Pure Bathing Culture >> You know it's your time, you're the one

Pure Bathing Culture - "Pendulum"

(Partisan Records [U.S.] / Memphis Industries [Europe],  2013)

It's a huge honor to present this song.  I first heard it in summer 2k13 on Sirius' XM U station.  I was immediately floored that an unknown new band could barge out of the gates with such a masterfully-crafted song.  (Though I secretly wondered if Pure Bathing Culture was Memoryhouse under a new name...)  And the opening jangly guitar chords made me think it was a cover of the Go-Betweens' brilliant "Streets Of Your Town" (see video embedded below), but luckily it turned out to be an entirely new song by an entirely new band, and it blew me an entirely new mind.

This truly should've been a massive radio hit.  If you're a fan of production like I am, you'll revel in every little detail of this song as it leaps out of the speakers with unmitigated authority, and it will truly be stuck in your head for the rest of your life.  I'm sure the band's manager or publicist is a nice person, and was smart enough to choose to work with such a talented band, but he or she needs to be replaced immediately.  In America's current musical climate, in which completely hookless, soulless songs by the likes of Vampire Weekend, Arctic Monkeys, and Arcade Fire are becoming hits or semi-hits left and right, it should be pretty easy for any trained squid to finesse this song onto playlists nationwide.  Obviously it did get onto Sirius, which is quite a taste-making entity, but the only times I've heard it on WTUL were when I requested it.  In fact, a DJ last fall played it back-to-back with "Streets Of Your Town," at my request.  I also got KLSU to play it last fall at my request.  It was on some sort of regular rotation on Sirius XM U, because I heard it several more times there.  In fact, Sirius was so devoted to this band that they hosted a live in-studio performance / interview session in September.  I recorded some of it, mainly because the lyrics to "Pendulum" were a lot easier to make out in the live version.  Watch it here.

Here's the Go-Betweens song I mentioned above.  Check out how similar the opening guitar part is to that of "Pendulum":

Note: That's the "big-budget" version of the video; there was also a more low-key original version that focused more literally on the streets of an Aussie town.  So, if the Go-Bees were able to get TWO videos made for their killer song, how come Pure Bathing Culture didn't even get one? Refer back to the criticisms I had for PBC's management...)

Download an interesting remix of this song called "Pendulum (Women's Hour Edit)" for free here.

Stairway left after bombing of Aleppo, Syria by the Assad regime. This reminded me of a pendulum.
(Posted by Tumblr user miymintimatmazel; photographer unknown.)

Planets with similar climates: The Go-Betweens - "Streets Of Your Town" (1988), Puro Instinct - "Slivers Of You" (2010), Cocteau Twins - "Heaven Or Las Vegas" (1990), Memoryhouse - "Heirloom" & "Sleep Patterns" (2011), Spiritualized - "Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space" (1997), Wild Nothing - "Through The Grass" (2012), Slowdive - "Alison" (1993).

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).

Lid >> The atmosphere is somewhere very, very close to here

Lid - "Up"

(Brilliant Records, 1992)

In early 2010 I was at The Mushroom and picked up a compilation CD called Something Pretty Beautiful from the pile of free used CDs that they sometimes stack up at the top of the entry stairway.  (They give away CDs that have gone unsold for years, sometimes for over a decade.)  When listening to the track by a band called Lid, something sounded very familiar to me.  I was all "This is like a bluesier, more psychedelic version of Poem Rocket!"  Well, it turns out Lid was P.R. singer / guitarist Michael Peters' previous band, and as far as I know, this was the only song they ever released, though hopefully I'm wrong.  Doing an online search for "lid" + "up" does not exactly return many music-related results.

"The atmosphere is somewhere very, very close to here" is a pretty unique way of saying that one is at a high altitude.  All the elements of Poem Rocket's genius are present here.  This song really takes the major-label suits on a wild rollercoaster courtship ride in the confusing wake of Nirvana, and makes them get out their pens and start clicking them to test if the ink works before fishing around in their pockets for a piece of paper on which to scrawl a multi-album contract for Lid to sign.  That's how good of a song it is.  The production values are simply stunning, with some of the most "3-D" surround-sound I've ever heard.  The closing guitar onslaught (3:58 mark) all but leaps out of the speakers; I really can't emphasize the coolness of this last part enough.  You have to listen to this song on a good stereo or with headphones, but it does sound rather massive even on small speakers, without relying on simple loudness.  I made this a high-quality 224 kbps file for maximum shock and awe.

Poem Rocket's press kit .pdf (see two posts ago), says that Peters lived in both Ohio and Virginia before moving to NYC and forming Poem Rocket.  Brilliant Records was based in Richmond, so it makes sense that this compilation has a good amount of VA bands, especially since the northern VA / southern MD area was really fertile with great bands at the time... Not that I knew this when I went to the Univ. of Richmond for a year in the mid-'90s, sadly.  The Virginia bands on this comp. are: Fudge (Richmond), The Knievels (Chester), Lid (Richmond), Lorelei (Arlington), The Petals (Richmond), Schwa (Richmond), The Technical Jed (Richmond), The Tribbles (Richmond), Twitch Hazel (Richmond), Ultra Cindy (Chesapeake), The Waking Hours (Midlothian).  The booklet says Lid also put out some stuff on a label called Radioactive Rat, which I really need to hear.  Unfortunately, the liner notes don't list the members of the bands.  I found out that Something Pretty Beautiful was the name of a band on Creation Records, so this comp must've been named after them.

