Harcourt toots his own horn

With all these "indie" bands getting their songs on bad TV shows like "Love Monkey", it's good to know someone is getting rich - fat cat music consultants!:

"With all due respect to other shows," says Harcourt, "I have to say that most music supervisors in LA listen to 'Morning Becomes Eclectic,' and they use a lot of our music on their shows. I don't really see other shows, but I see the soundtracks come in and I recognize a song and go, 'That's interesting.'"

It would be good to note that Harcourt is the "music supervisor" (does he have an iPod hardhat?) for the excreble "Love Monkey" and a host of other shows and movies so it's pretty funny that he thinks everyone is just stealing from him. I'm glad Harcourt thinks someone else's work is "our music" but it's this type of egotism that rules the day, I guess.

This passage was pretty funny, too - vapid actors are always good for a laff:

Brett Harrison can't stop talking about The Killers.

The 23-year-old actor, already a veteran of sitcoms like "Grounded for Life" and "That '70s Show," is bouncing up and down as he talks about his new role on "The Loop," an upcoming Fox comedy that has a soundtrack instead of a laugh track. At the end of the "Loop" pilot, the girl of Harrison's dreams walks away in another man's arms as The Killers' "Somebody Told Me" blares in the background.

"I can't believe I get to be on a show with a moment like that," he raves. "If it was any other song, it wouldn't work."

One problem: only a few days after Harrison was getting overcaffeinated about "Somebody Told Me," The Killers decide not to license the song to "The Loop." The producers rush to substitute The Bravery's "Honest Mistake," but that abrupt change of fortune symbolizes the elevated levels of risk and reward when it comes to TV music today.

Oopsy, honest mistake indeed.

link story by sepinwall

The best ones get more famous after they're dead

Andy Beta pays tribute to John Fahey we near the fifth anniversary of his death (2/22/01):

Soused and spiteful at shows, misunderstood by an audience wanting peace, love, and his old songs, Fahey loathed both his hippie followers and his imitators. Will Ackerman and the whole New Age neutering of Fahey's guitar style that cropped up in his wake were anathema to him; his true progeny were the tetchy alternative noisemakers, like Sonic Youth and Wilco. The tribute makes this clear, recasting his iconoclastic solo pieces with winsome arrangements from its participants. And yet reverence to the song was never his own agenda, as Fahey often disavowed his past discography outright.

Studying folklore at UCLA alongside Barry Hansen (a/k/a Dr. Demento), Fahey wrote his master's thesis on Delta demigod Charley Patton, only to immediately go against the grain of stodgy academia, record-collector scum, and object reverence. He never looked back. Doctoring loquacious, ludicrous liner notes for his self-released work that tempered his arrogant self-mythologizing with hilarious self-effacement, he mocked the academic bluster of scholars and revivalists. He renames his Fonotone patron "Joseph Buzzard," records as Blind Joe Death, or else espouses his work as "expert" Elijah P. Lovejoy. Noise guitarist and writer Alan Licht noted that Fahey "did as much to take folk out of the hands of squares as his music did," and he suffered lightly those that pined for the past.

Two shows I didn't see this weekend

Is it better to go out and see performances or stay at home and please The Insatiable One?

Like I had a choice.

Chris Porter and Catherine Lewis review the shows I was going to see - Deerhoof and Meloy, respectively - right here.

Lisa Recommends...

...this review

Rick Moody speaks and speaks and speaks...

From the Department of Oh-Shut-The-Fuck-Up:

"I'm tired of double kick-drumming and death-metal guitar tunings and guys yelling about how much trouble they're having with their girlfriends."

Rick Moody talks to PopMatters about his musical life.

Iraq War Opponent Dances in Red Leotard with TV

Cute...

New Crap To Buy

PANDA BEAR: I'm Not/Comfy in Nautica 7" (UUAR 006EP) 8.50
7" vinyl version. "Panda Bear (Noah Lennox), one of the influential voices in Animal Collective, returns with two essential new songs available on 45 rpm 7" vinyl and CD."



TOWN AND COUNTRY: Up Above CD (THR 165CD) 13.00
"Up Above may tend to make you woozy. It's a sleepy, trance-inducing affair, an effort to engross the black bee of our minds on the blue lotus feet of our divine mother. This is a first for cover tunes and a first for singing. 'Blue Lotus Feet' is a yoga tune -- apparently there is a Will Oldham version of this tune floating around as well. 'King of Portugal' is based on Cancao dos Reis from an old Folkways 10" of Portuguese Christmas carols. Up Above refers to the Paul Bowles novel Up Above the World. Psych folk drone may be the flavor of the month but Town and Country been doing this for eight years."



