Welcome to the start of Pitchfork Music Festival Week here at Faronheit! Starting today and going all the way through next Monday, I’ll be bringing you each and every play-by-play concerning the festival. That includes previewing the artists playing, commenting on how sets go during the fest, and a full post-mortem that includes plenty of photos. So I invite you to take this journey with me whether you’re going or not, primarily because it’s going to be a lot of fun and there’s so much great music involved. Want proof? This introductory post features music from every single artist performing this upcoming weekend. Most have mp3s for you to download, but some artists have Soundcloud streams only, because they prefer it that way. If you don’t want to download all of the songs below and like your taste testing via streaming, I’ve also assembled a Spotify playlist in which you can stream a track from (almost) every artist performing, AND it’s all carefully arranged in an order that is designed to create the most satisfying listening experience possible. Check that out if you’re so inclined. For everyone else though, feel free to take the songs posted below for a test drive to see what strikes your fancy. You might just discover your new favorite band even if you won’t be in Union Park this weekend!
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Welcome to a brand new week, friends. I’m going to make this introduction short and sweet today, because big things are afoot here on the site. It’s Pitchfork Music Festival week, and I’m doing my best to keep you as informed and up-to-date with all the comings and goings of one of Chicago’s finest (if not THE finest) music festivals. In addition to the regular dose of Pick Your Poison today, I’ll be posting a collection of mp3s and song streams from every artist on this year’s Pitchfork Music Festival lineup. The hope is that you’ll get some sort of education about artists on the bill you may not have heard of before, even if that dose is 3 minutes long. So enjoy that, as the next few days leading into Friday will be consumed with day-by-day previews of what artists to see. As to the official business at hand concerning Pick Your Poison today, please enjoy some great songs from CutWires, Debo Band, Feedtime, Frank Ocean, Golden Retriever, Memoryhouse, mum, and State Broadcasters.
Cantoreggi – Young Guns (ft. XOV)
Golden Retriever – Serene Velocity
La Chansons – Candy Party (Lost in a Dream Mix)
Pegasus Dream – In Absentia
Pegasus Dream – Oxen Free
Ryan Traster – Cruel Love
Ryan Traster – As We Go Up, We Go Down (Guided By Voices cover)
State Broadcasters – Trespassers
SOUNDCLOUD
Aiden Grimshaw – Curtain Call (II Figures Remix)
One of the most fascinating things about Dirty Projectors is how they continually evolve with each new record. It’s been almost 10 years since the band released The Glad Fact, which at the time really wasn’t much more than frontman Dave Longstreth and Yume Bitsu’s Adam Forkner playing oddball songs people had trouble describing. Things got even more fun in 2005 with The Getty Address, a concept “opera” that was about the destruction of the environment, 16th century explorer Hernan Cortes, and featured a main character named Don Henley. There was dense orchestration mixed with some more modern R&B beats that certainly gave it a unique feel and sound. When people started to earnestly pay attention to this eccentric and sometimes brilliant band was in 2007 with the release of Rise Above. The record was an attempt by Longstreth to re-interpret the classic Black Flag album Damaged track-by-track, in spite of not having listened to it in over 15 years. His focus also shifted away from epic, orchestral arrangements and more towards dense polyrhythms and visceral vocal harmonies. Band membership was somewhat streamlined too, and after working with a wide variety of people including members of Vampire Weekend, Dirty Projectors became a more comfortable five piece with people Longstreth actually seemed to care about. The real challenge was getting people to care too. Such wild musical ambitions often made for difficult results, and the critical love the band received didn’t exactly earn them a huge increase in fans. They are the sort of band best described as “not for everybody.” On their last album Bitte Orca however, they went a long way to help rectify that stigma by moving in a more accessible art-pop direction. Key elements such as West African-inspired guitar lines and offbeat percussion remained, but never had the band produced something that was so light, airy and altogether fun to listen to. After years of wandering through a desert of his own wildly strange vision, Longstreth had finally found the balance needed to take the band to the next level of success.
That was three years ago, and since then restlessness has once again gotten the better of Dirty Projectors. Never content to do the same thing twice, or even keep the same lineup for too long, there have been a few changes made in preparation for the release of the band’s new album Swing Lo Magellan. Keyboardist and singer Angel Deradoorian has taken a hiatus to focus on other projects, and drummer Brian McOmber left the band, with Mike Johnson taking his place. A close listen to the new single “Gun Has No Trigger” also yields some clues as to what’s in store on the new record. The arrangement is best described as minimal, with an unwavering beat and light flourishes of bass guitar being the only instruments used beyond Longstreth’s lead vocal and the harmonies of Amber Coffman and Haley Dekle. The poppy, R&B-like flavor of “Stillness Is the Move” off Bitte Orca is nowhere to be found. In fact, not one song on Swing Lo Magellan even comes close to that level of funky, resonating catchiness. That’s not the point though, because this is a fresh batch of songs written with different intentions in mind. Whereas the last album was very self-conscious by carefully reappropriating certain sounds in creative ways, Longstreth has called the new material deeper and more personal, but also more playful with an emphasis on writing great individual songs rather than leaning on an overarching theme. Instead of retreating from the more pop sensible and accessible song structures, the band drives even further towards them. The way they do it varies from song to song, as do the styles somewhat, but when you’re anchored by distinctive guitar playing along with equally distinctive percussion and vocal styles, those constants do great work keeping everything pretty uniform even when they’re anything but.
