September 24th, 2010
“Whenever people see a black man thinking outside of the box, they either think he’s switching it up for the white people or they think he’s gay.” — Andre 3000
Late one night, I was driving a stranger home, obviously because I’m sort of naïve and unaware that driving a random drunk home at 2:15am could result in me getting killed and having my car stolen. While trying to make awkward conversation and noticing the narrow length of my jeans, the drunk was so thrilled that I gave him a ride home, he exclaimed, “I’m going to hook you up with my friend Jeremy because you’re so cool!” I responded with awkward silence. He must have repeated this phrase at least four times, all with the same response. “I mean… you are gay, aren’t you?” I gave my single-worded answer (the truth, by the way) in the flattest voice I could muster: “No.” More awkward silence. “You mean… you like… chicks?” “Yes.” He asked me the question the same number of times as he offered to hook me up with his friends. “Yes. I like chicks. A lot.”
I wasn’t mortified, offended, or even the slightest bit perplexed. I mean, I get it; black dudes who dress and talk the way I do always get mistaken for being homosexual. The error was no big deal, because who gives a fuck? He asked me a question and I gave him an honest answer. I suppose it’s scenarios like this that make the so-called “big news” of Kele Okereke (of Bloc Party, who also released his solo debut record this year) coming out of the closet a little surprising. Not that it matters much at all– I still bump Silent Alarm almost as often as I did in 2005– but I didn’t really assume anything about his sexual orientation. However, it’s hard not to applaud him for his bravery. Coming out is hard for anyone, let alone the frontman of an internationally-successful rock band.
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September 23rd, 2010
If the demise of Def Jux yields any dividends, it’ll likely stem from El-P’s new found ability to shed the burden of trying to sell records to people who don’t buy records. The new music biz model is predicated upon licensing and TV, commercial, and film placement and with Mel Gibson on a semi-permanent sabbatical with options, the hope of a fourth Mad Max seems slim. There are only so many homes you can find for dissonant soul-crushing rap, and Mayer Hawthorne is a lot more likely to get that Mazda money than Vordul Mega.
During its last few years extant, Def Jux attempted to diversify towards the Stones Throw paradigm of releasing product from groups like electro-funk fusionists Chin Chin, who were apparently only liked by myself, Sach, and Jamie Meline. Nor was this any cynical bid to boost profit margins. One of the reasons why rap has improved over the last few years is that rappers are increasingly drawing from influences external to hip-hop. Of course, this was standard prior to 1996–those soul and jazz samples didn’t emerge spontaneously. But from the mid-90s until several years ago when the iPod, the Internet, and a Daft Punk sample obliterated musical insularity, hip-hop tended to produce rappers who thought collaborating with Linkin Park demonstrated their eclecticism (or Empire of the Sun, depending on which year).
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September 23rd, 2010
The only French Canadian Douglas Martin knows is Savoir Faire.
It’s pretty safe to assume that Thomas Meluch doesn’t lead a very ostentatious life. Not much is known about him because there’s not much to be said– par for the course when you’re a 26-year-old Portland transplant who records under a French Canadian name. Luckily for us, every eighteen to twenty-four months, Meluch stores his bike away, puts down the fair trade coffee, and records an album of lush, expansive ambient-folk music as Benoit Pioulard.
Lasted, Pioulard’s third proper LP, opens in a way that’s much like the album’s creator: with a found recording of a far off train horn, fading into hissing white noise and humming drones. It’s distant. It’s enigmatic. It captures the feeling you get when you’re walking along the train tracks at dawn, with the fog thick and ominous. Throughout the record, Meluch displays a level of musical craftsmanship unparalleled by many of his peers, possessing a preternatural ability to fuse together drone, noise, and found sounds and integrate them seamlessly into gorgeously written acoustic songs.
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September 22nd, 2010
Don’t mind me. Words may be mangled and weird over the next 24 hours. Between the Furthur concert last night and the vocoder vaporization slated for later on this eve, my brain will resemble a level of feebleness typically associated with Adbusters writers. HAVE I TOLD YOU LATELY ABOUT HOW HIPSTER CAPITALIST SWINE ARE MARRING OUR ONCE- GREAT NATION!?
I digress. Mount Kimbie, the two barely bearded British prodigies who are headlining the Fof and PotW All-Acronym Annihilation this Sunday night, have assembled a mix for XLR8R. It features household names like Dam-Funk, Kode9, James Blake, and Zomby. And by “household names,” I mean for people who only leave the household when they’re zonked on molly trying to remember where they were in ‘92. Mount Kimbie were not born much before 1992, but these kids are alright. You should come to the show. I can’t promise a Julianne Moore sighting, but Christina Ricci came last time–even though she disappeared before I had the chance to tell her how big of a Pumpkin fan I am. Alas.
Tracklist below the jump.
Download:
MP3: Mount Kimbie - XLR8R Podcast (Left-Click)
MP3: Mount Kimbie-”Field”
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September 22nd, 2010
Dave Tompkins says the best way to prepare for a vocoder reading in L.A. is by listening to Eazy E interview Roger Troutman on Ruthless Radio. Sage advice. Once upon a talkbox, 92.3, The Beat, offered Eric Wright his own program, a wonderful quagmire that forced him to wrestle with withholding “bitch” and “motherfucker” from his lexicon for at least three hours each week. There is a review of Dave’s How to Wreck a Nice Beach and a Q&A over at Pop & Hiss. The reading is tonight at 7:30 p.m. in Skylight Books. The book is highly recommended, but that’s implied.