WIRE, THE: #264 February 2006 MAG (WIRE 264) 8.00
"On the cover: Edan (The Boston DJ/MC/producer trawls widely, from Old School hiphop to 60s freakbeat heroes). Features: Battles (David Stubbs skirmishes with a leftfield New York 'supergroup' slugging it out at the frontline of rock and electronics); Birgit Ulher (The self-taught Hamburg trumpeter and artist expands her instrument's lexicon of sputters); Sleeparchive (Philip Sherburne attempts to unravel the Berlin minimal Techno producer's complex web of identities); Invisible Jukebox: Steve Reid; Bardo Pond (Philadelphia's psychedelic freeform collective reveal the secrets of their sonic vortex); Derek Bailey (David Toop plus a host of admirers and fellow musicians pay tribute to the pioneering guitarist who died in December).



PINK'S HAUNTED GRAFFITI 5, ARIEL: House Arrest CD (PAW 008CD) 13.00
"Think you've heard enough Ariel Pink? Well our favorite omnivorous media junkie from LA still has a few tricks left up his sleeve -- like the left-of-center House Arrest. Sure The Doldrums and Worn Copy had some hits and humdingers on them, but House Arrest never lets up. It's hit after hit after hit. Sorta like if you listened to your friend's boombox mix tape from Top 40 radio around 1985. Some people might think that sounds like a recipe for disaster. We say bring on the Doritos.



CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS, NICK: Road To God Knows Where/Live at the Paradiso 2DVD (MUTE 9310DVD) 21.00
"Previously available on VHS, now released on DVD for the first time. The Road to God Knows Where is a film by Uli M. Schueppel featuring a cast of Nick Cave, members of the Bad Seeds as well as Anita Lane, Lydia Lunch, Jim Thirwell, & more. Live at the Paradiso is a full-length live concert from the famed Paradiso club in Amsterdam from 1992 featuring Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds performing 'The Mercy Seat,' 'The Ship Song,' 'Tupelo,' amongst others." NTSC format, 168 minutes.




And via Aquarius Records:

PISSED JEANS s/t ( Too Pure) cd 13.98
A punk record for people who haven't bought a punk record in a while. It's not a retro exercise, but still something about this young Pennsylvania band brings back memories of '80s hardcore, Black Flag or Flipper back in the day, nasty punk scuzz with lots of badass guitar distortion and feedback, shambolic rock n' roll with rabid bite. The lyrics are sadsack smartass dumb, yowled over the band's noisy, catchy trashcan stomp, the vocalist really letting it all (down-and-)out on such songs as "I'm Sick," "Boring Girls", "Ashamed Of My Cum", and "I Broke My Own Heart." Can you feel sorry for someone who's wallowing in it? Doesn't matter, just enjoy the careening chaotic entertainment that results. The packaging features cool cartoon graphics of surburan banality.
MPEG Stream: "Boring Girls"
MPEG Stream: "Closet Marine"

