You are currently browsing the monthly archive for November 2009.
WEDNESDAY
Dan Auerbach, Justin Townes Earle at Webster Hall, 7ish
THURSDAY
Richard Lloyd at the Studio at Webster Hall, 7ish
Eternal Summers, Religious Knives at Cameo Gallery, 8ish
FRIDAY
Alela Diane, Marissa Nadler at (le) Poisson Rouge, 7ish (and Union Hall on Sat.)
Oneohtrix Point Never, No Fun Acid (Carlos Giffoni), Northampton Wools (featuring Thurston Moore) at Glasslands, 9ish
SATURDAY
Textual, Soft Circle (feat. Mary Timony) at Monkey Town, 8
Soft Circle and others at Southpaw, 8ish
(Slumberland Records Party) The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Crystal Stilts, Brown Recluse, Pants Yell!, Frankie Rose, The Ropers, Nord Express, Lorelei at the Bell House, 6ish
Awesome Color, Glass Rock at Glasslands, 9ish
Boat at Bruar Falls, 8ish
“I can’t do anything right…”
I often feel that way too. But right now i’m psyched to have “Mega Secrets” by Family Portrait to share with you. This song has a hook- a guitar line that circles around and around in your head. It sounds and feels good. “Again, again, again, uh oh.”
This track is on the newest announced 7″ from Underwater Peoples. It’s a split with Andrew Cedarmark. You can pre-order that shit at UP.
The song sounds like a reverb dream. It’s distracting me from real life. Wait- this is real!
Family Portrait: Mega Secrets
Various popular musical styling’s from Africa, Lagos to be exact, in the 50s and 50s, are collected on an disc I bought some time ago: Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump. I dug it out of the archives and here are a couple of tracks for your Tuesday. The first is “You Are My Heart” by Rex Williams, a softer, more melodic and groovy track. It certainly has an American 50s flair to it. The next is “Dododo (Ekassa No. 1)” by Sir Victor Uwwaifo. This track is more rootsy. Both songs and this whole compilation of course remind me of summer but what kind of dancing music doesn’t remind you of summer? Ekassa, according to the liner notes, is a type of dance indigenous to Benin, West Africa. The names above are various terms to describe these sounds.
“Much to his father’s disapproval, Uwwaifo had a ‘drinkard’ at the tavern tune the guitar in exchange for a jug of palmwine, got himself a book on music theory and started teaching himself to play.” More…
“You Are My Heart” by Rex Williams
“Dododo (Ekassa No. 1)” by Sir Victor Uwaifo
Fluffy Lumbers is Samuel Franklin, a native of New Jersey and a current Sarah Lawrence student. While Fluffy Lumbers is Franklin’s main gig, he also plays in multiple other Underwater Peoples bands. He is a cinema freak, a funny guy, a drummer before a guitarist and a lover of free coke. (a-cola).
Fluffy Lumbers is releasing its debut 12″ on Underwater Peoples in the not too distant future and is playing at Sarah Lawrence on Wednesday (with Pants Yell!), the Cake Shop on Nov. 21 and Bruar Falls on Dec. 5. The album is being recorded in his parents basement over Thanksgiving vacation and features mostly all new tracks. Franklin says “the cover, back cover and all inserts will be 3-D interactive holograms.” WOAH.
Read on if you’re interested in hilarity. Franklin talks bandmates, New Jersey, music categorization and much more.
What is a Fluffy Lumber?
Reactions to the name have ranged from “yeah” to “that’s the worst band name I’ve ever heard.” Frankly, I probably could have done a lot worse. Thinking about it, a lot of my favorite bands have what could be considered “bad” band names but I guess band names have never really mattered much to me. I realized at the onset that I probably wouldn’t be able to come up with a name of Guided By Voices or The Rolling Stones caliber so I just tried to choose something that sounded vaguely comforting and pleasant. Some people seem to think it’s referencing a fictional wholesale wood distributor, that’s fine. Someone made a joke once on a message board that it’s a synonym for flaccidity, that’s fine too. “Were you high?” No, I wasn’t high. It’s really just a name. Recent misspellings include: Fuzzy Lumbers, Fluffy Lumber, The Fluff Lumbers and Rob Bip & The Pacers.
When did you form this band? Tell me about the members?
In the fall of 2007 I began working towards a BFA at the School Of The Museum Of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts but due to an allergic reaction to something (maybe just some sort of late summer/fall seasonal thing?) the skin around my eyes became swollen and my eyes themselves were usually inflamed and watering. Looking this way, I rarely wanted to leave the single I had in the dorms except to attend class so I found that the best way to spend my time other than doing homework and going to the movies by myself was to record songs with my Casio keyboard and some guitar pedals. I sent these songs to a few friends and they were into it so I kept recording and, after learning the most basic basics of the guitar I received that Christmas, started playing shows by myself when I was invited. I decided from the get-go that the recordings would consist of only myself mostly because I find recording with other people to be very stressful but this summer and fall I asked some of my best friends to back me up at shows and they obliged. Luka Usmiani (bass), Ian Drennan (guitar), Ian Dykstra (drums), Alexander Steinberg (guitar), Alex Craig (guitar), Sebastian Castillo (guitar) have all played in various incarnations of the live band since June.