Swing Lo Magellan begins with Longstreth clearing his throat. It turns out to be the first of many raw “sounds of the studio” that appear on the album. “Unto Caesar” contains the most obvious use of the technique, with Coffman and Dekle asking, “When should we bust in the harmonies?” right in the middle of a verse, and later commenting on the lyrics with, “Uhh, that doesn’t make any sense, what you just said.” Such off the cuff moments actually lend the record quite a bit of levity and sharply reduce the impression that Longstreth is a bit anal retentive when it comes to song arrangement. Is almost everything else pieced together in an almost ironclad fashion? For the most part, but that’s another point Longstreth is trying to make: music should inspire you and relate to you rather than simply existing in a vacuum of your own complacency. Songs like “Offspring Are Blank,” “About to Die,” “Just from Chevron” and “Impregnable Question” tackle the big topics of birth, death, environmental disaster and love, because if you write about trivial things you’ll get trivial responses to your music. The whole thing is very nicely summed up at the end of the record with “Irresponsible Tune,” where Longstreth adopts a ’50s style croon and a lone acoustic guitar to make his case. “Without songs we’re lost/and life is pointless, harsh and long,” he espouses with the same sort of tender conviction that’s so effective across the rest of the album. Even if he sang it as though he didn’t believe it, that doesn’t make the words themselves any less correct.
What makes Swing Lo Magellan such a compelling listen is that you’re never able to put it into a box or describe it to someone easily. If you’ve heard a Dirty Projectors record before then you’ve probably got a reasonable grasp on what they sound like, even if words fail you. Opening track “Offspring Are Blank,” for example, is extremely organic in its initial approach, the melody created via humming voices and the rhythms sustained by handclaps. Three kids on a school playground can recreate it, no instruments needed. Until the chorus, that is, when the sky cracks open and the electric guitars and drums come to life next to Longstreth’s soaring vocal. The dynamic shift from quiet to loud and back again calls attention to the verse-chorus-verse nature of the song while also sucking you in with a dynamite hook. On a different side of the spectrum, “Just From Chevron” has no chorus or hook, and plays out as a story where Coffman and Dekle narrate the beginning and end while Longstreth belts out a meaty lead role through the middle portion. It’s a unique way to put together a song, but the lyrics about a dying oil employee’s final words are what sell and justify its existence. If you’ve ever wanted to hear Dirty Projectors get a little psychedelic, “Maybe That Was It” is a guitar-heavy dirge that’s one of the most normal things the band has ever done. There’s nothing inherently weird about it outside of some light effects applied to Longstreth’s vocals, yet such a straightforward approach almost leaves the song sounding like the odd man out. When you’ve got a record full of handclaps, alien-like harmonies and various electronic bric-a-brac, avoiding such things can give you the impression there’s something wrong.
Similar things could be said about the title track. Longstreth’s relaxed vocal is paired with a lightly strummed acoustic guitar and a very standard, unflinching snare rhythm. As he waxes poetic over those 2.5 minutes of folk, there’s something almost Dylanesque about it. That brings up a great point: Dave Longstreth and Bob Dylan have quite a lot in common. Both are very odd and mysterious creatures, about whom we know everything and nothing at the same time. The attitudes and opinions we’re supposed to glean from the songs themselves are nearly useless, because either the lyrics are too strange to make any sense out of, or the times we do understand will be contradicted in the next song or record. Interviews are awkward, and often classified as train wrecks. Yet in description, people tend to use the words “ahead of his time.” At the end of it all, the one thing we can remain sure of is that be it Longstreth with Dirty Projectors or Dylan and his band, we will always keep expecting the unexpected. It may not always work out or be the easiest to digest, but at least they’re still trying to reach that next level of greatness. That’s more than can be said about a vast majority of artists making music today.
