Monday, June 6, 2011
Wooow, a lot has happened in the past week and a half. I'll go backwards. Most recently, on Saturday we went to a Jimmy Eat World concert in Montclair at Wellmont Theater. I wasn't too excited to see them, since I'm not that big of a fan anyway. I really liked their opening act, Civil Twilight, though. At one point, the guitarist took out a bow, like for a violin, and played his guitar with it! It was really interesting and definitely caught my attention. After CT, Jimmy Eat World came on. We were in a sit down type theater, and I remember my friends complaining about how we all have chairs to sit, and the people in front of us were standing up, so in order to see the stage, we had to stand also. As I listened to the band, I discovered that I really like the instrumentals, but not so much the vocals. The intros were really cool, but once the lyrics started, the whole song was soiled. I know it's kinda harsh, but his voice got so whiny and unnecessarily annoying at times, it was almost comical. I enjoyed their performance only once when they did "The Middle." Yeah, if you were reading this, wondering why Jimmy Eat World sounded so familiar it's because you've probably heard the Middle before. It was the only song of theirs that I knew, so it was fun. It's always a better time at a concert when you know the songs the band is performing. Halfway through the show, I realized that I liked their opening act way better than the headliner. I just felt like Civil Twilight's alternative, psychy sound was more of something I'd prefer to listen to. I said to my friend Casey that the whole time I was watching Jimmy, I was wishing that I was seeing a different band. That thought kinda wraps up all my feelings about the concert.
Before the concert, on Thursday, we went to Montclair University to hear Val Azzoli, the former president of Atlantic Records. He sure had a lot to say. He first gave us his bio, sharing that he started off his career as a manager. He managed a lot of bands that are famous today, specifically The Rolling Stones, and many that didn't really go anywhere. He then went on to co found an indie record label and then later on ended up president of Atlantic Records, a big label. We discussed the pros and cons of a band signing with an indie label vs a big one, and as we were all talking, one thing kept crossing my mind. A big label is associated with money, and for me, and an indie label really isn't. Not implying that bands that go with the big companies necessarily "sell out," but the ones that go with indie labels usually get to do whatever they want with their sound, and get more creative control than if they signed to a big label. That whole idea of "selling out" is an interesting concept to me. Many people say that Green Day sold out, but I feel like they're just onto another stage in their career. They were so under the radar for a long time and now I feel like they've reached their peak. Selling out to me, means going with a record deal just for the money, and completely giving up creative control. Basically selling your soul to the devil. All Time Low is a band that people either love or hate. People I know claim that they sold out, and I can definitely hear it in their newer stuff compared to the older stuff. When they first started out, they were on an indie label and the band wrote all of its music and lyrics itself, but once they signed to Fueled By Ramen, other writers came in. They didn't completely take over, but you can definitely hear the difference. In their older songs, there was so much depth and poeticism to the lyrics, and you could hear the passion in Alex Gaskarth's voice as he sang, and now it doesn't sound much different to the pop crap you hear on the radio, besides the fact that there's not as much studio engineering. When people classify bands such as Fall Out Boy as selling out, they usually say this once they see one of their music videos on MTV, or hear a song by them on the big radio stations. Just because Fall Out Boy got famous and started going mainstream doesn't mean that they sold out. People enjoy their music, so to me, it was smart for the record company their on to make it more accessible to the public. But I think a huge part of selling out is the sound changing. For the most part, all the bands I mentioned, (All Time Low, Green Day, Fall Out Boy) more or less kept their sound the same from before they got really popular. But their are signs of changes. All Time Low became more pop-y and less pop punk (listen to "Circle", and then "Stella.") Fall Out Boy started being a little cleaner and less loosely recorded sounding, ("Pretty In Punk" and then "Thanks For The Memories.") Green Day has stayed true to themselves throughout their career, but they've added more ballads. In some interview on 21st Century Breakdown, their latest album, Billie Joe Armstrong was asked about one of the slower songs on the record, 21 Guns. He basically said that that was the song that they knew would be played on the radio, and they put that on the album personally.I think that was interesting of him to say. It's like he knows what's on the radio and is aware of what it takes to go mainstream.
The day before was Wednesday, and we went to NYC to see Miguel Zenon perform at the Jazz Gallery. It was really an interesting experience, because it was not what I imagined at all. I thought I would be listening to some smooth jazz that I hear on the radio when my mom's in the mood for it, but instead I heard this raw, drum filled, hodgepodge of sound that I didn't know what to think of it. It was so overwhelming, but so passion filled at the same time. I could tell each instrumentalist was so engorged in their instrument and really had passion for what they were playing, and I admired that about the performance. They were also all really great musicians and I have so much respect for them for that, as well, but I think together it just didn't mesh. In the beginning of the performance, it sounded like they all were playing different songs at the same time, or that they were messing up, or something like that. The drummer was amazing, but what he was playing was just too overbearing and overwhelming to the smooth sounds of the sax and piano, and the deep upright bass.
