This morning I hopped a plane to New York City for a long weekend visiting three of my best friends from the year I studied abroad in Florence, Italy. I am ridiculously excited. After all those months of spending ridiculous amounts of time together with these gals, seeing mind-boggling beauty and pushing our tenuous edges through hesitant Italian speaking, train rides all over Europe, lots of carbs and gelato and Michelangelo, and questionable Italian dance moves in sweaty clubs, we all went back to our respective lives across the country and the world. The four of us saw [...]
Welcome to a new working week and a new month. Hope everyone had a tremendous weekend -- mine in Chicago was fantastic, with a great performance from Alejandro Escovedo. Escovedo fronted a rock and roll band this time out -- just two guitars, a bass and drums (and Susan Voelz) for a few songs, and the man (as always) kicked some serious ass. Pretty cool to get to see him in that format, especially considering the last time I saw it was in full out acoustic mode (but even that still kicked tremendous ass). Stayed at [...]
Rainer Maria - New York, 1955 Richard Ashcroft - New York Dead Heart Bloom - New York City Heat Skytone - The New York Song LCD Soundsystem - New York I Love You
[ Richard Ashcroft - New York ] Song Selection by Martin // Away Message: Gone to NY for a days
The Verve reuniting and this Chris Benoit shit is almost too much to bear. If Alex Rodriguez is discovered to actually be in a band, that is the only thing that would supercede the weirdness of this day. More on the greatest band ever besides Jason Pierce's here and here . "Man on a Mission" - Richard Ashcroft Quality mixes here . I think we're all excited about the forthcoming Dice-K tribute album . Some great Elizabeth Treadwell poems over [...]
Reminds me of my Sweet Sixteen. I read Flatland in 10th grade Geometry. Now there is some kind of movie: Laura Dern is fucking hilarious : Dern, 40, recounted [on Ellen ] Monday how she couldn't get an acting job for more than a year afterward. "There was certainly backlash, I guess, (that) we all felt from it," she told DeGeneres, who [...]
There is no more ridiculously stupid thing in magazine publishing than the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue . It bears no relation to the magazine and makes no sense. On the other hand, if it substitutes for hardcore pornography for the young men of America, probably all the better. Our society can use all the substitutes for porn it can get. A healthy appreciation of one's own sexuality is important. Pornography itself, is important. There's nothing wrong with it, except feeling that there's nothing wrong with it. Like any institution, it needs policing, it needs a reality check. It needs [...]
Leelee, honey. You were so classy...until this moment. I actually took a fiction class with this woman. God bless her for existing. I don't say that enough. 1. "Oh Allah" - Alice Coltrane (right click and save as, or do the environment a favor and use DownThemAll ) 2. "California Heat" - You, Me, and Everyone We Know Indie powerpop at its best. ( freeindie mix ) [...]
Douglas Heart - Smoke Screen Stars - Krush Throwing Muses - Bright Yellow Gun Richard Ashcroft - I Get My Beat The Stone Roses - I Wanna Be Adored
Start the week off right with some satire, courtesy of The Onion in their article History of Rock Written By The Losers . "BOSTON—Fifty years after its inception, rock 'n' roll music remains popular due to the ardor of its fans and the hard work of musicians, producers, and concert promoters. But in the vast universe of popular music, there exists an oft-overlooked group of dedicated individuals who devote their ample free time to collecting, debating, and publishing the minutiae of the rock genre. They are the losers who write rock's rich and storied history." [...]
Is relevance relevant? Does it matter that Richard Ashcroft is no longer the swaggering, attutide heavy man from the Bittersweet Symphony video ? That his solo career has hardly set the world on fire? That he's still in the shadow of his former band 's glory? Well it does and it doesn't. The fact that he's managed to fill the vast arena of the NIA on the back of a poorly received album says a lot. But so does the fact that the second song of the night is 'Sonnet', [...]
I first heard of The Verve around the same time most people in the US did: upon the release of 1997's Urban Hymns . The album was a space rock masterpiece that both launched The Verve into public consciousness and simultaneously spelled the end of the band. The first song on the album, Bitter Sweet Symphony, is probably the only song that the band is really remembered for, and it still gets decent airplay on radio stations. However, since the band chose to use a sample from a Rolling Stones song and the holders of the [...]
Not that he'd be tempted to get anything out of proportion or anything, but Richard Ashcroft has suggested the end of The Verve was akin to somebody dying of cancer . He was grumbling about fans who think he was better when he was in The Verve rather than indulging his increasingly overblown solo stuff ("fans who resent him breaking up the Verve"): "I have no time for those kind of people. People die of cancer, shit happens, a band's a band. You feel stupid when people won't let go - it makes it [...]
I AM FUEL, YOU ARE FRIENDS
Ain't superstitious, but these things I've seen...
5 Acts
Achtung Baby!
This Recording
to die by your side
speed of dark
No Rock And Roll Fun
Loreen - Euphoria
Music Singles Chart #109
