tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-74378455833298423232024-03-13T07:39:18.146-05:00On Warmer MusicMusic That Doesn't SuckJohn M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.comBlogger146125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-84921897328808391452016-11-05T14:14:00.003-05:002016-11-05T14:27:31.656-05:00In Memoriam: saki (2010-2016)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zHnsvlaDnh4/WB4ymE4gjII/AAAAAAAABU4/Vv8NBTsFp4QBhE4JUU5ZRpmBkKx4ubS1gCK4B/s1600/20161103_220817-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zHnsvlaDnh4/WB4ymE4gjII/AAAAAAAABU4/Vv8NBTsFp4QBhE4JUU5ZRpmBkKx4ubS1gCK4B/s320/20161103_220817-2.jpg" width="240" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I first moved to Logan Square in late summer 2010. It was a brave new world for me - my first time living on the northside. Fresh out of college and student teaching, I didn't yet have the physical or financial stability </span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">for</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> a</span></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> vinyl collection but I was determined to explore the neighborhood. On my second day in my new neighborhood I went for an <span style="background-color: white;">exploratory </span>walk and, amidst a sea of of taquerias and by-the-slice places I ran into</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> a seemingly out-of-place record store on Fullerton called <a href="http://mailorder.sakistore.net/">saki</a>. I immediately knew I'd found something.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">That little shop became my first neighborhood </span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">place </i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">in</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> Logan. By that I mean, it was something I could put in a sentence like "you should check out my neighborhood ______ place, it's great".<span style="background-color: white;"> I felt a kinship with saki. We both loved music, had similar taste and were barely hanging on at the edge of the neighborhood's music scene.</span> It was an anchor in the landscape of my new life. Like my local bar or grocery store (The Double and Tony's, for the record), it became a part of my personal geography as a place that felt intensely like home.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It's also what helped drive me into record collecting. Although I still cringe at the fact that vinyl obsession is just another form of consumerist self-medication, it's MY medication and it helps get me do normal, dammit. As the mp3 blog world of the mid-to-late '00s gave way to the even mightier deluge of omnipresent "musical content" (although clearly this blog found out five years too late), I've become one of those assholes who has deep-seated convictions on the joys and benefits engaging regularly with music put out on physical objects with art on the cover and rich sound and all that crap. saki was my kiddie pool, helping me wade carefully into a new way of exploring music.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It's where I bought my copies of <i>The Monitor</i>, </span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">London Calling and</i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> </span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Double Nickels On The Dime</i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">. Do you KNOW what owning critically-acclaimed, genre-challenging punk double albums means to bearded record nerds of a certain age? And if I needed the newest Bloodshot release or Kendrick record or just a place to find something totally unexpected, I had an oasis less than a 10 minute walk from my knee-bumpingly cramped one-bedroom walkup. It wasn't necessarily a beneficial proximity, especially after losing my first teaching job <span style="background-color: white;">and often skated by on double digit bank balances for far longer than advisable. Still, at the time it felt like a good way to waste my youth and I stand by that.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The allure of the unexpected is what makes it especially appealing. Earlier this year I was browsing aimlessly through saki's Local Artist bin and I stumbled on an LP with a really sweet-looking cover and decided to purchase it for that reason alone. It turned out to be Bill Tucker's <i><a href="http://billtucker.net/punk-fillssad-bad-mittens/">Punk Fills / Sad Bad Mittens</a></i> compilation. As I've since moved, dealt with family medical issues and just generally tried to weather the unrelenting shitstorm that is 2016, I've often found myself seeking <span style="background-color: white;">the sweaterlike comfort</span> of his guitar and nasaly ruminations on life.<span style="background-color: white;"> It's the kind of record-I-never-knew-I-needed that I come in expecting to find and am rarely dissapointed.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I love the non-algorithmic serendipity of having a place to come and rub musical stones together and see if anything sparks. saki was particularly designed for this, lacing in weird noise records and the complete Sun Ra discography amongst the St. Vincent record I'd originally come in to buy. It was a place to enjoy art, familiar and unexpected. There was always local art and/or posters for sale hung with reverence on the walls and a small bookshelf where you could pick up anything from zines to 33 1/3 installments to John Darinelle's latest novel. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Baby Money & Beer</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">They were also a surprisingly great place to see live music. Although I love a cramped record cave, saki's airy layout with a small stage and open area contrasted nicely with most records stores. Here in-stores didn't require trying to cram oneself awkwardly amongst aisles of records, craning and straining to see the artist. The store's</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> giant plate glass windows were also a plus. They would absolutely drench the room in sunlight, giving whomever was onstage an air of having a natural spotlight and it made the pretentious can of beer you'd bought on the way taste that much sweeter.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The shows I most remember were mostly populated by scene faves like </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Runnies or B</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">aby Money, with the occasional local heavy hitter like <a href="http://www.epitonic.com/features/epitonic-saki-sessions/jc-brooks-uptown-sound-2013-epitonic-saki-session/">JC Brooks & the Uptown Sound</a> (which I might have <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2012/03/album-review-want-more-jc-brooks-uptown.html">mentioned before</a>). Then every once in a while they'd even grab someone like <a href="http://www.epitonic.com/features/epitonic-saki-sessions/superchunk-epitonic-saki-session/">Superchunk</a> and you felt proud that they'd managed to drag indie royalty into your grubby neck of the woods. They also promoted the hell out of live music outside their walls with an ongoing deal where they'd give you a guestlist spot at upcoming live shows if you bought the band's record beforehand. For places like Lincoln Hall or Empty Bottle, this essentially amounted to getting a couple of tickets for below face and a free LP to boot. I never understood why that alone didn't have them mobbed every time a new show was announced but such is fate.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">On Thursday, Adam Hirzel and Patrick Monaghan <a href="http://mailorder.sakistore.net/blogs/news/saki-to-close-december-1st">announced</a> that, due to the closure of Carrot Top Distribution, the company driving the store, saki will shut its doors as of December 1st, adding yet another tribulation to the biblical trial that is 2016. Although the news hit me hard, I can't say that I was surprised. As often as not I would stop by on my way home from work and browse for half hour as the store's only customer. Being as far west as they were, they weren't exactly a hotbed for foot traffic. I was spoiled but for most people it was a schlep and, with records stores sprouting up like mushrooms on the northwest side, record buyers didn't lack for other options.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Still, I'll always have fond memories of Adam behind the register chatting with me as I checked out and inevitably talking me into having them order the latest Feelies re-issue or tweeting me when the new Angel Olsen was back in stock, lest I miss out again. I'm sure I was fish in a barrel. Meanwhile Patrick, despite being a Cubs fan, is a wonderfully old soul and one of the finest <a href="https://twitter.com/pkmonaghan">twitter follows</a> in Chicago (and beyond), especially if you wanna get woke on the scourge of urban light pollution. These are the kind of people who made Logan Square feel like an actual community full of wonderful human beings, not just another "hot neighborhood".<br /><br />So let me just close by saying a heartfelt thank you to these cool dudes and all the other great folks who helped make saki a thing for these last six-and-half years. You created something meaningful that will always hold a special place in my heart. And on my shelves.</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-31748908689333029912014-03-28T00:29:00.003-05:002014-03-31T00:29:20.180-05:00On Warmer Music's Spring 2014 Mix<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://chicagocolors.blogspot.com/2010/05/chicago-spring.html">via Chicago Colors</a></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By this point in the year, most of my friends are pretty sick of me but this year, I'm starting to fear for my safety. </span><a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2013/01/winter-in-my-bones-on-warmer-musics.html" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank">As you might remember</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, I'm one of the few Chicagoans who is an unapologetic fan of winter. Far from a popular position in an average year, this year it was the kind of thing that had visions of torches and pitchforks dancing in Chiberians frostbitten heads.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />But even after a winter as <a href="http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2014-03-01/news/chi-chicago-snow-records-20140301_1_snowfall-total-inches-snowiest" target="_blank">historically bleak</a> as this one I will still defend my love of true winter because it makes the spring all that much sweeter. This morning I smiled because it was raining. Rather than snowing. In late March. Only someone whose dealt with freezer burn on their lungs could find happiness in a drippy, 40 degree day.<br /><br />Indeed spring in the midwest is a brief and flighty thing that exists for, at most, six non-consecutive weeks between March and early June but it's no less glorious because of it. A long-time spring fever sufferer, I still dream every year of the utterly giddy feeling I got in college when the season's first day over 50 when I could get away with skipping an afternoon class, throwing together a mixtape and go tooling down country roads to find a place to walk amidst woods and birds.<br /><br />Don't get me wrong, as a whole, spring 'round these parts is perhaps the least satisfying season. But like that girl/boy/other you always had a crush on growing up, the brief moments when the light shines on you are unbelievably heady in a ways a solid. steady relationship/season (OK, this metaphor is getting out of hand) never quite could.</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://app.box.com/s/ba0y4g4aucucbop4x55x">Download Complete Mix As A .ZIP</a></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/7ey94f62zgqjqxgqzr7x">Winter Blues</a> - Red Kross</b> <a href="https://www.mergerecords.com/researching-the-blues">Buy <i>Researching The Blues</i></a></span><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/dokfazqje8dwpcmjjfwc">Moonless March</a> - Aloha</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="https://www.polyvinylrecords.com/#product/home_acres" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Home Acres</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/o4v5uq3z8gbygmgi5gdu">March 9th (feat. Stage Soul Music)</a> - DJ Premier</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Buy</span><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">4. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/8sa1gub0dx502d523lt1">Winterlong [Neil Young]</a> - Pixies</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Complete-B-Sides-Pixies/dp/B000S55AAM/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy Complete B-Sides</a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">5. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/b29yss31ofln400asobw">Return To Spring</a> - Calexico</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/calexico-live-session-ep/id537882288" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Live Session [EP]</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">6. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/xi571uvbpo3yja9dps8t">Late March, Death March</a> - Frightened Rabbit</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Pedestrian-Verse-Explicit-Frightened-Rabbit/dp/B00B2IL0C6/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Pedestrian Verse</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">7. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/el30dh50q1uwjlyjrqro">April Come She Will</a> - Simon & Garfunkel</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sounds-Silence-Simon-Garfunkel/dp/B001DBMBNE/ref=sr_1_1?s=dmusic&ie=UTF8&qid=1395980567&sr=1-1&keywords=sounds+of+silence" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Sounds Of Silence</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">8. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/yfi5ua5zo6nwyzg9axwr">Snow Is Gone</a> - Josh Ritter</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.joshritter.com/hello-starling/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Hello Starling</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">9. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/cw93z5qd9jmh2yn8cfgu">Walking On Sunshine [Crooked Fingers Version]</a> - Fucked Up</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://store.matadorrecords.com/the-chemistry-of-common-life" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy The Chemistry Of Common Life</a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">10. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/lwtbbbn825uy84c8hd12">Open The Door</a> - The Men</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.sacredbonesrecords.com/releases/sbr090/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>New Moon</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">11. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/p05wsryw16jgl4uteahx">April Skies</a> - The Jesus & Mary Chain</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Singles-The-Jesus-Mary-Chain/dp/B000068ZXB" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>21 Singles</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">12. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/l4xveqwlupgb7dhbfayu">Spring 2008</a> - Architecture In Helsinki</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Fingers-Crossed-Architecture-Helsinki/dp/B0001JXPDE" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Fingers Crossed</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">13. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/jjpeav8jff62uk43xfde">Springtime In New York</a> - Jonathan Richman</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Her-Mystery-High-Heels-Shadow/dp/B00005Q66R" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Her Mystery Is Not Of High Heels and Eye Shadow</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">14. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/dynqs9ebb6c187fg0emy">Sure As Spring</a> - La Luz</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://laluz.bandcamp.com/album/damp-face" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Damp Face [EP]</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">15. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/38jc10r52sb10iwxqxdi">Springtime Is The Season</a> - Of Montreal</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Cherry-Peel-Montreal/dp/B001A3GTE2/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1395980958&sr=1-1&keywords=cherry+peel+of+montreal" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Cherry Peel</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">16. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/98jkvq57nq7vqabkmqe9">Month Of May</a> - Arcade Fire</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="https://www.mergerecords.com/the-suburbs" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>The Suburbs</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">17. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/6fou0j6crfkui4lao2fr">American Music</a> - Violent Femmes</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Why-Birds-Sing-Violent-Femmes/dp/B004T6VJFQ/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Why Do Birds Sing?</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">18. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/ev3d6yymkcfwkf9xywf8">Itchycoo Park</a> - The Small Faces</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002NK7QJI/ref=sr_1_5_rd?ie=UTF8&child=B002NJVD5C&qid=1395981075&sr=1-5%3C/a%3E" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>The Autumn Stone</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">19. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/xiznpeyizv1cghl1bcu8">The Boys Are Back In Town/Ignition Remix [Thin Lizzy/R. Kelly]</a> - Mountain Goats</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://4ad.com/releases/2098" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>The Sunset Tree</i></a><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">20. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/y31ukufm3h3j3y4t4iu2">Waterloo Sunset</a> - The Kinks</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Something-Else-By-Kinks/dp/B000002KOC" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Something Else</i></a></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-87287162565253807712014-03-26T15:54:00.001-05:002014-03-26T15:55:03.506-05:00Vinyl Vacation: L.A.M.F. Revisited - The Heartbreakers<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Ml6Q9B2oIKE/UzM5HMJnzvI/AAAAAAAABSA/pSUODsMKa8o/s1600/2006272.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Ml6Q9B2oIKE/UzM5HMJnzvI/AAAAAAAABSA/pSUODsMKa8o/s1600/2006272.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Doesn't the world of pop music ever seem hopelessly expansive to anyone else? And by "hopelessly", I of course mean "thrillingly"... unless it's the first one.<br /><br />The thing about being an intellectually inquisitive (at times veering dangerously towards acquisitive) person, especially in the 21st century is that there will always be infinitely more stuff to know than anyone, even one guided by supposedly impeccably high standards of taste could possibly hope to take in. So even as someone who's spent far more time than most reasonably socialized people diving into snobby depths of various strands of pop, punk, hip-hop, R&B, folk, indie and whatever else meets my very high and somewhat arbitrary standards of worthy music, I still have more glaring gaps in my knowledge than I like having to admit.<br /><br />Just as declaring oneself a history major makes one keenly self-aware of the vast amount of recorded humanity of which you have only the very faintest hints of knowledge, writing semi-seriously about music will drive the self-aggrandizing intellectual into spasms of guilt over their own shortcomings.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />Punk was one of my earliest musical loves (or, should I say, quote-unquote "serious" musical loves) but even within its confines I have large gaps. I'm great on pub rock, proto-punk, sprit of '77 UK stuff, American '80s underground (maybe a little light on hardcore but not embarrassingly so) and, of course, most of the big name/reputation stuff since the second Bush administration. But even that leaves something to be desired and one of my many musical projects in recent years has been to buff up on my early NYC punk. Sure I knew my way around the Ramones, the Heads and Television but there were so many groups (New York Dolls? Dead Boys?) that clocked in with barely more than a line and maybe one song in my mental encyclopedia entries.<br /><br />It was with this ridiculous sense of self-important record nerd guilt rattling in the back of my poor, overworked subconscious when last year I stumbled across a copy of the Heartbreakers sole record <i>L.A.M.F.</i> in Logan Hardware last spring. I new little about the band other than stories about Johnny Thunders or Richard Hell and that they did a mean version of "Chinese Rocks" and that Jeff Tweedy, in his salad days, responded to a record exec's suggestion that they sound Tom Petty's version to suggest that they preferred the original. This seemed more than pedigree enough.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Experiencing this record for the first time on vinyl was one of those sickeningly rewarding experiences that you hate vinyl lovers for waxing on about until you become one. First of all, it was a picture disc. I normally find this kinda tack but in this case "tacky" is pretty much the perfect aesthetic. Named after a graffiti tag which stands for the already junior high yearbookish phrase "Like A Mother Fucker", the album is a big sloppy mess of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll whose attitude practically <i>begs</i> for treatment with sneering action pics and stylized bright pink lettering. Indeed, a picture disc wrapped in two clear plastic wrappers seemed far more fitting than a cardboard cover, collector-ready white sleeve and stuffy set of reissue liner notes.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I decided to hold up on my usual procedure of doing homework on any new album before dropping the needle and just started playing <i>L.A.M.F.</i> as soon as I got it home. As I did, I was blow away by just how delightfully unrestrained these songs seemed and didn't end up getting around to learn its backstory until about six months later. In the meantime I'd fallen in love with this early punk gem. I loved the way the guitars sliced and buzzed, I loved the singalong choruses, I loved straightforward, damn-the-torpedoes songwriting that neither pulled punches giving it the kind of don't-give-a-fuck reckless honesty that makes raw rock 'n' roll great.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Eventually I would start playing my rock critic game of spotting its later influences which included everything from the Replacements ("Born To(o) Lo(o)se") to the Stiff Little Fingers ("Get Off The Phone") and beyond But before I started doing that, I was able to just loose myself in the fun and fury of an undiscovered gem of the early punk years. There is something so satisfying at being totally blown away by a great record from the past and trying to imagine just how ridiculous it would have been hearing this during the Ford administration. And it was incredibly not mediating this through the iTunes scree, the writing deadline, the Wikipedia article and allowing myself to just take it in. As music. Music to enjoy because it was there. Throwing on the Heartbreakers' cover of "Do You Love Me?" or their endearingly enthusiastic romp through "Chinese Rocks" became a treat to be enjoyed upon returning home, a blaring, distorted oasis from not just life, the job, etc. but also from omnipresent, deadline music.<br /><br />18 months after purchase, <i>L.A.M.F.</i> remains one of my go-to Saturday night pre-gaming albums and, even after delving more deeply into its backstory (and relating music), I still enjoy being able to burn through 40 minutes of mindless post-adolescent debauchery without turning on the old brain too much. If I'm ever in trouble of doing that all I have to do is start staring at the pretty pink lettering on the disc and start watching it spin around and around and around. It makes me kinda dizzy but I kinda like that. Why shouldn't an album give you at least that much?</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-40417382452972561102014-03-24T02:03:00.000-05:002014-03-24T10:38:06.516-05:00Concert Review & Pictures: Ex Hex & Priests at Schubas, March 18, 2014<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Humans are bad time-keepers. For example, it seems like just last year that I was rocking out to Wild Flag at the Empty Bottle while it seems like forever since <a href="http://mattconzen.com/blog">Matt Conzen</a> starting shooting shows with me. And yet <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2011/10/concert-review-pictures-wild-flag-at.html">both of those events were, in fact, two-and-a-half years ago</a> - go figure. Now Wild Flag is no more, Mary Timony is rolling through Chicago with her new project, Ex Hex and, fortunately, Matt Conzen is still snapping away with me.<br /><br />Last Tuesday's show was an all-ages special, which despite all the griping that usually accompanies such a designation, I was excited for. Generally I enjoy high schoolers getting their first taste of the endorphin rush of live music and God knows in this case I felt that no teen in Chicago wouldn't benefit from seeing the ass-kicking, no-names-taking bill being presented this night.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That being said, the 7:30 start time meant that I had to rush pell-mell from my last-possible-moment primary voting, down Belmont, past the Shell station advertising for Toni Berrios (seriously Chicago?), into Schubas and still arrived a couple songs into the opening set. No matter, though, I still was treated to a half hour of thoroughly-enjoyable "feminist dark surf" (their words) from Chicago's <a href="http://blizzardbabies.bandcamp.com/">Blizzard Babies</a>. Though their stage banter was a little wet behind the ears, it was endearingly so. At one point the drummer gave a shout-out to one of her drum students in the audience, you can't beat that for community. And once they started playing they impressed, generating the kind of fuzzy, wall-of-sound pop tunes that go down like mother's milk.<br /><br />By the time the second openers, Washington DC's <a href="http://priests.bandcamp.com/">Priests</a>, took the stage, the room was </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">mostly full. Although I was a little disappointed to see that most of the people there looked like they remembered Helium firsthand rather than like they were sneaking out for their first taste of indie rock, I was glad to see that frontwoman Katie Alice Greer had a large audience. Featuring a severely-styled, bleached blonde haircut, long wool (maybe?) dress and chunky black boots, Greer jumped, screamed and writhed her way around the stage with the kind of eye for performance that's all-too-rare in the punk/indie world these days. Burning through a set of loud, spiky punk tunes that often featured extended spoken word interludes, watching her felt like watching Patti Smith front Fugazi. Near the end of their set she dropped the news that that tomorrow the band's debut album on Don Giovanni would be officially announced which felt like a perfect, celebratory way to end the set for a group who swept through like a breath of fresh air.</span><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xKKiDjITBeg/Uy_UbIFL9QI/AAAAAAAABQw/0obH2PPaBvs/s1600/ExHex-Priests-BlizzardBabies+(30+of+33).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xKKiDjITBeg/Uy_UbIFL9QI/AAAAAAAABQw/0obH2PPaBvs/s1600/ExHex-Priests-BlizzardBabies+(30+of+33).jpg" height="400" width="266" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Speaking of new releases, Tuesday was also the release day of <a href="http://www.exhexband.com/">Ex Hex</a>'s debut single and their headlining set managed to top the already-strong performances preceding it. It's easy for beard-stroking rock critics like me to play "name-the-influences" and that's exactly what me and my similarly hirsute friend in the back did throughout Ex Hex's set, here's what we came up with: Thin Lizzy, the Runaways, Cheap Trick, the Ramones, etc. Whereas Wild Flag took a lot of pages from '70s AOR, Timony's new group is skewing more towards populist '70s shredders. I'd call it cock rock but, given the circumstances, perhaps pussy rock would be more appropriate? Whatever you call it, their set was ridiculously fun, culminating in covers of Johnny Thunders & the Heartbreakers and what I'm told was Transfixed.<br /><br />I spent about 15 minutes after the show hanging around the merch table shamelessly waiting for the band's wireless credit card system to work rather than suffer an annoying ATM fee in order to purchase the first ever Ex Hex single, "Hot and Cold" (a song which, by the way, played about as strongly as any new material can onstage). Seeing Mary and Katie respectively rooting through boxes of t-shirts and 7" records was a sight to behold. I'd say that they did it with the aplomb of someone actually employed in a customer service industry but that would be selling them short - they looked like they were actually happy to be where they were. Even if that wasn't strictly true (and, honestly, after at least one sweaty hour onstage, how could it be?), it's still the kind of thing that makes crusty old(ish) rock writers like smile, if for no other reason than that they deserve to not have to deal with such things, yet they still do it with aplomb. As great as this was, it was just another night, another chance for time to keep flowing and for us to misjudge it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://mattconzen.com/blog/2014/3/22/ex-hex-priests-and-blizzard-babies-schubas-31814">More Pictures From Matt Conzen</a></span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-60016419184637416072014-03-12T02:17:00.003-05:002014-03-12T02:17:51.478-05:00Concert Review & Pictures: Ice Balloons, Kyp Malone & Coins at The Empty Bottle, March 10, 2014<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Having a big name member can be a blessing or a curse for a new band. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the one hand, they'll help you garner attention but, on the other, a lot of that attention is going to come with some strong expectations that have nothing to do with you. It was precisely this tension between expectations and reality that made Monday night's show at the Empty Bottle so exhilarating.<br /><br />It was a free show and most of the advertising focused on Kyp Malone, of TV On The Radio fame, who was playing a solo set sandwiched in between local duo <a href="http://www.reverbnation.com/coins">Coins</a> and another project in which he plays, Ice Balloons. Given the attendance pattern, it was clear that most of the night's attendees were TVOTR fans interested in seeing their idol. I would wager that fewer than a quarter of the audience had any familiarity with Malone's solo work (released under the name Rain Machine), never mind that of the other bands, but here they were anyway. It was, a relatively full house of people excited to hear... something.<br /><a name='more'></a></span><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Coins, a collaboration between guitarist Angela Mullenhour of <a href="http://sybris.bandcamp.com/">Sybris</a> and <a href="http://www.redsandblue.com/">Reds and Blue</a> keyboardist Ellen Branch, started the night out with a set full of moody, wistful tunes about aliens and being struck by lightning played on equipment that appeared to have recently been salvaged from some forgotten '70s basement. The songs managed to etch their way into the back of your head, not necessarily due to their weird subject matter (which I might have missed without the band's intro) but due to the combination of Branch's waves of roiling keys and Mullenhour's prickly guitarwork, achieved by her practically clawing upward at the strings (or at least so it appeared). It was a strong opening set, priming the crowd perfectly for Kyp.<br /><br />Malone finally took the stage in a green khaki <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Kyp Malone</span></td></tr>