Speaking of the word "Lid" and the mid-'90s, I once went on a date with this girl Lydia in May '95, my last month of high school.  (That was also the month I got accepted into the Univ. of Richmond.)  We went to a women's beach volleyball match at Coconut Beach (R.I.P.) and then went to Blockbuster Music, where I bought Jeff Buckley's Grace on cassette.  I popped it in the tape deck, and it was kind of awkward listening to "Last Goodbye"'s line "Kiss me, pleeeease kiss meeee" during the car ride back to her place to drop her off.  And no, we didn't.  Strangely, the last time I ever saw her was on the morning of 9/11/11, walking across the campus of Loyola Univ. in New Orleans.

Planets with similar climates: Swervedriver - "Deep Seat" (1991) & "Duress" (1993), Juno (with Jen Wood) - "A Listening Ear" (1998), Acetone - "Sundown" (1993), Temple Of The Dog - "Reach Down" (1990), Nudeswirl - "Three" (1993), Big Head Todd & The Monsters - "Circle" (1993), Screaming Trees - "Shadow Of The Season" (1992), Soundgarden - "Blind Dogs" (1995).

Currently eating or drinking: Vincotto orange velvety condiment (fermented grape & orange must), BelGioioso mascarpone, Rouses polder goat gouda, Brooklyn Brewery Black Chocolate Stout, Naturally Delicious banana bread.

St*Johnny >> I wanna burn like a martyr in my Chevrolet

St*Johnny - "Go To Sleep"

(Ajax Records, 1992 / Caroline Records [U.S.], 1993; Rough Trade Records [U.K.], 1993)

This song was released as a 7" by cool indie Ajax in '92, and then appeared on the band's High As A Kite singles compilation the next year.  (The U.S. version on Caroline, which I own, has 11 tracks, while the U.K. version on Rough Trade has only 8.)  This type of song is a perfect example of why I started this site: An obscure indie band releases a universe-destroyingly great anthem; no one hears it back in the day; the band breaks up; the song languishes in cool ppl's mix tapes / closets / iTunes for years or decades until the song decides to break free and assert itself much like when the robots rose in T2: Judgment Day.  The only unfortunate thing about this song is its name, which does not exactly generate much excitement, especially when the mundane band name is factored in.  Note: They sometimes spelled their name St. Johnny (in the early days), st. johnny, or St Johnny, and the asterisked (DGC-era) version of their name is technically spelled st✮johnny.

Reviews and zines from the early to mid '90s always pointed out how St*Johnny were protegés of Sonic Youth, though I think they were more aligned with fellow New Yorkers Mercury Rev.  (The Rev's Grasshopper guested on at least three of their songs: "Velocity," "My Father's Father," "Matador.")  Either way, this kind of thing is always a double-edged sword.  The band was allegedly scoffed at relentlessly, at least by the hipsters and tastemakers of the era, which seems really sad to me.  This song obviously has a ton of S.Y.-esque characteristics and charisma, down to the Thurston-y vocals, but it is definitely its own beast.  To describe how awesome this song is would take me a while, but I don't think most people need a roadmap to its bounty.  That one killer guitar riff immediately grabs the attention, and melds perfectly with the vocals, which are delivered in a desperate way, and with interesting post-Lou Reed / Tom Verlaine enunciation.  It's a really amazing vocal performance overall.  He says "I know that we're in trouble now, and I know that we're in deep" and "You're cursed and I'm a liar" without explaining the conflict in question.  More cool lyrics: "If we live long enough we'll see the other side of everything," "The stars are out and they're comin' down on my head," and of course "I wanna burn like a martyr in my Chevrolet."  (Note: I had thought for the last decade that it was "I wanna burn like the motor in my Chevrolet.")  The somewhat detuned, violin-esque guitar anti-solo at the 2:29 mark is the perfect bridge between arena dino-rock and the noisy indie rock of the '90s.  And I love when any instrumental break is preceded by a frenzied volley of drumming.  Another cool touch is that the song's title is only uttered right before the guitar solo and as the final words of the song.  I mean, check this out, they should build a whole museum dedicated to this song, if only so that lame, putzy, non-rocking rock bands like Wilco, Arcade Fire, Spoon, etc. can make pilgrimages to it in order to learn how to rock like motherfuckers.
The band's proper debut album in '94 had the great title Speed Is Dreaming.  But, aside from the killer "A Car Or A Boy?" (featuring some backing vocals from Mercury Rev's head weirdo David Baker), sucked.  I owned that CD but actually threw it away years ago; wish I had it back to check it out again, though.  Being signed to DGC (Nirvana, Sonic Youth, Beck, Posies, Sundays) apparently didn't land them in the Buzz Bin, and they faded into obscurity in the mid-'90s.  Singer Bill Whitten reemerged with the band Grand Mal (named after a St*Johnny song, which was named after a type of seizure) soon afterwards, but I don't think I've ever heard them.