How is it playing drums in your own band?
People seem to like it but I would rather play guitar. My worry is that people will start calling the music ‘No Age-esque’ or something along those lines because all it took was a song about a COPS episode for people to start calling my music “beach,” “summer” and “surf.” The beach is fun sometimes but I don’t really feel strongly either way about it, summer’s cool and everything but I prefer fall and winter, and surf….what? I never really got that one. Drums were my first instrument so one could argue that the live show is tighter when I play drums and can’t make mistakes on the guitar but playing guitar is just more fun for me at this point.
Just when I was getting tired of Best Coast and thinking that her sound was good but her songs were not, a new track has surfaced. You can download it and listen to it at Black Iris, the label putting out the track, but i’ve posted it here below too. You can also stream the b-side.
This song, “When I’m With You” features classic lines like “I hate sleeping alone” and “The world is lazy/ but you and me/ we’re just crazy” and “when i’m with you we have fun.” Not much thoughtful stuff going on here, but that’s ok because this song has added instrumentation that fills it out. I think there may even be live drums up on there. Background ooh’s and ahhh’s as well as a great surf-rock solo that sounds like it’s coming from over behind the Hollywood Hills makes this song more than just simple.
Best Coast: When I’m With You
On Saturday early evening (my favorite time of day, why can’t more shows be hosted at this hour? It is dark!) I headed to the Brooklyn Museum for Who Shot Rock and Roll? and the Todd P sponsored first Saturday band showcase. The photography exhibit was packed to the gills with the crowd you’d expect: yuppies taking in rock and roll in a clean environment, Gen X-ers with their badly behaved kids, and youth absorbing the images of those that came before them- (and before the Internet).
In fact- this show could not exist were the Internet around when these pictures were shot. They would be far too well known and no one would be interested in seeing them in a museum.
With Who Shot Rock and Roll came the opportunity to open windows on the lives of rock stars– but unfortunately only stale images (most of which i’d seen before) were on display. With the exception of a few candid shots- most from the 80s, one of Madonna in civilian clothes on the Lower East Side and one of Bruce Springsteen surrounded by young girls in track shorts– most were all posed pictures of bands posturing. What would really have made the show more interesting would be some b-roll photos, catching Mick Jagger off guard, for example.
Regardless- everyone loves a rock star.
Downstairs Grass Widow was on stage and seeing a real live band after all those pictures was refreshing. The threesome of women pack a really hard and distorted punch. Their music was jumpy and catchy punk rock yet they had a flowery Laurel Canyon look and vibe about them. It’s a potent mix. The bass sound was very Kim Deal, (heavy, rich, deliberate) which is of course really fucking great. With three part harmonies and a garage-rock sound, Grass Widow had everyone shaking. I shot rock and roll:
Grass Widow: Celebrate the Mundane
Thanks to Gorilla Vs. Bear for posting this awesome fan video. The Mantles song goes perfectly with the tone and vibe of “Paper Moon”– what a stupendous and hilariously touching flick. Especially good is when the picture gets all blurry. How’d they do that.
The Mantles: Don’t Lie
Small Black is one of those bands that have been in my mind’s eye for a while now but for some reason they keep slipping out of view, out of grasp. Anyway we are here now to discuss the psyched-out-ness of Small Black’s music.
Hailing from, where else?, Brooklyn, the band makes music that is heavy with swirly guitars and electronic blips of some sort. A pretty voice sings lightly over the top of all the heavy noise and notes– it’s a good mix, let’s say.
Small Black have been getting a lot of attention for their great track “Despicable Dogs” and even Washed Out remixed that shit. Talk about being current. This song below, “Kings of Animals” is a little different. It’s got a cleaner sound (not counting the elephant sounds in the back of the mix and the reverb-heavy vocal track) and the drums sound like… I don’t know what. A drum machine? Take a listen.
Small Black play Saturday night at the Market Hotel with Pictureplane– who is CRAZYYYY. Check out a track by the boy from Denver below, too.
Small Black: Kings of Animals
Pictureplane: Goth Star
Those Darlins and King Kahn & BBQ Show?This tour, which unfortunately doesn’t stop in NYC, is sure to be a riotously fun event. Prepare yourself to get danced on, stomped on (in a good way) and really drunk. Most likely on bourbon and Budweiser. When I saw Those Darlins over the summer they really brought the power to the people. The stage ended up swarmed with the crowd, mostly dudes who want Nikki Darlin more than a dog wants a bone. Sorry fellas- she’s engaged! (To John from Deer Tick).
Jessi Darlin
Darlins’ joined the tour on Wednesday night and will continue with King Kahn until Cincinnati.
King Khan & BBQ Show: I’ll Be Loving You
Those Darlins: Keep My Skillet Good and Greasy
Well well, as if a Friday morning isn’t already the best morning of the week, THIS Friday morning in my inbox was a shining gem by Ray Concepcion. This time the subject is PILL WONDER. In the video they are performing at Cameo Gallery for CMJ. Ray gave me a little shout out on his Vimeo page too– because he knew I missed these guys. He’s such a nice guy.
See also this post on Pill Wonder.
more about “New Ray Concepcion Video: PILL WONDER“, posted with vodpod