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shirt, rabbinical fedora and a <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/Frederick_Douglass_c1860s.jpg">Frederick Douglas</a>-esque salt n' pepper beard. After a few minutes of tuning he gave himself a brief, self-effacing introduction before launching into a set of crackling, imagistic material that blended folk, blues and chunky rock 'n' roll. The set consisted mostly of songs from <i>Rain Machine</i> which were, unsurprisingly solid, but occasionally meandering. Although the moments of lenghty, softly-strummed verses could start to feel a bit listless, Malone was able to wring a tone of utterly filthy distortion from his guitar which made the bridges and choruses exhilarating exhibitions of the possibility of the electric guitar. The audience was mostly pleased with the die-hard up front nearly losing it. At one point the obligatory marriage proposal wafted up from the crowd, which the singer replied self-effacingly "I'm not really the marrying type" before launching into the crowd favorite, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CUsPALIA18">"Give Blood"</a>.<br /><br />After Malone's set, some people wandered off, their one mission of the night having been fulfilled. But the roughly 80% of the audience who stuck around for the Brooklyn psychedelic jazz extremists <a href="http://iceballoons.bandcamp.com/">Ice Balloons</a> were in for an unforgettable scene. Picture a band comprising of a bassist, a keytarist, THREE people on synths/pedals/etc, a rangey drummer almost complete covered in tattoos with a baseball cap reading "Comme des Fuckdown" and, oh yeah, a lead singer dressed in powder blue nudie suit, with no shirt underneath, matching Keds and a giant sparkling insect head mask. Now picture them all setting up their instruments to a building wall of sound and realizing at some point after the five minute mark that their set had already started. This is soon confirmed for you by the lead insect grabbing the mic and screaming into as the band somehow thunders into an even greater cacophony than before. Throughout all of this Malone lends a surreal air to things by standing still like a proud oak surrounded by a hurricane of noise, fiddling with his pedals resting on an old barstool. It was surreal.<br /><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_w_4UDPh8no/UyAEH5Cb8fI/AAAAAAAABOY/DEs-nlkJmgw/s1600/3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_w_4UDPh8no/UyAEH5Cb8fI/AAAAAAAABOY/DEs-nlkJmgw/s1600/3.jpg" height="213" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ice Balloons</td></tr>
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The Ice Balloons are clearly building on the outlaw/weirdo/wtf tradition of rock that runs from Zappa through the Butthole Surfers and up through the Flaming Lips (although more when they were psychotic acid-heads). Their set was a never-ending barrage of sound so loud that noise stacked on noise stacked on noise creating weird harmonics and the sensation of demented swarms of cicadas buzzing around the back of your skull or icy tentacles crawling up your spine. Set to a backdrop of swirling colors and footage of fan dancers and UFOs, the whole thing was bizarre, abrasive, compelling and above all LOUD, with my ears still ringing 24 hours after the show. It was so different from 99% of indie rock or music or life in general that it reminds you of the radical possibilities of rock n' roll and art and all that other pretentious bullshit that we get so passionate about when we're young. It's the kind of show that any and every 14 year old freak, outcast or oddball should be taken to show them just what's possible.<br /><br />By the time the last squelches of insanity had fizzled out, maybe a quarter of the crowd was still left and it wasn't hard to see why, I'm sure that few people were expect that kind of sonic assault. But for my (lack of) money, to witness something that ridiculous for zero dollars is about all I could ever ask for from a city or a Monday night and I couldn't have been happier as scurried back down Western to my car. Still, there's a part of me that kinda wished I'd have left a few songs earlier or at least stepped back from the monitors a bit. That kind of explosive creativity can really do a number on your ears.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">
<b><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattconzen/sets/72157642230132385/">More Pictures from Matt Conzen</a></b></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TlRjb-MSiBE/UyAITFBXcCI/AAAAAAAABOo/FYsaK0LRbLI/s1600/5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TlRjb-MSiBE/UyAITFBXcCI/AAAAAAAABOo/FYsaK0LRbLI/s1600/5.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Coins</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aOD57pcmUS4/UyAIX5Ys5sI/AAAAAAAABOw/P6VNP1Eao0s/s1600/6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aOD57pcmUS4/UyAIX5Ys5sI/AAAAAAAABOw/P6VNP1Eao0s/s1600/6.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Coins</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-rRiR00pdaVU/UyAIcqcC6YI/AAAAAAAABO4/ZKC6vJ3Rtyc/s1600/7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-rRiR00pdaVU/UyAIcqcC6YI/AAAAAAAABO4/ZKC6vJ3Rtyc/s1600/7.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kyp Malone</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3HK09ZKGbio/UyAIjP-B9AI/AAAAAAAABPA/qNWBuI2DX1s/s1600/8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3HK09ZKGbio/UyAIjP-B9AI/AAAAAAAABPA/qNWBuI2DX1s/s1600/8.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kyp Malone</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VXhvhs3YVJw/UyAIo95dE1I/AAAAAAAABPQ/vdrYGXW1MKs/s1600/10.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VXhvhs3YVJw/UyAIo95dE1I/AAAAAAAABPQ/vdrYGXW1MKs/s1600/10.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kyp Malone W/Ice Ballons</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-29dMw2RknE4/UyAI28wb2pI/AAAAAAAABQE/zlOJsn0Of0Q/s1600/16.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-29dMw2RknE4/UyAI28wb2pI/AAAAAAAABQE/zlOJsn0Of0Q/s1600/16.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ice Balloons</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QWeNAGNBhcs/UyAIscNgR3I/AAAAAAAABPY/kgazZzGbUqs/s1600/11.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QWeNAGNBhcs/UyAIscNgR3I/AAAAAAAABPY/kgazZzGbUqs/s1600/11.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ice Balloons</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UI4MIgSUF2I/UyAIvDyJMMI/AAAAAAAABPg/ya97KGnGPow/s1600/12.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UI4MIgSUF2I/UyAIvDyJMMI/AAAAAAAABPg/ya97KGnGPow/s1600/12.jpg" height="261" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ice Balloons</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hOliLTjfiG0/UyAI0YktxQI/AAAAAAAABPw/BqgM2EgfXU8/s1600/14.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hOliLTjfiG0/UyAI0YktxQI/AAAAAAAABPw/BqgM2EgfXU8/s1600/14.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ice Balloons</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EU1Rp5bMykQ/UyAI19vfnfI/AAAAAAAABP4/zu6jFjF40-Y/s1600/15.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EU1Rp5bMykQ/UyAI19vfnfI/AAAAAAAABP4/zu6jFjF40-Y/s1600/15.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ice Balloons</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YnX3vd2lDQ8/UyAIxP-iQfI/AAAAAAAABPs/Fb3BVd7LEJo/s1600/13.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YnX3vd2lDQ8/UyAIxP-iQfI/AAAAAAAABPs/Fb3BVd7LEJo/s1600/13.jpg" height="400" width="266" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ice Balloons</td></tr>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-3543100722813357072014-03-03T00:08:00.000-06:002014-03-11T23:20:39.645-05:00Concert Review - Empty Bottle Winter Block Party, March 1, 2014<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Courtesy of <a href="https://twitter.com/mattconzen">Matt Conzen</a>'s phone.</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At this point, all we can do in Chicago is lean into the winter. I mean, it's made it clear that it's not going anywhere so all we can do is wear our #Chiberia hashtags like a badge of pride. Besides, harsh winters have always been a part of Chicago's DNA. Even as it's become "international city", Chicago has never been a gathering place for celebrities either entertainment (LA), literary/business (NYC) or political (DC) and it's easy to see why - for at least five months of the year, you to have some starch in your shirt and iron in your spine to enjoy life in the city by the <strike>lake</strike> <a href="http://www.climate.gov/news-features/event-tracker/great-lakes-ice-cover-most-extensive-mid-90s">ice cube</a>.<br /><br />So a block party in the snow seemed like the perfect way to close out (or at least begin to close out) this 3rd coldest winter in our city's recorded history. The wonderful people at the Empty Bottle were behind this endeavor, which could not have been more fitting. Their scruffy, eclectic but still-discerning approach to music was note-perfect (if you will) for this kind of patently ridiculous celebration. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In fact, the perfect distillation of the event's spirit came earlier in the afternoon when an Empty Bottle employee asked everyone in the crowd to look up towards a second floor window where the owner was snapping photos of the crowd. Per their instructions we all looked up, smiled and gave the camera <a href="https://www.facebook.com/emptybottle/photos/np.17034959.53601013/10151957207083244/?type=1">the traditional one-finger salute</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was, sadly, late in arriving on Saturday because (as hopefully befits a hard-working Chicagoan such as I, etc, etc.) I had work in the morning and spent the early-afternoon scrambling to finish a long list of chores and make it out into the... lightly falling snow.<br /><br />I heard Diarrhea Planet's four guitar rumble echoing across Western Avenue before I could even see the Empty Bottle's lovingly-graffitied Old Style sign. By the time I arrived at the tiny sliver of Cortez Street that had been cordoned off, I was already feeling the electricity that these Nashville punks inevitably inspire surging through my body. <br /><br />After locating friends in the crowd I was informed that I'd already missed memorable moment when the band had decided that it was going to prove that "anyone can be punk rock." This lead them to picking a seemingly mild-mannered crowd member out of the group, dragging him onstage and telling him they were going to play some punk while he screamed about whatever made him mad. He (unfortunately) chose "White Sox fans" and proceded to rant about them over the band's riffing while the crowd (rightfully) showered abuse on him. It was, as promised, a fairly punk rock result from a contrived band stunt and set the stage for a memorable end to Diarrhea Planet's set.<br /><br />Despite the slowly falling snowflakes and the inhospitably-cold (mid-to-low-20s) temperatures, the crowd area had propane heaters dispersed throughout and, combined with the density of bodies, this provided a decent simulacrum of warmth and the rest of their set was about as raucous and ridiculous as one could expect from a bunch of southern punk/metalheads thrashing around in the snow. A crowd-surf-borne guitar solo closed things out for DP and left attendees to their own devices for 25 increasingly-cold minutes as Marnie Stern setup.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />After people had time to warm themselves with Goose Island beer/chili/trashcan fires ("it's got all the ambiance of a hobo camp but with less fear of being stabbed" quipped a friend), Marnie Stern took the stage to close things out. Her diminuative stature made viewing hard for those not in front, as the stage couldn't have been elevated more than 8" to accommodate the tent above it. Fortunately, Stern's set was rousing enough to forestall any grumbling about sightlines.<br /><br />Indeed, as Stern played, the temperature continued to drop and the snowfall continued to increase in pace, leading, if anything to an increase in masochistic energy. This was the kind of weather we in Chicago has been shivering through at bus stops, trudging through to work and enduring through shamefully under-insulated windows (in this writer's case) since November. With enough of us in the same place, spurred on by Stern's defiantly hopefully jams, the whole scene became a vision in perverse pride. At one point Marnie even complimented the crowd, for their fortitude, saying "I come from New York, which is tough but... wow, Chicago, they got nothing on you" (or something very similar in sentiment).<br /><br />As Stern's set wound down, the classic Chicago late-winter, late-afternoon gloom started to move in with a vengeance and people began clearing out to seek toastier environs either within the Bottle or elsewhere. But the sense of accomplishment as everyone dispersed from this ridiculous, benightedly-cold March block party was palpable. Amidst the fluttering blue and yellow flags of the Ukrainian Village, we'd turned a snowstorm into a dance party.</span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-30921362850688001992014-02-11T00:16:00.002-06:002014-03-03T15:37:10.474-06:00The 10 Best Non-Wilco Jeff Tweedy Songs<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;">As I type this, the curtains in my front windows are swinging softly in the breeze. What's problematic about this is that it's currently below zero here in Chicago and my windows are sealed tight. Unfortunately, that gentle sway is here to remind that my apartment's shitty single-pane windows are no match for the arctic vortices that, along with a seemingly-constant snowfall have defined this winter. But unlike <a href="http://jezebel.com/entire-nation-is-sick-and-tired-of-this-bullshit-winter-1515673238">everyone else in the goddamn country</a>, I'm not complaining about winter being cold. I'm a <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2013/01/winter-in-my-bones-on-warmer-musics.html">well-documented fan of winter</a> and I view this year's as more of a corrective to the watered-down global warming winters we've had of late.<br /><br />I've found that I often use the winter to circle back to old passions of mine - </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">books, movies and, of course, bands that I used to OBSESS over but maybe hadn't thought of much in recent months or years. There's something about the cold and darkness, the silence and gorgeous-end-of-the-world feeling about a deep, snowy winter that brings me back to my roots and this winter that's meant listening to a lot of Jeff Tweedy.<br /><br />Having been writing songs for nearly a 25 years, I don't think it's premature or out-of-line to say that Tweedy's proven himself to be part of line of great American songwriters that runs through greats like Cohen, Young, Newman or Dylan. He's always managed to balance his raucous D.I.Y. background, inveterate exploratory yen and love of classic American forms to produce songs that sound like instant classics without ever being too dated.<br /><br />As I plowed through his impressive catalog, I decided that I wanted to take the time to highlight some of his music that your casual twentysomething Wilco fan might not have stumbled across. After starting with an all-time favorite cover of mine, I'm moving into lists, starting today. Thus I present you with a 10 of great songs written by Jeff Tweedy for his many side projects, super-groups and other bands that aren't Wilco.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"><b>Click On Song Titles To Listen/Download</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"><b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/8al3jyt9v3ubbjv1obni">Download All Songs As A .ZIP</a></b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"><b>10. <a href="https://app.box.com/s/vgcy803r9gvnzhwib1nx">What Could Have Been</a> - 7 Worlds Collide</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sun-Came-Out-Worlds-Collide/dp/B002LBGB72/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229716&sr=1-1&keywords=7+worlds+collide">Buy </a></span><i style="color: #222222;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sun-Came-Out-Worlds-Collide/dp/B002LBGB72/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229716&sr=1-1&keywords=7+worlds+collide">Sun Came Out</a></i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In late 2008, former Split Enz frontman Neil Finn got a bunch of musicians from Wilco and Radiohead along with Johnny Marr, KT Turnstall and others to spend three weeks banging out a charity album. The result was a bit scattershot but it did contain a few nuggets from Jeff Tweedy, including "What Could Have Been". At it's root, it's an acoustic number but it features a the kind of minimal electronic embellishments reminiscent of the experimentation documented in <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aotXAXNpqDg">the songs</a> featured with <i><a href="http://wilcoworld.net/#!/music/the-wilco-book/">The Wilco Book</a></i>. He is haunted by the errors of his past, dreaming of being able to go back and fix them. At the same time, while wondering what could have been, he's also trapped by the knowledge that those mistakes also brought him to where he is. A tossed-off gem that shows just how deep Tweedy's catalog runs.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">9.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/72ve3geucvr2ayor26y5">The Family Gardener</a> - The Minus 5</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Down-Wilco-Minus-5/dp/B000R0130O/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229762&sr=1-1&keywords=down+with+wilco">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Down-Wilco-Minus-5/dp/B000R0130O/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229762&sr=1-1&keywords=down+with+wilco">Down With Wilco</a></i></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After putting </span><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yankee Hotel Foxtrot</i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> to bed in 2001, Wilco started paling around with Scott McCaughey and Peter Buck from R.E.M. and eventually ended up serving as their back-up band for their side-project, the Minus 5. Although the band mostly just stayed in the background, crafting psychedlic song beds straight out of the late '60s, Tweedy did co-write a couple of songs for the project, including this gem, "The Family Gardener". A soft acoustic number, Tweedy paints a pastoral scene straight out of the American song book, mixing the ideas of cultivation between plants and family. A sweet, wistful look at time passing and small-town life, this is one of the prettier Tweedy efforts, even if it's not the most substantial.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>8.</b> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/ib1v96z4t3w0q0san6c3">I Can't Keep From Talking</a> - Golden Smog </b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Weird-Tales-Golden-Smog/dp/B001RZA2UA/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229784&sr=1-1&keywords=weird+tales">Buy <i>Weird Tales</i></a></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Comprised of members of the Jayhawks, Soul Asylum and even Big Star, Golden Smog was a supergroup that gave Tweedy an avenue to release all the pressure he started feel about being Wilco's sole songwriter around the time of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Being There</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Summerteeth</i><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. Tweedy has a long history of singing about the power of music and it's effect on fans. In many ways, "I Can't Keep From Talking" is the flip side of </span><i style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Being There</i><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">'s </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G657c8OeToA" style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The Lonely 1"</a><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. Whereas that was a positively blubbery country ballad about the isolation felt by both fan and performer, who remain connected by a love of music. This song, on the other hand, is more a celebration of that connection. The first verse, sung from the fan's perspective starts with the line "hey, ain't great for us to be alive" and goes on from there, expounding on his love of music. Though the second verse can be read as a much darker response from the musician, the song itself remains upbeat and committed to the idea of music and the power it contains.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>7.</b> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/q9p8f88q0w2orfdnrzpk">The Ruling Class</a> - Loose Fur</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Born-Again-U-S-A-Loose-Fur/dp/B000E6EO1Q">Buy <i>Born Again In The U.S.A.</i></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">Dark times always make for fertile ground for protest singers and the Bush years were no exception. Although Jeff Tweedy was never a "rah-rah" protest singer, he was well-steeped in both the folk and punk traditions. Using a few tricks he picked up from his time singing Woody Guthrie songs, he penned one of the sharpest satires of the decade with "The Ruling Class". Featuring a plaintive whistle for a hook, the song is a breezy, searing indictment at the corruption of religion by politics and vice-versa. Tweedy sings about a ressurected Christ who's less interested in poor and meek and more on-board with the whole neo-con thing. "He's got deductions up and down the line," Tweedy proclaims, "dependent claims on all of mankind." It's the perfect send-up of the only kind of perverted Christianity that could have actually jibed with the interpretation that many so-called religious leaders were trying to shove down America's throat in the middle of last decade.</span></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">6.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/o2a5igko1z0igbkn3gya">Please Tell My Brother</a> - Golden Smog</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Weird-Tales-Golden-Smog/dp/B001RZA2UA/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229784&sr=1-1&keywords=weird+tales">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Weird-Tales-Golden-Smog/dp/B001RZA2UA/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229784&sr=1-1&keywords=weird+tales">Weird Tales</a></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">The spiritual precursor to "The Family Gardener", "Please Tell My Brother" was released in 1998 on Golden Smog's </span><i style="color: #222222;">Weird Tales</i><span style="color: #222222;">. The most skeletal of songs, it reads like a peak at Jeff Tweedy's personal therapy sessions at the time. He sings about reconnecting with everyone in his family despite, time, distance, etc. It's the kind of Americana that no one bothers to make any more, which makes it ring all the louder. Tweedy wishes he could tell everyone in his family how much they mean to him and yet you feel like he's writing this song instead. He knows he won't call his brothers, will miss his sister and her kids and wants his father to know it's OK to kick back with a cold one after a lifetime of working on behalf of others. He even talks about his deceased mother (a rarity in the Tweedy catalog) and how he "feel[s] her ghost" with him. Whatever "Please Tell My Brother" lacks in complexity, it more than makes up for in heart. This is a song expressing the tension and longing that the 21st century family imposes with a succinctness and honesty that cuts right through a listener's defenses. </span></span></div>