I’ve reviewed a few Wilco shows before, and I’m sure I’ll review a Wilco show again. Even though I was there, I won’t be reviewing this one. It was as good as almost every other Wilco show I’ve seen, even though I didn’t fully appreciate the sound system in the ballpark. Nels Cline is still killing it with those guitar solos, Jeff Tweedy’s vocals are sharp as ever, and there were some nice set list surprises at this show. That’s all I’m going to say about it. Here’s the full set list:
Set List
Dawned On Me
War On War
I Might
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
Box Full of Letters
Handshake Drugs
Spiders (Kidsmoke)
Impossible Germany
Born Alone
Not For the Season (aka Laminated Cat)
Side With The Seeds
Say You Miss Me
Candyfloss
Jesus Etc. (with Andrew Bird)
Hate It Here
Whole Love
I’m Always in Love
Heavy Metal Drummer
I’m the Man Who Loves You
ENCORE 1
Via Chicago
Art of Almost
Standing O
A Shot in the Arm
ENCORE 2
California Stars (with Andrew Bird)
The Late Greats
Hoodoo Voodoo
It’s been an interesting holiday week in music, hasn’t it? Christopher Owens left the band Girls. Tyler Sargent and Robbie Guertin left Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Frank Ocean left heterosexuality. Wild stuff, right? I don’t really have comments on any of those things, except to say I wish everyone the best. Do what makes you happy, and if that means quitting a band or announcing you’re a homosexual or bisexual, then hopefully it works out in the end. One other thing I wanted to mention, and it’s sort of a site housekeeping sort of thing, but next week is Pitchfork Week here at Faronheit. Starting Monday and ending the following Monday, I’ll be providing a go-to guide for anything and everything Pitchfork Music Festival. I’ll start with a day-by-day guide, then provide daily recaps over the 3-day weekend before wrapping up with a final assessment and some photo sets. It should be a lot of fun, and I hope you’ll spend plenty of time learning about this year’s fest and the artists involved. Covering it the last couple years has been a blast, and I suspect this year will be more of the same. So keep an eye out for that. As for this Friday edition of Pick Your Poison, allow me to recommend tracks from Echoes De Luxe, Kalen Nash, Silver Medallion, Tough Guys of America and Trebuchet. In the Soundcloud section there’s good stuff streaming from Bonde do Role, OM and Summer Camp. Have a great weekend!
Get People – Something Better (dBridge vs. Get People)
Jack Ladder & The Dreamlanders – Cold Feet (DM Edit)
Tough Guys of America – Jersey Shore
SOUNDCLOUD
Bonde do Role – Bang (ft. Kool A.D. of Das Racist)
Derby Sunshine – The Milky Way
While I sit back and recover from too much BBQ yesterday, let’s take care of a couple points of business. First up, this is the weekly reminder that the Faronheit Facebook page exists, and you might want to pop over and “Like” it if you’re not feeling too turned off by the mere suggestion. No pressure, I’m just trying to deliver the best content possible over there to help make it worth the 2 seconds it took you to click. Secondly, I like to mention sometimes if a band being featured in Pick Your Poison has an upcoming tour date in Chicago. That’s the case with Aktar Aktar, who will be performing at Subterranean on Friday, July 20th with Secret Colours (who I’ve also featured on here a couple times). Should be a great show, and you can buy tickets for $10 by clicking here. Listen/download the Aktar Aktar song below too – it’s pretty good. Other pretty good stuff comes from Careful, Easter Island, Le Youth, Peelander Z, Slow Dancing Society and Wildlife Control. Oh, and I’d like to thank the multiple (random) people that emailed me about The Ludlow Thieves this week. I don’t know if they’re trying some grassroots marketing campaign or if it was sheer coincidence that 3 non-PR strangers felt the need to “get in touch” all at once, but in any case they’re a band with plenty of support and listening to the track below I can kind of understand why. In the Soundcloud section, stream some great tracks from Dead Can Dance, Fang Island and Woods. Lykke Li’s cover of Fleetwood Mac’s “Silver Springs” is perhaps the best thing I’ve heard from the upcoming tribute record so far. Don’t miss it.
Aktar Aktar – Both Young and Wild
Body Language – You Can (Live)
The Delmore Schwartz – Best Friend
High Pines – All Around
High Pines – I Haven’t Seen It All
The Ludlow Thieves – To Travel
Slow Dancing Society – I’ll Leave A Light On
The Stowaways – Changing Times
Wildlife Control – Analog or Digital
SOUNDCLOUD
Echodrone – Under An Impressive Sky
Happy Independence Day to my fellow Americans! Today’s the day we celebrate not being ruled by England anymore. It’s a whole thing, we had parent issues and a rebellious phase that’s been going on for quite some time. Each year we get together with family or friends to fire up some grills, sit by the pool and launch plenty of fireworks. With that also comes the inevitable firework safety video, in which mannequins get their limbs blown off to illustrate the dangers of fireworks. So that’s always fun. I hope you enjoy your holiday, if you’re American and celebrating. If not, I hope your Wednesday is good regardless. If you’re throwing a party, some of the mp3s featured below could help make your soundtrack just a bit better. New stuff from Azealia Banks, Dylan LeBlanc, Railbird, Shark?, Truckstop Darlin, World Blanket (with a song especially effective today), and Zachary Cale. In the Soundcloud section, streams of songs by Allo Darlin’, Dinosaur Jr., and The June Brides will hopefully inspire you too.
