Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Now with 15% less cynicism

Sort of. I still don't like being kidded all that much. Don't prod me today, I'm sensitive.

Track list:

1. The Reasonable Men - the reasonable men - saloon song

Comments: Delightful.

2. Handsome Furs - plague park - handsome furs hate this town

Comments: But they hate it in such a lovely way. This is fantastic, I want it for Christmas.

**and now, a brief discussion of the film Jhoom Barabar Jhoom, which ROCKED MY FACE OFF. So amazing. Also a small clip from the song: Ticket to Hollywood

3. The Superfantastics - pop-up book - the only one I c++ is u++

Comments: This rules. I love nerd love lo-fi pop. I don't care how much of it they write, I love it to the limit!

4. Chet - flight against darkness - dollarton harbour

Comments: Unremittingly excellent.

5. Derek Robinson & Matt Brown - the indifferent ep - how we chose to travel

Comments: Lovin' songs about travel since 1981.

6. The Book of Lists - the book of lists - little jerk

Comments: Insult rock, very nice.

7. Bears - shortest day of the year - you can tell

Comments: cripplingly adorable album cover. Also really liking how this is gently rocking me into liking life. Stop that Bears, another five minutes and I'll be hugging strangers! Thankfully this song is only three minutes long or I would be humiliating myself and possibly getting in trouble with the po-po.

8. Illfit Outfit - proudly resenting illfit outfit - thee & me

Comments: Pinkest album ever not to feature girls. I approve. This is pretty great. I like the shocking vocals, which seem to say, my emotions are getting the better of me, but I am still unwaveringly cool, and very artistic, and my trousers are tight also. Love it.

9. Sean Na Na - family trees or cope we must - hairspray

Comments: Relaxed and lovely.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Pollen wolves, aaaargh.

I can feel them closing in. It would take very determined toothpicks to keep my eyes open.

Track list:

1. Land of Talk - applause cheer boo hiss - speak to me bones

Comments: Delightfully energetic. I love it! Play it again, talky.

2. Kids On TV - mixing business with pleasure - breakdance hunx (market value mix)

Comments: Saucy! This is some sort of lo-fi disco fight. It makes me want to dance in an extremely ugly yet comfortable outfit, in a dingy and tacky club, surrounded by the people I love. No hipsters allowed.

3. Shapes and Sizes - split lips, winning hips, a shiner - the horse's mouthy mouth

Comments: WHOO! Swears. I'm being edgy tonight, I guess. Well, not me personally, but the shapes and sizes are. This is very mellow who is messing up, uh, stuff. It's a nice mellow exploration of languid - something, with teamwork and variated tempos. Believe it or not, all of this becomes something I'm quite liking. My tastes are so varied these days.

4. The Sea and Cake - everybody - lightning

Comments: I always feel like a cheater when I pick a song by a band whose name I recognize. They're not obscure and exclusive enough! Their name is less than fifteen syllables and can easily be remembered by the hoi polloi! What a sellout I am! Aw, who cares. I like this.

5. The Februarys - all the time in the world ep - invisibility is a disability

Comments: This music was made in abbotsford! This in itself makes it a curiosity. What kind of music can you make in abbotsford? Well, this, evidently. I'm talking in circles.

6. Kill The Lights - buffalo of love - lady sniper

Comments: Driving music, for sure. I like the bit with the "lady".

7. Joel Plaskett Emergency - ashtray rock - nothing more to say

Comments: I'll probably just keep playing this until they tear it out of my cold, cramped hands. I love how bitchy it is. 'Don't call me up when you figure it out' is my favourite. Delightfully juvenile.
I ran out of space on the log sheet and had to shorten it to 'Joel Plaskett Emerg.', which is what my mum, the hospital worker, calls it. "Just take him down to Emerg." I like it, it implies an intimacy that is totally not there, but which I wish for. "hey yo, Emerg, let's hang out!" Fantastic.

8. Wooden Stars - people are different - gold dust

Comments: Fine craftsmanship, and an enjoyable result. Again with the variable tempo! this must be something the kids are doing now. Although I don't think you could do a comedy sketch where dad finds a variable tempo under your bed and is shocked and horrified. Where would the visual portion of that joke be? Larger minds would have to figure it out.

9. Au Revoir Simone - the bird of music - the lucky one

Comments: I sensed you were feeling tense, and I ordered this up to mellow you out. Soooothing, chickadees. Rest your downy heads on pillows made of pure cloud. Ahh.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Thinkin' about girls.

More specifically, today I have been thinking about lady issues, and mostly to do with equality and such. Notice how non-committal I'm being? Oh, I'm at odds with myself alright. But there are just so many important issues. Like, why are the ladies as consistently convincing rock-posturers as the men? The men seem to get more cred dressing up as ladies than the actual girls do. I think this is the result of some bogus construct that causes us to be defeated before we begin. Also, guitars are long and skinny, fundamentally. I didn't need to see Prince on the Superbowl to figure that out. He was great, though.

Track list:

1. Justine Electra - soft rock - fancy robots

Comments: Very slick production value. I like anything with robots in the title.

2. The Choir Practice - the choir practice - things I say

Comments: Ladies! Nice. I feel better, and possibly ready for a religious revival and/or nap. Can you have both at once?

