help us 'cause Momma killed a rebel, don't let it ruin our vacation. She swears she didn't mean it, he never saw it comin', let's act like nothing happened." "Whenever praying's back in season, so are guns." "Drink a beer, make yourself at home, can I get anybody... a beer?" "We were drunk while we were married a week and we both had us a farmer's tan, I like rock songs, hey baby baby yeah."

Choice Bio Quote: " Like the Mud Shark and the Rock Lobster before it, Vulture Whale is quickly making a name for itself in rock's rich taxonomy."

Choice T-Shirt Design:

Works: Vulture Whale (Skybucket, 2009), Vulture Whale (Ol' Elegante, 2007)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? You don't have much choice in the matter. Because I will remind you about them again and again until you learn to do it for yourself.

Wale (pr.Wah-LAY) (myspace)

Wale - The Opening Title Sequence (mp3)(full mixtape)

Wale - The Kramer (mp3)(full mixtape)

Wale (feat. K'Naan) - Um Ricka (prod. Mark Ronson, samples Amadou & Mariam, Fela Kuti )(mp3)(full mixtape)

Who? Maryland/D.C. rapper (born Olubowale Victor Folarin) with a cleverness that extends beyond similes. So good at substantive work that it's disappointing when he settles for anything shallower. He's been releasing mixtapes, singles ("Dig Dug, Shake It," "Nike Boots") and remixes ("W.A.L.E.D.A.N.C.E." etc.) since 2005; his first studio album -- guests include Rihanna, K'Naan; producers include Mark Ronson, TV on the Radio's Dave Sitek (whose tracks include "TV in the Radio," um) -- comes out next month.

The Seinfeld-riffing Mixtape About Nothing -- still available for free download -- has some impressive stuff.

Choice Lyric: "Everybody's shooting, there's really nothing to aim at."

Choice Critical Quote: "Wale has more crossover appeal than weed" - Rolling Stone

Works: Attention: Deficit (Allido/Interscope/Roc Nation, 11/2009), Back to the Feature mixtape (2009), The Mixtape About Nothing (2008), 100 Miles & Running mixtape (2007), Hate is the New Love mixtape (2006), Paint a Picture mixtape (2005)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Yes, whenever he's not overconcerned with correcting you about his name. (It's Wah-LAY.) But if you're going to make a video with Lady Gaga, and you want people to remember you, wouldn't you get her to dress like a titanium platypus or something?

WALL-E (myspace) - Animated robot, digs Streisand musicals.

Whale (fan myspace)

Whale - Pay for Me (mp3)(buy)

Whale - Smoke (mp3)(buy)

Who? I'm straying outside the current pod to show them up: This is the best band here. Horny Swedes worked with Tricky to make a triphoppier Garbage, production-thick heavy-riffed rockers overflowing with personality. Best known for "Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe," though the guitar line from "Pay for Me" was go-to commercial bumper music throughout the late 90s. Currently inactive.

Works: We Care (Virgin, 1995), All Disco Dance Must End in Broken Bones (Virgin, 1998)

Choice Lyric: "You hobo humpin' slobo babe! Get it off, get off, get off of me!"

Choice Myspace Bio Quote: " The sleepy fjords of Sweden, land of saunas, Abba and Volvos. Who could have guessed that among these tranquil pastures and majestic peaks would arise a new force. A force so huge, so all-consuming, so terrible that it would come to be known as Whale."

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Unforgettable.

The Whale/Fiat Lux (myspace)

Who? Motor City Libertarian offering "political satire comedic pop" from North Hollywood. More protest singer than Capitol Steps. Home page has links to The Declaration of Independence and The Bill of Rights.

Choice Lyric: "I'm an American, I'm buying Chinese junk, I'm an American, damn that NAFTA bill is bunk."

Choice Bio Quote: "Bend over and take it like an American. At an early age Whale hit the road as a vagabond troubedor and itinerant film worker."

Works: Here in America (Fiat Lux, 2006)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? You should remember the goddamned First Amendment, that's what you should remember.

The Whale and the Wave (myspace1 AND myspace2)

The Whale and the Wave - I'd Put U and I Together (She Said I Feel Like Jersey (mp3)(more)

Who? Megagoggled emo-inspired singer-songwriter based out of Florida. Specializes in lyrics so vague they're barely there. Should probably drop the guitar and start writing horoscopes.