Azealia Banks – Nathan (ft. Styles P)
Dylan LeBlanc – Part One: The End
Frank Rabeyrolles – Instable Drive
Matt and Kim – Let’s Go (Team Bayside High Remix)
Noah and the MegaFauna – We’ll Sail Above This (ft. Kat Edmonson)
Railbird – Jump Ship (ft. Sean Rowe & Sarah Barthel of Phantogram)
Truckstop Darlin – Same Old Story
Van She – Jamaica (Plastic Plates Remix)
World Blanket – The Holiday Song (For No Holiday in Particular)
Zachary Cale – Love Everlasting
SOUNDCLOUD
Dinosaur Jr. – Watch the Corners
Friends – I’m His Girl (AlunaGeorge Mix)
The June Brides – A January Moon
It’s a holiday week in America, and that typically means one thing: fewer new music releases. On Tuesdays I like to give you the rundown of what’s new out there so you can make an informed decision about what to spend your money on. This week sees new records from Easter Island, Chicago’s own Gold Motel, Johnny Hickman, Joshua Hyslop, Mum and Parlovr. Nothing too significant, but I promise you a couple of those records are more than decent. As for today’s Pick Your Poison, might I recommend tracks from Angel Haze, Denver, The Dust Engineers, Jenee Halstead, Tilly & the Wall and The Ugly Club. In the Soundcloud section you might be interested to stream tracks from James Iha and Lavender Diamond.
Binary – Modern Man (Atari Teenage Riot Remix)
Brian John Mitchell & Andrew Weathers – Only Dream You
David Bowie – Space Oddity (The Golden Pony Remix)
The Dust Engineers – So American
Gatekeeper – Tree Drum (Pre-Gen Exo Mix)
Jenee Halstead – So Far, So Fast
A Silent Film – Echoes Across A Bowl of Tears
The Ugly Club – David Foster Wallace
Wax Mannequin – Don’t Want to Go
SOUNDCLOUD
James Iha – To Who Knows Where
Keaton Henson – To Your Health
Plenty has been said about Billy Corgan. Too much, probably. The man has been and continues to be a polarizing figure in rock music, and when he’s not being judged for antics on stage or on records, he’s running his mouth and provoking critics or other bands. He also has the phrase “difficult to work with” tacked onto his resume, something he’s not apologetic about so long as his personal vision gets fulfilled. It’s why the original Smashing Pumpkins fell apart, and every project he’s done since then has failed to gain as much traction. Even when he reclaimed the Pumpkins moniker several years ago and unleashed the relatively forgettable Zeitgeist in 2007, the new people he was working with all eventually abandoned ship. That includes drummer Jimmy Chamberlain, the only original Smashing Pumpkins member left besides Corgan. You could almost audibly hear eyes rolling when the search for Chamberlain’s replacement became an online contest that ended with fresh-faced 19-year-old Mike Byrne earning a place alongside bassist Nicole Fiorentino and guitarist Jeff Schroeder as Corgan’s “hired hands.” These people are faceless entities compared to James Iha, D’Arcy Wretzky and Chamberlain. It’d be wrong to say they’re not good musicians though, and the last couple years of touring with this lineup has gone remarkably well for the Pumpkins Version 2.0.
Never one to sideline his ambitions, in 2009 Corgan announced the Smashing Pumpkins were embarking on a project he dubbed Teargarden By Kaleidyscope. The plan was to release the 44 tracks comprising this gigantic album in multiple pieces parsed out over time, all of it available for free download. The first two volumes, four tracks apiece, were released in 2010. A third volume was started, but has yet to be completed. Apparently the whole concept is undergoing a little bit of a makeover, as releasing music on a song-by-song basis wasn’t quite as successful as the band hoped it would be. Part of that makeover is the new album Oceania, marking a return to the full length format while still feeding into the conceptual Teargarden… whole. Maybe it’s the personnel shifts, maybe it’s the fact that they took the time to road test most of these new songs, or maybe it’s something else entirely, but these 13 songs are surprising because of the way they bring new life and a level of intelligence back to the Smashing Pumpkins name. For the first time in a long time, Corgan and friends have stumbled upon rock’s sweet spot.
Perhaps the biggest reason why Oceania is such a successful Smashing Pumpkins record is because of lowered expectations. On Zeitgeist, Corgan was creating the first Pumpkins record since 2000’s Machina II: The Friends and Enemies of Modern Music. His attempts to restart his career via Zwan and a solo record both fell flat, and reclaiming his old band name was a somewhat desperate attempt to remain relevant and prove his talents to a now jaded group of fans. It didn’t help matters that Zeitgeist was an overblown affair of psychedelic proportions as songs went longer and featured more solos than ever. Call it a case of trying too hard. After that point it became easy to write off the band as an act built for a certain time and place, both of which had long since passed by. Plenty of the die-hards stuck with them, and all the touring the last few years certainly didn’t leave many or any tickets left to sell at the door. Yet such devotion seems to have paid off, as time has allowed wounds to heal, people to forget and Corgan to get his memory back. The drive, wisdom and talent it took to craft amazing records like Gish, Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness have largely been reinstated, and the entire band plays like they’re out to prove their worth and worthiness. Only Byrne doesn’t fully succeed, simply because Chamberlain was such a powerhouse of percussion he’s irreplaceable.
