Merchandise >> Girl, I'm really just an animal

Merchandise - "Time"

(Katorga Works, 2012)

The title of "The next Smiths" has been floated in regards to many bands over the last 25 years, just like "The next Jordan" has been applied to everyone from Harold Miner to Vince Carter.  Merchandise crawled out of the Tampa punk scene with a polished, remarkably full-bodied sound that does evoke the Smiths, as well as stuff like Echo & the Bunnymen, the Chameleons, the Sound, Gang Of Four, and the Church.  I think the Smiths thing comes mainly from how the singer holds out his notes and lets them unfold luxuriously in the ether, and of course the tastefully skillful guitar-playing and catchy melodies.  Much like recently-minted star soul crooner The Weeknd and very serious rappers Das Racist, they give away their music for free on the popular mp3 format at their website, though vinyl will cost you.  (I did buy this album on LP at their show.)  I assume / hope they are named after the immortal Fugazi anthem "Merchandise".

Right from the opening (very Fugazi-esque) bassline, you know this band is swinging for the fences, and they pull it off in stunning fashion.  It took me a while to realize that the guitarist plays parts that sound like a singing voice, adding sort of phantom backing vocals to the music.  Johnny Marr aficionados will know what I'm talking about.  My only qualm is that they use a drum machine rather than a human drummer.  I really don't get excited like this about guitar-rock bands very often, but when it's done this well, you'd be a dumbass to not sit up and take notice.  As YouTuber Pablo Elias said in the first-ever comment on this video: "this guys know how to play post punk."

The two other great songs on this album, Children Of Desire, are the dense, Bailter Space-esque "In Nightmare Room" and the 11-minute "Become What You Are."  So go see Merchandise at a little club on their neverending tour before they either get huge or self-destruct.  From their website: "We’re putting the finishing touches on our next 12″, coming out via Iowa City’s impeccable Night People label. Should be out sometime in January. Touring will surely follow."  They recently did some shows opening for dazzling kindred spirits Wild Nothing.  And by the way, no, I don't think Merchandise are the next Smiths, because they don't have as many doofy, tedious filler songs as the Smiths.  In addition to the vocals, the unsung weapon that the bands share is funky, liquid-y basslines.

I like the "high art" quality of these recent woodcut-design posters by the An Idea Like No Other guys, but it seems to me that they're using centuries-old prints and not crediting the original artists, which, as an artist, is really uncool to me.  (One poster even has the artist's name visibly scratched out.)  Maybe the prints are so old that they're now considered part of the public domain, and hence the original artists no longer have to be credited, but I still think it's not a very punk thing to do.
Anyway, the concert was quite entertaining.  I filmed Merchandise doing their three best songs: "Time," "In Nightmare Room," and "Become What You Are."  I didn't take any pics.  The singer was really chatty beforehand (partly due to being drunk), and told me about the American Snakeskin 12" EP that they had at their merch table.  Fun Fact: He told me the woman on the cover of Merchandise's debut album (Strange Songs) In The Dark is the lead singer of the band Neon Blud, and maybe she was also in Amer. Snakeskin.  By the way, Loveless is a DJ, not a band.  Apparently it's usually a guy & gal, but it was just the guy at this show, and he wore a mask the whole time.  Noisy / danceable obscure '80s fare seems to be his / their specialty, and they apparently have a weekly gig at One Eyed Jacks, but I avoid any type of "'80s Night" as a rule.

At the Spanish Moon the other day, I asked Jack from Kindest Lines / The Public if he was into Merchandise.  He said KL had recently opened for M, but that he hates them because M's merch person stole KL's profits at said merch table.  I thought that was a weird reason to dislike a good band, but I didn't press further.

Find me at this tomorrow and I'll give you free record-buying guidance in exchange for free records or CDs from you:

This and the New Orleans Book Fair are stupidly scheduled on the same day this year, and at the exact same time, so I will have to pick music over books.

I was totally floored to see on the news yesterday that Mary Alvarez, co-owner of a plant nursery in Hammond, was killed (or died via suicide).  I only went there about three times and only bought a few plants (Foster's holly, white carnation) from them, but she was maybe the nicest person I've ever met.  The nursery is totally ramshackle and unorganized, with plants spilling out everywhere and hardly anything properly labeled; in other words, a plant-hunter's dream.  They have a big sprawling clump of Opuntia, a.k.a. prickly pear, cactus outside the front gate, and let me take a piece from it for free to start my own clump.  (See it at the 1:20 mark of the video.)  Unfortunately, I discarded it after I obtained a spineless variety growing in the yard next door to the Saturn Bar in N.O., but I may go back and get another piece at Alvarez.  People like the Alvarezes are a big reason why I've dedicated my life to horticulture, and people like them are the rule, not the exception, in this business.  Out of all the nursery owners I know from N.O. to Houma to Baton Rouge to Gramercy to Covington to Thibodaux to Prairieville, it's hard to pick which ones are the nicest, so I won't even try, but I can say these people have less overall petty angst towards life than your average citizen, due to being around plants every day and learning from an existential standpoint just how valuable life and nature are.  Even the older ones have an amazing youthful calm and inner vigor.  I would say my all-time favorites are Poochie and his wife at St. James Nursery in Gramercy; Wayne at Banting's in Bridge City; the ladies at The Cracked Pot in St. Rose; and the guys at Starke's in Houma.  When you grow an oak tree from an acorn, or a palm from a date seed, it makes you feel pretty useful in this world, yet also makes you feel very humble and small.  Plants are literally the lungs of the earth.  Give me a roomful of plant geeks over a roomful of anything else any day.  With Home Depot, Lowe's, Wal-Mart, KMart, etc. all selling plants nowadays, it's more important than ever to support independent plant nurseries, just as it is to support independent record stores, restaurants, etc.  Outsourcing the growing of plants to China is not something the Republicans have figured out how to do yet, and I intend to do my part to keep it that way.

17 of the saddest ex-celebrities on Twitter - "From Ian Ziering hawking anti-aging cream (rumor is he will actually call you if you fill out an inquiry) to Alfonso Ribiero selling a weight loss kit via their accounts, you can't help but think about how much more famous they would be if they had become stars today."