Choice Lyric: "I think I'm done and you have just begun to become what you've become. It has begun. So write it down and figure it out." I mean, wow. There's like an endless stream of that stuff. "It's time I say just what I think. And it's time to think things out before I speak. And it's times like these that we really live our lives." I shit you not.

Choice Bio Quote: " I write songs of hope, of love, of heartbreak and of remembering a time when nothing mattered but being a kid and having fun. I began playing guitar and writing songs at the age of 15 and have played in numerous bands along the way. I intend to play music until the day I die and anyone that knows me can tell you that it is my life."

Works: The Sound (2009), various EPs

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Remember what?

Whalebones - Blood Bank (mp3)(via)(buy)

Sidebar: WHALEBONE. There are at least three bands called "Whalebone." A "rootsy...funky... folky" instrumental acoustic trio in the UK (site, myspace); a pysch-blues band from either New Jersey or New York (Choice myspace quote: "we're gonna change our goddamn name"); and a "Pro-Whaling Power Metal" act from Hull (myspace). Whalebones (myspace) is - was? - a Seattle group that has/had some pretty good stuff! Stompy stoner rock that doesn't get out of control, nice hippified harmonies. Song up there rocks, effingly. Whalebone Farmhouse (myspace) is a Worcester, Mass. blues duo. Whalebone Jackson (myspace) is a Rhode Island-based R&B/Blues lark. Whalebone Polly (myspace) is a UK female folk duo.

Whale|Horse (myspace)

Who? One of the many, many offshoots of legendary-in-circles Chicago ska-punk band Slapstick. Dan Hanaway's project seems (based on two whole streaming myspace songs) less punk or emo than many of those formed by his ex-bandmates (Thursday, Alkaline Trio, The Lawrence Arms) or even others he'd previously put together (The Broadways, The Honor System). This is full, odd-signatured rock with surprising bursts of melody.

Choice Lyric: "We were born of so many different worlds... Keep it moving on, let this one die..."

Choice Critical Quote: " Great name for a band and a great logo of a horse head attached to a whale body." - Billy Zero, The Radar Report

Works: Count the Electric Sheep EP (Self-released, 2006)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Asterisks to afterthoughts.

Whale Shark (myspace)

Who? Let me answer your question with this question: What would you say if I told you there were a pair of white MCs from Seattle who rapped over The Lion King soundtrack?

Whale Shark - The Lion King (mp3)(more)

Me too! I would say that too! We should be friends.

For their first two records, "Mix Master" Andy Metz (who calls himself "the best hip hop artist alive") and Andrew "Smoke Ninja" McClure also got Ferris Bueller all over "Jaws," "The Godfather" (with guest P. Riddy), "Jurassic Park," and "Cléo from 5 to 7." Their take on "Harry Potter" (also featuring P. Riddy) is so fucking wizard. "Star Wars" they recorded. Listen, you will.

Whale Shark - Star Wars (mp3)(more)

Let's hope George-THX hears this and digitizes us up some Chapter VII: Another Fucking Jedi forthwith'nshit.

Those seeking authentic Puget sounds need look no further than Whale Shark's most recent opus, the "70 minutes of pure sickness" that is Across the Ave. (It is available for free.) There's some earnest love for their hometown, some standard-issue boasting, and a song called "Panther Rage" that employs the Harry Mancini theme. It's better than the Soundtrack stuff. It could always get worse.

Whale Shark - Rock Seattle (mp3)(more)

Choice Lyric: "It don't matter that we won't make a dollar wont even make a penny, no, we keep on droppin' beats."

Choice Bio Quote: " We combine intelligent/meaningful lyrics with a whole new style of music. Our sound is a powerful mix of soulful root hip hop combined with a splash of something new."

Works: Across the Ave (2007), The Soundtrack II: Representin' Deep Blue (2006), The Soundtrack (2004). All self-released and available here.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? For the record, a whale shark is a shark, not a whale. Which doesn't matter for our purposes here, but it's good to know.

Whale Tooth (myspace)

Whale Tooth - Marlboro Beach Bonanza (mp3)(buy)

Who? More Canadians. Bouncy Toronto indie rock; Elise LeGrow's mannered, jazz-inf'd vocals make the band more interesting or more annoying, either of which is better than base-level adequacy. Somehow they're better when they slip into angular post-punk on what seems to be newer material...