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<b style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">5.</b><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/yglwolrx7go7dq3dyl1m">Acuff-Rose</a> - Uncle Tupelo</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Anodyne-Uncle-Tupelo/dp/B001QU446E/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229821&sr=1-1&keywords=anodyne">Buy </a></span><i style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Anodyne-Uncle-Tupelo/dp/B001QU446E/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229821&sr=1-1&keywords=anodyne">Anodyne</a></i><br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ah, Uncle Tupleo; J</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">eff Tweedy's band before Wilco, founders of the "No Depression" alt-country movement, Midwestern punk icons. Although the band started out with Jay Farrar clearly in the driver's seat and Jeff Tweedy as the junior partner, by the time their last album, 1992's <i>Anodyne</i>, came out it was clear that they were at least songwriting equals. The second song on that album, "Acuff-Rose", is a tribute to a classic country publishing house that not only hosted some of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKLI6aDSmoI">Americana's greatest songs</a> but was also a renowned friend and fair partner to the artist. Tweedy's song mostly pay homage to a world where people could be united in something as simple and universal as a song by Acuff-Rose. The song is an evocation of warmth, familiarity and safety, invoking images "children in the playground / folks in the home" to evoke the sense of contentedness that certain songs can provide. Tweedy's hard-strumming has made the song an un-amplified fan favorite despite lacking the original's flying fiddles.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">4.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/mni1wwi7hhob92im7szb">Laminated Cat</a> - Loose Fur</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Loose-Fur/dp/B00007L9NJ/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229859&sr=1-1&keywords=loose+fur">Buy</a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Loose-Fur/dp/B00007L9NJ/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229859&sr=1-1&keywords=loose+fur"> Loose Fur</a></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The song of a thousand incarnations (or at least a half-dozen), "Laminated Cat" started off during the <i>Yankee Hotel Foxtrot</i> sessions as a Springsteenian rocker entitled "Not For The Season". Although it didn't make it onto that album, Jeff Tweedy kept playing it at solo acoustic gigs and it eventually became a droning experimental number on the first Loose Fur album he released with Jim O'Rourke and Glen Kotche. As its original title suggests, the song finds Tweedy working through a year's worth of seasons, from sunshine of summer to the dark, prowling dread of winter. It's a rumination on the passage of time and cyclical nature of life, wrapped in an intensely melodic package, no matter what iteration you listen to. In later years he's performed it solo with Kotche backing him on drums and, since this is my personal favorite, it is the version I present below.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/sgi5kcszpz0g3xcxxs7g">Wait Up</a> - Uncle Tupelo</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/March-16-20-1992-Uncle-Tupelo/dp/B001DU4Z5C/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229889&sr=1-1&keywords=march+16-20+1992">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/March-16-20-1992-Uncle-Tupelo/dp/B001DU4Z5C/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229889&sr=1-1&keywords=march+16-20+1992">March 16-20,1992</a></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Uncle Tupelo's third album, <i>March 16-20 1992</i>, was recorded with R.E.M.'s Peter Buck and saw the band zigging when everyone else zagged. Just as Nirvana helped punk break, Jeff and co. traded their axes for acoustic guitars and banjos for a breathtaking album of bare-bones folk songs. Arguably the finest spot on the album, "Wait Up" is a spare, haunting love song featuring some of the most emotionally vulnerable lyrics of Tweedy's career. Over plaintive banjo he pleads for his love to just wait up for him. Tweedy's is so heavy with emotion you can practically feel the ache in the back of your own throat. The way he drags out key lines such as "I miss... more than... I need sleep" makes the song feel even more nakedly emotional, as if the words were being dragged from him. After these moments the acoustic guitars fade out, a soft wash distortion backs a single banjo and the song hangs, painfully suspended in midair for just a few seconds. Then, as the confession fades and the tension becomes almost unbearable, everything falls back into place and things continue as they were before. </span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/nf79l7tez8n8pie9hd35">Radio King</a> - Golden Smog</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Down-Old-Mainstream-Golden-Smog/dp/B0000009PS/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229921&sr=1-1&keywords=down+by+the+old+mainstream">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Down-Old-Mainstream-Golden-Smog/dp/B0000009PS/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229921&sr=1-1&keywords=down+by+the+old+mainstream">Down By The Old Mainstream</a></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">One of Jeff Tweedy's many songwriting skills is his ability to craft melodies that sound immediately timeless and nowhere is that more in evidence than on "Radio King". The song's opening guitar run has a lazy finger-picked charm that Llewyn Davis would say sounds like "it was new but it never gets old". Fittingly, this is a bit of unrepentant escapist nostalgia. "Let's go out together, 3am tomorrow night" Tweedy sings, in a way that conjures up a childhood friend knocking on your bedroom, beckoning you on to an evening of illicit fun. But, as so often, Tweedy is singing here about music, to an old musician. "Your music fills my car / your voice breaks every time" he reminisces, admitting "I hang on every line". Youth, freedom, music, radio are the song's currency. Although they combine to paint a picture of a long-ago America that seems just a little too perfect to have actually existed, it's the kind of wonderful delusion we should all allow ourselves every once in a while. "Radio King" is three minutes and ten seconds of escape to a time that we all deserve to be able to recall.</span></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> <b><a href="https://app.box.com/s/k7rtiuhpvgkbzn385ti9">Gun</a> - Uncle Tupelo </b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Still-Feel-Gone-Uncle-Tupelo/dp/B00138FAU8/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229945&sr=1-1&keywords=still+feel+gone">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Still-Feel-Gone-Uncle-Tupelo/dp/B00138FAU8/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1392229945&sr=1-1&keywords=still+feel+gone">Still Feel Gone</a></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">Although the Uncle Tupelo's alt-country insurgency went by the name of the band's first album, No Depression, it was really their second record that perfected the punk/country blend. Leading off </span><i style="color: #222222;">Still Feel Gone</i><span style="color: #222222;"> was Jeff Tweedy's absurdly anthemic chestnut, "Gun". The song was once described by Pitchfork's William Bowers a "[a synthesis of] the entirety of the Replacements </span><i style="color: #222222;">Tim</i><span style="color: #222222;">" and it's hard to argue with that assessment. It starts with the rumble of guitars that build like rolling thunder before finally crashing down with spectacular clarity. "Falling out the window" Tweedy cries, setting the stage for the song's <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6yi30_what-a-mess_music">"dreams unfulfilled"</a> motif that most of the song sticks to. The only respite from this is the sighing admission repeated at the end of each verse. "My heart / it was a gun / but it's unloaded now / so don't bother" it's this mixture of beaten-down cynicism cut with just a touch of openhearted romanticism that Tweedy pinched from Paul Westerberg and spun into gold of his own. Wrapped in a hard-hitting shell, "Gun", packs an emotional wallop strong enough to resonant just as loudly as it did nearly a quarter-century ago.</span></span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-90933713248722333412014-02-07T01:28:00.002-06:002014-02-09T17:32:03.994-06:00Covering Our Bases: "I Wanna Be Your Dog" - Uncle Tupelo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EP2v0Kkyk9E/UvQj30TQd9I/AAAAAAAABNM/j4XlZ0R2w0o/s1600/418455677025-245.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EP2v0Kkyk9E/UvQj30TQd9I/AAAAAAAABNM/j4XlZ0R2w0o/s1600/418455677025-245.jpg" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Great music doesn't transcend genre boundaries so much as it devours them. The Beatles knew that "Twist & Shout" wasn't just an R&B barnburner, it was a garage-rock classic waiting to happen. Similarly, Al Green looked at the guitar pop bliss of "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" and knew that it had an organ-drenched soul treatment hiding in its DNA. Perhaps the band best at illustrating this principle was the Clash who looked at </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16u0wwCfoJ4" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">rockabilly</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">, </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQXgfD0UKIY" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">reggae</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">, </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-Lj9yzct3U" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">R&B</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">, </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5extIQ3EXjM" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">ska</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">, </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-x4JbW6L8BM" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">classic rock</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"> and infused them with a leftist snarl and turned them punk.</span><br style="color: #222222;" /><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">In its conception, Uncle Tupelo was all about smashing genres together. Throughout the late '80s Jeff Tweedy, Jay Farrar and their bandmates were taking the rebellious, defiant loserdom of punk, combining it with the drunken sorrow of country and seeing what stuck. Indeed, their 1990 debut album <i>No Depression</i> was generally credited as kickstarting the very idea of "alt-country". But as much as Uncle Tupelo reveled in the dynamics of Black Flag and the Carter Family, most of their early work sees them playing an either/or game with indie rock and traditional country and folk.</span></span><br />
<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">"I Wanna Be Your Dog" is a prototypical Stooges song. Released on their debut album, it's clearly just the skeleton of far more expansive onstage freakout with Ron Asheton pounding the living hell out of three fizzling chords, John Cale plunking along on piano and two basic verses. The lyrics mix Iggy's typical nihilism with that tiny sliver of sweetness and grovels before the girl he loves, begging to be treated like a mere pet.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Uncle Tupelo's version is perhaps their first true marriage of the souls of punk and country as they take all the original's self-loathing and anger while filling it out with a weepy, last-call twanginess, While the original relied on Asheton's hammered bar chords and cheap, sizzling distortion for atmosphere, Tupelo adds some flourishes around the basic chord structure, giving the song the air of a tipsy countryside ramble.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Over this Tweedy croaks his lines with a sweet, defeated lonesomeness entirely missing from Iggy's sneer. The song's resigned imagery of wanting to "close my mind" and "lose my heart on the burning sands" sound tailor-made for his delivery. In fact, it's this bone-tired attitude mixed with the band's twangy-yet-distorted gallop that makes the cover truly great, carving out a perfect little niche where country and punk aren't just being combined, they're being revealed as two sides of the same coin.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Just like great literature, great music makes us feel alive and connected with others, able to surrender to common pleasure. Uncle Tupleo's cover of "I Wanna Be Your Dog" is an clinic on how that it accomplished. The presentation drills down to the core of two seemingly disparate genres and reveals them to be essentially the same thing in different clothes. It tells the cowboys it's OK to get loud and the punks that it's OK to get weepy. In fact, a later demo from the <i>March 16-20, 1992</i> sessions shows that the band was able to turn it into a full-on banjo lament shows just how rootsy the song could get.<br /><br />From the very beginning Uncle Tupelo and Jeff Tweedy showed themselves to both richly immersed in musical history while still being able to turn that reverence into something both innovative and refreshing. I've been on a bit of a Tweedy kick lately so expect more on that in the days to come.<br /><br /><b>Download/Listen</b></span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><a href="https://app.box.com/s/uvyo1d6o391o1f9p09tv">I Wanna Be Your Dog [Acoustic Demo]</a> - Uncle Tupelo <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Uncle-Tupelo-89-93-Anthology/dp/B00138GYW6/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0/184-1556240-5987351">Buy <i>89/93: An Anthology</i></a></span></span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-62947372851414075642014-01-13T00:37:00.001-06:002014-02-11T00:17:19.651-06:00On Warmer Music's 30 Favorite Songs Of 2013 (10-1)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And there they are, the final songs of the year. It's funny, when I first started doing my end of the year list, I was a bit underwhelmed by my choices. Yet as I've gone through writing this, re-listening to the music, I've realized just how strong these songs are. Perhaps my 2013 list is the least flashy or catchy one I've made but I suspect that the grit and heart in these songs will hold up surprisingly well. Oh well, You can be the judge, here, after a brief recap are my ten favorite songs of 2013:</span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>30.</b> Lake Michigan Wind - Jones Street Station</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>29.</b> Nothing Is Gold - Bare Mutants</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>28.</b> New You - My Bloody Valentine</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>27.</b> Wendy 'N Becky (feat. Chance The Rapper) - Joey Bada$$</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>26.</b> Lookin - The Dismemberment Plan</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>25.</b> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;">Uptown Boys - Netherfriends</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>24.</b> Come Walk With Me - M.I.A.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>23.</b> Dreaming Of Giants - Radar Eyes</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>22.</b> Nightwater Girlfriend - Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 16px;"><b>21.</b> White Girls (Student of the Blues) - Diarrhea Planet</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><br />20.</b> Joy To You Baby - Josh Ritter</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>19. </b>Husbands - Savages</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>18. </b>Coming Through (feat. Cat Power) - Willis Earl Beal</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>17. </b>I Saw Her Face - The Men</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>16. </b>Coast To Coast - Waxahatchee</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>15.</b> Only A Clown - Caitlin Rose</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>14. </b>Unbelievers - Vampire Weekend</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>13. </b>Get Back In Love - Carrie Rodriguez</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>12. </b>Banana Clipper (feat. Big Boi) - Run The Jewels</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>11.</b> It Can't Be You - Basia Bulat</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>10.</b> Oil Slick - Frightened Rabbit <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Pedestrian-Verse-Explicit-Frightened-Rabbit/dp/B00B2IL0C6/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389327362&sr=1-1&keywords=pedestrian+verse">Buy <i>Pedestrian Verse</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I love Frightened Rabbit albums but I can only seem to listen to them for about four to five months of the year. Scott Hutchinson's tales of loneliness, alienation and sadness, delivered in his deliciously chocolaty brogue are so effective at conjuring up the bleak feeling of a wintry Scottish moor that I'd no sooner throw one on in the middle of July than a couple of heavy wool sweaters. But "Oil Slick", the closing track on <i><a href="http://spectrumculture.com/2013/02/frightened-rabbit-pedestrian-verse.html/">Pedestrian Verse</a></i> managed to buck that trend. Whereas on previous album closers Hutchinson's found himself in the cold water, about to sink, here he finds himself in a boat, trying to plow through the black viscous sadness of his own words and strike out for something more hopeful. Aided by bouncy bass and deft guitarwork, "Oil Slick" manages to bring the Scot's music somewhere that sounds downright vernal.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>9.</b> Tell The Truth - Lady <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lady/dp/B00AX20A96/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_1">Buy <i>Lady</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The first time I saw Lady, I was blindsided. They were opening for Lee Fields and borrowing his band and the combination of that sound with the singers' confidence was nearly overwhelming. Naturally, I flew to the merch table to grab their record after the show and had a similar experience the first time I set needle to vinyl and set "Tell The Truth" jumping through my speakers. The steady piano, soul-rattling bass and brassy horn hits bring everything back to a Soul Brothers session in the early sixties. But its Nicole Wray and Terri Walker who really bring things home with their powerful, punchy harmonies, equal parts anger and sadness. It's a track one, side one that perfectly sets the table for the album about to unfold.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>8.</b> Dance Apocalyptic - Janelle Monae <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Electric-Lady-Janelle-Mon%C3%A1e/dp/B00EVCD9HY/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389327330&sr=1-1&keywords=electric+lady">Buy <i>The Electric Lady</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Janelle Monae's music is wonderful because it tends to succeed on multiple levels. For example, the lead single from <i>The Electric Lady</i> has specific meaning within the context of the album and our exploration of Cindi Mayweather and her world. But at the same time, the song itself is so wonderfully simple on its own that it needs no explanation - it's about dancing through the end of the world, what's not to love? Built around a simple dance beat and jangly guitar riff, "Dance Apocalyptic" just takes over - as soon as the music starts, you can feel the tugging at your hips, with undertones of rock, funk and r&b playing delightfully well with each other. It all subtly reinforces the lyrical conceit - no matter who/what you are, we all need to dance.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Unless, of course, your chicken tastes like pork. That can be a problem.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>7.</b> Pusha Man (feat. Nate Fox & Lili K.) - Chance The Rapper <a href="http://www.datpiff.com/Chance-The-Rapper-Acid-Rap-mixtape.483826.html">Download <i>Acid Rap</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Oh Chance, that loveable rapper. He seemed to be everywhere this summer, at least in Chicago (although <a href="https://twitter.com/msjwilly/status/421339758694920192">maybe</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/msjwilly/status/421339778257133568">beyond</a>). It's no surprise given how ridiculously addictive Acid Rap has proven to be. It was hard picking a favorite song from that mixtape but I ultimately landed on "Pusha Man" because it manages to encapsulate so many facets of what make the record great. It's got everything, the retro production, the cruisin' vibe, the catchy jokey chorus, followed by the introspective and socially-incisive commentary. It shows just how versatile Mr. Bennett is in one (well, really two) track(s). The second half, "Paranoia", tends to get most of the critical applause and understandably so. It sees Chance looking with a critical eye on himself, his home town, the national media, pretty much anything you can name as he tries to deal with growing up surrounded by the gun violence that plagues Chicago's south and west sides. But the "Pusha Man" first has just as much to recommend itself, with it's undeniably bouncy hooks and braggadocio that highlight the young MC's equally-impressive ear for melody. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>6.</b> Elephant - Jason Isbell <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Southeastern-Explicit-Jason-Isbell/dp/B00D4FCTTI/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389326829&sr=1-1&keywords=southeastern">Buy <i>Southeastern</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From my posting on <a href="http://www.popmatters.com/feature/176773-the-75-best-songs-of-2013/P5/">PopMatters</a>:</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'PT Sans', Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 27px;">Some songs that are so powerful that they land like a sucker punch to the gut. Maybe it’s because the truths they carry can strike us with the same force. That’s certainly the case with </span><a href="http://www.popmatters.com/artists/jason-isbell/" sl-processed="1" style="background-color: white; border: none; color: #0160a2; font-family: 'PT Sans', Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 27px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;">Jason Isbell</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'PT Sans', Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15.199999809265137px; line-height: 27px;">‘s “Elephant”. Written about a friendship between the singer and a cancer-stricken woman, the song’s unblinking honesty lends it considerable emotional heft. Over a musical bed of softly plucked guitar and plinking piano, the song’s narrator, Andy, chronicles his friend’s slow descent to the inevitable with heartbreaking observations about missing hair and “sharecropper eyes”. The two share joints and one-sided gallows humor as they circle around the inescapable truth alluded to in the song’s title. While Isbell pulls no punches, “Elephant” is saved from bleak hopelessness by its willingness to chronicle people who are unafraid to share in the raw humanity (other’s or their own) that life eventually reduces us to and we’d all rather avoid.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>5.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Black Skinhead - Kanye West </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Yeezus-Explicit-Kanye-West/dp/B00DF0POXA/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389327215&sr=1-1&keywords=yeezus" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy <i>Yeezus</i></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The first time I saw "Black Skinhead" was late at night on my laptop. I had all the lights off and was catching up on music videos when I decided to check out Kanye's recently SNL performance. It was hard to know what to expect after the darkly maximalist masterpiece that was <i>My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy</i> but after seeing the flashing doberman teeth, harsh beats and screaming it was obvious that Kanye had managed to somehow one-up even his own over-the-top work. Although it was a pretty stiff blow to see the song used in a series of cell phone commericals, "Black Skinhead" has been stuck in my head all year, along with "Bound 2", which it was neck-and-neck with for this list. Ultimately though, while "Bound 2" shows that Yeezy still has the old touch, "Black Skinhead" a more accurate representation of where he was in 2013 and what it felt like grappling with the beast that is Yeezus </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4.</b> Night Still Comes</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> - Neko Case <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Things-Harder-Deluxe-digital-booklet/dp/B00ENIBJE6/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389326875&sr=1-1&keywords=neko+case+the+worse+things+get+the+harder+i+fight">Buy <i>The Worse Things Get The Harder I Fight The Harder I Fight The More I Love You</i></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Neko Case's longwinded but wonderful new album was another record that strained to be contained to just one song on this list. But ultimately, after giving long listens to both "Nearly Midnight, Honolulu" and "Man", I had to go with "Night Still Comes". The song reflects, in equal parts Case's romantic side as well as her utterly anti-romantic side and shows how they can fit so well together. Sung as swaying, soulful lament, "Night Still Comes" addresses, presumably a lover who Case both wants desperately to be the one but also knows unequivocally isn't. It's Case's oeuvre in a nutshell, sweet, loving but just a bit personally removed. The lilting chorus, "you never held it at the right angle" strikes me with just the right amount of poetry, hinting at a mismatch, not in anything effable, but in those subtle, indescribable factors that end up deciding so much of our lives.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Rose Of Summer - Robbie Fulks <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Gone-Away-Backward-Robbie-Fulks/dp/B00E6BV0VW/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389326978&sr=1-1&keywords=gone+away+backward">Buy <i>Gone Away Backward</i></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">OK, this might not even be the "best" song on Gone Away Backward, but I choose it because it's the one that hit me the hardest. Tucked at the end of an album full of songs that sound like they've been sung happily for decades, no tune more than "Sweet Rose Of Summer" has that air of timelessness. Perhaps it's the storyline, a classic tale of a man in love with a woman he's unable to marry until her returns from war to find her wed to another. Perhaps it's the wonderful harmonizing that sends tingles down your spine on every chorus. Perhaps it's the tragically old-fashioned morality of the whole thing, wherein each character denies their hearts for the sake of propriety/family/community in a way that we just don't see anymore. Whatever it is though, this song slays me every time I hear it, leaving me often (in my more vulnerable moments) with a tear in my eye for this fictional bridegroom and his lost Rose.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Me & You & Jackie Mittoo - Superchunk <a href="http://www.amazon.com/I-Hate-Music-Superchunk/dp/B00EISE0OC/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389327077&sr=1-1&keywords=i+hate+music">Buy <i>I Hate Music</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If there was one thing that 2013 lacked, it was the kind of crackling, anthemic punk that makes up so much of my listening, except, of course for Superchunk. <i><a href="http://www.popmatters.com/review/174668-superchunk-i-hate-music/">I Hate Music</a></i> is an album as full of wisdom as it is of "whoah-oh" choruses, which is something you don't see often but I've sung its praises elsewhere. So I'll just say that this was a year when I needed a flag-waving guitar jam to ease my jangled nerves and "Me & You & Jackie Mittoo" fit the bill admirably. It comes in the middle of an album about a recently-deceased friend, which lends it an extra layer of poignancy but it has the kind of universally-nostalgic lyrics to touch most any music listener's heart. Mac McCaughan's lyrics about sitting in a van listening to the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9HyXc4e7Qc">Skatalites</a> manage to evoke the bonds of music, friendship and memory that help give our lives meaning. Played out over the classic Superchunk guitar-build-into-chorus, the effect can be almost paralyzing, sending me back into various moments in time when specific songs and people meant more to me than I can articulate, even at such a remove.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1.</b> Wise Man - Frank Ocean <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Channel-Orange-Explicit-Version-Frank/dp/B008KW43TE/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389327264&sr=1-1&keywords=frank+ocean">Buy <i>Channel Orange</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Recently Googling has revelead to me that this song actually leaked in late December 2013. It's also true that this song wasn't actually "released", as such. But there's something about "Wise Man" that has kept in steady rotation all year for me in a way no other song has. Originally submitted for the <i>Django Unchained</i> soundtrack, it's a credit to Quentin Tarantino that he recognized the song had no place in his blood-spackled revenge fantasy and has been given to us on its own merits. Singing over a haunting background of feedback and tremeloed guitar, Ocean bemoans man's inherent failings. Looking back at a history of war, slavery, conflict, the singer concludes that there is no good, no evil, no wisdom, no nothing - just humanity. The idea here being that everything we think of morality, justification, the narratives that give the past shape to us are just spin, PR, <i>ex post facto reasoning</i>. It's Ocean's trembling, delivery that sells the song, imparts it with it's resonating sorrow. It's the kind of song that should hang over every deserted battlefield or play at the end of every tragedy. A dust thou art and dust returneth song that defies you to prove it wrong. Or else asks you to join it in a wake.</span><br />