RECORD REVERSER, THE (Top Quality Rock And Roll) record reverser 15.00
For those of you who missed out on what is quite possibly the greatest record player related invention of all time, we just got another batch of these in!
SDRAWKCAB RETTEB SDNUOS CISUM LLA!!!! I mean, ALL MUSIC SOUNDS BETTER BACKWARDS!!!! It's just a fact. There's something completely alien but so strangely beautiful about music in reverse. The way the drums sort of swoosh backwards, the attack and decay exchanging their rightful places, the vocals, a sweetly smooth garbled alien language, even more musical once the context and words are removed, leaving just the sound and timbre, and melodies become seasick, woozy smears of sound. Everyone discovers it eventually. Maybe it was when you were first trying to discern the hidden Satanic messages on your Iron Maiden or Beatles records. Once you tired of that, you suddenly realized that the rest of the record sounded pretty dang cool backwards too. Maybe even better! For some, it happened even earlier, just messing around as a kid with your folks' turntable, that almost always resulted in some sort of scolding that it would damage the needle. But what was it that they were really trying to hide? Satanic messages? Maybe. But maybe it was the fact that music really did sound better backwards. Once the word of that got out, what would happen to music as we know it. For me, it was the realization as a teenager, that you could unscrew a cassette tape, turn the tape over and put the tape back together, resulting in some of the coolest weirdest music we had ever heard. Fifty cent tapes from the thrift store became our car music of choice, once they had been reversed of course. A favorite that I still have to this day is a Bangles cassette, that once reversed turned into a gorgeous dizzying blast of Sgt. Peppers-ish My Bloody Valentine psych-pop! Some folks took this sacred knowledge, and started bands, the most notable being Teenage Filmstars, who employed backwards drums, backwards vocals, reversed guitars, sometimes whole songs played in reverse! (For a taste, check out their track on the Here's To Old England comp we reviewed recently.) And who can forget the first Sonic Youth ep, the cassette version of which featured the whole program in reverse on the other side of the tape. And you know what? It sounded so much better!
So now it's the age of computers and electronic music, so with a push of a button you can turn songs around or do whatever you want really, but there's something about vinyl records, lp's, and the act of playing them backwards that cannot be reproduced on a computer. You can also by a fancy DJ turntable that will play backwards, but A. we're not entirely sure that's good for the needle OR the record, and B. that'll set you back hundreds of dollars. Thus, we have the Record Reverser, an ingenious gizmo that enables you to play any record, backwards on the turntable you now have! We weren't sure to expect, but when we got one, and threw on a record, BACKWARDS, we were floored. I took one home and have been listening to backwards records for the last two weeks almost exclusively, because music DOES sound better backwards. IT DOES!! How does it work? Well, first you just need to make sure of two things, first that you have a removable stylus on your turntable, and second, that once removed, also make sure the tone arm has BOTH a top and bottom slot. Then all you do is flip over your needle, attach your favorite record to the record reverser and VOILA, it's playing backwards! Here's a pretty extensive 'how to' videoclipRECORD REVERSER
Each Record Reverser is hand made out of recycled lps -- mine is a High Masekela record on on side and an Engelbert Humperdinck on the other! So completely cool. We've even been talking about the idea of buying 50 Record Reversers and pre-preparing 50 records and DJ-ing with nothing but backwards lps and Record Reversers!!

A Scholarly albeit Conservative Take on BSG

Peter Suderman writes about Battlestar... says it's not just for geeks and nerds...

Based on the terminally cheesy late 1970s show of the same name, Battlestar Galactica is the creation of Ronald D. Moore, a former Star Trek scribe best known for his revitalizing work on Deep Space 9. The dark, gritty texture he applied to that show is even more evident on Galactica. Currently in the middle of its second season, the show follows a space fleet containing the last survivors of the human race as they flee a decimated home world in search of the mythical planet Earth. Driven into space by the Cylons, a robotic race of human creation, the survivors fend off attacks from within and without while struggling to create a working, ordered society from the ashes of a destroyed civilization. Problematically, the Cylons, once standard issue mechanical goons, have developed models that pass indistinguishably for human, meaning that enemy sleeper agents strike from within the fleet. Despite its fairly standard science-fiction premise (intelligent robots have an awfully bad habit of turning on their human creators), the show is a stirring portrait of human survival in the wake of tragedy, where even the most mundane challenges come loaded with the threat of species-wide extinction.

Dueling Quotes from Last Week's Battlestar

"Inevitably, each and every one of us will have to face a moment where we have to commit that horrible sin. And if we flinch in that moment, if we hesitate for one second... If we let our conscience get in the way, you know what happens? There are more kids in those body bags. More kids floating out that airlock....Now, I don't know why but I have a lot of faith in you. And I want you to promise me that when that moment comes, you won't flinch. Do not flinch." - Admiral Cain, may she rest her ever lovin' done-got-evil ass in peace, speaking to her would-be assassin...



"It's not enough to survive. One has to be worthy of surviving. That's all." - Adama

Crap Song Writer for Celeb-Popsters Revealed

Now that we know who is responsible for "La La", I was gonna say that we can hunt her down and kill her but it looks like she's read to do it herself:

For the last six years, to little fanfare, she has written songs for and with many of the tabloids' favorite subjects — Lohan, Simpson, Hilary Duff and Paris Hilton among them. Over that time, DioGuardi has become known within the music industry as a hit-making machine; earlier this month, her behind-the-scenes work was responsible for three of the four fastest-rising songs on pop radio.

But DioGuardi's more singular skill may be enabling high-profile performers with limited musical acumen — the new order of ingénues whose primary talent is to be well-publicized — to broadcast their innermost feelings in autobiographically loaded songs.

Unofficial mother confessor figure to the Us Weekly set, she's an outsider with a talent for gaining unfettered access to young Hollywood's soul-baring thoughts.

It's been lucrative, but DioGuardi admits that the celebrity muse gig hasn't always been easy. "Sometimes, when I enter a room with a girl who has had no pain, no sorrow and no experience and I have to write songs for her, I almost want to put a gun to my head," she says. " 'Cause there's nothing to pull on. Art is about pain and struggle."