7" insert sheet

Well, I was very wrong about Hurricane Isaac last week.  It turned out to be one of the worst disasters in the state's history, and was much more of a rainmaker than I had anticipated.  Luckily I had trimmed most of my trees a week or two earlier, so they didn't blow around too much in the wind and suffer torsional stress injuries to their trunks.  Since the eye of the hurricane passed directly over us, I went out and trimmed them a little more during that calm period.  That day (Wednesday) was probably the most harrowing day of my life, due to all the wind and rain noise, and not being able to see the origin of it since most of the windows were shuttered closed.  We never lost power, though over a million people statewide did.  And it's fun to be able to walk around the house butt-ass naked, thanks to the boarded window thing.  I drove through Gonzales, Prairieville, & Baton Rouge a few days later and ended up scoring this t-shirt at FYE:

...as well as the Stooges' Fun House 2xCD reissue and a rather tame CD by a band called The Mysteries Of Life. The store was playing Portishead's first album, so I recommended Slowdive to the Asian employee who had put it on after he told me he was a big Cocteau Twins fan.

Mon. 3rd: Went to Cocodrie (old Cajun slang term for "crocidile"), right on one of the southernmost tips of Louisiana.  Listened to Verve's A Storm In Heaven, perhaps the ultimate roadtrip album.  The area pretty much got no damage.
Tue. 4th: Watched Batman Begins at my sister's, since my parents in N.O. still hadn't gotten power back.
Wed. 5th: Went used book shopping for a few hours at The Book Rack in Mandeville, then drove over through Lacombe & Slidell.

Planets with similar climates: Sonic Youth - "Hey Joni" (1988), Verve - "All In The Mind" (1992), Swervedriver - "Blowin' Cool" (1993), Ride - "Here And Now" (1990), Catherine Wheel - "Texture" (1992), Silversun Pickups - "Well Thought Out Twinkles" (2006), Glide [Australia] - "Taste Of You" (1992), Nice Strong Arm - "Cloud Machine" (1989), You Am I - "Berlin Chair" (1993).

The Bevis Frond >> I drown, I get resuscitated

The Bevis Frond - "Desperate"

(Woronzow Records, 1993)

This is just a dope as hell song that fuses classic rock stylings (Stones, Hendrix, Clapton) with enough Stooges / Dinosaur Jr. bite to keep the Pitchfork kids from feeling like their own dads.  Trust me, Pitchfork kids are way lamer than their own dads.  I think I once read Nick Saloman say in an interview that he saw Hendrix live, or maybe it's just that he was really into him as a kid growing up in England in the '60s.  In any case, his congested voice and badass way of brandishing a guitar would please even the most discerning Jimi fan.  The way the guitar line doubles / rises imperceptibly right as Nick sings "love me" in the chorus is so spine-tinglingly cool, and dare I say sexy.  The line "I get insufficient adulation" needs to be made into a t-shirt.  The song is from their album It Just Is, which was directly responsible for kicking off the annoying "It is what it is" craze.

I first heard the Frond via their amazing Pink Floyd-esque epic "Requiem" on a Darla Records sampler CD in '97 or '98.  It's more psychedelic and vast than the compact rocker "Desperate," so I would say those two songs perfectly encapsulate each extreme of the band's sound.  (Well, much like Guided By Voices, it's really a solo project of Nick Saloman + a rotating cast of backing members.)  Their discography is large, and I only own a few CDs, so I can't preach about which ones you should buy; sorry.  But a third song I can highly recommend is the evocative "Coming Round" from the album London Stone.  The Frondies rarely performed live, mainly preferring to rock out at the annual Terrastock festivals.

Back of CD booklet; note the fact that Nick Saloman did literally everything on this album except the "engineering."

Fun Fact: After seeing psychedelic warriors White Hills last year, I asked their singer / guitarist if he was into the Bevis Frond.  His eyes got wide and he told me he was a big fan.  (IIRC, we both gave props to "Reqiuem.")  Bevis Frond fandom is sort of like a secret society.

Let's see, in the last three weeks....
I did the Nielsen ratings again, after doing them in Feb.
I decided to do "Meatless Mondays" from now on, after hearing Rush Limbaugh relentlessly mock it on his show one day in late July.  "Eat nothing but beef from now on!," he implored his Dittoheads.  Having been a vegetarian for two years, it shouldn't be too hard.
I caught the end of a Saints practice on Fri. morning, Aug. 3.  Drew Brees signed autographs right next to me afterwards, but I didn't have a pen or anything to sign.  Man.
I went to the New Orleans Botanical Garden the next day and took a bunch of photos.  Also notified them of a mislabeled palm (A Chamaerops humilis labeled as a Washingtonia robusta!  I know, I almost laughed too.)
I have been watching the XXXth Olympiad obsessively, like most other true Americans.
I read a horrifying article on the rise of dubstep in SPIN.