...though that might only be because we're in-between waves of that. Still, okay little number.

Choice Lyric: "Don't you think if I could do much better I would? Maybe if you'd give me just one chance I could. In light of the circumstances, well, I think you should."

Works: Whale Tooth EP (Self-released, 2009)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Passable.

White Whale (myspace)

White Whale - The Admiral (mp3)(buy)

Who? Kansan indie-prog outfit that featured an ex-Get Up Kid and a former Butterglorier.

Choice Lyric: "We were holding to our candles too tight and it went out."

Choice Bio Quote: "Call me Ishmael. Or don't. That's entirely up to you."

Works: WWI (Merge, 2006)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? You worked so hard to remember them just three years ago, didn't you? They were on Merge! You really wanted at least one of The Get Up Kids to go on and do something special! And you've already forgotten.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

Three for Three

J____ — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 14:37:00 GMT

An Education

1. Carey Mulligan is almost too good in this. Sometimes her character's written too wise for the part, but she nails the excitement, embarrassment, overcompensation of a teen. Coming in over-acquainted with "Blink," I couldn't help noticing tics Mulligan's Jenny shared with Sally Sparrow. But then, they share the same face.

2. This movie is very well made.

3. The movie is, actually, too well made. It reeks of conservatism both in topic and in handling. For all this talk I've seen about a representation of pre-Beatlemania UK, of cultural shifts and changes in thinking, I can't imagine that the essence of An Education is really all that different from that awful-looking Julia Roberts movie I am never ever going to see. When the movie cords its knees together and sits up straight at the end, it looses its spine. "Blink " was actually better than this.

Paranormal Activity

1. I recently sat down and watched, back-to-back-to-back, three POV "found-footage" horror films: Diary of the Dead, Cloverfield, and The Blair Witch Project. Whatever their merits (Diary's failures are complicated, though I think it had a lot of value as a movie; Cloverfield was just an insulting roller coaster; Blair Witch - which I hadn't seen since it was in theaters - held up surprisingly well and was the strongest of the bunch), they had two things in common: On some level, they were all about how our technology cannot save us. And whatever character held the camera for the longest time in each film quickly became the most annoying asshole in the cast. In Paranormal Activity, there are only two main characters (two others make brief appearances), so for a lot of the time 50% of the onscreen cast is an annoying asshole.

2. It doesn't use its format to say anything about anything, really. It's a "found footage" horror movie, but really it's a filmed stage play. It takes place in one location - the characters leave the house and the camera once - and its best scenes come when the camera is locked down. I was rooting for this movie because minimalism is so rare in, like, ANYTHING these days. And it takes its time developing its shit, it is willing to risk being dull. But once things start moving there's just no reason for it to stay in one place or to be self-contained. Blair Witch worked because those kids were lost in the woods and had no safe place. These idiots keep crawling back into the same bed where that freaky shit just happened.

3. That said, there are a couple good scares. If you're going to see it, go see it in a theater with an audience willing to overreact.

A Serious Man

1. I don't know how I was so unprepared for this, but I was. I might still be! When it started -- and the opening sequence is in a different aspect ratio than the rest of the film -- I had that momentary did-I-get-in-the-wrong-theater thing. As far as the Coens' films go, A Serious Man is more Barton Fink than Fargo. Instead of goopy wallpaper paste of the mind there's cyst irrigation.

2. Sometimes it doesn't make enough sense. Sometimes it makes too much sense. Which, in context of the movie, makes total sense.

3. A lot of very good laughs, and the line that goes (I'm going to have to paraphrase) "I was just in a tragic car accident and I do not want Santana's Abraxas" deserves four or five Nobel Prizes.

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

It is Never a Bad Time to Be Reminded of the Awesome Weirdness That is Shakira

J____ — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 20:36:00 GMT

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

A Goddamned Guide to All These Goddamned Whale Bands (Part One, A - N)

J____ — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 05:51:00 GMT

(LEGO art by Bjarne P. Tvseskov)

We have a little emergency.

After years of living under siege by bands calling themselves Wolves and Bears and Hands and Tapes/Cassettes and Crystal This and That, "Whale" is the new Who Gives a Shit. Records by Noah and the Whale, Said the Whale, Black Whales, and Or, The Whale all have dropped/will drop over the space of a month. It's like when there was that one volcano movie with Pierce Brosnan and that other volcano movie with Tommy Lee Jones. Jinx!

