☼ The Sun ☼

I made a summer mix of songs about the sun. And here it is.
☼
1. Sun // Caribou
2. Sunlight // tUne-YarDs
3. Love Me 'til the Sun Shines // The Kinks
4. Mister Sun // Bridget Bardot
5. The Sun Was High (So Was I) // Best Coast
6. The Sun is Out // Reading Rainbow
7. There is No Sun // Jay Reatard
8. Sripper Sunset // Harlem
9. On The Sunny Side Of The Street // Les Paul and Mary Ford
10. In The Sun // She and Him
11. A Place In The Sun // The Shadows
12. Til' The Sun Rips // Woods
13. Morning Sunshine // Jeff Lynne
14. A Sunshine Fix // Olivia Tremor Control
15. Touching The Roof of The Sun // Indian Jewelry
16. Sun // Pocahaunted
17. Bright Lit Blue Skies // The Rockin' Ramrods
18. Sun It Rises // Fleet Foxes
19. The Sun Goes All Around // Thee Oh Sees
20. Sunny Afternoon // Os Baobas
21. Sun // The Essex Green
22. Tahiti Sunrise // The Surfmen
23. Walking Into the Sun // The Brazda Brothers
24. Ride Into the Sun (Demo) // The Velvet Underground
☼

Thee Oh Sees Please

We ended up seeing Thee Oh Sees five times during sxsw. Which means I've now seen them live eight times. I've only seen Jonathan Richman live 5 times, and Miley Cyrus live once. So I must be a pretty big fan. The above video is all captured from the sweaty packed shows in March. (I don't think I'll ever tire of the three frame .gif effect.)

Get the newest oh sees record: mp3 format or buy the record from In the Red - I hear it's pressed on orange-opaque vinyl.

SXSW 2010 Complete!

What I ended up seeing in alphabetical order, repeats noted in parenthesis, newly discovered favorites denoted in bold:

Alex Bleeker and the Freaks
Andrew WK
Awesome Color
The Baths (2)
The Beets
Birthday Suits
Black Angels
Black Cock
The Carrots
Cheap Time
Cheeseburger
Cococoma
Destruction Unit
Eternal Summers
The Fresh and Onlys (3)
The Girls at Dawn (2)
Golden Triangle
Gun Outfit
Gwar
Hunx & His Punx
JEFF the Brotherhood
Magic Kids (2)
Man or Astroman?
Mickey
The Muffs
Pierced Arrows
Puffy Areolas
Rainbow Bridge
Rayon Beach
Reading Rainbow
Shapes Have Fangs
The Spits (2)
Tamaryn
Thee Oh Sees (5)
Thomas Function
Total Slacker (2)
Ty Segall
Tyvek
Vivian Girls
White Mystery
Wizzard Sleeve
Woods (2)
Wounded Lion
Woven Bones

I think I'm forgetting some - but it's all a blur at this point. I made a compilation of some of my favorites. Find it *here.

*(ugh - I'm afraid the files might be a little sloppy (missing artwork) - but I'm too tired to correct it at this point. my apologies.)

SXSW plans: Friday 3/19

PPM & The Smell @ Cheer Up Charlies

12:00 Moment Trigger
12:30 Lovvers
12:55 Devon Williams
1:20 Audacity
1:45 Residual Echos
2:10 Pocahaunted
2:35 Infinite Body
3:00 Tearist
3:30 Randy Randall
3:55 Gun Outfit
4:20 Pearl Harbor
4:45 Total Abuse
5:10 Abe Vigoda

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SXSW plans: Wednesday 3/17

I've listed all the bands playing these shows, but hyperlinked the one's I'm planning on seeing.

////\\\\////\\\\

Can’t Stop The Bleeding @ Beerland


The Uptown Bums (1:00 pm)
TV Ghost (1:40 pm)
Cruddy (2:20pm)
Woven Bones (3:00 pm)
Awesome Color (detroit)(3:40 pm)
The Spits (4:20 pm)
The Muffs (5pm)

//\\//\\

BrooklynVegan Day Party @ Emo's

(FREE BREAKFAST TACOS + DAILY JUICE!)
noon YellowFever
12:45 The Rural Alberta Advantage
01:30 The Morning Benders
02:15 Japandroids
03:00 Titus Andronicus
03:45 The Black Angels
04:30 GZA
05:15 Fucked Up

//\\//\\

Escapes IV @ Club 1808

Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt (NY)(5:30pm)
Male Bonding (UK) (6pm)
Peter and the Wolf (6:30pm)
Reverse X Rays (7pm)
Popo (7:30pm)
Prince Rama (8pm)
Quiet Hooves (8:30pm)
Light Pollution (9pm)
Yellow Fever (9:30pm)