Surprisingly addictive TV shows:
The Newsroom (HBO)
The Girls' Guide To Depravity (Cinemax)
Bar Rescue (Spike)
Victorious (Nickelodeon)
Women's fencing; anything with Alex Morgan or Allyson Felix (Olympics on NBC)
Restaurant: Impossible (Food)
Dan LeBatard Is Highly Questionable (ESPN2)
Showbiz Tonight (HLN) (mainly because of former FOX 8 Saints reporter Nischelle Turner)
It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia (reruns on Comedy Central)

I watched upwards of an hour of rhythmic gymnastics just to espy this particular athlete but came up empty-handed:

Canadian rhythmic gymnast Kelsey Titmarsh, doing the "geeky glasses with no lenses in them" thing, concurrently popularized by Dwyane Wade, Russell Westbrook, etc.

Not to be confused with:

Noted non-Olympian Sally Jesse Raphael

Video showing every Space Shuttle launch at the same time::

Related: 30 years, 135 launches in 135 seconds

Unfun Fact: My elementary school class in San Francisco watched the Challenger explosion occur live on a TV set that our teacher had wheeled into the classroom.

Planets with similar climates: Pink Floyd - "Young Lust" (1979), Acetone - "Sundown" & "Pinch" (1993), Meat Puppets - "Scum" (1995), Lynyrd Skynyrd - "Gimme Back My Bullets" (1975), Jimi Hendrix - "Crosstown Traffic" (1967), The Rolling Stones - "Brown Sugar" (1969), Screaming Trees - "Shadow Of The Season" & "Nearly Lost You" (1992).

Sovetskoe Foto >> Seeing you breathing is my inspiration

Sovetskoe Foto - "Cellophane Laughter"

(Rebel Rec. / SPV Recordings, 1991)

I don't really know anything about this band, especially what this song title meant.  That really irritates me.  While looking for their music on eBay, I ascertained that their name was taken from an old Soviet photography magazine called... Sovetskoe Foto.  The members of the band, at least on this album, were Georg S. Huber (bass), Walter Sterr (guitars), Stefan Busch (vocals), and Marc Turiaux (drums).  They hailed from Rosenheim, Germany, but recorded this album, The Humidity, in NYC with esteemed noise rock producer Martin Bisi.  I bought this CD on a whim for a dollar at the Tulane Record Raid in March of last year, drawn in by the cover art and song titles.  To read my overly long review of it, go here and look under the username shockofDAYLIGHT.  The song itself starts off funky and sleazy, and would be pretty memorable if it just continued on that way for its duration.  But it undergoes a sudden Helmet-style breakdown and then a speedy tribal part.  Just amazing, breathtaking musical talent, especially the rhythm section (translation: drummer + bassist).  Though the rest of the album doesn't live up to this song, the jarring, Bare Minimum-esque "Necromancer" and the ultra-funky, The Pop Group-esque "Stay Tonight" are noteworthy.

"Seeing you breathing is my inspiration" is a blithely romantic line upon first listen, and later becomes evident as a great pun when you realize what the medical definition of "inspiration," as part of the system known as respiration, means.  Also buried under the instrumental fireworks is the line "Struck my eyes with a thousand lights."  Jim Thirlwell (a.k.a. Foetus) sings guest vox on the feral "Forget".

Fun Fact: Sovetskoe Foto's publicity company was named Art Rock Mgmt.

CDs in my car on March 8th; top one is Secret Life Of Machines by Doldrums.

Friday: Ate at Clancy's with parents, Em & Damion. Met one of D's brothers, who played hoops at (I think) Swarthmore.  I had the best bread pudding of my life for dessert.

Saturday: Went to Mandeville & took my customary stroll through the Northlake Nature Center, which is sort of a Zenlike ritual that I always do when I'm up there.  The flora really is quite different from that of the south shore of the lake.  A big black snake with yellow spots slithered right in front of me, and I, a former aspiring herpetologist, was sadly unable to identify it.  I semi-accidentally took a root pup of one of my all-time favorite tree species, Vaccinium arboreum (Sparkleberry or Tree Huckleberry).  It has some roots so hopefully it will live.  The pup I took in Dec. 2010 died.
Then went to a great plant nursery called Inwood Gardens in Covington.  They had dozens of unlabeled cacti & succulents, so I volunteered to write their Latin names on the sides of their pots.  So I did this off the top of my head (no books) for about half an hour.  Finally one of my useless talents came in handy... The lady working in that greenhouse seemed pretty bemused.  Bought an Agave guiengola, which I never thought I'd see in person, much less be able to buy.  Just look at this motherfucker reclining in a group of them, living the high life while you sit here on your computer.

