toOOOoons

Haven't done reviews in a while, the summer months tend to be slow for new releases, all the sudden they've stacked up on me though...

transplants - Haunted Cities: A punk rock supergroup(?) consisting of Tim Armstrong (Rancid, Op Ivy), Travis Barker (Blink 182, Boxcar Racer, Meet the Barkers), and some other guy, plus guest spots from currently irrelevant lyricists, sen dog, b real, and the boo-ya tribe. The best song (which is really good) from this random mix of tunes is the single, 'Gangsters and Thugs', with the super cathcy chorus, "some of my friends sell records, some of my friends sell drugs".

clap your hands say yeah - s/t: Talking Heads meets Hidden Cameras. Pretty cool stuff from this band that has never played a show outside of new york.

limbeck - Let Me Come Home: This might have been popular in 1993, so much so that they might have secured an opening spot on a Gin Blossoms tour. It couldn't be less important or remotely redeeming in 2005.

envelopes - Demon: This is what I'd hoped all the hype surrounding the Fiery Furnaces would have yielded.

sing sing - Sing Sing & I: Second release from Emma Anderson's (of Lush noteriety) new outfit. Far too poppy, comes off sounding like an underdeveloped Cardigans or St. Etienne record. 'Sweetness and Light' this surely is not.

solex + M.A.E - In The Fishtank Vol. 13: Take two bands, stick them in a studio and see what happens. The Fishtank series is a great concept that has produced more hits than misses. Unfortunately Solex (essentially one dutch record shop owner) peeked with her first release, and M.A.E. don't seem to help much here.

bedrock - Layered Sounds 2: Disc one is surprisingly (or maybe not, I haven't been following the label's recent releases too closely) leftfield/downtempo fair which is a refreshing treat, while disc 2 has your more typical Bedrock style floor fillers.

nick warren - GU 28 Shanghai: You pretty much know what to expect from the Global Underground series. This is more of the same ultra prog.

skopic - s/t: Decent downtempo beats rife with melodies reminiscent of film noir-ish soundtracks.

pick of the week:
portable folk band - Introduces the Royal Postal Bazaar: Refreshingly good indie rock recorded in a cold basement somewhere in Pennsylvania during the winter months. You can d/l their whole album with their blessing, if you clicky.



-brrrr, neph-

major dischord with nike

It seems that Nike has borrowed the now legendary Minor Threat album cover art concept for it's new east coast skate board tour campaign, without the blessing of the afformentioned parties at Dischord Records. Admiration or appropriation, you decide:



-out of step, neph-

shinola

Ween has announced a new album of hodge podge items that have been in circulation for some time now in various forms. Only now they won't sound like they've been regurgitated by the poop ship. This is the first in what will hopefully be many volumes of such essential epherma. The release date for Shinola is July 15, and they're keeping the tracklist a secret. My fingers are crossed that 'albino sunburn girl' makes the cut.

-boobs on, neph-

thank your parents for the dna

Sojourned into denver today for the Westword Music Showcase. Westword is essentially the same as the Loaf except it's for, yep you guessed it - denver. It was a locals only version (bands & dj's) of something like the Midtown Music Fest, except scattered across a few blocks in various clubs with one outdoor stage area. They touted it with 2 out of town 'headliners' as they always do, this time dj jazzy jeff & mark "cream of wheat" farina headlining the outdoor stage.

Got there Justin Time for the Hot IQ's (formerly The Royal We) set, whom is one of my fave local acts - you have to appreciate fetching female drummers of asian descent that can wail on the skins, you really do. Besides playing one of the all time best theme songs, they also covered one of my personal faves, "Web in Front" by the allmighty Archers of Loaf. After their set, we made tracks over to Vinyl to catch some more local talent on the main floor (with a brand new custom JBL boomin-type system). Being that it was only 6-8pm that we were there, it had that 6-8am kind of vibe to it, crowd wise. Oh yeah that andthe 1/2 pint of vodka with us to spruce up our 'red bulls on the rocks' we had been ordering - straight ghetto fab, if I do say so. I don't get out much at all in the denver club scene so it was interesting to a put a sound and face to some names I've seen promoted herr & therr (miss audry - cool casual techy house; wyatt erp - driving thumpy house; ivy - mundane breaks). After an unfortunate no show by the wheatiest of cream, we made tracks back to boulder whilst the night was still young, for tomorrow we celebrate lauren's 23rd...

