Ah, December. The final month of the year. It contains the festival of Hanukkah, sometimes! For journalists - and to a lesser extent their retarded cousins, bloggers - December is a time for looking back over the events of the last three-hundred-thirty-plus days. Across all forms of media, the next four weeks will be filled with cloying fits of nostalgia, hindsight-enriched wistfulness, and even some good-old-fashioned navel-gazing. Please stay tuned to Swan Fungus each Fridays as we conclude each week with a new Year-End list. If you are a regular reader you will recall that I like to end each [...]
Last year about this time I posted a few songs about giving thanks; this year, I was so appreciative for the wave of support which followed my call for patronage that I jumped the gun, posting my favorite coversongs of thanksgiving in celebration of you, my beloved readers. Sharing those songs just a few weeks early was worth doing, though it preempts the obvious set of thankful songs and blessings. But this, too, is a gift. For it allows us an opportunity to delve a bit deeper [...]
Sorry, Red Sox fans. At least you made it further than the Yankees did this year...Now, please enjoy this Sunday mix tape. Wait, before we begin, I want to take a moment to recognize Swan Fungus reader Bennett for his amazing attempt at trickery. After making a generous donation to the website, he was the proud recipient of one of my now-infamous "Thank You" care packages. His parcel included a mask, some weird little trinkets, a Rod Stewart backstage pass from a '70s or '80s tour (I don't remember which), and -- best of all -- a really [...]
Sorry, Red Sox fans. At least you made it further than the Yankees did this year...Now, please enjoy this Sunday mix tape. Wait, before we begin, I want to take a moment to recognize Swan Fungus reader Bennett for his amazing attempt at trickery. After making a generous donation to the website, he was the proud recipient of one of my now-infamous "Thank You" care packages. His parcel included a mask, some weird little trinkets, a Rod Stewart backstage pass from a '70s or '80s tour (I don't remember which), and -- best of all -- a really [...]
Traffic: Shootout At The Fantasy Factory Featuring the all-universe rhythm section of Roger Hawkins (drums), David Hood (bass), and Rebop. If the lengthy guitar solo isn't to your taste, you can just focus on what David Hood is playing during that part. Recorded at Strawberry Hill Studios, Jamaica
It was, oh, two and a half years ago now, that we heard last from Dallasite Eric Grubbs about that status of his book Post: An Anthology of American Post-Hardcore, 1985-2007 . Well, now comes this news: Grubbs, who spends the bulk of his time broadcasting area traffic reports for a couple radio stations around town, has finally finished--and published-- Post , a full four-and-a-half years after he started writing it in March of 2004. "Why it took so long to come out was for various reasons," Grubbs says. "Lots [...]
The 3th September session of finest sounds!!! Format: Digital Download Mixed: 20 Sept 2008 Genre: Electronic Style: Tech House, Minimal, Minimal House Bitrate: 320 kbps Rar-File: 172 MB Including: 1-mp3, 1-cue, 1-jpg Tracklist: 01 - Eric Kraffman & Alvaro Garfunk-Lost in Traffic 02 - Audio Bullys-Flickery Vision (Extended Mix) 03 - Mario Impellizzeri-Eleganter Spielraum 04 - Esse-Robots Can Feel 05 - Sierra Sam And Marcus Vector-Jump Rope 06 - [...]
SomaCow Media is proud to present SomaCow , brought to you in this hour by The Sports Buzz . You can catch them live every Sunday from 6-8 PM. In this hour we took a break from having Hurricanes here in Florida to point and laugh at the people of Ike-besotten Texas, we discussed the use of red-light cameras at intersections, and we struggled to determine if Lock-Ins cause Teen Pregnancy. Look. I don't want to get a bunch of mail [...]
Old 97's : She Loves The Sunset [ purchase ] Groove Armada : Suntoucher [ purchase ] Traffic : Paper Sun [ purchase ] The Pernice Brothers : There Goes the Sun [ purchase ]
The short list for the Polaris Music Prize was announced a couple of weeks ago. The list is as follows. Black Mountain - In the Future Basia Bulat - Oh, My Darling Caribou - Andorra Kathleen Edwards - Asking For Flowers Plants & Animals - Parc Avenue Shad - The Old Prince Stars - In Our Bedroom After the War Two Hours Traffic - Little Jabs The Weakerthans - Reunion Tour Three things are wrong with this list; The Weakerthans, Stars and Two Hours [...]
Traffic : Heaven Is In Your Mind [ purchase ] Combine the spacey sixties, Brit R&B, three months in an isolated Berkshire cottage and you get Heaven Is In Your Mind. Traffic's one constant over the years is Stevie Winwood, who has been there throughout all permeations of the band. Heaven Is In Your Mind is from Mr. Fantasy/Heaven Is In Your Mind, one of the finest albums of sixties-styled music you can find. If you have a chance, I highly recommend a listen.