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-21014937592764886212014-01-09T00:23:00.000-06:002014-01-14T22:30:04.810-06:00On Warmer Music's 30 Favorite Songs Of 2013 (20-11)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yup, you guessed it, more songs. But first, a quick recap:<br /><br /><b>30.</b> Lake Michigan Wind - Jones Street Station</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>29.</b> Nothing Is Gold - Bare Mutants</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>28.</b> New You - My Bloody Valentine</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>27.</b> Wendy 'N Becky (feat. Chance The Rapper) - Joey Bada$$</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>26.</b> Lookin -bgvvgfc The Dismemberment Plan</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>25.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Uptown Boys - Netherfriends</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>24.</b> Come Walk With Me</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>23.</b> Dreaming Of Giants - Radar Eyes</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>22.</b> Nightwater Girlfriend - Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>21.</b> White Girls (Student of the Blues) - Diarrhea Planet</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b>20.</b> Joy To You Baby - Josh Ritter <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Beast-Its-Tracks-Josh-Ritter/dp/B00B7BBTYW/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148379&sr=1-1&keywords=beast+in+its+tracks">Buy <i>The Beast In Its Tracks</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I've long had a soft spot for Josh Ritter, which is good, because the guy doesn't have a hard bone in his body. Sure, he's studied his Prine and Dylan and Van Zandt, but Ritter has more easy good-humor and empathy in his songs than those three combined. Thus, leave it to him to write an easy-going breakup album. I can't say I could get into it much, mostly because, when I want breakup music, I want anger and desolation, not reasonable and mature well-wishes to your past. But even I couldn't curmudgeon myself away from the simple-strummin' charms of "Joy To You Baby". Taking off with a feathery organ and bosomy bass, the song lifts you above anger, worry and care as Ritter sings about "the lion of evening" and makes the world feel alright for a few minutes.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>19.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Husbands - Savages <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Silence-Yourself-Savages/dp/B00CJLW7YA/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148517&sr=1-1&keywords=silence+yourself">Buy</a></span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Silence-Yourself-Savages/dp/B00CJLW7YA/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148517&sr=1-1&keywords=silence+yourself"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Silence Yourself</i></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Although they released their first music in spring of 2012, I didn't come around on Savages until downloading their full-length debut, <i>Silence Yourself</i> this year. It was the kind of record that I had to love, in spite of its own buzz. Savages clearly push just the right buttons (four girls, sounds like Wire, <a href="http://www.aux.tv/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Savages-no-cameras.jpg">pseudo manifesto</a>) for certain critics in a way that made some want to turn them into more than they were. Although I didn't think that <i>Silence Yourself</i> was the knockout debut that some saw, there were moments of brilliance scattered throughout. "Husbands" is easily my favorite as the prickly guitar, bruising bass and Jehnny Beth's tortured vocals cohere into an explosion of righteous fury that every punk purist lives for like a a junkie does methadone.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>18.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Coming Through (feat. Cat Power) - Willis Earl Beal <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Nobody-Knows-Willis-Earl-Beal/dp/B00DLNQX68/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148542&sr=1-1&keywords=nobody+knows+willis+earl+beal">Buy</a></span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Nobody-Knows-Willis-Earl-Beal/dp/B00DLNQX68/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148542&sr=1-1&keywords=nobody+knows+willis+earl+beal"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nobody Knows</i></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Although I loved moments of Willis Earl Beal's "debut" <i>Acoustmastic Sorcery</i>, I could never quite shake the feeling that, while they were good demos, I wasn't actually listening to songs, I was functionally just listening to demos. But in 2013, with XL contract in hand, Beal upped his game with a full band and proper studio for his second record and the results were far more satisfying. Besides snagging Chan Marshall for it, "Coming Through" was my go-to song for this album (and artist) because it has the bounce and confidence of an old R&B/soul classic without sounding the least bit dusty. The truth IS coming through and anyone who argues with Beal or this groove is just asking to get run over.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>17.</b> I Saw Her Face - The Men <a href="http://www.amazon.com/New-Moon-Men/dp/B00B7L7EC8/ref=sr_1_4_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148564&sr=1-4&keywords=new+moon">Buy <i>New Moon</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After proving themselves to be more than just exhilirating-but-abrasive noise rockers with last year's <i>Open Your Heart</i>. Without missing a beat, they got even more eclectic and tuneful on this year's <i>New Moon</i>. <a href="http://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/14987-the-men-i-saw-her-face/">I wasn't the only one</a> to think "Tom Petty fronting Crazy Horse" the first time I heard "I Saw Her Face" and it's fair to say that the song lets down the legacy of neither. On a record full of cryptic lyrics about lost women, "I Saw Her Face" fits right in as the singers voice struggles to emerge from the fizzling guitar haze created by riff-upon-riff. It's a shimmery, old-fashioned guitar jam of the the type that, when done well, never goes out of style.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>16.</b> Coast To Coast - Waxahatachee <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Cerulean-Salt-Waxahatchee/dp/B00BDVVSBA/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148587&sr=1-1&keywords=cerulean+salt">Buy <i>Cerulean Salt</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Cerulean Salt</i> is your classic not-coming-of-age album. In it we watch Katie Crutchfield wanders through her post-high school years, not quite finding happiness in love, her job or even the search for herself. It can be a weighty listening experience until a song like "Coast To Coast" comes on with a couple of crunchy guitar chords and an Elliott Smith reference and reminds you how, even amidst the heaviness of, you know, adult (however we define that) life, there's still romance. Even driving around the country, nervously playing shows and not falling in love can sound pretty good over less than two minutes of bouncy distortion.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>15.</b> Only A Clown - Caitlin Rose <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Stand--Caitlin-Rose/dp/B00DOTWZ98/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148610&sr=1-1&keywords=the+stand-in">Buy <i>The Stand-In</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't know why someone didn't tell me about Caitlin Rose before this year because her Linda Ronstadt, country-meets-new-wave sounds and Replacements-level misanthropy are about all you need to get this guy on-board. <i>The Stand-In</i> was in heavy rotation this spring and early summer and I had more than a few singalongs with "Only A Clown". The fact that they were solo only further lends to the song's self-effacing appeal. There's something deeply meaningful in finding out that self-doubt, loneliness, painful awkwardness and other such emotions are, despite what your high school self suspected, universal emotions. "Only A Clown" distills those particular feelings in a way instantly recognizable to losers of all ages, adds some rollicking guitar and calls it a night. Sold.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>14.</b> Unbelievers - Vampire Weekend <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Vampires-City-Vampire-Weekend/dp/B00CP2Z5TC/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148633&sr=1-1&keywords=modern+vampires+of+the+city">Buy <i>Modern Vampires Of The City</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Modern Vampires Of The City is almost certain to be the album of 2013 that I will keep going back to for a while, if for no other reason than to try to understand its capital-I "Important" reputation with music critics. I've always loved me some V-Weekend but mostly as not-quite-guilty summertime lit-pop, nothing deeper. I'm not so blind as to miss the band's attempt to get lyrically "deeper" on <i>MVOTC</i>, I guess I just missed the moment when the music got the gravitas to be much more than just smarty-pants sunshine pop. Anywho, "Unbelievers" is yet another VW song that I'll be able to instantly sing along to in ten years because it's just the right mix of smart and infectious. Even if I don't think it was on an album of the year, that's still a pretty damn good endorsement.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>13.</b> Get Back In Love - Carrie Rodriguez <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Give-Me-All-You-Got/dp/B00B0NF4SO/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148670&sr=1-1&keywords=carrie+rodriguez">Buy <i>Give Me All You Got</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Carrie Rodriguez's <i><a href="http://www.popmatters.com/review/167675-carrie-rodriguez-give-me-what-you-got/">Give Me All You Got</a></i> wasn't a front-to-back great album but it had more than its fair share of moments that I absolutely fell in love with. After giving strong consideration to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VT4j6Qd-0U">"Cut Me Now"</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JEr9w6aSGo">"Brooklyn"</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R1HW2PQSxg">"I Don't Mind Waiting"</a> I finally went with "Get Back In Love" as the record's standout. Washed in luscious lap steel and featuring an achingly lovely slow-build, it's the kind of song that sticks to your ribs on a cold winter day, offering warmth hours later. That succor also flows from the lyrics which are eternally hopeful but in that hard-won manner that makes them feel wise rather than saccharine. Be it in love or life, I'm always well-served by being reminded that it only takes an old jukebox song to get back in love.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>12.</b> Banana Clipper (feat. Big Boi) - Run The Jewels <a href="http://foolsgoldrecs.com/runthejewels/">Download <i>Run The Jewels</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To be honest, this pick is another tossup with more than a few other off the album. After their jointly valedictory run through 2012, Killer Mike and El-P decided to turn their unofficial collaboration into a full-on "thing" and the result, Run The Jewels is just about as much fun as you'll find in hip-hop these days. After a couple of albums as dense and heavy as <i>R.A.P. Music </i>and <i>Cancer 4 Cure</i>, it was refreshing to see Mike and El-P just goofing off, talking shit and making fun, funny-ass diss tracks that constitute their joint release. "Banana Clipper" is my personal favorite outing not just because it begins with Mike claiming "I have the elegance of an African elephant" but also becuase it brings his old ATL mentor Big Boi into the proceedings, just in case you weren't enjoying yourself enough.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>11</b>. It Can't Be You - Basia Bulat <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Tall-Shadow-Basia-Bulat/dp/B00FADHW12/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389148712&sr=1-1&keywords=tall+tall+shadow">Buy <i>Tall Tall Shadow</i></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Basia Bulat's <i>Tall Tall Shadow</i> was a record haunted by a lost love that stalked this singer like a cold breeze on a autumn evening. The album's centerpiece, "It Can't Be You" perfectly captures that emotional tenor. It starts with the deftly-picked guitar which seems to almost be chasing the user across the mix, at once enchanting and also oddly prickly. But it's Bulat's wailing vocals that steal the show, dragging every ounce of emotion out of her words. If nothing else, don't deny yourself the exquisitely elongated rendition of the word "you" found on this song, it will send chills down your spine.</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-11987444359053016012014-01-07T20:30:00.002-06:002014-01-14T22:30:47.871-06:00On Warmer Music's 30 Favorite Songs Of 2013 (30-21)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the "it's not the number of times you fall down but the number of times you get up"-spirit, I'm deciding not to let my late-year slowdown stop me from my 2013 lists. I spent too much time listening to too much good music last year, despite it all and I'm gonna say something about it, goddamit!<br /><br />I appreciate all those out there still listening and apologize for a lack of mp3s this year. I am including one for songs unavailable streaming or on YouTube but I found that there were so few downloads that few would probably miss them. Don't worry though, I'll still be posting mp3 mixes and other goodies, when appropriate. So, with no further adieu, here's some pretty good music!</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>30.</b> Lake Michigan Wind - Jones Street Station <a href="http://jonesstreetstation.com/main">Download Perennials</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Formerly a strictly-Brooklyn concern, Jones Street Station saw it's members scattered to the winds. They responded by choosing the oft-maligned LDR and write a song a day for a whole year strictly via online collaboration. The result ia </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Perennials</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, a charming collection of homespun folk songs and even includes </span><a href="http://jonesstreetstation.com/profiles/blogs/perennials-volume-42-wszystko-nowe-everything-s-new" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">a song written in Polish by <i>Community</i>'s Danny Pudi</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">! My favorite of the bunch was, unsurprisingly, a mournful Chicago-based number about loss and aging called </span><a href="http://jonesstreetstation.com/profiles/blogs/perennials-volume-32-lake-michigan-wind" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Lake Michigan Wind"</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. It's a perfect companion for a mid-winter block of Chicago greyness.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>29.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/07p6pwh9co6ldc30ygh9">Nothing Is Gold</a> (Play/Download) - Bare Mutants <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Affliction-Bare-Mutants/dp/B00DH78K9G">Buy <i>The Affliction</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Comprised of some of the cream of Chicago's fuzz rock scene, I've had my eye on the Bare Mutants for a few years now. They finally released their debut album, <i>The Affliction</i>, this year. Although I thought it laked some of the bite of their debut Hozac single, it did contain a gleeful little gem of VU-style Moe Tucker pop that I'd been hankering to hear on record for years now. "Nothing Is Gold" is just as cute, gleeful, pretty and pointless as I remember it and God bless that. Nothing wrong with a little <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRrZD6HZAto">"After Hours"</a> knockoff every now and then.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>28.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Wendy 'N' Becky (feat. Chance The Rapper) - Joey Bada$$ </span><a href="https://soundcloud.com/proeraradio/joey-bada-wendy-n-becky-feat" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Download</a><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For the second summer in a row, we were stuck with "hits of the summer" so <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NV6Rdv1a3I">vapid</a> or <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyDUC1LUXSU">unpleasant</a> that finding alternate-universe songs of the summer. With <i>Acid Rap</i> producing more than a few on its own, Chance also got some help from Thelonious Martin (and, to a lesser extent, Joey Bada$$) on this contender. Nothing says "summer" like throwback production and singing about girls (just ask the Beach Boys) and "Wendy N' Becky" boasts both of those elements in spades. Martin's lazy beat and sun-shiney horns provide the perfect backdrop a cruisin'-with-the-top-down favorite.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>27.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Uptown Boys - Netherfriends <a href="http://www.netherfriends.us/tag/p3ace/">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.netherfriends.us/tag/p3ace/">P3ACE</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Speaking of would-be jams of the summer, how about the Netherfriends? After writing a song about every state, Shawn Rosenblatt's one-man band spent the latter part of last year complaining about drug testing on twitter and starting to promo his next project, <i>P3ACE</i>, which he plans on releasing March 3rd this year. But way back last summer he dropped the hazy "Uptown Boys" on the world, giving us yet another summer cruisin' song. His second leak <a href="https://soundcloud.com/netherfriends/joey-vision">"Joey Vision"</a> is also pretty catchy, which all bodes well for March.</span><br />
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">26.</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lookin - The Dismemberment Plan <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Uncanney-Valley-The-Dismemberment-Plan/dp/B00FIYG7CS/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Uncanney-Valley-The-Dismemberment-Plan/dp/B00FIYG7CS/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0">Uncanny Valley</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Dismemberment Plan were one of those bands whose return from retirement was hard to gauge in terms of likelihood of success. Although their live show remains top-notch, their first reunited album, <i>Uncanny Valley</i>, was a mixed bag, in terms of quality. But, picking up right where Change left off, UV had more than enough wistful mid-tempo jams (what I call "Sunday Night Songs") to be savored, chief among them "Lookin". After four albums of sexual frustration, Travis Morrison seems to have finally found some romantic peace and "Lookin" showcases his new, more laid-back look at love. Hey, there's even a little nostalgia, in there! Although all their new avenues weren't necessarily successes, it's nice to see that Morrison and the Plan can play sweet and romantic sometimes.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>25.</b> The King - Tree <a href="http://www.thefader.com/2013/05/15/download-trees-sunday-school-ii-mixtape/">Download <i>Sunday School II: When Church Lets Out</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I first read about local MC Tree in the Reader last year after the release of his first mixtape, <i>Sunday School</i>. I appreciated his music but his unique "soul trap" sound still felt a little undercooked for my tastes, as did the jarring juxtaposition of lyrical elements from both of those two genres. His second mixtape, (fittingly titled <i>Sunday School II</i>) sees him finding his feet a bit more and figuring out exactly how to straddle the world of soul-sampling and the sound of Chicago's current streets. Easily the standout track, "The King" is one of Tree's more laidback affairs, half boast, half statement-of-purpose. Featuring a chirpy Elvis sample, it's the kind of delightful number you'll only find on mixtapes and makes you thank God for that particular tradition.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>24.</b> Come Walk With Me - M.I.A. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Matangi-Exclusive-Version-Explicit-digital/dp/B00G9FOU7O/ref=sr_1_1?s=dmusic&ie=UTF8&sr=1-1&keywords=matangi">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Matangi-Exclusive-Version-Explicit-digital/dp/B00G9FOU7O/ref=sr_1_1?s=dmusic&ie=UTF8&sr=1-1&keywords=matangi">Matangi</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Remember 2008? After living with her amazing second album, Kala for over a year, M.I.A. was suddenly rocketed to pop royalty when "Paper Planes" got it's long-overdue recognition as an absolutely unbeatable single. It was hard to believe that a half-decade and one Lynn Hirschberg takedown later the woman so bubbling with energy ideas would have given us so little to get excited about. This year's <i>Matangi</i> is nothing on par with her first two explosive records but it's got enough bangers to at least wash the taste of <i>/\/\/\Y/\</i> out of our mouths. "Come Walk With Me" isn't one of her neo-clash efforts but it has the fun-loving catchiness to sound like it could have been a pop hit... somewhere </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>23.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dreaming of Giants - Radar Eyes </span><a href="http://radareyes.bandcamp.com/music" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Download</a><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">OK, I've had a lot of summer songs here so far but I know that sometimes you want to avoid the sun with something dense and claustrophobic. Radar Eyes will sea you now. After releasing their excellent self-titled debut in 2012, the only thing they snuck out this past year was a single-song download on their bandcamp. Always happy to mix '60s melodies with their Ponys-esque wall-of-sound, on "Dreaming of Giants" feels like the essence of their garage psych condensed into three minutes.</span><br />
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<iframe seamless="" src="http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/track=3302627895/size=small/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/transparent=true/" style="border: 0; height: 42px; width: 100%;"><a href="http://radareyes.bandcamp.com/track/dreaming-of-giants">Dreaming of Giants by Radar Eyes</a></iframe><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>22.</b> Nightwater Girlfriend - Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Someone-Still-Loves-Boris-Yeltsin/dp/B00EXWK5TW/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389146935&sr=1-1&keywords=someone+still+loves+you+boris+yeltsin">Buy <i>Fly By Wire</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After a brief-but-intense love affair with Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin at the beginning of college, I reconnected with them in a strong way this year after getting a chance to <a href="http://www.popmatters.com/feature/173309-living-the-dream-someone-loves-you-boris-yeltsin/">interview them about their latest album</a>, <i>Fly By Wire</i>. Upon listening, I immediately fell in love with them all over again, filled as it was with wistful guitar pop, charging pop-rock and sweet ballads all touched with that same lovely home studio production I so loved on <i><a href="http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/7844-broom/">Broom</a></i>. It's a song that makes you want to go back in time, be seventeen again and find a way to fall in love over a magical summer with this playing in the background. "Nightwater Girlfriend" is the American teenage summer dream in song - there's weed, cars, skinny dipping and, of course, that girl of your dreams.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>21.</b> White Girls (Student of the Blues) - Diarrhea Planet <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Rich-Beyond-Your-Wildest-Dreams/dp/B00E0PVG0E/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389147334&sr=1-1&keywords=i%27m+rich+beyond+your+wildest+dreams">Buy <i>I'm Rich Beyond Your Wildest Dreams</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">No, I still haven't seen Diarrhea Planet live, yet! Yes, shut up, I know I should, I'm working on it! Still, for sheer adolescent-level blasts of rock endorphins, their album <i>I'm Rich Beyond Your Wildest Dreams</i> was still a solid substitute. "White Girs (Student of the Blues)" ain't much lyrically, just your average nerdy guy bitching about how girls only date jerks. But, as Rivers Cuomo taught us in the '90s, that exact sentiment plus ungodly loud, pseudo-metal chords and enough melody is all you need for a great song.</span><br />
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-86856964698187009072013-12-20T00:05:00.000-06:002014-01-14T22:31:34.449-06:00On Warmer Music's 10 Favorite Concerts Of 2013<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SM50R8Rfdjw/UrPj4Ign2sI/AAAAAAAABM8/EO_wNekF4_w/s1600/625430_10101332633623639_670814212_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SM50R8Rfdjw/UrPj4Ign2sI/AAAAAAAABM8/EO_wNekF4_w/s320/625430_10101332633623639_670814212_n.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So I might have mentioned in a previous post how this year I started getting more than a little overwhelmed by the whole treadmill aspect of music writing. Though it can be hard to maintain that childlike joy at music when you're constantly having mp3s and deadlines dumped down your throat, the good news is that the same is harder to say about live performance. Sure, I don't get the same giddy feeling the whole day of a concert the way I did when I was in high school and, sure, it's a little easier to dismiss the mediocre opening bands that are sure to come your way without a second thought. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But for me going to concerts has become like attending church or baseball games. You do it so often in your life that some of new apple shininess will inevitably wear off. But the deeper rituals make it even more rewarding to come back to. Being surrounded by people looking to lose themselves in sound and emotion is, when done properly, an act of communion with ourselves and each other. And, like baseball or even mass, there's always the possibility of something truly spectacular happening that will never happen again. No matter how many shows you've seen that week or how many times you've seen a great band, there's always the possibility that you'll find a few moments where everyone in a room transcends the everyday and loses themselves in something communal and life-affirming.<br /><br />Fortunately for me, 2013 had more than a few of those moments and, if you'll permit me, I'd like to ramble off a few of the better ones for you.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b>10. </b></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-weight: bold;">Wavves, Fidlar, Subterranean, April 1st / </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-weight: bold;">Meat Puppets, The Empty Bottle, September 27th</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">I'm 27. Which, by most standards, is still pretty young. But as soon as you start strolling through your mid-twenties and into the "late" prefix, it's hard not to feel exponentially older than that, especially if you spend your time hanging around rock clubs. I included these two shows in my list not for their similarity but because they both were the kind of fast, loud, dumb rock n' roll experiences that I need every once and a while to remind me just how young music can make you feel.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm on record as being lukewarm about Wavves but I couldn't pass up the opportunity to cap a <a href="http://espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=330401104">White Sox Opening Day</a> full of suds with a nightcap of all-ages mayhem at SubT. My adventurousness was richly rewarded as there are few things more invigorating being amidst a mass of sweaty people going crazy to pop-punk. It was a also a night when I was glad that I had friends able to shrug off a chipped tooth from a kamikaze crowd-surfer and keep right on moshing.<br /><br />The Meat Puppets show was slightly different as the crowd mad sure I had no delusions of being amidst the young and hip. Rather, finding myself drinking whiskey from the Kirk Kurtwood's glass at 1 am when I had to be up early to be in a wedding in the morning made me feel confident that even as I age, they'll always be a community of people willing to share in my irresponsibility. Plus, nothing makes me let go of regrets quicker than a surprise encore cover of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvYgKE5NLmg">"Sloop John B"</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">9. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Janelle Monae, The Vic, October 21st</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">Speaking of feeling young, it should surprise no one that a hulking 6'4" 27-year-old bearded dude stuck out like a sore thumb at Janelle Monae's October appearance at the Vic, but there I was anyway. I've long felt that the audience reaction can add almost as much to a show as the performer and being in the middle of a thousand screaming Janelle Monae fans that night was <i>electrifying</i>. As one would expect, given the elaborate narratives in her work, the stage show was just the right amount of theatrical without detracting from the music. Being someone who admittedly leans towards the indie/D.I.Y./mumbly shows, it was refreshing to be treated to the kind of elaborate planned stage show that I got with Janelle. Of course, what really mattered was the music and Janelle did not disappoint. </span></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">8. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Screaming Females, Waxhatachee, Tenement, Lincoln Hall, September 25th</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">There are some large bills that just work and this fall's Don Giovani-sponsored trek was one of them. Wisconsin punks opened things up with the kind of scuzzy, howling noise that appeals to the inner jaded fourteen-year-old in all of us. Moving forward in terms of maturity, Waxhatachee was entrancing. I'd taken a flier on their first album but seeing them live, with Katie Crutchfield pouring her heart into the songs, was hard to resist. On top of that, her tales of the meanderings and groping for meanings in the morass of possibilities and (somewhat) cold realities that is your twenties spoke too me a little more directly than even I would have imagined.