Tuesday: Went to Baton Rouge to see School Of Seven Bells and EXITMUSIC at the Spanish Moon.  On the way, I stopped at the Blockbuster Video that's going OOB and scored a bunch more obscure foreign (mostly) flicks for $2 each.  Then I hit up FYE and got lots of kewl cheapo used CDs (The Heart Throbs, Hooverphonic, The Railway Children, Secret Machines, Sunny Day Real Estate, King Missile, Heather Duby + Elemental, Teenage Fanclub).  Passed on a Zapp CD due to its lame song titles.  I made it to the essentially empty club just in time, and saw SVIIB's Ben Curtis shooting pool upstairs.  As befitting their Radiohead-based name, EXITMUSIC were not too exciting, kinda dirgey, like Beach House meets Swans or something.  I think I just heard half of the blogosphere pop a boner after hearing that description.  They opened with "Sea," and closed with a great new song, "Sparks Of Light," from their upcoming LP Passage.  Their guitarist played it using a cello bow, Jimmy Page-style.  They were so loud that all kinds of things were rattling throughout the club, and I hence didn't even try to take a video clip of them.  SVIIB came on like a well-oiled machine and delivered a great performance to a crowd of only 40-50 people.  I saw them open for Interpol last April in front of almost 1000 people, so I was crestfallen that they had to headline for so few people.  The club had only put up a few crude flyers, so I mainly blame the club's management.  This time SVIIB had four members, whereas last year it was two, or maybe three.  Anyway, their new LP Ghostory is the one that I predicted would make them Big, but it seems the public is not paying attention, even though Katy Perry(!) is apparently a fan, according to every recent YouTube commenter.  (E.g. "katy perry sent me here XD")  Their setlist: Intro (sampled chanting of "I am here... I am here..."), Iamundernodisguise, Scavenger, Windstorm, Bye Bye Bye, Love Play, White Elephant Coat, Lafaye, The Night, I L U, White Wind, Low Times, My Cabal.  No encore.  No "Babelonia," which was their first song at the NOLA show last year.  Bought a cool white t-shirt afterwards with the "Kiss Them For Me" 7" cover art on it.

The two logo things were flickering lights of varying colors via MIDI; my flash unfortunately negated it.
Not shown: 1.) The entertaining way that the singer shakes her head from side to side after every line. 2.) The guitarist's SVIIB chest tattoo.

Offensive wallpapers

Planets with similar climates: The Pop Group - "Sense Of Purpose" (~1980), Shudder To Think - "Goat" (1992) & "Gang Of $" (1994), Gang Of Four - "Damaged Goods" (1979), Live Skull - "Machete" (1987), Polvo - "Highwire Moves" (1995), Fugazi - "Sieve-Fisted Find" (1990), Tanner - "Hey Jigsaw" (1995).

A Place To Bury Strangers >> You make my dreams complete and then crash them down

A Place To Bury Strangers - "I Lived My Life To Stand In The Shadow Of Your Heart"

(Self-released, ca. 2006; Mute Records, 2009)

The band first put this song on a self-released CD-R EP, recorded in 2005 or 2006, and then re-recorded it for their album Exploding Head on venerable Mute Records.

Original 2006 version:

2009 re-recording:

The re-recorded version is over a minute longer and has much clearer vocals, sacrificing little of the feral intensity of the original version, so I think most people will favor it.
As I've seen some other astute fans point out, this song is heavily indebted to both of the songs ("Beach Song" and "Take Me Down") that comprise Slowdive's 1992 flexi 7".  (Yes, Slowdive used to rock pretty hard for a brief while.)  And it even brazenly has the lyric "I want to take you down," and they also have a song called "Missing You" which is not a cover of Slowdive's song "Missing You."  If you want to hear the lyrics very clearly, go listen to the synth-y Broken Spindles remix on the "I Lived My Life..." remix single (Mute Records, 2010), which has the vocals mixed up high and has most of the pesky guitars removed.  There's also a nice choppy industrial remix on there by Secret Machines.

Front cover of 2006 EP

Back cover or inner booklet of 2006 EP

2010 remix maxi-single cover art

I've seen APTBS perform this song live twice, in Oct. 2008 in Baton Rouge at Chelsea's Café and in Sept. 2009 in New Orleans at One Eyed Jacks.  They are known for doing an extended noise bridge during the middle of the song (starting at the 2:20 mark), like My Bloody Valentine infamously do during the middle of "You Made Me Realise," and believe me, it's amazing live. The first time was amazing, mind-shattering, etc.  The second time was actually even better, maybe because the sound system was much better and there were a lot more people there, and because I was amped up to go on that rollercoaster again.  They play live using lots of fog and strobe lighting, like all bands should.  While singer/guitarist Oliver Ackermann is obviously the main focal point, drummer Jason "Jay Space" Weilmeister is an absolute monster.  I mean, holy shit, he was killing it, in a savage-yet-jazz-informed vein not unlike, say, John Stanier of Helmet.  The bassist is no slouch either.  They launch immediately into each song without even a millisecond of pausing, which takes a ton of rehearsal and ears a band the title of being "tight."  They have absolutely no time for between-song banter.  If you want that, go see fucking Guided By Voices or Lil Wayne or Elvis Presley or something.  When people talk about great power trios, let there be no doubt that APTBS is right at the top of the (my) all-time heap, along with Bailter Space, Unwound, Poem Rocket, Hovercraft, and a few others.  Listening to an entire APTBS studio album, on the other hand, can be a bit difficult, due to all the distortion and the relentless sonic overload.  Ackermann also makes guitar pedals guitar effects pedals under the name Death By Audio, and is sometimes overeager to show off his wares on record rather than backing off and letting the songs breathe a bit.

