final february reviews

modest mouse - We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank: Isaac and crew are back on track after the wildly inconsistent Good News album. From what I understand, Johnny Marr (the Smiths) is now a full fledged member of the band and does a good job of filling out the guitar work. Angst and ambivalence intertwine inclusively as they did in days past for the band.

blonde redhead - 23: Continuing in a similar trend similar to the wonderful Misery disc, the melodies here are hauntingly pleasant as opposed to the more angrily excitable vibe of years past. Additionally the music has a bit more of a progressive vibe that the band falls into quite easily. Sonic Youth in bed with the Cocteau Twins.

the sea and cake - Everybody: Understated, unassuming, unsung hero of indie rock, sam prekop is back with his regular band for more breezy spring time tunes not to different from his last solo endevour.

deerhoof - Friend Opportunity: If you have the opportunity to share this with your friends, do them all a favor and stop right there. This disc goes way beyond acceptable levels of annoying. Total shite.

of montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?: I always give these guys a shot, but usually their sound just comes off a with a little too much sacharine. I put this on my shuffle and have listened to it solely while x-country skiing and running. It's got a groovy beat, and the lyrics are interestingly foreboding.

great lake swimmers - Oniagra: Sounds markedly similar to their other two albums, which treads in the same water as iron & wine, but murkier.

arcade fire - Neon Bible: This has been SO hyped, that I was expecting nothing short of a miracle. Upon a few listens, I still haven't gotten that, but at the same time, it took me a while to get into their debut album as well. What is apparent is the heavy bruce springsteen influence, much more prevalent than what everyone was going on about with that new Killers disc. After watching them on SNL, I also realize they tend to yell a lot.

albert hammond jr. - Yours to Keep: You definitely hear elements of the strokes, but alas this suffers in much the same way as thom yorke's solo album - you really need the rest of the band to fill out the sound and, in Albert's case, to sing.

and the winner is...

Casual friday - had fajitas and caught up on last weeks tv that I had taped. Up sort of bright but very early to head to the hills saturday morning. My dad, dylan, stephanie and I made it up to a-basin with pleny of time to spare, so we had some breakfast at the lodge. GW met up with us after a few runs, and we had a quite a day. A-basin is a very aggressive hill, great when there's fresh snow. Took a long nap when we returned then met up again with everyone at redfish where I was also synching up with dan d'aquani who was in town for an academic competition. Had a couple of rounds then called it a night. Had a productive sunday morning, got lots of errands done, watched wikked fuckin depahted, then headed to hillside for our traditional oscar dinner. This year's menu included:

Brie-Anardo de Caprio with Blood Diamonds
Chicken Scoresese
Marinated Porta Babel Mushrooms
The Devil Wears Pasta
Garlic Bready Murphy
Leonardo De Caprese Salad

Helen Mirren Misu
Cheese Kate Winslet squares
Coffee & Cream Girls

Little Miss Sunshine Wheat Beer
Sauvignon Blanchett
Merlot Streep

(menu item that didn't make the cut - Peter Pan's Labyrinth & Jelly Sandwiches)

ace is the place

Ace Frehley committed suicide earlier this morning. No wait, he didn't. From his current record label's blog:

'Rumors Of My Demise Have Been Greatly Exaggerated' - Feb. 23, 2007

Contrary to published reports, former KISS guitarist Ace Frehley is alive and well and working on his highly anticipated solo album.

It has been erroneously reported on various web sites and wire services that the legendary guitarist had committed suicide.

Not so!

"I don't know how this ridiculous rumor got started," smiles Ace, as he eats his daily allotment of wheat germ, preparing to jump back on his treadmill.



Either way - Ace rock(s)(ed)!

2 bad church mice

Why is everything considered a bombscare these days?