//\\//\\

Tormenta Tropical @ Iron Gate Lounge

Lemonade (SF)(7:30pm)
Delorean (spain)(8:30pm)

//\\//\\

Hozac Records Party @ Trailer Space

The Fresh&Onlys (SF)(7pm)
Puffy Areolas (clevlnd)(8pm)
Rayon Beach (ATX)(9pm)
The Girls at Dawn (Bklyn) (10pm)
White Mystery (chicago)(11pm)
Mickey (chicago)(11pm)
Wizzard Sleeve (alabama) (12am)
Woven Bones (atx)(1am)

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Strangest band name of the day: Puffy Areolas
Favorite band name of the day: Wizzard Sleeve

I saw: Woven Bones, Awesome Color, The Spits, The Muffs, Rayon Beach , The Girls at Dawn, White Mystery, Mickey, Wizzard Sleeve, Woven Bones

SXSW plans: Tuesday 3/16

Day Before the Mess Fest (free)

@ 2908 Cole St. off 30th/Red River (near Austin vet hospital)
Predator (GA, 6:30pm)
The Girls at Dawn (NY, 7pm)
Eternal Summers (VA, 7:30pm)
Reading Rainbow (PA, 8pm)
The Carrots (8:30pm)

@House of Guys (1907 Rio Grande)
Fungi Girls (Denton, 9pm)
Total Slacker (NY, 9:30pm)
Air Waves (NY, 10pm)
Beach Fossils (NY, 10:30pm)
The Beets (NY, 11pm)
Harlem (11:30pm)

@ 21st Street CO-OP (707 W. 21st St.)
Shapes Have Fangs (11pm)
The Baths (SF, 11:20pm)
Wounded Lion (LA, 11:40pm)
Woven Bones (midnight)
The Fresh and Onlys (SF, 12:20am)
Thee Oh Sees (SF, 1am)

2nd Annual Panache Pre-Party @ SCOOT INN 7pm (free)

Turbo Fruits: [myspace]
Golden Triangle: [myspace]
The Strange Boys: [myspace]
Thee Oh Sees: [myspace]
The Coathangers: [myspace]
So Cow: [myspace]
Signals: [myspace]
Z's: [myspace]
Videohippos: [myspace]
Baths: [myspace]

////\\\\////\\\\

update 3/17: saw - Eternal Summers, Reading Rainbow, The Carrots, Total Slacker, Shapes Have Fangs, The Baths, Wounded Lion, Woven Bones, Fresh & Onlys, and Thee Oh Sees

A Few New Albums I'm Enjoying

Pill Wonder - Jungle/Surf

Gonjasufi - A Sufi and a Killer

Eddy Current Suppression Ring - Rush to Relax

Beach House - Teen Dream

Cults - Cults 7" (thanks Jordan)

Yellow Fever - Yellow Fever

RJD2 - The Colossus

Pierced Arrows - Descending Shadows

Sleigh Bells - not an album or new, but I sure enjoy 'em

Acid in My House

I found this one propped up against John's collection today. "Acid House" is a type of trance music, but that's not really how this cover reads. Kid Paul, a 13 year old German boy with a sweaty, droopy eyed smiley face drawing next to him, seems like he might be describing the weird cult his parents are involved in.


And you can't see his button, but it's for the 60's u.s. rock group Love. What? Unfortunately the free poster is missing. Fortunately, I found a clip of the video on youtube. It looks like he's a few years older here.

Jay Reatard

Honestly, I kept hoping news would break that Jay Reatard's death was a hoax. Very, very sad news.

There's not much I can say that hasn't already been said - plus I would feel like a big phony if I tried, considering I'm a relatively new fan. He was a integral part of the Memphis garage scene 10 years before I heard 2006's Blood Visions, and at 29, he'd been playing music for half his life. In my opinion, he put out some of the best music released in the past decade, including last year's Watch Me Fall.

It is incredibly unsettling and sad that he’s gone so soon.

Waiting For Something - a short documentary about Jay Reatard

Jay Reatard | MySpace Music Videos

"Jay was what few people have the capacity to be. He created an undeniably classic album that contained so much pain transferred to tape in such an explosive way that it made you feel different after hearing it. He was transgressive and honest. His flaws were something he focused on and overdubbed and distorted until they made you forget who he really was-- a person with feelings and a good heart. He loved music and worked hard from a young age to pursue it. He was a self-made and unmade man. I am truly sickened to see him go." -- Deerhunter/Atlas Sound frontman Bradford Cox

Favorite Albums of 2009 (so far)