Mix tracklist below the jump.
Download:
MP3: The Bees in Your Beargut or “Beach Bonus” Mix”
MP3: Volume 10-”Where’s the Sniper (OG Version)”
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September 22nd, 2010
Douglas Martin’s birthday is in less than two weeks. Someone should buy him a leather jacket and sunglasses he can wear at night.
Crocodiles remained a small band for as long as they could.
Until recently, the LA-via-San Diego band were just a two piece, using only one voice, one drum machine, one guitar, and one-hundred effects pedals to record their late-80’s noise-rock-influenced jams. Summer of Hate was a gloriously loud one trick pony that ably copped the style of early-period Jason Pierce and few others. But if you subscribe to the Douglas Martin School of Thought, where it’s written that not enough bands rip off Spacemen 3, this shouldn’t have harmed your enjoyment of Crocodiles’ debut record. Somewhere along the line, their profile increased significantly– despite the fact that frontman Brandon Welchez is probably better known by indie-rock snobs as Mr. Dee Dee Dum– which caused the band to expand their lineup and chase a more accessible sound.
Sleep Forever‘s first single and title track was indicative of their career ambitions, for better or worse. Everything sounded bigger, more skyward, ready for their big close-up. I mentioned their skuzzy cool had been somewhat scrubbed away, that there was something lost in their transition to hi-fi. The rest of Sleep Forever finds the band still in their leather-jacket-and-sunglasses-at-night-cool pose, albeit they seem to be posing for cameras that take far glossier photos now.
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September 21st, 2010
Real Jews don’t camp. By real Jews, I mean Angeleno agnostics who commune with Yahweh via deli platters and dim jokes, word to Tim Watley. So I’m not sure what Henry Laufer is doing calling his follow-up to Shlohmoshun Deluxe, the Camping EP. My only experience with the great outdoors involves John Candy and eating obscene amounts of Sour Patch kids after 14 bong rips during the one time I attempted to set up shop at the Grand Canyon.
But I do know that his latest effort for Friends of Friends, comes correct with air mattresses and a roaring fire, building on the firm foundation he established on his impressive debut. Like the intro to Moment of Truth, the beats are elevated– ethereal but rooted in increased attention to song-craft. See “Sippy Cup,” where Shlohmo lets the trap door loose at about the one minute mark and his smoked-out glide gets equipped with a fierce sound system and a fistful of barbiturates. Shlohmo is playing Sunday night at the Downtown Independent, part of the Friends of Friends and Passion of the Weiss Super Happy Fun Fun extravaganza. You can buy pre-sale tickets here for just $12 –nembutal not included.
Download:
MP3: Shlohmo-”Sippy Cup”
MP3: Shlohmo-”Post Atmosphere (Baths Remix)”
Listen to more at the Friends of Friends SoundCloud
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September 21st, 2010
A day in the life of Damon Riddick. Repping Pasadena and Leimert Park. Collecting props from record store employees and Funkmosphere fanatics. Handing out ice cream to little children, bowling strikes, paying tribute to patron saint, Roger Troutman. Dam-Funk doesn’t lease, he buys the whole car, like you should.
Download:
MP3: Dam-Funk-”Hood Pass Intact”
Posted in Dam-Funk, Videos | 2 Comments »
September 21st, 2010
My LA Times feature on Autolux came out one month after it was supposed to, and wound up online-only rather than print. I’m writing about it three days after I’d planned to, and doubt it will be linked, commented upon, or read beyond the four barnacled and bescarfed Silverlakians who read this blog and dig the band. May your beards be refulgent, sirs.
This outcome is consistent with a crew who took six years to finish their sophomore effort Transit Transit, and largely lost the locomotion they’d gathered in 2004, when they were the first local outfit to escape the dance-punk albatross of Aoki. Accuse this of being bluster and I will point you to thid Pitchfork review, that does everything but accuse Dim Mak of replacing Owens Valley water with Red Bull and Vodka.
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September 21st, 2010
Sach O’s the masked avenger…here to sharpen your swords (one).
Forest Swords must’ve slipped through the cracks here at Passion of the Weiss HQ. I don’t know how it happened exactly, you’d think a project best described as “dubbed out cinematic psych-rock” would have a bunch of us playing rock-paper-scissors for a chance to cover it… but nope. Maybe it’s because Englishman Mike Barnes’ project ignores just as many stylistic boxes as it checks: it’s too organic and guitar based to be considered electronic music, too dark and forward looking to qualify for chillwave nostalgia and too concerned with fidelity and bass weight to fit comfortably on an indie rock playslist. In short, consider his debut album Dagger Path an odd bird in 2010, which makes it all the more interesting.
If I were to compare the record to anything, it might be Neil Young’s fantastic score for Jim Jarmusch’s Dead Man. Not to say that the guitar playing here comes anywhere close to Young’s effortless emotion but Barnes’ twang manages to convey the same sense of vastness and loneliness, the kind of isolation one might find in the middle of a vast prairie field with no sign of human life for days. The other obvious touchstone is Morricone, whose finger picked guitars may not have been an inspiration but certainly stand as a parallel. Throw in some reggae grade bass and thundering drums all tied together by immaculately modern production and you’ve got the kind of record that should be scoring Tarentino flicks. If that’s too much of a stretch, a number of Forest Swords videos have popped up on Vimeo to help flesh out the world these instrumentals might illustrate, populating them with 70’s city kids, alienated youth and disaffected sharecroppers.
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