Wild Nothing >> The past was folded up and in the twinkle of an eye everything had been changed

Wild Nothing - "Paradise" (feat. Michelle Williams)

(Captured Tracks, 2012)

Yes, this is the "video version" of Wild Nothing's shoulda-been-a-megahit, featuring ultramegafamous actress Michelle Williams(!).  M.W. recites from Iris Murdoch's 1975 novel A Word Child in the middle of the song, which is just a spacey instrumental passage in the album version.  This Michelle-fortified version is not available anywhere, and believe me, I looked high and low for it, so this is certainly a Blowtorch Baby exclusive.  The place I ripped it from rhymes with MooCube.

Counting days

The opening synth wash sure reminds me of the melody in Slowdive's best-known song, "Alison".  I first heard this song in my car while parked in a thrift store parking lot in Terrytown in summer of 2012.  Its amazing bassline and breezy overall feel prompted me to immediately text my sister to tell her to check it out.  I wasn't yet obsessed with WN, but it happened fairly quickly.  It ended up being a no-brainer to name Nocturne my favorite album of the year, and I think most followers of this blog would agree with me on that.

Last October, I finally got to see Wild Nothing live, opening for Local Natives at Tipitina's, and thankfully they played "Paradise."  Yes, the bassline is just as huge & badass live as it is on record.  Still amazed / saddened that they weren't headlining.  And next month the headliners are opening for Kings Of Leon at the N.O. Arena(!).

Mon. Mar. 10: Went to the Circle Bar to see Weekend + Nothing + AAN (pronounced "On").  AAN's singer has a beautiful voice, not unlike Wayne Coyne's, and the band cranked out multifaceted, Yo La Tengo-esque indie rock. The guitarist with the white Jazzmaster was almost a dead ringer for Damon Albarn, so I expect a strong female fanbase with this band.  Ashley had to leave to get to sleep.  I wanted her to see Nothing, who sound like a recreation of Slowdive / MBV on record.  Much to my surprise, they sounded more like Slayer live, so I was actually kind of glad she missed them.  They played five songs from the new album, and one from their 6-song EP.  Weekend were as streamlined and muscular as I had anticipated they'd be.  After the disappointment of no "Spiral" from Wye Oak the previous night, I had to deal with Weekend not playing the song I wanted to see, "Mirror."  Their singer seemed a bit drunk and angry, swinging his bass into the crowd at one point.  He got rather forcefully pushed back by them.  And each band only played for about 30 mins.  But overall it was a good night, and the highlight was Weekend's "Just Drive," which I got a full video of.  Nothing's bassist (also in Whirr and Death Of Lovers) was really engaging and we recommended shoegaze bands to each other.  Drove down Bourbon St. blasting "It's Alright" on Weekend's album Jinx, as I had just bought the CD at the gig.

Fun Fact: I sat next to local jazz drumming icon Johnny Vidacovich during Nothing.  Not sure why he was at this show...  Also met a guy who flew to L.A. just to see a recent reunion of the band Failure, so we talked about our love of Failure for quite a bit.

Tue. Mar. 11: Went back to the Spanish Moon to catch Weekend and Nothing again.  Right before this show, I stopped at F.Y.E. and got the latest CDs by Chairlift, CHVRCHES, and Danny Brown.  Seeing these bands on a stage in a much larger venue with a better sound system made quite a difference.  (Not dissing the Circle Bar at all, by the way.)  The crowd was only about two dozen souls.  No flyers for this show were spotted around the area.  You do the math...  Nothing played the same basic set again; one of their singers told me the previous night that they do the same 35-minute set each night on this tour.  And yes, just like the previous night, they sounded more like Slayer than Slowdive.  Traded more shoegaze recommendations with Nothing's bassist and merch guy.  Weekend's set, on the other hand, was quite different from the previous night.  They started with "Just Drive" (said the drummer, though I thought it was "July"), ended with "Coma Summer," and did a killer "Mirror" in between.  (The singer introduced that song by saying it was about his mom... then, after a short pause, said it was about his dad.)  Overall, they did more krautrock-y, jam-friendly songs than the previous night.  Afterwards I shot some pool upstairs by myself, then talked with Weekend's awesome drummer.  Some of the bands we touched on included CAN, Moonshake, Heat Dust, Belong, and Glish.  I didn't buy a drink at any of these three shows... Sorry, bartenders!  Had to spend a lot on gas and merch, and booze is very low on my priorities list.

Some of the excellent music heard on the club's PA on this night included lots of weird hip hop, The Cure's "One Hundred Years" (seguing into Nothing's first song), some Prefab Sprout, Flipper's "Ha Ha Ha," and the Chameleons' "Don't Fall."  I got a particular kick out of the Chameleons song, because I had just posted "Swamp Thing" on my Tumblr a few hours earlier, and I leaned over the second-floor balcony (this venue used to be a fire station) during the aforementioned game of pool while singing the phrase "donnnn't fall."  Kinda rad.

Sat. Mar. 15: Bought some plants at the annual Parkway plant sale @ DIllard University.  At Bed Bath & Beyond that night, I walked right by the first person I ever got a New Year's kiss from and she didn't recognize me.  In the twinkle of an eye everything had been changed indeed...

Planets with similar climates: Catherine Wheel - "Flower To Hide" (1992), Slowdive - "40 Days" & "Alison" (1993), The Smiths - "The Boy With The Thorn In His Side" (1985).

Poolside >> The starlight will guide us through the night

Poolside - "Slow Down"

(Day & Night Recordings, 2012)

I can't believe I never posted this.  I'll sheepishly admit I found out about this song thanks to a feature in Pitchfork that summer, and in my opinion it was the unquestioned slow jam of that year.  The more you listen to this song, the more you realize just how perfect every tiny detail of it is.  You will understand why Poolside calls their music "daytime disco."  They literally have a poolside studio, and in fact that's where their band name comes from.  Best line from the Pitchfork article: "They aspire to parlay their success into DJing high-end pool parties."

Note: This Poolside is a duo from Los Angeles consisting of Filip Nikolic and Jeffrey Paradise.  They are not to be confused with the indie pop group Poolside, whose boring CD Indyglow I bought a decade or so ago.
Daft Punk's "Get Lucky" is basically just a more disco'd up, cocaine'd up, and way less subtle, take on this song. Then again, this song is extremely similar to chillwave's defining song, Washed Out's "Feel It All Around."
Here's the video that started my obsession:

Incredibly, though they obviously made a video for it, this song was apparently not released as a physical single.  Record labels are fucking stupid, as I've said time and time again.  A few months ago, on Sirius radio's Chill station, I heard a Poolside remix of Black Sabbath's chillout classic "Planet Caravan."