Planets with similar climates: Silkworm - "Quicksand" (1996), Echo & The Bunnymen - "The Killing Moon" (1983), The Sound - "Love Is Not A Ghost" (1984), The Comsat Angels - "The Eye Dance" & "Be Brave" (1981), Bailter Space - "Now I Will Live" (1987), The Church - "Tear It All Away" (1981), The Smiths - "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" (1986), The Public - "Ghosts" (2004).

Blouse >> You're a strike of lightning

Blouse - "Into Black"

(Captured Tracks, 2011)

Note: I started writing this in June but never got around to posting it.  I noticed the outdated R.I.P.'s at the bottom and decided to keep them in.

As you have probably already gathered, most good band names are taken by now.  I mentioned in the last post that Portland is a hotbed of talent, and Blouse is another great example.  I think Johnny Marr or Robert Smith would be proud of this song's loping, serpentine guitar riff.  There's something sexy and funky and very New Orleans about that jazzy, off-beat stutter in it.  And the singer is the one who plays that guitar part, as you can see in the video clip embedded below.  This song is almost impossible for me to get out of my head.  If I heard the line "And you're a strike of lightning, making up a sky for the gods to kiss with" correctly, then I'd have to say that's one of the coolest lyrics I've heard in the past few years.  (You can actually hear the lyrics better in the live clip.)  There's some line about a stained glass window near the middle, and the intensity ramps up subtly in the song's final minute.

"Fade to black" is of course a cinematography term, and this song has a very cinematic feel.  A convenient way to describe Blouse would be "The XX meets Joy Division," and it wouldn't be far off from the truth.  The sound quality of this song is awfully murky and "dark" (bass-y), in production lingo, but I guess it suits the music well.  One expects this kind of jangle-pop stuff to be trebly and shimmery, so it sort of surprises the ears to hear something so sludgy.  The synth near the end of the song does brighten it up and adds some extra edge.  This song was released as a 7" single in early 2011, with striking cover art that was a clear homage to Joy Division's Closer.  It then appeared on their self-titled debut album near the end of the year.  Their song "They Always Fly Away" is their other clear standout, with a truly badass bassline, showing that this band is much more than a one-trick pony.  AllMusic Guide said "There's a tingling chill running through Blouse's self-titled debut album that suggests both erotic reverie and nervous foreboding.  Blouse seems to be a work in progress, but this provocative first effort shows the band is heading for fascinating territory."
I'd have to say Captured Tracks, also home of dreamy retro janglers Wild Nothing, is my favorite up-and-coming record label right now.

Amazingly, I just went and checked out the song on YouTube and noticed lots of people saying that the MTV teen ho dramedy Awkward. (yes, the show's name has a period at the end) "brought me here."  So I guess MTV scooped Blowtorch Baby for the first time, but only due to my procrastination.

Wed. Oct. 31: I went in to N.O. to see the Jezabels at Circle Bar.  I had a weird feeling that it would be cancelled, but I didn't call ahead of time for some reason.  Sure enough, I walk into the near-empty club in my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles shirt and green wristbands only to find out they had cancelled, due to their singer's alleged throat problems.

So this pic sums up my two dismal trips to the Circle Bar in late October... Two headlining bands, one of which played for 10 minutes and the other of which didn't show up.  When I took this pic next to the club's jukebox on the 24th, a few minutes before Exitmusic went on, things seemed so promising:

(Look at the size of the crowd in that Jezabels poster, and then think about the fact that the Circle Bar holds about 50 people.)

Thu., Nov. 1: Took a pic of some random CDs in my car:

I originally bought the N.W.A EP on cassingle in 1991 (at age 14... sorry, PMRC!), the PJ Harvey album on cassette in '95, and the MBV album on cassette in '96.  Sensing a trend?  Lesson to record industry: If people buy or obtain a musical item cheaply or for free, e.g. on cassette or as free mp3s, they will end up later buying it on CD if they like it enough.  So if you record labels sign good bands and put out good albums, people will continue to buy them in multiple formats over the years.  Anyway... I bought the Nudeswirl CD in '96 in Richmond, VA, and the Pale Saints and Six By Seven CDs in '02.  The Twin Peaks soundtrack was bought by one of my parents when it came out; I later borrowed it & decided to keep it.  I added a clear red tray to the Lush CD's case in order to match the cover art.  Those of you who don't own early Mercury Rev on CD are missing out, since the spines say STEREO PATHIC, STEREO PHOBIC, STEREO FUCKED, etc.

I was so bummed by the Circle Bar shows that I didn't go to see the Psychedelic Furs on Nov. 2 with my sister and Damion.  She said it was a great show, and they even played one of my favorites, "All Of This And Nothing."  (But no "Highwire Days" or "Dumb Waiters.")  And she said Richard Butler was dancing around as crazily as !!!'s singer, which is pretty impressive for a guy of his age.

So the promising month ended with a whimper, but I still saw over a dozen bands, the best of which were Godspeed You Black Emperor, Merchandise, MONO, and Meta The Man.  And locals Glish, the Tarik Hassan Group, Miss Mec, and I, Octopus.  The two songs that Exitmusic played before quitting were good.  In fact, the bands that I skipped last month would constitute a best-ever month of concertgoing for a normal Pitchfork-focused indie-vidual: Dinosaur Jr., M83, P-Furs, Silversun Pickups, Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Kendrick Lamar, Dum Dum Girls, Cold Cave, Diamond Rings, Trust, etc.