+++ Note: This post has been modified. Blogger took it down because I had a link to a rapidshare file in the comments. It's too bad, because I really think that my friend who I was sharing the file with would have liked the album, but it's doubtful he'll ever listen to it now, and I bet he would have become a fan and gone to see the band live and bought the album on vinyl and befriended them on myspace and told other people that they were cool and all sorts of other stuff, but instead they took down my post because some intern at Rabid Records' whole job is to surf the internet looking for this sort of thing. I mean I guess I feel sort of bad about giving it away. But not too bad. It's not like this blog is one of those ones where every link is a mediafire file or something. Anyway... whatever, no big deal. Just an extra half hour out of my life is all... +++

Mika Miko - We be Xuxa

Fever Ray - Fever Ray


Thee Oh Sees - Help

Dan Deacon - Bromst

Strange Boys - And Girls

Leslie Hall

If you like Har Mar Superstar, Amy Sedaris, Tim and Eric, Tracy Ullman or Jean Teasedale, I feel pretty confident you will thoroughly enjoy Leslie Hall.



I've followed her online for a few years, and have been impressed by the traveling Gem Sweater Museum, her guest appearance on Yo Gabba Gabba, and the plethora of entertaining videos. But seeing her live sealed the deal for me. She owned it - there's a sincerity behind the gimmick that makes it work. Plus, she eptomizes my favorite comedic archetype - the unnattractive character with grandiose delusions (Will Farrell, Danny McBride, Amy Sedaris).


Check out more at her site and wikipedia entry.

SXSW Wrap

Ahhhhh. It's all over. It was totally worth it, but, boy I am beat!

I posted a handful of photos and video in this flickr set.

Highlights included: No Age (twice), Mika Miko (3 times), Thee Oh Sees (so good), Woods (new discovery), The Evaporators (very fun way to start a morning), Box Elders and Japanther. I'm sure there are others but my mind is fried.

I did that thing again with the drummer from No Age. The: "Awww man, I think you guys are amazing, I mean just really really cool, just so awesome, I mean really - just great. So rad. Really."

Dork.

Trend alert:
Last year's pastel 80's yuppie prick button downs, ties and polos is sooo, uh, last year. This year is all about tribal prints, headresses, geometric shapes, and flourecent colors. But Ray Ban Wayfarers are still totally in.

Mazzy Star

With the exception of Sonic Youth I kind of missed out on a lot of 90's music featuring female vocalists. I guess I thought I was too tough at the time. (Which, of course, makes no sense to me now.) I've been slowly rediscovering some of the ones that I remember liking, (but pretended not to).

Tonight: Mazzy Star. Who I must say, have held up very well in my opinion. Not as pop-y, bittersweet, or quirky as Liz Phair. Not as brooding, angst ridden or intense as P.J. Harvey. Mazzy Star (Hope Sandoval / David Roback) were dreamy, reflective, and cough-syruply haunting. And they did psychedelic-revival/dream-pop really well - a style that seems to have made a strong comeback lately with bands like Beach House, Broadcast, Thee Oh Sees, and Dungen.

Plus, did I mention how beautiful I think Hope Sandoval is?

And on a side note I'm now super intrigued by Opal, which was the band that David Roback and former Dream Syndicate bassist Kendra Smith were in before Kendra Smith left the group during a tour and Hope Sandoval took her place. The group then turned into Mazzy Star.

Brain Power

Every "TED Talks" I've watched has been amazingly inspirational, but this one takes the cake.

Update 20:41 later...
This one is pretty incredible too.

Girl Crushin'

Yé-yé was a style of pop music that emerged out of France and Québec in the early 1960s. It was France's answer to British invasion and American girl groups.

I love British Invasion.

I love American Girl Groups.

I love cute sweet sexy French women.

I love yé-yé.







I really want to find Francoise Hardy, The "Yeh-Yeh" Girl from Paris or on vinyl for less than $25.00. Keep your eyes out for it won't you?

Links for more:
Blow-Up-Doll
Yé-Yé Girls
Yé-Yé Land
Les Chanteuses

Update:
Wow. I just searched for The Yeh-Yeh Girl from Paris again, and my friend's amazing podcast came up! He's going to give it to me, so you can stop looking. heh. Thank you Daniel!

Christmas Lights and Music

The Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights is a display of christmas lights and decorations at Disney World (not Land). It started in 1986 as a 1,000 light display on an Arkansas house - a gift from a Little Rock businessman to his six-year-old daughter. Each year it got bigger and bigger (he even bought the properties on either side of him to expand). By 1993, the house had over 3 million lights. The neighbors complained and he was taken to court. In 1995, Walt Disney World project director John Phelan contacted Osborne's attorney about moving the display to the Orlando resort.

Initially the display was just the original lights from the Osborne estate, but in the past 12 years, over five million lights have been added. Disney caretakers have also added hidden Mickeys into the lights. The 2007 edition of the display has more than 40 of them.

I vaguely remember going to see this house as a kid while visiting my grandma in Little Rock. More here.