Over these two entries -- to both strain the krill from the bilgewater and further confuse the issue -- I'll consider 36 current or recent Whale bands, great and small. And I'll mention an additional 25. Way more than you've heard of, way more than you need to know. Some of the best ones fall near the end. You won't be able to care by then. Frustrating, I know!

Whale!

Presented in dipshit listicle form, because everyone loves a dipshit listicle.

Beluga Whale (myspace)

Who? Acoustic trio from Portland, Oregon, produced okay-enough singer-songwriter stuff for the RPM Challenge. Creaky casual effort, nothing more.

Choice Lyric: "You make your wishes, I don't expect they'd match mine."

Choice Bio Quote: " The people who played on this album are Jon K., another person named Jon K., and a person named Ned."

Works: Under Glass (Navy Bean, 2007)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? We have a long way to go. Pace yourself.

Berlin Whale (myspace)

Berlin Whale - Igloos (mp3)(buy)

Berlin Whale - Husbands and Wives (mp3)(buy)

Who? St. Louis band that slapped together an enjoyable formula for basement rock: Dancey post-punk, cheap synths, emo vocals and group chants/claps. Their record has some nice unexpected left turns without feeling proggy. And live?

They put in their two-and-a-half years, moved on. Their main songwriter went to Exercise, which is mathier, AnCo-ier.

Choice Lyric: "Let's lay down in the middle of the road and keep the cars from driving over us... Keep your head down keep your eyes closed keep your eyes keep your head down."

Choice Interview Quote: "I'm not trying to be Simple Plan. Not too much, anyway."

Works: Berlin Whale (Factorize/Divide, 2008)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? I have a feeling someone does. Someone remembers this band hard.

Black Whales (myspace)

Black Whales - Young Blood (mp3)(buy)

Who? Affable Seattle indie rock quintet with an affinity for 60s pop. Like Interpol and Made Out of Babies and Ola Podrida, they have been to a Natural History Museum. Their PR rep e-mailed me their info just as I started working on this thing as if to belabor the point. Alphabetically, they land near the top! Sometimes life isn't fair.

Choice Lyric: "I am not the war you're looking for."

Choice Bio Quote: "There's so much darkness in their pop, and there's so much brightness in their shade. Black Whales are far from being one-dimensional; they've done what, if one is honest with oneself, only happens rarely: they've found perfect matches and musical foils with each other. They've found an incredibly textural, experimentally off-center, perfectly heart-hitting way of bringing their amazing songs to fruition."

Works produced: Origins EP (Mt. Fuji, 2009)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? They're just a baby band, fresh out the inbox. Make them make you remember them.

Blue Whales (myspace)

Who? Capable anachronistic Costa Mesa classic rockers locked on the local track. You'd think they were something dug out of a crate if they didn't have a song called "Emo Haircut." The OC Weekly ran this photo...

...with this caption: "The Blue Whales fend off their fanbase." Ouch!

Choice Lyric: "You look so uptight, it's psychological make-up" (from their song "Emo Haircut")

Choice Article Quote: 'Brown used to dream of making it, and not in the '70s-movie-about-a-pimply-boy-who-never-gets-any variety. "As time went on, I realized that the reality of the music business is nothing like the delusional concept that [I] and so many musicians fall for...'

Choice Bio Quote: "Their incandescent sonic grandeur points toward a psychedelic, star gazing, future; where shoes will actually be worth staring at."

Choice Song Title: "Emo Haircut."

Works: Tracks for sale on their myspace.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Does anybody remember laughter?

British Whale (myspace)

Who?: A post-Darkness project from Justin Hawkins, seems to have been abandoned in favor of Hot Leg.

Works produced: Two singles. One of the A-sides was a cover.

Choice Lyric: "Girl, I love America. It's got countryside and towns, sky up in the sky, ground

down on the ground."

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Might have forgotten themselves.