I'm not bragging whatsoever, just trying to start a dialogue about how one decides which shows to attend and which shows to skip.  I've been wanting to do this for a long time now, so this seems like a good time to do it.  For me, going to a show a very complex form of calculus that factors in obvious things such as "Does the band kick ass?" with more nebulous ones like "Is their career on the downswing or is it still on the upswing?," "Have I missed them in concert before?," and "Could this be their last-ever tour?"  (If the band members hate each other, any show could be their last.)  Ticket cost, opening act(s), venue, etc. also factor in.  How many original members, or members from the band's "golden era," are still in the band?  It of course helps to find out whether or not the band is playing your favorite songs on this particular tour, or if they've decided to move on to "the new stuff," or if they're doing one of those stupid "Play an entire album all the way through" things.  However, this only applies to "song"-based bands & solo artists.  There's of course a whole other category of experimental music in which the avant-gardeness of the music is the only thing that matters, and you're surely not going to recognize anything in terms of a lyric or a melody.  You're going just to hear them try to play something you've never heard before and may never want to hear again.  Sometimes a band that hardly ever tours is hitting the road; in this case, it's more important to see them then to see some band that tours constantly.  If it's a hip hop or electronic / DJ act, how much of their music do they actually perform live and how much of it is pre-recorded samples?  Are you under the weather, and if so, just how devoted of a fan are you?  One of the toughest things for me to decide on is seeing a local band, since you can probably see them any old time, but what if they break up and you never got to see them, or only saw them once?  (E.g., the fact that I only saw my favorite-ever local band, The Universal Chrome, once.  And I never saw Falling Janus, Dead Hand System, Burnversion, Evil Nurse Sheila!, etc.)  When in doubt about seeing ANY concert, even if it's "just" a local band, it's always best to just go, because otherwise, you might be wondering for the rest of your life if you missed a great show.  If the show was mediocre, at least you saw it, and you know that you don't have to wonder for the next 50 years if it was great or not.  And you supported the band and supported the music club.  The turnout may influence the band's decision to come back to your town again, and may influence the club's decision to book the band again.  And you might meet an interesting person, or see a flyer at the club informing you about an upcoming concert that you didn't know about.

As examples, here are some recent & upcoming concert dilemmas spanning early October to early November:
1.) The P-Furs only had two original members, the Butler brothers.  But they are the main driving forces of the band, and the lineup also has fiery saxophonist Mars Williams, who joined ca. 1983.  (Did not go, and regret it.)
2.) In a few days a fairly lame synth-pop band called Future Islands is playing at the Spanish Moon.  I have no desire to see them, but the opening act is an uncompromisingly brutal female noise-rock band called Talk Normal.  Do I go just to see the opening act?  What if the opening act cancels or is replaced?  (Will probably go.)
3.) Voodoo Fest every October: Lots of bands, but most are lame or washed-up, and tickets are like $90 per day.  (Solution: Went to the free local band festival Houmapalooza.)
4.) MONO at the Spanish Moon.  Yes, they're great live, but I had already seen them there 3 times.  Do I go yet again?  (Went & was glad I did.)
5.) Mercurial band Merchandise playing at a club with barely any air conditioning, right as I was getting over a cold and hence was pretty feverish.  (Went, because they could be legitimate stars soon, and I had missed them in April at an even smaller club called United Bakery.)

If you have anything to add about concert dilemmas you have valiantly faced and overcome, let Blowtorch Baby know.  I'm currently wrestling over whether to see DJ Shadow next month at Republic...  The dude's first album kinda changed my life in 1997, but do I owe him the favor of buying a ticket to one of his shows 15 years later?  He played at House Of Blues as the opening act for rapper Jeru The Damaja in '97, and I bet tons of underground music heads went to that show just to see Shadow do his magic.  Then again, what if he still "has it" in 2012?  The interesting thing about a DJ is that his music never "ages," since he's spinning samples, and those samples will still sound literally identical to how they sounded x amount of years ago, and you're not gonna see some aging guy on guitar.

R.I.P. Ray Bradbury, a genius.
R.I.P. Tim Mooney of American Music Club, Sun Kil Moon, and other San Fran bands.

Brilliant retort I observed on June 23, in the AOL chatroom The Crash Pad:

Murrican:  i've got a nickname among a certain group of females.

SpudMakenzie:  heart attack while havin sex with a hooker/?

Why Romney's not talking about Benghazi anymore

Atlantic City faces long recovery before it can start destroying lives again

Planets with similar climates: The Organ - "Brother" (2004), Sonic Youth - "Becuz" (1995), Siouxsie & The Banshees - "Christine" (1980), The Cure - "Lullaby" (1989), Bell Hollow - "Eyes Like Planets" (2007), The Lucy Show - "Ephemeral (This Is No Heaven)" (1985), Tamaryn - "Love Fade" (2010), Lush - "Take" (1992).

Asylum Party >> I can only hear the sound of my own shade

Asylum Party - "Play Alone"

(Lively Art [France], 1989)

Asylum Party formed in 1985 in Courbevoie, France, and lasted only about 5 years, which is about the maximum that any good post-punk band should last.  They were part of what is allegedly called the "Touching Pop" movement in France ca. '89-91.  I didn't find out about them until a few years ago, and by golly if I didn't have to wonder why they are not superstars of the post-punk scene.  In this song, and in many others, they knew how to use an athletic bassline to guide a song melodically, giving it a visceral feel in the midst of the prevailing gloom.  I'm always a sucker for songs that begin with the instruments entering one at a time.  I guess I never realized that practically every country in Europe had its own post-punk scene in the '80s.  I had thought the bands over there emitted mostly nuance-deficient stuff like neanderthalic industrial metal or cheesy synthtronic pop.

This song definitely goes on a bit too long, but that Krautrockin' beat makes it a joy to listen to all the way through.  As for the lyric "I can only hear the sound of my own shade," that's how it is written at SongMeanings, but it sounds to me as though they got that last word wrong.  Maybe it's "chase"?  I've been meaning (ha... ha...) to join that site for many years now.

Back cover of LP

Tue. Sep. 18: Did some yard work.  Took this pic in my car window with a tarp inside that reflected lots of weird gleams of light.  Another thing you can see reflected on me is bags of recycling that I was bringing in to New Orleans, since recycling is no longer done where I live.

