In previous years, a twee-ish piece of curatorial, '60-reconstructing pop might have been all wrong for a post-Super Bowl morning. But since the ritual watching of the game is pretty much all we have left to unify us a nation and with pro football marketers have become savvy enough to bring the ladies into the jersey-wearing, wing-chomping fold, we find ourselves in a different world. Which is to say, at least some pallid indie rock boys and girls will enjoy the transition from gridiron heroics to these precious 3 minutes. Pitchfork actually got its [...]
Saturday Looks Good To Me - Alcohol Buy US: Buy UK:
(credit to venueszine for the picture) Living in central Illinois, there's not much going on in the cultural landscape that's worth mentioning, but Polyvinyl Records in Champaign / Urbana, IL has been a beacon of excellence since their inception as a fan-zine in 1995. This weekend, Polyvinyl is celebrating it's 15th anniversary with a huge concert on the closing day of Pygmalion Festival with a bunch of artists from their roster (including Braid, Japandroids, STRFKR, Asobi Seksu, Deerhoof, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin and more). In honor of the [...]
I've gone high concept this week, and that is not a reference to this week's cover art which is by my friend Davie Kaufmann. No, I mean there's a gimmick: all the songs on Summer Fridays 4.10 are less than two minutes long. All 33 of them (maybe even 34). With this kind of criteria, we don't really have much in the way of new music (two songs by my count) but quality remains high of course. I've tried to vary it up as much as possible because the bulk of the two-minutes-or-less songs in my collection are of the [...]
De zomer lijkt in ons land maar niet los te willen barsten. Misschien stijgen de temperaturen als we allemaal het Swimsuit album gaan draaien. Swimsuit maakt heerlijk zomerse surf- pop. Op het debuut van Swimsuit hoor je tien heerlijke songs die geïnspireerd zijn door 60's pop, surf en rock'n'roll. Een groot deel van het album is instrumentaal, maar regelmatig duiken Dina Bankole, Amber Fellowsen Shelly Salant op voor de vocalen. Het debuut van Swimsuit kun je beluisteren en bestellen via Bandcamp . Het genie achter Swimsuit is Fred Thomas. Thomas is de man van [...]
Words by Brendan Being somewhat new to this whole blogging thing, I still feel surprised and honored that people choose to send me their music. I guess music is art and people want to share their creations, you know? Sometimes I don't really like what I hear, though, but I still get that tingle of ... I don't know, joy almost-a common bond over the human experience. But it's even better when someone says, "Hey, listen to this. I made it. You'll like it!" and I find myself saying, "You know what? Yes, yes [...]
I'm a few months late to this party, but apparently Fred Thomas—the creative mind behind the excellent Saturday Looks Good To Me —released a record with singer Betty Marie Barnes as the Mighty Clouds . The duo's self-titled LP is out now on Polyvinyl and contains Thomas's unabashedly poppy approach to songwriting along with an assortment of 60s-tinged vocal melodies, which Barnes fills out beautifully with her bright tone. If Thomas's songs are the mashed potatoes, Barnes' voice is the gravy on top that enriches everything below. Grab the album digitally via Bandcamp or on vinyl [...]
an saturday looks good to me werden sich einige erinnern. ein glanzvolles großprojekt, das einige schillernde popalben auf den markt warf. bis zu zwölf mitarbeiter wies manches der auf u.a. polyvinyl, redder oder k records veröffentlichten releases auf. das letzte erschien in 2007. danach gab es lediglich eine 7", ein jahr später auf ernest jenning. doch fred thomas, man muss ihn wohl den mann hinter saturday looks good to me nennen, war stets lebendig und hellwach. und er äußerte sich auf seinem blog zum sukzessiven sterben der band und zog mehr oder weniger einen schlussstrich. schade, aber nicht zu ändern. [...]
In 2006 it seemed like Matthew Adam Hart would soon reach prolific status. Hart's flurry of successful remixes and the release of The Russian Futurists' '05 gem, Our Thickness, suggested that he could become the next Matthew Herbert of sorts, a musical entrepreneur with refined innovation even beyond his specialized niche of electronica. Our Thickness [...]