Yesterday, three cd players blasting 'foul language' were found underneath church pews in Santa Fe during an ash wednesday mass. Two were blown up by the bombsquad, before they finally realized they should maybe hang on to the third cd player to dust for prints.

kool keith/black elvis/tracy morgan

'I'm Seeing Robots' by Kool Keith/Black Elvis is on the radio right now, and I totally thought it was Tracy Morgan on the mic. The more I listened, the more it sounded like him. Uncanny.

president's day massacre

Began another low-key weekend by celebrating v-day with stephanie a day late partially because I was hard at work on a paper wednesday, but mostly because I took her to the sold out Shins show at the fillmore on thursday. We mowed some dinner in the car, then headed in. The first opener, the granimals, was pretty boring. The lead singer was preggers, and pretty far along by the looks of it. Viva Voce was up next, and they were kind of a reverse white stripes. The guy was on drums, keys and sometimes guitar all the while still playing drums. And the lady was the main voice and guitarist. They were pretty cool. Shins were up next, and they came correct. The first half of the show was mostly the new material, then about halfway through they kicked it with all the older stuff, including my fave, 'know your onion'. Picked up some cheese steaks on the way home for our romantic v-day dinner.

Tried our hands at rock climbing at one of those indoor climbing gyms friday after work. I'm not stoked on the whole ropes & boles and such, so I stuck to bouldering. Damn that's a tough workout.

Up bright and early saturday to head for the hills since they were getting dumped on. We made it all the way to the tunnel, and were about a half mile from it, then suddenly they close it. So we sat on the I-70 parking lot for about an hour until they reopened it. Loveland pass was closed too, which sucked because we were headed to a-basin which is just on the other side of it. Despite the silly traffic we were on the slopes by 9. The back side of a-basin was painfully windy, but there was plenty of fresh powder to enjoy the frontside on. Epic day. Took a nap when I got home, then started getting ready for the 'bloody valentine' party. After I grabbed us some food, I was all ready to plug in the jbl monitors on loan from 3rd street, when I discovered that a 1/4" jack would not cut it. I needed a frickin neutrik connector, which I could have easily picked up at the guitron center, but it was closed along with every other store in town that may have had 'em. So we just used my trusty pair of klipsch. We went sans turntables for the first time, using jake's cdj800's exclusively. Those things are idiot proof and way fun to play on. The party was a throwdown, and somehow we still have a ton of beer leftover, probably because all of the hard liquor was consumed instead.

The crew crashed at my place and we all slept in sunday morning, before heading back to edgewood for brunch. The weather was gorgeous and once we cleaned up, steph & I rode our bikes down to pearl street where we met up with dyl, jacq & jean at the mountain sun. After stops at the west end and bacaro, somehow we ended up going back to bacaro after closing since the ladies had befriended the bartender earlier. We pretty much helped ourselves to anything we wanted behind the bar until the wee hours when the bartender grabbed a few bottles of wine for the walk back to my hut, where I promptly passed out. When we woke, stephanie had disappeared only to return later that afternoon after waking up on someone's couch somewhat disoriented as to how she happened to end up there.

Ahhh, another par for the course weekend.

save boston

The best part about this game is listening to what they're saying. I couldn't play because I was laughing too hard.

special guest recap

My how time flies! Here I've been so busy working on this paper all week (I just handed it in), that I completely spaced recapping the weekend adventures. Lucky for me, someone had asked stephanie how the weekend went, and this is what she said:

ok, so after driving around golden and stopping at various loaf 'n jug's until 10p due to radioator trouble, we headed on up to Breck. Found the place ok, the guy at the front desk was a TOTAL idiot. This place is a studio. So there's room 6302 and then there's 6302S right next door. So he gives us a key to 6302 and heidi uses it on the door, the light turns green and she starts to go in. There's some dude right there! then she says "i think it's 6302S" which is not what he wrote down, but it sure makes sense. the key wouldn't open 6302S. So we go back up to the desk and he tries telling us the key is supposed to be good for both 6302 & 6302S and we have access to both with the key. riiiiiiiiight.

