joy's music

22-year old NYC noise artist. I cannot wait for this album.

Wed, 08 May 2013 15:31:59 -0400

22-year old NYC noise artist. I cannot wait for this album.

“Pink Gorilla,” White FenceCyclops Reap (Castle...

Sun, 05 May 2013 17:10:00 -0400

“Pink Gorilla,” White Fence
Cyclops Reap (Castle Face, 2013)

In my class on contemporary art this semester, after we finished our lecture on painting in the last twenty years, someone raised their hand and asked, “You keep saying that all this has been done before. Is none of this original? What’s the point of looking at it then?” Most paintings we saw that day were references to something else, simply re-hashing works from thirty years before. Or, maybe they just took magazine covers and painted over them.

When Beat Happening became known for their inability to play their instruments well in the late 80s, it was already an established tradition in the musical community. Half Japanese formed in 1975 with the same idea. The Velvet Underground, of course, is the most well-known for starting the trend, though The Godz and The Shaggs
began even before the VU’s debut in 1967.

No Joy is recycling the shoegaze of My Bloody Valentine. I have seen more bands compared to Dinosaur Jr. this year than I can count. Dinosaur Jr. itself is indebted to classic rock, Neil Young, Black Sabbath, the Replacements, etc. These are all good ideas, though, and why eschew good ideas just because we’ve heard them hundreds of times before?

The question is not whether authenticity still exists, but whether we are going to redefine authenticity, or at least acknowledge that there are degrees thereof. Is it personal preference that distinguishes an artist like White Fence from, say, Foxygen? Where does one draw the line between “evoking pleasant memories of listening to San Francisco 60s acid pop on a broken tape recorder” to “this poor motherfucker just wants to be George Harrison”? Both artists are appearing at the Woodsist Fest this year in Big Sur, CA.

There is also the question of what parts of music history a band honors in the course of making a record and formulating their public persona. Foxygen, for example, constructs a history of music that excludes all but mainstream 1960s rock, stating “they don’t relate” to music made past the 60s and 70s (and then namedropping only names of modern artists like Animal Collective and Dirty Projectors in their Pitchfork interview). Other artists like The Men take the good bits of a lot of genres from classic rock to shoegaze to post-hardcore, acknowledging the broad base of musical references available to artists these days.

White Fence reminds me of artists like Ariel Pink, recycling recognizable elements of pop and combining them with lo-fi recording techniques (itself a technique already pioneered by some artists mentioned above). Maybe it is recording style: perhaps the crackling, flawed background is an overt acknowledgement that this music is an homage to 60s psych or 70s AM pop. Though Ariel Pink might be a purveyor of the most sincere irony ever, with his lyrics of immature jokes and failed attempts at beginning relationships. I like thinking of some artists as channeling a beat-up, worn-down memory of punk or AM rock or whatever.

The following two issues arise when I consider the “authenticity” of music: 1) What if something just sounds original to me because I am not aware of its influences and 2) Does it even matter? I can tell you that there is nothing studied or ironic in say, Ty Segall’s live performances, though he is reviving garage rock for the nth time in 2013. I feel like a lot of music critics (or critics of music critics) would suggest that people like me maybe should just shut up and enjoy the nice music other people are making for me. Sure, but I think these artists at least deserve a consideration of the historical context in which they operate.

Low, “Sunshine,” from I Could Live in Hope (1994).

Wed, 01 May 2013 23:43:00 -0400

Low, “Sunshine,” from I Could Live in Hope (1994).

The new Wolf Eyes record, No Answer: Lower Floors is exactly...

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 01:02:00 -0400

The new Wolf Eyes record, No Answer: Lower Floors is exactly what I want from noise music right now. Or music in general. The pieces are varied and exacting. There are chopped vocal samples on “No Answer,” harsher noise on the first two tracks, something like drone to start “Chattering Lead.” Good use of percussion. Meditative, in a way. Yes.

The repetitive nature of the tracks is sometimes absorbing, sometimes off-putting. I’m listening to “Confession of the Informer” in the dark right now and it’s scary as shit, because the slow, steady, sparse beat is interrupted by bursts of random noise. The album is balanced in that way, between harsh noise and structure. The sounds are of this world (static, percussion) but are arranged in an artificial manner.