The slight paunch is probably due to my recent beer enthusiasm, which I've decided to curtail.  The curve of the window makes my arm look a bit bigger than normal, not that I'm complaining... Watched some of the season finale of So You Think You Can Dance with Em and mom.  Gave Em a big black portfolio thing to keep concert posters in, and an extra copy of J.D. Salinger's Nine Stories.  Stopped at the Mushroom while on my way over to Tipitina's to see Beach House, hoping to see Sam, but failed yet again.  Recommended Curve's Cuckoo to Michael ("They're like Bleach with a drum machine""), who immediately put it on.  Bought Godspeed You Black Emperor's Slow Riot For New Zerø Kanada EP on used CD.  I had first heard a song from it in summer of '99 on WTUL, so it was nice to finally own it on CD.  (The CD's packaging makes no mention of the band's name.)  Michael was surprised when I told him GYBE were coming to Tip's and that MONO were coming to the Spanish Moon in B.R., and said he wanted to see Beach House, but couldn't.  The Beach House show was sold-out, with a huge line to get in, even though we had tickets.  I spontaneously confessed to the doorman that I had used a fake i.d. to get into my first-ever show at Tip's, which was Helmet, a few days before my 18th birthday in '95.  Opening act Dustin Wong studiously tormented his geetar as though he he felt he was reinventing the medium, but it came off as pretty tedious.  After a ridiculous 30-min. wait, the House kicked things off with their best song, "Wild," so I was pretty happy.  Also did "Norway," "Gila," "Silver Soul," "10 Mile Stereo," "Myth," "Lazuli," and many more crepuscular hits.

A full setlist will probably be added here at some point.  They were much better than when I saw them in '08 at the Spanish Moon.  This is mainly because they simply have better songs now, and a better drummer (their drummer last time was the singer of their opening act Papercuts), and a sweet light show.  Afterwards, Em & I hung around in the suspiciously cool air of a cold front for the Beachies to stumble out to their tour bus, but they never did.  We smoked a few cigs, since I allow myself one or two per month, then went to a bar down the street, and after a little while my sister realized that it used to be Shiloh, one of her old hangouts.  She told me about how she had said a few words to Carlos D. of Interpol after their show at TwiRoPa in Feb. '05, when he DJ'd a heavily-advertised afterparty at Shiloh.  I think some other members of the band were there too; not sure why I didn't go.

Wed. 19: Cleaned my parents' gutters & rooftop.  Hit up McKeown's Books and scored some good stuff: Donald Rawley - Slow Dance On The Fault Line (Stories); Ron Rash - Chemistry (Stories); Ekkehard Jost - Free Jazz.  Bought a ticket for Godspeed You Black Emperor at Tip's next month, after grudgingly deciding that they are "the kind of band that I'd go see on a reunion tour."

Thu. 20: Went into a nearly empty little coffee shop called Sound Café, next to the Bywater NOCCA, and was impressed to find out they have a built-in bookstore called Beth's Books.  The girl working there was really sweet and thoughtful, and mentioned she was a jazz singer.  She told me her name and said I should come see her sing at her next few gigs (Tommy's Wine Bar and The Spotted Cat).  The shy African-American guy sitting in the café turned out to be her trumpeter; they do only jazz standards.  Here's the video for a song she did with someone else: "Emergency Baby".  So yeah, the old cliché about the person serving you your coffee being a musician sometimes turns out to be true, and you sometimes wonder why the person isn't a big star yet.  This particular lady could win American Idol with half her vocal cords tied behind her back.  I began debating in my mind if she was better than Sasha Masakowski, but decided their voices are too different to make for a fair comparison, even though they both sing the jazz.
I bought a very strong and flavorful iced coffee, which is what I usually buy after panicking upon realizing I don't know all the cool terminology that is needed to order complex coffee drinks.  As for books, I scored:

Yes, I don't have much of an attention span for novels, so I tend to go with collections of short stories / poems.  I got the one called Body Betrayer gratis, sitting on the freebie rack outside.  It's a collection of very edgy, sexually blunt poems that Anais Nin or Erica Jong would be proud of.  Not sure why they were giving it away.  My interest was piqued in the James Purdy book because The Dream Palace was a local music club; since about 2003 it's been under new ownership as The Blue Nile.  Saw a building that was possibly destroyed by Hurricane Isaac:

Good question

Then I went to Harold's Nursery and bought a little tillandsia (air plant), then to Euclid Records, where I got three good 7"s (Psychedelic Furs - "The Ghost In You"; Windy & Carl / Hopewell split; Bush Tetras - "Things That Go Boom In The Night").  Listened to an A.R. Kane 12" and an early Sad Lovers & Giants LP but didn't like them enough to buy them.  Recommended a Dif Juz EP to one of the dudes there who likes to play New Age-y, 4AD-ish stuff over the store's stereo.  Sorry for all the specificity, but music and books are not things that can just be mentioned vaguely.

Fri. 21: At night I talked to Drea on AOL for a few hours, during which we apologized for a little spat we had a few weeks ago.  Have known her online for 7 years, and didn't want to lose her friendship, so I was relieved.  I think her site is one of the few female-run Tumblrs in existence that are Ryan Gosling-free.