Before the concert, on Thursday, we went to Montclair University to hear Val Azzoli, the former president of Atlantic Records. He sure had a lot to say. He first gave us his bio, sharing that he started off his career as a manager. He managed a lot of bands that are famous today, specifically The Rolling Stones, and many that didn't really go anywhere. He then went on to co found an indie record label and then later on ended up president of Atlantic Records, a big label. We discussed the pros and cons of a band signing with an indie label vs a big one, and as we were all talking, one thing kept crossing my mind. A big label is associated with money, and for me, and an indie label really isn't. Not implying that bands that go with the big companies necessarily "sell out," but the ones that go with indie labels usually get to do whatever they want with their sound, and get more creative control than if they signed to a big label. That whole idea of "selling out" is an interesting concept to me. Many people say that Green Day sold out, but I feel like they're just onto another stage in their career. They were so under the radar for a long time and now I feel like they've reached their peak. Selling out to me, means going with a record deal just for the money, and completely giving up creative control. Basically selling your soul to the devil. All Time Low is a band that people either love or hate. People I know claim that they sold out, and I can definitely hear it in their newer stuff compared to the older stuff. When they first started out, they were on an indie label and the band wrote all of its music and lyrics itself, but once they signed to Fueled By Ramen, other writers came in. They didn't completely take over, but you can definitely hear the difference. In their older songs, there was so much depth and poeticism to the lyrics, and you could hear the passion in Alex Gaskarth's voice as he sang, and now it doesn't sound much different to the pop crap you hear on the radio, besides the fact that there's not as much studio engineering. When people classify bands such as Fall Out Boy as selling out, they usually say this once they see one of their music videos on MTV, or hear a song by them on the big radio stations. Just because Fall Out Boy got famous and started going mainstream doesn't mean that they sold out. People enjoy their music, so to me, it was smart for the record company their on to make it more accessible to the public. But I think a huge part of selling out is the sound changing. For the most part, all the bands I mentioned, (All Time Low, Green Day, Fall Out Boy) more or less kept their sound the same from before they got really popular. But their are signs of changes. All Time Low became more pop-y and less pop punk (listen to "Circle", and then "Stella.") Fall Out Boy started being a little cleaner and less loosely recorded sounding, ("Pretty In Punk" and then "Thanks For The Memories.") Green Day has stayed true to themselves throughout their career, but they've added more ballads. In some interview on 21st Century Breakdown, their latest album, Billie Joe Armstrong was asked about one of the slower songs on the record, 21 Guns. He basically said that that was the song that they knew would be played on the radio, and they put that on the album personally.I think that was interesting of him to say. It's like he knows what's on the radio and is aware of what it takes to go mainstream.
The day before was Wednesday, and we went to NYC to see Miguel Zenon perform at the Jazz Gallery. It was really an interesting experience, because it was not what I imagined at all. I thought I would be listening to some smooth jazz that I hear on the radio when my mom's in the mood for it, but instead I heard this raw, drum filled, hodgepodge of sound that I didn't know what to think of it. It was so overwhelming, but so passion filled at the same time. I could tell each instrumentalist was so engorged in their instrument and really had passion for what they were playing, and I admired that about the performance. They were also all really great musicians and I have so much respect for them for that, as well, but I think together it just didn't mesh. In the beginning of the performance, it sounded like they all were playing different songs at the same time, or that they were messing up, or something like that. The drummer was amazing, but what he was playing was just too overbearing and overwhelming to the smooth sounds of the sax and piano, and the deep upright bass.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Pitchfork Review- Bad Brains
Bad Brains' Live at CBGB 1982 is the audio counterpart to the recently released DVD of the same name, a sight to behold: The Bad Brains at the height of their power, HR shaking hands in the crowd, dancing like a madman, seething and stalking the stage. In the crowd are black folks and white; women and men; old and young; Rasta and otherwise. Vintage CBGB, vintage Bad Brains.
The audience for this kind of creaking document is clear: Those who wish they'd been there, those who were and want to look back, and those who just really, really love the Bad Brains. There are those of us who always wanted to believe there was something different about this band, that every show they played was like an army marching to war; that they really did play that fast; that there was so little quit in their sound you could believe the four of them were invincible. And the recording bares witness in spite of (or because of) a soundboard that is, as befits a raging punk rock show, barely functional. Drums are no better than banging on a desk; the bass sounds like the lower half is missing; vocals are barely pronounced, let alone pronounced into a microphone.
Some contest that Bad Brains were a hardcore band first and a second-rate reggae outfit second; with this release, those people may be in for a surprise. By 1982 the band had already become a full-fledged split personality, equal parts dub-reggae and searing punk rock, and the two sit aside one another with neither explanation nor any real effort to mitigate the shock of the switch. On the DVD, you see the crowd take the band's two heads in stride, but it's jarring. Robert Christgau wrote in the Village Voice in 1986, that, "As a reggae band, they were a hardcore band with a change-up," but that's understating it: Maybe a hardcore band with an eephus pitch?