The time I wrote a review of New Moon while I was angry

Mon, 08 Apr 2013 20:41:00 -0400

I procrastinated when I heard that the Men’s new album New Moon was streaming online. I was afraid that every song on the album was going to sound like “Candy,” the tourin’ blues “country” song thrown into the middle of 2012’s Open Your Heart. I am wary of each new release from the Men, as they alter their sound with each one, moving farther away from the noisy post-hardcore band I initially fell in love with. As it turns out, I was right. There are even more songs on New Moon that sound like “Candy,” plus others that mimic Open Your Heart’s title track in its use of ‘70s rock radio staples as inspiration. The first two times I listened to the album, I was disappointed and not impressed.

I knew that there was a good chance that I would dismiss New Moon by listening to it a few times in the background and then forget it, minus a few tracks. I didn’t want this to happen, given my continuous support for the band in reviews and on my radio show for the past year. One of the problems of the infinite availability of music these days is that people like me have the ability to only listen to exactly what they want to hear. I mean, what kind of asshole am I when I go to write a review of an album and my main thought is, “needs more screaming and feedback”? After repeated listens, though, I still want to say that besides a few standout tracks like “Electric,” New Moon is a solid but unmemorable rock record. That’s not to say you shouldn’t listen to it, because I also learned that what I like and don’t like is shaped by personal experience more than an album being deemed “good” or “bad” by so-called rock critics.

My difficulties with New Moon mainly stem from the fact that 2011’s Leave Home, the Men’s second full-length and debut for Brooklyn label Sacred Bones, was the album that introduced me to the Men. It was one of those albums that I discovered at exactly the right time, and I buried myself in its abrasive, challenging sound. Even now, I return to the album frequently. I love that it is a tough but rewarding slog. There are spaces of just noise and there are ugly bodily functions, like the cough on “L.A.D.O.C.H.” that is just as percussive and jarring as the sparing drums. An overarching dirty, post-hardcore aesthetic complete with (mostly) screamed vocals and squealing feedback tenuously holds the album together.

I even tolerated how some of Leave Home’s songs sounded derivative, mostly because they drew from so many genres I rarely object to, like punk, krautrock, and the shoegazing psychedelia of Spacemen 3. It was fascinating to witness the band working through the building blocks of a sound that took the history of indie, punk, and classic rock, and played it loose and loud. It’s not blind idol worship, like Foxygen’s wrongheaded “I saw George Harrison wear striped pants and a top hat, so I bought striped pants and a top hat” approach. In fact, my favorite quality of the Men is still their utter disdain for the typical bullshit associated with some rock bands. They barely have a name, I don’t know or care what they look like, what clothes they wear, or what kind of guitars they play.

But the Men disowned Leave Home before its follow-up, Open Your Heart, was even released. My heart sank reading their “Rising” interview on Pitchfork when guitarist Mark Perro dismissed the album as “so loud and chaotic and… all over the place” and promised that the band was going be “more positive” from then on. The move from experimental to accessible is natural for most bands: as Bob Mould of Hüsker Dü said in Our Band Could Be Your Life, first you play as loud and fast as possible (i.e. Land Speed Record), and then you don’t. The Men were ready to try something new and hopefully become more mature in the process. Two albums later, I still might not be.

The beginning of Open Your Heart confirmed this inevitable shift in style. The Men don’t fuck around with introductory tracks; they fully announce their intentions in the first seven minutes of an album. Leave Home’s first track, “If You Leave…” builds quietly for the first three minutes, and then assaults the listener with the slinking rhythm of a fuzzy guitar and drums that sound enormous. The only chanted, drawn-out lyrics are: “Die/I would die/I would die…” fade into the effects-laden instrumentation. In contrast, Open Your Heart’s first side starts with two big, cheesy rock numbers, “Turn it Around” and “Animal,” though the latter still has crazed, shouted vocals. These were shorter songs with something kind of approaching a verse/chorus structure, but not totally objectionable. On the rest of the album, I enjoyed some of the decisions the band made to expand their sound further, like the motorik beat of “Oscillation” and the newfound musical tightness of their instrumental numbers, especially “Ex-Dreams.”