Things start off strong with the acid rock riffage of “Quasar,” which bears an almost eerie resemblance to the guitar work on “Cherub Rock.” The religious affirmations he makes in the lyrics, “God right on!/Krishna right on!,” are very “Siva”-like in nature too. Such calls back to classic Pumpkins material are enough to at least inspire a little hope that maybe the band has found their mojo again. “Panopticon” holds that idea steadfast, surging ahead with confidence and intricacy before soaring into a massive chorus. “There’s a sun that shines in me,” Corgan sings at the end of the song, and for once you can almost hear him smile as he sings it. The acoustic guitars and sawing violins of “The Celestials” bring in some nice balladry reminiscent of “Disarm,” but as with almost every Corgan record, there’s a questionable lyric or two. “I’m gonna love you 101 percent,” is not one of his better moments.
What really makes Oceania tick are the transitions it goes through while you listen. It’s impeccably structured with some tracks bleeding into one another, and logical sonic progressions that never seem too far out of left field. The movement from the lighter pop-rock of “My Love Is Winter” into the synth-heavy pop of “One Diamond, One Heart” feels almost organic – their connective tissue bound by the same lyrical topic and a keyboard. Where such sonic glue is most prevalent is within the three tracks at the center of the record. The steady and beautiful “Pinwheels” flits around in its intro with some twinkling synths and cello, devolves into introspective acoustic folk then incorporates some gorgeous female backing harmonies. It feels like an appropriate slice of bread before the sandwich meat reaches your tastebuds in the form of the nine minute epic title track. Instead of simply descending into swirling psychedelic rock that was largely explored on Zeitgeist, the song instead sustains itself by continuously shifting sounds every couple minutes to keep the listener engaged. The final two minutes or so do get a little gratuitous with the guitar solos, but by that point they’re pretty much earned. The final piece of this mid-album trilogy is “Pale Horse,” a sad, pleading piano ballad that plays like a mellow version of “Thru the Eyes of Ruby.” It’s not Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness that best ties into these three songs though, it’s Adore. They might not have the electro-pop vibe of that record, but they do have the darkness and self-loathing in both lyrics and melody.
The crunchy heavy metal guitars on “The Chimera” suddenly whip Corgan and the rest of the Pumpkins out of their funk like somebody waking up from a nightmare or a bad drug trip. It’s an invigorating kick in the teeth worthy of future single status, as Corgan comes to the realization that, “All you need is you, lover/so please need me too.” Ignoring the romantic implications of the song and those lines, you could well interpret this as his desire to have the love and support of a larger and more avid fan base once again. While he’s maintained in interviews that such things aren’t important to him and all he wants to do is maintain his artistic integrity, the reach backwards and near copying of material from classic Smashing Pumpkins records on Oceania appears to suggest otherwise. Either that, or he’s just out of fresh ideas. Whatever the cause or reason may really be, there’s still something inherently exciting about having such a great ’90s band rediscover what made them great and prove there’s still plenty of life left in them. Then again when you’ve got a lineup of all new members, it’s not so much a rediscovery as it is just a discovery. If they can keep this going, we could well be looking at a new era of Smashing Pumpkins excellence. Let’s just hope Corgan remembers the many lessons he learned the first time around.
Happy Monday. I hope you had a great weekend. Have you gone to see Ted yet? It got solid reviews, but seriously cleaned up at the box office over the weekend. I guess people are just really, really interested in seeing a movie about a foul-mouthed teddy bear. I thought it was excellent, and considering it was written by, directed by and stars the voice talents of Seth MacFarlane, it’s easy to say he’s destined for bigger and better things beyond his work on Family Guy, American Dad and so forth. Hopefully a successful movie career doesn’t put a stop to all that. Anyways, let’s get to today’s Pick Your Poison. You might be interested in tracks from Arcadia Gardens, Birthmark, Company, Leverage Models, Milk Music, Twin Shadow and Why?. In the Soundcloud section stream Best Coast’s cover of the Fleetwood Mac classic “Rhiannon,” and you might also enjoy listening to tracks from Delay Trees and Follow Me.