Fri. Mar. 7: Went to new Central American / Mexican restaurant Mizado for my mom's birthday.  It was indescribably loud.  My dad, who is 61 and has been to probably thousands of restaurants around the country / world in his life, said it was the loudest restaurant he had ever been in.  I unfortunately missed Com Truise at the Hi-Ho Lounge that night because it sold out.

Sat. Mar. 8: Went to Euclid Records' sidewalk sale ahead of their move one block west later this month.  It turned out to be a stunning 5 CD's for a dollar bonanza.  And the stuff being sold was not garbage either.  Spent 3 hours loading up on tons of CDs, including ::reaches for big cardboard box:: John Coltrane, Sigur Rós, 2Pac, Steve Roach, the Pointer Sisters (x2), Diana Ross / Supremes, Opal, Ivy, Coldcut, Aphex Twin / AFX, Pole (x2), Vangelis, Dizzy GIllespie, Baaba Maal, Deee-Lite, Spearhead, Smashing Pumpkins, Tortoise, Goodie Mob, Royal Trux, Johnny Griffin, Steely Dan, the Crystal Method, Spiritualized, Foreigner, Aaliyah, the Pastels, Henry Mancini, the Telescopes, Adina Howard, Born Against, Beans, Plastikman (x2), Maude Maggart (Fiona Apple's jazz-croonin' sis), Carla Bley, Sponge, Iron & Wine, V/A - Lounge-A-Palooza, Edith Frost, Kings Of Leon, Dead Kennedys (x2), Nine Inch Nails, the Warlocks, Eisley, Sonny Rollins, Delerium, Sting, 702, the Seconds, Jaco Pastorius, the Crimson Curse, the Ocean Blue, Magik Markers, Gang Gang Dance, Amorphous Androgynous (a.k.a. the Future Sound Of London), Robyn, Mötley Crüe, Diana King, Rachelle Ferrell, Liz Story, Mary Lou Lord, Skinny Puppy (x2), David Toop, Foo Fighters, Gravity A, the Other Planets, Reception Is Suspected, Sade, Loop, Paul Simon, Rickie Lee Jones, Autechre, Black Dice, Chris Thomas King, Sam Phillips, Digable Planets, Nas, MGMT, Cex, Keith Jarrett, Primal Scream, Arcturus, the Donnas, Sage Francis, Fluke, Squarepusher, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Michael Gira, Transvision Vamp, Brass Bed, Björk, Davell Crawford, Mercury Rev.  All for only $11.  Wow.  Thank you, Euclid!  I also talked with DJ Lefty Parker about Chapel Hill's early '90s indie rock scene.  He said he worked at Schoolkids Records with members of Superchunk and other bands, told me some stuff about Polvo that kind of blew my mind, and said a band called Metal Flake Mother was the best band in town. This sale, combined with this recent find, has swamped me with CDs.  So I've been busily burning them onto the ol' MacBook so that people on last.fm can see what I listen to.  Afterwards, I went to Harold's Nursery and bought an echeveria.

Sun, Mar. 9: Saw Future Islands + Wye Oak + Ed Schraeder's Music Beat at the Spanish Moon.  ESMB play a hokey, primitivist rock n' roll that wears thin very quickly, much like the music of Beat Happening or the White Stripes.  Wye Oak were good, doing mostly stuff from their upcoming album Shriek, according to singer Jenn Wasner.  Plus an intense "Holy Holy."  But the entire reason I made the trek to Baton Rouge was to see them do their masterpiece "Spiral", and they did not.  Oh well.  I asked Wasner if they still play it, and she said they hope to start playing it again soon.  She was beaming after I told her I thought it was the best song of the last five years.  I bought a 7" by her solo project Flock Of Dimes.  Future Islands, fresh off an appearance on Late Night With David Letterman, did their usual workmanlike synth-rock replete with odd dance moves from their singer.  I guess being on Letterman didn't provide a huge career boost, because I seem to remember just as many, if not more, people at their show at the Moon in Nov. 2012.  Weird.

Planets with similar climates: Washed Out - "Feel It All Around" (2009), Kool & The Gang - "Summer Madness" (1974), Ween - "Freedom Of '76" (1994), School Of Seven Bells - "Love Play" (2011), Janet Jackson - "Funny How Time Flies (When You're Having Fun)" (1985), Dead Leaf Echo - "Act Of Truth (Extended Truth Mix)" (2009).

Hotel X >> Flute routes

Hotel X - "Iqbal"

(SST Records, 1997)

I wrote most of this post in 2012 or '13 but never posted it.  I got this album, Routes Music, on used CD in '97 for 2 bucks on a whim and found myself smitten by its haphazard blending of styles into a cohesive subtropical gumbo.  This was not long after I had spent a year at the University of Richmond in Hotel X's hometown.  The name of their first album, A Random History Of The Avant Groove, sums up their aesthetic quite well.  I once did an internet search for the band name (pre-Google... I have no idea what search engine I used back then), and I remember that it was a reference to some movie.  This piece is presumably named after Muhammad Iqbal, who helped create the 6th-most populous country on earth, Pakistan.

The coolest thing in my opinion was that SST signed a band like this.  I'm sure the SST logo is the reason I even picked the CD up and inspected it in the first place.  I only ever got one other album by Hotel X, Residential Suite (1994), but didn't like it very much.  Post-1997, the band is still sporadically together, but they seem to only perform live, not release new music.  Based on the insanely huge amount of people who have done time in the Hotel (62, says their website), it must've been some sort of revolving-door collective, apparently always led by Tim Harding.  To see the full list, click here.

Time to cut and paste...  On this album the band was:
Tim Harding: alto sax, bass
Ron Curry: bass, guitar, trombone
Chris Davis: drums
Pat Best: guitar, bass
Eric Ungar: guitar, flute

With guests:
Billy Fox: timbales, percussion
Steve Matthews: vibes

According to their website, "Hotel X toured regionally and nationally between 1992 and 1997, received reviews in Jazz Times, The Washington Post, Option, The Wire and Alternative Press among others; was nominated for Best Jazz Group by NAIRD (National Association of Independent Record Distributors) in 1996, and participated in the JVC Jazz Festival in NYC, 1997. National Public Radio selected soundbites of several songs from the Hotel X CD Engendered Species for use between news stories during Morning Edition in 1994. Richmond Magazine awarded Hotel X with the Pollack Prize for Excellence in Arts in September of 2005."
And "Hotel X has shared the stage with Bern Nix (Ornette Coleman and Primetime), Greg Ginn (Black Flag), Balla Kouyate (Super Rail Band), Papa Susso (Gambian kora master),The Roots, Gary Lucas (Captain Beefheart, solo), Harvey Sorgen (Hot Tuna), Yellowman, Medeski, Martin and Wood, Ran Blake, Hasidic New Wave, Marc Ribot, Plunky Branch, Wayne Horvitz and Pigpen, Amy Denio, John Bradshaw and Bazooka, just to name a few."

Their website has a photo titled "The Routes Music line up" at the URL http://www.hotelxband.com/page12/files/collage_lb_image_page12_13_1.png, but it won't load.  Oh well.  I prefer to not see what bands look like anyway.  So here's the highly memorable, primitivist album cover:

Here's a great pic I found on Tumblr recently.  If anyone knows what it's from, let me know:

Planets with similar climates: Frank Zappa - "Peaches en Regalia" (1969), maybe some Yusef Lateef (R.I.P.) due to the flute, Gil Scott-Heron, Fela Kuti, '70s Miles Davis, etc.

Miracle >> I'm watching the sun fall from the sky, as many have done in the eye of the mind

Alrighty, I'm back.  After realizing three years have passed since I started this thing, I've decided to stop beating around the bush and just post lots of my all-time favorite songs, since I've barely gotten to many of my all-time favorite artists.  Yes, Tumblr has been consuming most of my attention, since I can post major-label songs (recently by the likes of Ween, the Sundays, the Pointer Sisters, the Police, *NSYNC, Ride, PJ Harvey, the Church, Marvin Gaye, Goldie, the Bangles, the Future Sound Of London, Depeche Mode, PM Dawn, Daft Punk, Plexi, Sinéad O'Connor,  etc.), which is something I obviously can't do on here.  I'm going to start doing shorter posts on here.

Miracle - "Strange Taste"

(self-released[?], 2013)

Here is an astounding song from Steve Moore (Zombi) and Daniel O'Sullivan (lots of bands).  It effortlessly lays to waste most of the '80s-wannabe bands of the current era, as well as the output of most actual '80s bands.  I got it for free from Mixmag at SoundCloud.  The production is gorgeous.  You can tell the band did not treat this song as a mere throwaway.

Here are the young men

This song is not on any of Miracle's official releases (an album, an EP, and two singles), for some unfathomable reason.  I really hope they release it as a standalone single, because it could be huge on college radio.  The bio at the Planet Mu page says "In fact it was on a Guapo / Zombi tour in 2006 they first met, with the music starting to trickle out slowly around 2010. Initially the music was intended as an instrumental dance project, however the project started to take on a life of its own when Daniel started to add vocals and lyrics."  I would love to get an instrumental version of "Strange Taste," but the version with vocals is impossible to improve upon.  The long pause between "sun" and "fall" in the chorus is so tantalizing.

I think this sums up Miracle's main influences pretty well

The concerts I've seen since I last posted on here 4 months ago:
Cat Power + Nico Turner at House Of Blues
Rihanna + A$AP Rocky at New Orleans Arena (rechristened Smoothie King Center [really] last week)
Bodhi3 w/ guest poet Moose Jackson at Siberia
Darkside + High Water at House of Blues
Julianna Barwick + Vasillus at Tulane's LBC Quad
Cobalt Cranes + Grooms at Circle Bar
The Body + Pyeya at the Mushroom
The Amazing Acro-Cats (yes, performing cats) at the AllWays Lounge's Marigny Theatre
Chelsea Light Moving + Merchandise at One Eyed Jacks

(After the Darkside show ended on Super Bowl night, I drove by Siberia to possibly catch High On Fire, but after seeing the huge throng of black-clad people milling about outside, I assumed it was a sellout and didn't even stop.)  Skipped Voodoo Fest, at which the Cure played "Burn," my favorite song by them, for the first time ever.  Out of the bands in the list, Grooms were the most striking and memorable.  Expect a song from them on here very soon.  The new Warpaint and Blouse albums are big disappointments so far.  And Grimes signed to Jay-Z's management team... No comment on that.

Planets with similar climates: Depeche Mode - "Blasphemous Rumours" (1984), National Skyline - "Metropolis" (2000), Tears For Fears - "Change" & "Start Of The Breakdown" (1982), Satisfact - "Dysfunction" (1996).

Orbit >> Shed your skin and let me in

Orbit - "Come Inside"

(Lunch Records, 1995)

This song takes the Pixies' sound a bit further by adding a rockabilly-style guitar riff and Sonic Youth-y flourishes.  Just an amazingly badass song overall, though it took a while to grow on me.  I actually overlooked this song for years because "Purge" was my favorite song on the EP (La Mano), which I bought at a thrift store ca. 2006.  "Come Inside" steadily grew on me over the years, with its simple, chanted slogan and well-placed "oh-ohh"s.  I think the rockabilly thing is what prevented me from loving it immediately.  Orbit were yet another Boston band that wanted to be the Pixies, even covering "Where Is My Mind?" in 1998.  But they came at it with their own personality and charisma, and created some of the flat-out greatest songs of the era.  I think they could've been legitimate stars.

Above is my 7" which I bought at Euclid Records a few months ago.  I had seen it there 2 years ago but stupidly passed on it, and only recently re-found it while spending a few hours digging through their endless boxes of used 7"s.  It's actually a split single with a band called Welcome To Julian (wow... and you thought band names nowadays sucked...), on Orbit's own label, Lunch Records.  It's a numbered edition and one of the hidden crown jewels of my record collection.  Marine biology buffs like myself know that starfish look cute but are relentless predators of bivalves, often expelling their stomachs out of their bodies to digest their prey.  (Info)  Hence the genteel cover art hides a violent secret, muahaha.  This song is likely about sexual assault, with Jeff Robbins singing from the perspective of the assaulter.  The opening line is "Why can I not come inside?  Beautiful, I'm beautiful like you."  The phrase "come inside" takes on a disturbing meaning when you think about the song this way.  This of course ties in with the disgusting way that a starfish feeds.

The music video is strange, pretentious, trippy, and NSFW, so I doubt MTV ever aired it:

Most people know Orbit for their 1997 MTV / alt-radio hit "Medicine", a.k.a. "Medicine (Baby Come Back)."  That album, Libido Speedway, also had the stunningly awesome song "Nocturnal Autodrive".  I can't post it because it came out on a major label, but trust me, go out of your way to track it down.  It's very dark, intense, and predatory.  It takes the sound of "Come Inside" to a new dimension of desperation and obsession.

So to summarize, here are Orbital's best songs, in order, from Libido Speedway and La Mano:
1. "Nocturnal Autodrive"
2. "Come Inside"
3. "Medicine"
4. "Purge"

Tue. Oct. 1: I photographed the most metal car in New Orleans on Tulane Ave.  (That elevated freeway is I-10.)

As best as I can make out, these are the band stickers on it:
Pestilence, Opeth, Testament, Iron Maiden, Terrorizer, Suffocation, Asphyx, Nuclear Assault, At The Gates, Skeletonwitch.  Plus four more that I can't make out.  But I can tell you without hesitation that they were all bought at The Mushroom.
Wed. Oct. 2: Saw Local Natives + Wild Nothing at Tiptitina's.  Jack from WN sang live exactly like he does on record, which for some reason really impressed me.  They concluded with a killer extended version of new cut "Ride," but sadly omitted personal favorites "Shadow," "A Dancing Shell," and "Disappear Always."  In fact, they played a mere three songs from Nocturne, my favorite album of last year.  (They opened with the title track, and later did "Paradise" and "The Blue Dress.")  We went just for WN, but were all won over by LN by night's end.  I inflicted a severely sprained ankle on myself in between bands by trying to jump up and touch the Napoleon Ave. sign on the median.  It was probably 11 feet high and the ground was slightly slick from rain.  I was able to see most of LN though.
Thu. Oct. 3: I opted to ditch my crutches and go to see Sigur Rós on two feet like a boss.  They played at Champions Square, which is outside right next to the Superdome.  Louisiana-born ambient vocal soundscaper Julianna Barwick was the opening act.  She cancelled her fall headlining tour (incl. stops in N.O. and Baton Rouge) to do this.  The concert was amazing; see a clip I took of SR here and a few pics I took of J-Bar here.  This made up for missing SR at the House Of Blues in early 2003, something I had regretted constantly since that night.

Planets with similar climates: Pixies - "Is She Weird?" (1990), Pavement - "Conduit For Sale!" (1991), Poem Rocket - "Appeal To The Imagination" (2000).

The Sheila Divine >> I'd rather have a fatal than a life unstable

The Sheila Divine - "Back To The Cradle"

(Arena Rock Recording Co. [U.S.] / Rykodisc [Europe], 2002)

Sorry for neglecting this site yet again, but I'm back in the fuckin' saddle, baby, and all it took was thinking about this song.  The lyrics are about someone who is on life support due to being in a coma or persistent vegetative state.  (In the class on medical ethics that I took in college, the difference between a coma and a PVS was one of the most frequently discussed topics.  See the famous Terri Schiavo case.)  "If you were sent to prison, [and] prison was your mind, would you try escaping or would you do the time?" is a boldly chilling way to open a song.  For what it's worth, this song is similar in topic to Metallica's masterpiece "Fade To Black" (which is of course based on the book / movie Johnny Got His Gun).  The delivery of the line "WAAAAKE UPPPPP!" at the end of this song is the most stunning thing I've ever heard in music, singing-wise.  Singer Aaron Perino could've tried to end it with some sort of pretentious bit of phrasing, but the fact that he chose just those two primal words really makes his sentiment hit home.  He summoned up his internal passion and just let loose.  I'd pay to see video footage of him laying down this song's vocals in the studio.  One would never guess that Perino is a blond guy in a suit and horn-rimmed glasses.  Frank Black is rightly considered the gold standard for the shrieking style of vocals in indie rock, especially in the Boston scene, but I'd say Perino swiped his crown with this song (especially the very ending).  Though hardly anyone knows about it, of course.
This song gives me the energy of 7 PowerBars and 3 to 4 cans of Jolt cola.  And it is my personal fuck you to all the shitty imagecore "indie rock" bands of the '00s like the Strokes, Spoon, Arcade Fire, the Hold Steady, etc.  Those bands and most of their fans should pretty much be slaughtered after being sent to dig ditches for a few decades in Siberian prison camps, but that's another topic.  Search out better music and you shall find it.

I downloaded the EP Secret Society from eMusic in 2003, and was immediately knocked out of my chair by this song, especially since it comes a few tracks after the very cool, restrained and elegant "The Swan".  I had read about TSD going back to '99, when their album New Parade was released to somewhat frenzied acclaim in the music mags.  In fact, that album predated the whole Interpol / Editors suave Britpoppy post-punk revival thing by several years.  (Makes you wonder if Paul Banks & Co. ever caught any gigs by TSD in Interpol's formative days...)  Of course, the Sheilas broke up the same year I finally heard them, which was the same year that Interpol became international icons.  Not picking on Interpol, by the way.  TSD never played in the New Orleans area as far as I know.

AllMusic Guide's terribly-written review starts off by comparing the band to Weezer, then mentions "politely anguished vocals" and John Hughes soundtracks.  And of course, the author doesn't even mention "Back To The Cradle."  (Guess he was busy answering the door or hosing off his latte machine in the backyard when that song erupted onto his hi-fi.)

Fun Fact: The band's name is Aussie slang for "faggot."

Image I found on Tumblr that has been weirding me out / cracking me up for weeks

Some more songs that end with alarmingly tortured screams like this one does:

You Am I - "Embarrassed" ("Gonna tear it, you'll forGETTTTT ITTTT!")
Pixies - "Tame" ("TEHHHAAAAAAME!")
Nirvana - "Territorial Pissings" (A better WAAAAYY!")
Unwound - "Feeling$ Real" ("The world starts coming DOWWWWN!")
Helmet - "Murder" ([some yelling])

If you hate amazingly tortured screams, go to this concert on Thursday:

Planets with similar climates: Black Flag - "Room 13" (1981), Hole - "Violet" (1993), The Sound - "The Fire" (1981), Buffalo Tom - "Taillights Fade" (1992) & "Summer" (1995), U2 - "Like A Song..." (1982), Catherine Wheel - "Chrome" (1993).

Caspian >> That was the sea, this is the ocean

Caspian - "La Cerva"

(Radar Recordings, 2008 [split 7"] / The Mylene Sheath, 2009 [CD / 2xLP])

Note: I wrote almost all of this post on July 2nd.
Note 2: The title of this post is a vinyl etching from the stunning "Columbus" 7" by one of my favorite bands, the Church.  I found it here years ago and made myself memorize it.  See, the band Caspian is named after the Caspian Sea, and... uh, yeah, you knew that.  Did you know that seas are smaller than oceans?  Ah, you did.  Moving on then...

I've seen this rock band three times in New Orleans.  They played "La Cerva" the first two times (as their opening song in March 2010 at the Dragon's Den; at an unknown part of their set in April 2011 at the Howlin' Wolf), but alas, they did not the third time (February 2013 at Siberia).  Hopefully it's still in their setlist from time to time.  Right before Caspian went on at that Dragon's Den show, I helped to save a guy who was overdosing outside on the Esplanade median.  I then bounded up the winding staircase as "La Cerva" rained down upon me, just as it is about to rain down upon you.

I first heard this song after on a split Caspian / Constants 7" (upper left in pic above) that I bought at a Constants show in New Orleans in Oct. 2009.  I highly recommend this single, as you could imagine.  Constants are badass as hell.

Lots of so-called "post-rock" / "post-metal" bands get (justly) criticized for just relying on climax after climax, but son of a bitch if it isn't awe-inspiring when done right.  Caspian wastes no time frittering around before getting right to the heavy stuff in this track.  I bet even Beavis and Butt-head would've lost their shit over this one.  The jazzy drumming (à la Tristeza, Dif Juz, Tortoise) gives this track a certain cool swagger that most furrow-browed "post-rock" bands fail to achieve.  The cello playing is credited to a guy named John Rogers.

LIVE PIC (2013) [coming tomorrow]

Planets with similar climates: Trans Am - "Trans Am" (1995), Metallica - "Orion" (1986), Mogwai - "Mogwai Fear Satan" (1997), Sonic Youth - "Death To Our Friends" (1986).

Swirlies >> She's got a gun in her drawer that's meant for me

Swirlies - "Park The Car By The Side Of The Road"

(Taang! Records, 1992)

I wrote this post last September & October, but for some reason never got around to posting it.  So since I'm doing Massachusetts bands, here it is.  Sorry for the 2-month delay since the last post.

By the way, my mp3 hosing service, DivShare, has a new policy: "All your files will stay online as long as they are viewed at least once every 30 days. (Upgrade to keep your files online forever.)"  So it looks like most of the songs on this site will be deleted gradually, since I doubt anyone downloads or streams them very often.

Swirlies are the only band that I know of that has a song called "Chris R." (my name), but this song is much better. If there is ever a noise pop box set on Rhino -- Yes, I love saying "If there is ever a [genre] box set on Rhino..." -- this song ought to make the cut.  And its title could even be used as the name of this box set, since operating a motor vehicle while listening to such angular riffage could be dangerous.  Apparently the band named itself after the prank of putting someone's head in a toilet and flushing it.  I only recently learned that a melvin is a particularly severe type of wedgie, so I guess highbrow rock outfit the Melvins were named after that.  The name of this blog is a lyric in a song that's named after a wrist-abrasion technique.  Smashing Pumpkins are named after a prank in which you smash someone's pumpkins.  Bands... They're so funny!

The first time I ever heard of Swirlies was in a review of Modest Mouse's Interstate 8 EP in Alternative Press in fall '96.  I immediately bought that M.M. EP just because I assumed that any band that sounded like a band with the name "Swirlies" must have a really swirly, unique, shoegazey sound.  Yes, I bought a CD in large part because I liked the name of a band to which they were being compared in a review.  (Gotta love those pre-internet fumblings...  People these days have no idea how easy they have it.  One can now literally become an expert on some obscure old band in 20 minutes by just reading up on the right websites.)  That rationale turned out to be not quite accurate, but I'll still vouch for the quality of that Modest Mouse disc.

Jumping a year forward... In fall of '97 I decided to finally get into the Swirlies, after having heard about them in AOL's indie rock chatroom quite a bit that year...
October: I bought their Brokedick Car EP for about a dollar at a booth at the French Market in New Orleans and was fairly impressed.  (This purchase was overshadowed by the fact that I also bought You Am I's stunning Coprolalia EP from the same seller on the same day.)
November: I saw Syrup USA, a band helmed by former Swirlies singer Seana Carmody, at the Mermaid Lounge.  The crowd was about 10 people and it was freezing outside, but the Syrup still rocked out in a cutesy sort of way.  Syrup USA had a very keyboard-based sound, not the fuzzy noise-pop of Swirlies.  I even bought a t-shirt and both of their 7"s.
December: I bought this CD, Blonder Tongue Audio Baton (named after a guitar pedal) for my sister for Christmas.  I kind of soon "borrowed" it back and I don't think she ever really dug it.  The noisy guitar textures made me sit up and say "Dayumn," even though I was a huge Sonic Youth, MBV & Dino Jr.  fan and I had thought that genre was tapped out.  Swirlies obviously proved me wrong.  Anyway, Swirlies' heyday was a little before my time, so I never got to see them.  After Seana left the band, she was replaced by a soundalike named Christina Files, and uh, well, I don't like to sit here and give band bios unless I have some cool factoids to add, so you can go read an exorbitant amount about them on any number of fine websites.  If Swirlies hadn't been so in thrall to the early '90s slacker ethos popularized by Pavement, Archer Of Loaf, etc., they could've really been great.  They probably have the worst cover art of any band ever, aside from Pavement, and some irritatingly pointless song titles too.  In fact, my favorite Swirlies song overall is "Jeremy Parker", but I name-specific song titles annoy me so much that I couldn't allow myself to post that song.

This one goes out to the local band Glish, who apparently arrived at a similar sound as that of Swirlies without all members even knowing about them, or at least without trying to emulate them.  This could be compared to the biological concept called convergent evolution, a prime example of which is the similar appearances of the green tree python (Morelia viridis) from the Indo-Pacific and the emerald tree boa (Corallus caninus) from South America, which each evolved separately to sit in trees and be green while waiting for prey to pass below.