Renaldo in art exhibit

For more than a decade, the poet and musician Lee Ranaldo, a founding member of Sonic Youth, has been collaborating with the artist Leah Singer on a multimedia performance piece involving sound, words and photographic projections. Titled "Drift," the work is to some degree improvisatory, with Mr. Ranaldo reciting his poetry over the drone and clangor of electronic feedback as Ms. Singer projects pairs of images in rapid, percussive succession. Sometimes the pictures and the words connect; mostly they follow separate paths, glancing off each other suggestively. read it all here

Lisa Carver In Alternet

As a person who interviewed Lisa when she was still a teenager and long before became an "international sensation", it's always nice to check in on her, although I would contend that our generation was never "hurt and lost"... her book, like her, is quite good.

From Zinester's paradise (interview by Laura Barcella)

You wrote very openly about real people in your life -- a lot of whom were famous, like GG Allin, Boyd Rice, Bill Callahan, Dame Darcy and Anton LaVey. How did those people react to your portrayals? Was it tough to figure out how much information might be too much?

The ones who were upset by it already didn't like me, and they feared the day I would write this book. The ones who liked it knew that this was the kind of thing I do: confessional memoir.

The best reaction was that Anton LaVey's grandson and his girlfriend attacked me [while on tour promoting my book]. Before I was going on, I already knew they were going to do it, because they'd said they would. I went into Mondo Video and people were asking for my autograph. I got so full of myself; I forgot to have people [stand guard] in front of me. I traipsed out of Mondo Video and walked right into their trap. They jumped me.

His Angry Grows Daily

- but Henry Rollins took some time out of his angry schedule to chat with the Washington Post's angry denizens (one of whom thanks Henry for helping him get rid of his "angst"). Nothing new here or actually very interesting but since it's kinda local to me, thought I would let ya know... here's the link...

Iggy Wants No Part in Frodo Movie

The casting of Wood to play Iggy Pop appears to be akin to that of casting Tom Cruise to play the Vampire Lestat...

IGGY POP REFUSES TO TAKE PART IN BIOPIC

IGGY POP is refusing to have anything to do with his biopic after learning LORD OF THE RINGS star ELIJAH WOOD is to play him in the project.

Extreme Geek Chic

Helmet-fixed cameras and calorie-counting watches among gadgets tailored for the snowy slope

RON HARRIS / Associated Press A snowboarder listened to music through a Giro Encore helmet, which can be linked to most digital players, at an Olympic Valley ski resort.

Lips Release One on iTunes

http://www.filter-mag.com/news/interior.2916.html

Flaming Lips Release New Track Online
by Staff | 01.10.2006

The World’s most exciting Oklahomans The Flaming Lips will release a brand new recording digitally today Tuesday, January 10, 2006. “The W.A.N.D.”,
a track from their upcoming album At War With The Mystics, is 3 minutes and 34 seconds of pure, uplifting sonic bliss produced by Dave Fridmann and The Flaming Lips. The album is expected this April.

Okkervil River Reach Adult-Alt-Pop Milestone

NPR covers Will Sheff and company...

Okkervil River, from left: Will Sheff, Jonathan Meiburg, Zachary Thomas, Travis Nelson

PJ to make new album

Not that it's any surprise but PJ Harvey will be coming out of isolation this year to release an album or so announces her manager:

So what does Paul McGuinness get up to when U2 are not touring? The manager told Billboard last week he will now be concentrating on his other artists. “PJ Harvey will be making a record,” he said

Her last was one of my faves of 2004 but she was quiet all throughout 2005 - not even a concert appearance that I can remember and her website hasn't had a major update since the last record.

New Music Scan

This must be reissue week...Dinosaur Jr.'s first three will come in limited edition LP (four colors, 2000 copies) as well as Tim Buckley (below)... and in anticipation of reissues of Bastro's two LPs comes a live CD... also, goofy recyling project called Record Reverser "reissues" old LPs in a strange way... and finally one of the best releases from Poison Idea is being reissued on CD.

Starting with releases from ForcedExposure.com:



BUCKLEY, TIM: Goodbye and Hello LP (4M 132LP) 15.00
Gatefold 180 gram LP reissue of this album from 1967, the 2nd Buckley album, originally issued by Elektra. Produced by Jac Holzman and Jerry Yester. "One of the great rock vocalists of the 1960s, Tim Buckley drew from folk, psychedelic rock, and progressive jazz to create a considerable body of adventurous work in his brief lifetime. Often cited as the ultimate Tim Buckley statement, Goodbye and Hello is indeed a fabulous album. Contains 'Once I Was' and 'Pleasant Street.' Original artwork."