I admitted that it showed growth, but I was overall slightly disappointed with Open Your Heart. It simply did not affect me personally the way Leave Home did. “Candy” still makes my soul sink, and the novelty of the band had already begun to fade. Seeing the Men live last summer didn’t help, either. I expected a face-melting onslaught of noise at least a few times during their set. Instead, their set lacked energy and sounded much too similar. Granted, it was a typical 95-degree day at a music festival, the crowd was mostly waiting for Kendrick Lamar, and the Men took the stage directly after a typically excellent show from Thee Oh Sees. Later that summer, I comforted myself by tightening my grip on the past with the reissue of the Men’s even-noisier first full-length LP Immaculada via Deranged, a Canadian hardcore label.

So I approached New Moon with this tangle of emotions and experiences coloring my reception of the album, coupled with the desire to not lose what remained of their old sound. The first track, “Open the Door” begins with piano that reminds me vaguely of “Till the Morning Comes” from After the Gold Rush. Instantly, the vocals are as evident as they are during “Candy.” It is immediately followed by “Half Angel Half Light,” which is best described as Flip Your Wig-era Hüsker Dü, except also kind of country. It is interesting that these tracks incorporate more varied instrumentation, including a harmonica and, later on the album, a slide guitar.

The influences that certain tracks on Open Your Heart hinted toward are confirmed by New Moon. The Men’s most recent blog post is characteristically pithy and straightforward. No text, two pictures, and the title is “Suck My Vibe.” It’s two images, one of Neil Young’s Chrome Dreams and the other of The World of Dolly Parton, that explain the country-rock sound of most of these tracks. The other influences I’ve been hearing more than ever are watered-down ‘70s rock bands like Boston or Blue Öyster Cult. New Moon could remind me of lying awake at night in middle school, happily listening to the “Deep Tracks” program on a local classic rock radio station. Instead, it reminds me that I really could go the rest of my life without hearing Boston ever again.

The problem with a lot of bands that change musical styles to one that more heavily favors lyrics is that now I have to pay attention to them. A number of songs, namely “Open the Door,” “Half Angel Half Light,” “The Seeds” and I assume “High and Lonesome” are written for a girl whom the singer loves or loved but is no longer there. I can’t determine if these songs are written from the heart about a real girl, or if they are a regurgitation of a standard rock lyrical tropes. There are some ridiculous lines on Open Your Heart, but “Half Angel Half Light” contains my favorite Men-ism ever: “I’m in a rock band now and we’re on a roll.” It’s so self-aware, but at the time, so very not. I also happen to think that the Men were better suited to shouting than actually trying to carry a tune.

The band’s sound has been condensed and standardized, but at the cost of more of these tracks sounding exactly the same. And, by their third album, some of their tricks are getting old. “Shittin’ with the Shah” from Leave Home is slow until the last minute when it breaks down and finally becomes the fast-paced noise freakout it was building towards. “I Saw Her Face” does the same thing, though without the tension of the former song, as it opens as a standard, slow-paced country-rock number with Tom Petty as a guest vocalist (not really). “Supermoon” is the predictable long album-closing jam, and really nothing remarkable. I enjoy “Without a Face,” “Electric,” and “Freaky,” as basic rock songs, but they’re largely indistinguishable from one another. I am probably the last person you will ever find complaining about sound quality, but I think the lo-fi style of all of these songs does not suit the Men’s new sound at all. The tighter instrumentation and pop format of New Moon is contradicted by the fact that all of it kind of sounds like slush.

A lot of this review seems like I’m trying to find things wrong with the album, but I don’t want to turn people away from listening to the Men so much as examine why New Moon doesn’t appeal to me specifically. To the right person in the right moment, this album could do what Leave Home did for me. It still has the Men’s signature blend of the best of a variety of genres, played openly and honestly as the music that truly appeals to the band. I plan on sticking around for the Men and hope the next time I see them play live they fucking rule. I’ll continue to respect them for making an album that was meaningful to me, and for playing what they like with uncompromised integrity.

Originally published as “Please Don’t Go Away” at The Declaration.