So, last month my sister got married and the band was Meschiya Lake and The Little Big Horns.  The first-dance song was the Cure's "Just Like Heaven."  Yes, it was weird seeing a female-fronted 1920's-style jazz band covering a Cure song.
In other musical news: The weekend before that, I went to Jazz Fest and caught Fleetwood Mac, Frank Ocean, and some Terence Blanchard and Stanley Clarke / George Duke.  Saw Pure X (chilled-out desert pop) + ArchAnimals (angsty emocore) at the Circle Bar.  This month I saw a typically kickass performance by A Place To Bury Strangers, opening for Japandroids at the Spanish Moon.  Also saw an incredibly fun and strange performance-art-y headlining set by Prince Rama at Circle Bar.  (The opening band, Spaceface, ended with a cover of David Bowie's glam classic "Moonage Daydream.")  Also saw a few songs at the AllWays Lounge by a promising band called Jane Jane.  They have recently relocated to New Orleans and shortened their name from Jane Jane Pollock.

In May and June I missed lots of concerts: Broken Water + Glish at someone's house called the Stripped Mall; Twin Shadow + Elliphant at Maison; Glish (opening for Coliseum) at Circle Bar; Faun Fables (headlined over Jane Jane but played first for some reason); Des Ark at the Big Top and at the Spanish Moon; the Record Raid on Piety Street.

Planets with similar climates: Mystery Machine - "Shaky Ground" (1992), Sonic Youth - "Silver Rocket" (1988), My Bloody Valentine - "Feed Me With Your Kiss" & "(When You Wake) You're Still In A Dream" (1988), Glish - "Future Things" & "Swings" (2012), Polvo - "Bend Or Break" (1992) & "High-Wire Moves" (1995), Pond - "Sideroad" (1995), Sebadoh - "Rebound" (1994).

Currently obsessed with: Sacred Grinds coffee house.  It's the size of a closet, but has some of the best food and smoothies in town, and two of the best baristas ever.

R.I.P. Maple Street Books Mid-City and Maple Street Books on St. Claude Ave.  Both closed on June 28th.  Not to be rude, but wouldn't it have helped if they had changed their names to fit into their respective neighborhoods?

Sebadoh >> I only need to feel a balance

Sebadoh - "Careful"

(Sub Pop Records, 1994)

Since the Boston Marathon bombing, I've been definitely catching some of the "We are all Bostonians" fever.  So my next few posts will be by Massachusetts bands, even though I've never been to that state.

I can't believe I've never posted this absolute scorcher of a song by Westfield's finest, so here it is.  I think some of the lyrics can work as a fuck-you to potential terrorists: "It's twice as hard to fool us" and "Careful as a soldier, we're so strong."  And the disarming opening line "Drop your guard, I'll get to know you" gives another way to deal with psychopaths.  This one was written by bassist / guitarist Jason Loewenstein, not mainman Lou Barlow.  J-Loew seems to have been responsible for some of Sebadoh's more manic / edgy / fleshed-out / non-"lo-fi" songs.

[Note: This mp3 is from the original '94 release, not the recent remastered 2-CD reissue.  That one has an alternate version of "Careful" on the bonus disc.]

I bought this album, Bakesale, in October 1996, on the same day that I bought Tool's Aenima on the day it came out.  My main reasons were: 1.) hearing the infectious indie classic song "Rebound" on a Sub Pop sampler CD called That Virtua Feeling: Sub Pop And Sega Get Together and 2.) a long article about Lou / Sebadoh punningly titled "Kind Of Blue" in Rolling Stone around that time.  (I was a subscriber.)  I also bought Smash Your Head On The Punk Rock at around this time through Sub Pop mailorder.  Despite the awful nude-Lou cover art, Bakesale is one of the most essential albums in rock history, not just indie rock history, from an era when the phrase "indie rock" meant more than just "a rock band on an independent label."  Every song is a cornucopia of inventive riffs, melodies and lyrics, and the band never came even close to equalling it before or after.  Some of the songs are slow and shoegazey ("Dreams"), and a few are quick and ultra-poppy ("Got It").  It comes off as a great mix tape seemingly made up of songs by many different bands, yet still retains that certain Sebadohness that fans demand.

I was totally crestfallen to miss a Sebadoh concert at the Howlin' Wolf (now called Republic) at the end of January '97.  As in: I fucking sat in the living room and watched an episode of 7th Heaven (yes, I remember exactly what I was watching) by myself and felt like such a poseur for liking Sebadoh but not knowing anyone to go see them with.  I think this was actually a transformative moment for me, in that it made me determined to go see bands I wanted to see even if that meant sometimes doing it alone.  And I later found out that Sebadoh had played just a few months earlier at House Of Blues, with a then-unknown moper / budding junkie named Elliott Smith as an opening act.  Then they came back and played somewhere in early '99 in support of their disappointing swan song The Sebadoh.  Have still never seen them, and have skipped lots of dates on their recent reunion tours, because I just don't go to reunion tours.  And because aside from this album, Sebadoh's overall discography is very hit-or-miss.  The only other songs by them that I'd say are in the same category of intensity as "Careful" would be "Beauty Of The Ride," "Crisis," and the speed-metal ending of "Mean Distance."

Loewenstein put out a well-received solo album about a decade ago, but I've never heard it.  Dinosaur Jr.'s reunion has taken Barlow away from his Sebaduties.  Dino are stuck in a classic rock rut, so I personally would rather take in the more varied stylings of Sebadoh, if given a chance to see one of them or the other.  At one point in my life, I would've shouted "Just gimme indie rock!"  It's a new generation of electric white-boy blues!

Funniest / truest thing I've seen on Tumblr in a while:

#voodoofest #jazzfest

Sat. Apr. 13: Went to a crawfish boil at Sprague's new house, and he decided to let me landscape it after we talked about trees for an hour or so.

Fri. Apr. 19: Skipped a Crystal Castles / Doldrums concert at HOB because it was $31 plus a $10 "service fee."  I had been wanting to go for months but I just couldn't justify the cost.  I'm sure it sold out anyway.

Sat. Apr. 20: Caught the end of a Record Store Day concert at Euclid Records.  Saw Truth Universal (politically-charged hip-hop), AF The Naysayer (futuristic beatmaking), and Peace Love Technicolor Dream (collaborated on sax with AF, then did a solo house set on MacBook).  I then by total chance caught a free happy-hour show by the hilarious Alex McMurray (honestly, he's funnier than any stand-up comedian I can think of) at Siberia, and got some of their excellent Slavic / Russian food.