2800 Stunnaman – I Make My Own Rules (ft. Trouble Andrew)
Birthmark – Stuck
Birthmark – Shake Hands
David Rael – Nothing Could Have Gone Any Better
Jeans Wilder – Limeade
Jeans Wilder – Spanish Tile
Josh Gilligan – Whispers in the Breeze
Leverage Models – Cooperative Extensions
Minotaur Shock – Saundersfoot (Gold Panda Remix)
SOUNDCLOUD
Afterworks – You Are Given (Single Version)
Best Coast – Rhiannon (Fleetwood Mac cover)
Say hello to the weekend, because it just arrived. I don’t know about you, but my summer weekends are packed with parties, BBQs and outdoor activities. Enjoy it while you can. Try and make some time to see Ted this weekend too. It’s supposed to be really funny. Also, because I mention it weekly, I’d be super appreciative if you’d head over to Facebook and do the whole “Like” button thing on the Faronheit page. Your support means a lot to me, and I try and throw some exclusive content over there to make it extra engaging. If you’re hoping for some fun weekend music, this edition of Pick Your Poison certainly has some of that. I’ll advise you to download tracks from Elk, Jesca Hoop, Joe Jackson with Iggy Pop (covering Duke Ellington), Meyhem Lauren, The Raveonettes, They Might Be Giants, Videoing and Wake Up Lucid. The Jensen Sportag remix of Erika Spring is great too. In the Soundcloud section, stream super fun tracks from Com Truise and Dignan Porch, while CFCF’s remix of Azari & III’s “Into the Night” is positively sublime. Have a great weekend!
Bravestation – Western Thrills
Burning Jet Black – Magazine Girl
Erika Spring – Hidden (Jensen Sportag Remix)
Jesca Hoop – Hospital (Win Your Love)
Joe Jackson & Iggy Pop – It Don’t Mean a Thing (If You Ain’t Got That Swing) (Duke Ellington cover)
Luke Frazier – Interstellar Road Trip
Meyhem Lauren – BBQ Brisket (ft. Action Bronson & Ag Da Coronoer)
The Raveonettes – Observations
They Might Be Giants – Alphabet of Nations (Bonus Extended Version)
SOUNDCLOUD
Let’s just get a couple need-to-know bits of information taken care of right away. DIIV is the band formed by Beach Fossils touring guitarist Zachary Cole Smith. They used to be called Dive, but decided a few months ago to change it because a Belgian band has been using the moniker for more than a decade. Now when you write DIIV, you’ll know exactly what band is being talked about. After signing to Captured Tracks last fall, they released a few 7″ singles to quite a bit of buzz. Their full length debut Oshin is hot off the presses, pulling together most of those singles along with a bunch of new material. As to DIIV’s sound, it fits well under the label of dream pop, but plays with the conventions of that genre just a bit to make you question whether it’s properly applied here. Many of the songs on the album are instrumental, or at least instrumental adjacent. The ones that do have lyrics are often buried, processed or echoed to the point where you can’t make out what’s being said anyways. The times you can are typically when the song title is repeated over and over again. You’re not intended to gain understanding or purpose from the words; it’s the melodies and the way they’re presented that affect your enjoyment of this record. In that sense the listening experience is like that of a post-rock album, only with each journey packed into three minutes instead of eight. Surrender yourself to the waves of guitar washing over you and get transported to another time and place. There’s plenty of beauty to be found in these tracks, but it’s often the muscular kind of Explosions in the Sky rather than the more subtle crest and fall of Sigur Ros. It’s best on display via “Doused,” which brings forth an intensity and tension the rest of the album lacks. Placed at almost the very end of the record though, it’s off-the-map thrill ride vibe feels like a reward rather than a way to show up everything that came before it. Oshin actually thrives because of the way the whole thing is arranged. Individual highlights like “Human,” “How Long Have You Known?” and “Sometime” are parsed out generously from start to finish, and though the moments in between can sometimes sound like unimportant interludes, everything is essential if you listen to the record in its entirety in order. While the shimmering guitars are probably the most stand-out thing about the album, DIIV’s secret weapon is the rhythm section. It gives the record heft and propels things forward rather than simply allowing it to float in the ether. That’s an essential component giving the band more gravitas and separating them from similar-sounding peers. Oshin might not be the home run the band was hoping to hit in their first time at bat, but it’s a very strong triple that shows serious promise for the future. You couldn’t ask for much more.
Class of 2012 crossover alert! A few months ago I told you that A$AP Rocky and Lana Del Rey were working together on a song. It was originally set to appear on a mixtape by production team KickDrums, but they decided to remove the song and save it for A$AP Rocky’s upcoming album this fall. Funny story: the song “leaked” months ago before it was pulled from the mixtape, and then this week it resurfaced with claims it was “official this time” but of course it wasn’t and got pulled down again. Somebody keeps screwing up with that track. Really what I want to talk about though is the official music video that Lana Del Rey released a couple days ago for her song “National Anthem.” It’s nearly 8 minutes long and features Del Rey as both Jackie O and Marilyn Monroe. A$AP Rocky is not on the song anywhere, but he appears in the video in the role of JFK. Don’t ask me to make sense of it, just watch it. I’m just happy that these two kids found each other. I mean, who hasn’t dated a classmate a time or two? Anyways, onto today’s Pick Your Poison. Strong lineup today, with tracks to recommend from Barbara Morgenstern, Chelsea Light Moving, CIRC, Edmund II, Giant Sand and Rainer, Oddience, Paul Banks (of Interpol), and Trick Shooter Social Club. The Soundcloud section has some great streams as well from The 1975, Dark Dark Dark, The-Drum, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and Fang Island, as remixed by Anamanaguchi.