Sat. 22: Okay, this really strange thing happened this morning... I had put out my nasty old sofa for the trash guys to take away.  I'm playing basketball shirtless, and a girl and a boy, about age 7-10 or so, drive past on a golf cart, as kids (and adults) are often wont to do out in the country.  This sofa, well loveseat actually, probably dates back to when the house was built & furnished 35 years ago, and is hideous, saggy, brown with fucking tan and navy zig-zag stripes.  Seriously, you couldn't even dream up a lamer and more pathetic couch as a joke.  The girl asks "Can I have your sofa?"  It's a valid question, but I don't turn around to talk to her, because I don't want to be seen by neighbors talking shirtless and sweaty to some kids, and because it might take a while to explain why this sofa sucks and why their parents wouldn't even allow this thing anywhere near their house, much less inside it.  Don is painting some iron porch furniture black across the street and the smell of paint fumes is wafting over.  I kinda turn my head a few degrees in the kids' direction to show I had heard and processed the question, but I walk further away.  "Hey! Can we take your sofa?"  I still don't turn around, so they ride off.  The garbage guy crams the monstrosity into the back of the garbage truck several minutes later, rejecting my offer for help but taking the sports drinks I had laid out as thanks.  On the kids' next pass (they passed by about 10 times), I see the girl picking up and examining a shoe or something, which had apparently dropped out of the garbage truck.  ("Wow, and I thought I was an obsessive scavenger," I think to myself...)  I go inside now, having just thrown my sweaty clothes into the washing machine, wearing only boxers, about to go hop in the shower, and I hear the doorbell ring.  "Oh great, it's some candidate for a November election seat," I think, and I hope he/she hadn't peered in and seen me.  Instead I see the girl running from my door back to the street, whereupon the kids motor away nonchalantly.  Okay, a simple doorbell-ringing prank... So I take a shower and come down, and the doorbell rings again, and I see the girl running back to the golf cart again, but this time she (AND the boy) both have some sort of wedding veil on.  This is turning into something right out of Gummo now... (That's what I always say to myself whenever I see some bizarre incident going on out in the sticks: "This is like something out of Gummo.")  Believe me, you never see any kind of cross-dressing out here.  Maybe they were annoyed at me for ignoring them, or just wanted to ask why I was getting rid of something that is functional.  I guess this story is not very interesting without visuals, but it's of course a felony to film someone without permission, so you'll just have to take my word that it was a head-scratching situation.  A little while later, I saw them pull into a special golf cart garage door at a house a block away.  I started chuckling uncontrollably at the concept of a mini garage door sized specifically for a golf cart, especially since it was situated right next to the "big boy" garage door for a car, just like a doggy door next to a people door.  I think I'll put out something at the curb next week for the kids to scavenge up, so that they won't exact some violent revenge on me years from now for rudely depriving them of a sofa.  So I'm at that awkward moment when I feel pressured to put some stuff out at my curb to appease some Mad Max-esque kids, but I have to make sure it's not too cool, otherwise they'll expect more.
Later on XM radio I heard the Sonic Youth song that Drea had used as her AOL name years ago, and smiled.

Sun. 23: The Saints dropped to a stunning 0-3 with a home loss to the Chiefs, blowing a 24-8 lead.  At home.  Panic grips the state, since everyone here hoped they would go to the Super Bowl in NOLA this season.  The main problem is that the defensive scheme used by new defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo is giving up the most yards in the NFL.  And Darren "Sproles Royce" Sproles, who set the NFL's single-season yards record last year (yes, he amassed more total yards last year than any player in history had ever amassed in one year, and even got his own exhibit at the Hall Of Fame in Canton to commemorate it), has been MIA.
Repotted a cactus and planted a Butia palm I had plucked up as a tiny seedling 4 years ago at the north border of Esplanade Mall in Kenner.

Music video of the year so far: Strip Steve feat. Puro Instinct - "Astral Projection"

Latest obsession: The band 2:54, particularly their song "You're Early"

Planets with similar climates: Bleach - "Seeing" (1991), The Chameleons - "Second Skin" (1983), For Against - "Autocrat" (1985), Bailter Space - "Now I Will Live" (1987), Kitchens Of Distinction - "Hypnagogic" (1990), U2 - "The Unforgettable Fire" (1984).

Springhouse >> Find the bullet, not the gun

Springhouse - "Enslave Me"

(Caroline Records, 1992)

Sick basslines, passionately cryptic vocals ("All makes my heart yearn for a beach where we burn"), jangly-yet-intense guitars (with a roughly-strummed acoustic guitar hidden in the mix too), a minimalist guitar anti-solo, choppy drumming, even some EBow drones... This song has it all.  Even the album title, Postcards From The Arctic, is a champ.  The band was even on one of the most prominent indies of the era, yet they languish in near-total obscurity to this day.

The other essential songs on this album are "Asphalt Angels," "Ghosts," and "Shattering Cold."

Back cover of CD; credited in booklet as "1910 Arctic expedition photograph by 'Unknown'"

Drummer Jack Rabid (presumably a pun on "Jackrabbit") is one of the most bestest dudes in indie / punk music history, having published his influential zine The Big Takeover since the early '80s.  One of the things he did that people like myself will always want to buy him a beer for is to champion the shoegaze / dream pop bands as they were coming out of England and later the U.S. and other places.  He was/is a massive fan of The Chameleons, Catherine Wheel, The Sound, The Comsat Angels, Swervedriver, For Against, Hüsker Dü, Ride, Kitchens Of Distinction, The Wipers, etc.  For example, in 1997, he chose Catherine Wheel's Adam And Eve as album of the year over Radiohead's much-touted OK Computer.  I think that C.W. album is non-amazing, but still, anything that knocks Radiohead down a notch is great by me.  (I believe he also chose C.W's Happy Days as album of the year in '95 over Radiohead's The Bends.)  And I think he was the author of the article that got me into Feverdream in '98 or '99.  And believe me, almost no one else was writing about Feverdream then, or ever.  Jack was in a punk band called Even Worse in the early '80s and named his zine after the famous Bad Brains song, but like I said, he later branched out into lots of other, more mature styles of music.  If you're into the Blowtorch Baby aesthetic of music, you've probably come across an occasional review of his that I've cited from AllMusic Guide or Trouser Press.  About 6-7 years ago I put together a long-ass playlist of songs to burn onto CD-Rs for him, but I figured he had probably already heard most or all of them, so I never followed through with it.

Bassist Larry Heinemann has (or had?) a lucrative side gig with Blue Man Group.  His big, round bass tone was Springhouse's secret weapon.  Mitch Friedland played the guitar and did all the vocals, which is quite a demanding task in a "power trio."

There's a nice Springhouse fansite that summarizes them thusly: "Springhouse is an American band, although you might not guess it from their strong UK influences... Springhouse songs have one foot grounded solidly in early 80s post-punk and one floating in ethereal guitar-swirl heaven. Their earlier material tends to be more driving and energetic, while their later material is more soothing, eerie, and reflective. Power and beauty. That's Springhouse... Sadly, Springhouse disbanded shortly after Postcards was released. They reformed briefly in 1994 in order to open for the American leg of the Mark Burgess And The Sons Of God tour. After the tour, they disbanded again."  They reformed for a new album a few years ago, but I haven't heard it, since I'm not really into "reunion albums."  Some recent reunion albums by Springhouse's peers have been good (For Against) and some have been bad (The Verve).