I quickly try and heat/mix up the chicken tortilla soup I made. we wound up microwaving it. we watched some tv, ate a ton and hit the hay. got up bright and early and headed to vail. and of course there's like no parking, so marc paid $17 for us to park. it was warm but snowing sort of. weird spring-like weather. we found some powder areas, but others were totally bare! it was weird. met up with jean and dyl and hit it and had lots of fun. left around 2. when we got back, heidi was at the bar. had been there awhile...... marc and i ate in the room and just chilled awhile. then met heidi poolside. the bar serves you drinks in plastic cups to take to the hottub! there were these crazy kids in there that were practically worshipping marc who had a frozen mohawk. they'd run out of the hottub and whitewash themselves in the snow, asking him if he dared them to. it was too funny. when he told them he's snowboarded for 16 years, their jaws totally dropped. then their dad came and got them. he was apologizing to everyone for his kids, and saying how "someone's got to have the kids that go to jail". we about died. then back to the room. i made coq au vin and we attempted to watch Kung Fu Hustle. basically we just drank and drank. then we took the shuttle out to town. while we were waiting, we did some Karate Kid moves. I wore my newly acquired fur hat from savers. we went to 'motherloaded' and had some weird shots with double espresso vodka in them. i played marc at foosball. then we decided to leave and catch the last shuttle back to the hotel. while we were waiting, one of the bartenders from the hotel was out and spotted heidi. they chatted it up like old friends or something. she had this weird guy with her that started petting my hat and wanted to trade or something. HELL NO. marc kept asking him why he had on a red wings jersey. the guy said "because i'm from detroit". marc apparently didn't put together that the red wings are from detroit. so the shuttle came and we were headed back to the hotel. the driver let some people off at beaver run resort. this sparked a whole "beaver" convo on the shuttle, because marc all day was wanting to know why everything is beaver this or that. well, one woman got a little dirty and started in on "beaver bush" and talking about brazillians and waxing! telling marc i don't know what. eventually it led to marc kicking his legs in the air and what not. the driver did a light check (flashed the shuttle lights on for a sec) as a result. back in the room, i kept talking about ordering extreme pizza (no one knew what i was talking about!) and i passed out on the floor, clothes glasses and all. marc went down to the arcade to play centipede with his one and only quarter or something and to steal a sign. but it was closed.

the next day we slept in. once we were up and ready, we rode breck for awhile. again - weird spring weather. it started hailing?????? we headed back to the room at noon, packed up and hit the road by 1. traffic was getting heavy - i guess later it was AWFUL, so we left just in time.

we were home around 3:30. i headed over to marc's and we attempted to sell clothes at buffalo exchange and look for stuff for his costume. nothing all around. then we went to target because he wanted to buy this stereo you can hang on the wall. but he changed his mind. went back to his place, ate the leftovers, watched tv and movies. pretty much passed out.

don't forget this saturday night...

anna nicole trimspa-ed

A small degree of normalcy has been restored to the universe. Just last night as I was accidentally watching Entertainment Tonight I happened upon an interview with ms. smith and was wondering just what her deal was. She was all puffy and could barely keep her eyes open while she spoke/mumbled. Oh well, now we'll never know.

new tunes

dinosaur jr. - Beyond: The first dinosaur jr. album since 1997 ( more importantly, the first with the original line-up of J, Lou, and Murph since 1988). It's a pretty standard issue kick ass dino jr record - nine songs sung by J, and two by Lou. If you've been following J's post-Lou work through the 90's and his two solo discs, this is not much of a departure except for the songs have more punch and tend to meander a bit less. And Lou's 2 contributions don't sound like shit because they weren't made on a 4-track outside near trafiic, which kind of puts me in the mood for a new seBADoh album as well.

gus gus - Forever: I've accumulated a few gus gus singles and remixes through the years, and never really thought they were an 'album' band. Forever offers up a female vox heavy and house-y-ish sound which makes me more interesetd in hearing the ensuing remixes.