Tonight and tomorrow night: Skipping Deerhunter for about the infinityith time because I still think they suck, aside from half a song or so per album.  The amount of press they continue to get is nothing short of baffling to me.  In the '90s heyday of indie rock, a band with their talent level would've barely merited a mention in its own hometown's zines, but I guess by today's standards they're considered edgy / inventive / cool, thanks to the ongoing wussification & dilution of indie rock into mere sonic wallpaper in which bands try to relay to the listener "Okay, on this song we show that we're into the Beach Boys, and on this next one we do an homage to the Replacements, and then we're gonna blow everyone's minds by showing that we dig synth-pop!," etc.  "Record-collector rock," it's been wisely called.  Well, Deerhunter seem to be one of the token RCR bands of the '00s, so more power to them, I guess, and I do feel bad for the singer since he has Marfan Syndrome and presumably doesn't have too many more years left to live.  I don't even know if they have any synth-pop songs; I was mainly referring to the Strokes with that one.  I guess I should just shut up at this point.  If Deerhunter has any songs that I should like, let me know; I only like "Helicopter" by them, mainly b/c it sounds unlike any of their regular output.

Planets with similar climates: Dinosaur Jr. - "Let It Ride" (1988), The Sound - "The Fire" (1981), Sand Rubies - "Drugged" (1993), Polvo - "Tragic Carpet Ride" (1994), Sonic Youth - "Stereo Sanctity" (1987), Fugazi - "Sieve-Fisted Find" (1989).

Love Of Diagrams >> You broke into my house and you stole it

Love Of Diagrams - "The Pyramid"

(Matador Records [U.S.] / P-Vine Records [Japan], 2006)

Since I was befriended by an Aussie on both RYM and Tumblr last week (two separate people), I knew my next post on here had to be a killer Aussie song.

With a killer bassline, spiky guitar, mammoth drumming, and a set of memorable lyrics, this song should've made Love Of Diagrams into instant indie rock royalty.  This song just destroys on so many levels, and is one of the most addictive songs I've ever heard.  Sonic Youth have been unable or unwilling to craft a tune like this since the mid-'90s, so I guess it's good that they finally kicked the bucket, but the point is that their progeny will always continue to churn out great music.  Just look at the list of bands at the bottom of this post for proof.

Note: Matador Records is still giving this song away for free; download it here.  That link is where I originally acquired this song, though this rip is from my own CD, bought in 2010.

I had been hearing a bit about this band as part of the whole post-punk revival of the mid-'00s, and thought about going to see them open for Ted Leo at the Spanish Moon in 2007.  Really, really regretting that.  They have apparently been broken up for a few years now, and, being from Australia, the chances are less than zero that they'll ever trek to Louisiana again.  The lyrics are apparently about rape, with "the pyramid" representing the vagina, which the intruder "broke into."  And what he "stole" was presumably the protagonist's innocence and/or trust in humanity.  So it's a fun & thought-provoking protest song in the best Gang Of Four tradition, but hopefully the lyrics are not autobiographical.

The video mainly involves the band members physically playing their instruments, which is the stupidest fucking thing in the world for any music video to feature. But an edgy "house" theme is used in it, tying in with the lyrics, and the visual effects are pretty amazing.  In fact, you'll never be able to get these colors out of your head whenever you hear this song in the future:

My sister had her appendix removed last week, so I made her this mix CD.  Last weekend, I met my future sister-in-law Mila, and lent her some CDs to copy (The Church's Heyday, Sonic Youth's Daydream Nation).  We also went to brunch at Commander's Palace with the whole fam, and to the Spring Garden Show at City Park.  It was my first time going to Commander's in almost 20 years.  Also went to Parkway Bakery & Tavern (best chicken po-boy of my life) and Angelo Brocato's later that night.  (Thought I was pretty clever for including a song about having a sliver of herself removed...  And the Black Flag song has the lyric "Keep me alive / Only you can do it."  And so forth with some other medical-related lyrics.)

I snapped this pic of an impressive Mammillaria bombycina (Silken pincushion cactus), a recent addition to the cactus / succulent greenhouse at the N.O. Botanical Garden.
I have three of these myself (tip: get one right now at Lowe's or Home Depot), but none of mine have clustered like this one, which must be 10-15 years old.

On Monday, I skipped the 2nd half of the college basketball championship to see a rock concert starring Merchandise, White Lung, and Glish.  Glish were great as usual, and debuted two new songs, but sadly didn't play longtime set opener "Collider."  Luckily they played the quite similar song "Sex."  White Lung just kicked all kinds of ass, especially on my two favorite songs of theirs, "Bag" and "Take The Mirror."  I expect them to go down as the key hardcore band of this generation.  Singer Mish Way seemed a bit annoyed with the crowd's passivity, and I was thinking to myself how their set would've spawned a serious mosh pit back in the '90s.  Oh well.  Merchandise now have a human drummer, and crooner Carson Cox now plays guitar, and they now have a sax player on a few songs.  So their sound was much fuller (and I would say sometimes too full / busy) as compared to last fall, when they only had two human-played instruments (guitar and bass), plus a drum machine.  DJ Wesley Stokes played some good stuff, such as Slowdive's "Morningrise," My Bloody Valentine's "You Made Me Realise," and CHVRCHES' "The Mother We Share."  And speaking of Sonic Youth, Carson wore a Chelsea Light Moving t-shirt.

I planned on seeing the movie Spring Breakers, but its theater run seems to be over.  I will say without shame that I've seen Ashley Benson's movie Fab Five: The Texas Cheerleader Scandal about 5 times.  One of the most quotable movies ever.

Woman arrested for beating up boyfriend after he got wasted and sang that annoying Macklemore song, "Thrift Shop," 25.5 times on his 26th birthday - "Enraged, Samantha started to shove Lars, but he still wouldn't stop singing the song. So she grabbed him by the throat and started to choke him (wait, now it's the worst birthday ever)."  Couldn't you have at least let him finish the 26th rendition?  Now he'll subconsciously just be wanting to sing it even more.

Planets with similar climates: Drop Nineteens - "Delaware" (1992), Bleach - "First" (1991), A.C. Temple - "Miss Sky" (1988), Gang Of Four - "It Is Not Enough" (1982), Springhouse - "Enslave Me" (1992), The Black Watch - "Come Inside" (1994), Catherine Wheel - "Chrome" (1993), Moonshake - "Spaceship Earth" (1992).