Pissed Jeans - Honeys

Wed, 27 Feb 2013 19:07:00 -0500

Honeys, Pissed Jeans’ fourth-full length, drags the listener through a pummeling, sludgy whirlwind of post-hardcore noise. Pissed Jeans sound like that liquid on the floor at every basement frat party circa 1 a.m. You wonder whether it is beer or mud, and realize it’s too dark to tell anyway. Rising out of the sludge is the singer, who shouts like he’s trying to exorcise a demon, the kind of off-kilter guy who writes songs about failing relationships and his coworkers dying, and sings them on stage with a crazed expression. The band is a side project of 30-year-old insurance salesmen, and Honeys is about putting on a show in order to loudly and aggressively tackle personal issues. “Health Plan” advises the listener to stay away from doctors, and the video for the fast-paced “Bathroom Laughter” features a balding man watching television by himself. The true darkness of this album comes not from the sound, but from the often-petty concerns of men slipping into middle age and the loneliness and fear that come with it.

The album drags in the middle with some slow-tempo, similar sounding songs. However, upon repeated listens, Honeys reveals itself to be an accessible entryway into the Pissed Jeans catalog. The riffs are solid; the noise is balanced, and tracks like “Bathroom Laughter” and “Cathouse” stand out. Compared to Sub Pop labelmates, fellow post-hardcore revivalists Metz, Pissed Jeans make up what they lack in technical ability with ferocity and feedback.

Review originally published for The Declaration.

Mikal Cronin, “Shout it Out”From MCII, out 7 May via...

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 00:03:00 -0500

Mikal Cronin, “Shout it Out”
From MCII, out 7 May via Merge

New shit from sometime-Ty Segall guitarist/collaborator Mikal Cronin. Clean and accessible jangly introduction, straight power-pop-punk chorus, repeated twice sometimes for effect. “Shit goes on an on and on,” he sings, plus the requisite “ooh-ooh”s.

This new album will probably be a solid set of psychedelic/garagey tunes with more of an edge than Real Estate (who bore me to tears, sry2say).

“20,” Lightning BoltRecorded 11 August 1997Yeah, yeah, there’s a...

Sun, 03 Feb 2013 16:19:00 -0500

“20,” Lightning Bolt
Recorded 11 August 1997

Yeah, yeah, there’s a new My Bloody Valentine album out. We’ll get to that later (I like it).

I’ve been thinking a lot about Lightning Bolt recently, and how I would like to be them, if I was ever in a band. I like their aggression and the level of noise (of course), but even more so the fact that the noise is framed within these repetitive rhythms. It has a structure, so it’s not completely alienating. (Like Les Rallizes Dénudés on triple time?)

The band describes this track as “an endurance test,” a “hypnotic experiment,” “the most Lightning Boltesque song of all Lightning Bolt songs.” It was a cassette release, and the band just set a timer for 20 minutes and went at it. This is the essence of noise music: testing boundaries, reaching limits. It’s primal, too, the way it’s captured live and unstudied. It came out furious and engulfing, a test for the band and for the listener.* How did they feel recording it? Is the experience replicated in the listener to some extent?

You’re reminded that they’re only human when it sounds like they take a little break at 10:45 or so. I think I can hear them breathing.

*and my poor suitemates, SORRY GUYS

NO LOVE DEEP WEB (Death Grips): Quick Review

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 14:15:00 -0500

(SORRY, this is old and I forgot to post it)

This album was supposed to be released sometime in 2013 on Epic Records (an imprint of major label Sony), probably without a giant penis on the cover. But, in a giant fuck you to their label, the recording industry, the powers that be, etc., Death Grips released it themselves for free on SoundCloud, and for download under a Creative Commons license. Since the release of their first album, Death Grips have been defying restrictions placed on artists in terms of marketing and distribution in the modern music industry. They have also been pushing boundaries sonically. They are one of the most ballsy (pun intended?) and innovative groups to release music in last few years. Their sound goes beyond rap, noise and punk, pushing the genres to their logical extremes, combining them into an explosive, aggressive assault on the listener.

NO LOVE DEEP WEB, even more so than The Money Store, moves away from Death Grips’ previous sample-based sound, found on their first album Ex-Military, and focuses more on heavy synths combined with the skilled drumming of veteran noise artist Zach Hill. The lyrics stand out more on this album, showing off vocalist MC Ride’s talent with playing with repetition and the sound of his words for effect. Overall, this album is a worthy follow-up to The Money Store, just as challenging and rewarding as Death Grips’ previous two records.

Download this album and everything by Death Grips for free on their website.