Speaking of slavery, I mentioned a little while back that the first person in my family emigrated here in 1903, some 38 years after slavery ended in America.  I'm quite proud of that fact & just wanted to point it out in black & white for those of you who skipped the SAT.  I'm also quite self-conscious of the lack of non-white artists on this blog, but I'm trying very hard to fix that.  The problem is that the vast majority of my favorite bands with black members have been on major labels, so I simply can't post them, and I don't know of many, say, Mexican shoegaze bands or Cambodian ambient dudes or Inuit noise rockers.  Oh well, music has no color since it's just an invisible entity.  Carry on...

Time-lapse of ocean currents looks like a living Van Gogh painting

Planets with similar climates: The Chameleons - "Return Of The Roughnecks" (1985), Adorable - "Crash Sight" (1992), The Black Watch - "Come Inside" (1994), The Sound - "Burning Part Of Me" (1984), Catherine Wheel - "Waydown" (1995), Verve - "All In The Mind" (1992), Spy Vs. Spy - "Injustice" (1985), Hüsker Dü - "Don't Want To Know If You Are Lonely" (1986).

Bell Hollow >> And you have lost the perfect jewel of the sky

Bell Hollow - "Storm's End"

(Five03 Records, 2007)

I got into this band a few years ago, right after they had broken up, as luck would have it.  I had them confused with all the other "Bell" bands of the era (Bell Tower, Howling Bells, The Belle Stars, etc., and later the Broken Bells), so I unfortunately missed them when they played in NOLA in '08 with local Interpol acolytes The Public.  This song is from their sole full-length, Foxgloves, named after the plant from which the heart drug Digitalis is made.  The vocal performance is just stunning, with singer Nick Niles effortlessly assuming all sorts of voices, like a 4AD-ified version of Mike Patton.  Singing along to any Bell Hollow ditty is like the Vocal Olympics, but at these Olympics, everyone wins a medal.  Two members of the band were in the mid-'80s goth band The Naked And The Dead, so this is a type of music they have felt deeply for several decades, and hence they were not just some younguns trying to cash in on the post-punk revival of the '00s.  Guitarist Greg Fasolino is a massive Chameleons fan, not surprisingly, and on this song he nails The Cure's loping, watery, slo-mo, reverbed, surf-rock-stuck-in-molasses Disintegration-era guitar sound.

Lyrics here & in the CD booklet.

Note: This post was originally going to be about the ultra-jangly, Smiths-esque "Copper Crayon", but I rewrote it after having a change of mind.  Another stunner on this album is the acoustic, mournful "Eyes Like Planets".

From the German magazine Gothic Chronicles (issue #63), July 2006.  The last sentence is all that matters to me.

A band called White Lies came along with pretty much this exact same sound but little to no discernible songwriting talent, and are now semi-huge stars touring big venues across Europe.  Go figure.

Correction: My mom just hit the big 5-9, not 6-0.  On the night after we went to the Pelican Club, my sister and I took her to a Mexican place called the Velvet Cactus on Harrison Ave. and had lots of tequilas at our table outside.  I got her a mini jigsaw puzzle, one that is billed as the world's smallest wooden jigsaw puzzle, in fact, earlier that day in Slidell.  It was made in Sweden some decades ago.  I found it in an antiques store that had mainly trinkets rather than actual antiques.

I somehow made myself watch both of the Shins' songs on SNL last night.  It's sort of mind-boggling that a former member of Bare Minimum made it to what could be called the top of the pop culture mountain, albeit by joining one of the suckiest, most derivative bands in history.  His drumming was really the only interesting thing about the first song, and the second song was so boring that I literally can't remember a single detail about it.

If you want to be really depressed about the current state of music ("indie" or otherwise), just check out this concert listing page from exactly 20 years ago, March 11th '92.  It's from the 3/14/92 issue of Melody Maker; click here to view it full size:

Toni already had her existential Robert Smith impression down to an exact science, right down to the floppy hair strands, eyeshadow, lipstick color, & head tilt
...not that I'm complaining.

I personally have no idea which of those gigs I would've gone to on that night, because I would give my left hand to go to about five of those shows.  Which would you have gone to?  You can see that the previous owner of this rag was so excited about that night's gig bonanza that he/she actually BLED ON IT.  Or maybe the blood came later that night during a rough session of something or other, or maybe it's pomegranate sorbet, but the point is that people in England in the early '90s were spoiled beyond belief when it came to music.  And all they ever really did was bicker about which band ripped off which other one, blind to their good fortune, to the point where most of these bands changed their sounds dramatically just to get some respite from the constant critical drubbings coming from all sides.  Another interesting thing is that all of these shoegaze bands seemed content to play locally at this time, which was their all-time peak of commercial popularity / exposure, rather than touring to far-flung corners of the world.  (Although that "Rollercoaster tour" mentioned on the front cover did criss-cross the U.S. and helped to establish shoegaze over here.)  So I guess it really was as insular of a scene as people make it out to have been.  And I think Bell Hollow would've fit into that scene quite effortlessly.  Maybe they would've toured big theaters across the pond rather than dingy clubs over here in America.

I will not be pinkwashed: Komen's race is for money, not cure - "Susan G. Komen for the Cure is a multimillion-dollar company with assets totaling over $390 million. Only 20.9% of these funds were reportedly used in the 2009-2010 fiscal year for research 'for the cure.'"

Komen Foundation offers pink handgun, "Hope Edition":

Atheist billboard goes up in NJ Muslim neighborhood

Planets with similar climates: Kitchens Of Distinction - "Aspray" (1990), Asylum Party - "Play Alone" (1989), Pale Saints - "Thread Of Light" (1992), Echo & The Bunnymen - "The Killing Moon" (1983), Film School - "Two Kinds" (2007), National Skyline - "Air" (2000), The Comsat Angels - "Independence Day" (1980), Band Of Susans - "Blind" (1993).

Necropolis Of Love >> I'm looking at something left unsaid here

I can't believe it's still California Month, tremor #41:

Necropolis Of Love - "Talk" (re-recorded version)

(Thumb Records, 1984)

Yup, I extended it for yet another month...