DINOSAUR JR: Dinosaur Jr LP (BG 004LP) 15.00
"The first three Dinosaur Jr records repressed for the first time since their original release (the first being on Homestead and the second two on SST). All three records are in edition of 2000 copies and contain bonus tracks: Self Titled -- 'Bulbs of Passion,' 'Does It Float (live)'; You're Living All Over Me -- 'Just Like Heaven'; Bug -- 'Keep The Glove.' Baked Goods is Mascis' own label."

And from Aquarius Records...

BASTRO Antlers (Drag City) cd 14.98
Here's a band that far outshone most of their contempories but somehow managed to slip through the cracks and become more known as a footnote of the bands that came after than the rock legends they truly were. Ever wonder where David Grubbs spent his time after Squirrelbait and before Gastr Del Sol? Ever wonder what Bundy Brown did before Tortoise? Ever wonder what John McEntire did before he was in Tortoise and the Sea & Cake and started producing Stereolab Records? Did you ever wonder what band featured members who would go on to play in bands like Slint, Evergreen, King Kong, The For Carnation and more? Well, if you did, the answer is a resounding BASTRO!
This live release was supposed to coincide with the two proper Bastro lps finally released together on a single cd, but there seems to be some weird legal hang up, presumably with Bastro's old label Homestead, but for now we have this glorious live record, from one of the most amazing bands of the late eighties / early nineties.
If you're already a fan, this record is Holy Grail type shit, all songs that were never recorded, caaptured live right before the band broke up. Some of these songs morphed into Gastr Del Sol songs, but a whole new record of never-before-heard Bastro songs should have your jaw around your ankles. And for those of you new to the whole Bastro experience, these songs will definitely whet your appetite for more.
Bastro are really hard to descibe, which could be why maybe they ended up going over a lot of people's heads. They incorporated lots of elements of other post hardcore / college rock bands but in perfectly obtuse, totally unlikely ways. You can hear bits and pieces of Jesus Lizard, Big Black, Rapeman, Scratch Acid, Drive Like Jehu and Don Caballero. They started out as a sort-of-industrial-noise rock band a la Big Black, turned into a pumelling noise rock combo, and eventually morphed into a dense, complex avant-math-rock outfit, which is where this live recording catches them, live in 1991, in Chicago and Germany. Super serpentine guitar lines, extended convoluted song structures, impossibly mathy drumming (resident AQ drummer Andee spent ages learning and then playing along to Bastro songs, and considered McEntire one of his favorite drummers back then) all in a dense tangle of fragmented pop, mathy post rock and obtuse musical chaos. So incredible. As much as we love the bands that came after, Bastro still hold a special place in our heart, their music somehow transcending the music of almost all of their contemporaries, melodic, heavy, bizarre, beautiful. We're dying for the reissue of the albums proper, but for now we'll just listen to Antlers, over and over and over and over and over.....
Also includes two live Quicktime videos of Bastro live in Germany and Holland!!!
MPEG Stream: "Antlers"
MPEG Stream: "Educated Fool"