The Devil Whale (myspace)

The Devil Whale - Butter for Burns (mp3)(buy)

Who? Gentle Utah group (formerly one of several bands called Palomino) with an earnest lead who turned from horsies to Moby Dick after having a polyp removed from his vocal chords (pdf). A bit like Damien Rice. But you know how you get the feeling that Damien Rice is trying to feel you up every time he coos? Without that. MOR territory in which I wouldn't normally want to find myself -- but something made me stop here. I like how "Butter" melts at the end, and they seem to get moderately excited on stage:

Could be that extended exposure will reveal them to be cloying and dull. I'll find out. What's streaming at their myspace got me to buy the record.

Choice Lyrics: "Everyone I love doesn't try enough." "I'm a crash and a burn away from being in love, I'm a midnight kiss away from trusting someone."

Choice Bio Quote: " Brinton Jones reveals himself in a beautiful blend of delayed guitars and poetic lyrics that will quite possibly change your life."

Works: Like Paraders (Northplatte, 2008)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Check with me in a couple weeks.

Echoes of the Whales (myspace)

Who? Ambient tinkering from Italians Pierpaolo Leo and Populous.

Choice Bio Quote: " If whales were able to make music how would it sound?"

Whole Goddamned Myspace Text: "It's all about being alive. Being nothing and everything at the same time. Being a part of a greater whole. It's all about having the strength to be fragile. Being broken into thousands of pieces each with their own unique emotion. It's all about being transparent, joyfully clear. A biological mapping of feelings, all exposed and revealed. It's all about beauty. It's all about being a part of the beauty. Being a fragment of the gorgeous blue thing we all live on. Earth. A world of art in its clearest natural representation. It's about gazing at the world and just being a poet, a painter, a musician. Being an artist as a result of being alive. Our mere existence as an artistic act. It's but a simple question. Why waste the beauty if you are the beauty? It's all about love. It's about feeling beautiful for life's most minute details. It's being aware, perfectly and clearly, of every moment that passes. It's all about a spark. The first spark lighting up when all started to be. A spark being us and we still being that spark. It's all about the future. The future being love. If we are love, we are the future. Love. Light up. Follow. Follow your own whale.

Works: Echoes of the Whales (Disasters by Choice, 2007)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Follow your own whale.

Freelance Whales (myspace)

Freelance Whales - Generator ^ Second Floor (mp3)(buy)

Who? Queens, represent! Wait: Castrato vocals, glockenspiel, überdeliberate banjo... This sounds nothing like The Ramones. Band's got a marching bass drum with a flower on it. Lyrics about the songwriting process ("we can argue where the cymbal hits should be"). A quilted album cover with a button for the sun. Their myspace page refers to their instruments as "musical gadgets," they're as proud as Carrot Top of their trinket box. (A Waterphone! Which is that thing Tom Waits was fucking around with in Mystery Men, God knows everyone loved Mystery Men.) It's like sulfuric acid on my sensibilities, like a band staffed by Hummel figurines.

I almost hate to say that there's some really good stuff here.

There are qualities that will cause quick checks to the Postal Service and Arcade Fire -- intimate bloopery and communal hum -- along with every folk-instrumented indie outfit out there (so many of those, so many), but more than anything else this new band's first record reminds me of Anathallo's Floating World. Which was a lovely piece of work. Inquisitive, expansive, assured.

The problem's balancing the preciousness with precociousness, talent, and confidence so folks don't gag. Make sure amusement doesn't become harmlessness. A quick-fed line like "Hannah takes the stairs and I usually take the elevator, every now and then she offers me a lemon Now n' Later, please don't play the match maker please don't be a player hater, if you dig her recent work then you should go congratulate her," has about five things right with it, two things wrong. Math's in their favor but it's not decisive. Maybe, live, they serve a shutout.

On record, Freelance Whales' songs about ghosts and death and stuff couldn't scare a fly. More than that. They'd hold its hand, help it move, do its taxes.

Choice Lyrics: "And oh! you caught me sleeping in the power sockets, you caught me mildewing the tiles of the bathroom." "We compare our hearts to things that fly but cannot land."

Myspace Quote: "Sounds Like: Somebody wired their heart to a synthesizer."

Works: Weathervanes (self-released, 2009 - available on eMusic and iTunes)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? You should. Some people are going to love this, and if the band defies its more delicate urges they could be something.

But for fuck's sake cut back on the glockenspiel. It's like you've hung wind chimes from your Prince Albert and are doing jumping jacks.

Fudgie the Whale (myspace) - Not a band at all! A frozen treat and/or this guy I knew in prison.