This song came out as a 7" single in 1982, and again on the band's EP The Hope in 1984.  I have both mp3s, and I can't tell any real difference.  The liner notes of the EP state that this song was "Recorded at Dangerous Rhythm Studios, Oakland, CA in May 1984. Additional recording at Peak Design/Tony Milosz, Berkeley, CA."  So I guess this version that I'm posting (from the EP) is indeed re-recorded.  Both of those releases have cool cover art.  Thumb Records was presumably a self-run micro-label, since all three of its releases appear to be by NOL.

I have to wonder aloud if Tears For Fears got inspiration for their giganto-hit "Shout" from "Talk," since both have similar tribal drum patterns, melodies, and of course lyrical themes.  I'll admit I love mid-'80s TFF, and you should too.  I don't know how close they had their ear to the underground at this time, and I don't know how much airplay "Talk" got.  But I do know NOL got briefly signed to Sire Records, though it looks like no music ever came out of it.  They remain a cult favorite in the San Fran area, but I don't know if they've ever reunited.  One of the most eyebrow-raising band names ever, too.  Singer David Velasquez recently said he described his band's sound as "existential dance music" and as "hostile disco music."

I almost chose not to show this live clip, due to the dance maneuvers, but heck, here it is:

The main thing this video does for me is to clear up the intricate, and yes, savage – you know I love that word – drumming.  I was wondering if it was some sort of hybrid between real drumming and a drum machine, and sure enough, it is.  That's a pretty huge sound from a band with only two instrumentalists, though the singer does play some keyboard at one point.  A gig flyer of theirs offers "complimentary aspirin."

Existential sign at Crosby Arboretum in Picayune, MS, 10/23/11.  Vaccinium elliottii (Elliott's blueberry, a.k.a. Mayberry) in background.

Two days ago I read that Kim Kardashian & Kris Humphries' wedding cake cost approximately $20,000, and today she filed for divorce after 72 days of "marriage."  Refer back to the last sentence of yesterday's post in order to see how I feel about this.  My sister met Kim after the Saints-Steelers game in the Dome last Halloween, when she was dating Reggie Bush, and said that she's very nice in person, so oh well.  I just watched a documentary about this guy named Chris Herren, called Unguarded, that chronicles how his struggles with drugs ruined his NBA career.

Planets with similar climates: The Sound - "Golden Soldiers" (1984), Tears For Fears - "Shout" (1985), The Comsat Angels - "Eye Dance" (1981), Sponge - "Plowed" (1995).


Currently eating or drinking: Shultz honey wheat braided twist pretzels, Dixie Jazz amber light beer, Brothers All Natural freeze-dried banana & strawberry crisps.

Abecedarians >> I've waited for one thousand years to die

California Month, tremor #15:

Abecedarians - "Soil" (early version)

(Independent Project Records, 1983, '84, or '85)

Trying to come up with a genre to describe this spidery song is next to impossible.  Psychedelic post-goth?  Stoner dream-punk?  Proto-shoegaze krautrock?  The jazzy drumming becomes almost industrial, especially contrasted with the abstract, liquid guitar lines played above it.

This song is taken from the posthumous compilation The Other Side Of The Fence (1983-85), released only on double 10" vinyl (some copies on black wax, some on yellow), numbered, with strikingly desolate cover art that suits the music perfectly:

Those are Phoenix dactylifera palms (Date Palms), a.k.a. my favorite plant in the world, presumably in situ in the Middle East / N. Africa

It consists of recordings that predate their impressive 1986 debut album Eureka.  Despite the song's languid tempo, the opening line is pretty intense: "Seeping from soil, the juices of lust that once held me at bay."  Does it refer to water, blood, or uh... something else?  (Huh-huh...)  This song is a treble lover's dream, and the stereo separation in the mixing job (done in 1990) is really impressive.  Abecedarians were a relatively unknown group from Los Angeles by way of Orange County, active from about 1983-90.  I just discovered this band a few years ago.  Chris Manecke handled the vocal and guitar assignments, Kevin Dolan thrust his sticks upon the drums, and John Blake strummed on his bass guitar.

In L.A., even the cacti are paparazzi.  (From the booklet of their great compilation CD, cleverly titled AB-CD.)

I was stunned to discover earlier this year that the Abs had a music video for this song, and it remains one of my favorite YouTube discoveries.  It's the re-recorded 1986 Eureka version:

The Eureka version of "Soil" is almost a minute longer than the one I'm posting, and is a little smoother.  It goes without saying that both versions are amazing.  The history of the band's first album is confusing.  Eureka was put out by a micro indie called Southwest Audio Reproductions with two different cover designs, then reissued by Caroline Records in 1987 with an entirely new cover (consisting of blocks of mini permutations of the original covers) and one different song.  See info on all three versions here.  All three versions sell for large sums on eBay, so I have no hopes of ever owning one; an eBayer named shugarecords is actually trying to sell one for $3,000 right now.  Eureka indeed...

Planets with similar climates: Gang Of Four - "The History Of The World" (1982), Poem Rocket - "Bataille" (1997), Section 25 - "New Horizon" (1981), For Against - "Echelons" (1987), New Fast Automatic Daffodils - "Music" (1992), The Durutti Column - "Never Known" (1981), Sonic Youth - "I Dreamed I Dream" (1982).

Chrome >> Found the answers to the question of the human state

California Month, tremor #8:

Chrome - "Isolation"

(Siren Records / Beggars Banquet Records, 1980 / Cleopatra Records, 1996)

I got this song in 2003 when I downloaded Chrome's box set, which is appallingly titled Chrome Box, from eMusic.  It clicked with me more than their other songs did, due to its slower, more chilled-out tempo and jazzy hi-hat flourishes, and of course its unique, androgynous vocals.  It's the last song on their album Red Exposure, which came out with two equally-bad covers and also contains the shoulda-been-a-New-Wave-hit "Electric Chair".  It's hard to believe that "Isolation" and "Electric Chair" are by the same band, let alone from the same album, so I guess that shows Chrome's diversity, though most of their songs used the same primitive elements of tribal rhythms, guitar feedback and barely-human vocals.  Check out the truly def video for their 1982 song "Firebomb":

It's weird for me to think that this band, as well as one that would end up in my all-time top ten (Faith No More) was making groundbreaking music in San Francisco at the same time that I was living there as a kid. Luckily, I was aware of the 49ers when they were winning several Super Bowls, and my dad took me to many a game at Candlestick Park.  (A young Tom Brady was going to these same games with his dad at this same time.)  Jerry Rice and Ronnie Lott would later be two of my main football idols.