Speaking of breathing, I was able to overcome steady waves of toxic fog to take this pic of them at Chelsea's Café on 10/16/08, using a long shutter speed to get intentional blurs:

As Plexi once sang, "When I was looking at you, I didn't mind your foggy weather"

I unknowingly got into APTBS by hearing about a band called Skywave all the time on the Blisscent mailing list circa 2000-2001.  The main people talking about Skywave at this time were apparently members of Skywave.  I got kind of annoyed by this, but bought their "Don't Say Slow" 7" in the mid-'00s, and later got their full-length CD.  APTBS emerged out of the ashes of Skywave, with a very similar sound, albeit with less (or zero?) synth.  (Skywave's album was titled Synthstatic, and I remember getting a chuckle when someone on Blisscent erroneously transposed a few letters and called it Synthtastic.)  Some other dudes from Skywave went on to form the Joy-Divisionally-monikered band Ceremony.

Anyway, here is the original (ca. 2006) video for the original version of "Shadow Of Your Heart":

The inferior 2010 video for the 2009 re-recording:

That second video was shot by the guitarist from Sian Alice Group, who were the opening act at the APTBS show I saw in '08.

The Joy Formidable + APTBS spring tour, guaranteed by Blowtorch Baby to be the best live show you see all year or else you pay me $20:

03/12/12 - San Francisco, CA - The Independent
03/13/12 - San Francisco, CA - The Independent
03/14/12 - Los Angeles, CA - The Music Box
03/17/12 - Denver, CO - Bluebird Theatre
03/19/12 - Minneapolis, MN - Fine Line Music Cafe
03/20/12 - Madison, WI - Majestic Theatre
03/22/12 - Bloomington, IN - The Bluebird
03/23/12 - Cincinnati, OH - 20th Century Theatre
03/24/12 - Atlanta, GA - The Masquerade
03/25/12 - Asheville, NC - Orange Peel
03/26/12 - Washington, DC - 9:30 Club
03/28/12 - New York, NY - Terminal 5
03/29/12 - Philadelphia, PA - Union Transfer
03/30/12 - Boston, MA - Paradise
03/31/12 - Montreal, QC - Cabaret Mile-End
04/02/12 - Toronto, ON - Lee's Palace

Apparently, hipsters are taking hints from the Amish now

Romney tax plan adds $600 billion to deficit, analysis says - "Though the Tax Policy Center said Romney’s tax plan would 'reduce federal tax revenues substantially, the budget hit isn’t as severe as some of his competitors. The same group previously said former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s tax plan would increase the deficit by $1.3 trillion and that Texas Governor Rick Perry’s proposal would boost the shortfall by $995 billion."

The final sentence. - A blog whose ambitious goal is to post the last sentence of every literary work ever published.  Good luck.  Speaking of books, I bought one the other day (My Brother's Gun by Ray Loriga) because it had a blurb by Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo on the back cover reading "Like the rush of an electric guitar riff charging up your spine, Ray Loriga's voice angles, beautifully desperate, to grasp our place in these chaotic times."  Here is the book's final sentence: "It was nighttime now, and then it would turn into day and all the planes in the world would continue passing through that very same spot."  That's translated from Spanish, so it's not his actual words, but it's pretty good stuff.

Planets with similar climates: Slowdive - "Beach Song" & "Take Me Down" (1992), My Bloody Valentine - "You Made Me Realise" (1988), Plexi - "Fourget" (1996), ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead - "Ounce Of Prevention" & "Prince With A Thousand Enemies" (1997).

Junius >> That's some line between love and hate

Junius - "A Word Could Kill Her"

(Radar Recordings, 2006)

Yes, guitar heroics are back in indie rock, since post-punk kids in tight clothing have been rediscovering Dinosaur Jr., The Wipers, Soundgarden, and other axe-friendly '80s bands.  I prefer my songs to be driven by bass and drums rather than by guitar, but sometimes a band just nails a guitar riff, and this is one of those times.  Junius wear all black, which makes them look like anarchist ninjas, and are Very Serious about their bombastic forging of epic rock.  For this song, their guitarist came up with a hybrid surf-meets-goth riff that is as addictive as it is improbable.