-kp-

p.s. This post was brought to you by the sweet intonations of It's Tomorrow Already by a certain Irresistable Force and Speed Limt 140+ volume 5.

glass & crass

The Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center is hosting a Dale Chihuly retrospective with works spanning his 35 year career, including the Macchia Forrest, Persian Wall, Ikebana, Niijima, Floating Pool, Tower, Cylinders and Basket series, some of which is installed outside in the garden area. The exhibit runs through August 14th. I was lucky enough to see a gallery showing a few years back in the ATL, which although impressive, it was smaller than I had hoped. I'm eagerly anticipating this showing. If you should miss this current exhibit (?!), you can always see one of his massive blue chandeliers on permanent display (until someone shells out the $$$$ to buy it) in the fancy art gallery in Beaver Cerek Village. It's in the window, you can't miss it. This one below was from Monterey, California, 1999.



Completely lost it award of the week goes to Tom Cruise for arguing with Matt Lauer on the Today Show about psychiatry & ritlin. Usually Matt Lauer drives me bonkers, but as you can see in this video, he definitely holds his own during Tom's tirade (fast forward to the good part about 8 minutes in).

Friday techn0 of the day - King Britt presents Scuba: Hidden Treasures

-diver down, neph-

almost there

My lappy has a staunch new 60g HD and is fully operational again. And I have two neighbors with wireless access points that give a strong signal who don't mind my poaching. Now if only the lappy would actually connect to the www, I'd be in business. Almost all the pieces seem to be in place but one, I'm just not sure what it may be...



-contemplation, neph-

more of my recordings

I've been digging through the numerous stacks of cd's in my hut. My rummaging has provided us two DCFC offerings from 2003 & 2004 which you can now find over on CO Tapers. Once again all you need is your favorite bittorrent client and FLAC to enjoy.

2003 info.
2004 info.

-death cab to nephew-

flogging poor dead horses

Baldy Corgan took out a full page ad in the Chicago Tribune today announcing the release of his new album and the desire to reform the defunct Smashing Pumpkins. It seems unlikely that the latter announcement will bear much fruit - James Iha has a pretty sweet gig with A Perfect Circle these days and D'Arcy is likely dead from an OD in an alley somewhere. Howver, good 'ol Jimmy Chamberlin has likely already signed on for the potential project, having stuck with Bill through the ridiculous Zwan debaucle and even sitting in on drums for a track on his new solo disc. What say I about a reformation, you ask? So what, I reply. Do something uselful and release Gish on SACD instead.

-gosh, neph-

boat on

Went up to Steamboat friday for a saturday wedding. Specifically it was Allison's friends, Brian and Carol, who were wed at a quaint little ceremony in the botanical gardens with bubbles. The reception followed at the SlopeSide located at the base of the mountain. Flasks are definitely the hot item once the open bar runs out. After dinner & drinks we cashed out for a spell before watching the Aviator, which was a lot better than I had expected.

After a father's day bbq with the fam on sunday, I returned to the sweatbox that is my apartment (the AC is busted - should be fixed today) to find that the wind had blown out the screen to the big window. Sweet.

-sauna style, neph-

mile high

According to a new federal study, Boulder ranks #2 in the nation for per capita pot smoking, second only to Boston. The Moe's Bagel slogan, "Only the best get baked," certainly rings true. Not that anyone here at the Beach condones that sort of thing.

-cough, cough, neph-

tryin to take my shoes off

My recording of the Pinback show is up on CO Tapers. You will need a bittorrent client and flac to bring the audio to your ears. Enjoy!

spillage

The second night of Built to Spill at the Fox is up on COTapers.org.

-enjoy-

reviewsday

broken spindles - Inside Absent: Think the 'Faint Light' or 'Diet Faint', which is pretty accurate since the Spindles is what's-his-face from the Faint's little side project. This time out we have some vocals. Decent, but extremely short - 10 songs, 26 minutes.

foo fighters - In Your Honour: One disc is loud Dave Grohl yelly rock, the other tame acoustic fair. A couple solid tracks on here, which will sound great live when played alongside their other solid tracks.

cursive - The Difference Between Houses and Homes (Lost Songs & Loose Ends 1995-2001): I've never much listened to these guys, their whole concept album about an organ seemed tright. Mainly because being a Saddle Creek band, I unfortunately lumped them in with some of their more bland label mates (I won't mention names, they're too obvious). I kind of like this collection - it's a ruff around the edges dischordian screamo type fair for the tragic lovelorn angst in you.

jamiroquai - Dynamite: Sha-zaam, disco is alive and well. It's as if the guy with furry hat is channeling Disco Stu. One wonders if the album title is a nod to Napolean for his display of rad dance skills during 'Canned Heat' which may or may not have fueled the 'renewed interest' fire behind this release.

royskopp - The Understanding: I don't get it...HA! No really though, some songs are really good, others are snoozers / filler. Further proof that electronical genred musica tends to work best at the 12" level.