Amazing infrared photo of Canary Island Date palms, using a fisheye lens, of course.  By Peter iNova; undated.

Hey, remember a few weeks ago when I said I suggested a really obnoxious P.M. Dawn album title to the geniuses at Warm Voices Rearranged?  They came through for me!

Planets with similar climates: Circle X - "Culture Progress" (1981), Live Skull - "Bootcamp" (1986), Plexi - "Ganesh" (1994), The Sleepers - "B Side" (1980), The Comsat Angels - "Sleep No More" (1981), Pocahaunted - "Follow I" (2008), probably something by Swans.

The Cleaners From Venus >> Some of my dreams weren't really worth saving

⍟ The Cleaners From Venus - "Follow The Plough" ⍟

« (Man At The Off License [or RCA Records], 1986; Tangerine Records, 1993) «

The Cleaners From Venus were an '80s English jange-pop group, essentially the mastermind of a guy named Martin Newell, who is revered amongst circles of people who revere this type of music.  I'm not sure if this song is from their 1986 cassette-only album Living With Victoria Grey, or from their 1987 (recorded in '86) LP Going To England.  Maybe those versions are the same?  All I know is it's taken from their best-of compilation called Golden Cleaners, put out by Tangerine Records in 1993.  Man, it's just so beautiful and intense.  "I followed you like a seagull follows the plough" refers to the way seagulls flock behind plows [ploughs], shrimp boats, etc., looking for scraps of food that have been stirred up by the commotion.  One of the most bizarrely romantic things I've ever heard anyone say about someone else...  He just keeps hanging around a person due to force of habit, even though he knows it probably isn't going to lead him anywhere in the long run.  The line "Live in a world of violence and danger, finding myself a comparative stranger" is open to many interpretations, especially since he seems to be singing from the standpoint of himself as a child in that part of the song. "You are before me, you are behind me / It was predestined that you would find me" is another line that sends a chill up my spine for some reason.

The guitars chime along (using a picking technique called harmonics, used to spectacular effect in the second half of "How Soon Is Now?" by The Smiths) in an urgent manner as Newell's vocals swell with passion in the choruses, while a truly sick bassline provides the undertow.  The way he sings the "And I can't remember how..." line in a descending manner is just too cool for words.  I'll admit to not knowing much about this band, but I kind of don't want to investigate much further, since I can't imagine they have a better song than this one.  It's not surprising that a major label, RCA, snatched the Cleaners up immediately after hearing this song, but I think most of the band's music was too quirky to reach a larger audience.  Their lyrics also contain lots of references to obscure facets of British culture, most of which wind up going right over the heads of non-Brits like myself.  The Cleaners are apparently best known for their cult hit "Ilya Kuryakin Looked At Me".  It will never cease to amaze me how most bands are beloved for a song that is nowhere near their overall best song, but that's a whole 'nother topic.

L-R: Martin Newell & Giles Smith, ca. 1986

This will probably interest absolutely no one, but I like to always tell how I got into a song, so I was in a Goodwill thrift store in Houma, LA in summer '07 when I saw an LP by Gerry & The Pacemakers, which had a song called "Girl On A Swing."  I made a mental note to check out whether one of my favorite songs, "Girl On A Swing" by Lions & Ghosts (a song which presages the band Morphine's entire aesthetic), was a cover of that one.  So when I got home I typed in that song name on iTunes and lo and behold, found a song called "Girl On A Swing" by the preposterously-named Cleaners From Venus, on one of their (other) greatest-hits albums.  I clicked on the 30-second sample clip of "Follow The Plough," was immediately stunned, listened to it over and over, and eventually got an internet buddy to track down the mp3 and send it to me.  So there you have it.  All three "Girl On A Swing"s are different, for what it's worth...

Well, a few hours ago the Mavericks just won their first NBA title over the choke-a-riffic Heat, as I predicted in my post on May 8th, in what was definitely the most interesting NBA Finals I've seen.  Big ups to those old dudes, especially to Dirk for somehow managing to avoid the dreaded Sports Illustrated Cover Jinx.  Jason Terry is probably my favorite player in the NBA now.  The Mavs' run had lots of parallels to the Saints' Super Bowl season, and I've adopted them as my secondary basketball team, since the Hornets will never win one.  (Until tonight, only six teams had won the last 27 NBA titles.)  The grind of playing seven-game series means that fluke teams never make it through to the Finals, as often happens in one-and-done formats like the NFL, tennis, or March Madness.  And the current craze for assembling an expensive "Big Three" means that small-market teams simply have no way of being competitive, and must live off of other teams' scraps.

Planets with similar climates: The Smiths - "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" (1986), The Go-Betweens - "The House That Jack Kerouac Built" (1988), The Church - "Shadow Cabinet" (1984) & "Tantalized" (1986), The Sound - "Golden Soldiers" (1984), Tears For Fears - "Broken" (1985), Kitchens Of Distinction - "What Happens Now?" (1992).


Still chuckling at: The couple in front of me in the line to get into a show by This Will Destroy You on Friday night in Baton Rouge.  They were casually improvising some nonsensical stuff in a British accent, which I thought might be some lines from Monty Python.  A few hours later I ran into them at the merch table, so I asked them what they were talking about, and they told me they were imagining what Morrissey would say if he were making an order at a fast-food restaurant.  Also, upstairs next to the pool table, some guy next to me quoted one of my favorite Ahnuld lines: "Get to the choppa!"

Surprisingly, it was the first time I'd ever heard anyone quote this legendary line in the field.  (Though it was cancelled out by his clichéd request to opening band The Nighty Nite to "Play some Skynyrd," for which I almost threw him over the railing.)  So overall, it was a pretty entertaining night, though I hate driving home for an hour every time I go to shows there, especially since they always seem to end at around 2 AM.