May 2009
Lexxus - “Monkeys Out”: Spindly,...
Pitchfork: Keith Fullerton Whitman: Playthroughs →
barthel:
9.7! Remember this? With all the talk about BNM and ratings lately it’s interesting to revist, as it’s from after the Ryan-only era that exists now nowhere but on archive.org, but before the firmer editorial control that seems to have been in place for the past few years. (Firm editorial control exercised in part by…the author of this review!) Hard to imagine this getting such a...
Matumbi - “Man In Me”: London, late...
Excellent, it’s last.fm update time! My favourite part of the tumblr week.
My Top 5 Artists (Week Ending 2009-5-24) →
Duran Duran (12)
Michael Jackson (7)
VV Brown (6)
Jordin Sparks (5)
David Bowie (4)
Imported from Last.fm Tumblr by JoeLaz
The Red Krayola with Art & Language -...
hereharehere:
Baako via Côte d’Ivoire’s Champion...
Pitch Perfect →
“A few months ago I heard a song from the Côte d’Ivoire. Twelve minutes long, Champion DJ’s ‘Baako’ is built around a baby crying through Auto-Tune. The software bends the baby’s anguish into eerie musicality. The ear likes it. The mind isn’t so sure. ‘Baako’ is disturbing. The aestheticized cry no longer corresponds to any normal emotion. Before Auto-Tune, we had no melodious...
Barry Adamson - “Set The Controls For The...
Papa Sprain - “U Swell”
Papa Sprain...
I appreciate the sentiment and all, but as claims of football loyalty go ”I bleed Red” is kind of lacking something.
Never get out of the boat: influence vs popularity... →
mikearauz:
The ‘influence’ of the Velvets can be felt as it permeated right through much of the important non-mainstream white music from 1967 to this day. I don’t need to list them here, surely. …note: As a…
On first reading of this post I left a comment. On second reading I realised that what was weirding me out was how the “everyone who heard the VU formed a band” canard seemed...
“what does Los Campesinos! have to do with [Danananananaykroyd’s] “Hey...”
– Le Review Revue: Marc Hogan: Dananananaykroyd, “Hey Everyone!”
um, my first guess would be… a lot?
“it’s called reading comprehension, guys!”
(via offnotesnotes)
Oh god it’s one of those sites. Give it up, man: you’re no indieshite.co.uk that’s for sure.
Karl Hector & The Malcouns - “Sahara...
My Top 5 Artists (Week Ending 2009-5-17) →
Yeah Yeah Yeahs (9)
Kajagoogoo (8)
The Bangles (6)
Madonna (5)
Arcade Fire (5)
Imported from Last.fm Tumblr by JoeLaz
Action Action Action in the Mighty Marvel Manner! →
OK first of all Jessica P is right and Jordin Sparks’ “Battlefield” is a 10. And secondly what I really like about it is the way the lyrics set up this narrative of oh noes why are we fighting and then as soon as the monster “GET YOUR ARMOR” bit kicks in this storyline becomes flagrantly unconvincing because the fighting is very clearly the BEST BIT.
Lyrics by Lee,...
““my main interest these days is
A: “here’s the system”
B: how do we...”
– Mark Sinker, on FT’s Eurovision thread
bud caddell - to have and to hoard →
mikearauz:
From the Wired article, “eMusic is the long tail,” reiterated Madeleine Milne, managing director of eMusic Europe. “Our customers buy music beyond the mainstream top 40 because we provide them with…
To be fair, unless it’s changed a lot since last time I looked, eMusic customers in general have no other option but to buy music beyond the “mainstream top 40”, cuz those...
Mott The Hoople - “Saturday Gigs”
...
somesongsconsidered:
To his credit, Ian Hunter...
ATTN MUSICAL PEOPLE OF THE TUMBLR-WORLD
postpunk:
katbeee:
so i write for tiny mix tapes. we are beginning to create our “best albums of the decade” lists. that’s all fine and dandy, except for the fact that from between the years of 2000-2003, my musical tastes were limited at best. hell, in 2000, i was still going to nsync concerts (don’t hate.) 2004 i’m a bit wonky on; i was in a transitional period from shitty music > good...
Shorter version of my last post
Somewhere, Sir Fred Goodwin is laughing his arse off over all this.
Conspiracy Theorisin'!
Something has been nagging at me about the expenses claim story that the Daily Telegraph is making hay with - its daily dripfeed of claims successfully stoking public outrage and pushing other stuff way down the UK news agenda.
It’s not that the story is a total non-issue, like Stephen Fry has (fatuously) been saying. The MPs involved were swinish idiots and they’ve only themselves to...
Release the worms! →
Offnotesnotes asks if music can be “objectively good”.
I used to think about this but far greater minds than mine have stumbled over it. It tends to spin off into some interesting places tho and Marc’s post is no exception.
My response now would be: what difference would it make to your behaviour if it could (or couldn’t) be?
Re: HotOrNot - I became quite good at...
33 1/3: The New Batch →
1. Massive congratulations to Scott PGWP, whose book on Slint got in. I remember a good blog post by him on that record, and he’s a big early 90s fan so he’ll do the context stuff well too.
2. That said, I could happily go the rest of my life without reading a single extra word on any of these records.
pgwp:
Scott Walker: Black Sheep Boy (from Scott...
My Top 5 Artists (Week Ending 2009-5-10) →
Yeah Yeah Yeahs (6)
ABBA (5)
Arcade Fire (5)
Röyksopp (3)
T2 (3)
Imported from Last.fm Tumblr by JoeLaz
Hold on? Tumblarity? This is like one of those guilty pleasure Twitter analyser website things except it’s PART OF THE SERVICE? Noes!
(NB I use those things ALL THE TIME but I don’t want that side of me pandered to kthx)
And you may find yourself...: Bad Music Writing →
offnotesnotes:
long overreaching piece criticizing (i guess?) “critical overreach”. obviously i feel implicated, but c’mon, how many paid critics (or, hell, bloggers, paid or un) do you really see “overreaching” these days? most of the criticism i read, like most of the music i hear, seems like a deadly boring effort to blend in and be as faceless/unobjectionable as possible.
and then there’s...
My Top 5 Artists (Week Ending 2009-5-3) →
GZA/Genius (8)
Bob the Builder (7)
The Sundays (5)
The Rolling Stones (4)
Lonnie Donegan (4)
Imported from Last.fm Tumblr by JoeLaz
The 90s
“the 90’s have been structured into this narrative of rock dying and then being saved by Radiohead” - sez Tristan Postpunk on the comments to my last post.
This intrigues me, as I hadn’t encountered this as a version of the 90s before. What do other people think? What happened to rock in the 90s?
postpunk:
Disco Inferno - The Last Dance
I...
Here and There →
“A horizonless projection in Manhattan”