A belated Happy Birthday to Catbirdseat.Org's very first really-successful internet meme, Hipster Bingo , which actually turned *5* years old last month. Believe it or not, fresh links to this STILL come in many times each week- it actually accounts for a full 25% of Catbirdseat.Org traffic. I know, I know, you'd think I'd have updated Hipster Bingo at some point, to include "beards," or to replace "ironic trucker cap" with "$50 New Era 'Fitted,;" but thing is, you gotta know when to let something go. You gotta know when to stop. The last thing [...]
la serata di venerdì, con un piede nel fango e un orecchio teso al passato. I Wire stanno dentro benissimo al vestito della reunion, riprendono in mano gli strumenti come se fosse per pochi amici e senza troppi fronzoli tirano fuori il loro meglio. E poi i Pistols, che la loro però non è una reunion. E' il punk, è l'attitudine, è quel farsi fottere ancora una volta da Rotten e tutto quello che gli gira intorno. Con quella camicia da ciccione i suoi fuck e il continuo prenderti per il culo. Ironico, se ne frega. Probabilmente ancora [...]
I posted these somewhere else a while ago, but thought more people might like them. It's a bunch of psych rock in various forms, some harder shit that sounds like protometal and some real stoner sounding shit. The Seeds - Travel With Your Mind Neil Meryweather - Sole Survivor Neil Meryweather - 8 Miles High Traffic - Cloured Rain The Third [...]
Volevo scrivere che in sto periodo non ho tempo per niente e tanto meno per il blog. Ma era abbastanza palese, credo. Volevo lamentarmi delle serata di Traffic appena persa (Tricky, Soulwax, Battles, Fujiya & Miyagi). E fanculo questo, e fanculo quello... Ma poi ho alzato le spalle e ho pensato cazzo me ne frega domani ci sono i Pistols (e i Wire!). L'ho detto come se trent'anni non fossero passati, cercando di non pensare a un potenziale effetto circo che potrebbe creare questa reunion. L'ho detto con l'entusiasmo di un ragazzino che pensava che nella [...]
Si sta diffondendo anche da noi il fenomeno dei secret show, appuntamenti live annunciati all'ultimo momento e in maniera informale, spesso con line-up sconosciuta, gratuiti e riservati agli appassionati più attenti o casualmente di passaggio. La scorsa notte all'interno del Traffic Free Festival di Torino s'è consumato un evento. Senza alcun annuncio sul sito del locale (giusto ieri era comparso un piccolo box sulla homepage del festival ), allo storico Hiroshima Mon Amour il re del trip hop Tricky ha suonato per più di un'ora e mezza per 300 fortunati. Iniziata [...]
Traffic: The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys [ purchase ] Rickie Lee Jones: The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys [ purchase ] EMF: The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys [ purchase ] At almost twelve minutes long, Traffic's 1971 laid-back jazz jam anthem is heavy with solos from the various bandmembers, and a tight funk/rock chorus which plays on [...]
Tom Bombadil was always one of my favorite characters from J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Fellowship Of The Ring . Even though the characater has been hotly debated by those with more time than me , I always thought of him as an enigmatic nature spirit who was in love with the concept of life. A cult of personality, minus the cult and the funny mustache. The real Neal Cassady of Middle Earth. Bombadil is an enigmatic group of musicians who obviously love what they are doing. Their debut album, [...]
stevie winwood gets a little help from his old blind faith mate & recent concert partner, god, on this new track from his forthcoming album, nine lives ...definitely an throwback to winwood's early seventies heyday & on par with the material off his previous effort, 2003's about time , which was one of his best in quite a while... nine lives will be available april 29th & winwood will be on the road this summer with tom petty & the heartbreakers. download: steve winwood ft. eric clapton - dirty city [...]
This weekend was the 5th annual Extreme Beer Fest in Boston. I couldn't go, seeing as how I'm living 3,000 miles away now, but I remember fondly the last time I attended what could only be described as a huge, nerd-filled drinking contest. It was two years ago, and I drove up to Bristol, Rhode Island, where my friend Ian attended law school. I described the entire weekend in detail here on the blog, but I'm sure it wasn't my finest moment as a writer seeing as how I was intoxicated pretty much from the moment I arrived on Friday [...]
Swan Fungus
Cover Lay Down
Art Decade
DC9 At Night
Minimal Freaks
SomaCow
Star Maker Machine
The Panic Manual
The Catbirdseat
sciampagnino tonight
These Rocks Pop
soundsblog
Shinjak's Listening Lounge
the leather canary
Stream: Disclosure – When A Fire Starts To Burn
40 Year Itch: David Bowie TV Documentary Shot
Boards of Canada :: Tomorrow's Harvest
You’ve GOT to Hear This: “Enemies”
