The New York Times reported yesterday (March 27) that a “phonoautograph recording” made April 9, 1860, by Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville has been made audible by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California. Scott’s piece, the Times reports, was made 28 years before Edison (and company) provided what was considered to be the first audio recording that could be played in 1888.
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Butane Variations’ second release, the Love Five Songs EP, comes just six months after their debut, the self-titled LP. And while the LP was sometimes exhilarating and often admirable it was not as compelling, as persistent, as its successor.
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(Author’s note: Meet the Eels: Essential Eels Vol. 1 1996-2006 is a two-disc set; one the “Essential Eels” CD, the other an “Eels Video Collection” on DVD. The CD is up for review presently. The DVD review by the same author will be discussed in a follow-up article when he retrieves the television from the garage.)
I first became aware of the “Essential” releases that music companies had up their sleeves when I saw the 2000 release The Essential Bob Dylan. Being an album man – and not a collection one – it has not been until the Eels’ Meet the Eels: Essential Eels Vol. 1 1996-2006 that I learned that “essential” does not mean “greatest hits” but “a seemingly random selection of songs from the artist; selector unspecified.” With this exciting new knowledge it becomes clear that there are two records to review here: the one offered and the one compiled by each listener and/or fan of the band. In this instance: me.
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In the summer of 2007 Ladyhawk, of Vancouver, BC, issued their second release, on Jagjaguwar Records, Fight For Anarchy, an EP. Less than a year later the band – obviously hard working lads – have recorded their second LP, Shots. What I would think of as the Single (if it meant anything), “Fear,” announces with a vibrant hook, “I just wanna feel something other than fear / I don’t want to go home but I can’t stay here.” Happily, this courageous motivation has Ladyhawk shooting stars all over the garage where once (Anarchy) it was a sort of croaking but defiant heartbreak; cultural and personal.
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2007 being my second consecutive year attending the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival I know where the porta-johns are, that arriving early means hysterical heat and perspiration in the sun on the vast hillside, and that I am, arguably, the only jerk on the premises. An accomplishment, if you have not had the privilege of my (demure?) acquaintance. This is part of the spirit of Falcon Ridge, I think, or part of its anti-spirit. What is not here. It is a place where no one acts like an asshole because no one is more of an asshole than me, and I’m kind of nice.
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“Lights Off,” one of the catchiest and most interesting in the set of wily and exuberant electric guitar hooks that envelope Mason Proper’s debut album, There Is a Moth in Your Chest, states, “It is not exactly what I meant to say / But it will do.” And here and there Chest does do. Particularly when one reaches beyond song 10, “I Spy,” from which point onwards the LP becomes something it was not before. It is fair to say that there are two albums – or an LP and an EP – presented here. The first nine songs are hard rock (and ska? not punk; young?) peppered with tech and gadgetry sounds. With the tempo of each song pedal to metal – and off the walls – it is strange that most of them are in the 3-4 minute range. This longevity is tempered by each song being full of parts – not just verses and choruses; though the effect is sometimes of being in a very large and empty hotel.
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Beginning the Monday night show at the Bug Jar, the Norwegian band Syme (the name of a character from Orwell’s 1984 – though perhaps not the band’s inspiration) opened with what must have been a ten (or more) minute blister called “I Drink My Beer With Two Hands.” It was one of two particular tones the band shifted between through the set, “Hands” a sort of bludgeoning of the psychedelic, Fredrik Vogsborg picking out thick riffs and progressions on his electric guitar in a slowly dilating trance. I was reminded of the Warlocks’ latest effort, Heavy Deavy Skull Lover – music that beats the listener into beautiful submission.
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When I am an old man I will still feel that cold. The skin on my neck was dry and I was planning to apply lotion to it, which I had not done in the twenty-seven years allotted myself thus far. The cold made me feel wet; my socks and shoes seemed to squish as I pounded them in place on the sidewalk, holding a sign that read ‘Constitution in Pakistan’ which I had not made.
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Two young men set up beach chairs on the sidewalk opposite the school’s front lawn. The tall one wore a black t-shirt which read ‘City Property’ in white block letters. The shorter man wore an untucked dress shirt and a tie. City Property rested heavily a large cooler between the chairs. Tie rummaged about a black backpack he had set on the pavement, producing a stack of cardboard party hats in vibrant colors and handing one to City Property without looking up from the pack.
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