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">Finally, closing things out was the Screaming Females, a band that I have managed to not see on at least four separate occasions, two of which I had even purchased tickets for. This Jersey power trio was my white whale and finally experiencing them live did not disappoint. Although I'd seen videos of them perform, standing a few feat from the front of the stage at Lincoln Hall, I was still blown away by just how small Marissa Paternoster is. Which is perfect because she is the heart of the Females' torrent of sound and fury and watching all that noise emanate from such a relatively diminutive source. Although onstage Paternoster is still relatively shy, her ferocious guitarwork and vocals did more than enough talking. Those close to the stage lost themselves to the music and, for a beautiful brief while, I was able to blend into a blur of bodies and jagged guitar chords. At every level, you couldn't have asked for more from a concert.</span></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">7. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Divine Fits, JC Brooks & The Uptown Sound, Taste Of Randolph, June 14th</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">My love of JC Brooks and his fabulous soul punks, The Uptown Sound, is no secret. But honestly, I wasn't super impressed with <a href="http://www.popmatters.com/review/172802-jc-brooks-the-uptown-sound-howl/">their third album, <i>Howl</i></a> off the bat. It was until I saw them live, on the hulking stage in the middle of Randolph that I connected with the music. The massive, insistent basslines laid down by Ben Taylor were so undeniable in their mesmorizing charm that suddenly the records '70s/'80s soul/funk approach made all the sense in the world.<br /><br />This, however, was just an appetizer as the Divine Fits provided the main music course. My similarly lukewarm reaction to THEIR most recent album proved for the second time that night that dance music is meant to be experienced live. Between them Britt Daniels and Dan Boeckner have made some of the best dance rock of the last two decades and, as the Divine Fits, they actually delivered what felt the like the best parts of a joint Spoon/Handsome Furs concert combined. Daniel's terse post-punk traded of wonderfully with Boeckner's electro-clash. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Between the two sets I'd spent over 90 minutes by the over-dressed Big 10 alums who flooded the West Loop that night.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">6. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Neko Case, Superchunk, The Hold Steady, Hideout Block </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Party, September 6th & 7th </span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I first encountered the Hideout after winning tickets to the 2006 Block Party from my college radio station. At the time I was told that it was one of the homiest venues in Chicago, a place one would be lucky to feel at home at. Now, some (gulp) seven years later, I'm lucky to say that I truly never feel more at home musically than when I'm at the Hideout and I consider it's annual festival the official beginning of fall.<br /><br />This year's block party was especially packed, with only a few acts that didn't absolutely delight, but there were two in particular that warmed the cockels of my heart. The first was Saturday's penultimate one-two punch of Superchunk and the Hold Steady. Though both bands were down one key member, it didn't matter. They're each so ferocious in their approach to live performance, each so full of life and absolutely punishing (by which I mean life-affirming) riffs that their back-to-back early evening sets seemed to blur together into one extended rock look at aging, exuberance and power chords after 40.<br /><br />But the true high point of this year's fest was a set from the longtime Hideout favorite, Neko Case. I've loved Case's albums for more than a few years but, I have to admit, I'd found both previous live experiences with her to be extremely boring. I was assured by friends and well-wishers that this was a fluke and, fortunately, I believed them. For this time, seeing Case with her band just itching to set off on tour behind her stunning album <i>The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You</i>, I was rightfully and righteously blown away.<br /><br />Songs I'd not yet heard like "Night Still Comes" and "Man" sounded like old classics while "Midnight, In Honolulu" was already obviously a career-defining piece of empathy. But even as she mixed old favorites into the set, what made the evening was the sense of utter familiarity and ease. With Kelly Hogan singing in lockstep behind her, Neko breezed through her set in the way that makes the hearts of young men grow soft and music lovers weak at the knees. As always, being in that dump truck parking lot, listening to that music, made me ever more sure that the Hideout was the place for me.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">5. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">R. Kelly, Run The Jewels, Pitchfork Music Festival, July 21st</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">I haven't had an honest-to-God, get out of town summer vacation in over four years. But I've always said that Pitchfork has become a pretty decent substitute. Despite being old enough to know better, there's still something about a music festival that enchants me. I love the idea of taking over a tiny little green patch of Chicago, filling it with art, food, beer and living outside with a bunch of filthy people who just want to listen to as much music as they can. As it happened, personal circumstances made it hard for me to really get into Pitchfork with my usual bon homie. Until, that is, Day Three.</span><br /><br /><span style="color: #222222;">The festival's final day was stacked top to bottom with a slew of heavy hitting hip-hop and R&B acts that, not only looked stronger than any other day on paper, but provided a thematic unity that weaved everything together. You can read my blow-by-blow account of the day <a href="http://www.popmatters.com/review/174170-popmatters-at-pitchfork-music-festival-2013-day-three-21-july-2013/">over at PopMatters</a> but there were a couple of moments that particularly stood out for me.</span><br /><br /><span style="color: #222222;">The first was Killer Mike's solo set which veered from powerful, ass shaking hip-hop to movingly personal audience interaction, with Mike pouring his heart out to the audience. It was the kind of personal connection that one rarely gets at a festival and it was clear to everything that this was more than just a rap show. Of course, what followed was nothing less than just a great rap show. After a few choice cuts from Cancer 4 Cure, El-P's proceeding set quickly became a Run The Jewels affair. Mike and El-P had the mischievous grins of boys playing hooky and could have done a better job contrasting the fun side of hip-hop with Mike's earlier set.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">Finally, came the headliner. Although the more one reads about R. Kelly, the harder it is to ignore his personal life, I decided that there were times to take a stand and times to let those around you be your guide and this was the latter. Surrounded by women and girls who'd grown up on Kelly's bedroom R&B, it was impossible not be carried away by just how much this music meant to a generation. It was 90 minutes of love, sex, personal freedom and complete release. Kelly gave the crowd his white folks set, low on stepping, high on clipped songs and cheesy covers and they ate it up with a spoon. Surrounded by my deliriously happy friends dancing inappropriately in public, I was, for the first time during a personally trying week, lost in the moment.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4. BBU, Multi Kulti, March 30th</b></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">2013 saw Chicago's great BBU toy with our hearts by breaking up and reuniting no less than twice. Originally billed as their last show, their appearance at Multi Kulti at the end of March was supposed to mark the end of their time together and give everyone a chance to say goodbye.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">If you've never been to Multi Kulti, imagine a post-college apartment party taking place within a performance art piece. Located on the fourth floor, above the old VFW, it's a maze of rooms featuring art displays, projections, people selling jewelry and a makeshift cash bar in the kitchen. The stage is barely a couple inches above the floor while behind the kitchen there's a second dance area setup with DJ's spinning. In short, it's the perfect community-oriented space for a group as consciously progressive and local as BBU.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">And this "final" show was a blowout, starting with a host of local artists ranging from teenage punks to Frank Ocean-esque soul crooners, all playing to the rafters. Finally, sometime after 1 am, BBU took the stage and began tearing through a set of should-be hip-hop classics. The threesome tore through songs like "BB Who?", "C.H.I.C.A.GO", "Outlaw Culture", "The Hood" with equal parts playfulness and ferocity despite the three singers being reduced to two working mics. It was all, of course, leading up to the insanity that is "Chi Don't Dance", which brought the crowd to an ecstatic frenzy before sending them into the chilly morning with a subdued closer, "Jumpers".</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Though I couldn't be happier to see BBU getting back together to make music, I know that nothing beats the excitement of seeing something when you think it'll be the last time.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Robbie Fulks, Laurie's Planet Of Sound, September 5th</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Laurie's Planet Of Sound is everything a record shop should be - tucked away in a cozy corner of Lincoln Square, right near the el tracks, it's stuffed to the brim with great new releases, wonderfully cheap old 45s, books, videos, board games and musical brick-a-brac from time immemorial. I'd never imagined it as an ideal venue, however, until this fall. Given my <a href="http://www.popmatters.com/review/174785-robbie-fulks-gone-away-backward/" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">ecstatic reaction</a> to his most recent record, I'd normally never settle for a mere in-store from the man, but seeing as his show coincided with previously-purchased Hideout Block Party tickets, this would have to do it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">In the end, I couldn't have asked for a better experience. Packed in with thirty or so other Fulks diehards, I was treated to one of most intimate shows I've ever experienced. Joined by </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Jenny Scheinman on fiddle and Robbie Gjersoe on guitar, Fulks' trio handled these country songs (<i>sans</i> amplification) with a deftness and power that sent tingles down my spine. I stood mere feet from the man as he bellowed through "Long I Ride" or whispered the haunting "Imogene" so faintly that a rumbling train outside threatened to drown him out. With just three people harmonizing and playing acoustic instruments, it was a performance that could have taken place anytime in the past 150 years. And yet, you felt blessed to have been in that record store on that early-autumn evening because you know you just experienced something special.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Neutral Milk Hotel, The Canopy Club, October 15th </span></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">I've seen Jeff Mangum before and when I did, </span><a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2012/02/concert-review-jeff-mangum-at-athenaeum.html" style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank">I compared it to a religious experience</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">. Thus, it should be no surprise that I found myself making a foggy pilgrimage down I-57 to see his reunited band on their first tour since the Clinton years. Though they'd announced Chicago dates since I bought my tickets for this Urbana show, the idea of traveling to see them felt appropriate. This would allow me to see Neutral Milk Hotel with a friend who'd been with me when I discovered the band. And besides, it felt right to say that one does not simply go to a Neutral Milk Hotel concert.<br /><br />When I saw Mangum perform solo, he noted that he conceived and wrote most of his songs alone with a guitar. That may be true, and the purity of that performance was moving. But seeing Mangum's music performed with a full band behind it gave his words the impact of a true religious pronouncement. The brutally fuzzy guitars made <i>On Avery Island</i> material shimmer with mystical power while the mournful sigh of the singing saw made "In The Aeroplane Over The Sea" and "Engine" practically wrench the tears from your eyes. This was an early, tentative first lap of what is turning into an impressively ambitious reunion tour and it left little doubt that this was a comeback with a lot more to offer than simple nostalgia.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Replacements, Riot Fest, September 15th</span></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It makes sense that Riot Fest would be the group that finally got the 'Mats (sort of) back together. The festival mixed the overlap between Gen X and the Millenials to bring back the favorite bands of every resentful, underpaid employee who graduated high school in the past 30 years. Sure, it wasn't the full band, with only Paul Westerberg and Tommy Stinson remaining (Chris Mars was, by all accounts, not even contacted) but it didn't matter. These songs were so in the DNA of two generations of rock bands that anything even approaching the elan of the 'Mats glory years would be met with rapture.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And boy did they deliver. By the time the 'Mats took the stage, your narrator, already sick, had been standing around soaking wet for nearly seven hours, miserable. But as that first medley of Sorry Ma, Forgot To Take Out The Trash snot-punk classics, nothing else in the world mattered. Maybe all of us in the auidence just wanted it but the band was neigh perfect. The rave-ups buzzed by leaving scorch marks on the pavement, the anthems soared with the same anger and ragged glory as they used to and even the stumbles (such as the softer moment of "Androgynous") were endearing.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Paul Westerberg's songs register so deeply because he was able to give voice to the painful insecurities and truths that we all try to hide somewhere close to our hearts. He did this while also proving, if only through his talents, that us scared, lonely, fuckups were also capable of great things, even despite our baggage. Given that I was surrounded by thousands of shivering, muddy people who'd been standing in a fiend all day and were now singing joyously at the top of their lungs, I think his message had been taken to heart.</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-40257833796726403062013-12-10T23:58:00.001-06:002013-12-10T23:58:34.233-06:00To Heck With Ole Santa Claus - The On Warmer Music 2013 Christmas Mix<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Well it's been quite the year here at <i>OWM</i> and though I have (more or less) retained my health, hearth and loved ones, it's still been somewhat of a let down. A year of wheels spinning and frustration. And, perhaps not surprisingly, those feelings are leaking their way into this mix.<br /><br />It's a more downbeat collection of Christmas songs, which is fortunate because Christmas is a holiday that can actually take some sadness and melancholy and downright knife-twisting heartbreak (just wait till your hear the end of "Rudy"). To achieve that, I've gone with a lot of early country tunes which manage to combine sweet and sad in perfect proportion.<br /><br />The man in the beard plays a big role in this year's mix and things don't always go well for him. People want to hit him with snowballs, shoot him with water guns, pull the beards off his mall-bound helpers and blackmail him for plutonium. Perhaps it's that broke, late twentysomething realization that, as a grownup, Santa is gone forever but so it goes.</span><br />
<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />There's lots of other goodies in here, including Stephen Colbert singing an old carol, some problematic Christmas drinking, John Darnielle going morbid with and old classic and even a moment of genuine sweetness on Christmas eve. As with previous mixes, I'm including a James Brown song, a Sufjan Stevens song and yet another version of "The Fairytale Of New York" because Christmas is about TRADITIONS, dammit!<br /><br />And finally, one quick note. I've often thought about trying to make a mix that I can also put on YouTube or Spotify or some other such Millennial avenue but have once again decided against. I pride myself on including rare, live or otherwise out-of-the-way songs that aren't quite so easy to source. So once again, you can preview everything on here by clicking on the link but it's really designed to be listened to. In order. By physically downloading the music. It's how I roll (although individual song poachers are also welcome, been there, girlfriend). Anyway, I hope this helps drown out the treacle and get you through this Christmas in one piece.</span><br />
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://app.box.com/s/a3xg9lpsgbye17hfi6ov">Download the whole damn thing as a .RAR</a></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/talbygv2rz33jidei666">To Heck With Ole Santa Claus</a> - Loretta Lynn</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>2.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/7uin5m469ks6dwliovje">Sleigh Ride</a> - The Ronettes</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>3.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/d1lfvi0s4offxtynk9mz">Put The Loot In The Boot, Santa</a> - Mae West</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/gvxd3ho00fkrup6a75dq">Santa's Beard</a> - The Beach Boys</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>5.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/htw3e8fpqoi6wakw4ssg">Rudy</a> - The Be Good Tanyas</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>6.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/395586qiq9yq9sn8g7b7">Silent Night</a> - Charlie Musselwhite</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>7.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/l10s3hrh4262iapn42d0">Good King Wenceslas (feat. Mandy Patinkin & Michael Stipe)</a> - Stephen Colbert</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>8.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/f3d1ovktkxekfa9soca3">Lumberjack Christmas/No One Can Save You From Christmases Past</a> - Sufjan Stevens</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>9.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/9gdu1hxg0frdtbh20c7z">Soulful Christmas</a> - James Brown</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>10.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/cpcrt29tg3hi0kulveej">All Fucked Up On Christmas</a> - Billy Filo & the Christmas Allstars</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>11.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://app.box.com/s/7lbcnt10ebhvxlmy0v69">I'm Going To Lasso Santa Claus</a> - Brenda Lee</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>12.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://app.box.com/s/864j9qhtfje9tmf08au9">Little Hands (feat. Beck)</a> - Wilco</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>13.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/4kcd8irrdtgk8ioqkubc">Donna & Blitzen</a> - Badly Drawn Boy</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>14.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/7n5980fj5a7uagwp1r2b">Santa Looked A Lot Like Daddy (And Daddy Looked A Lot Like Him)</a> - Buck Owens</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>15.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/equaxnqvdpuvezjng70f">Old Toy Trains</a> - Roger Miller</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>16.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/qgpsytj2je2ehikv75h4">Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas</a> - Mountain Goats</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>17.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/xaagtzbrzoi8k2qoul01">The Fairytale Of New York [The Pogues]</a> - Scotland Yard Gospel Choir</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>18.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/mtasb1jy28208ty9s8ty">Christmas Must Be Tonight</a> - The Band </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>19.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/x86z6f60q0wxb500qrso">Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (feat. Mavis Staples, Sean Lennon & The Harlem Gospel Choir) [John Lennon]</a> - Jeff Tweedy</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>20.</b> <a href="https://app.box.com/s/ztk7j5sod7ppgptewu55">Empty Hearts</a> - Josh Ritter</span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-43665048977527807052013-12-07T01:27:00.000-06:002013-12-07T01:37:05.501-06:00"Nelson Mandela" - The Specials<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G9PHpqVcr2U/UqLQBrmreCI/AAAAAAAABMc/MctXny3_2ec/s1600/The-Special-AKA-Nelson-Mandela-95979.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G9PHpqVcr2U/UqLQBrmreCI/AAAAAAAABMc/MctXny3_2ec/s320/The-Special-AKA-Nelson-Mandela-95979.jpg" width="317" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Music can be dangerous for an overly-idealistic, bookwormy teenager. There's something about the adolescent swirl of hormones that makes one painfully (or is it wonderfully) susceptible that all the answers to life can be found in a truly great song.</span><br style="color: #222222;" /><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Before I ever touched a beer or knew what weed smelled like, I would spend many a long high school evening getting absolutely blitzed on music.</span><br style="color: #222222;" /><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Punk was the most effective delivery vehicle for the combination of righteously angry idea and amphetaminic effective music that would flood my body with the rage, indignation and misguided zeal of a teenage radical.</span></span><br />
<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222;">This is probably especially dangerous for the young, fairly shielded, upper-middle-class liberal such as myself. Growing up in Hyde Park and other mixed-racial communities, surrounded by self-selected people who are generally nice, well-intentioned, etc, it's always a shock to start paging through your first Chomsky or Zinn book because it's hard to conceive that things this bad would still be possible in what you had thought was this enlightened day and age.</span></span><br style="color: #222222;" /><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">And so I would often imbibe heavily of the Clash or Specials or Stiff Little Fingers and do things like pen vitriolic letters to the school newspaper about missing votes in Ohio or craft bitterly critical pans of US IMPERIALISM (all caps!) in Latin America for APUSH. The anger in those songs, ballasted by the unstoppable logic of their speed, hooks and volume was overwhelming. They seemed like blasts of truth from on high, felling scales from the eyes of the newly-enlightened converts.</span><br style="color: #222222;" /><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">I've been thinking about the intoxicating fervor of those nights a lot recently. As you might have noticed, my musical writing output, both here and elsewhere, has taken a notable drop this year. Although there are many reasons I could cite, a large factor has been the lack of that kind of zeal that I've felt listening to music. Being even an unpaid music writer means you're constantly bombarded with more music than you can ever listen to. There's some that you have to listen to process, and express "considered" opinions about on deadline, there's others you </span><i style="color: #222222;">should</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"> listen to in order to stay relevant and then there's the every-growing list of bands you feel obligated to stay current with.</span><br style="color: #222222;" /><br style="color: #222222;" /><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222;">Combing those expectations with a life that inevitably makes more demands on the body and mind while allow less time and energy to accomplish them has meant that my experience listening to music generally fails to capture the transcendence of those nights with the Clash. I know that all experiences get less vivid with repetition but it's one of those twenty-something realities that's been dragging me down.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">I had all these things floating in the back of my mind yesterday when I heard about the death of Nelson Mandela. The news brought me back to the first time I heard the Specials' "Free Nelson Mandela". The song was so ridiculously catchy, so insanely joyful that it shamed me into learning more about the man whose name and smiling face evoked a vaguely musty, Mother Theresa-ish vibe in my mind. Everything I found out about the man (a revolutionary, freedom fighter, outspoken critic of imperialism right up to Bush II) and the band (politically activist pop, the bold racial stance of 2 Tone, unabashedly angry AND celebratory music) blew my mind. It was like the truth come down from on high, the perfect marriage of people living their ideals, changing the world and making life-affirming music to boot.<br /><br />As I got older, I learned more about Mandela, about the many obstacles his movement still hasn't overcome, the sanitizing of his politics, his many personal flaws, especially towards wives and children and for a while, all those facts would leave a bitter taste in my mouth. Somehow the idea of his less-than-perfect record combined with his virtual canonization by people unwilling to see the full picture tainted my perception of him. It made me feel stupid and horribly naive to have allowed myself to get so carried away by a song and the idea of a man that it represented because the reality was far murkier and filled with half- and quarter-victories than I could have ever imagined.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222;">But recently I'd like to think that I'm coming around. Nelson Mandela was a great man who did undeniably great things even though he didn't do all the great things, even though some twist his life into a lesson into how racism was solved, even though the man known for Christ-like feats of forgiveness was at other times far from perfect. I now see how much better it can be to have imperfect heroes. That imperfections are what make heroes believable and remotely useful for assholes and sinners like me. And sometimes assholes and sinners like me are allowed to put all the bullshit and pressure and everything else aside aside and just let ourselves feel embarrassingly, naively happy enough to believe that a truly righteous song can make everything all better.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #222222;"><b>Listen/Download</b></span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://app.box.com/s/x0uw6wf8418e0js8fwva">"Free Nelson Mandela"</a> - The Specials <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Singles-Collection-Specials/dp/B000003JB9/ref=sr_sp-atf_title_1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1386399399&sr=1-2&keywords=specials+nelson+mandela">Buy <i>The Singles Collection</i></a></span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-87408199319113133132013-07-04T13:55:00.003-05:002013-08-05T00:33:17.751-05:00Citronella Serenades - The On Warmer Music 2013 Summer Mix<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">Photo By <a href="http://bandoodie.deviantart.com/">bandoodie</a></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In my
ongoing education called “life”, last summer taught me a few lessons about that season we call summer. Having been raised mostly in the centrally aired rooms of
suburbia, I appreciated summer’s heart with the unspoken assumption that, when
it became overbearing, I could always retire to a nicely chilled environment to
lounge and slumber in comfort. My first full summer without the convenience of AC was an unusually chilly one, which fed my hubris about my body’s ability to
deal with prolonged heat. Then came summer 2012 which, like the machinations of
fate in a Greek tragedy, brought me abruptly back in contact with my own
fallibility.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Days were
spent baking next to box fans that circulated furnace-ready air in a pitiful