RECORD REVERSER, THE (Top Quality Rock And Roll) record reverser 15.00
SDRAWKCAB RETTEB SDNUOS CISUM LLA!!!! I mean, ALL MUSIC SOUNDS BETTER BACKWARDS!!!! It's just a fact. There's something completely alien but so strangely beautiful about music in reverse. The way the drums sort of swoosh backwards, the attack and decay exchanging their rightful places, the vocals, a sweetly smooth garbled alien language, even more musical once the context and words are removed, leaving just the sound and timbre, and melodies become seasick, woozy smears of sound. Everyone discovers it eventually. Maybe it was when you were first trying to discern the hidden Satanic messages on your Iron Maiden or Beatles records. Once you tired of that, you suddenly realized that the rest of the record sounded pretty dang cool backwards too. Maybe even better! For some, it happened even earlier, just messing around as a kid with your folks' turntable, that almost always resulted in some sort of scolding that it would damage the needle. But what was it that they were really trying to hide? Satanic messages? Maybe. But maybe it was the fact that music really did sound better backwards. Once the word of that got out, what would happen to music as we know it. For me, it was the realization as a teenager, that you could unscrew a cassette tape, turn the tape over and put the tape back together, resulting in some of the coolest weirdest music we had ever heard. Fifty cent tapes from the thrift store became our car music of choice, once they had been reversed of course. A favorite that I still have to this day is a Bangles cassette, that once reversed turned into a gorgeous dizzying blast of Sgt. Peppers-ish My Bloody Valentine psych-pop! Some folks took this sacred knowledge, and started bands, the most notable being Teenage Filmstars, who employed backwards drums, backwards vocals, reversed guitars, sometimes whole songs played in reverse! (For a taste, check out their track on the Here's To Old England comp we reviewed recently.) And who can forget the first Sonic Youth ep, the cassette version of which featured the whole program in reverse on the other side of the tape. And you know what? It sounded so much better!
So now it's the age of computers and electronic music, so with a push of a button you can turn songs around or do whatever you want really, but there's something about vinyl records, lp's, and the act of playing them backwards that cannot be reproduced on a computer. You can also by a fancy DJ turntable that will play backwards, but A. we're not entirely sure that's good for the needle OR the record, and B. that'll set you back hundreds of dollars. Thus, we have the Record Reverser, an ingenious gizmo that enables you to play any record, backwards on the turntable you now have! We weren't sure to expect, but when we got one, and threw on a record, BACKWARDS, we were floored. I took one home and have been listening to backwards records for the last two weeks almost exclusively, because music DOES sound better backwards. IT DOES!! How does it work? Well, first you just need to make sure of two things, first that you have a removable stylus on your turntable, and second, that once removed, also make sure the tone arm has BOTH a top and bottom slot. Then all you do is flip over your needle, attach your favorite record to the record reverser and VOILA, it's playing backwards! Here's a pretty extensive 'how to' videoclip:
RECORD REVERSER
Each Record Reverser is hand made out of recycled lps -- mine is a High Masekela record on on side and an Engelbert Humperdinck on the other! So completely cool. We've even been talking about the idea of buying 50 Record Reversers and pre-preparing 50 records and DJ-ing with nothing but backwards lps and Record Reversers!!
Definitely just about the coolest thing we've seen in ages.
MPEG Stream: YLLIB 'ECNIRP' EINNOB "Daerd Fo Lluf Yad Rehtona"
MPEG Stream: RUOF SEUQIPOIHTE "Wes Morekey"

POISON IDEA War All The Time (Abstract USA) cd 13.98
Several Poison Idea cd reissues recently hit the racks, and we rate this one the best (although they're all pretty darn good!).
Poison Idea is one of the few bands that comes immediately to mind when you think about what a good hardcore band was really all about. Manic pace, adept "sausage-finger" guitar playing, a tight rhythm section and a singer wailing over the top with lyrics so poetic and fucking deep it's actually worth reading the lyric sheet! Poison Idea was that band -- Portland's finest -- and on top of it all, you had two serious behemoth madmen drinking and bleeding and rocking in a hellbent frenzy.
With this 1987 release, War All the Time (yes, it's named after Bukowski, duh) the self-proclaimed "Kings of Punk" added extra power-pummel to the mix with the addition of Thee Slayer Hippy on drums and Vegetable Olsen on second guitar. This record still proves to be a timeless classic today as far as early hardcore/thrash/crossover goes. Lots of stop-and-start on a dime riffage, a million little cymbal splashes filling in the holes, Pig Champion moving those little chubby stubs up and down the fretboard at the speed of light (or maybe as fast as the malt liquor would allow on any given night!) and on top of it all Jerry A. mumbling / howling / screaming some seriously stoic shit in that immediately recognizable caterwaul, but you wouldn't know how serious unless you were reading along...
You're definitely not a real punk without this in your collection!

Yet Another Punk Documentary

Documentary Delves Into 'American Hardcore'

Minor Threat

January 06, 2006, 3:55 PM ET

Greg Prato, N.Y.

What is considered punk rock and hardcore nowadays has evolved considerably since the early '80s, a point proven by the new documentary, "American Hardcore: The History of American Punk Rock 1980-1986." The 90-minute film will premiere at the Sundance Film Festival at the end of the month and features vintage footage from numerous U.S. hardcore/punk bands from this period, including Minor Threat, Black Flag and Suicidal Tendencies.

Idiot Fans Mull Class Action Suit

"I'ma get get get get you drunk"


We've written previously about the angry Squirrel-costume guy who missed the Flaming Lips on NYE when the L.A. show got cancelled on the advice of L.A.'s Fire Marshal. Now comes word that Fans of Fergie's Lovely Lady Lumps wanna sue the promoter (who has already lost "seven figures" in the fiasco).

Shouldn't we be sueing Black Eyed Peas fans for foisting such bad music on the world?