Barbara Morgenstern – Spring Time
Chelsea Light Moving – Burroughs
Courtship – The People Around You
Deep Forest – White Whisper (Pericles Remix)
Giant Sand and Rainer – The Inner Flame
Miss Shevaughn & Yuma Wray – The River Made Me Do It
Paul Banks – Summertime Is Coming
The Sometime Boys – The Good People of Brooklyn
Trick Shooter Social Club – Powder Blue
SOUNDCLOUD
Fang Island – Sisterly (Anamanaguchi Remix)
Occasionally I like to keep my Chicago readers informed about the latest and greatest shows happening in and around the city, and today shall be no different. The sextet known as Still Flyin’ will be making their way to the city this Friday, performing at The Burlington Bar with two great Chicago bands Roommate and Magical Beautiful. Still Flyin’ is touring in support of their new record On A Bedroom Wall, which is an excellent slice of 80’s-styled synth pop. If you’d like to hear something from the band, definitely check out the two mp3s posted below. If you’d like to go to the show at The Burlington Bar on Friday, it starts at 9PM and tickets are being sold at the door for a mere $7. It’s worth it if you ask me. As for today’s Pick Your Poison, don’t miss songs from Doc Days, Grand Resort, Ivan & Alyosha (with Aimee Mann), Me and My Drummer, Mungolian Jetset, and Waterlaso. The M Machine’s remix of Passion Pit, which is available for streaming in the Soundcloud section, is a nice slice of fun too.
The Beatles – Eleanor Rigby (Feature Cuts Remix)
Doc Days – Mirrored Dream
Doc Days – Oceanic Consciousness
Feist – Bittersweet Melodies (Christian Strobe Remix)
Female Demand – Paint My Brains With Your House
Grassfight – Look Homeward, Heathen
Ivan & Alyosha – All the Times We Had (ft. Aimee Mann)
Me and My Drummer – Heavy Weight
Mist Glider – Blueberry Hill (ft. Shelf Nunny)
Still Flyin’ – Travelin’ Man
Still Flyin’ – Cleat Talking
SOUNDCLOUD
The East Collective – East End Rudeboy
Fiona Apple is best classified as an eccentric. She’s been that way ever since her first album Tidal came out in 1996 and the video for “Criminal” was damaged, dark, skeletal, and above all memorable. That record and song catapulted her to a level of fame that isn’t handled well by everyone, let alone 19-year-olds with a history of mental and physical trauma. So you get awards show speeches claiming that the “world is bullshit” and tours get cancelled because of “personal family problems.” Even though she returned in 1999 with her sophomore album When the Pawn… which only further solidified her already large fan base, incidents like her meltdown at a show in NYC persisted to the point where she pretty much vanished entirely from the public eye. She said in interviews years later that she thought about retiring from music, and probably would have had things gone a little differently.
What wound up happening was that Apple recorded a number of songs with her friend Jon Brion in 2002-3, and the tracks were submitted to her label shortly thereafter. It’s still unclear if Sony refused to release the Extraordinary Machine album because it wasn’t commercially viable, or because Apple herself asked them not to because she was unhappy with how the songs turned out. Nevertheless tracks leaked onto the internet anyways in 2004 and 2005, and fans finding out the album had already been completed, launched a “Free Fiona” campaign to give it a proper release. Apple says she was moved by the fan support, and Mike Elizondo was brought in to officially complete the record, rebuilding many of the old tracks from scratch and producing a couple new ones as well. Despite lacking a true single, Extraordinary Machine still did reasonably well for her, selling almost half a million copies. Tours with Coldplay and Damien Rice kept her busy through much of 2006, and after a string of dates with Nickel Creek in 2007 she once again retreated into the darkness, nobody knowing exactly when or if we’d see or hear from her again.
One of Apple’s favorite things to do in L.A. is dropping in and playing a set at Largo, which she’s done a number of times. Jon Brion has a weekly residency there, and she’ll show up and mess around with him. She was performing there last November and after a fan asked if she’d play something new, she said she couldn’t remember how to play anything off her new album because it’s been done for a year. Recalling the mess leading up to Extraordinary Machine, things moved a bit quicker this time. No demos were leaked and no tracks were re-cut. Epic Records head L.A. Reid promised in January that the album would be out soon, and five months later here we are. The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do is not the longest title Apple has ever affixed to one of her records, but it’s still more of a mouthful to say compared to anything else released recently. This fourth long player has her teaming up with percussionist and producer Charley Drayton to make a raw and uncompromising collection of songs the likes of which she’s never quite done before. It’s not a huge directional shift that’s set to redefine her trademark sound, but a few small adjustments have been made to emphasize her particular strengths that much more.