The singer has said that his favorite album is Fantastic Planet by Failure, and does a good job of channeling Robert Smith, though I'd have to say the lyrics in this song aren't much to write home about.  I also recommend the very Joy Division-ish title track from this EP, Blood Is Bright.  I almost saw Junius in Baton Rouge in March '08, with a few other great bands, all of whom I ended up seeing separately over the ensuing few years: Ghastly City Sleep, Constants, Pygmy Lush.  Seriously, that's a jaw-dropping slate of bands, but hindsight is always 20/20, right?  Dangit.  It was a house show in Baton Rouge, and I didn't feel like hanging around at the house of someone whom I didn't know for 5 or so hours.  I'm excited to finally get to see Junius this March at the Circle Bar in NOLA, a venue the size (and temperature, since it lacks A/C) of a fireplace.  I've never posted tour dates for any band on here before, but I'm going to for this tour, and for another fine band in my next post.  I rarely post songs by bands that are currently active, so when I find one that's on tour, it's only logical to tell you folks about it:

02/15/12 New Haven, CT @ Bar
02/16/12 Washington, DC @ DC9 w/ O'Brother, Black Clouds
02/17/12 Boston, MA @ Brighton Music Hall w/ O'Brother, Ribs
02/18/12 Brooklyn, NY @ Knitting Factory w/ O'Brother
02/19/12 Philadelphia, PA @ North Star Bar w/ O'Brother, Val De Val
02/21/12 Pittsburgh, PA @ Stage AE w/ O'Brother, Sainthood Reps
02/22/12 Columbus, OH @ Basement w/ O'Brother, Sainthood Reps
02/23/12 Grand Rapids, MI @ Pyramid Scheme w/ O'Brother, The Soil And The Sun
02/24/12 Chicago,IL @ Beat Kitchen w/ O'Brother
02/25/12 St Louis, MO @ Firebird w/ O'Brother, Time & Time
02/26/12 Lawrence,KS @ Jackpot Music Hall w/ O'Brother
02/28/12 Denver, CO @ Marquis Theatre w/ O'Brother, Lucida Tela
02/29/12 Salt Lake City, UT @ Kilby Court w/ O'Brother, Loom
03/01/12 Reno, NV @ Jub Jub's Thirst Parlor
03/02/12 San Francisco, CA @ Bottom Of The Hill w/ O'Brother, Happy Body Slow Brain
03/03/12 Los Angeles, CA @ Satellite (formerly Spaceland) w/ O'Brother
03/04/12 San Diego, CA @ Soda Bar w/ O'Brother
03/05/12 Las Vegas, NV @ Bunkhouse
03/06/12 Tucson, AZ @ Club Congress w/ O'Brother, Sleep Driver
03/07/12 Mesa, AZ @ The Nile Underground w/ O'Brother
03/08/12 Midland, TX @ Pine Box
03/09/12 Austin, TX @ Red 7 w/ O'Brother, Brother Ghost
03/10/12 Dallas, TX @ Bryan St. Tavern w/ O'Brother
03/11/12 Houston, TX @ Warehouse Live w/ O'Brother
03/12/12 New Orleans, LA @ Circle Bar w/ Steve Eck And The Midnight Still
03/13/12 to 03/18/12 Austin, TX @ SXSW

These U.S. dates are followed by a lengthy European tour, whose dates you can see here.  The New Orleans date is not even listed on their website, so hopefully noladiy.org got their facts right.  By the way, my next post will be about another band that is on a big tour.

Some reviews of Blood Is Bright:

"They wear their brooding Eighties swirling darkness on their sleeve, yet still manage to conjure something fresh, majestic and uplifting. The vocal drips onto a textured canvas of chiming echoed guitars and a throbbing backbeat reminiscent of Pornography-era Cure, with the bombastic crunch of My Bloody Valentine." - The Noise

"Breathtaking atmospherics and dark sensibilities deserved of being likened to The Cure's Disintegration punctuate this EP. Vocalist Joseph E. Martinez deadpans a brooding style that clashes at the perfect angle with the swirling sounds that rise around his words. Without straying into anything too heavy, Junius manages to maintain an intense presence that is as stylish as Interpol but carries a sincerity and distinction not found in enough young acts. This band seems to have borrowed just enough from previous decades to build and shape something all its own. This Boston-based quartet approach New Wave tendencies with a shield of spacey guitars and artistic vocal stylings to create something that is not soon forgotten. With high energy emanating out of a pensive sound, Junius punctures each track with unshakable singularity until it turns into something addictive and encompassing." - Exclaim! magazine (Canada)

"Genius as far as contemporary New Wave / cinematic Art-Rock goes... [an] epic audio masterpiece." - The Big Takeover

I had never experienced symptomatic sports-related heartbreak until the last minute of the Saints' loss to the Niners on Saturday.  It was almost identical to the ending of the Steelers-Cardinals Super Bowl three years ago.  To get over the shock, we watched a move called Flame And Citron and some SNL and an apparently-legenendary short film called C'était un rendez-vous.  I was also shocked that Lana Del Rey didn't sing her superb new single "Born To Die" on SNL.  The only reason I slogged through the whole episode was to see her do it.  She did "Video Games" and some other mediocre song, and was brutally panned by smug news robot Brian Williams, who called her perhaps the worst performer in the history of the show.  Ouch.