If I owned a home, I'm pretty sure I might go ape shit crazy decorating with lights and blow-up figurines. I love the idea of a nativity scene under a North Pole sign with a waving Santa overlooking the 3 wise men and like a I dunno, blow up Calvin and Hobbs peeing over the whole thing.

Do you know Pickwick Records? It's too much to condense in one posting. And not really interesting enough to do so either. I don't really know a whole lot. But lemme try...
They were an American record label, and they mainly made their money from re-issues of Elvis an Jackson 5 recordings.
Mostly it's exciting because Lou Reed did some session work on some of their recordings in the mid-60's.
But these are also exciting:

If you want more, here's a great posting about the lights.
And for more music, check this out.

Homerpalooza

I am lightly toying with the idea of spending my birthday weekend in Marfa, TX this year.

Sonic Youth is playing a free show as part of the Chinati Open House Weekend. The idea of traveling to West TX the first week of October, camping with a group of friends, gazing at the stars and my all-time favorite band at the Thunderbird sounds fantastic.
The fact that a couple thousand extra people will be in town sounds daunting.

Plus, as much as I love the town, Marfa-ites and others who have the desire and finances/time to visit Marfa regularly, generally make me a little uncomfortable. Only in the sense that I feel like I don't belong - I'm not an academic, old money, minimalist, hippie. I prefer not to have to overhear statements like, "Well, I think the common thread in his work is rational thought expressive of the cummualative experience in materials and technical processes," before I've had my second cup of coffee. I like to look at art, but I really don't want to listen to others talk about it.

Wow. Guess that solves that. Looks like I'll be seeing Sonic Youth in the comfort of my own town. At Stubb's BBQ. Amongst rough-and-tumble, working class, action painting, conformists.
Or at least a bunch of hipsters.


P.S. If anyone else goes to Chianti(or wants to go with me and complain about people who seem richer and smarter than us), I would like your take on the work of: Munson Hunt, Rex Ray, and Andrea Zuill. Oh and David Rabinowitch's block prints.

Oldie but a Goodie

This is the sort of thing that Sunday morning dreams are made of. Rummaging through a flea market and finding an entire collection of surreal handmade album covers with fake cardboard records, all dating from the late 1960s and early 1970s and all by a mysterious funk/soul artist calling himself "Mingering Mike".

From the 2/2/04 New York Times article by Neil Strauss:

The front covers were intricately painted to look like
classic funk albums; on the spines were titles and
fake catalog numbers; the backs had everything from
liner notes to copyright information to original logos;
the inner sleeve was often a shopping bag meticulously
taped together to hold a record; and some actually
opened to reveal beautiful gate fold sleeves. A few
albums had even been covered in shrink-wrap and bore
price stickers and labels with apocryphal promotional
quotes.

The couple was able to track down Mingering Mike, and it turned out that the music to these fantasy records really exists. He still has tapes of the homemade music, which has people mouthing the sounds of instruments in the background. You can listen here.

I think I'll take a break from my air guitar lessons and start making cardboard albums.

Link to the home of all things mingering.

Internet cafe refugees!

"Japan estimated it has about 5,400 "net cafe refugees," a new species of working-class poor who sleep on reclining chairs at Internet cafes because earnings from their odd jobs are insufficient for them to afford the rent on even a small apartment." link

Yeah? I'd sleep there too if this video is anything like what it's like: (...give it a few minutes - it's worth it.)

I'm totally confused by the last 30 seconds- the Japanese really know how to blow a person's mind, don't they? Link to Ging Nang Boyz MySpace page.

What do I get?

I happened upon them at the right place at the right time. I needed someone to sing to me that it was okay to want to wanna be in love. And to complain about not getting it. And to do so (want/complain) in a loud and fast, unyielding, penetrating, upfront way.

They're melodic, but biting and snide. Energetic, but not angry. Funny but still anguished. Intense but easy to listen to. -In my opinion, the Buzzcocks are one of the best punk bands ever. Unfortunately I wonder if they might be one of the most influential too.

I work with this precious dweeby-indie eighteen year old and he was complaining that he hated Pearl Jam because they influenced all these other bands that he really hates. Yeah, maybe without the Buzzcocks maybe there wouldn't be obnoxious San Diego brats whining about not getting laid with droopy drawers and their ball caps cocked to the side. (don't get me started) But there probably wouldn't be the Smoking Popes, Red Kross or (haha) Magazine either.

I was lucky enough to see the Buzzcocks play on Friday (thanks Mac!), and they absolutely tore it up. Smiling sweaty loud fun fun fun! I have to admit I was a little worried it might be a little on the depressing side. But they were sooo great One thing about every reunion show I've been to -bands wouldn't still be doing it if they didn't enjoy it, and they have little to prove, other than that they still enjoy it.