“World of Dogs” official video

FIDLAR & the state of punk in 2013

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 09:20:00 -0500

The world needs a punk song with the following chorus, screamed loudly: “I DRINK CHEAP BEER! SO WHAT! FUCK YOU!” The world, unfortunately, does not need thirteen more of them on two sides of the same record. Hyped L.A. punk band FIDLAR (“Fuck It Dawg, Life’s A Risk”) has released their debut LP via Mom & Pop after a series of successful EPs and singles. It’s a typical drunk punk/skate punk record, with lyrics about the following topics: cheap beer, whores, getting laid, skateboards, and cigarettes. If taken at face value, it’s simple Ramones/Germs/what-have-you high schooler punk with shallow lyrics. If taken as vaguely tongue-in-cheek parody, that still does not hold up for the course of the album. Few tracks on the album match the mosh pit-ready fury of “Cheap Beer,” instead leaning heavily on the laid-back fuzzy surf side of FIDLAR. Citing Blink-182, Green Day, NOFX, and Offspring as 90s inspirations, FIDLAR go for the easy rhyme, the big riff: “Cocaine/running around in my brain.” “Can’t get drunk no more/Cuz I’m on the floor.”

Blogs that have covered FIDLAR have referred to them in a specific way—as a “punk band with a tumblr.” I think this is telling, as the band often lazily falls back on its grim-reaper-on-a-skateboard aesthetics instead of on the music. Like many hyped bands (Sleigh Bells, Cults, Best Coast) maybe FIDLAR rushed their debut album. They did have to recycle a lot of material from their EPs. “Wake Bake Skate” used to be a tight, “No Hope Kids”-esque two-minute singalong, but for the album was slowed down considerably for no discernible reason. “No Waves” has been floating around the internet for awhile, and it’s ultimately forgettable.

“Whore” encapsulates a lot of what is problematic about the album. Melodically, what could be one of the album’s catchiest songs turns into five minutes of calling the singer’s ex-significant other a whore. Though it’s supposed to fault the narrator as well—“I stay at home drinking/you’re such a whore,” as a female listener, I feel uncomfortable. And a record that’s supposed to be accessible sonically and lyrically shouldn’t make me feel that way. It reveals that in searching to be easy to digest, FIDLAR’s lack of complexity and searching for the lowest common denominator actually alienates listeners. And shouldn’t punk be inclusive, in the end?

Punk doesn’t have to be dumbed down like this, either. FIDLAR definitely has its place (next to Andrew W.K. but without actually being hilarious), but there are smarter bands out there that actually advance the genre. Compare Metz, who also have heavy, distorted riffs and shouted vocals, but their 2012 release on Sub Pop was much more creative and touched on alternative rock and post-hardcore to add depth. The Men also yearn for simplicity and straightforwardness, but for every skate trick FIDLAR learned, The Men listened to a krautrock or Spacemen 3 album. Parquet Courts are also twentysomethings in a big city known for its punk history, digging their way out of 30+ years of musical influences, but their complicated songs speak to careful songwriting. White Lung’s 2012 release Sorry tackled feminist issues, and backed them up with blistering guitar work. At the very least, Wavves has being singing in L.A. about being high on a skateboard since 2008.

That’s fine, though. Not everyone has time to sort through her music collection and have a serious discussion about the merits of imitating The Fall v. The Descendents. If you’re a frat brother and you want something hip and relevant to play when you’re sitting in your backyard crushing Natty cans at 4 p.m. on a Saturday (and you lost your iPod with dubstep on it), FIDLAR will be as innocuous as trying to remember what Blink-182 sounds like. Or, go to a FIDLAR show, get a little too fucked up, and elbow some strangers in the face. Put their DIYDUI EP on in the car when your hangover finally lifts, if you need music you don’t have to think about. If you’re interested, though, in seeing where punk is headed as 2013 begins, FIDLAR tells an incomplete story about the genre and its possibilities.

“Dropla,” Youth LagoonFrom new album Wondrous...

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 10:34:00 -0500

“Dropla,” Youth Lagoon
From new album Wondrous Bughouse out 5 March via Fat Possum.

Wide-eyed, sweet pop similar to Youth Lagoon’s 2011 release, The Year of Hibernation. Hearing a bit of Elephant 6 in here too. It’s a longer track, and the repeated lyric, “you’ll never die” gives the song an earnest, dreamy innocence. I like it, but I wonder if the new album will stick to this format or evolve a bit.