3. The Mudlarks - various: innocence is bliss - gimmie some

Comments: Woot. Combined with the last one, I suddenly feel like I've overestimated the whole 'angry femiladyism' problem. In that maybe we don't need it so much. But wait! Neither of these bands are on the all-important Billboard top eight-hundred-and-seventy-three! For shame.

4. You Say Party! We Say Die! - lose all time - opportunity

Comments: So danceable. I just saw a dude dance in the studio. Your license to love this has just been renewed.

5. Shrimp Attack - shrimp attack - house of dead bodies

Comments: Music from a wonderful group of artists with developmental disabilities. It's honestly jaw-droppingly great. The bit about the disabilities is not a qualifier in any sense. It should just make you appreciate even more the effort that someone made to bring a group of people who might otherwise have been musically ignored together. Gloooooory glory halleluuuuuu... ahem. Pardon me.

6. Mary Timony Band - the shapes we make - killed by the telephone

Comments: She owes a debt to Courtney Love - but I kind of think we all do. Oh sure, she's betrayed the sisterhood by becoming a surgery-mangled strung out incoherent freak with designer shoes (gasp), but she did it her way, I guess. And she legitimately rocked it out. Not many of us can say that.
I like the funny little arpeggios in this, it's a bit funky but musically proficient also.

7. The Book of Lists - the book of lists - moon balloon

Comments: Awesome, in a subtly Jerry Lee Lewis way. The piano guy, not Jerry Lewis. Nobody in the band is chewing scenery. Featuring the lovely Laura Piasta on bass! See, sister-mine, you can be the bassist in an awesome band too, if you want.

8. Les Petits - the mighty antlers of song eps - best tasting wool in the whole world

Comments: As a knitter AND a vegetarian, I totally love this song. Not exactly sure why, but it moves me. And just enough sing-along potential to knock me on my butt with awesomeness.

9. Mob - polygon - memento

Comments: Because I've never seen the movie, but I want to. Also, a ladytrack! Which completes the novecta of ladysongs. You love it.

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Cardboardasaurus

Today I will be conducting a little experiment. More on that later. On to the oddments!

Track list:

1. The Soft Parts - unerring melodic scents - christine is pristine

Comments: Pleasant. If elementary school kids were as good with the name-rhyming as the soft parts seem to be, the insults would be much more interesting. And potentially less hurtful, but whatever.

2. The Cripple Lilies - la bete - carnations

Comments: Soft, soothing, ladysinging.

3. Chet - flight against darkness - don't let your cruel heart count me in

Comments: So deliciously mellow. I want to run through remembered fields of wheat in slow motion. Aaaah.

4. The Sea and Cake - everybody - coconut

Comments: Played for its 'Waitress' appropriateness. Sort of. Pie, cake, I like them both. And both could potentially have coconut.
I LOVE this. Predictably.

5. The Great Outdoors - food, booze and entertainment - too many jennifers

Comments: Ooh sad. sounds like maybe there were too many Jennifers, he dated all of them, and they all broke up with him, one at a time, each more horribly than the last.
Oh, pickup. Too many g.d. jennifers! Sing it sister!

AND NOW: an experiment. I've noticed lately that many groups have decided to release their CDs with minimalist packaging. Namely, the rough, undyed brown cardboard sleeve with foldover cover. Before the show I pulled FIVE of these from the playlist shelves. I'm sure if my eyes were better I could have pulled more, but hell, who wants to hear more than five anyway? Okay. So now I'm going to play them back to back and try to discern whether there is a band type associated with this brown cardboard approach (not my wildest hypothesis ever, but what the hell). Here we go.

6. Goodnight Streetlight - the curfew bell - mesmer

Comments: so slow and instrumental. And yet I love it. Is that wrong? This sounds like music to have an amusing and quirky revelation to. Like when the guy got in the tub and discovered density. Yes. That's it.

7. The Phonemes - there's something we've been meaning to do - snowshoes

Comments: Oh, I'm sensing a common theme already. And it is: amplified acoustic guitar. Also, making me feel mighty relaxed. I like how the singing grows subtly, and kind of has a threatening undertone, like "yes, I will soothe you, but you'd better pay attention in case I bite your neck after." This is honestly very pretty, and I'm sure no neck-biting was involved.

8. Gowns - red state - cherylee

Comments: This is piano and soothing, but with some electronically produced sounds thrown in. I feel that it's building toward something... please stand by... oh, key change! We're now having a piano recital underwater. Float away on a sea of pain and fluffy pink dresses. And now singing. Makes Catpower sound hyperactive.

9. The Line Atlantic - the subhuman condition - public transit

Comments: You knew I was going to play the song about public transit, right? Have we met? Hm. Anyway. My hypothesis on this was "hey, they're from Edmonton, I assume they're full of vigour, that economy is booming!" Hell no, I was terribly wrong. This is more sad piano. Come on, there are crazy people on public transit! What, do they only ride it at 2am? Ridiculous. But it conforms to my misery hypothesis, so, uh, go me?

10. Unknown Instructors - the master's voice - this black hat is rage

Comments: Yeow, with the yelling! I like the drums. So, so much wackier than any of the other cardboard bands, and therefore extremely refreshing.

CONCLUSION - Everything in moderation. Including misery and brown cardboard.

11. Maybe Smith - animals & architects - I fight birds

Comments: Have accumulated recent cache. With the accent on the 'e'. I like them.