-nephew-

a page (or two) of madness

Friday night started off innocently enough with a trip to the gym and a new pair of sandals. It was a rainy-ish night, so I just stayed in. The later it got, the more commotion I eventually heard outside, so I poked my head out and sure enough there was a party in full swing just below me. TV was boring me sensless, so I decided to join in the festivites. My neighbors initially freaked out because they thought I came down to complain about the noise. When my intentions were clarified that I was itching to get my party on, we all did shots and so the night went.

Saturday brought the sun, and it was off to d-town to soak up the rays at jen's pool. We came equipped with all the ingredients for our now legendary pomegranate mojitos. The pool scene was in full effect by the time we got there. Everyone was on the same page, when it came to poolside bevvies. There was a keg, which somehow we only discovered as it was being carted off. There was the guy pooring ice of his second story balcony into a cooler below. There was the apartment of ravers that woke up around 2p and started bangin' out the tek-no. And there was us, ordering pizzas poolside.

Several hours later, and completed sunstruck, we all decided to hit LoDo. We started off at an interesting spot called, Lime. It was an 'american cantina' which had house dj's and margs. It was likely a combination of several things (I blame the gran marnier), but I found myself in the restroom not feeling so hot. Some water splashed on my face seemed to help out, and when I returned to our table, everyone was gone. So I, innocently enough and still a little dizzy, just sat down not expecting the dine & dash plan that had been hatched while I was gone. Ooops, foiled that one - sorry guys.

Now it was pouring rain, but we had pretty much committed to leaving the cantina after dylan & matt decided to knock over a tower of marg challaces. As we sauntered down 16th street en route to find a suitable venue for dancing, I booted here & there, until I felt at peace with the world - real cool. After some dancing with blue haired girls at Rise, we wound up at some tavern playing shuffleboard, at which dylan & I reigned supreme. Some illegal pete's later and we were back at jens' watching Napolean Dynamite. Then came zzzzzzzz.

-havocaly yours, neph-

quickies

Not much left to review after last week's fairly exhausting list...

ian pooley - A Subteranean Soundtrack: A 2 disc set styled in the increasingly popular fashion of dj/producer releases. That is to say one disc is the artist's original studio work (or maybe some remixes too), and the other is a mix. Of these two, I enjoy the housey mix disc, but am kind of bored with his studio stuff this time around.

billy corgan - TheFutureEmbrace: Seriously, there are no spaces in the album title - could this guy be more difficult? If the name sounds familiar, it's because we saw the EP a few weeks back. This here is the full length, and in summary it comes off sounding like a solo version of Adore. Billy's career is an open wound, and each subsequent release is equivalent to picking at the scabs.

-nepho-

commitment & seduction

++ Bio Jewellery is now taking bone marrow donations in order to craft rings for couples. What better way to say 'I love you' than to offer up a piece of your own inner self, right? The easiest, and most convenient way to harvest your marrow, according to the project facilitators, would be to provide them with an extracted wisdom tooth. It almost gives me excuse to have another one taken out. Seriously, that would be one nifty ring.

++ Actress Anne Bancroft has passed away. Although she won an Oscar for her role in a Helen Keller bio who's name escapes me, she is best known for her role as the original desperate housewife, Mrs. Robinson, from The Graduate.
- "Do you find me undesirable?"
- "Oh no, Mrs. Robinson. I think you are the most attractive of all my parents' friends."

-sympathetic eyes, neph-

spilled until

Announce: My recording of last friday's Built to Spill show is up on CoTapers.org. Enjoy, and of course please seed for a minute...

coming soon: BtS night #2, pinback, luna, and possibly some others...

pinebark

While cruising the isles at Liquor Mart friday afternoon, I receive a call from Jay who just spotted Trey Anastasio buying a pair of mesh shorts at the Lenox Target. I find this fascinating, and procede to scoop up two 4-packs of the Gonzo Imperial Porter.

Cut to later on: Tonight's evening with Pinback was to be the last of a steady month's worth of shows at the Fox. Allison was in town for the event, and after a quick bite on the hill we headed over to get my gear set up.

Soon after I raised my stand, another taper came in with a duffel bag full of god knows what. She was a bit frazzled, having left her mics in the car and worrying that she was late, so I let her patch off my rig. Her oversize tote contained all kinds of gear & cables in seperate tupperware containers which she proceeded to open / close, all the while plugging / unplugging various pieces of equipment. After a good 30 minutes of this she was eventually successful in getting her minidisc plugged in. Her 'setting up' ritual was a tad frenetic, and I just had to give her some good humored grief about the amount of effort she just went through to that end. I continued to pull her chain a bit when she asked about my source lineage, giving her a barrgae of unnecessary articulations such as cable diameter and decibul padding, which she feverishly jotted down.

After the opening band was through, she thought Pinback was yet another opener, until I informed her that they were indeed headlining the show. She proceeded to pull out the ticket which they let her through the door with: The Motet, Fox Theatre, Saturday, June 4th. She looked around completely bewildered, and then came to the shocking realization that she was indeed a day early for the hippy stylings of her beloved Motet.

Set:
bloods on fire
the yellow ones
syracuse
non photo blue
concrete seconds
penelope
3x0
seville
tripoli
microtonic wave
offline p.k.
grey machine
loro
fortress
prog
AFK

Encore:
XIY
tres
manchuria
june



-notet, neph-

drink up

Flying Dog Brewery out of Aspen has just released Gonzo Imperial Porter in honor of the late Doctor of Journalism, Hunter s. Thompson. The label feature's Ralph Steadman's artwork and contains the quote, "I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence or insanity, but they've always worked for me." A portion of the sales generated from the new brew will go to the 150 foot tall 'Gonzo Fist' statue to be erected at Owl Farm Estate in Woody Creek, CO. The statue will house the canon from which Hunter's ashes are to be blasted at his memorial service sometime in august.



-thirsty, neph-

no zooma no cry

The ill-fated Zooma Tour was cancelled last week, no doubt due to lagging ticket sales. The tour featured Trey Anastasio, Ben Harper, G. Love, and Galactic (that was the red rocks line-up, it changed a bit from city to city), had early start times (3pm) on weekdays, and was $75 a head once you cleared service fees. It sounds as if all the acts will be striking out on their own now, so as long as trey hits the rocks, I'll be happy as a clam. As a futile reminder of this non-event, I just received my tickets in the mail yesterday. I'll be sure to file them with the stack of rained out Bull Run tix and that asheville ween ticket that was never used because we arrived after the show had ended...

tunealge

The holiday has put me a day behind schedule especially with all the new stuff on it's way, but without further ado, here ya go:

coldplay - X & Y: They sure took their time with this one, but it seems to have paid off. The result is a very solid and anthematic disc from apple's dad & co. It's hard not to like Coldplay, and this is probably their best album yet, a bit less melancholy than the last two. FYI: the japanese version has an extra hidden bonus track after 'Til Kingdom Come'.

bob mould - Body of Song: I miss Sugar & I miss Husker Du, but I've already deleted this album from my hard drive. It's like the 'Frank Black disease' - you're solo work only sells because some people are so intrenched with nostalgia they'll buy any crap you release, instead of leaving well enough alone.

sasha - Fundacion: A new mix cd recorded over a couple of days in NYC with his new toy "the Maven", which word on the street tells me is basically made up of Ableton Live software on a G5 sans decks of any kind. Despite the ridiculous intro, the result is a pretty swell, although somewhat sterile, proggy house mix reminiscent of Involver.

lali puna - I Thought I Was Over That: A collection of b-sides and remixes of their own material and work done for other bands including Boom Bip, Dntel, and Two Lone Swordsmen. Essentially a smooth around the edges collection of pleasing glitchtronica.

smog - A River Ain't Too Much to Love: More sludgey folk rock smog style. It is interesting to note that he's taken the parentheses off of the band name now. Couldn't tell you why.

herbaliser - Take London: Boom boom, ninja tune camp studio wizardry. Scattered rap stylings (mostly female) accent another great collection of funked out down tempo big beatisms.

meat beat manifesto - At the Center: Jack Dangers is flying the jazz flannel on this one, which works , and is his most cohesive effort in some years.

oasis - Don't Believe the Truth: Although they had some good tunes released in the mid '90's, and apparently were extremely popular, I never quite bothered with oasis. This album doesn't really make me feel like I missed out on much, mainly because it comes off sounding like extremely mediocre brit-rock, just like the Doves.

the posies - Every Kind of Light: Ken Stringfellow has been pooping up a lot recently, playing keys on last fall's REM tour, and releasing a solo album. And now he's back with his old outfit, The Posies. I remember trying to get into these guys after they had some brief radio success in the early '90's with 'Dream All Day', but they're just not that engaging, and neither is the new album.

bebel gilberto - Remixed: Her first record, Tanto Tempo stood rather well on it's own before it got the remix treatment, which was just as good. But I never got much into her second album, annoyingly titled Bebel Gilberto (eponymous album titles should be reserved for your debut, if at all). This round of remixes has breathes some much needed new life into her sophtmore release. FYI: there's a bonus cd of 6 more remixes with some versions of this, and the track, 'Baby', is awful no matter how you rework it.

-tried & true, neph-