The Seer (Swans): Review

Tue, 15 Jan 2013 17:43:00 -0500

I realized partially through “93 Ave. Blues,” which sounds like a violin dying on the beach while being pummeled by waves of sound instead of water, that I might be a bit of a masochist. The Seer is Swans’ immersive, punishing, and ultimately rewarding second studio album after their 2010 reconstitution. This album reaches the sublime and engulfs the listener, but in the way getting lost in a large forest full of really tall trees would make you feel completely overwhelmed, insignificant, and terrified. Then, out of the darkness, that horrible wolf on the cover of the album appears. The appearance of that wolf is like Gira panting rhythmically in “Mother of the World.” I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but all the dark parts of my soul are interested.

In a recent interview with Pitchfork, Michael Gira spoke about his old tendency to throw himself onto the stage until he bruised his ribs. At the ripe old age of fifty, he said has finally realized that this probably isn’t healthy. Michael Gira seems to live on his own plane of existence, where this sort of thing is a totally normal, everyday reality. In the same way, The Seer sucks you in and forces you to evaluate it on its own terms within the universe it creates. The length of this album is ridiculous. Its title track is 32 minutes long. My first reaction was, “Michael Gira, what are you doing, I do not have two hours to listen to this album.” Four hours later, after back-to-back listens, the rest of the world seemed entirely insignificant in comparison to the world this album had drawn me into. Some of the songs even seem unfinished, the longer pieces acting movements of a symphony missing a beginning, a middle, or an ending. Swans has mined something deep, accessed something eternal with The Seer.

Much of this album alternates between drone/ambient sections, and harsh, repetitive rhythms. Occasionally, Gira decides to reward the listener with a haunting melody or a memorable vocal. “A Piece of the Sky” spends over fifteen minutes building up to a section with a dark, catchy feel that reveals the influence of the freak folk artists Gira works with on his Young God label. A few days ago, I skipped the introduction, however, and I felt like an angry god was going to smite me. The song did not have nearly as much power as it had when I had to wait for it. Another gorgeous moment on the album is the contribution from Karen O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs on “Song For a Warrior.” Her vocal, pure and confident, contrasts with Gira’s baritone, like Jarboe’s contributions tend to do throughout the Swans catalog. But, the lyrics evoke an unsettling reality of war, both alien from and uncannily similar to our own, and the song’s placement on the record serves to further disorient the listener.

The enormity of this album, and the way Swans unites disparate genres and sounds under an overarching aesthetic draws the comparison with Spiritualized, an influential band also back after a hiatus. Though Spiritualized grew out of shoegaze and Swans out of no wave, both groups have established themselves as touchstones, or cultural institutions, defying categorization and creating inimitable sounds. Both come out with enormous, should-be-overblown-but-somehow-they-pull-it-off albums that twist and turn between genres related to noise and those traditionally outside the genre (gospel, folk). Both revolve around the psyches of Michael Gira and J. Spaceman, who seem larger than life, onto whom you can project things about yourself you’d normally hide. What distinguishes Swans, I think, is the way this album shakes you to your primitive core. J. Spaceman is the preacher, but Michael Gira might be God. He has created a masterpiece of sound that is immersive and self-negating, uncompromising in its integrity.

“Master of My Craft,” Parquet CourtsLight Up Gold...

Mon, 14 Jan 2013 10:08:00 -0500

“Master of My Craft,” Parquet Courts
Light Up Gold 2012/2013

I wasn’t sure about this band at first—through the front half of their record, they sound like a country-fried The Fall, to the point where sometimes I just wanted to listen to The Fall instead. There are repetitive vocals, they’re not trying to make sense, there are memorable lines just thrown out there like, “Socrates died in the fucking gutter.” I actually got kind of hooked on the track “Stoned and Starving,” which actually reminds me a bit of The Men in a way that I can’t explain, and then this damn song started getting stuck in my head. I found myself wandering around with some of the lines running through my head—“forGET about it” “I’m master of my craft!” What does it mean? Who can say?

I probably won’t be super into this album in a couple weeks, but there you have it.

“Electric,” The MenFrom their new album New Moon, to...