attempt to provide an illusion of coolness. Nights were spent trying to sleep whilst sweating through my sheets. It's hard to describe just how dispiriting to wake up from a night of unrestful slumber to find oneself already soaked in a sweat that you know will be your constant companion all day, save for a few mercifully cool showers. Also, it's hard to over-emphasize just how satisfying it is to step into one of a few cool showers on a sweltering summer day.</span><o:p></o:p><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This year I finally broke down and accepted an excess window unit from a friend, but I've determined to only use it on truly uncomfortable nights. There's something satisfying about getting to know the heat and sun. About living with a raised body temperature for a few months. Around this time of year I often feel like a solar camel, soaking in heat now so I can draw on that feeling in six months when I'm stamping my feet at a cold bus stop and cursing myself for forgetting my gloves.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So here we are again, Chicago, sweaty-but-happy and overwhelmed by street fests and cookouts. May this celebration of summer society keep you warm until next year!</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><a href="https://www.box.com/s/her8o7hsrw4gyxrgcauu">Download The Mix As A .RAR</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/kj3ropq2jpazt6qqsvyo">This Summer</a> - Superchunk</b> <a href="http://www.mergerecords.com/store/store_detail.php?catalog_id=945">Pre-Order <i>I Hate Music</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If ever there were an argument for vanity, limited-edition singles, this slice of driving summer escapism is it. I miss the beach.</span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/jz1tfo3203pbz9tvkx3z">California Sun</a> - The Rivieras</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Is any summer mix complete without a surging 60's organ line? I think not.</span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/1zzbbs28w6z49z5srizn">Into The Sun</a></span></b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b> - Screaming Females</b> <a href="http://dongiovannirecords.com/product/82-chalk-tape" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://dongiovannirecords.com/product/82-chalk-tape" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Chalk Tape [EP]</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The snake-charmer guitarwork here never fails to delight me. Also, sun... summer? See, it's topical!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4. </b></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><a href="https://www.box.com/s/82bbrd9490p89k8r9sh7">Juice</a> - Chance The Rapper</b> <a href="http://www.audiomack.com/album/ventlyfe/acid-rap-1">Download <i>Acid Rap</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Look, hip-hop is meant to bumped in cars with the windows down, so that makes this a fucking summer jam! Also, juice is very refreshing.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>5. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/8r0iqc5otixo2h17l0ix">Shoulder Length</a> - The Sea & Cake</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/One-Bedroom/dp/B0014VRIVS/ref=sr_1_1_bnp_1_mus?ie=UTF8&qid=1372740713&sr=8-1&keywords=one+bedroom+sea+and+cake">Buy <i>One Bedroom</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If ever there were an aural representation of walking out of a climate-controlled location and into the muggy caulding that is a chokingly hot summer day in Chicago, this is it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>6. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/1s8jmpoescs4qnx9m6x3">Books About UFOs</a> - <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 19.1875px;">Hüsker Dü</span></b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Candy-Apple-Grey/dp/B001AXKV2I/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0">Buy <i>Candy Apple Grey</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Walking to the market is something you do in summer, right? Plus this song is just way too happy not to be heard in the summer.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>7. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/sh53t9fu5btdxbuvjtz5">Another Sunny Day</a> - Belle & Sebastian</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Life-Pursuit/dp/B000S570AA/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372740807&sr=301-1">Buy <i>The Life Pursuit</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The imgaes in this song are so fucking achingly picturesque, it's hard to stand. Bonus points for use of the word "herbacious".</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>8. </b></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><a href="https://www.box.com/s/0a9c1d7313267e055c85">Summer Chills</a> - Radar Eyes</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Radar-Eyes/dp/B0071X79T4/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372740844&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Radar Eyes</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The "summer chills" weren't a phenomena that I was actively aware of until I heard this song, which recreates the feeling perfectly.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>9. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/v6l5kfqym3db9impvdgv">Sunken Union Boat</a> - John Vanderslice</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Romanian-Names/dp/B0029N9LH4/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372740786&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Romanian Names</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just like B&S makes you wish you born a preppy Scottish kid, this makes me wish that I also lived a double life where I was born an adventurous southern kid who spent my summers diving in rivers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>10. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/nbvk9bbhowrksqot56dr">Summer</a> - War</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004EXZ26Q/ref=dm_att_alb5">Buy <i>The Very Best Of War</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yeah, it's War, but you know what? The percussion alone makes this song awesome. As does it's tempo. THAT'S summertime.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>11. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/efza77ak4v5z4r325ads">Summer's Waltz</a> - Spider Bags</b> Buy <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Celebration-Hunger-Spider-Bags/dp/B000PHW2C2">A Celebration Of Hunger</a></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm Polish and I love the Spider Bags. How could I NOT include their Waltz? (Note, I don't care that this isn't the song's original title, it fucking WORKS).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>12. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/sdsgpzu7zhf4agd87hcj">Always Saturday</a> - Guadalcanal Diary</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Flip-flop-Vinyl-record-Vinyl-LP/dp/B000091KHC/ref=tmm_vnl_title_0">Buy <i>Flip-Flop</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you're too cool to acknowledge the obvious attraction of the suburban ideal (myth?), then you might wanna get yourself looked at.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>13. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/6q9prl9w9e4sflbpydht">Summer Madness</a> - Cocaine 80s</b> <a href="http://www.djdownloadz.com/cocaine-80s-the-pursuit-ep-mixtape">Download <i>The Pursuit [EP]</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I spent many summers driving up Stoney Island on my way from the south suburbs to LSD on summer Saturday afternoons. This song always reminds me of that.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>14. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/ytdct2jh3b0ag7yuv7km">A Dip In The Ocean</a> - Fountains Of Wayne</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Holes-Amazon-Exclusive-Bonus-Version/dp/B00585N7D4/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0">Buy <i>Sky Full Of Holes</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I miss summer vacations. And, again, the beach. FoW will surely soundrack my next one.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>15. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/37zvmd55w3wi3v6y0ogk">Me & Jiggs</a> - Josh Ritter</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Age-Radio-Deluxe/dp/B006JXGRW2/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1372741110&sr=1-1&keywords=the+golden+age+of+radio">Buy <i>The Golden Age Of Radio</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another like I would like to have lead - small town middle American boy with a twang and mad harmonica/guitar skills.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>16. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/xiznpeyizv1cghl1bcu8">The Boys Are Back In Town [Thin Lizzy/R. Kelly]</a> - Mountain Goats</b> Buy <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Sunset-Tree/dp/B000S5AFCK/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372741538&sr=301-1">The Sunset Tree</a></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Both of these songs are unbelievably awesome on their own. Then you combine them AND add John Darnielle? Sold.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>17. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/c1nz82u71yrurnzu1zgl">Summer Nights [feat. Tennille]</a> - The Cook Kids</b> <a href="http://www.ihiphop.com/blog/mixtape-download-cool-kids-tacklebox/">Download <i>Tackle Box</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">May I never run out of Cool Kids songs to put on summer mixes. They're breezy fun on the bun.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>18. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/3lb8ivx8gw17rlhztbjw">Gospel</a> - The National</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Boxer/dp/B000S5BUXI/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1372741175&sr=1-1">Buy <i>Boxer</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I love the image of Matt Berninger suffering stoically in an Ohio backyard with an icy drink, swimming pool and string lights in the background.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>19. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/1k9f6rnzshdhdyqbcnml">Bound 2</a> - Kanye West</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Yeezus-Explicit/dp/B00DF0POXA/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1372741148&sr=1-1&keywords=yeezus" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Yeezus-Explicit/dp/B00DF0POXA/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1372741148&sr=1-1&keywords=yeezus" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yeezus</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I have a lot to say about this song but just TELL me it's not a summer jam! Go on, TELL ME!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>20. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/65swu9uwp8jatbiuep93">Backstreets</a> - Bruce Springsteen</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Born-To-Run-Anniversary-Edition/dp/B006ONY954/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372741202&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Born To Run</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Although my own youth was FAR less gritty than a Springsteen song, this one always reminds me of wandering the over-heated streets when I was a kid and didn't have a bedtime for a few months.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>21. <a href="https://www.box.com/s/xv1izejc98rqb2hk7zse">Your Summer Dream</a> - The Beach Boys</b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Surfer-Girl-2001-Remaster/dp/B009B51CSY/ref=sr_shvl_album_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1372741231&sr=301-2">Buy <i>Surfer Girl</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Beach Boys must be on every summer mix. This song's hokey emotionalism always makes me tear up so I saved it for the end.</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-17987717342486222342013-06-26T22:10:00.000-05:002013-06-27T11:51:21.007-05:00Concert Review: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, Schubas, June 24, 2013<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It had been a long time for me and Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin. I first fell in love with the band when they played my college in spring 2006. Their debut album had just been re-released by Polyvinyl and they'd had a song featured on The OC, back when that was still a thing (I'll admit it, I wouldn't mind more <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnZ70Q4SN2g">Rachel Bilson</a>). That wave of buzz steered me towards Broom, a record whose warmth and intimacy have given it a longevity that other mid-00's flavor-of-the-month bands have lacked (OK, that first Clap Your Hands Say Yeah record holds up alright but when was the last time you played any Tapes N' Tapes?).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Although I've dutifully checked out songs from their following albums, I never quite gave them the honest chance they deserved. You know how it goes, you get busy, your eyes start wandering, life happens. Then I was given an opportunity to interview them a few weeks ago, which gave the excuse to ramble through their catalog with new purpose. I ended up falling in love all over again and when they offered me a spot on the guest list for a show and Schubas, I jumped at the chance.</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a rough night to be playing Chicago. Not only was it the night of what turned out to be the historic Stanley Cup Game 6, but this was an early show that was preceded by vicious, <a href="http://southtownstar.suntimes.com/photos/galleries/?story=9182421">semi-toppling winds</a> and rain. If ever their were a star-crossed booking, this was it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So it was with delighted surprise that I greeted the early-arriving crowd in Schubas wonderfully cozy back room. I arrived in the middle of the opening set from Chicago's own Sunjacket. They'd clearly brought a lot of good-natured friends to the show and their home crowd nervousness was apparent in their on-stage demeanor. Fortunately, the music sounded fine, a fine blend of crackly guitars and fuzzy synths that created the perfect blanket of mid-fi guitar racket to smother a Monday's worth of other thoughts and make you happy to be hearing music.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was scarcely 8pm when SSLYBY took the stage but the rays of sunlight sneaking in through an open door didn't drown out the rock vibe. They opened with my old college mixtape standby <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QkNDGn1VL8">"Oregon Girl"</a> and everything was right with the world. Their live sound had a little more of a punchy power-pop feel than I remembered it (which makes sense, given the dynamics of <i>Let It Sway</i>) but that kind of energy was just what the doctor ordered. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The band's lead singer and vector for contagious enthusiasm Phil Dickey started things off behind the drum kit, which was, like the rest of the set, a fun choice. Sitting behind a drumhead which now reads "SSL BY" (the loss of the direct address feeling fitting, given ol' Boris' 2007 demise), he looked hemmed in by his instruments yet also delighted at the chance to loose his energy on skins and cymbals. After a few more numbers, including another from <i>Broom</i> and a song from their upcoming record, the wonderful summertime escape <a href="https://soundcloud.com/polyvinyl-records/someone-still-loves-you-7">"Nightwater Girlfriend"</a>, Dickey finally moved up to guitar duties and kicked the show into the next gear.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Between his bantering with the audience, jumping off of amps and joking with a manic, slightly-nervous joy, Dickey dared the audience not to love every minute of the show - fortunately, it wasn't a hard sell. During my interview, the band noted that though they didn't have a massive fanbase, they did have an engaged and devoted one which, for a music snob asshole like me, is so much more satisfying. I've always been of the opinion that if you've got a fanbase full of white people that can effectively keep time, you're probably doing something right and by that standard, SSLYBY's devotee's acquitted themselves admirably multiple times.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The set kept things breezy, mixing a few new numbers with the best of the band's released discography in such a way that the announcement that there were only two songs left felt like a ludicrous overestimation of the time elapsed. Songs that I'd not heard in years like "Modern Mystery", "Back In The Saddle", "Let It Sway" revealed themselves to be forgotten favorites as I started mouthing lyrics and the band even threw us a few curveballs. For me the high point might have been the energetic cover of the Hollies "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgA4-bLcoN8">Carrie-Anne"</a>, an obvious choice for the band, even though I'd long associated them more with Elliott Smith than lighthearted '60s pop.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After the briefest of pauses, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin emerged from a football-like huddle in the the not-really-hidden Schubas sidestage for an encore. They started with the band's thus-far unrequited love song for their hometown minor league baseball team, "Cardinal Rule" and ended it with oddly-upbeat sounding "I Think I Wanna Die". It was a fitting mixture of passionate exuberance and melodic misanthropy for the Springfield scrappers and, despite the fact that neither are "hits" even by the band's own modest standards, they sent the crowd out smiling.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's nice to know that there are some things that we can depend on in this life: unpredictable Chicago weather, Congressional ineptitude, your significant other always wanting half of what you ordered for dessert. At some point, SSLYBY became one of those touchstones, always delivering catchy, life-affirming indie rock on an endearing and wonderfully approachable scale. Everyone at Monday's show was able to take a little piece of that feeling home with them that was surely worth more than the price of admission.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/l1yg5sbmdu5b7nzu7zht">Pangea</a> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Buy </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Broom/dp/B000X6U8NA/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1372301564&sr=8-9">Broom</a></i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(If you're a vinyl lover, especially make sure to grab a copy, it's gorgeous 180-gram vinyl and has three LP bonus tracks and two more on the download - it's STACKED.)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/l0uri1ulqaggsglm1vde">Cardinal Rules</a> Buy <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Let-It-Sway/dp/B003YNKTN8/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0">Let It Sway</a></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://soundcloud.com/polyvinyl-records/someone-still-loves-you-7">Nightwater Girlfriend</a> Pre-Order <i><a href="http://www.polyvinylrecords.com/store/index.php?listID=221">Fly By Wire</a></i> (Their best record since <i>Broom</i>? Do it!)</span><br />
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-86738597763286511382013-06-07T00:41:00.003-05:002013-06-07T12:18:36.410-05:00"Our Happiness Is Guarenteed" - Quasi<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dfIcxUzBcwY/UbIVsxIoDhI/AAAAAAAABKA/WBNadq5C61M/s1600/quasi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="202" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dfIcxUzBcwY/UbIVsxIoDhI/AAAAAAAABKA/WBNadq5C61M/s320/quasi.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hello, old friend. It's been a while, hasn't it? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Today's song comes from a band that I'm ashamed to realize that I've yet to write about - Quasi. Comprised of Janet Weiss (who you probably know from Sleater-Kinney and/or Wild Flag) and her husband Sam Coomes, the group was originally conceived as a drums and keyboards (and etc.) duo in the mid-'90s, with an occasional bassist added in since then. Although I first discovered them at the Hideout/Touch & Go Block Party in 2006 touring off of </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When The Going Gets Dark</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, their favorite album of mine (and of many others) is probably 1997's </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Featuring "Birds"</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Quasi has never been a "feel-good" band, always keen to expose the darker side of life, politics, the universe and everything and their best song exposes just how skilled they are at turning pessimism into insightful, energizing music.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Our Happiness Is Guarenteed" starts with an undifferentiated cavalcade of pounding drums and thick, throbbing, atonal keys that eventually resolves itself into an odd, heavy, even somewhat catchy groove in a way that only Weiss and Coomes could accomplish. This transition from angry, painful chaos into a pacifying rhythm is important because it sets the stage for the song's major premise. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since I was in junior high, I've always loved dystopian political fiction from <i>1984</i> to <i>Brave New World</i> to <i>A Handmaid's Tale</i>. Exercises like this were groundbreaking for me in the way they allowed me to conceive of alternate realities and test my ideas regarding alternate constructions of reality. "Our Happiness Is Guaranteed" manages to pack the revelatory insight and perspective about human society and nature of those novels with incredible concision into just a few lines.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Out of that opening tumult, the song begins by painting a picture of a serene and idealized society located away from trouble under the water. In the world Coomes imagines for us, some humans have fled from conflict and fear into a world of "orbiting pods" and "underwater domes" where everything is strictly controlled. Although Coomes sings as a contended citizen extolling his society's virtues, it's obvious to the observer just what a horrible cost such safety requires.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It seems that the only way to guarantee "happiness" is to eliminate passion. Love is replaced by breeding science, which also eliminates all war (again confirming that the <a href="http://www.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/04/08/conservative-foreign-policy-critique-nuclear-weapon-is-like-a-giant-erect-penis">phallic nature of nuclear warheads</a> is not coincidental). Difficulty and pain, it would seem, are the flip side of free will, desire and and achievement. In just a few couplets Coomes highlights just how boring, robotic and ultimately unfulfilling such a "perfect" life might be.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The song speaks to humanity's restless nature and wonderful imperfectibility. Not only are we all flawed, does it seem to say, but to act any differently would merely deny us of our own humanity and would lead to a world even bleaker (as hard as this may be to believe) than one filled with jealousy, competition, anger and violence.<br /><br />It's a bold position for a pop song but it's also one that comes across as amazingly cogent and convincing despite being made in just a few allegorical lines. "Our Happiness Is Guaranteed" wonderfully illustrates the brevity and incisiveness that songwriting uniquely allows. The pulsating keys and inventive drum-based groove also reinforces and magnify's the song's gut-punching insight. Quite simply it's a song that perfectly embodies pop music's unique ability to speak directly and viscerally to people in a manner catchy enough to ensure repeated exposure.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When you're caught midstream paddling frantically against life's many currents that threaten to drag you this way and that away from the things you think you want, a song like "Our Happiness Is Guaranteed" is a wonderful life-preserver. It reminds us that, though life is most certainly filled with more heartbreak and pain that we'd like to really think about (cue <a href="http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/b3d89ba441aa40d2bd256204643aaaae/BBA--White-Sox">White Sox</a> joke here), it's only because we have the audaciousness to love and dream. Nothing truly satisfying can be achieved without struggle and nothing truly worth having can be gained without exposing oneself to the risk of humiliating rejection or failure. Sometimes all it takes to put a sunny perspective on things is the pessimistic sytlings of a gloomy duo from Portland. Thank God for that.</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-79460920720741475942013-05-06T00:32:00.003-05:002013-05-06T10:18:36.406-05:00Album Review: Four Records That Have Gotten Me Through Spring<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Despite my best efforts to the contrary, each and every one of my days on this earth remains finite in its capacity. That means that, despite my best efforts, I simply do not have time to tell people about all the great music that I'm lucky enough to find myself being exposed to these days. After watching <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/whitesox/ct-spt-0506-white-sox-royals-chicago-20130506,0,802160.story">the White Sox blow a tremendously winnable game</a> this Sunday I decided that that, in an effort to cheer myself up, I should finally start working my way through the backlog of great albums that have been figuratively been piling up on my iPod with nary a drop of digital ink expended on them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With genuine spring finally starting to take hold here in Chicago, I hope that everyone will be spending a little extra time in the sunshine in the coming weeks. There's nothing that aids the euphoria of nice weather after a stubbornly long winter than aural accompaniment. With that in mind, I humbly submit the following four records to help you make the most of your only-slightly premature sunbathing.</span>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1. Lady - <i>Lady</i></b> <a href="http://truthandsoulrecords.com/albums/lady/">Buy It</a></span><br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aAfzu91jQHE/UYc97f5aoSI/AAAAAAAABIk/F08BlopyXnQ/s1600/LADYCOVER-700x700-RGB-480x480.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aAfzu91jQHE/UYc97f5aoSI/AAAAAAAABIk/F08BlopyXnQ/s320/LADYCOVER-700x700-RGB-480x480.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For anyone who says that it's not worth showing up for the opening act, I say to them, what about Lady? Ever since <a href="http://spectrumculture.com/2013/04/concert-review-lee-fields-the-expressionslady.html/">seeing them open for Lee Fields & the Expressions</a> this March, I scarcely taken their album off my turntable. Comprised of two R&B vets, American Nicole Wray and Brit Terri Walker, their self-titled debut was recorded with the Expressions as their backing band and it is one of the most heavenly slices of neo-soul I've run across in years. These two have written an album full of assertive songs that brook no bullshit but are also incredibly fun. Whether demanding satisfaction ("Good Lovin'", "Tell The Truth"), honoring their friends and mothers ("Sweet Lady", "Please Don't Do It Again") or just singing some love songs ("Waiting On You", "If You Wanna Be My Man") Wray and Walker deliver vocal performances that command respect while displaying impressive emotion. Behind them, band shuffles through Motown, <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2011/08/i-love-beach-music.html">beach music</a> and baby-makin' '70s soul backings without blinking an eye.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since <a href="http://spectrumculture.com/2013/04/monthly-mixtape-april-2013.html/">I've written a decent amount about Lady already</a>, I'll just shut up and let the music do the talking. My favorite song is currently the menacingly sultry "Karma", which I've included below but any of these songs could easily get themselves lodged into your head. <a href="http://www.hulu.com/watch/23445">"Fairly warned, be thee" says I.</a> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Listen/Download:</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/mynlklu0fonqsrx7g8kj">Karma</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>2. Jake Simmons & The Little Ghosts - <i>Them & Them & Us</i> [EP]</b> <a href="http://jakesimmons.bandcamp.com/">Buy It</a></span><br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-IVFdiezrBvg/UYc9_l5x4SI/AAAAAAAABIs/u8T73lAWObU/s1600/images.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-IVFdiezrBvg/UYc9_l5x4SI/AAAAAAAABIs/u8T73lAWObU/s320/images.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As a Midwesterner, I had a stark realization recently. I realized that almost all of my favorite punk bands today are coastal creations. Though I've been wearing out the 0's and 1's on my <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2011/11/wayback-machine-naked-raygun-throb.html">Naked Raygun</a>, Effigies and </span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hüsker Dü songs, I noticed that regional punk has dropped off sharply since Reagan. Then, I got an email from a guy named Jake Simmons that reassured me that there was still someone in the heartland making punk rock worthy of the name.