david vandervelde - The Moonstation House Band: What could have been easily have failed as straight forward indie rock gets a 70's style boost from various studio sonics that make this one worth checking out.

the rakes - Ten New Messages: The next Arctic Monkeys, in so much as they are yet another in a long line of over-rated and over-hyped british bands du jour that you would be better off completely ignoring.

the second coming of greatness

note: These are the same bears whose track, 'punkrocker' with iggy pop, is in that cadillac commercial.

family reunion

super bowl weekend

Had an early night friday, got caught up on dirt, the office, and ate homemade burritos. Up bright and early saturday to head to breck. Dylan picked us up then we headed to get ian who was still asleep. Soon enough we were heading down 93 with high winds blowing sow everywhere. Visibility was pretty bad and there were several cars spun out and drifted. Breck got tons of new snow, but it was bitterly cold and windy all day and all of the lifts serving the upper portions of the mountain were closed. We did meet up with aurelie, wendy & basil later on which was pretty cool. I hadn't seen any of them in quite some time, and it was really fun to see them again. The ride home was a nightmare, as they had since closed off 93 due to the winds. While taking an alternate route through arvada, yet another road was closed due to an accident, so we detoured yet again. We eventually got home in time to get ready to head to casa alvarez for meg's b-day dinner. Notably absent was lauren, who eventually showed up later at j& d's while we were having cake, but only after being called and reminded. Jean hosted a Super Bowl XLI get together at her new apartment in denver. We had tons of food & drinks, which kept us occupied long after we lost interest in the game. Jean also gave me my belated xmas gift, a dartboard plastered with pictures of celebrities that get on my nerves.

un-rhumba

One of our fave pearl street jaunts will soon be no more. This tuesday rhumba closes its doors for good. Boo. On a lighter note, the big red F group (owner's of all the hotspots - jax, lola, zolo, the west end, and actually rhumba also) will be opeing a new resty in the old rhumba location sometime in march.

stereo sisters

Looks like jacq made the local news last weekend while galavnting around steamboat.

I wish I were a fish

Underwater living?

vuja de

April 29, 2006, SANTA CLARITA, Calif. - A newspaper promotion for Tom Cruise’s upcoming “Mission: Impossible III” got off to an explosive start when a county arson squad blew up a news rack, thinking it contained a bomb.

The confusion: the Los Angeles Times rack was fitted with a digital musical device designed to play the “Mission: Impossible” theme song when the door was opened. But in some cases, the red plastic boxes with protruding wires were jarred loose and dropped onto the stack of newspapers inside, alarming customers.

Sheriff’s officials said they rendered the news rack in this suburb 35 miles north of downtown Los Angeles “safe” after being called to the scene Friday by a concerned individual who thought he’d seen a bomb.



Times officials said the devices were placed in 4,500 randomly selected news boxes in Los Angeles and Ventura counties in a venture with Paramount Pictures designed to turn the “everyday news rack experience” into an “extraordinary mission.”

It was just that, at least for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department arson squad, which destroyed the box.

“This was the least intended outcome. We weren’t expecting anything like this,” said John O’Loughlin, the Times’ senior vice president for planning.

The devices are to remain in the boxes until May 7, two days after the film is scheduled to open.

Didn't we all learn our lesson back in 1938 after War of the Worlds was first broadcast?

age of aquarius

"I'm sorry, that's not a question about hair."

This developing story just keeps getting better and better. The lite-brite like devices have been in place for weeks in several major cities without any such mayhem as witnessed in boston yesterday. Apparently massholes are just a little more high strung than the rest of the country, "It had a very sinister appearance," Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley told reporters. "It had a battery behind it, and wires." Um, so does my clock radio when I knock it off the end table...

Shouldn't the media be partially to blame for insighting most of the hysteria?

Now on ebay! Or, if you want to splurge, you can bid on the only known remaining one from boston.

AND if you can't afford to bid on the real dealio, you can make you own!