Reasons to Drool My Geek Drool This Weekend

1) "Thank you for your recent order ... The following item(s) are now en route:

• Remo Fiberskyn 3 Medium Weight Drum Heads
• Remo Fiberskyn 3 Medium Weight Drum Heads
• Remo Fiberskyn 3 Medium Weight Drum Heads
• Maestro Innovations Drum Tuner CD
• Remo Fs3 EE Heavy Bass Drum Head
• Remo Fiberskyn 3 Medium Weight Drum Heads
• Remo Fiberskyn 3 Medium Weight Drum Heads"

2) Battlestar Gallactica returns:

Edward James Olmos is Cmdr. Adama in "Battlestar Galactica," at 10 on Sci Fi. (Alan Zenuk For Sci Fi - Alan Zenuk For Sci Fi)

3) QT's Hostel

4) I received my Buddha machine this week (actually isn't this minus geek points?)

Merry Christmas To Me...

now what do I do with it?


2488
24-track, 24-bit, 36-channel Digital Portastudio

Hunter Thompson's widow to start journal

via Mike Watt:

January 3, 2006

WOODY CREEK, Colo. (AP) -- Hunter S. Thompson's widow will co-edit a new magazine called The Woody Creeker, which is expected to hit newsstands next month.

The gonzo journalist shot himself in his kitchen Feb. 20 last year, apparently despondent over health problems.

''We have some good writers already,'' Anita Thompson told the Aspen Times for its Tuesday editions. Satirist and political commentator P.J. O'Rourke plans a profile of her husband based on interviews in 1987 and 1997, she said.

Anita Thompson continues to work on a book she calls ''Hunters Wisdom,'' a collection of witticisms, aphorisms and other expressions from Hunter S. Thompson's bibliography of 14 books, along with her personal notes.

The magazine is named after the community where the Thompson property is located. Anita Thompson said she came up with the idea for the magazine mainly as a way to celebrate the oddities and richness of her neighborhood.

''We're living the Woody Creek lifestyle,'' she said. ''We should be recording it, at least.''

Two Japanese Online Stores that Take Paypal?

Thanks to the Andersens, I've been clued in on two sites that appear to carry all that Jap lo-fi stuff I love:

ontonson

das gemeine

You'll also find rarities and apparently Jap-only releases by American artists like Grubbs and O'Rourke.

Angry Squirrel Threatens Lawsuit Over NYE/Flaming Lips Cancex

Dude, Dr. Cox wants one of your "Man Cards":

The last-minute cancellation of the Giant Village New Year's Eve celebration in downtown Los Angeles didn't just throw people's Saturday night plans into disarray. In some cases, it disrupted lives, as in the case of the man set to propose to his girlfriend from the stage.

News of the refund came as little consolation to James Smith, a journalist from England. He planned to propose to his girlfriend onstage, during a set by the alternative rock band the Flaming Lips, while wearing a squirrel costume. The group is known for its outlandish live performances involving animal outfits, lights and video screens.

He said he spent more than he could afford to buy plane tickets from London and rent a hotel room. But once at the event site, he and his girlfriend were turned away by security.

"It was one of the most crushing disappointments I've had," said Smith, 29. "It blew my plans out of the water. I was completely gutted."

"To dance onstage with the Lips was my life's ambition," his girlfriend, Tara Street, added. Smith later proposed at the hotel and she accepted.

I hope, that at the very least, he got lots of sympathy sex and she let him wear the squirrel costume... read the rest here

NYC Is a Downer, Man

On the day of the NYC's biggest punk band, The Strokes 3rd release, Iggy slams the state of music in NYC:

Iggy Pop misses 1970s New York

New York : Punk rocker Iggy Pop is missing the old bad days of New York city.

According to pagesix.com, Pop said: "Everything about New York was cool in the '70s. People slouched when they walked, and they didn't look like they had anywhere to go. Everybody wasn't dressed for success. There were still peep shows in Times Square. To me that created art."

He also commented on city's rock scene. He said: "The worse New York is doing, socially and economically, the better the music. Unfortunately, it seems like New York is doing awfully well these days."

Set to Break in '06:

Impress your friends with your hipness. Andy Samberg is the new It Comic Jewish Guy.

See him in Chronic Ills of Narnia

and on Comedy Central

and catch up with him in Lonely Island

New Releases - First Week 2005

This week sees a reissue of a classic Nina Simone LP on 180 gram vinyl, a new one from Bettye LaVette and more Buddha machines.