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;">Joined my his band, the Little Ghosts, Simmons' latest EP, </span><i style="line-height: 16px;">Them & Them & Us</i><span style="line-height: 16px;"> is a thoroughly satisfying nugget of politically-minded punk that's been an ideal drive-time palette cleanser after many a </span><a href="http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2013/04/22/3-killed-13-wounded-in-weekend-gun-violence/" style="line-height: 16px;">heartbreaking</a><span style="line-height: 16px;"> or </span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/18/opinion/a-senate-in-the-gun-lobbys-grip.html?_r=0" style="line-height: 16px;">enraging</a><span style="line-height: 16px;"> news bulletin this spring. The songs are scratchy, seething and just hopeful enough to get you through the day. Simmons sings about the feeling of abandonment, stymied hopes and other frustrations of life in the Obama years with a disappointment that never veers into disillusionment. This is all backed by stellar production; guitars crash, drums thunder, basslines undergird everything, all with a forcefulness and clarity that brings out the visceral appeal of this brand of meat-and-potatoes rock.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;">I've got the video for the lead single below, although my current favorite is "Who Are You", a slow solo number reminiscent of Ted Leo circa 1999 so I threw that up there as well. </span></span><a href="http://jakesimmons.us/shows/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">The band's also touring some of the finer towns of the Midwest this spring</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">, you should take the opportunity to say hi.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>3. Caitlin Rose - <i>The Stand-In</i></b> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Stand-In/dp/B00B5SGEQ0/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0/188-9829856-8716548">Buy It</a> (it's only five bucks!)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are some artists who are just so up your alley that as soon as you discover them, you get a little angry that it took you as long as it did. For me Caitlin Rose was that kind of artist. My first exposure to her has been through her third album, <i>The Stand-In</i>, which blends country, pop and rock with a hooky sweetness that calls to mind Linda Ronstadt and Jenny Lewis, both of whom I have a tremendous predisposition </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As befits a good country album, <i>The Stand-In</i> is full of songs about loss, accented by organ and pedal steel that lets them drip with a sweet sadness, slightly tinged with a kind of serene resignation. Songs like "Pink Champagne" and "Everywhere I Go" best exemplify Rose's weepy side but she's got more than one trick up her sleeve. "Waitin'", for example has a gentle swing to it that provides a spoonful of sugar to make it's heartbreak go down. On the other end of the spectrum, "No One To Call" and "Silver Sings" both have more than a little power pop in their DNA while "Menagerie" adds a little stomp and George Harrison-esque slide guitar to the mix.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Perhaps because it most directly recalls the Ronstadt during hid mid-'70s heyday, "Only A Clown" has been my go-to song from this record, which I've included below. That being said, this is definitely a record that is worth getting lost in as a front-to-back listening experience. It won't be hard, trust me.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Listen/Download:</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/y2r6qgecwv7jcbz9jm3t">I Was A Clown</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4. Freddie T. & the People - <i>Gypsy City</i></b> <a href="http://freddietandthepeople.bandcamp.com/album/gypsy-city">Buy It</a></span><br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-WLJ9NxqQ90Q/UYc-GYwNK6I/AAAAAAAABI4/Spbr-A5j-ik/s1600/3243127968-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-WLJ9NxqQ90Q/UYc-GYwNK6I/AAAAAAAABI4/Spbr-A5j-ik/s320/3243127968-1.jpg" width="318" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fred Erksine is a veteran of more indie bands than you can shake a stick at, the best known of which is probably <a href="http://www.allmusic.com/artist/june-of-44-mn0000258910">June of 44</a>. His latest project, Freddie T. & the People, is nominally a soul band but it also contains so much late '90s indie rock and noisy pop-punk in its DNA that it practically begs for its own multiply-hyphenated genre. Their second album, <i>Gypsy City</i> was released in closing days of last year but it's functionally a 2013 album and one of the finest of the year at that.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From the first crashing wall of sound that opens"You've Made A Man Out Of Me" to the fade out of the Stax-throwback instrumental "Dunn Deal", <i>Gypsy City</i> is a gloriously schizophrenic mess of an album. Whether it's ruminative singer-songwriter material ("The Show"), sensual R&B ("Midnight") or some wonderful mixture of pop-punk and galloping soul ("Everything Is Broken") there's a restless energy that suffusing the music that makes it compulsively listenable and re-listenable.<br /><br />Like <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2012/09/album-review-yoni-gordon-hard-way.html">one of my favorite records of last year</a>, <i>Gypsy City</i> is a mature record that never sounds tired or preachy the way that such statement records often do. Instead, Erksine writes what he knows, delivering a set of songs about the tangled mess of fear and excitement that is modern urban existence. Rousing and soothing at the same time with music just as compelling as its songwriting, this is the Lays potato chips of albums - betcha can't listen just once.<br /><br /><iframe allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="100" src="http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/v=2/track=1334333806/size=venti/bgcol=FFFFFF/linkcol=4285BB/" style="display: block; height: 100px; position: relative; width: 400px;" width="400"><a href="http://freddietandthepeople.bandcamp.com/track/everything-is-broken">everything is broken by freddie t. and the people</a></iframe>
<b>Listen/Download:</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/6645tkyg7l4tj2bmptyk">The Show</a></span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-48671977195344194282013-04-17T23:23:00.000-05:002013-04-17T23:23:09.208-05:00Vinyl Vacation: "Sooth Me" - The Sims Twins<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Record Store Day is fast approaching and though the event has started to take more than a little flack of late, as a relative vinyl neophyte, I thought it might provide me with a handy excuse to talk about some of my own recent acquisitions and, wax rhapsodic about, well, wax.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm the kind of guy who approaches life like a kid in a candy store, which has its ups and downs. Although I love trying to sample everything life has to offer (because, let's face it, life kicks fucking ass), actually attempting to sample EVERYTHING life has to offer is also kind of insane. Add to that my decision to try to write about many of those things I just can't get enough of and I often find myself perilously falling into <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/30/the-busy-trap/">"The Busy Trap"</a> wherein the pursuit of things I love becomes a stress creating end unto itself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is especially dangerous for a music writer as there's not only always infinity great new music coming out but there's also way more stuff that you should have already listened to popping up on your radar every day. Many's the night where a simple thought like "you know, I can't believe I only have three Superchunk albums" ends with me on the other side of an internet wormhole with six more hours of music on my iPod that I'll never have time to listen to.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's times like this that I've been walking over to my stereo and throwing on "Soothe Me". Everything about acts as salve to the over-connected soul.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It started with the discovery process. In an age where "music discovery" is generally a two-second Google search, there's something so enjoyable at shifting through racks of dusty 45s in Laurie's Planet of Sound and stumbling on an old soul song you'd forgotten about. The inefficiency of spending ten minutes to find two songs that I didn't even know I was looking for feels so gratifyingly luxurious that it would be worth the buck-fifty I paid for the single alone. But the discovery didn't end there. I'd only ever been familiar with the Sam and Dave version and was unaware that it was originally recorded by a group I'd never heard of called the Sims Twins. On top of that, thanks to the label I learned that "Soothe Me" was a Same Cooke song, a fact so blindingly apparent once I'd read it that I kicked myself for never connecting the dots.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But ultimately, it's the music that gets me. The record starts with a satisfying pop and crackle that sounds like it coulda been a sound effect from a Quentin Tarantino movie. This is followed by the intro of a mellow bass, followed quickly by the kind of tinkling piano that so abounded on old soul records and whose cheap thin sound is, to me, a slice of aural comfort food. Indeed everything about "Soothe Me" is meant to, well, soothe. It's one of those love songs that cuts right through the noise of everyday life, stress and anxiety and manages to evoke the feeling of taking total comfort in another. I've read that Cooke apparently repurposed the song as religious gospel, which makes total sense to me. A few lyrical tweaks is all that's called for because it's not a song about carnal love but about the kind of connection between people that creates a tiny slice of divine between two human beings.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The B-Side is another Cooke song, this one called "I'll Never Come Running Back To You". It's a sprightly, latin-tinged torch song whose message is presumably meant to contrast with it's A-Side. It's never going to be a favorite of mine but dammit, it sounds like a Sam Cooke song and it's one I've never heard before, which is in and of itself a treat. More importantly it gives me a a two-and-a-half break to cleanse my palate before allowing myself to flip the thing over and listen to "Soothe Me" again. Listening to the same couple of songs on repeat can be so satisfying, especially after a long day and it feels so easy and natural, yet it's something I never would have even thought to do on my bottomless iPod.<br /><br />It's not that I would ever consider ditching my iPod or trying to have a complete music collection on vinyl, the toothpaste is out of the tube and, frankly, I do enjoy being able to dj with a library of practically every song I own, anywhere I go. But when I'm feeling burnt out or worn down or overwhelmed there's something so comforting about this wonderfully finite and imperfect-sounding hunk of plastic and the scratchy succor it provides.</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-23908561645406300862013-03-30T14:04:00.001-05:002013-07-04T14:10:48.740-05:00On Warmer Music's Travel Mix: Side B - Let's Get Out Of This Country<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are some songs that you read the title of, hear for the first time and say "there's a mix there." I remembering buying Rogue Wave's first album in fall 2007 (at <a href="http://www.b-sidemadison.com/home.html">B-Sides in Madison, WI</a> I might add, one of my all-time favorite record stores) and having just such an experience. I was trudging across the Rock River on one of those disgusting November mornings that makes you question why anyone ever bothers and listening to <a href="http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/6919-out-of-the-shadow/" style="font-style: italic;">Out Of The Shadow</a> when <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5t8--H8zQtc">"Postage Stamp World"</a> started playing. Its dry acoustic guitar and warm production immediately made life seem a little more bearable. When Zack Rogue started singing about "this postage s-stamp world" and the pedal steel kicked in, I was in another place. Soon I would leave for a semester abroad and my Postage Stamp World Mix would be my companion the whole time, providing aural comfort and stability throughout my travels. When I'm ready for some platinum-grade nostalgia these days, I give it a spin.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Camera Obscura's "Let's Get Out Of This Country" is another song that was dying to be a mix from the second I heard it. Dreamy pop, more escapism, it was destined to soundtrack great travels, either mental or physical. Along with it, I threw together a little bit of globe trotting, from a Bob Dylan song about a country that no longer exists (and that he wrote on a bet) to one of Big Star's loveliest little throwaways to one of the best Jonathon Richman/Modern Lovers songs of all-time, even if it is an instrumental. Ted Leo & the boys make such powerful get-off-your ass and move music, they had to be in here twice as well. I hope you have as much fun in these songs as I did.</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><a href="https://www.box.com/s/r2dtan12dsk8s81hvdnc">Download The Whole Mix As A .RAR</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/gjw4f5gxjjoq8zqdjz63">Let's Get Out Of This Country</a> - Camera Obscura Buy <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lets-Get-Out-This-Country/dp/B000FFJ8CG/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_5">Let's Get Out Of This Country</a></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>2.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/oqc7mskfjgujlrx8i4rl">Holiday</a> - The Kinks <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Muswell-Hillhillies/dp/B0040N59TK/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364659503&sr=1-1&keywords=muswell+hillbillies">Buy <i>Muswell Hillbillies</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>3.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/by1mt9mq204caxvjzp1d">Mexico</a> - Cake <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Prolonging-the-Magic-Explicit/dp/B00138J20W/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364659913&sr=1-1&keywords=prolonging+the+magic">Buy <i>Prolonging The Magic</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/o1dw01rtp978cg0p9qy4">Flight To Spain</a> - Waco Brothers & Billy Burch <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Great-Chicago-Fire/dp/B0082C7E1Q/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0">Buy<i> Great Chicago Fire</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>5.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/riy6a1a6wg4r831vfmk1">La Costa Brava</a> - Ted Leo & the Pharmacists <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Living-With-The/dp/B008CZ438K/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364664263&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Living With The Living</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>6.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/qv56kokv15zii1rodjso">Blues Run The Game [Jackson C. Frank]</a> - Simon & Garfunkel <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sounds-Of-Silence/dp/B001DBMBNE/ref=sr_shvl_album_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1364664299&sr=301-2">Buy <i>The Sounds of Silence</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>7.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/s9veuiefl3j7r3opahj4">A Free Man In Paris</a> - Joni Mitchell <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Court-And-Spark/dp/B001KWJ1UC/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364664364&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Court and Spark</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>8.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/byhnodiddfgm7dnuroi0">Paris, Tokyo</a> - Lupe Fiasco <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lupe-Fiascos-The-Cool-Explicit/dp/B001230T0K/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364664388&sr=301-1">Buy <i>The Cool</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>9.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/l5e43sfdgey9ghd68pfp">Discovering Japan</a> - Graham Parker <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Squeezing-Out-Sparks-Live/dp/B00138HBE6/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364664415&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Squeezing Out The Sparks</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>10.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/ya91q58fifa4m79cgblc">Six Months In A Leaky Boat [Split Enz]</a> - Ted Leo & the Pharmacists <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sharkbite-Sessions/dp/B00A7DV306/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364664466&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Sharkbite Sessions</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>11.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/o7p4qykxbsbehspllqlu">The India Song</a> - Big Star Buy <i>#1 Record</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>12.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/obkp7k5349snofny156j">Thee Olde Tripe To Jerusalem</a> - The Mekons <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0088HM8SE/ref=sr_1_album_3_rd?ie=UTF8&child=B0088HM8UC&qid=1364664512&sr=1-3">Buy <i>OOOH! (Out Of Our Heads)</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>13.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/rr05o8tww9zxs3pv94ip">Egyptian Reggae</a> - Jonathon Richman <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Surrender-Jonathan-Richman/dp/B000005J5H/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364664563&sr=8-1&keywords=surrender+to+jonathan">Buy <i>Surrender To Jonathon</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>14.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/8rf18saoqfgl5c2wphen">A Place Called Africa</a> - Junior Byles <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Jordan-Junior-Byles/dp/B0000003Z6/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364664641&sr=1-1&keywords=jordan+junior+byles">Buy <i>Jordan</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>15.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/i3srxsmxakuq8i7vd8si">Mozambique</a> - Bob Dylan <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Desire/dp/B00138H7CW/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364664671&sr=1-1&keywords=desire">Buy <i>Desire</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>16.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/72qzzpml5ibnk0ob4tbw">Home</a> - David Bryne & Brian Eno <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Everything-That-Happens-Happen-Today/dp/B001GGXGKI/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364664709&sr=1-1&keywords=everything+that+happens+will+happen+today">Buy <i>Everything That Happens Will Happen Today</i></a></span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-57346328607539069762013-03-26T00:22:00.001-05:002013-07-04T14:08:27.317-05:00On Warmer Music's Travel Mix - Side A: Maps & Legends<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Spring will arrive Chicago. I promise it will get here.<br /><br />I get a lot of crap from my friends for my <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2013/01/winter-in-my-bones-on-warmer-musics.html">unrepentant winter-boosterism</a> and fairly so, but everyone knows that the best part of a good Midwestern winter is how much sweeter it makes the spring.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There's something so completely and utterly-joyful about the first warm, sunny day after a long winter. When the grass is still brown and the trees bare but the air tells you that better things are coming. If there were a way to bottle the feeling of walking around in a tee shirt for the first time, it would be the hottest thing since sliced crack.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since modern food science is still at least a decade away from being able to physically bottle abstract concepts, <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2012/02/celebrate-leap-day-with-chisel.html">I always turn to music</a> as the next closest thing to joy in a bottle and every year, without fail I make some version of the first day of spring mix. Although it will vary from year to year, one constant feature of the spring mix is that it's made for the road.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As an incurable spring fever sufferer, I invariably back in college, when such things were feasible, I'd often skip class on the first warm day, cue up some songs and drive straight into the Wisconsin countryside, windows down, utterly in love with being alive. Now that such spontaneity is a bit more tricky, making rent-wise, I'm a bit more vicarious.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This year I've decided to make my spring mix travel-themed, creating my own little sad music nerd road trip that I can escape to on the way home. As befits the immensity of my desire to take to the road, this one's a two-parter. Because I'm also a bit of a map nerd, I've made it as geographically coherent as possible and tried to tell a story or some shit.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even if the story works only in my head, I'm pretty psyched about this set of songs. It includes perhaps the finest ode to the state of Illinois from the Mountain Goats, an enchanting vision of wanderlust from the band Illinois, an underlooked Josh Ritter gem from way back in the day, a lovely Decemberists b-side, a cuddle core rocker you probably recognize from the They Might Be Giants version, a ballad of truly devastating beauty from Rogue Wave and, you know, some other pretty decent music as well.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><a href="https://www.box.com/s/u5hbkwpc6xhppojjjme2">Download The Mixtape As A .RAR</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/lnttq74l0p3w8j0c5aej">Do Anything You Wanna Do [Eddie & The Hotrods] [Live]</a> - Ted Leo <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Ted-Leo-The-Pharmacists/e/B000APR1YS">Buy All The Ted Leo</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>2.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/it9skinvhk7cqaq7bhml">Are You Coming With Me</a> - Illinois <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Adventures-Kid-Catastrophe-Bundle/dp/B00AQMPGWE/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1364273046&sr=1-1-spell">Buy <i>The Adventures Of Kid Catastrophe</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>3.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/tkbra2qxtd12r4m7gsav">New York City</a> - Cub <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B0000015DJ/ref=dp_olp_0?ie=UTF8&condition=all">Buy <i>Mauler</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/1qoqvsgoz9mftgs7odp4">O New England</a> - The Decemberists <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Always-The-Bridesmaid-Vol-1/dp/B001LV9PAS/ref=sr_1_3_title_0_main?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364273109&sr=1-3&keywords=decemberists+always+the+bridesmaid">Buy <i>Always The Bridesmaid Singles</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>5.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/23z47sg7f1smb447c689">Travel Song</a> - Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Broom/dp/B000X6U8NA/ref=sr_1_4_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364273168&sr=1-4&keywords=someone+still+loves+you+boris+yeltsin">Buy <i>Broom</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>6.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/2z309o807rxfefhfqw9h">Sweet Virginia</a> - The Rolling Stones <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Exile-Main-Street-2010-Re-Mastered/dp/B003L5BRXK/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364273205&sr=1-1&keywords=exile+on+main+street">Buy <i>Exile On Main Street</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>7.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/kh0j147myb4hs1pgr3sv">Cigarette State</a> - Robbie Fulks <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Revenge/dp/B000S9BV38/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364273238&sr=1-1&keywords=robbie+fulks+revenge">Buy <i>Revenge!</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>8.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/a7wuww4kgw7v0sq1ordm">Hotel Song</a> - Josh Ritter <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Josh-Ritter/dp/B0017SP3XI/ref=sr_1_10?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364273309&sr=1-10&keywords=josh+ritter">Buy <i>Josh Ritter</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>9.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/jc3ntilpvvyzyegu5v7v">Weekend In Western Illinois</a> - Mountain Goats <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Full-Force-Galesburg/dp/B0013AYXDG/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1364273454&sr=1-1&keywords=full+force+galesburg">Buy <i>Full Force Galesburg</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>10.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/ankwhusvg5tlj9ael1l5">Nebraska [Bruce Springsteen]</a> - Deer Tick <a href="http://www.amazon.com/War-Elephant/dp/B001J7ADGO/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1364273477&sr=1-2-fkmr0">Buy <i>War Elephant</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>11.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/z05vyx2t2carj3gzz4dh">Maps And Legends</a> - R.E.M. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Fables-Reconstruction-Edition-Digital-Booklet/dp/B003TASLAY/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364273529&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Fables Of The Reconstruction</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>12.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/1s0t0wt0p4k01254to9o">Get Out Of Denver [Bob Seger] [Live]</a> - Eddie & The Hotrods <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0019B8DSK/ref=sr_1_album_8_rd?ie=UTF8&child=B0019B3EYS&qid=1364273596&sr=1-8">Buy <i>Doing Anything They Wanna Do</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>13.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/x2dzu09juiqpvrpoyiwq">Portland</a> - The Replacements <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0046WP0JE/ref=sr_1_album_2_rd?ie=UTF8&child=B0046WSMOY&qid=1364273700&sr=1-2">Buy <i>All For Nothing/Nothing For All</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>14.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/igetw8x2083i76frnicb">Pacific Coast Highway</a> - Sonic Youth <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sister/dp/B007VB69SS/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364273750&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Sister</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>15.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/dbw2i60u3soiixtip7vx">California</a> - Rogue Wave <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Descended-Like-Vultures/dp/B000YR5PHW/ref=sr_shvl_album_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364273787&sr=301-1">Buy <i>Descended Like Vultures</i></a></span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-88702349871425092562013-03-18T13:37:00.001-05:002013-03-18T19:59:03.128-05:00Artist Primer: Project Film<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I could tell
from the first listen that <a href="http://youloveprojectfilm.com/">Project Film</a> is the kind of band I could love. You
see, I have a weakness for a certain kind of indie rock band that they play to
with a vengeance. It’s a sound that I associate with the mid-‘00s, a sort of
mid-fi, mid-tempo rock with inventive, guitars that tread that careful line
between shimmery and spikey, maybe with some acoustic strumming and keys thrown
in for good measure.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Project
Film, is comprised of singer/songwriter/instrumentalist Sam McAllister with the assistance of Megan Frestedt (the two also run </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the band's label, </span><a href="http://home.tandemshoprecords.com/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tandem Records</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">)</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> hit that sweet
spot perfectly with their first album, 2010’s </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Chicago</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. I love the fact that McAllister apparently recorded the whole
thing in his Chicago apartment, save for Frestedt’s vocals because there is a
warmth, intimacy and slightly ramshackle quality to whole affair which that
origin story would account for perfectly. It was good timing for me because
this record worked its way into heavy rotation for me this January and February
and it’s great hibernation rock. As a product of Minneapolis and Chicago, McAllister knows a thing or two about surviving a Midwestern winter and it’s no
coincidence that a group of songs he holed up in his apartment to creates sound
really good while holed up in one’s apartment.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The music is
a lovely stroll through the world of bookish indie guitar influences so popular
in the last decade such as Modest Mouse, Death Cab For Cutie and the Feelies.