Apple could well have gotten away with making The Idler Wheel… an entirely a capella record, and judging by the way most of the songs progress, that’s probably how it started anyways. Her voice comes first, percussion second, and piano or other instrumental flourishes third. Such an emphasis on singing means she can wrench every single painful or joyous moment out of a lyric and push it straight into your own heart. On opening track “Every Single Night,” her voice quivers and lowers to almost a whisper when singing the lines, “I just wanna feel everything.” There’s an almost childlike innocence about it, one that’s carefully balanced against her riled up anger in the chorus, as she practically shouts, “Every single night’s a fight with my brain.” Much of the record does find her battling with her personal demons. “Don’t let me/ruin me/I may need a chaperone,” she ominously sings on “Daredevil”. Those feelings only spiral down further as the song progresses, and eventually she throws a temper tantrum, demanding, “Look at! Look at! Look at! Look at me!” with such throatiness you can envision tears of anguish streaming down her face. Yet in spite of the emotions that bleed through her voice, on “Left Alone” she claims to be more in control of those things than ever. “I don’t cry when I’m sad anymore,” she confesses with a calm and even-toned demeanor that nearly betrays the scat-jazz melody built around it. Mentally drained from searching for a reason for her solitude, Apple ultimately concludes she’s sabotaging herself. “How can I ask anyone to love me/when all I do is beg to be left alone,” she cries out.
When she’s not eviscerating herself over her own perceived flaws, Apple largely sticks to the familiar topic of good relationships gone bad. Of course when you tear up your voice yelling lines like, “I ran out of white doves’ feathers to soak up the hot piss that comes from your mouth every time you address me,” as she does on “Regret,” there’s nothing familiar or normal about it. Things don’t get much better on “Valentine,” where the sprightly chorus has the lines, “I root for you/I love you,” but the verses detail a love that has gone stale. “While you were watching someone else/I stared at you and cut myself,” she bemoans somberly. Not everything on The Idler Wheel… is sad, angry or disturbing though. The piano melody of “Jonathan” brings with it feelings of dread, but the lyrics are tender and sweet. Apple wrote the song about her ex-boyfriend Jonathan Ames and has nothing but nice things to say about him. “Werewolf” is in essence a break-up song, but it puts a positive spin on things by taking an equal blame perspective and a bright outlook for the future, where “We could still support each other/all we gotta do is avoid each other.” The sound of children playing that comes in near the end of the track emphasizes the somewhat playful vibe but also adds a tinge of sadness as an expression of lost youth, innocence and a time when love was the easiest and most organic thing in the world. Similar qualities are taken on by “Anything We Want,” which is uncharacteristically optimistic at the start of a relationship that really could go anywhere. Closing track “Hot Knife” builds off that vibe in an even more celebratory way. As Apple gushes over a great relationship, harmonies build atop one another in an off-kilter fashion, each singing a different part of the song until it’s a bird’s nest of voices and you can barely make out a word. The drums fade, and the last 30 seconds are just those vocals alone, each one competing for your attention and representing the many sides of Fiona Apple.
Vocals and lyrics aside, one of the biggest keys to the success of The Idler Wheel… is Drayton’s percussion work. He gets extremely inventive with how the rhythms are put together on the album, quite literally pulling from the kitchen sink for inspiration. When some artists say they experimented with percussion outside of traditional drums by hitting objects they found around the house, you can’t always tell that’s the case. Given the sparse arrangements on this album though, every bit comes through with forceful purpose. Light double taps on a bass drum mimic a heartbeat on “Valentine.” The rhythmic push and pull on “Jonathan” could very well be that of an office copy machine spitting out page after page just slightly offset from the driving piano melody. Shoes scraping against pavement create the march-like pace on the sprightly “Periphery,” and “Anything We Want” features pots and pans and a host of other hollow metal objects being tapped with a stick. The album credits also mention that a pillow was hit for percussionary purposes as well, however it’s not exactly clear when and where that happens (not that it matters). All of it contributes to the record’s unique charms, of which there are many. Apple has never made an album quite like this before, and it represents a seismic shift in the way we perceive her both professionally and personally. She’s still the same unbalanced and somewhat damaged girl we met over 15 years ago, but now more than ever she’s in control of her demons. A new sense of freedom comes along with that, and she takes full advantage of it. Those looking for the next “Criminal” or “Fast As You Can” will be left sorely disappointed. But if you pay close attention to the lyrics and allow yourself to fully engage with these songs, you’ll find a wealth of power, beauty, anger and tragedy poured out with the intent of reaching even the most hardened of hearts. It might not be the easiest thing to listen to, but nothing this brilliant ever is.
