Kanye West 808s & Heartbreak Roc-a-fella, 2008 R ap's must vulnerable pillar crumbles under the sudden vacancy of women in his life. Fair enough; his outlook is bleak at the right time. 808s and Heartbreak is the sissiest album released by someone who was ever a rapper, and for that Kanye deserves credit. Look at the sheepish posture in the press photos, listen to the lost diary entry in hidden track "Pinocchio Story." But it's never been about the words with Kanye. He was a pretty [...]
W hile Britain has The Beatles, Canada has The Band, Scotland has the JAMC, and Australia has AC/DC, the picture has never been quite as clear in the States. Despite (or maybe because of) the fact that America has been the birthplace of nearly every major movement in the last century of popular music, no one band has managed to emerge from the field and transcend time and classification as The Great American Band. That is until now, when one lowly website concocted the hair-brained scheme to sort it all out. So here it is, in three parts, The Bathysphere's [...]
W hile Britain has The Beatles, Canada has The Band, Scotland has the JAMC, and Australia has AC/DC, the picture has never been quite as clear in the States. Despite (or maybe because of) the fact that America has been the birthplace of nearly every major movement in the last century of popular music, no one band has managed to emerge from the field and transcend time and classification as The Great American Band. That is until now, when one lowly website concocted the hair-brained scheme to sort it all out. So here it is, in three parts, The Bathysphere's [...]
W hile Britain has The Beatles, Canada has The Band, Scotland has the JAMC, and Australia has AC/DC, the picture has never been quite as clear in the States. Despite (or maybe because of) the fact that America has been the birthplace of nearly every major movement in the last century of popular music, no one band has managed to emerge from the field and transcend time and classification as The Great American Band. That is until now, when one lowly website concocted the hair-brained scheme to sort it all out. So here it is, in three parts, The Bathysphere's [...]
T he final night of singer-songwriter Vic Chesnutt's tour with fellow Athenians and current collaborators Elf Power brought them to the Jackpot last Friday for a calm night of unabashedly quality music. Elf Power's set was surprisingly great. I've never listened to them a lot, but they kind of rule. All of their lyrics are really hallucinogenic and visual, unfolding with a very stream-of-consciousness logic. Musically, they came across as a bit more straight-forward and less psyched-out than their albums, but their lyrical delivery was spot-on. They played mostly songs from their newest record. The highlight was probably the older [...]
Lil Wayne & DJ Drama Dedication 3 Purloined .rar, 2008 C ontext matters so much more than content on this mixtape – Lil Wayne accomplished his old goal and seems to be formulating a new one. What about now? After Da Drought 3 cemented his claim to "best rapper alive" as reality and Tha Carter III spread the word far (nearly 3 million copies sold) and wide (he recently made an appearance at the Country Music Awards), Dedication 3 seemed poised to [...]
Lil Wayne & DJ Drama Dedication 3 Purloined .rar C ontext matters so much more than content on this mixtape. Lil Wayne accomplished his old goal and seems to be formulating a new one. What about now? After Da Drought 3 cemented his claim to "best rapper alive" as reality and Tha Carter III spread the word far (nearly 3 million copies sold) and wide (he recently made an appearance at the Country Music Awards), Dedication 3 seemed poised to be the [...]
F irst off, the sound at The Gargoyle is exquisitely terrible. That needs to be said and someone needs to do something about it. If you're bringing in top-tier acts like Broken Social Scene, Wolf Parade, Ratatat (joke!), No Age, and Cut Copy (more jokes!), you should be shooting for at least bottom-of-the-barrel quality. That was indescribable though, and this is coming from someone who has never cared about live sound quality beyond "too soft" and "too loud." Glad we got that out of the way. . . . Soft Circle, or Hisham Bharoocha, the name [...]
I first saw Gentleman Auction House back in February when they opened for Evangelicals with Penny Marvel. I liked some of their songs a little, and some of them I liked a lot. Even better, all three of the singers had sore throats that night, so they all sang in these raspy voices that made every line sound that much more compelling and expressive. Actually they sounded uncannily like Daddy's Hands, the British Columbia band that's been credited with inventing the Wolf Parade et al. sound - even the ridiculous female soprano was there. Daddy's Hands was never exactly [...]