Although it’s not a wildly diverse record the band knows its strengths and
sticks to them with just enough variation to keep things interesting. From the
whispered acoustic numbers (“Sun,” “Kapture”) to bouncy pop (“Cut Outs,”
“Motionless”) to textural guitar explorations (“Ink,” “Cool Kids”), <i>Chicago</i> neither lags nor soars in its 40
minute run time but rather coats along with a pleasing consistency that never
veers towards monotony. And speaking of charming, how about Frestedt? Her vocal
additions, whether it’s simple harmonizing, background humming or upbeat “bop,
bop, bah”s never is a consistent pleasure that adds immeasurably the records
charm and insouciance.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Apparently
hard at work on a follow-up to Chicago, Project Film has been popping up around
Chicago every month or so recently. Circumstances keep conspiring against my
catching them but I have a high hopes for this Wednesday. Not only are they
playing a free show right down the street from me in Logan Square but it’s at
<a href="http://whistlerchicago.com/events/midwest-project-film">the Whistler</a> (so this one's 21 and over, sorry kids_, where I should be able to enjoy some fantastic drinks via their
bomb-ass cocktails without violating my “no beer for Lent” vow. See you there?</span><o:p></o:p><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Take a listen and if you like what you hear, why not give it a buy?</span></div>
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John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-6005848105755706592013-03-10T21:14:00.002-05:002013-03-10T21:45:21.830-05:00Artist Primer: Sleepy Kitty<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You might remember me writing about Sleepy Kitty last summer after being blown away by their mesmerizing but under-attended performance on a slab of sun baked concrete at the Electric Petting Zoo. I chatted with both drummer Evan Sult and singer/guitarist Paige Brubeck who were nice enough to slip me a copy of their album, </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Infinity City</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. At the time I made a mental note to write about it once I'd fully digested it. Well, it's eight months later and now I'm finally making good on that promise. It's my goal to use the month of March to buckle down and put digital ink to digital paper about some of the many great local bands I haven't yet found time to sing the praises of and I couldn't think of a better place to start.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Technically, Sleepy Kitty is really more of a St. Louis band, by way of Chicago by way of New York. And even more technically they're a "graphic arts and music project," No matter, I'll take any connection, no matter how tenuous to lay claim to this duo on behalf of my city. They're the kind of band who you feel like could be way bigger if they cared half as much about self-promotion and "making it" as they do about the artists and communities that they're connected to. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For example, upon starting this article I checked in with the group and, despite following them on Twitter and Facebook saw that they'd snuck a new album out this fall and played Chicago multiple times without my knowing! Saddened by the missed opportunities but excited for some new tunes, I quickly downloaded the songs and got to writing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sleepy Kitty with the ability to always sound like at least twice their number. In the studio, they're masters at layering tracks and mixing styles, live their manipulation of looping pedals lets them create invigorating collages of sound and fury. They wear their influences on their sleeve, drawing on everything from showtunes to <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ckXALWn1M">"White Light, White Heat"</a> while managing to make the whole thing sound fairly organic. Their debut album, <i>Infinity City</i> is packed with songs that are able to mix noisy hell-raising with heartfelt charm. Songs like "Gimme A Chantz!" and "NYC Really Does Have It All" just . Throughout the album, Paige Brubeck channels the confessional charm of Jenny Lewis and the pop hooks of Bethany Cosentino while kicking both of their asses sonically with well-crafted mountains of sound courtesy of Sult.</span><br />
<iframe allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="100" src="http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/v=2/track=403316754/size=venti/bgcol=FFFFFF/linkcol=4285BB/" style="display: block; height: 100px; position: relative; width: 400px;" width="400"><a href="http://sleepykitty.bandcamp.com/track/nyc-really-has-it-all">NYC Really Has It All by Sleepy Kitty</a></iframe>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For me, however, the song most deserving of special mention from that album is the swirling, distorted Beatles cover, "Seventeen." It's more an experience than a song that starts with a basic electric guitar riff then puts it through a psychedelic washing machine. Brubeck's singing is full of sex and longing and blends perfectly with the wall of feedback, effects pedals and percussion that threatens to swallow it whole but never does. It's enough to make me get to work on my next installment of favorite <a href="http://onwarmermusic.blogspot.com/2011/09/covering-our-bases-beatles-pt-1.html">Beatles covers</a>.</span><br />
<iframe allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="100" src="http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/v=2/track=2816879190/size=venti/bgcol=FFFFFF/linkcol=4285BB/" style="display: block; height: 100px; position: relative; width: 400px;" width="400"><a href="http://sleepykitty.bandcamp.com/track/seventeen">Seventeen by Sleepy Kitty</a></iframe>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Oh, and as for that new single from this fall? As it turns out it consisted of two lovely tales of love from afar. "Don't You Start Now" sounds like it could be a vintage Rilo Kiley track, sung to an ex whose love she still craves even though she knows it's ultimately a bad idea. Meanwhile, the b-side a demo of a song called "All I Do Is Dream Of You" is charming as it is, a lo-fi girl group-style pop song, but promises to be so much more with a few sonic bells and whistles.</span><br />
<iframe allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="100" src="http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/v=2/track=1213391438/size=venti/bgcol=FFFFFF/linkcol=4285BB/" style="display: block; height: 100px; position: relative; width: 400px;" width="400"><a href="http://sleepykitty.bandcamp.com/track/dont-you-start">Don't You Start by Sleepy Kitty</a></iframe>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At the end of their set this past July they played a song that Brubeck said she'd written about the experience of going on <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sp87J_lADI">Batman The Ride</a> as a kid. I can't remember any of the lyrics but I remember the song being wry and wistful, smart and funny and absolutely lovely to hear. I remember thinking that I couldn't wait to see hear it on album. I still can't.</span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-87047286690693726302013-02-27T16:39:00.004-06:002013-02-27T16:39:40.235-06:00February Made Me Shiver<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">February is, generally speaking, a rough month for me. I mean, it's a rough month for most people, especially those living in a northern climate where it's a time associated with frozen snot, fasting and those particularly blightful chunks of snow turned to ice turned to mud repository that cling stubbornly to life far longer than anyone wants them to. It's a time of introspection and self-assessment that goes part-in-parcel with the long nights, broken resolutions and guilty Lenten vows, which is rough enough. On top of that, February is, personally-speaking, a lull in my work year that makes liquid assets depressingly scarce.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And here I am again, another year, still chugging away, in a place not to dissimilar to where I was twelve months ago - is it unfair to feel a bit depressed?</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Well, fair or not, that has been my mindset recently. Whereas other months make it easy to take comfort in the little things, late winter tests you and makes all the tedious, unpleasant, seemingly unimportant things that comprise such a large part of, well, <i>life</i> seem so particularly soul-crushing. Any of a cocktail of unfulfilled plans, promises and goals both professional and (inter)personal will, at various points in my day cough loudly, reminding of all that I haven't done or seen or tried or figured out. It's the type of thing that can send you tumbling forever under the icy waves of shallow self-pity and despair if you don't have the right life-preserver.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My life preserver came in the form of a blog post from my friend, <a href="https://twitter.com/captainsdead">Gregor</a> on his his blog <i>Captain's Dead</i>. Gregor, it must be said, is a friend of the kind you can only have from afar, through the exchange of words and ideas in ink or pixels in a way that's at once incredibly close and almost anonymous. It's the kind of connection that thrives in our Twittering present in a way that I sometimes find atomizing and empty but this time took great comfort in.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Anyway, Gregor turned me on to a song from Public Enemy's most recent album, "Everything." It was from the <i>The Evil Empire Of Everything</i>, an album I'd managed to miss last year, a fact which I found unconscionable. It actually ended up being quite fitting, my missing the album in my flurry of list-making and writing as I chased some measure of recognition (and money!) as a writer. I'm sure Chuck D. had, at some point, been where I was, struggling to just get his head above water. Now, having conquered the world and lived to tell the tale, he was back to let me know that it can be OK to let go. "Everything" is relaxed R&B number focused on accepting life, whatever it does (or just as often, doesn't) give you. It hit me like a beam of sunlight on a cloudy day.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">During this same period, I've also been listening to a lot of Fela Kuti. Even more so than Chuck D. or Public Enemy, Fela was a man of principle and struggle. If I needed some perspective, looking at his life, fighting corruption and colonialism under a brutally repressive regime that beat him to within an inch of his life certainly puts my own whining in harsh relief. Of course we're all prisoners in our own realities and, as helpful as that kind of perspective is, knowing that others have suffered more rarely provides ultimate solace. What I love about hearing Fela is his brilliant doggedness. He released over 50 albums in the course of 25 years, each filled with 8, 10, 20 minutes songs of unrelenting personal conviction and musical </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">joie de vivre</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> that's hard to process. Hearing him play minute after minute, year after year, always in service of a seemingly-unattainable goal is inspiring and instructive. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Bill Keller recently published <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/25/opinion/keller-on-keeping-on.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&pagewanted=all&adxnnlx=1362001891-bsXZm+RylcuQhu6VO9jF2A">a column</a> about former Vietnam War POW and failed Senate candidate John Borling. The thrust of the column was that Borling was a brave and determined man who spent his life struggling for his principles, in endevours that, in one way or another, ultimately failed. The piece ends with a quote where Borling sees himself through the lens of Sisyphus, saying “my view is that our job is to get the rock up and over the hill and once you do, the rock rolls down the other side, and what do you see? You see another hill. The essence of life is really just pushing rocks.” I found the sentiment oddly comforting - focusing on results is, ultimately misguided, we can only control our effort and process in trying succeed in life.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />Of course the idea that success is not only not guaranteed but is likely to be unrealized or at least incomplete isn't exactly the most comforting one. That's where Carrie Rodriguez comes in. <a href="http://spectrumculture.com/2013/02/monthly-mixtape-february-2013.html/3/">I recently wrote about</a> a song stuck in the middle of her <a href="http://www.popmatters.com/pm/review/167675-carrie-rodriguez-give-me-what-you-got/">wonderful new album</a> that has helped me hold onto a little optimism. "Get Back In Love" is an wonderful wisp of a song where Rodriguez reminds us that it only takes a little nudge, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">be it a</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> slow dance, a soft smile or, fittingly "an old country song,"</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> to rekindle our passion and remind us of what makes all the effort of everyday life actually worth the frustration.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />And speaking of falling back in love, I'm pretty sure the White Sox are playing baseball today. They're basking in warm sunshine on green grass under clear blue skies. And while Chicago is being coated with a healthy dollop of slushy <a href="http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/18487397-418/winter-storm-arrives-in-chicago.html">heart attack snow</a>, I know that ballgame in Arizona is a vision of my future and I love it. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Listen/Download</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/r7j6lmxgo9zbtw7ttibx">Everything</a> - Public Enemy <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Evil-Empire-Of-Everything/dp/B0099MTZJW">Buy <i>Evil Empire of Everything</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/ehwt3vnhhn698og5dca2">Mr. Follow Follow</a> - Fela Kuti <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Best-Black-President-2/dp/B00B0NDP1C/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361932928&sr=1-1&keywords=best+of+the+black+president+2">Buy <i>Best of the Black President 2</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/9xwkr99ipxl4v1f86qdv">Get Back In Love</a> - Carrie Rodriguez <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Give-Me-All-You-Got/dp/B00B0NF4SO/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361933009&sr=1-1&keywords=give+me+all+you+got+carrie+rodriguez">Buy <i>Give Me What You Got</i></a></span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7437845583329842323.post-72822940703422215532013-02-16T20:20:00.003-06:002013-02-16T21:05:23.413-06:00Six Song Six-Pack - The Musical Coup D'Etat<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I hate Bluetooth. And YouTube. And smartphones. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This will come as no surprise to those who know me but let me reassure them that this isn't one of my usual high-minded, technology-is-forever-altering-humans-attention-span style rants. This time I'm being far more narcissistic.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You see, my college glory days took place at the perfect time for an opinionated music fan such as myself. It was when mp3 players became ubiquitous (by which I mean that I had one - I rarely own a technology before it's already become ubiquitous) but before people always had one with them via their smartphones. This was also before most stereos could be wirelessly connected with such music players or with YouTube, aka the free world's free music library.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Back in those halcyon days of yore, most parties were reliant on whatever actual music libraries were available via computer or mp3 or other headphone jack technology. As you know, most sane people don't lug their iPods around for a Saturday night of partying. Therein lay my advantage.</span><br />
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<a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With at least 50 or 60 gigs of music in hand at any given time, I'd always locate the speaker system and wait for my opportunity to strike. When I was on my best behavior I'd wait for people to express dissatisfaction with the music or for an album to run out or some other organic reason to ask the host innocuously "hey, you mind if I put on song?" Other times, I was far more shameless and operated on the forgiveness is easier granted than permission theory, merely waiting for a lapse in attention towards the music to swoop.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now I realize that this isn't probably the most healthy behavior in the world and I am trying to amend my ways. But my motives, beyond simple snobbery were generally rooted in the altruistically arrogant belief that the atmosphere would be lighter and the audience happier were I allowed to assume the DJ mantle.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When making such a blatant power-play, one must always have at least a few absolutely corking songs lined up and ready to go (unless of course you're offering to play a song requested by the host which they don't own, a popular gambit to wrest control of the music). It's absolutely essential that your music be better, more ass-shaking and more well-received than whatever was previously playing. I always considered this consideration to be not just practical but a point of honor - one doesn't music-jack with inferior tunes, we're not barbarians.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nowadays of course, everyone has a every song with them at all times and it's rare to find people at a loss for music to allow such jackings. But it is on the off-chance that the need should arise that I write this installment. All these songs contain the three elements absolutely essential for such an enterprise.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>a)</b> The song must have broad appeal. You can never be sure of the musical tastes of strangers so you've gotta try and shoot for broad appeal within the party's age demo. This means everything from hipster bros, hip-hop lovers, Gleeks and people who "don't really listen to much music but really liked 'Call Me Maybe.'"</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>b)</b> The song must be easily danceable. Hopefully people didn't come to NOT to dance their asses off so . As an added benefit of this rule is that (broadly speaking) songs that inspire dancing do so because women like them and, as everyone knows, when the women are happy, you've got a good party.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>c)</b> The song should be something that's not already a party cliche. You love "99 Problems" and "Mr. Brightside"? That's awesome! So do I! But so does everyone else, you wanna not only get people dancing but get them dancing to something they're not used to. This rule can be fudged in a pinch, especially with tougher audiences but consider it a personal challenge (and remember, those songs people all know make great drunk, end-of-the-night singalongs).</span></span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With these criteria in mind I present <i>On Warmer Music</i>'s six songs guareenteed to ensure that your musical coup d'etat goes off with minimal bloodshed and maximal rump rotation.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Click Song Title To Listen/Download</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>1.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/cbtyp11dnrgbttpy3pua">Blankest Year</a> - Nada Surf <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Weight-Is-A-Gift/dp/B000S59RLK/ref=sr_1_2_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361066448&sr=1-2&keywords=the+weight+is+a+gift">Buy <i>The Weight Is A Gift</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Released on an album mostly filled with mid-tempo meditations on aging, "Blankest Year" stood out like a sore thumb, as if its 2:12 of massive fuzz guitar was meant to blast away all the maturity and sobriety like dust on a mantle. With a hook too big to deny, pounding drums and the undeniable charm of being able to sing "oh, FUCK IT! (fuck iiit!), I'm gonna have a party!)" multiple times, this song has never let me down.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>2.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/9el4s6ooune3uje1sgdu">Bassment Party</a> - The Cool Kids <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Bake-Sale-Explicit/dp/B0019A1RN4/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361066744&sr=1-1&keywords=the+bake+sale">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Bake-Sale-Explicit/dp/B0019A1RN4/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361066744&sr=1-1&keywords=the+bake+sale">The Bake Sale [EP]</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is a great song no matter where you're from but it should hold a special place in your heart if you're a Chicagoan. From their debut EP, the Cool Kids made the perfect song for those basement parties that Chicagoans know so well, right down the versimilitude of the directions in the first verse and admonition to "get bent before you come / 'cause for that liquor I'll be chargin'". As the title implies, Chuck Inglish and Mikey Rocks supply plenty of phat bass as well as the kind of goofy, shaggy dog rapping and that no human being with a heart can resist.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>3.</b> <a href="https://www.box.com/s/no9enjc8yj3aoh4cpwqu">Let's Dance</a> - The Ramones <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dpopular&field-keywords=ramones">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dpopular&field-keywords=ramones">Ramones</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You remember the absolute scourge of those <i>Punk Goes Pop</i>-style records in the early '00s? Though most just turned shitty three-chord pop songs into equally shitty three-chord pop-punk songs, it's obvious why these attempts seemed like a good idea - the Ramones made it look so easy. The mopheads from Queens always loved simplicity and joy of the pop of their childhood and had a penchant for re-purposing such songs for their own use. This old Chris Montez number, already a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dg7E2pbG5QE">frat-rock staple</a>, it worked just as well for for slam-dancing as the twist and it's appeal is still undeniable. Particularly wonderful is they way that everything but Tommy's toms drop out for the "hey baby..." only to have the wall of head-slicing guitars explode again on the word "dance" - rock genius.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>4.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/iz7rlru8s3o12vy2en57">Dancing Choose</a> - TV On The Radio <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dear-Science-Deluxe-Edition/dp/B001HE2SRQ/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361066889&sr=1-1&keywords=dear+science">Buy <i>Dear Science</i></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another rule that should have been mentioned above is that a party-jacking song has to grab the listener within the first second, something that this menacing rumble of "Dancing Choose" certainly does. Propulsive and wickedly catchy, it appeals to the beard-strokers, dance-mavens and woo-girls who have no idea what it is in equal measure. Although the song itself is a rant about wealth and conformity, the rapid-fire delivery makes the message opaque to anyone not familiar while Tunde Adebimpe's pauses at key lines provide emphatic fun for all and singalong opportunities for those in the know.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>5.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/9el4s6ooune3uje1sgdu">One Fine Day</a> - The Chiffons <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Best-Of-The-Girl-Groups-%28Series%29/e/B000APJFE2/ref=ac_dpt_sa_bio">Buy <i>The Best Of The Girl Groups</i> (both albums, this is required listening)</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's hard to think of a more appealing open than the plinky piano followed by the Chiffons' "shooby-dooby-dooby-doo-wop-wop" that open "One Fine Day". When crash-DJing I find it's generally good to mix your styles and for God's sake, mix your eras. It doesn't matter the age range of the party-goers, rare is the time when a really great cut from the '60s doesn't get the best reaction of the night. I like "One Fine Day" not just because it's upbeat, dancey and insanely fun, but also because it's old enough to be a classic but not so overplayed that people are sick of it. The reaction I love to this one is the slow-dawning "heeey, I remember this!" Just remember, girl groups, oldies and songs about longing for love are always a must - this one manages all three.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>6.</b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.box.com/s/kh5yu7a2ycz9bppd5nrh">Build Me Up (feat. Ol' Dirty Bastard)</a> - Rhymefest <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Blue-Collar-Explicit/dp/B00136JTS4/ref=sr_1_5_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361065491&sr=1-5&keywords=blue+collar">Buy </a></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Blue-Collar-Explicit/dp/B00136JTS4/ref=sr_1_5_title_1_mus?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1361065491&sr=1-5&keywords=blue+collar">Blue Collar</a></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I saved Rhymfest's "Build Me Up" for last for a reason and that's because this shit is the party-equivalent of weaponized plutonium. It takes a beloved song that everyone and their grandpa knows, adds a hip-hop beat, some funny as hell verses about trying make it with a chick ("tryin' to get up in her bush like dubya") and then, just for good measure, somehow brings Old Dirty Bastard back from the fucking dead! If you're ever in doubt of your efficacy as a provider of party music, play this song immediately and you will immediately become the most beloved person at that particular shindig. And deservedly so.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to a party tonight. It's sure to exquisitely DJ'd in a way that will match an elaborate theme that will surely delight the guest of honor. I still think I'll throw the iPod in my jacked though. Just in case.</span></div>
John M. Tryneskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02464826056876144365noreply@blogger.com1