Jonah and the Whale (myspace)

Who? Fresno singer-songwriter. Quiet, ok stuff.

Choice Lyric: "The problem with people is we are quite feeble."

Choice Myspace Quote: Sounds Like: A man walking alone on a dessolate dirt road in the woods while its snowing.

Works: So far, streaming tracks.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? [SPOILER] This "Jonah" stretch is particularly forgettable. [/SPOILER]

Jonah and the Whales (myspace)

Who? Minneapolis cover band.

Choice Lyric: "I kissed a girl and I liked it."

Choice Bio Quote: "Yes, they even do weddings!"

Works: Others'.

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Are you lining up talent for a street fair?

Jonah... Like the Whale (myspace)

Who? Emo-influenced Thousand Oaks, California singer-songwriter. Has a song called "Harry Potter and the Imposter."

Choice Lyric: "You try to hide your lipstick and heavy make-up and put aside the cross on your chest so that you can have sex and not feel like a whore, and not feel like a whore."

Choice Myspace Blog Quote: "Pretty soon we are going to be selling Jonah...Like the Whale T-shirts. In all sizes. They will be awesome, and yes they will have a whale on them!"

Works: A Midwest Winter (2006)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? ...Like, no.

Jonah the Whale (can't find his myspace, though his record is streaming on the service)

Jonah the Whale - Passing Breathe (Featuring Creed Chameleon)(mp3)(buy)

Who? Hawaii-based hip hop artist. Samples The Little Mermaid soundtrack.

Choice Lyric: "Why can't you look me in the eyes when you criticize me down to minimum size?"

Choice Bio Quote: " His hypnotic wardrum-like sound represents the streets and hunger of the Hawaiian Islands. Jonah is conscious of the struggle that many young Hawaiians face in finding their identities being raised on the 50th State, Hawaii."

Works: Friend or Foe (Siq, 2008)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? He's a rapper! From Hawaii!

Litany for the Whale (myspace)

Who? Pounding metal sextet from Santa Rosa, California. Possibly named for a John Cage composition.

Choice Lyric: Good luck with that.

Choice Bio Quote: "History will absolve us, something better will follow."

Works: Dolores EP (Teenage Disco Bloodbath, 2009)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? Their myspace is littered with posmens from parties whose ears are more attuned to this stuff than mine. Heck, the band scored a mention on the influential "Rock Ass Dick" blog.

Many Against Blue Whale (myspace)

Who? Chicago lo-fi dicking-aroundness.

Choice Lyric: "We toiled in the soil and we panned in the sand and still all our cash we can count on one hand."

Choice Bio Quote: " Think about three prongs and then make it four; Four lacy currents of vibration, thick from the Mega Protean Crush of decades past whip and snap to form sinewy columns, heaving and rolling in rhythms."

Works: I'ma Cutchu (2008), a couple singles

Should You Bother Remembering Them? They stopped calling themselves MABW this summer, now instead call themselves Far Things. So stop not remembering them here, and start not remembering them there.

Sidebar: NARWHAL.

A number of bands call themselves "Narwhal:" London's Narwhal (myspace) get screamo over Slint lines; Florida's Narwhal (myspace) likes their Sigur Ros; Narwhal (myspace), split their act between Austin and Osaka, do a loungey soft synth bounce. (Richmond, Virginia's ambient Mother Sea (myspace) used to call themselves Narwhal, thought better of it.) Just plain Narwhal (myspace) is a California band who plays just plain modern radio rock.

Bride of the Narwhal (myspace) ~~was~~ is a Charlottesville, Virginia punk band that has played plays songs like "Turtle Power" at shows called "Pre-New Year's Eve Bro-Fests." Eric Narwhal and the Manatees (myspace) add a touch of the ominous to the standard thin kitsch of retro-rock. San Francisco's Narwhal Brigade (myspace) does yikesish soft rock. Narwhal Decimation (myspace) makes Cookie Monster stuff. The Narwhal Invasion (myspace) is/was Matthew Long, an ellipses-loving Texan who layers with his laptop. Narwhal Soup (myspace) is a hushed solo project out of Illinois. Narwhal Tusk (myspace) does hilarious, schmaltzy Russian metal.