Sebadoh (Lou Barlow) >> Turning personal vendetta and small-minded revenge tactics into eventual cult status

Sebadoh - "Showtape '91"

(unreleased, 1991 / Domino Records, 2006)

On their 1991 tour, burgeoning indie rock stalwarts Sebadoh were known for playing a tape of obnoxious / baffling spoken word stuff in between songs while they were tuning.  (By the same token, Sonic Youth were known for playing Madonna songs and samples of European church bells in between songs in the '80s, since they had to tune and retune dozens of modified guitars.)  It was all spoken by singer / guitarist Lou Barlow, fresh off of being kicked out of Dinosaur Jr.  Tapes of this were passed on in the underground tape-trading community, and it was finally released in 2006 by Domino on the deluxe reissue of III.  I bought that album in '97, but was not too impressed and soon sold it.  I had heard about the showtape, so I didn't think it could live up to my expectations, but definitely did, and then some.  Lou spoof lots of things that later became indie tropes (e.g. "drone-rock," emo, fanzine dweebs, Swans worship), and uses a strange enunciation most of the time to convey either sarcasm or mental instability.  He constantly hammers away at the "three guys" premise, casting the band's members as everymen, heroes of the hoi polloi.  Towards the end, it starts to get unhinged and quite uncomfortable to listen to, as Lou ruthlessly skewers his band's own motives for making music.  It took me until just today to realize that "The lonely band that mutters" is a spoof of the Clash's laughably false slogan "The only band that matters."  Hahahahahaha.... x 1000.  The first line is an example of Lou intentionally messing up the syntax to make it sound more like a sound collage made from various sources.

Some samples, in the order they appear:

"Guitars, in front of Marshall stacks as full wall of them explode with a simultaneous on switch, begin wailing various percussion at any tempo.  I, bloody with Uzi blast, reach to play guitar, fumbling violently as it screeches through the Marshalls.  Grab guitar and plays what he wants.  I struggle to my feet, hoisting the guitar over my head.  Ladies and gentlemen: The pieces of meat!  Dual denial... Duel of denial... Dueling denial."
"Your postmodern folkcore saviors: Sebadoh!"
"Three guys who appreciate and simulate [assimilate?] the power of modern drone-rock: Sebadoh!"
"Sebadoh... Featuring that guy who played bass in Soul Asylum: Lou Barlow!"
"Another evening of oppressive noodling, courtesy of Sebadoh!"
"Three guys in search of the eternal party: Sebadoh."
"Open-chord tuning saviors of alternative rock and roll: Sebadoh!"
"And now, shattering the barrier between artist and audience... Three guys with smiles you can trust: Sebadoh."
"Three more reasons to doubt your boyfriend... Sebadoh: Jason, Eric and Lou."
"Guitar, bass, percussion... The fire, the wind, the heartbeat. A live experience surely among the top ten this year: Sebadoh."
"Three guys who think it's much more important if the music is heartfelt rather than if the music sounds like shit or not: Sebadoh!"
"The east is where the vampires live. The west is where the searchers go. Searching for a reason just like you: Ladies and gentlemen, the sensitive power of Sebadoh."
"In the tradition of Daniel Johnston under a cloud of hiss: Sebadoh!"
"Searching for a reason, just like you. Ladies and gentlemen, the sensitive power of Sebadoh."
"It's not bullshit, it's Sebadoh."
"Distinctive songwriters, any Beatle wannabe, three guys you need to know. Super show, Sebadoh!"
"Unencumbered by structure... masters of melodic, atonal free-association. Three free spirits... Jason, Eric and Lou: Sebadoh!"
"A crystal shining forever moment, courtesy of Sebadoh!"
"Sweet, destructive, turning musical corners at breakneck speed."
"Battling monumental indifference, sadly overlooked as creatively inferior bands are basically treated like geniuses and receive enormous recording budgets. Buns up to corporate wastemongers: Sebadoh!"
"Three dumpy guys with no fashion sense."
"Shaking hands or sharing feasts, three friendly minstrels who aren't very friendly... Reinventing folk music: Sebadoh!"
"Boys and girls, as free as the fingers flow, a heartful drone you should know: Sebadoh."
"Sebadoh: The lonely band that mutters."
"Perhaps smoking pot or drinking beer before setting foot onstage, it's Sebadoh."
"Figuratively pissing in your mouth, humiliating and subduing your spirit, exposing every nook and cranny of the human psyche... Way to go, Sebadoh!"
"Searching for the lowest common denominator, resorting to tired tales of naughty-boy boredom, asking annoying questions and providing bogus answers. Self-serving closet fascists making money from marijuana masturbation."
"Incompetence masquerading as inspiration, inspiration mistaken for true talent, a spectre of egocentric behavior sputtering wildly out of control.  Ladies and gentlemen, indie rock's newest unrecognized genius of songwriting sucker-punch, in a minivan for a six-week tour: Sebadoh!"
"Taking every opportunity to subtly manipulate your expectations for a moment's amusement.  Becoming suddenly bored at your immature attempt to engage our approval with your typical butt-licking fanboy fervor: Sebadoh!"
"Driving dozens of college-age lemmings off the cliff of limited imagination. Smashing their soft skulls on the jagged boulders of our bitter sarcasm... Three assholes: Sebadoh!"
"Laughing at your shortcomings, tactlessly wielding destructive honesty to protect themselves from true feeling, eagerly butt-fucking your grandpa."
"Turning personal vendetta and small-minded revenge tactics into eventual cult status... The only man in the world who truly appreciated the genius of the Swans: Lou Barlow!"
"Rescuing wounded animals and diligently nursing them back to health and returning them to their woodland homes: Sebadoh!"
"Putting down everything, judging all as lame.  But for all their hype as something new, they play the same old game.  Another letdown, another reason to do it yourself: Sebadoh!"

Some of today's pompous indie-hero windbags (Arcade Fire, Conor Oberst, and Radiohead / Thom Yorke come to mind quickly) could learn a lot from Lou and the boys on this track.

Here's a pic I found a few weeks ago of a pair of flyers created by the NOLADIY guys.  They apparently date back to at least 2006, maybe earlier. The one on the left is a spoof of the "punk police" (people who decide whether or not a band is worthy of remaining relevant), I guess.  (I think I remember reading that it was put up in protest of a gig at One Eyed Jacks by the Dead Kennedys after they had reformed without Jello Biafra, but I could be totally wrong.)  Pretty simple and effective... but the one on the right really stopped me in my tracks:

Reverse psychology can be a great weapon...

Best / least pompous bio I've probably ever seen, found today on IMDB's message boards for the movie School Daze: LadyGlamSlam - "I was born, I grew, I learned, there was pain, I got fat, then there was some sex scenes, roll credits."

Planets with similar climates: None