T urns out some mysterious disparity in schedules has put the kibosh on the much-hyped Evangelicals Tourtrickle 2008 . As recently as two months ago, the band's official Dead Oceans website advertised a November 16th date with Mojo's of Columbia, but Mojo's says Mike Zito on the 16th and Dead Oceans says...nothing. A passive glance at bassist Kyle's tourblog also reveals nothing. Guess this means No Age @ The Gargoyle . On a barely related note, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin will not be playing Mojo's this Sunday either, but they will [...]
T-Pain Thr33 Ringz Nappy Boy Entertainment/Konvict/Jive/Zom ba W hile listening to Thr33 Ringz , "The King Back" popped into my headphones (because T.I. is the next dude in the alphabet). The song is not especially great. But after an hour of T-Pain, his garbage music and his stupid rhymes, here was damning perspective: T-Pain is a purposeless musician of flimsy talent and he is dwarfed by King . It's hard to commit a void to record and Thr33 Ringz gets the half star because it's [...]
T-Pain Thr33 Ringz Nappy Boy Entertainment/Konvict/Jive/Zom ba/LaFace W hile listening to Thr33 Ringz , "The King Back" popped into my headphones (because T.I. is the next dude in the alphabet). The song is not especially great. But after an hour of T-Pain, his garbage music and his stupid rhymes, here was damning perspective: T-Pain is a purposeless musician of flimsy talent and he is dwarfed by King . It's hard to commit a void to record and Thr33 Ringz gets the half star because it's [...]
Turns out some mysterious disparity in schedules has put the kibosh on the much-hyped Evangelicals Tourtrickle 2008 . As recently as two months ago, the band's official Dead Oceans website advertised a November 16th date with Mojo's of Columbia, but Mojo's says Mike Zito on the 16th and Dead Oceans says...nothing. A passive glance at bassist Kyle's tourblog also reveals nothing. Guess this means No Age @ The Gargoyle . On a barely related note, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin will not be playing Mojo's this Sunday either, but they will [...]
A IDS Wolf gets lumped in with the noise scene a lot, and not entirely unfairly--their music is loud and dissonant, and I probably wouldn't want to listen to them around any family members. But they achieve it through a means completely opposite most "noise" music; instead of sludgy, plodding and drenched in feedback, their tunes are razor sharp, astonishingly precise and filled with a tense, reckless energy. Less bad weed and PBR, more methamphetamine and guarana. That's what impressed me about them live Tuesday night at The Record Bar; unlike a lot of noise dudes who hide behind a [...]
Love Is All A Hundred Things Keep Me Up At Night What's Your Rupture, 2008 S weden, man, I don't even know you anymore. Here's all I've ever asked of you: unassuming, inconsequential pop songs swathed in hazy feedback. Moderate memorability. Twee leanings. TAKE NO RISKS. Win me with hooks, and most importantly, sing like you're cold and miserable all the time, because you live in Europe's Canada. Love is All, you are not what I love about Swedish music. A song ("Sea Sick") about fun happenings on [...]
Love Is All A Hundred Things Keep Me Up At Night What's Your Rupture, 2008 S weden, man, I don't even know you anymore. Here's all I've ever asked of you: unassuming, inconsequential pop songs swathed in hazy feedback. Moderate memorability. Twee leanings. TAKE NO RISKS. Win me with hooks, and most importantly, sing like you're cold and miserable all the time, because you live in Europe's Canada. Love is All, you are not what I love about Swedish music. A song ("Sea Sick") about fun happenings on [...]
(click to enlarge) It's a trombone. [photos by Zach Noland]
(click to enlarge) It's a trombone. [photos by Zach Noland]
the bathysphere
Bison - Quill
Neutral Milk Hotel- Aeroplane Over the Sea
Shinichi Osawa – Big Beach Mix 2012