In 2006 it seemed like Matthew Adam Hart would soon reach prolific status. Hart's flurry of successful remixes and the release of The Russian Futurists' '05 gem, Our Thickness, suggested that he could become the next Matthew Herbert of sorts, a musical entrepreneur with refined innovation even beyond his specialized niche of electronica. Our Thickness [...]
Ypsilanti's own, Swimsuit! Not since getting ahold of the Weed Hounds demo last year, have I been so excited and blown away by the first listen of demo. The band is Swimsuit and they're from Ypsilanti, MI! They're relatively fresh out of the over and are not to be slept on! Fred Thomas of the amazing, incredible, best ever Saturday Looks Good To Me teamed up with friends Shelley, Dina (of Secret Twins), and Amber to form Swimsuit back sometime around the beginning of the year. They've since released a Demo EP, Life [...]
I was reading up on Sebastien Grainger and it's strange to see the 00's already being recorded as a decade gone past; a chapter gathering dust. Here's a fun tidbit from the Wiki page on DFA1979 that talks about Grainger's obsession with the year 1979: "Coincidentally in the 1979 movie Apocalypse Now , there's a helicopter that has the words Death From Above stenciled on it. " Grainger recently took part in a video series about the El Mocambo . [...]
Have you always felt a sense of regret at missing out on the paranoia, fear and all-round mind-fuck insanity of the Cold War? (yep, me too) Then this is your week. See, the FBI just announced the discovery of a rather large number of deep-cover Russian 'spies' implanted inside the US. Spies! They looked just like you and me! Deception! One of the spies is quite pretty ! The words 'covert', 'secret' and 'rendezvous' in the same newspaper article! Pretty exciting, right? So yeah, spies. Whose job it was to.. well, to do [...]
Pop music formed by '60s girl groups are often subjected to ancient stereotypes. Joyous harmonies, lyrics consisting of nothing more than multiply layered "doo-wop-da-doo-wop"s, and a subtle sway of the hips for sex appeal (or the most of what was allowed of it on TV at the time). While much of what was considered [...]
Tomorrow Looks Good To Me: Local Music Friday What's up with Local Music Fridays? Before I get started, I just want to tell everyone that yesterday's post was totally accidental. I had no idea that Malcom Mclaren had died. This article provides a little backstory on the famed punk personality's relationship with Ant . Moving on, it really has been a Good Week ! I spent a hell [...]
Erik Hall has had his share in the music biz, playing with NOMO and Saturday Looks Good to Me . Now, he's set to release his own album under the name In Tall Buildings , which comes out this week on Whistler Records . This track sort of has the old feel of Rogue Wave , but you can tell that Hall spends his time dabbling with every instrument possible. It's full of layers, but in the sort of [...]
Low - Words Saturday Looks Good to Me - Typing Sandbox Astronomy - Lost Languages Jeffrey Lewis - Alphabet Jordaan Mason - What's In Your Head Radiohead - These Are My Twisted Words Please tell me you're one of those people who love looking up words in dictionaries. Good. Thanks for that. I like to imagine that all our readers are the kind of people who [...]
IMDB Another year, another... year. This here blogsite turns seven years old today, a milestone which simultaneously fills me with pride, amazement and some degree of despair. If you told me seven years ago that I'd still have enough free time and energy to be blogging extensively on an almost daily basis, I'd have thought you mad. Mad, I say. How would I have time on top of tending to the wife and kids and other domestic responsibilities I'd surely have acquired by then? Ahem. Yeah. The [...]
![Fred Thomas: Flood [Album Review]](http://cdn.elbo.ws/posts/1953709_lg.jpg)
Directly upon the heels of two stellar releases, Every Scene Needs A Center by Tullycraft and Daughters And Suns by The Owls, Magic Marker Records treats us to a bit of a surprise. Where the label's typical release is inundated with pop and twee, Fred Thomas ' Flood can almost be considered experimental folk, or even freak folk. Learning Thomas' history in pop will help the listener understand this release and its home on Magic Marker. [...]
City Center - Bleed Blood City Center - Summer School This one could be a special find. City Center is Ryan Howard and Fred Thomas (ex-Saturday Looks Good to Me), two prolific sound architects comparable to a quieter, more intricate Panda Bear. They have a slew of releases on CD-R, cassette and vinyl - many of which are out of print, but some are still available - and a great blog where they regularly post up tracks, photos and mixtapes. Both of these songs [...]
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