Check out this site's own archives and you'll find this gem, which says it well: "By the time they released their artistic milestone, I Against I, and reggae influences had spread deeper and deeper into their sound, the Bad Brains had already forgotten more about hardcore than most of their successors would ever learn." Live At CBGB 1982 comes at the dead center turning of the tide, nearly equidistant between the masterpiece hardcore of their debut tape and the nearly full-on reggae of their most accomplished effort in that genre, 1986's I Against I.
The criminally under-compiled "Supertouch" appears here, three years after being left off their most recent best of; there's no "Pay to Cum", but "Banned in DC" and "Big Takeover" fill that gap. "I And I Survive", "Jah the Conqueror", and "Joshua's Song" step in as Bad Brains dub-reggae at its most evocative. In 1982, HR, their mercurial lyricist, was still looked upon as a prophet and near god, and his proclamations of "Real unity-not just talk about unity" get at the reason why.
Of course, those lines are also colored by the band's now known future, in which misogyny and alleged-homophobia, demons that dogged HR through clashes with gay hardcore bands, prison officials, and even the Beastie Boys, loom large. Soon "real unity" would be replaced by more esoteric loyalties; peeks at the past are complicated this way. These are not particularly intelligible versions of these songs, nor are they very well recorded. So what we're left with is the raw, screaming moment. And that, for all its discomfort, is best left for the many who would, when transported back in time, be happy to be there.
— Zach Baron, December 4, 2006
http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/9655-live-at-cbgb-1982/
The audience for this kind of creaking document is clear: Those who wish they'd been there, those who were and want to look back, and those who just really, really love the Bad Brains. There are those of us who always wanted to believe there was something different about this band, that every show they played was like an army marching to war; that they really did play that fast; that there was so little quit in their sound you could believe the four of them were invincible. And the recording bares witness in spite of (or because of) a soundboard that is, as befits a raging punk rock show, barely functional. Drums are no better than banging on a desk; the bass sounds like the lower half is missing; vocals are barely pronounced, let alone pronounced into a microphone.
Some contest that Bad Brains were a hardcore band first and a second-rate reggae outfit second; with this release, those people may be in for a surprise. By 1982 the band had already become a full-fledged split personality, equal parts dub-reggae and searing punk rock, and the two sit aside one another with neither explanation nor any real effort to mitigate the shock of the switch. On the DVD, you see the crowd take the band's two heads in stride, but it's jarring. Robert Christgau wrote in the Village Voice in 1986, that, "As a reggae band, they were a hardcore band with a change-up," but that's understating it: Maybe a hardcore band with an eephus pitch?
Check out this site's own archives and you'll find this gem, which says it well: "By the time they released their artistic milestone, I Against I, and reggae influences had spread deeper and deeper into their sound, the Bad Brains had already forgotten more about hardcore than most of their successors would ever learn." Live At CBGB 1982 comes at the dead center turning of the tide, nearly equidistant between the masterpiece hardcore of their debut tape and the nearly full-on reggae of their most accomplished effort in that genre, 1986's I Against I.
The criminally under-compiled "Supertouch" appears here, three years after being left off their most recent best of; there's no "Pay to Cum", but "Banned in DC" and "Big Takeover" fill that gap. "I And I Survive", "Jah the Conqueror", and "Joshua's Song" step in as Bad Brains dub-reggae at its most evocative. In 1982, HR, their mercurial lyricist, was still looked upon as a prophet and near god, and his proclamations of "Real unity-not just talk about unity" get at the reason why.
Of course, those lines are also colored by the band's now known future, in which misogyny and alleged-homophobia, demons that dogged HR through clashes with gay hardcore bands, prison officials, and even the Beastie Boys, loom large. Soon "real unity" would be replaced by more esoteric loyalties; peeks at the past are complicated this way. These are not particularly intelligible versions of these songs, nor are they very well recorded. So what we're left with is the raw, screaming moment. And that, for all its discomfort, is best left for the many who would, when transported back in time, be happy to be there.
— Zach Baron, December 4, 2006
http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/9655-live-at-cbgb-1982/
The Hives
This band is just fantastic. Most people who are hip to them only heard "Main Offender" which was featured on the first version on Rock Band. Unlike them, I've been a fan for a while now. The screaming, strained sounding (not screamo) vocals of Pelle Almqvist are genius, in my opinion. The way the band stays true to themselves in all their stuff is very admirable. Even in the song they collabed on with Timbaland -yes ,you read correctly,(Throw It On Me) you can hear how they still kept that fun, punk-y style that they are known for. Even if you only just heard Main Offender and call yourself a Hives fan, listen to some more, like "Try It Again," or "Tick Tick Boom" and you'll be a fan for realzzz.
Monday, May 30, 2011
Sacred Trickster
Just found this gem on my youtube suggested list, and I'm so glad I clicked on it. Even though I think pretty much everything by Sonic is amazing, this is really good. The music composition itself is pretty basic and repetative (yes, I looked up the guitar tab already) but there's something about it. Maybe it's Kim Gordon's vocals, which I love. They're always so intriguing and have that uber cool experimental-y feeling, like in "Drunken Butterfly." Anyway, Thurston Moore's guitar playing is just God-like and I can only pray to get to his level one day.
Friday, May 27, 2011
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