On Monday, the always-classy Spike network did the only thing any reasonable channel would do in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day: It aired a marathon of Steven Seagal films.  I was lucky enough to tune in and catch a hilarious fight scene in his 2003 effort Belly Of The Beast.  I looked it up on YouTube to watch it again, and learned that I missed an even more hilarious beginning part of this very fight:

1.) Is this the worst scene in the history of cinema?  Y/N

2.) Is this the apex of the S. Seagal canon?  Y/N

(Note: By answering question 2, you hereby admit to having viewed the entirety of the S. Seagal canon.)

I watched the pilot episode of a new show called Alcatraz, mainly because our dad used to always take us around Alcatraz whenever we'd go out on the little sailboat (The Green Toad) that our family briefly owned in the '80s.  The show was pretty good, but I was just totally enraptured by the lead actress, Sarah Jones. Just watch an episode and you'll see what I mean.

On Wed., I got a gigantic cheeseburger for only $4 at this little soul food place in Morgan City called Rita Mae's.  Before eating it, I played some hoops at this court a few blocks away situated directly under Hwy. 90.  There was a rail-thin tween biracial girl riding erratically around the court on a bike, lost in her own little world, warbling some song at low volume.  After she almost crashed into me a few times, I asked her what she was singing, and she said it was a song by Adele.  I remember it had "Rain" in the title; I just looked it up and it must've been "Set Fire To The Rain," which iTunes says is her most popular song at the moment.  She then sang "Someone Like You" and "Rolling In The Deep" at my request, like my own little rolling jukebox.  It was kind of like a scene out of Gummo or something, with the sound of cars rumbling up above our heads.  "She's kinda weird, isn't she?," I asked one of her friends, who smiled broadly and nodded her head as the girl pedaled away down the street.  Then I drove over two of the city's epic bridges as the sun set while listening to Poem Rocket.  Perhaps subconsciously inspired by C'était un rendez-vous, I filmed it:

Planets with similar climates: The Chameleons - "Return Of The Roughnecks" (1985), The Cure - "Burn" (1993), The Comsat Angels - "The Eye Dance" (1981), Juno - "All Your Friends Are Comedians" (1998), The Wipers - "Against The Wall" (1987).

Nice Strong Arm >> There's no room in this room for us to expand

Nice Strong Arm - "Cloud Machine"

(Homestead Records, 1989)

I obviously like the drifty dreamy music as much as the next person, if not 100 times more, but sometimes you just have to throw on a viscerally rocking Rock Song.  I downloaded this EP, Cloud Machine, several years ago, but just bought it on 12" the other day.  It was one of those things I never thought I'd find, so I was a bit stunned to see it in the flesh, and it's #1991 in a numbered edition of 2000.  (My copy is on black vinyl, but it was also pressed on purple.  Black vinyl always sounds better than other colors, so I'm actually glad I don't have a purple one.)  It was the first time I ever just picked up a vinyl release and just tossed it on the store's counter and bought it without even checking on the condition of the vinyl.  If you're into borderline metal stuff like Helmet or Quicksand, check out the two very intense live songs on the B-side, recorded at CBGB by Prong's singer / guitarist Tommy Victor.  (I saw Prong slay in an opening slot for Pantera & Sepultura in 1994.  It seems to me that their single "Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck" might've been inspired by "Cloud Machine."  The choruses have a similar feel, at least.  And check out the machinery in the guy's head at the 1:56 mark...)  Aside from England, New York City was simply the epicenter of great music in the '80s.  The guitar on "Cloud Machine" is so expressive and imaginative, exploding the notion of what a "noise rock" or "indie rock" band could be, going into abstract psychedelic realms, especially near the end.  The vocal melody is addictive enough that I can forgive the singer's gruff voice.  The spoken-word backing vocals near the middle are an interesting, mellow touch.  Somehow I think Jimi Hendrix would smile if he ever heard this song (or the previous song I posted, by Bright Channel).

© Charles Schulz, 1970

Occupying something, probably in New York City

I first got into this band in 2005 by seeing their video for "Framingham" on an Atavistic Records DVD called Twelve O'Clock High:

Another NSA song I'll be posting someday is "Everyday An Ambulance."  I don't know if NSA could have "become big," but I think they would've surely gotten a major-label deal had they stayed around a few more years until the Nirvana thing happened.  They certainly had better melodic sense than lots of mediocre indie bands that got deals at that time.

Congrats to Drew Brees for setting the single-season passing yardage record last night, though Tom Brady will probably eclipse it next week if Brees sits out game 16... I doubt Sean Payton would let such a snafu happen, though.

Planets with similar climates: The Chameleons - "Return Of The Roughnecks" (1985), Poem Rocket - "Small White Animal" (1995), Swervedriver - "For Seeking Heat" (1993), Dinosaur Jr. - "Raisans" (1987), Live Skull - "Fort Belvedere" (1985), Broken Water - "Coming True" (2009).