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 13:55:00 -0500

“Electric,” The Men
From their new album New Moon, to be released 5 March via Sacred Bones.

On the surface, The Men are about a no-crap, straightforward approach to noise punk. They call themselves “The Men,” for one. THAT’S WHAT THEY ARE. However, if you dig a bit beneath the surface, their influences are as varied as Spacemen 3, krautrock, and whatever spawned that damn song “Candy.”

I also liked their first* album, Leave Home, much better than their 2012 release, Open Your Heart. When it’s done well, I prefer visceral noise over songs with structures. Open Your Heart had both that and some catchier punk numbers. I’m hoping New Moon will stay noisy, and “Electric” has a lot of promise. I also appreciate the regularity of their output—seems to be a new trend for bands to just shit out music instead of perfecting it in the studio. We need more of that too.

*their actual first LP Immaculada was recently reissued and it’s also wonderful

“Intrusions,” Tim Hecker & Daniel Lopatin Instrumental...

Sat, 29 Dec 2012 03:21:36 -0500

“Intrusions,” Tim Hecker & Daniel Lopatin
Instrumental Tourist (2012)

Sorry for disappearing for so long. If my life were a movie, this would be the soundtrack to me slowly, epically trying to fix my broken static-y TV while someone takes pictures of me on Instagram. I don’t know.

FOLLOW

Fri, 14 Dec 2012 12:58:25 -0500

FOLLOW:

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tumblr whore. best of 2012 coming up soon.

“Beautiful Child,” SwansChildren of God,...

Wed, 12 Dec 2012 12:02:15 -0500

“Beautiful Child,” Swans
Children of God, 1987

I’ve posted from this album before but… damn. I think Swans are one of my favorite bands of all time. And The Seer is my favorite album of 2012.

This is a live video of “Beautiful Child” from 1987. It’s intense, frightening, primal, and I WISH I COULD HAVE BEEN THERE. (Maybe one of my favorite moments of seeing them this year was when they played “Coward” from Greed/Holy Money.)

“Aimless Arrow,” ConvergeAll We Love We Leave...

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 12:02:31 -0500

“Aimless Arrow,” Converge
All We Love We Leave Behind, 2012

METAAAAL

Seriously though this album could have gone way too far into “chaotic noise” but it’s actually really balanced well. Also seeing this band would probably RULE.

“Psychic Cat” video, by The Invisible Hand They were...

Mon, 10 Dec 2012 12:02:16 -0500

“Psychic Cat” video, by The Invisible Hand

They were the first local band I got into when I came to Charlottesville for school. This video has a lot of local sites in it, like the Pavilion and Random Row. The song is great, too.

Movie Review: Jay Reatard, Better Than Something

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 12:59:00 -0500

Better than Something is a moving documentary about garage-punk legend Jay Reatard, filmed just before his untimely death at the age of 29 in 2010. It features interviews with Jay Reatard’s friends and family, and some archival footage, even dating back to old concerts with the Reatards from 1999. The film succeeds in creating a nuanced portrait of the artist, from his humorous moments to his darker side.

One of the strengths of the film is its unabashed portrayal of Jay Reatard’s music as inheritor of and participant in the particular scene in Memphis. Jay Reatard grew up in some of the most poor and dangerous areas of the city, and his music is presented as being a product of that environment. In one scene, Jay Reatard drives around Memphis pointing out all the houses his family lived in when he was younger, and describing how those places affected his early music and sense of himself.

This film also explores the nature of Jay Reatard’s creativity and his ideas about music. He would always record when he was in his worst moods, which gives his music a sense of immediacy, and explains the prolific nature of his recordings. One of the best moments in the film is when one of his producers describes a technique Jay Reatard learned from Brian Eno, which highlights his vast musical knowledge and desire to evolve as an artist.

While the film does focus on the violent, dark origins of his music, it does not dwell on these aspects of Jay Reatard’s personality. He was someone who rebelled against conventionality, whether it was the “punk aesthetic,” the Elvis legacy, the notion that a live set should be constructed around single songs, or the idea that an artist should wait to record and carefully craft each record.

Overall, the film gave me a deeper understanding not only of Jay Reatard’s music, but also how his music is in some ways inextricable from its origins in Memphis and from the biography of its creator. It is a touching retrospective on the legacy of an artist.