According to their myspace, Narwhal Party hails from "Rancho Cowabunga, California" and sounds like "CATS IN A MEAT GRINDER." Song titles include "Ice Cream, Pillow Fights, Sleep-Over," "Planet Swelbow," "Anal Retentive Pterodactyl," "Revenge of Kelly Clarkson," and "Kill Your Family with Folding Chairs/Larry Chair Decapitation." Your new favorite band until you can't stand them anymore.

Portland, Oregon's Narwhal vs. Narwhal (myspace) has a saxophone! Any polish simultaneously makes their indie rock bearable and robs it of its charm. British Columbia's Narwhal vs. The Unicorn (myspace) " is the search between real and fake, fiction and non fiction, mythical and material, awake and dreaming," is "influenced by" Bright Eyes and Gandhi. Michigan's Narwhals Collide (myspace) and Wisconsin's Scream of the Narwhal (myspace) were designed to make you worry about the Upper Midwest. Wisconsin's Teasing the Narwhal (myspace), has a song called "I Want to Get Laid;" the song will not help them any. OMFGNarwhal's myspace page lacks both tracks and an exclamation point.

You do not have to remember any band with "Narwhal" in its name.

Noah and the Whale (myspace)

Noah and the Whale - The First Days of Spring (mp3)(buy)

Who?: UK indie folk group that rubbed elbows with Emmy the Great, other things with Laura Marling. Extracted its name from Noah Baumbach's The Squid and The Whale. A quick side-by-side with the insipid, Tenenbaums-inspired Margot & the Nuclear So and So's proves that having better taste in movies than doesn't make you a better band.

NotW's first record never seemed more than duly delivered. The new one starts - dishwater lyrics aside - promisingly. There's the track above, sad hope stirred by Irish-sounding fiddlework. That's followed by an acceptable bit of naked I-wish-I-were-Linkous-ness; that by a simple, tuneful plea; and that by disaster. It gets so bad so quickly! Any quality moments are lost among tiny turns of uselessness and thuddish, calculated overreach. Here's hoping "Love of an Orchestra" winds up the worst post-Sufjan glee club gangbang the world will ever have to endure.

Choice Lyric: "I have nothing, I have no one, I've been so quickly set free."

Choice Quote: "'The First Days of Spring' is the first and title track from our new album, making it the obvious choice as the introduction to the new material. In entirety and in the smallest detail it is Noah and the Whale. If not instantly then resolutely."

Works produced: The First Days of Spring (2009), Peaceful, The World Lays Me Down (2008)

Should You Bother Remembering Them? They've gotten some acclaim and a car ad. Remember their name so you can roll your eyes when one of your less-discerning indie friends recommends them to you.

(CONTINUE TO PART TWO)

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

A Goddamned Guide to All These Goddamned Whale Bands (Part Two, O - W)

The Bowery Presents... Actual Country Music!

J____ — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 16:09:00 GMT

Short notice: Critically acclaimed, award-winning artist Jamey Johnson (myspace) is doing what most country musicians do not: Playing Brooklyn. He'll be at the Music Hall of Williamsburg Thursday (10/8 - tix) and then at the Bowery Ballroom on Friday (10/9 - tix). I recently moaned, after trucking down to see Johnson at some Jersey steakhouse, that New York City was regularly snubbed by top country talent. This week has also seen Lucinda Williams at Irving Plaza and Keith Urban at MSG; make Johnson feel welcome both downtown and in Williamsburg, maybe the area'll be more than an afterthought and promo pit stop.

(His hit's a ballad, but he does somber rockers too.)

A reminder: The WPRB membership drive is now ON.

"We're Screaming Females, from New Brunswick, New Jersey," she says. "This next song is a new one. But most of you don't know who we are, so these are all new songs, so I didn't really have to tell you that."

"Yes, that's a Viking eating a burrito."

"Direct From Hollywood Cemetery are playing one last show this Halloween. It promises to be a wild time if you are interested in faux evangelical horror rock."

Which reminds me that it's time to start stitching together this year's Halloween mix. Which reminds me that Janelle Monae has this new song available for download.

"The human mind is like Van Halen: If you just pull out one piece and keep replacing it, it just degenerates."

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

It's Been a While Since Just Yesterday

J____ — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 15:11:00 GMT

Brothers (and Sister) Hanson:

Brothers Avett:

Leave Comment

Related Entries:

Worldwide Pantsing

J____ — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 12:56:00 GMT

Leave Comment

Related Entries: