white & nerdy

-classic!

for a friday

beck - The Information: Beck brought back the beats with guero, and brought back some more with guerolito, but there still seemed to be some resounding lyrical malcontent leftover from the depressing sea change sessions. Here we have a return to beck's more lyrically playful side, beats intact, even on the slower numbers. Apparently if you buy the cd in stores, it comes with accopanying michael gondry directed videos for every song, and you can create your own cover art with stickers. Neat-o.

the killers - Sam's Town: Supposedly named after a casino from their home town of vegas, we see the band alledgedly shift from their duran duran influences to that of bruce springsteen a la 'born to run'. A lot of the songs seem to be about the melancholic pain of getting older, but it has a tough time coming accross as legit since these guys are still in their early 20's. The japanese version has two bonus tracks that you will never listen to since it's hard enough as it is to get through the rest of the album.

portastatic - Be Still Please: With superchunk pretty much dead in the water, longtime fans have to settle for mac's now full-time side project, portastatic. Up 'til now the output has been fairly average, perhaps highlighted by the upbeat sunniness of last summer's release, bright ideas. Over the years mac's falling outs with love and romance have morphed from searing angst into bittersweet sentimentality, mostly stomachable because you knew that his heartbreak came at the hands of his old bass player, the lovely laura balance. Who knows what he's going on about these days as the agonizing 'i'm in love (with arthur doyle)' seques horiffically into the next track which may as well be about getting your nuts clipped.

weird al yankovic - Straight Outta Lynwood: You gotta love satire. The more popular the target, the greater the laugh, and what greater target than popular music? Now, I may be biased after assigning weird al to the ranks of genious after being absolutely railed by his performance at the tabernacle years back, but he proves me right yet again, even though some of the spoofs are lost on me because I am not familiar with the source material. The required polka number is great (it includes 'pon de replay' amongst other notable pop radio staples), but the standout is the 11 minute opus, 'trapped in the drive through', which chronicles al and his girlfriend trying to decide what to eat then ordering food at the drive through. Watch the video for 'white & nerdy'.

joe lally - From Here to There: Fugazi bassist going it alone with mostly just bass and voice. It really makes you miss the rest of fugazi.

mercury rev - Stillness Breathes: Two disc set, the first is the "greatest hits" portion, and the second is a not complete collection of b-sides. Really only interested in filling in the tiny gaps in my mercury rev collection, the second disc was helpful, but not really a cohesive listen. Many of these are b-sides for a reason. Mercury neophites will do well to grab the first disc as a nice place to start.

colorado in the news again

This time for a high school hostage situation. Sweet.

ramadan-a-do-ya

Went and saw TV on the Radio last tuesday, and their performance was decent enough but somewhat eclipsed by the 3 hour BJM marathon set from saturday still fresh in my mind. (note: that show is all tracked and ready to post with the exception of some elusive song titles I'm working on - stay tuned.)

Got lost on campus trying to find the muenzinger auditoium on thursday for a showing of run lola run and subsequently never quite made it in to actually watch the film. Not a huge upset, as I've seen it several times before, but it's always fun to see things on the big screen.

Watched the CU / UGA game saturday morning with robert & GW. Man that was a close one. Even though CU lost 13-14, at least they did not play like shit as they have been doing lately, making the #9 team in the nation really work for that win. Later that night, the 9th street sound system made it's way over the edgewood ladies' hut for jaime's b-day festivities. I was the only one with records, so cdtrons filled up my bathroom breaks & social jaunts since no one really pays attention anyway. We didn't rage too late and (most) everyone wound up crashing back at my place since it's mere blocks away.

Wathced some movies (swimming pool and me, you, and everyone we know) on sunday before returning to the edgewood abode to pick up the sound gear. Upon arrival we discovered the keg was still cold and flowing, so we lounged about as did our best to kill it.

)) <> ((

sick!

This photo was taken earlier today near telluride:



Breckenridge has reported 18" of snow since yesterday and still falling...

ribbit

I've posted the Frog Eyes show from the Fox back in August. You can grab it at COTapers or Dime.

-enjoy!

anagram of fury

time is honey

Had dinner and a movie night with stephanie on friday. Specifically italian & Little Miss Sunshine, which were delicious and entertaining repectively. It should be noted that most of the music in the movie was performed by devotchka, a cool band from denver.

Saturday was a blustery tailgate day as CU hosted, and subsequentlty got beat by, arizona state. We did put 3 points on the board though, which puts our continuous games scored in to about 213. This stat will likely get reset on saturday when CU takes a trip to athens. I did not go to the game, but watched on tv after leaving the tailgate and before heading to the boulder theater to watch the brian jonestown massacre wail away on stage for a hearty three hours. Epic. I was again the solo taper on the night, and will be posting the show somewhere soon...

new coke

Cocaine is the name of a new energy drink on the market and the makers claims that it is a legal alternative to the illegal drug it is named after. They also claim it will give you a longer and better energy boost then any of other brands out there. It is also said to taste like a cherry jolly rancher.

The drink is only being offered in bars in Los Angeles and New York and will debut in San Diego bars this weekend. Even though cocaine is not an ingredient in the drink, health officers are afraid it is sending the wrong message.

-first you get the money, then you get the power-

plastic fantastic

back for the attack

It's been requested that I hot link some samples of the tunes that I've been reviewing. I've been reluctant to do this because a lot of what I review here has yet to be officially released and I don't need the hassle of anyone getting all legal on my ass. That and I really don't have anywhere to host the tunes (most all these can be found on private torrent trackers, btw). However, I am open to suggestions...

scissor sisters - Ta Dah: What began as sort of a one-hit-wonder with their brilliant disco-y cover of the floyd classic 'brain damage', kind of evolved into their familiar, yet new-ish take on dancey classic rock a la elton john and the bee gees. Funny I should mention that because the aforementioned knight makes a guest appearance on this disc. Lots of songs about dancing and having a good time usually makes for a good time.

eric bachman - To the Races: Solo release from archers of loaf / crooked fingers frontman. The rumour is he's got a new bird here in town, which would explain the frequent area performance over the past few months where this material has been previewd. After catching the three said prerformances, I'll have to say I felt right at home with this upon first listen. Real stripped down to mostly just eric & classical guitar recorded in a north carolina hotel room. Me like.

clinic - visitations: Nothing new here, it's clinic doing the clinic schtick. But if you happen to enjoy that kind of thing, as I find myself doing more often than not, then you'll whole heartedly dig this. Another release filled with pulsing rhythms, mumbled vocals, and of course that unmistakable organ-y sound.

radio dept. - Pet Grief: Be the first on your block to get into these guys before Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette soundtrack thrusts them into the lime light. Cool whispy atmospherical pop.

lemonheads - Lemonheads: Self-titled albums this far into one's career are pretentious by nature. It's as if it signals some kind of bullshit rebirth or focus or insert-played-out-reason here. You may ask why I'm even remotely interested in this since frontman evan dando left us with a clunker of a solo disc a few years back. Well I have a good answer - the descendents. That's right, the milo lovin' punkers of yore, specifically Garth Hudson and Karl Alvarez who make up the backing band. Oh, that and good ol' J mascis makes an appearance. The result is as you'd expect, kind of a Lovey era lemonheads. It's too bad he didn't release this as a follow up to It's a Shame About Ray when people still gave a crap.

pajo - 1968: This was dripping in potential, as dave pajo has played the guitron for such notables as slint, papa m, and zwan. Unfortunatley, this just kind of meanders along even with the inclusion of backing instruments (which his miriad of other solo releases lack). The end result is a bit dry mainly due to trite lyricisms. It bored me to tears as I drove to work this morning.

whoa

I thought I was a pretty die hard ween fan, but these girls take the cake. Damn, they can go ahead and it it too...

doe a deer

Had a more relaxing weekend this time around. After congregating with the trey ticket lottery mob on the hill, steph & I joined devin & kim for a delicious dinner at D'Napoli.

Woke up bright and early saturday to go down to albums on the hill for the trey lottery drawing which unfortunately did not yield us any additional tix (I lucked out with a pair of presales last week). Ran some errands before heading over to jacq & dyl's hut to watch the big rivalry CU/CSU game which CU not surprisingly, but still unfortunately, lost. We did play much better than last week with our new starting quarterback, b-jack (brian jackson). Some out of town guests were there too - kelley from CT, and derr from UT. Eventally called it an early night after watching kiss kiss bang bang which was actually pretty decent.

Thouroughly vegged out sunday, unpacking some more, hanging up artwork, and watching football. My picks this week were over half wrong. It's always tougher at the beginning of the season.

Went for a run last night despite the overcastness of the evening, and of course I was rained upon. But I did see a dear as I was running around the nobo neighborhoods.

it's been too long

A seemingly eternal amount of time has passed since I've graced you, my readers with some reviews. Now that fall is more or less upon us, I have to clear my plate to make way for the myriad of new releases expected in the coming months. So here goes:

sean lennon - Friendly Fire: John's hipster son is back with this overcast followup to his sunny 1998 debut, lamenting away at his break up with bijou phillips, who incidentally does some backing vocals. Has it's moments, but I'll take the old grand royal release over this one any day.

easy dub all stars - radiodread: You've likely all heard of this by now. It is what implies, reggae covers of the ok computron album. Some work better than others, my fave is 'fitter happier'.

the panic channel - ONe: Hmmm, what do you get when you take dave navarro, stephen perkins, and the new bassist guy from jane's addiction, and get some lame asshole to sing instead of perry farrel? A lackluster glam metal album.

marble valley - Wild Yams: This is tasty. The welcome return of former pavement drummer, steve westie's new project. You may remember the first release brought us the magnum opus, 'pneumonia', which I absolutely loved sneaking into my sets. Think Beat Happening bumps into Can on a crowded new york sidewalk and decide to share a cab. 'Fag & ah Light' is key. Bum one now.

kasabian - Empire: These guys saw a lot of success in the way of licensing out the two more 'rocking' tunes on their debut to the likes of tv shows and adverts. So it comes as no surprise, but still a bit of a disappointment, that this new release focuses on material in that vein, as opposed to their more laid back groovy tunes. Oh well.

robert pollard - Normal Happiness: Bob just keeps churning 'em out. Hot on the heels of his 3 other collaborative efforts earlier this year, we have the next solo effort, at least in name, from the former GBV frontman. Clocking in at half the time as his Matador debut, this is much easier to wrap your head around, and is in turn, a more focused affair. As always there are some clunkers, but they serve the purpose of making the stand-outs, well, stand out.

joanna newsome - Ys: Who knew anyone would ever get this worked up about harp music? Well, I was sure excited to pick up this new release after falling under the spell of the milk-eyed mender. But where that release was cute and quirky, this one is pretentious and meandering. Makes you want to put a gun to your head.

tortoise - A Lazurus Taxon: Hoo rah for these three discs! The first two are various re-workings, remixes, and b-sides, largely culled from hard-to-find imports and EP's. The third disc is a re-issue of their long out-of-print debut LP, Rhythms, Resolutions, and Clusters. If you're not familiar with the tortose sound, it is an instrumental affair in a indie-jam-post rock-IDMish kind of tip. A cherry of a box set.

blowoff - s/t: What do you get when you pair up bob mould and rich morel? This. And let me tell you, it comes off as awkward as it sounds. The first track is kind of rocky á la bob mould, but I think Morel might be the singer, and he's singing about what I can make out to be homo love. Fair enough. We go through another rocker or two before the disc starts to morph into Morel's tell tale proggy house sound with Mould as the 'diva' vocalist. It's really worth tracking down so you can hear first hand what I'm yammering on about. It wouldn't surprise me one bit, however, if one of the more 'epic' tracks found itself sandwiched seamlessly in the middle of a deep dish set.

not even banksy

Fresh off the Banksy droplifting prank, paris got herself arrested for drunk driving. If Banksy ever 'represses' the limited run of 500 paris discs, he should certainly add this shot:



"Everything I do is blown out of proportion and it really hurts my feelings," said paris, who must have forgotten that her original album release was received with more of a mild breeze and hardly blown anywhere.

-celebutante-

fake

Colorado's in the news again, and of course it's for nothing good. But this time instead of someone falsely claiming to have murdered a 6-year old beauty pageant queen, it is a marine who has faked his own 'disappearance' while hiking with a pal so he could get out of the marine core.

-awol-

oh happy day

Pee-wee's Playhouse: The Movie (coming 2007)
Plot Outline: An epic adventure, the characters get out of the playhouse.



-nuf sed-

cold war leftovers

The general vibe the current 80's cultural revival we are experienceing is cheery & goofy. Before you embrace the 80's with open arms, we should take a moment to be reminded of some of the scary shit that was going on at the time. In between the lines, or sometimes right in your face, we had music videos channeling our fears of global nuclear warfare. Indeed some good ones here, but they left off my fave, 'two tribes' by Frankie Goes to hollywood. And of course we should mention the feature films Wargames and Red Dawn that also honed in on this underlying paranoia.

Now that communism is on the wane and most everybody has agreed to nuclear disarmement, we beg the question what do we do with a bunch of trash that will remain hazardous for practically ever? Some scientist/researcher folks are busying themselves with that very problem as we speak.

-whopr-

lost

CU did not fare so well in their home opener against Montana State (10-19). What makes it worse is that the opponent is a I-AA team - ouch! The weather wasn't so great, but the tailgate crew was in effect at our new spot regardless. The next few games will be tough, we'll see what happens. Post game, we paid lauren a quick visit at her new hut before calling it an early night.

lost game

Twas a three day weekend, as the day of labor soon approached. GW was in town again, and sunday we started the day with a hike up to lost lake.

lost lake

Post hike it was down to pearl street for grub and what eventually and rather haphazardly became a bar hop as we met up with more and more folk. I ducked out after we 'returned' to the foundry. Several hours later we were awoken by jacq and allison as they came crashing through my front door wanting desert, which randomly enough, I had.

lost boys

Labor day itself was somewhat of a wash, as most good holidays should be.

mmermmm hermmmm

sheep's clothing

Students were back in class and the weather had an autumn bent on monday. A perfect time to take advantage of some free passes I scored from 1190 for the sold out Wolf Parade show at the fox. Not to be confused with that led zepplin re-hash wolf mother, or the noise act wolf eyes (whom I actually saw a few years back with sonic youth). Incidentally Frog Eyes were opening. Aren't there any other words available? Has the random band name generator gotten stuck on repeat? Semantics aside the wolves came correct. The set was mostly culled from their debut LP with a few newbies thrown in for good measure. The frog eyes (one of spencer krug's other bands) joined the parade onstage for a rousing rendition and send off with 'dinner bells'. A special fuck you goes out to the knob in the balcony who threw their drink into the ventilation duct overhead (listen to a disgruntled me around 43 minutes in). The sole taper was I, and you can grab the show with a clicky.

things I don't know (bones)
shine a light
grounds for divorce
it's a curse
dear sons and daughters of hungry ghosts
we built another world
you are a runner and I am my father's son
modern world
cathedral bells
bed's exploding
I'll believe in anything >
this heart's on fire
secret knives
dinner bells