Via ForcedExposure.com:

SIMONE, NINA: The Amazing Nina Simone LP (4M 126LP) 15.00
"Nina's second LP, originally released in 1959, The Amazing Nina Simone features a repertoire ranging from a swinging 'Stompin' at the Savoy' and an emotional 'It Might as Well Be Spring' to an English folk ballad ('Tomorrow'), spirituals, and an R&B song ('You've Been Gone Too Long') and is backed by a subtle orchestra arranged by Bob Mersey that effectively showcases her top-form vocals. 180 gram vinyl."


LAVETTE, BETTY: I've Got My Own Hell to Raise LP (DBK 116LP) 13.00
"Great lost soul singer Bettye LaVette returns with an amazing album produced by Joe Henry (the man behind Solomon Burke's Grammy-winning 2002 comeback). Elvis Costello says it best: 'You've got a singer here who is willing to stretch and not content to live in the safety zone. Bettye Lavette's voice is the superb line that connects Lucinda Williams' 'Joy' to Dolly Parton's 'Little Sparrow' via numbers by Sinead O'Connor and Joan Armatrading. Those songs never sounded better and neither has one of R&B's greatest under-acknowledged vocalists.'."

FM3: Buddha Machine Soundbox (BUDDHA 001) 23.00
Restocked! 2nd edition now available. A unique 'soundbox' from China, which is causing senstation worldwide. A totally dazzling item which causes jaw-dropping delight everywhere -- Alan Bishop bought twenty-four of these on sight, Brian Eno bought eight (how's that for apocalyptical math?). FM3 are a duo of Christiaan Virant and Chinese keyboardist and computer musician Zhang Jian -- based in Beijing. The Buddha Machine is a hardware loop player, built kind of like a little AM radio (available in 6 different colors, shipped randomly), but without all the nonsense -- total genius from out of nowhere. More info/pictures at: www.fm3.com.cn [there's also a definitive FM3 interview at: www.rarefrequency.com]. Comes with 2 x AA batteries. "The Buddha Machine is a small soundbox made in China which comes with an integrated speaker, a volume control, mini jack-out and a switch to choose between nine different loops which are stored on a small chip and can be directly played by this mini soundsystem."

WIRE, THE: #263 January 2006 MAG (WIRE 263) 8.00
"On the cover: Rewind 2005 (Eyes down for The Wire's annual selection of the year's best music, plus critics' and musician's reflections). Features: Burning Star Core (Bruce Russell descends into the subterranean drone-disco run by Ohio violinist C Spencer Yeh); Dan Wilson (The songwriter and radio artist conducts acts of poetic subversion from Meadow House); Yannis Kyriakides (Cold War geopolitics, philosophy and Improv are all mixed up in the output of this Greek composer); Invisible Jukebox: Nurse With Wound; Tetuzi Akiyama (Armed with a guitar and samurai sword, the Tokyo Improv warrior tells Clive Bell why he wants us to boogie); Noah Howard (Decades after migrating to France in a squall of free jazz, the alto sax master is still blowing strong); Volcano The Bear (Keith Molin� tries to keep order among the good humoured sprawl of Leicester's finest free rock troupe)."

Aquarius Staff Favorites: http://aquariusrecords.org/2005faves.html

And BompRecords.com has some swell stuff:


WIPERS - REBEL WITH A CAUSE Euro release. First
time on vinyl. Excellent compilation of demos and
studio outtakes from 1979-1982.. IMPORT LP $18

DAMON ``SONG OF A GYPSY (LP+7")`` Originally
recorded in 1969 and released in some
micro-quantity of non-distributed LPs, the album
documents Damon's travelling-gypsy-psych
concoction . Lovely zap-fuzz psych guitar This
record is also in Paul Major's "Top Five of Weird
Underground Psych/Folk", as revealed in Vice
magazine. GOLD EMBOSSED GATEFOLD COVER W/4 TRACK
33RPM EP W/INSERT. ALL COPIES HAVE DAMON'S
SIGNATURE. TRUE PSYCH. LP $32

SCIENTISTS Human Jukebox- 1984-1986- 14 track
companion to the "Blood Red River" release of
last year. Pure genious Australian swampy dirty
r'n'r CD $12

SCIENTISTS- Pissed on Another Planet DBL CD
Chronicles THE SCIENTISTS early experiments
1978-1980. previously unreleased material
included. CD $16


RADIO BIRDMAN PEPPER, ANGIE - Res Ipsa
Loquitor. First solo album by ex-vocalist of
Australia's legendary PASSENGERS; this time Angie
is backed by the DENIZ TEK GROUP and DONOVAN'S
BRAIN, among others. Includes a great cover of
"Hindu Gods of Love", originally recorded by
Sydney's infamous LIPSTICK KILLERS. CD $12