Looks like we’re still in the year of the badger.
(via The Badgermin)
M Ward SHREDDING out Duet for Guitars #3. I forgot about this video!
My new favorite song: The Fox by Niki and The Dove. Layered Swedish jams with a creepy music video to complement. Was so enthralled I bought tickets to see them at U Street Music Hall!
Uh I’m a smiling alligator.
The subtlety of this ‘campaign’ from the W, DOM, and Stereogum is quite admirable. Come on guys!
Songs to Deck Yr Halls Off
I hear it everywhere I go. When I walk through the automatic doors at Target, I hear it. When I hop down the block to grab a Troeg’s MadElf (yum), I hear it. It drives me to drink 4 more. When I drive the two hours home the Sunday after Thanksgiving, I hear it probably 8 times, and it goes something like this:
♩ ♪ ♫ Simply. Having. A wonderful Christmastime. ♩ ♪ ♫
I turn into an awful person when I hear or think about this song. I curse, I spit, I do graffiti and other destructions of public properties. It’s terrible. Everything Paul and the Beatles did might be totally null and void because of this song.
Enough about that song. Forget it. I have a couple Christmas tunes that I like, I might even LOVE them. They should be the default classics that “Simply Having” is most definitely not. At the risk of venting more about Paul’s biggest atrocity, here goes.
1. John Prine- Christmas in Prison
No doubt it’s a slow jam, but I have had a soft spot in my heart for John Prine since I heard Fish and Whistle. “The searchlight in the big yard/turns round with the gun/and spotlights the snowflakes/like the dust in the sun/it’s Christmas in prison/there’ll be music tonight/I’ll probably get homesick/I love you, goodnight.”
2. Joe Gibbs- Winter Wonderland
This example is kind of just a placeholder for the bigger Reggae Christmas music industry. There are a number of great options out there for celebrating a Reggae Christmas, and all the songs have great bouncy bass lines that just make you feel happy. I’m kind of curious now if there is a “Simply Having” reggae version. I can hear it in my head.
3. Sufjan Stevens- Get Behind Me Santa!
Matthew 16:23 reads, “Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”
Coincidence?
4. Bob Dylan- Must Be Santa
My neighbors showed this off to me last year. It’s a bizarre, sped-up version of the song in Bob Dylan’s tired because I’m singing so I’m not singing style. The best part isn’t even the song though, it’s this video, which is maybe everyone’s dream Christmas party. Gone is the sitting around bored conversations with extended family, and instead you have a house full of dancing, balloons, and Bob Dylan coming out of nowhere and scaring the tinsel out of you.
5. Sleigh Bells- Rill Rill
I cheated because I love Alexis Krauss. You can judge me if you want, but you know she’s phenomenal. :)
BONUS: Daryl Hall and John Oates- No Child Ever Cry on Christmas
Rule number 12: Always have a bonus in your back pocket, and always have it be Hall and Oates. Their opus of an album, Home for Christmas is worth every damn penny of the $4.99 it’ll cost you on Amazon. You can trust me.
The Power of Music. Thank you veterans.
(via)
Daft Punk Orchestrated!
I could have joined my high school band back in August of 2000, but I didn’t. Why? Probably because Daft Punk’s Discovery hadn’t been released yet, and wasn’t in the band repertoire. Fortunately, that album came out in 2001, and a few months ago, the Trinity Orchestra played Discovery in its entirety.
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New-to-me tunes (or specifically, bands) are the best kind of tunes I can ask for, especially if they hook me in the way that sends chills up my spine. It’s the same feeling I get when I get my haircut and they run the clippers on my neck. I think the last time I got that might have been LCD’s “Dance Yrself Clean”, when the track synths out to the maximum. Another pick from recent memory is Panda Bear’s “Last Night At the Jetty” from the upcoming Tomboy, where he says I know, I know, I know, I know, I know I, know I, know I, know…
But LCD and Panda are artists I know well already. For a while there, the whole search and destroy method I had for finding new music was kind of bringing me down. I’d listen to something until I exhausted it, and then I’d move on to a new artist, the best new thing, the Pitchfork BNA’s…whatever. So for the past months I’d recycled some of the older releases I’d appreciated before, without venturing into very much new stuff. But now I think I’m ready to venture out again into the new. I found Oregon Bike Trails on The Hype Machine yesterday, and now I find myself searching for anything I can get my hands on of theirs.
Reminiscent of Beach Boys musically, and so also Panda Bear in the vocals anyway, it definitely has me swooning for the warmer weather that’s obviously missing outside. “Summer’s starting to drift away, but you don’t want to let go.” Thank god it’s only starting.
Go-go Gadget…Box?
This’ll cost you a decent $200, but it looks like it might be worth it if it actually puts out good sound. From Jawbone, the JAMBOX isn’t an eyesore like some other wireless speaker systems, let alone wired ones. Of course, the magic’s in the Bluetooth, and you can use it as a conference caller when your iPhone just doesn’t cut it.
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I’ve been using HypeMachine increasingly at work, for the variety and for the excellent mash-ups and blogoteque mixes, but yesterday I came across the new collaboration between Crystal Castles and Robert Smith of the Cure. Man it’s good.
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The Dirty Projectors
—I Will Truck
Tune sharing time! As reported, Tuesday night brought me to the Dirty Projectors show at the 9:30 Club in Washington, DC. I’m tellin’ ya, those guys are just talented beyond their years. Dave Longstreth went to Yale so you know he’s smart, and the girls he brought into the band can belt it out. Longstreth’s guitar is meticulous and raw, but it’s meant to be. The girls scream their “Ah“‘s into the mic, but it’s harmonious. The drummer is just effortlessly keeping this carefully calculated beat in the background. It’s all cohesive, but at the same time, they’ve constructed a type of song you never recognize. It’s beautiful. It’s Dirty.
The song I’m sharing tonight is called I Will Truck and it’s off their The Getty Address album. I have to admit I don’t have this album, and when I heard this song live the other night I was immediately smitten by that choppy little guitar riff that ambles through the song, along with with the tune of the melody. It really feels like a good soundtrack for these cool end of summer nights.
Other songs of note (beside the Bitte Orca goodies): Beautiful Mother (recently written with Bjork) and Imagine It. Search em on the Hype Machine.
Anywho, I’ll have to get The Getty Address soon. An album about the Battle of Gettysburg where the hero is Don Henley? Where can you go wrong?
ps. My deepest apologies for the lack of posting. I’m being a busybody these days, and it won’t happen again. At least until next week. :)
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Girlfriend bought me tickets to see Dirty Projectors next Tuesdee at the 930 Club. Pretty excited. I saw them last year at Bonnaroo, and while I wasn’t a huge fan beforehand, I walked away from that show pretty mesmerized by both Longstreth’s guitar skills, and the ability that the girls have with their voices alternating like they do in this song. Everytime I hear it I get the chills.
Longstreth’s voice isn’t a voice you want to sing you to sleep per se, and I can see how that might turn people off (James Devilbiss). But the girls angel voices make up for it. And and song structure is pretty unpredictable, which is always nice!
If you’re still not convinced, check out this llama:
