tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42845506228432417372024-03-14T12:49:56.343-06:00Adrift and At PeaceColinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.comBlogger29125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-80038717450268744062011-07-28T14:03:00.004-06:002011-07-28T14:06:27.990-06:00Liturgy - Aesthethica<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWkd8D-RjhRRHTDIzaNFyH4FvrCx-LoKPkI5NlvIJKeEOLmPhC8q0lqzJ5kwDD4kxADmK9sQIZkUF3eUzMUe4HPMyFB4Wy-lBX76XuJOEXVFY8adS9JMlsZQjBJx9ZULPaKuYutyXEIti3/s1600/Liturgy-Aesthethica.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 294px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWkd8D-RjhRRHTDIzaNFyH4FvrCx-LoKPkI5NlvIJKeEOLmPhC8q0lqzJ5kwDD4kxADmK9sQIZkUF3eUzMUe4HPMyFB4Wy-lBX76XuJOEXVFY8adS9JMlsZQjBJx9ZULPaKuYutyXEIti3/s320/Liturgy-Aesthethica.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5634496949113131794" /></a><br />Few bands from the last year have drawn as much scrutiny from the music community as Brooklyn metal act Liturgy. Despite the critical success of their past work, the band has succeeded in the dual tasks of alienating itself from fans of its native genre while cultivating a following in the new indie culture. The former is admittedly not necessarily a Herculean feat; the black metal scene has for years been notoriously inaccessible to outsiders, and little breathing room is typically allowed for bands that attempt to stretch the boundaries of the style. However, that a band as sonically challenging as Liturgy has managed to find a new audience in a crowd that has only recently begun to accept metal as a legitimate musical entity is somewhat more surprising. Given the undeniably pretentious sound of their self-ascribed classification, transcendental black metal, one might expect Liturgy to become mired in the same overdramatic wasteland that has held back progressive metal for so long.<br /><br />However, Liturgy’s latest release, the infuriatingly-spelled Aesthethica, manages to succeed in spite of all this. The album is comprised of 68 minutes of searing, high-register guitars and unflinching blast beats, featuring plenty of the speed of traditional black metal and none of the trudging grind that characterizes many works of the genre. That’s not to say Aesthethica is an easy listen; the album attacks at full strength from the outset, only rarely letting up from the furious energy of opener “High Gold.” Most of the album seems to burst forth fully developed, and the songs are sometimes more likely to settle into predestined patterns rather than evolve over time. As a result, the album is not always a terribly involved listening experience; one is more likely to appreciate its strengths as they wash over and grow in the ear over time rather than at the first try. Frontman Hunter Hunt-Hendrix’s vocals contribute to this attitude of atmosphere over detail. Never shifting away from its incomprehensible shriek, his voice is really more of a textural instrument than a device of musical exposition.<br /><br />But it is this sense of elevated, nonspecific grandeur that allows Aesthethica to work. Pretentious underpinnings aside, the qualifier transcendental does seem to have some meaning here. Each song bears a feeling of almost colossal ambition, guitars and drums and vocals all striving to reach some unchallenged height with each shift in composition. There’s simply something about this album that feels fraught with a sense of glory, a kind of skyward drive that sends the music charging above the clouds. It feels like a work that knows exactly what it wants do to, made by a band that knows exactly what it wants to be.<br /><br />Metal fans can and certainly will argue over whether or not Aesthethica is really black metal. The absence of melodramatic darkness will be a detriment for some, and others will take issue with the album’s apparent lack of traditional structure. But arguments of classification are hardly compelling when a band succeeds so readily in defying the standards of a genre that seldom ventures into such wild territory. Its crossover appeal means that Aesthethica could become something of a transitional work for many listeners, something that will draw attention to the often-ignored metal scene. However, it’s just as likely to be overlooked by music listeners because of its origins, and that’s unfortunate, because what Liturgy has created here is more than a mere gateway. It has marked lands all its own, new spaces where light and energy resonate more powerfully than cheap theatrics, and where new possibilities appear at every turn.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-52350178615952491382011-03-07T18:32:00.003-07:002011-03-07T18:39:38.374-07:00Writing Exercise: Dream DescriptionsA few days ago, I stumbled across a writing exercise that suggests you describe a couple of dreams as quickly as possible in as much detail as possible. I'm not sure how I feel about what I came up with, but I figured I'd post them anyway. As it happens, I have a number of recurring dreams that pop up every so often, and I happened to have variations on two of them the past couple nights. They are obviously absurd (especially the second one), but I'm not really interested in interpretation. I just wanted to see what I would get if I tried the exercise. Criticism is more than welcome. 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mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style> <![endif]--> <p style="font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal">Last night:</p> <p class="MsoNormal">There is a bus, of which I am either a passenger or the driver. Sometimes both. The bus moves too fast and it’s scaring me, like, seriously freaking me out. It drives down narrow city roads that roll like waves. Sometimes the world seems to undulate; the asphalt rolls up against the bus, but it keeps speeding on. Later, the bus is in a parking structure. There are other cars there, and I think a fuel tanker. I know what’s coming but I can’t stop it. I’m not driving anymore. It’s a man, middle-aged, white, and skinny. He has brown hair and a long face. He looks a bit like Bill Nye the Science Guy. I think he is crazy. He probably is. He’s driving way too fast and there’s no space anymore. The bus skids around the garage until it can’t miss the tanker anymore, and there’s an explosion. 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font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style> <![endif]--> </p><p style="font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal">Night before last:</p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’m in a forest. It’s cold and grey. The ground is moist and soft, and the air is so foggy that it wets my skin. There are huge trees, tops obscured in mist and trunks dripping dew. The forest should feel healthy and alive but it doesn’t. It’s still vaguely beautiful, though. At least there is no wind. The ground between the trees is brown and bare, and my feet twist and catch on the uneven clumps of dirt. It feels like I’m on a slope. It’s not steep, but I’m definitely looking downhill, for now. I’m walking between the trees, but I don’t know where I’m going. I’m wearing a watch, a black digital one with a rubber band that pulls at the hair on my arm. I look at the watch. It says something very precise, like 11:57 AM in flashing black digits. When I see the time, I realize that I am terribly late for something. Not the kind of late that you can play off by saying you were stuck in traffic or your car wouldn’t start or something harmless like that. It’s the kind of late where you know you overslept, and you’re going to be way too late to get away with it and you’re going to fucking get it. I turn and run, at first downhill but then uphill, like the ground is a seesaw that suddenly swings the other way. I’m trying to run but I’m wearing shoes I’m not used to, they’re heavy and I keep tripping on roots. I’m not running fast enough and there’s no way I’m going to make it on time. I wake up and check the time. It’s only 7:14 AM and I have time. I go back to sleep.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’m on a hillside again, but this one is different. I can see down the slope for miles. There is a cobblestone road that weaves down between mounds of green and brown. The colors are pretty and bright but somehow flat and without texture, like someone spilled paint and just let it dry instead of brushing it. There are low brown fences, like the ones they put around pastures. It’s a beautiful day; the sky is blue and dry and I can see the sun when I shield my eyes just right. When I look up the hill behind me I can see thick patches of trees, with a few gaps through which I can see brown ground and more sky. For a few minutes, things are warm and peaceful and beautiful. I look downhill one more time. I begin to feel uneasy. The leaves twitch restlessly. I know there’s something behind me. I don’t want to look but I think I won’t live if I don’t, so I look. In a clearing of trees stands a huge dinosaur, looking away from me, for now. My pulse triples, and I turn downhill to run, hoping it won’t see me and I will get away. I don’t look again, but I hear a crunch of dirt and leaves and I know it has seen me. I run as fast as I can, but for some reason I’m not moving very fast. It feels like I’m running on like an astronaut. Each step takes an eternity to hit the ground, no matter how fast I push myself. I’m more falling down the hill than running. I turn to look and I see it chasing me. It is huge, and its skin is a dead green, like drying grass in fall. I try to keep running. I feel a primal terror, like a rabbit chased by a wolf. I’m going to be eaten and I can’t do anything about it. There is a short fence in front of me, so I jump over it. I hope the fence will stop it from coming, but it won’t. I’m in the yard of a farmhouse, but I don’t have time to get inside. I don’t even try. I turn and look at the monster. It is upon me before I can gasp in shock. It picks me up in its jaws. My head and chest are inside its mouth. Its tongue is red and wet and huge, bigger than me. It feels like raw chicken meat under my hand. Its teeth are the size of my arm, not sharp but it doesn’t matter because its jaws are too strong and I can’t move. The monster drops me. I look up and see its skin up close. It looks like the dry patches between my thumbs and forefingers. I think it roars at me but I can’t really tell, because it has picked me up again. I lay on the ground while it eats me in pieces. I wake up.</p>Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-9739925878384179732011-02-28T18:59:00.004-07:002011-02-28T19:01:24.324-07:00Radiohead - The King of Limbs<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4ix0f2JANjruCBwOps5thn0FxZs51QwPMI3yJrre_vjkwq7QUJTGls9wtEz8tmiDaaDKN4xcULfoTtawOAb0mmlnKQBtWzaTO-f639tgS9RUVB03_mYVBIZoVQ5XhMYolOmGRuAubDMIA/s1600/radiohead-the-king-of-limbs.jpg"><img style="float: right; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 318px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4ix0f2JANjruCBwOps5thn0FxZs51QwPMI3yJrre_vjkwq7QUJTGls9wtEz8tmiDaaDKN4xcULfoTtawOAb0mmlnKQBtWzaTO-f639tgS9RUVB03_mYVBIZoVQ5XhMYolOmGRuAubDMIA/s320/radiohead-the-king-of-limbs.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5578925548059561426" border="0" /></a>Announced out of the blue and arriving one day ahead of schedule, Radiohead’s newest release <i style="">The King of Limbs</i> seems like an attempt to sneak up and surprise the music community. For Radiohead, this has become par for the course. Like them or not, this is a band with a penchant for the unexpected, both musically and in terms of their reclusive image. The initial novelty of the pick-your-price scheme introduced with <i style="">In Rainbows</i> has long since worn off, and wisely, no such attention grab has been made here. As a result, the music-listening collective and I are forced to dig in to the music directly rather than distract ourselves with notions of industry-changing gimmicks, effective as they might be. <p class="MsoNormal">So, after a week or so of repeated listens, I can’t help but feel a bit confused by this album. Generally speaking, Radiohead seems to have momentarily abandoned the charged instrumentals of <i style="">In Rainbows</i> for a more electronically-focused approach, similar to the one they used for <i style="">Kid A</i>. The album’s opener, “Bloom,” feels constricted by Phil Selway’s trademark choppy rhythms, which are as proficient as ever but seem toothless under weak synthesizers and wandering vocals. The cluttered percussion samples of the first two tracks are as close as this album will get to the sound of <i style="">In Rainbows</i>, but “Bloom” feels like more of a downgrade than an evolution from the previous album’s opener, “15 Steps.” It’s not long, though, before the band switches gears, dropping the mash of rhythms for the more laid-back roll of “Little By Little.” This one is the most seamless blend of Radiohead’s sonic capabilities, mixing electronic percussion under organic melodies in the best hook the album has to offer.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">If three tracks in feels like an early peak, that’s because it is. It would be a mistake to skip the rest of the album, but one can’t help but feel like everything tapers off a bit from here. “Lotus Flower,” the literal centerpiece of the album, is Thom Yorke’s best moment on the record. His falsetto is focused and precise here, an improvement over the textural vocals that pervade a good portion of the album. The song is close enough to the top of the slope that it is memorable enough to stand out from the rest of the music here. The pulsing piano chords of “Codex” are sonically gorgeous but lacking in direction or motivation. Beyond that, the album just kind of shuts itself down, running out its brief 38-minutes with two more tracks of pretty music that don’t really add anything substantial to the structure of the record. “Give Up the Ghost” is too subdued and fuzzy for its own good, and “Separator,” though an effective closer for this particular album, just sounds like something we’ve heard before.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">And that’s the real problem with <i style="">The King of Limbs</i>. It is the rare album that will likely be enjoyed more by non-fans than by Radiohead devotees. On its own merits, it is perfectly listenable, and frequently enjoyable. It can be texturally and instrumentally beautiful at times, but there is little here that feels grand or musically daring. There is no tension and no anxiety. It too often sounds like an album put out by an excellent band that sat down and said, “Hey, we haven’t done anything in a while. Want to put out a record?” Radiohead’s characteristic music prowess is certainly here, and for many listeners, that will be more than enough. It’s just hard to see the band’s fans accepting this as an integral part of Radiohead’s catalogue. You just have to decide how it works for you.</p>Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-58130792442703048662011-02-18T15:29:00.004-07:002011-02-18T15:42:53.922-07:00Cut Copy - Zonoscope<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2uSW4jDqHTulYwSKHJ9K2et_wsup-P-mhc3zqrWNcpHN4hc4SSaqzFt4fk8Q1M5QRXEEOR9h4tVLpNxbrMvE7x9nGHKXIW8weiZANJ7nJFbsNxgd2jnQRf11hyphenhyphen3lTwj7vMRC9bnYuVTCw/s1600/CUT-COPY-ZONOSCOPE.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2uSW4jDqHTulYwSKHJ9K2et_wsup-P-mhc3zqrWNcpHN4hc4SSaqzFt4fk8Q1M5QRXEEOR9h4tVLpNxbrMvE7x9nGHKXIW8weiZANJ7nJFbsNxgd2jnQRf11hyphenhyphen3lTwj7vMRC9bnYuVTCw/s320/CUT-COPY-ZONOSCOPE.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5575160946620592642" /></a><br />Speaking from grossly limited experience as a music writer (read: unemployed blogger), it can be difficult to review a band that you know nothing about. This is true of music from all genres, but the effect seems amplified when writing about indie, partly due to the massive influx in popular artists from the genre in recent years. As quickly as the scene grows, so does the range of sounds encompassed under the descriptor, often resulting in combinations of influence that are simultaneously derivative and entirely inventive.<br /><br />This phenomenon is most recently embodied in Zonoscope, the latest album from Australian indie outfit Cut Copy. In some ways, Cut Copy have here chosen to stick with their guns, following the sonic tropes of their obvious influences. Singer Dan Whitford prominently echoes Joy Division and other early electronic artists, even as far up to the present as LCD Soundsystem. The similarities can be difficult to ignore. Whitford sings with the same wistful tenor as many of his predecessors, but with none of the prerequisite angst and teenaged frustration that characterized so many early electro-pop artists.<br /><br />It’s a marked similarity, but the resemblances more or less end there. Behind Zonoscope’s vocals lie such a vast array of sonic devices that you can’t help but feel that you’re hearing something entirely new. In “Take Me Over,” Cut Copy provide a lush arrangement of echoing percussion, prominent guitars, and electronic backdrops, all set around one of the best grooves to come out of the scene in recent memory. Next, the pounding drums of “Where I’m Going” lay out the frame for Whitford to do some of his most creative vocal work. He hits his stride here, harmonizing an excellent chorus melody that numbers among the best moments on the album. <br /><br />That chorus also represents all that is best about the album. Each tune resounds with an enthusiasm for creation that is rare in all forms of music. Track for track, this might be one of the happier albums you’ll hear in months. The songs are almost uniformly upbeat, but in a way that never feels cheesy or less than genuine. For example, “Alisa” is really not much more than a good love song, but it is composed with such clarity and sung with such stylish grace that it becomes something more. The album does occasionally fall too far into its own patterns, as is the case with “Hanging Onto Every Heartbeat.” The track thumps along on the album’s most patient groove, relying on shimmering electronics and strummed acoustic guitars rather than huge dynamic bursts and polyrhythmic explorations. It’s not so much bad as uninteresting, given the immensely animated sound of the album as a whole. It’s a rare miss for an album that is otherwise entirely in charge of its own direction.<br /><br />Speaking of structure, it’s impossible to talk about Zonoscope without mentioning its closer, the 15-minute electronic excursion that is “Sun God.” Lyrically, the song is nothing spectacular, but the sheer audacity of ending a pop album with a song over ten minutes long should not be ignored. “Sun God” is a trek through the best of Cut Copy’s electronic abilities, an entrancing showcase of pop sensibility and inventive instrumentation. It’s as effective a closer as it is a standalone work, a feat that is admirable in itself, and a testament to this band’s willingness to follow their creative urges. Ultimately, it is the album’s ending that provides its most resounding endorsement: when “Sun God” finally drew to a close my first time through, I just wanted it to keep going. It’s tough to get much better praise than that.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-87499689756694240702011-01-18T19:25:00.003-07:002011-01-18T19:27:36.267-07:00New Story: Part 2Here's the latest section. Still needs revision, but I like where it's going. Let me know what you think.<br /><br /><br /><br />Tomas Barden opened his eyes to the dim light of midday. He raised his head an inch from his thin grey pillow. The sheet smelled like dirt and sweat and dreams unbegun. A breath creaked out between his dry lips. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep again.<br /><br />Twelve minutes later, a harsh digital chirp sounded next to his head. Tomas glanced at the clock as the chirp accelerated. He forced his feet to touch the floor and reached to deactivate the alarm. Standing in front of his tiny window, Tomas looked out upon the world. The sun was only barely visible in the sky, and the street below was shrouded entirely. The fog was thick today.<br /><br />He dressed and fed himself. Glancing outside again, Tomas noted that the sun was now completely hidden. He had overslept. He put on a grey rain jacket and prepared to leave. Before opening his door, Tomas paused to look at a photograph hung by the frame with a thumbtack. She was still smiling through brown hair and green leaves. He wondered where.<br /><br />Tomas opened the door and stepped outside. The fog was thick enough today that he could not see to the other side of the street. He glanced at his watch. He was an hour late. It wasn’t safe to drive on a day like this, but he didn’t really have a choice, so he walked to the curb and unlocked his car. It was a 2009 Toyota Camry. How it had survived this long was beyond comprehension, but here it stood, defiant, if shabby, on the street before his doorstep. So many of its exterior parts had been replaced with scraps that it looked more like a kid’s half-painted model than a working vehicle. <br /><br />The streets were mostly empty, thanks to the fog. Before he drove away from his home, Tomas tapped a device on the dash with a jury-rigged digital clock face. A small antenna sat on top of the instrument, pointing directly upward, seeking for objects in the sky above the fog. With a faint buzz, the screen lit with dim green zeroes. Nothing.<br /><br />The drive was easy enough. The building where Tomas worked was a standard modern office, metallic grey on the outside with no windows. It was a small building, set on the fringes of a large cluster of buildings like it. The towers increased in size towards the middle, where a single massive cylinder loomed above the rest of the city. Unlike the boxes around it, the tower was smooth and black, with silvery windows stretching up to its top above the haze. Its walls seemed to shift around the glance of the eye, contorting and bulging out of focus. It looked weird, out of place among the standardized rectangles that surrounded it, as if it had drawn them together like scraps to a magnet.<br /><br />Tomas left the car a block down from his building and walked to one of the side doors. He was almost two hours late by now, and he knew he would have to sneak in to avoid being disciplined. He entered the building and walked directly to the staircase in the corner of the lobby. Seeing no one on the stairs, Tomas began to sprint, taking the stairs in threes until he reached the twelfth floor. Panting, he stopped beside the entrance to the floor and leaned against the wall to compose himself. He glanced at his watch, trying to remember when they checked the floors for attendance. 9:58. Shit, he thought. Too close.<br /><br />Suddenly, the air passing in and out of Tomas’ lungs changed. It grew tense, vibrating within his chest and around his face. Invisible molecules trembled violently, and his skin began to shiver, agitated by a gentle but persistent itch. Tomas pressed himself against the wall. He held his breath. He tried to stop the blood from pulsing through his veins. The vibration intensified into a clutching pressure, and he felt his skin turn white and then begin to bruise in spots, like a piece of fruit abused by a careless hand. He squeezed his eyes shut and prayed that it would not see him.<br /><br />Finally, the vice loosened and the air calmed itself. Tomas opened his eyes and allowed himself to breathe again. Uttering a sigh of relief, he opened the staircase door and slid through onto the office floor, collapsing in the chair of his narrow stall.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-88447259198057991982011-01-07T22:35:00.004-07:002011-01-07T22:37:53.475-07:00New Story: Part 1This is the introduction to a new story I've been working on. I have more coming, so let me know what you think.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">When he was young, the man saw a shooting star streak across the night sky. He had been driving down an empty stretch of highway, carrying his girlfriend home. Tired and distracted, the young man stared into a patch of space above the horizon. The spot of light coalesced into existence and streaked across the unmarred navy heavens, disappearing without trail or trace. Years later, the man remembered what he felt at that sudden coincidence. Things were normal then. But he remembered the feeling, seeing that flying bulb. A sudden heaviness on his heart. An unconscious clutch of fear, unbearable dread that his rational mind soon replaced with the appropriate awe and wonder. Looking at his girlfriend, he realized that she saw the light too, and felt comforted by the shared gasp and surprised laughter.<br /><br />Things are different now. When he goes outside at night into the vast indigo waste there is no upward stare. He does not hope for a flash and a streak of white. And when he looks up at long last, he sees the falling shards of heaven and can only remember when they meant just a gasp and a wish.</span><br /> <br />The first cases were barely noticed. They happened too far apart to be considered unusual. They sometimes happened around cities, but most of the cases occurred over oceans, empty fields, frozen wastes. A few scientists spoke up, but only to note a small rise in reported sightings in the past five, ten years. When someone happened to actually see one, they reacted normally. They told their friends and families the next day, and went on with their lives.<br /> <br />It wasn't until twenty years after the first cases that people began to notice the difference. Within a month's time, sightings increased a hundredfold. More were happening above cities, and more people began to wonder. When it became clear that something was happening, people started talking. They talked at first like they weren't afraid, with feigned scientific interest. Soon though, voices became hushed, and the cases became the default topic when people ran out of distractions. They talked about their own sightings, and how afraid they had been. They talked and admitted their fear because if everyone feared it then it was alright to be afraid.<br /> <br />Still, few people took the cases seriously. The impacts, when they actually happened, didn’t seem to have any effect on the land or the people living nearby. The objects were rarely found, and when they were, they were so small that it seemed impossible that they could be dangerous. <br /> <br />The world changes every day. On July 12, 2036, the world changed again. It began in the dusk hours around the globe, just as the light from the sun faded to a deep violet and the stars began to shimmer. Among the stationary points of light streaked small white lines that fell between the stars like raindrops between leaves. At first there were just a few, appearing every few minutes, then every ten seconds. By midnight, the news stations were reporting a surprise meteor shower, more intense than any other on record. As darkness moved across the planet, the meteors continued to fall, cascading over the unsuspecting Earth as onlookers watched in awe and mounting fear. Scientists had no explanation; it was later discovered that the meteors had been mostly concealed in the shadow of the moon. Strangest of all, however, was that the objects did not seem to make contact with Earth as a few of the early cases had. Scientists assumed that they simply burned off in the atmosphere, like any other asteroid would. That day is known as Cataclysm Zero. No physical consequences were observed, but the event became the topic of concern for the media worldwide. Scientists were disturbed by their inability to anticipate an event of such magnitude. People were scared for a while, but eventually forgot their fear and went on with their lives.<br /><br />That was two years ago. The world has changed.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-81414947178599131212010-12-20T00:58:00.013-07:002010-12-20T01:07:34.784-07:00The Top 10 Albums of 2010<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiCRowdvP-5MP0qca3DH-Ltqk_sPhEu_5B_Zbxl18Oh1YN9GUdaeGSZZA7ulxGt2AZFWq1x8uK88zRPSKEKt1GcTUEFmvAfsFuIY0JUastx4b2u_idgWkn4rhyphenhyphenw8U-vIF_31F-zDp6opRB/s1600/american+slang.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 182px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiCRowdvP-5MP0qca3DH-Ltqk_sPhEu_5B_Zbxl18Oh1YN9GUdaeGSZZA7ulxGt2AZFWq1x8uK88zRPSKEKt1GcTUEFmvAfsFuIY0JUastx4b2u_idgWkn4rhyphenhyphenw8U-vIF_31F-zDp6opRB/s200/american+slang.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552671499599554722" /></a><br />10. The Gaslight Anthem – American Slang<br /><br />One of the most surprising albums of the year, The Gaslight Anthem’s American Slang is a passionate, heartfelt ode to nostalgia, a collection of rough, throaty barroom rockers without pretension or gimmick. The guys from New Jersey are so powerfully connected to their roots that their music runs the risk of being derivative, even imitative; even writing about them is difficult without namedropping their obvious Bruce Springsteen and Van Morrison influences (see?). But this set of twangy, contemplative tunes so keenly recreates the best parts of the band’s heroes that they manage to make their own meaning, even if you never quite clicked with the likes of the Boss. Between bouts of air guitar and toe-tapping, you can’t help but wish for the old days along with the boys, even if, as Gaslight suggests, those days weren’t all that great anyways.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaV1bsE809-VXCg9Afq2pGtj6v3vXBNmqzBdQSudLhKPQ6Cmp7WvwKnWBdAj0wXjvCj2LHIN41k_vUnLVGTn3mwVj6cUyRDjDeDO9pmn-Rac1TzD0Sai6g6yYrpBqS2xPumAOZWAJTLLl/s1600/teen+dream.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaV1bsE809-VXCg9Afq2pGtj6v3vXBNmqzBdQSudLhKPQ6Cmp7WvwKnWBdAj0wXjvCj2LHIN41k_vUnLVGTn3mwVj6cUyRDjDeDO9pmn-Rac1TzD0Sai6g6yYrpBqS2xPumAOZWAJTLLl/s200/teen+dream.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552671663902731826" /></a><br />9. Beach House – Teen Dream<br /><br />Here is an album with the strange power to deceive through simplicity. Everything here is slow and lilting, seemingly written according to a formula of lazy beats and cloudy synth lines. Listen closely, though, and you find layers upon layers of texture and rhythm, all creating a sonic portrait under which Victoria Legrand sighs with grace. Her vocals actually take a back seat here, lying down under the weight of Beach House’s rich musical signature. Dream-pop leanings aside, there is an intense discomfort at work in these songs, seeking a fulfillment that always seems on the edge of vision. On “Real Love,” Legrand sings, “There’s something wrong with our hearts.” Doesn’t get much more honest than that.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoz7FdSk5kTkWbc95ocXWaEPuNuhdzXoetRRRwaJIfokcy4MJoDpeSnbJxuQbblbCX8XCLb41ey0QwFw8GvXEPPTfDTTuvJLkKa0075aCz2DdhFoaXoUKxo6cylYUcz4QzqqeG6eDNt6Nu/s1600/astro+coast.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoz7FdSk5kTkWbc95ocXWaEPuNuhdzXoetRRRwaJIfokcy4MJoDpeSnbJxuQbblbCX8XCLb41ey0QwFw8GvXEPPTfDTTuvJLkKa0075aCz2DdhFoaXoUKxo6cylYUcz4QzqqeG6eDNt6Nu/s200/astro+coast.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552671806054084514" /></a><br />8. Surfer Blood – Astro Coast<br /><br />The Florida outfit’s shark-adorned debut album Astro Coast takes classic surf rock and pushes it into the bass age. From the beginning, the album rides guitar riffs as thick as marble, punctuated by screeching solo lines and the heavily echoed singing of frontman John Paul Pitts. His vocals feel so modern that they feel almost out of place among the power chords and driving rhythms that back them, but strangely, Astro Coast never seems conflicted or misguided. Immediately listenable and deceptively deep, these tracks have an upbeat presence that is largely absent in most of the year’s best (and worst) music, and chances are you’ll want to swim right to right to the album’s end and come back again.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCa8vwR764V6rh_6OhzPQ-Su0Ybhngt68M-wFzO9prVZQ8foIUqshwzrNRRTxxW1iBhyFet1-zsx_UCzm2dWGMEsmjmESNT6RzjLDPnyitGhD0DqxWz1snvJM15RTi3rIyrC7Vd9sQ7CEc/s1600/treats.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCa8vwR764V6rh_6OhzPQ-Su0Ybhngt68M-wFzO9prVZQ8foIUqshwzrNRRTxxW1iBhyFet1-zsx_UCzm2dWGMEsmjmESNT6RzjLDPnyitGhD0DqxWz1snvJM15RTi3rIyrC7Vd9sQ7CEc/s200/treats.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552671958524565650" /></a><br />7. Sleigh Bells – Treats<br /><br />Speaking of musical conflicts, this Brooklyn-based band’s debut is a doozy. Sleigh Bells is the musical child of pop singer Alexis Krauss and hardcore guitarist Derek Miller, and it sounds exactly like you would expect an album of such disparate influence to sound. From the outset, Treats overwhelms the ear with pounding drums and overdriven guitars, set to a vaguely poppish beat that wouldn’t be out of place in a radio rap tune. The calamity of the opener, “Tell Em,” is so vicious that it seems almost unsalvageable, save for Krauss’ vocals. Amongst the noise, her chants are just beautiful enough to soften the blow without stopping the punch entirely. She maintains this balance throughout the album, keeping that synth-rock feel with just a touch of pop vocal sensibility. It’s a truly unique sound, making it one of the most original albums of the year.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGfW9LEZy3Jw0YmSmX0H0Tq0Qavzws-GRzGqQqNgO8ZE-shHaBz6RdAI3b7PfPJE2klyTs98HbIqjLwHDnR8LHDViw1NSnsigA1oV-TrIJRD_NsJqmCooHWxLMiX5aj-m7NFJOvlGEmUDz/s1600/the+lady+killer.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGfW9LEZy3Jw0YmSmX0H0Tq0Qavzws-GRzGqQqNgO8ZE-shHaBz6RdAI3b7PfPJE2klyTs98HbIqjLwHDnR8LHDViw1NSnsigA1oV-TrIJRD_NsJqmCooHWxLMiX5aj-m7NFJOvlGEmUDz/s200/the+lady+killer.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552672126286184226" /></a><br />6. Cee-Lo – The Lady Killer<br /><br />In truth, this album is nearly impossible to review with any kind of honesty. The success of its lead single, the hilarious and deservedly sensational “Fuck You,” could tempt many to ignore the album the Cee-Lo created around it. Listening to the record though, one can say that this would be a terrible mistake. On The Lady Killer, Cee-Lo prudently takes a moment to warm up the listener before jumping into “Fuck You” with the appropriately titled “Bright Lights Bigger City,” a funky anthem based on a chorus synth line that is nothing short of massive. Later, Cee-Lo cedes the spotlight to Lauren Bennett in “Love Gun,” which attempts and nearly succeeds at replicating the defiance and sexual pulse of “Fuck You.” Cee-Lo deftly brings out the funk on The Lady Killer, melding his feel for pop hitmaking with his classical soul. Surprisingly, he often abandons the romantic persona of the album’s hit, but the music is so damn good that you can’t help but love him anyway.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCdv1HrzYPXg_Shw5TYtU6eJPgVb4u7yKMt11rsTonkHguJZU6grvopvaFO2PnNAIhrmhVBJg9jsnpZ7BcClo-bnT-FSBAHU3fRPbJd_GfGMxMVho5rwokWIKd9soqEeUkcIwOHS3PjyJj/s1600/the+monitor.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCdv1HrzYPXg_Shw5TYtU6eJPgVb4u7yKMt11rsTonkHguJZU6grvopvaFO2PnNAIhrmhVBJg9jsnpZ7BcClo-bnT-FSBAHU3fRPbJd_GfGMxMVho5rwokWIKd9soqEeUkcIwOHS3PjyJj/s200/the+monitor.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552672276045651330" /></a><br />5. Titus Andronicus – The Monitor<br /><br />My strategy when writing lists like this, and reviews in general, is to listen to the album that I’m reviewing while I write. Sadly, I seem to have hit a roadblock. That is the virtue of Titus Andronicus’ sophomore album, The Monitor. It has a pure rock ‘n roll attitude that refuses to let me focus on anything else. The album’s opener, “A More Perfect Union,” may be the best rock song of the year. It begins with a snippet of an Abraham Lincoln speech, introducing the album’s Civil War theme, and then launches into a barrage of rolling drums and buzzing guitars. When vocalist Patrick Stickles rouses the troops with his slightly off-key holler, one wonders how he got to be a singer, and how this band can possibly be so damned good. Now, let me get back to rocking.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl2n6z91N33fQnHcRgfivW0bWOAGJMCPHyUhcMzPs8bCcN6kjccvI0N9OR5taGHr3UhTz4DQokiRpdCEn6BOM-6zB0Scl-Gj7figWugf2ON-y40fS5UfMI0uhn3xtRiL-HVx_s17w-ZWl6/s1600/my+beautiful+dark+twisted+fantasy.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl2n6z91N33fQnHcRgfivW0bWOAGJMCPHyUhcMzPs8bCcN6kjccvI0N9OR5taGHr3UhTz4DQokiRpdCEn6BOM-6zB0Scl-Gj7figWugf2ON-y40fS5UfMI0uhn3xtRiL-HVx_s17w-ZWl6/s200/my+beautiful+dark+twisted+fantasy.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552672462131171154" /></a><br />4. Kanye West – My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy<br /><br />And now we come to the album that I’ve been afraid to review for weeks. Out of his depression, online rants, and awkward television interviews, Kanye has managed to come up with the most challenging set of his career and of the year. True, Kanye’s music has lately become so difficult to separate from his questionable persona that anything he releases is likely to be confusing, at best. Behind all the attention-whoring, though, Kanye remains an incredibly talented hip-hop artist. In terms of production, this album is wildly different from his previous work, using less blatant sampling in favor of a darker atmosphere. Technically, Fantasy is far from Kanye’s best rap work; his rhyming is often ragged and unpleasant, forcing the listener to turn to his supporting cast, which is considerable. Jay-Z, Rick Ross, Pusha T, and Nicki Minaj all make notable contributions, filling the gaps where Kanye himself seems unable to say what really needs to be said. Despite her infuriating public presence, Minaj proves herself an extremely capable rapper on “Monster,” the album’s rap-battle ego-fest. However, everything on both ends of the album seems to lead to one point. “Runaway,” Kanye’s self-conscious tribute to assholes, is by far the best track here, combining a brilliant verse by Clipse MC Pusha T with surprising humility from Kanye. It’s a stark moment on an album that may not even be Kanye’s best album ever, but is certainly his most memorable.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnJfIy9LBwEMLJMc_XPhYD52D-5illi051U4UHz31OqWC9h15uvlZHtiJWF2mYNcm3pT3mmLw96-8pk22g6rA0vYfGcfIUSk4Q4Ew7x8L2aWDE2C5FQyp8Z8qXk88NQDXXp2LpzbCzHO3h/s1600/this+is+happening.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnJfIy9LBwEMLJMc_XPhYD52D-5illi051U4UHz31OqWC9h15uvlZHtiJWF2mYNcm3pT3mmLw96-8pk22g6rA0vYfGcfIUSk4Q4Ew7x8L2aWDE2C5FQyp8Z8qXk88NQDXXp2LpzbCzHO3h/s200/this+is+happening.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552672625900471890" /></a><br />3. LCD Soundsystem – This Is Happening<br /><br />For a humble-looking nerd, James Murphy sure is tricky. In “Dance Yrself Clean,” the album’s opener, he taps and clicks with almost frustrating patience, waiting over three minutes before launching into the electro-pop beast that is the next six minutes. This Is Happening is strange in its organization alone, with all but one song clocking in at over five minutes, and three at over eight. Despite its generous track times, the album is starkly minimalist for most of its duration, featuring synth patterns that sometimes sound like they were made with a cheap loop creator. Give him time, though, and Murphy will make you rock out in original and unexpected ways. The crushing pulse of “One Touch” roars with unstoppable energy, rocking so hard it will make you wish it kept going past the nearly eight minutes that it bores into your skull. Have no fear, though; Murphy provides plenty here to get you dancing. Just don’t let him fool you.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBDYlwrH0FnkYWAXg0m5L1KW8zV1SBVLaj2Qx5K3_koC8wQ8bKO9Gjib_Wo4oXH_wskW_r9HG-NuiuZO_IltsH90JDVvYpwKj8GOsDeGQI1iw_QtDfzED1rr0KkLmDeeb1bEyIG_VIokvX/s1600/sir+lucious+left+foot.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBDYlwrH0FnkYWAXg0m5L1KW8zV1SBVLaj2Qx5K3_koC8wQ8bKO9Gjib_Wo4oXH_wskW_r9HG-NuiuZO_IltsH90JDVvYpwKj8GOsDeGQI1iw_QtDfzED1rr0KkLmDeeb1bEyIG_VIokvX/s200/sir+lucious+left+foot.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552672769098062386" /></a><br />2. Big Boi – Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty<br /><br />More than three years overdue, OutKast MC Big Boi has finally released an album that proves he is just as worthy of the spotlight as his somewhat crazier counterpart. Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty is the best hip-hop album in years, more creative than anything OutKast ever did and more straight-up entertaining than anything anyone did this year. The album is produced by a variety of guests along with Big Boi’s own team, leading to a varied mix of sound that constantly keeps the listener guessing. Chico Dusty is never predictable, always good, and often brilliant. Three songs form the album’s strongest set, starting with “Shutterbugg,” the best hip-hop track of the year. Based on a chugging vocal loop, the song leans and pops with funky vigor, while Big Boi brings his signature rhyming style between a sick chorus line. “Tangerine” is darker, dirtier; a distorted guitar line reverberates over tribal drum samples that bounce with filthy energy. “Hustle Blood,” the most surprising track on the album, features a shockingly good performance by Jaime Foxx and deeply sexy production from Lil’ Jon, booming around a chorus so soulful it’ll reverberate for years.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOT4mTd61Yf9n8SIjb98Lycmy-ii6kbZuYOhwi60l0vwNqtJr3mCU6igZzfjUKQcIEk92mUOX-9kiayjIAgoV6O8TZATN1pXIsnFxR_SZLI_XoR2GHsE2xo0-Ykc5VyL2W6732hfKiJcKA/s1600/high+violet.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOT4mTd61Yf9n8SIjb98Lycmy-ii6kbZuYOhwi60l0vwNqtJr3mCU6igZzfjUKQcIEk92mUOX-9kiayjIAgoV6O8TZATN1pXIsnFxR_SZLI_XoR2GHsE2xo0-Ykc5VyL2W6732hfKiJcKA/s320/high+violet.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552672940690609954" /></a><br />1. The National – High Violet<br /><br />And so we arrive here, at an album released by a band that is notoriously difficult to praise. Unlike many of the year’s best albums, High Violet is neither particularly creative nor immediately approachable. Had it been released sooner than a month or two ago, it may not have cracked my top ten. That’s just how the National are. Their music grows on you, creeping up from unremarkable mediocrity to something that is crushingly honest and deeply evocative. Their last album, Boxer, holds a place very dear to me, and it is difficult to compartmentalize High Violet and recognize its virtues apart from the latter album. After months of struggling, it now feels like an album that is altogether more cohesive, layered, and mature than Boxer. Unlike its predecessor, High Violet is a unified statement, commenting on the nature of manhood in the modern age, with all its expectations and disappointments. Despite its subdued tone, it manages to feel ambitious. “Terrible Love” opens with slow grandeur, only to fall into the bitter reflection that is “Sorrow.” Singer Matt Berninger hums with depression that feels all too genuine: “I don’t wanna get over you.” Later, his voice expands to encompass the scope of the album’s centerpiece, “Bloodbuzz Ohio,” a driving track that captures all the stress and complication of adulthood when Berninger laments, “I still owe money, to the money, to the money I owe.” High Violet never rises out of its lyrical doldrums, speaking in “Lemonworld” of class confusion and social fatigue, and trying to fake adulthood in “England.” Taken together, High Violet is sometimes uplifting, always heartbreaking, and so, so, beautiful.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-80066477281574696272010-08-14T23:25:00.002-06:002010-08-14T23:28:11.076-06:00Story in Progress: Section OneThis is the first section of a story I started writing a few weeks ago. At some point I'd like to develop it into something longer, but this is what I have so far. Let me know what you think.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />He woke with a jolt in a dry darkness. The air left his lungs in a gasp, as if he had been hit in the gut. He looked around in the close black with the momentary panic of someone waking in a new place for the first time. After a moment, he flexed his hands weakly, rousing them from stiffness and slowly forcing them back to life. He was calmer now; he still could not see, but he remembered why. His breath heated the cold metal before his face, and sweat began to drip from his nose. It was time; he had to get out. <br /><br />Stretching his arms slowly outward, he pushed on the familiar ridged surface before his waist until he heard a click. His hands now free, he quickly wiped his face before unbuckling the straps around his chest and legs. Heat returned quickly; his breath was again quick and labored, and every movement ached. With a desperate motion, the man pushed on the warm steel behind him, leaning his body into the curved wall that faced him. A click sounded, but he did not move. A faint whimper escaped his lips. Frustration took over as his lungs filled with warm, spent air. A last twitch of energy pulled his head back and jerked it forward, into the dark barrier. This time the click was louder, and he felt the door give. With a high squeak, it fell forward and down, and Jacob Clarke tumbled into the light.<br /> <br />He lay still for a moment, closing his eyes against the blinding sunlight. Forcing himself onto his back, Clarke lifted a hand to cover his eyes before opening them. Tears streamed down his face as his tender retinas perceived the light of what he realized was merely the dim glow of a sunset. He had been lucky - the light of a midday sun could have blinded him permanently. His childlike eyes eventually stopped watering, and Clarke weakly smiled in the joy of his sight, after twelve years of darkness.<br /> <br />Gathering himself, Clarke examined his surroundings. The black shell that had held him was now a heap of bent steel. He hurriedly crawled back to the pile and began to search, pushing aside chunks of shell that were already collapsing into dark dust. After a moment he pulled a small leather parcel from the heap, which he opened in delight. Inside he found a package of semi-frozen meat product and a small bottle of distilled water. He breathed on the food package excitedly before wolfing down half of its contents, chasing the tasteless mixture with two gulps of water.<br /> <br />His strength somewhat renewed, Clarke finally stood. A cursory scan told him that he was in a coniferous forest, fairly dense but open enough to allow travel. The ground where he stood was mostly flat and was mostly covered by needles, some bright blue, some a deep, rusty red. Behind him stood a small foothill that lead to a mountain, stretching to perhaps fifteen thousand feet at the summit. He saw no clear path out of the area, but knew he must move soon.<br /> <br />A sudden breeze blew over Clarke, and he shivered under the sweat of exhaustion. A poignant scent entered his nostrils, like old eggs and car exhaust. Clarke’s eyes blurred momentarily, and as he gazed at the ground beneath his feet, the deep red of the dry grass forced sharp realization into his mind. His breath stopped short, caught by the sudden knowledge that every breath was toxic. Panicked, Clarke stumbled to the remains of the black shelter, throwing the remaining pieces aside as his lungs clinched tighter in terrible immediacy. His last ounce of strength heaved away a small segment of steel that covered the floorpiece of the shell, revealing a small silver package lined with tiny blue capsules. His strength almost gone, Clarke ripped the aluminum package and choked down two of the pills before his vision faded once more to black.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-6675871730360486162010-08-08T23:51:00.009-06:002010-08-13T17:35:39.434-06:00Queens of the Stone Age - Rated R (Deluxe Reissue)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPJ_Q7NPM8X1QWp-5tn4l91BUUysYaRJjrY3kGx2J9g7Ir2yH4iRvY03N1XgRzPtvTkXwiu9Ip-iKRbDJwp6eMzsKtAlI6jGitomVg9FxlpLtkb4hOjYg2KQ1aFAUBcbhi6-Jr37mLtTcm/s1600/rated+r+blog.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPJ_Q7NPM8X1QWp-5tn4l91BUUysYaRJjrY3kGx2J9g7Ir2yH4iRvY03N1XgRzPtvTkXwiu9Ip-iKRbDJwp6eMzsKtAlI6jGitomVg9FxlpLtkb4hOjYg2KQ1aFAUBcbhi6-Jr37mLtTcm/s320/rated+r+blog.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5503302978561817154" /></a><br />Some artists have a unique talent for attitude, an intrinsic charisma that often is both natural and ludicrous. Elvis gave it a name. The Rolling Stones gave it a dark sexuality. In the modern era, this attitude is embodied in Queens of the Stone Age, the eclectic modern rock act spawned from the ashes of desert metal gods Kyuss. Fronted by ex-members Josh Homme and Nick Oliveri, Queens have managed to isolate the most focused aspects of their former band while introducing a sense of humor that was seriously lacking with Kyuss. Queens, the result of this experiment in facecrushing rock, have managed to create something original and consistently excellent in a career that saw a musical high point in 2000's "Rated R."<br /><br />The most immediately noticeable trait of "Rated R" is its incredible ability to <span style="font-style:italic;">party.</span> The opener, "Feel Good Hit of the Summer," consists entirely of Homme singing a laundry list of narcotics over a dense mix of power chords and chest-thumping bass. "Nicotine, valium, vicodin, marijuana, ecstasy and alcohol.....c-c-c-c-c-cocaaiiine!!!" says Homme. Ok, so on the subtlety scale, this one earns about a negative pile of turds. But then, Queens have never been about subtlety, preferring instead to slap you in the face while shouting vague innuendos in your ear. This tactic is surprisingly effective, and chances are it won't bother most listeners.<br /><br />But Homme doesn't really seem content with stating the obvious. The following standout track, "The Lost Art of Keeping a Secret," finds him in total command of his own mystery, daring the listener, "Leap of faith, do you doubt?/ Cut you in, I just cut you out." The deceptive sweetness of the chimes that echo throughout the song only serves to shock when Homme's distorted guitar roars into the chorus under his oddly charming falsetto. The album is filled with brilliant moments like this; the hand-drum intro of "Better Living Through Chemistry" and the Nick Oliveri's terrifying howl in "Tension Head" are two more examples. The former is dominated by the creep of Oliveri's twisting, sliding bassline, which stands out as one of the album's best musical statements and its most unshakable earworm. Likewise, "Tension Head" rides a vicious guitar riff from Homme into Oliveri's animalistic shriek, extolling the virtues and vices of the hard-partying lifestyle for which the bassist was later fired from the band. It's this interplay between Homme and Oliveri that makes "Rated R" so successful as a whole. Homme provides a laid-back, intriguing charm that is both tempered and enhanced by the downright sleaze of Oliveri's vocal chaos. <br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtx7XTFM-jvpap6iri5NvNaA6JxcjNbCQzMab5zj-CPH1fS2gcWfOOWuIgajaxTfJfw3O68jZn_zpUYIFYs7dSRdekL1PtaOqziaxCcil9k1lX3nepPxx9mKPnuf88Q1Os_c7C5Y64vHDV/s1600/img_5682_045josh+homme.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 382px; height: 322px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtx7XTFM-jvpap6iri5NvNaA6JxcjNbCQzMab5zj-CPH1fS2gcWfOOWuIgajaxTfJfw3O68jZn_zpUYIFYs7dSRdekL1PtaOqziaxCcil9k1lX3nepPxx9mKPnuf88Q1Os_c7C5Y64vHDV/s400/img_5682_045josh+homme.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5503303998471926562" /></a>Though Queens has continued to rock after Oliveri's departure, their raw edge has been a little tempered in later releases. Fortunately, this year's reissue of "Rated R" contains an extra helping of the Queens in their absolute prime. Five unreleased tracks have been included, highlighted by the Carly Simon parody "You're So Vague" and the pounding thrash of "Born to Hula." Even better are the ten live tracks included on the album's second disc, mostly derived from the band's performance at the 2000 Reading Festival. The set contains a few of the album's best, executed in a searing fashion that should make any fan desperately crave for some tour dates. Closing out the live material is a rendition of "Millionaire," a song from on of Homme's side projects that would be recorded for the next Queens album. It stands as arguably their best song, and it's fascinating to hear it live before it was recorded in 2002. Less facemelting but equally amusing are Homme's antics throughout the set, during which he tells the crowd several times, "This is a song for you!" <br /><br />Overall, "Rated R" deserves the deluxe treatment, and it is well served by the chosen bonus material. Submit yourself to "Rated R"'s distorted heat, and you'll be dazzled by its desert thunder. By the end, you undoubtedly will find yourself echoing Oliveri and Homme in the set's closer with an eager, if less throat-shredding cry: "This one's down.../Give me some more!"Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-66337885125008715492010-07-30T18:14:00.002-06:002010-07-30T18:17:49.631-06:00Arcade Fire- The Suburbs<meta equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"><meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><link rel="File-List" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CBen%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="PlaceName"></o:smarttagtype><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="PlaceType"></o:smarttagtype><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="City"></o:smarttagtype><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="place"></o:smarttagtype><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:browserlevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><object classid="clsid:38481807-CA0E-42D2-BF39-B33AF135CC4D" id="ieooui"></object> <style> st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } </style> <![endif]--><style> <!-- /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; 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margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </style><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal">Before we begin, a quick preface: my name is Ben and I’m going to be hopefully contributing to this blog on a fairly regular basis, especially in terms of reviews.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The <st1:place st="on">Arcade</st1:place> Fire- <i style="">The Suburbs<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i style=""><o:p> </o:p></i><span style=""></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""></span>So it’s come to this, the most impossible-to-review album of the year (unless, of course, Radiohead follows up on rumor and releases something, but that has yet to be seen). Arcade Fire put themselves in a difficult place after starting their career with one of the landmark albums of the decade, a work that garnered massive critical and popular acceptance. Of course, as with any band that comes out with something of <i style="">Funeral</i>’s stature, backlash is inevitable, and the band did little to temper that backlash with their second album, <i style="">Neon Bible</i>, a decent if incredibly bloated work trading on awkwardly used Springsteen-isms, only occasionally reaching the highs of power and poignancy that so defined <i style="">Funeral</i>. So, here, another three years later, they’ve released <i style="">The Suburbs</i>, and, inevitably, we must attempt to consider it in multiple ways.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">
<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""></span>The problem with a band like Arcade Fire, one that seems fully formed from the second they come into popular view, one that releases a bona fide classic as its first major release, is that from then on, considering their work will become a constant tug of war. On one hand, we have to try and consider their albums as objectively as possible, as products, statements of their own. On the other hand though, it is impossible to ever fully separate Arcade Fire from <i style="">Funeral</i>. It’s their definitive work, and will be, probably for their entire career unless they can pull a Radiohead and drop an album so innovative and advanced as to make <i style="">Funeral </i>sound like a mere stepping stone.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">
<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""></span>How then, is the album? Well, in the objective-rating sense, pretty fucking good. Better than that, even, a potential album of the year contender, guaranteed a major presence on end of the year lists ranging from the glossiest of magazines to the depth of the blogosphere. There are numerous standout tracks, ranging from “City With No Children,” a stronger invocation of classic Springsteen tropes than anything on <i style="">Neon Bible</i>, to the ambling, cosmic <st1:place st="on"><st1:city st="on">Americana</st1:city></st1:place> inflected “Wasted Hours.” “Month of May” and “Ready to Start” are propulsive, thrilling rockers, “Deep Blue” perfectly encapsulates everything appealing about their apocalyptic tendencies, and “Half Light II” instills a new wave sensibility that balances magnificently with the Neil Young-esque guitar stomp. There are some weak spots, as, without the immensely diverse and unusual instrumental decisions found on <i style="">Funeral</i> and remaining as one of the stronger aspects of <i style="">Neon Bible</i>, a lot of the tracks blur together as almost interchangeable guitar and keyboard driven indie rock anthems, albeit uniformly strong ones. When they stretch out, however, and add the instrumental flourishes that so distinguished their debut, the results are unsurprisingly tremendous.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>
<br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">The next question, and perhaps the more important one, is how does it stack up? And, perhaps inevitably, the answer is, “adequately.” The peaks in tracks like “Tunnels,” “Power Out,” and “Rebellion (Lies)” are approached, but never equaled by “We Used to Wait,” “Suburban War,” and the like. The general absence of the ornate instrumentation so prevalent in the past can put an uncomfortable amount of light on Win Butler’s lyrics, which, when surrounded by grandiosity always sounded appropriate, but, in certain contexts here can sometimes seem alternately forced and embarrassingly elementary. <i style="">The Suburbs</i>, while certainly personal and sincere, doesn’t come close to the grand, tortured emotional statement that was <i style="">Funeral</i>. And, of course, it couldn’t. <i style="">Funeral</i> was the product of a very specific set of circumstances, circumstances that can’t be duplicated on a regular basis. It would be absolutely unreasonable to expect Arcade Fire’s later works to match it. But that’s the trouble of starting your career with a classic. So, while “Sprawl I (Flatland)” could have been the crowning achievement of a lesser band and “The Suburbs” suite in many hands would have seemed a pinnacle of ambition, <i style="">The Suburbs </i>will forever lay in the shadow of the now near-mythical classic that preceded it.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">
<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""></span>To avoid ending this on a down note though, one song deserves special recognition, a track that resides proudly in the canon of untouchably great Arcade Fire songs, up there with the gothic grander of “Intervention,” the exhilaration of “No Cars Go,” and, admittedly the majority of <i style="">Funeral</i>. This is “Sprawl II (<st1:place st="on"><st1:placetype st="on">Mountains</st1:placetype> <st1:placename st="on">Beyond</st1:placename> <st1:placetype st="on">Mountains</st1:placetype></st1:place>).” It is thoroughly unlike everything else the Arcade Fire have done to this point, but thoroughly recognizable as nothing else. An immense, almost electro-pop track, clearly indebted to the new wave acts claimed by Arcade Fire as influences this time around, but thrillingly vibrant and vital, sung by Regine Chassagne. This track reminds us that while Arcade Fire may be perpetually trapped in a quixotic attempt to define themselves outside of a monolithic work, they remain capable of astonishing audiences in ways that could never be expected.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;" align="right">W</p> Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-67436049076634192822010-07-23T23:22:00.010-06:002010-08-09T01:23:34.457-06:00Concert Review: Kings of Leon @ Fiddler's Green Amphitheater, 7/20/2010<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPmhVcHfCKx0c_UpSdquKFvdAGggnHkiK8KxWLtkHd_GZI5h8-FiSWLanU4NXFpCsvZPVzZB-rZSowqT7l_GdtJhXx9lEGbakyetmYCvqflST1tq8SsLL3VV5rtzm9yEtp7x8iIIXsfMwu/s1600/kingsofleon4-0407-460x360.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 250px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPmhVcHfCKx0c_UpSdquKFvdAGggnHkiK8KxWLtkHd_GZI5h8-FiSWLanU4NXFpCsvZPVzZB-rZSowqT7l_GdtJhXx9lEGbakyetmYCvqflST1tq8SsLL3VV5rtzm9yEtp7x8iIIXsfMwu/s320/kingsofleon4-0407-460x360.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5497352348794079906" /></a><br />Thanks to my lovely girlfriend Meg, I had the chance to see Kings of Leon this week at Fiddler's Green (or Comfort Dental Amphitheater, as it will heretofore not be called). I've been relatively familiar with Kings of Leon for a while now, but I'd never gotten into their music much past the singles from their last two albums, so I was looking forward to hearing their music in a different setting than contemporary radio.<br /><br /><br />I've always felt that Kings of Leon are one of the more unique rock bands to gain mainstream success in the last few years. Their 2007 effort, "Because of the Times," gained considerable success overseas, while the more recent "Only by the Night" (2008) employed a more mainstream rock sound that granted them larger recognition in the States. Some longtime fans found this move somewhat alienating, seeing the more accessible approach as a kind of sellout for radio play. Granted, "Only by the Night" did and does receive a great deal of radio time, but this has never bothered me much. It's not a sin for a band to seek a wider audience as long as the material is still strong, which I felt it more or less was.<br /><br />That said, I've consistently been bothered by KoL's album sound. Across the board, the band's albums suffer from poor mixes that make the music feel much weaker than it should. In studio, KoL seems more or less content to undercut their guitars in favor of upmixed drum tracks and cranked vocals. Unfortunately, this trend really doesn't suit the group's talents. Lead singer Caleb Followill tends to put a great deal of energy into his vocals, and while he's certainly competent, his tendency to miss notes is somewhat amplified by loud volumes.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghHvvLs1kh_hDpxBuhbnuFwvvSITr6ilAjRT-n0PyxVV4XCWgolDWGc6R3GdWbijJ-uN3Qk7QyTEW-6d_j7fE8672UgBtJLRtRjqopNVzxPod4FbMwcPiA2f_vxvjRjBa6agWBvv78Farj/s1600/22_kings_of_leon_B.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghHvvLs1kh_hDpxBuhbnuFwvvSITr6ilAjRT-n0PyxVV4XCWgolDWGc6R3GdWbijJ-uN3Qk7QyTEW-6d_j7fE8672UgBtJLRtRjqopNVzxPod4FbMwcPiA2f_vxvjRjBa6agWBvv78Farj/s320/22_kings_of_leon_B.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5497352747909265794" /></a><br /><br />I was pleased, however, to discover that these issues are virtually nonexistent on the live stage. The band opened Tuesday's show with the quasi-industrial chugger "Crawl," which happens to be one of my personal favorites of theirs. I was instantly surprised and pleased by the aggressiveness and power with which the band played. Drummer Nathan Followill (they're all Followills, three brothers and a cousin) competently lead the group around most of the songs, as he does on album, but more noticeable was the force behind guitarist Matthew Followill's riffs. These simply blasted from the first moment, making an instant and substantial improvement on a good repertoire that simply <span style="font-style:italic;">begs</span> to be performed live.<br /><br />From here, Kings of Leon moved into a diverse selection of their career's work, sampling from their earliest albums, "Youth & Young Manhood" and "Aha Shake Heartbreak." Songs like "Slow Night, So Long" and "Immortals" provided a glimpse into territory that was, for me, entirely unknown. I was impressed by these early entries, as much by their actual quality as by the band's decision to fill a good portion of their setlist with older material. From there, the band played their obligatory hits "Sex on Fire" and "Notion" to great effect, and to the great pleasure of the night's enthusiastic crowd. After a short setbreak, KoL played mega-hit "Use Somebody" before closing with the excellent "Black Thumbnail," which served as an powerful bookend to an extremely entertaining night.<br /><br />While their new work differs from their earlier material, their entire catalogue is bound together by its visceral, gut-level impact. To enjoy Kings of Leon, one must try not to think too much; their music hits low and fast, with all the frenetic energy befitting a great rock show. While each member contributed a great deal of intensity, Caleb Followill provided a passionate focal point for the entire experience. He sings with a reckless abandon that few modern singers dare to approach, boosted by the increased instrumental power that the band demonstrated all night. The man simply bellows every line, and rock fans should be more than willing to listen.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-43834236102899269422010-06-30T19:32:00.002-06:002011-01-07T22:44:50.417-07:00Concert Review: Tool @ Red Rocks, 6/29/2010<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtttdDpBFX9O0Jn59A7_HULJp3Z0jFYX6yQzHLhWvNPSW5oGM9L8K56eOYJZUEJoeKPLcX3tj8Pl1gOoB82VTg5TSStG8wuO_mTqOnlf29NGIADbynqSuFcL4Qlofk4ihVEdwtSlN6N_Tk/s1600/Tool+Band.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 222px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtttdDpBFX9O0Jn59A7_HULJp3Z0jFYX6yQzHLhWvNPSW5oGM9L8K56eOYJZUEJoeKPLcX3tj8Pl1gOoB82VTg5TSStG8wuO_mTqOnlf29NGIADbynqSuFcL4Qlofk4ihVEdwtSlN6N_Tk/s320/Tool+Band.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5488758281801489266" /></a><br />I had the good fortune to get my hands on tickets to see Tool on their summer mini-tour this year, where they played two nights at Red Rocks Amphitheater in Morrison, Colorado. Here's my review of the show.<br /><br />The first time I saw Tool was at Bonnaroo 2007, where they headlined on the main stage. At the time, I considered that show to be the best I'd ever seen, until I saw Nine Inch Nails on their Lights in the Sky tour. Tool's visuals were as spectacular as I expected that night, and they played a great, if a little predictable, setlist with the fantastic live sound for which they're known. Last year's set at Mile High Music Festival was almost identical, though with a somewhat poorer sound mix that left me just a bit disappointed. In light of that, I went into this week's show trying not to get my hopes up too high for any surprises; if anything, I expected another solid set from one of the best live acts in the business.<br /><br />Fortunately, my expectations were blown away from the first note. After a dismal set from hip=hop duo Dalek, the lights at Red Rocks went out and the amphitheater began to echo with the sound of Timothy Leary's ragged voice stating, "Think for yourself...question authority." Fans of Tool will recognize this as the live intro for "Third Eye," the thirteen-minute, rarely-played closer to Tool's second album, Aenima. Tuesday's rendition of the song was easily the best live version I've heard, and it charged the night atmosphere with furious intensity. It was an entirely unexpected start to one of the best shows I've ever seen.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibMw3UoXClKBQkL52BCg6HjciYPY6wWhiPuBRweDkUdLG1e7o2tUmmO2M_LCh33kjRv2IduO_F6DY2yrviCulmnvymw6TBnpBMCIGQ_DdSR0ao82ugT54-LhS4eCd6mxS5oqIpFusUZS8S/s1600/maynard.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 311px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibMw3UoXClKBQkL52BCg6HjciYPY6wWhiPuBRweDkUdLG1e7o2tUmmO2M_LCh33kjRv2IduO_F6DY2yrviCulmnvymw6TBnpBMCIGQ_DdSR0ao82ugT54-LhS4eCd6mxS5oqIpFusUZS8S/s320/maynard.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5488758445174766322" /></a><br /><br />Maynard James Keenan's vocals were the strongest of his that I've heard in a live setting. Likewise, his energy was off the charts for most of the concert; the simian dance of his mohawked silhouette was a constant source of entertainment. Instrumentally, Tool is always stellar, both on album and live, but they seemed especially tight for this show. Bassist Justin Chancellor provided a meaty foundation for guitarist Adam Jones, whose distorted guitar lines were as varied and complex as I've heard from him. Of course, Danny Carey continues to prove that he is by a wide margin the best drummer in music today. Watching Carey play is one of the greatest displays of musical excellence in the business; the man simply astonishes every time he takes his seat behind the kit, and Tuesday was no exception.<br /><br />Following "Third Eye," the band moved into the heavy chug of "Jambi," from their most recent album. From their, Tool moved through classics like "Stinkfist" and "Schism," always concert favorites on which the band has expanded and perfected over the years. Another pleasant surprise came in the form of "Intension," which provided a downtempo interlude before the heavier "Right In Two," which was also unexpected. Of course, no Tool show would be complete without the nine-minute epic that is "Lateralus." Tool invited openers Dalek onto the stage for this number, and the duo did an admirable job of not butchering the song. It wasn't as memorable an appearance as, say, Tom Morello's at the Bonnaroo show, but Dalek's ambient electronics provided an interesting take on a song that is already great. Tool closed the show with "Aenema," the fiery title track to their second album. I saw them play this at Bonnaroo, but Tuesday's performance was intense in a way that was not possible at a festival show. The entire crowd seemed behind this one, ranting and screaming and pleading along with Keenan until the final blast. It was a massive display, and is definitely one of the best tracks I've ever seen performed live from any band. <br /><br />Visually, Tool seems to have somewhat reimagined their live approach for this tour. The large screens that backed the band previously were increased in both size and number, and Carey's drum kit was lit from underneath. The screens played a mostly new series of animations, some from Tool's stop-motion videos and some different entirely. This effect was coupled with a stellar laser setup that kicked in at perfect moments throughout the show. The most remarkable visual element was, however, not the band's doing. About an hour and twenty minutes into the show, the moon rose behind the huge rock formations around the stage, bright orange and gargantuan. It provided an anchor for the chaos of the lights on stage, and was the kind of perfect moment that happens only very rarely at any live show.<br /><br />Ultimately, though, it's Tool's instrumental preciseness and the fullness of their live sound that makes them such a great act to behold. When the band sticks to their comfort zone and plays their hits, they're great. When they take chances, as they did with "Third Eye" and "Right in Two" last night, they're phenomenal. Despite claims that the band is aging, Tool's show is still one of the very best, and is something that any music fan should see.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-20213391195679977512010-06-21T01:14:00.000-06:002010-06-21T09:59:28.942-06:00The Roots - How I Got Over<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-SFq_hgDkDPj_IH5so4pyd79sJGa4KLIjVKWcvzB5GN5oO2WKqIY8g7TZZ57LQMLBAPn9iTaduIspIBqIn2HDlOB1W-6HJggWEii3RIYN9jfW73Ug9Ai2Nu-yrO_ZBLlCCOP4KutwFlu7/s1600/The-Roots-How-I-Got-Over-Album-Cover.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-SFq_hgDkDPj_IH5so4pyd79sJGa4KLIjVKWcvzB5GN5oO2WKqIY8g7TZZ57LQMLBAPn9iTaduIspIBqIn2HDlOB1W-6HJggWEii3RIYN9jfW73Ug9Ai2Nu-yrO_ZBLlCCOP4KutwFlu7/s200/The-Roots-How-I-Got-Over-Album-Cover.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5485139920515915874" /></a><br />For almost two decades, The Roots have remained a beacon of musical and intellectual quality in the mire of a hip-hop scene that has undergone constant fluctuation. For a casual hip-hop listener like myself, The Roots embody everything that is best in the genre: powerful lyrics, aggressive production, and a stellar live show that stands head and shoulders above its contemporaries. Lead MC Black Thought has never shied away from a bit of modern wisdom rapped with spirit and intensity, backed by the always-excellent production and percussion of drummer ?uestlove (I'm going to try to write that name as few times as possible for the sake of my sanity). Unfortunately, their unique approach to hip-hop has always kept The Roots more or less out of the commercial spotlight, though fans of the genre will undoubtedly appreciate their influence. This trend has never really changed, so whenever the band decides to release an album, it always comes as both a surprise that they continue to successfully reinvent their music and a disappointment that their type of work isn't less prevalent in the popular music scene.<br /><br />The band's latest effort, "How I Got Over," comes after they have been thrust into the spotlight by virtue of being Jimmy Fallon's late night band (probably the only thing of value Fallon has ever been associated with). On a large scale, the album marks a significant departure from the band's last release, "Rising Down," which was 16 tracks of caustic hip-hop fury at its finest. This time around, The Roots find themselves more or less in relax mode. "How I Got Over" contains some of the most laid back material the band has ever released, largely as a result of its chilled-out, almost ambient production style. As usual, the songs are anchored around ?uestlove's beats, which are as solid as ever, if not particularly remarkable here. More surprising is the use of piano and light synth samples that seem to float around the drums. These musical choices have the dual effect of creating an exceptional flow over the album's duration while making the individual songs nearly blend together. As a cohesive product, the album works particularly well in this regard; it is listenable on a broad scale in a way that "Rising Down" was certainly not. Unfortunately, this makes "How I Got Over" difficult to engage in on the intimate, smash-your-face way that makes much of The Roots' material so effective.<br /><br />Fortunately, it doesn't seem that the band's recent exposure has altered their poetically realistic worldview. Black Thought seems as inspired as ever, engaging in topics ranging from religion, modern discourse, poverty, and so on. As usual, guest appearances abound here, with P.O.R.N., Truck North, the Dirty Projectors, and various others offering their stylings to the record, but none with the same power as Black Thought himself. His disgust with the state of modern media is apparent on "Dear God 2.0," the album's first standout, where the MC observes, "technology turning the planet into zombies/ Everybody all in everybody's dirty laundry," and asks, "Why is the world ugly when you made it in your image?" These are deep issues for any rapper, and Black Thought tackles them with courage and intensity. For all the uncertainty contained in the first half of the album though, The Roots seem to offer some reconciliation. On "The Fire," a notable collaboration with John Legend, Black Thought raps a kind of fierce determination that was previously absent from the album: "You can't escape/ the history you was meant to make/ That's why the highest victory is what I'm meant to take/ You came to celebrate/ I came to celebrate." Coming from Black Thought, it's a convincing sentiment, and is ultimately the emotional high point of the album.<br /><br />More than anything, "How I Got Over" is the most mixed bag The Roots have created in years. In the end, enjoyment of the album will likely come down to the listener's mindset. Longtime fans, especially those who enjoyed "Rising Down," may be disappointed by this album's laid back tone, mostly devoid of musical aggression. However, listeners are also encouraged to take in "How I Got Over" a few times before making judgment; its ideas are rapped in such density that it merits repeated listens. Though it lacks a significant number of excellent songs, the album works well enough as a whole that the dedicated listener will forgive the absence. If nothing else, "How I Got Over" proves that The Roots are as observant as ever, and are perhaps even hopeful about what they see.<br /><br />6.9/10<br /><br />Stream the album for free <a href="http://www.myspace.com/theroots">here.</a>Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-49647177354130427662010-06-01T16:58:00.000-06:002010-06-01T20:37:35.291-06:00How to Destroy Angels - EP<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnFVg41wLrIe4JRviJLZmXeXxF7FICbvm_SkJkd0_AJFdlCEbozXW2Y4MmnItvqVVf5E42UWzo_zXyBjoy-FrOXHFz1Mqbq-u_btHokHfP8JnCujBKXVLqpITEXjGzf8p50vKDRBdkSHy6/s1600/How+to+Destroy+Angels+-+EP+-+Digital+Cover+Art.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnFVg41wLrIe4JRviJLZmXeXxF7FICbvm_SkJkd0_AJFdlCEbozXW2Y4MmnItvqVVf5E42UWzo_zXyBjoy-FrOXHFz1Mqbq-u_btHokHfP8JnCujBKXVLqpITEXjGzf8p50vKDRBdkSHy6/s320/How+to+Destroy+Angels+-+EP+-+Digital+Cover+Art.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5477991651540464770" /></a><br />Those readers who have followed my blog or who know me personally will know that I am a diehard fan of both Nine Inch Nails and its key member, Trent Reznor. This week, How To Destroy Angels, Reznor's first project since declaring Nine Inch Nails to be on hiatus, released its debut online, a free six-song EP. The band features Reznor along with his new wife Mariqueen Maandig (formerly of West Indian Girl) and longtime colleague and multi-instrumentalist Atticus Ross. <br /><br />Early clips and suggestions from the band's members suggested that HTDA would at least be influenced by Reznor's musical signature, but differences in sound were evident from the start. Most notable of these is the introduction of a female vocalist in Maandig, whose undulating whisper provides an intriguing change to the sound that Reznor more or less perfected in two decades of Nine Inch Nails. The first single, "A Drowning," finds Maandig at her most aggressive, breaking over the song's mix of fuzzy electronics and distorted guitars to lend a firm foothold on a song that focuses mostly on atmosphere. The song is unique in this way, because for the majority of the EP, Maandig's vocals are mostly used for texture, rarely rising above a soft lilt. <br /><br />Thankfully, the combination of her voice and Reznor's signature electronics seems to work, at least for a short set like this. Though the EP certainly isn't short on atmosphere, its greatest strength lies in its percussive hooks, most of which are reminiscent of late era Nine Inch Nails. Computerized distortion blares in tandem with the more organic sounds of keyboards and occasional strings, creating a synthesis acoustic and electronic that recalls tracks from Reznor's masterpiece, "The Downward Spiral," while incorporating the harsh soundscape of "Year Zero." The EP's final single, "The Believers," represents the most complete fusion of these elements. The song's acoustic elements lend a tribal feel to the heavy percussive beat, punctuated by bursts of the static and fuzz that made "Year Zero" memorable. Maandig's vocal restraint also contributes here, an almost instrumental sigh that intones, "We are the ones who still believe." Focused without being constrained by its own direction, "The Believers" is the strongest number of the set. Indeed, it seems that Reznor has found inspiration in this new project, in which he is free to explore sonic realms outside the darkness embodied in Nine Inch Nails. Likewise Reznor, and the musicians around him, truly do seem to believe that they are on the road to capturing something musically unique.<br /><br />Despite this, it occasionally feels that the group loses direction. "BBB" commands, "Listen to the sound/ Of my big black boots," a line that seems ridiculous by itself, let alone repeated ad nauseum as it is. It's an unfortunate lapse, because musically, "BBB" boasts one of the tightest, sexiest grooves on the album. It's certainly a hook worthy of Reznor's extensively sexual canon; it's just a shame that the chorus line comes off so hackneyed. Fans will easily forgive the oversight, though, and it remains one of the set's only weak points.<br /><br />On a large scale, "How to Destroy Angels" accomplishes exactly what it intends, introducing a new brand of industrial pop backed by the genre's undisputed master. Fans of Nine Inch Nails will undoubtedly seek to locate the record within the NIN catalogue, but this EP really needs no history lesson. It knows its strengths and plays to them well, drawing on powerful contributions from each member (Atticus Ross' bassline on "Parasite" is one of the best in years), and it inspires hope for the band's future. In the past, Reznor was at his best when he sought to construct cohesive, complex albums without shying from the power of a great hook. A short collection like this, successful as it is, makes us wonder what the trio plans for its first full-length release, presumably later this year or early next. If nothing else, let it be said that "How to Destoy Angels" shows great promise, and it proves that age and marriage, at least for Reznor, are not creative obstacles in the least.<br /><br />8.3/10<br /><br /><a href="http://howtodestroyangels.com/home.html">Get the album here.</a>Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-26413887886498478062010-03-07T23:07:00.000-07:002010-03-07T23:10:50.680-07:00Return to Cookie Mountain<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1VP3ZNPi0JIkJ7M1Ch86EULe3ButHX2mnzM6Iqsi3Lnq4et6D4tLEDTdNovCiirmNruItlbjVowHKQc6Yc_hMIosKUC-szB2COAeUJmZSIbtxEaVWDgl1qjVNnvW6fcxfzxtDqpOVlIVd/s1600-h/return+to+cookie+mountain.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 300px; height: 297px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1VP3ZNPi0JIkJ7M1Ch86EULe3ButHX2mnzM6Iqsi3Lnq4et6D4tLEDTdNovCiirmNruItlbjVowHKQc6Yc_hMIosKUC-szB2COAeUJmZSIbtxEaVWDgl1qjVNnvW6fcxfzxtDqpOVlIVd/s320/return+to+cookie+mountain.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5446141445186914146" /></a><br />Recently, Metacritic.com named Spoon the band of the decade, based on a number of arbitrary criteria that don't seem to have a whole lot to do with the music Spoon released and supported by my friend Hugh at <a href="http://warm-sound-aqueous-transmission.blogspot.com/">Warm Sound, Aqueous Transmission</a>. I don't much care for Spoon, so I've decided to defend my own pick for band of the decade, TV on the Radio. I've decided to start with a review of their second album, “Return to Cookie Mountain.” Though TVotR (as they will henceforth be referenced) released an excellent EP (“Young Liars”) and an full-length record (“Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes”) in 2003 and 2004 respectively, their sound did not reach its deserved fruition until “Return” was issued in 2006. <br /><br />TVotR's unique combination of funk, rock, and electronic elements is more fully explored in this second album, largely due to the explosive production of David Sitek. Though the band employs diverse instrumentation and unique lyrics, “Return” features a broad, epic sound that is almost entirely unheard of in the realm of indie music, which relies so frequently on instrumental minimalism and stripped-down production. The synthesized soundscape of “Province” provides an early indicator of the album's musical color, featuring the elegantly harmonized vocals of Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone over an expansive background of electronic sound. “Hours,” meanwhile, represents the best vocal melody on the album, where Adebimpe regretfully states, “You listened for the truth/ Just too bad they lied.” The song's mournful, dirgelike vocal bridge highlights Adebimpe and Malone as perfect vocal counterparts; the album plays on this interchange through its duration, and it remains one of the record's greatest strengths. <br /> <br />Instrumentally, “Return to Cookie Mountain” benefits greatly from the addition of a live drummer in Jaleel Bunton, whose percussive skills provide a sense of groove that was strikingly absent on TVotR's previous releases. Bunton's work finds ways to remain relevant over the constant barrage of melodic instrumentation, most powerfully so on the frenzy of “Dirtywhirl” and in the churning grind of the album's closer, “Wash the Day.” However, no song on “Return to Cookie Mountain” finds a better balance of musical ferocity and lyrical presence than on the album's brilliant centerpiece, “Wolf Like Me.” The song's primal beat feels like a chase through the wilderness, paralleled by the deranged intensity of Adebimpe's vocals. The terror in his voice betrays a savage honesty; when he confesses, “My heart's aflame,/ my body's changed, but god I like it,” you're forced to believe him. Malone's late entrance into the song is a conciliatory decree: “We're howling forever,” he cries. The end result of these elements is undoubtedly the best song on the album, and a strong candidate for best song of the decade. With the whole of “Return to Cookie Mountain” revolving around the song as an emotional anchor, one can't help but feel that TVotR is a band striving to illustrate a universal torment caged in the intricate rhythms and broad progressions of their music. The result is an excellent album, almost certainly the year's best, and a candidate for best of the decade.<br /><br />9.5/10Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-77515474546302506552010-02-23T23:36:00.001-07:002010-02-23T23:38:31.390-07:00Pretty Hate Machine: Happiness in SufferingThis is a piece I did as a writing sample for school. Let me know what you think.<br /><br /><br /><br />Trent Reznor, frontman and creative arbiter of industrial rock group Nine Inch Nails, has always been something of an enigma as a musical artist. While his roots lay in the burgeoning synth-pop movement of the 1980’s, Reznor’s development as a musician and composer are somewhat abstract, owing largely to the stark originality of his creative catalogue. By the early 90’s, Reznor had established himself as the father of industrial music, spawning a variety of well-intentioned imitators that never managed to replicate his commercial and artistic success. Strangely, though, this fame seems largely to have been retroactively attributed to Reznor’s early work; at the time of his 1989 debut Pretty Hate Machine, the majority of critics either ignored or deemed the album mediocre at best. Despite this fact, Reznor has become recognized as one of the best composers, producers, and performers of electronic music in the world, though a great deal of his material employs traditional instruments. <br /><br />Likewise, Pretty Hate Machine has developed as one of the markers of change in the popular music of the 1990’s, partially because of the excellence of its composition, but also because of the intense originality and striking honesty of its lyrical content. Instrumentally, the album relies heavily on synthesizers and electronic percussion, making sparing use of electric guitars as backing textures. Famously, Reznor recorded the album during a stint as janitor at a Cleveland studio, working exclusively by himself through the entire album. Reznor’s solitary nature at this time is apparent in the music; moreover, his intense loneliness serves as the album’s primary source of power. Drawing from this, Reznor finds time in the album’s relatively sparse ten songs to explore love, faith, addiction, and every possible response to each. Though his lyrics have an undeniable tendency towards the dramatic, Reznor’s musical and vocal skill never leave his words feeling anything short of entirely genuine.<br /><br />Most striking about the music Pretty Hate Machine is the strange juxtaposition that Reznor creates from the very first beat. “Head Like a Hole,” the album’s classic opener, features an infectious dance club beat under Reznor’s frustrated growls against some nameless controller. This musical contrast continues throughout the album, and it partially explains why Pretty Hate Machine has garnered so much cult success since its release. More interesting, however, is the voice that rides the ever-present beat. Reznor’s always dramatic, often tortured voice lends to the music a presence that is inconsolably alienated, yet deeply human. This is a trend that is evident through the caustic rage of 1992’s Broken EP and refined to musical and lyrical perfection in 1994’s masterpiece The Downward Spiral, though neither album did so with the shocking originality of Pretty Hate Machine.<br /><br />Beyond the melodrama of Reznor’s words, the most dominant trait of Pretty Hate Machine is the apparently solitary theme of every song. Tackling serious subjects like religion and addiction is no meager task for any songwriter, and Reznor’s strict focus on the individual makes them seem altogether inaccessible. However, the initially terrifying intimacy of his words betrays their unique beauty. Paradoxically, Reznor’s lyrics here are so intensely personal that they become undeniably universal. Consider the agonized confession of “Terrible Lie”: “Seems like salvation comes only in our dreams/ I feel my hatred grow all the more extreme/ Can this world really be as sad as it seems?” Here, Reznor’s religious torment, though based in personal questions, reflects the rejection of spiritual faith in an increasingly secular society striving to maintain religious influence. Likewise, when Reznor states in “Kinda I Want To,” “I know it’s not the right thing…but kinda I want to,” his rejection of sexual repression echoes a society in which youth were previously taught to ignore their sexuality entirely. More broadly, Reznor’s talent of humanizing the unrelatable translated into an album of uncompromising social power, establishing Pretty Hate Machine as the harbinger of a generational attitude that was reflected in all art forms throughout the 1990’s. <br /><br />At first glance, the timing of Pretty Hate Machine’s release has as much to do with its relevance as does its content. Debuted at the end of 1989, the album has the unique position of being one of the last major works to arrive on the popular music scene before the decade changed. However, to state that the album’s release date is responsible for its importance would be to shortchange its quality. Specifically, Pretty Hate Machine’s themes seem both to mirror and to predict the angst and social disconnect discussed by more commercially popular bands like Nirvana. However, aside from some basic thematic similarities, the Nirvana and Nine Inch Nails strove to illuminate vastly different subjects. Where grunge explored boredom and apathy, Trent Reznor depicted a deep-seated personal disease that directly affected 90’s youth as a whole. In essence, Reznor cried the pain of a generation without a meaningful cause or sense of unity, one that did not fit the mold constructed by the social powers of its time. By picturing himself as an outcast, Reznor created through Nine Inch Nails a sense of common struggle in which the archetypal pariah became intimately human. Likewise, more than any other artwork of its time, Pretty Hate Machine and the deliberate honesty of its lyrics preserve the vulnerability of isolated youth while speaking to the common repression, fear, and religious anxiety of an entire generation.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-36175759096173152732009-12-22T00:07:00.001-07:002009-12-22T00:09:37.403-07:00Short StoryThis is the first time I've put any of my fiction writing up here, so comment and let me know what you think.<br /><br /><br /><br /> I boarded the bus outside of a post office in the small town near school. The air outside had been cold, and I had no gloves. I carried my bag over the snow-draped paths, dragging it where the snow was too deep. The bus was warm, filled with a thick air like breathing through wool. Stumbling down the aisle, I bumped a few passengers here and there with my backpack before finding a seat near the middle, not too far back but certainly not in the front. I stretched my legs down the aisle (I like aisle seats; windows are always cold) and rested my head against the seat, waiting for the bus to move.<br /> <br />It was late, but I didn’t mind. I sat and allowed the contents of the bus to wash over me: I heard sounds, people talking, dulled cars outside the window, more talking. I was a sponge on the rocks, eating what passes (I should have been a sponge). The bus lurched, finally, but I continued to listen. Eventually the sponge found something it couldn’t digest, a bit of stone floating in the current, an inquisitive fish. A conversation, just behind me, was already in progress; I sat and chewed on it.<br /> <br />The bus continued to move. Its drone undulated in my ears, a consonant vibrato rising and falling like a sitar’s drone. Behind me they played out an endless discordant solo for two voices, minimal yet piercing, shaking with the subtle madness of a string held to wood, scratched by an untaught finger. It cried of connections cut and spliced, arranged out of key. I soaked and soaked, the deep bass of the engine mixing my meal as I ate. Though I chewed hungrily, I could not swallow the unrelenting tinkering of the dual strings, and I spat.<br /> <br />The window was too near, and I felt its chill against my arm, urging my skin to rise and meet. The landscape is nearly white, flecked by the grays of horses and pale yellow of dead wheat. As I watched, the horses and the wheat and the cars stood flat and without depth against the filthy window of my moaning coach. And not without considerable disappointed, I thought myself this window, attached to this tonedeaf instrument, flecked with the world’s dirt, its mud, its roadkill. I looked on, a gray-eyed onlooker on a clouded real. My habitat was carpeted and cushioned and cramped, room for one only, and I lost my vision to the crush of this world’s wheels over gray snow.<br /> <br />The bus finally stopped, and its muteness stunned me. Making myself thin, I stepped into the aisle and out of the vehicle. I looked back once; my instrument sat mute and voiceless, unseen to eyes of brown or blue, and I walked. I’m sorry if my bag hit you. It was an accident.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-6723511449500522882009-09-16T22:50:00.000-06:002009-09-16T22:52:08.907-06:00The Kanye West Debacle (and the Larger Issues at Stake)I know I’ve been neglecting the blog for the past few weeks, but I’ve been busy as hell. I’m gonna try to update more frequently from now on.<br /><br />Ok, so I’ve got beef. As you likely gathered from the post title, it’s with Kanye West. I know everyone’s riding the Kanye hate-train right now, and I want to get in on the fun.<br /><br />So here’s the situation. Taylor Swift wins the VMA for best female video or whatever. Two sentences into her acceptance speech, Kanye runs onstage and interrupts her, since, obviously, no one was thinking of how amazing Kanye West is at the time. He grabs the mike, stammers some bullshit about how he’s happy for Taylor Swift, but you know, Beyonce’s video was just the shit. <br /><br />Alright, let’s get the obvious stuff out of the way. Pretty much everyone even vaguely in tune to music culture at this point knows that Kanye’s a self-important douche. There’s a staggering amount of evidence pointing in this direction, including his belief that he would be a major player in the modern Bible. This isn’t exactly news at this point, so what’s the big deal, right?<br /><br />It’s actually kind of strange that we’re all so amazed at what he did to Taylor Swift. This is just the latest attention grab for a musician who sees himself slowly but surely fading from the public limelight, whose product has been declining in quality since 2005’s “Late Registration.” Many musicians take this transition hard, and even the best have their head-shake moments (check Pete Townshend’s last 20 years of pretentious crap for proof). <br /><br />Unfortunately, Kanye is something of a different case, due in part to the changing nature of today’s music industry. The vast network of labels, producers, and musicians, along with evolving technology, have allowed artists to musically intermingle in ways that would have been thought ridiculous two decades ago. As a result, Kanye West has been involved in some way with an incredibly vast amount of material released in the past ten years. He’s shoved his puffy cheeks into virtually every major hip-hop act from the past ten years, and even before that, to a lesser extent. And, to be honest, a decent amount of this material is pretty damn good. He’s a valued and respected producer in hip-hop circles, and his record sales are perennially ridiculous.<br /><br />All talent notwithstanding, though, Kanye seems to have formed a somewhat distorted vision of himself as the speaker of a generation of musicians and music listeners. While he’s certainly popular, he fails to realize the undisputable truth about the music listening public: that it will either turn on, devour, or simply forget almost any musician, no matter how popular or talented. This has happened time and again, and few artists are immune; Elvis, the Beatles, and Michael Jackson have withstood the public fury better than most, and Kanye is definitely none of the above.<br />The more important issue here, though, is that the public seems to have a soft spot for this man. It buys his albums, attends his concerts, and most importantly, forgives him every time he does something like this. I’m as guilty of this as anyone, I’ll admit. I love The Who, despite Pete Townshend’s alienating his fellow musicians, for just one example of many. The bottom line is that people seem to love Kanye’s music despite his rampant dickery. This seems to say that, at least in this case, people care more about the music than they do about the musician. <br /><br />I’m not sure how I feel about this. I’ll always love the music of some artists who are not exactly paragons of good personality, but at the same time, I think I would rush to defend any musician who I truly respected if he did something like Kanye has done. I guess I just want it both ways.<br /><br />Anyways, the point I guess I’m getting at here is that we should at least try to stop giving people like Kanye such an attentive audience. Sure, listen to his music (if it gets any better; “808s and Heartbreak” was flat-out terrible). But at least try to ignore his cries for attention. At least that way, maybe he’ll get past this self-loving midlife crisis and stop annoying us all.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-33495064018480035552009-08-09T00:17:00.001-06:002009-08-09T00:20:55.829-06:00The 5 Bands With the Most Insufferable FanbasesIt’s obvious that everyone has their own unique taste in music, and everyone likes different bands for different reasons. However, there are a few bands around that, for some reason, inspire the most annoying people who absolutely worship them either for stupid reasons or in ridiculously annoying ways. These are the five bands that I think suffer from this more than any others.<br /><br />5. Tool<br />Okay, I’m going to be honest. I fucking love Tool. They were one of the most musically and thematically interesting bands to come out of the grunge-metal underground scene in the 90’s, and for the most part, they’ve only gotten better over the years. All criticisms aside, Tool features some extremely talented musicians, most notably drummer Danny Carey, who is without doubt the best drummer in rock, and is probably in the top ten in the world. Vocalist Maynard James Keenan, though sometimes annoyingly pretentious, remains an excellent frontman and voice for one of the best live acts in music today.<br /><br />However, I must be honest and say that Tool attracts some of the more annoying fans of the bands I consistently follow. From my experience, the cultlike fanbase is composed largely of rednecks, nerdy quasi-goths, and wannabe spirituals. Even more annoying than these living stereotypes are their frequently vocal opinions. If you enjoy Tool’s music, you probably know that one of their central messages is the idea that people should think for themselves. While this is all well and good, Tool’s fans somehow exclude the band themselves from this mantra. Toolheads constantly watch the band’s every move, a practice which has lead to fans practicing religions that were made up by the band in order to fuck with said fans (Google “Lachrymology”). Even more annoying is the near-Messianic image some fans have bestowed upon Keenan, who eats that shit like candy and turns it into new ways to fuck with people. Now, I enjoy the fact that Keenan has a sense of humor, but his fans should probably realize at some point that he’s kind of an asshole. That doesn’t mean you can’t like him or his band; just take them for what they are.<br /><br />4. Metallica<br />I had a hard time deciding who to put in this spot, but I eventually settled on Metallica, if only for the fact that I don’t really like them. I admit that I find Metallica to be one of the most colossally overrated bands of the past thirty years, and that fact might taint my view of their fans. I don’t think I’m completely unjustified in that belief, though. Mostly, I dislike Metallica for spawning hundreds of terrible thrash metal acts, such as…oh, fuck it. I hate thrash metal.<br /><br />Metallica fans love to talk about the band in two ways: how “fucking awesome” their music supposedly is, and how incredibly influential they are. Both of these claims are flawed, and here’s why. First, Metallica didn’t write good songs. They wrote songs for people to call “fucking awesome” while swinging their greasy hair in my face. Usually this involves writing a decent riff and repeating it under inane lyrics about riding the lightning. I can’t think of other examples because I don’t want to go listen to their music again. Metallica fans are utterly convinced that the band members are the most talented people in the history of nerdy pale guys, and they are wrong. <br /><br />Secondly, on the issue of perceived influence: Metallica fans love to tout how the band supposedly created a whole new genre, and how they have remained relevant for so many years. This is probably the more annoying claim. These people need to realize that influence doesn’t matter if the music wasn’t any good to begin with. Besides, this idea is simply wrong. Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, and other such bands did it first, and did it way fucking better.<br />Also, the band members are douchebags. Fact.<br /><br />3. Pink Floyd<br />Again, I gotta be honest. I like Pink Floyd’s music a lot. Most of their catalogue, especially “Piper at the Gates of Dawn” and “Dark Side of the Moon,” is shockingly creative, and has the musical quality to back it up. That’s really all I’ll say, because I don’t like any other aspect of the band itself.<br />The group members have proven themselves time and again to be self-absorbed, whiny pricks. Except for Richard Wright; he was mostly cool. Actually, I’m really just speaking of Roger Waters and Brian Gilmour. Songwriting skills aside, neither of these individuals are nearly as talented as they think they are. In fact, they both think they’re so fucking good that they’re too good for each other. The near-constant feud between these two is annoying as hell, and I’m sick of hearing about it.<br /><br />What about the fans, you ask? Well, the main problem is that their fans are mostly just like the band itself. Creepy, passive, and self-absorbed to the extreme, Pink Floyd’s fanbase is a suicide cult waiting to happen. They also suffer from Tool syndrome; that is, waiting with bated breath for the band’s next move, constantly praying for a reunion tour and whimpering at every failed attempt. That’s the other thing. I’m so tired of hearing about Pink Floyd reunions. They did it for Live 8, and it sucked. I’m sure they’ll do it again, and it’ll still suck. Waters and Gilmour have become washed up yacht clubbers, and no amount of moaning from their fans will change that.<br /><br />2. The Grateful Dead<br />Far be it from me to deny the coolness of the 60’s-era San Francisco jam movement, but I don’t really like the Grateful Dead. Actually, they have some really good songs. They just couldn’t play them live. I’m serious. I hate the Grateful Dead’s live sound. It’s boring. I can kind of see where it might be fun to take a shitload of acid and get sweaty with a bunch of dirty hippies…wait. No, I can’t. That sounds terrible. I can’t stand hippies.<br /><br />That’s what bothers me most about this band and their fanbase. The only way to enjoy their music is apparently to do what I just described. That is not a good statement about any band. These people are so convinced in how good the Dead are that they really don’t see how bland and uninteresting the music actually is in a live setting. They have no edge, no surprise, no energy. They’re one of the few bands that I just really don’t understand. I don’t get why everyone on the planet thought (and still think) they were the best thing since sliced bread. It just makes no sense to me, and I guess that’s why their fans annoy me so much. Maybe I’m just missing something, some delightful bounce to the music that makes them fun to listen to in a crowded room for four hours. I doubt it, though.<br /><br />1. Nirvana<br />You probably knew this was coming at some point, but here it is anyways. I’m in the middle of the road on Nirvana. I don’t hate them, but I don’t really like them either. I certainly don’t understand the worship they get from again grunge fanatics and poser high school kids. Anyways, my problem with their fans is similar to my problem with Metallica fans. Nirvana fans love to preach about how Nirvana gave a voice to a generation, redefined music, yadda yadda yadda. I call bullshit.<br /><br />Now, I don’t deny that Nirvana was a very important band in the grunge movement. Their muddy sound and dispassionate lyrics paved the way for dozens of post-grunge bands the world over. However, they’re definitely not the best band from the start of the grunge movement. Soundgarden was more musically complex. Alice in Chains was darker and more brutal than Nirvana could have ever hoped to be. Pearl Jam was so much better than Nirvana that it’s hardly worth talking about, not to mention far more relevant and genuine.<br /><br />More important, though, is how Nirvana’s fans have betrayed the memory of their angsty hero, Kurt Cobain. Supposedly, Cobain’s reasons for committing suicide centered on his revelation that he had become what he started out hating. His initial rebellion against the social expectations of youth crumbled when the entire fucking country started agreeing with him. As pretentious as his motives may have been, worse still is how his fans have continued to emulate Cobain to this day. Through their efforts, a mediocre songwriter has become the subject of fevered rumor, the emblem of mainstream “rebellion.” Nirvana’s fans just don’t seem to understand that rebellion isn’t cool if everyone thinks it is.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-1641551516020453402009-07-26T16:22:00.000-06:002009-07-26T16:23:45.647-06:00Why the New Harry Potter Isn't As Good as Everyone ThinksIn the months leading up to the release of the newest installment in the Harry Potter series, “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” my desire to see the movie went through considerable fluctuation. I’ll admit that the initial release seemed exciting; I’ve been enjoying the movies since “The Prisoner of Azkaban” changed the series from childish junior-high fantasy to dark, horror-suspense action. The acting has never been superb, but I’ve come to accept that as part of the territory. However, when the release of the newest film was pushed back several months, I found myself caring less and less about the series as a whole. It’s been so long since I read the books that I feel the studios are losing a portion of their audience to boredom.<br /><br />Nonetheless, going into the theater to finally see the movie had me excited again. Social hype and positive reviews galore set up what I expected to be at least another good, if not excellent Potter film. Let me just say that I both expected and wanted this movie to succeed, regardless of my continuing annoyance with the series’ increasingly obnoxious fanbase.<br /><br />The movie didn’t exactly start on the right foot; an awkward scene of two average-looking teens flirting in a train station isn’t exactly how I would have set up suspense for the impending takeover by the world’s most dangerous villain. Nevertheless, I gave the movie a chance. <br /><br />I sat through about an hour and a half of the film before I started to realize that this pointless drivel was not going to end any time soon. I was particularly struck by the overall disingenuous portrayal of the film’s favorite subject: awkward teen romance. One scene in particular drove this point home for me, when everyone’s favorite ginger kid tries out for the Quidditch team. I discovered several things in this scene and the following few. First of all, the decidedly average-looking Lavender is every teenage male’s fantasy: a fawning, physically aggressive moron who wants nothing more than to suck Ron’s face off. Second, it turns out that Ron is kind of a douche. I know the movie wants us to think that he doesn’t see Hermione’s affection for him, but I’m not buying it. No guy is that stupid. Most guys go out of their way to convince themselves that any female who gives them the slightest amount of attention is trying to seduce them, and I refuse to believe that Ron is that stupid. I mean, he’s pretty stupid, but I’m trying to give the guy credit here. And last but not least, I discovered that Hermione is yet another high school driven stereotype, the girl who breaks into exaggerated sobs whenever her ginger of choice glances at other females. Bear with me, because this all has a point, which I will soon relate.<br /><br />Another matter to discuss is how incredibly boring the villains of this movie are. Say nothing of Lord Voldemort (he never shows up), but let’s examine the next most obvious one: Draco Malfoy. For the first time in the series, my disgust with his character had nothing to do with the acting, but instead with the writing behind it. Throughout the movie, I counted exactly two things that Malfoy actually succeeded in doing: pulling sheets off closets and brooding. That’s it. He does nothing else. Yeah, he breaks Harry’s nose, but what happens because of that? Nothing. He’s supposed to kill Dumbledore, but it turns out that he’s even better at whining than he is at looking depressed, so he complains to the old headmaster for a while before the much more interesting Snape shows up to cover his inept ass. As for the old potions master, he’s almost completely irrelevant to the plot of the movie, despite the fact that it’s named after him. I fault the writers here for giving no weight to their best asset, which is Alan Rickman’s considerable talent.<br /><br />Whatever. In the end, none of this matters. Dumbledore’s murder scene contains exactly zero tension, and off the balcony he goes. Despite the fact that an evil witch can’t shut the hell up and starts breaking all kinds of shit in Hogwarts, no one has noticed the presence of the villains, so no one tries to stop them. This is where I was most disappointed with the film. If you’ll remember (like I didn’t; I had to be reminded), there is a massive battle scene at the end of the sixth book that is mysteriously absent from the film version. How odd; the filmmakers seem to have found a way to completely ignore the literary progression, and have skipped from buildup and gone straight to resolution. Amazing, isn’t it? One minute, the greatest wizard in the world is falling off a tower, and the next, the sun is shining and Harry is looking forward to his next meeting with Ginny.<br /><br />I guess the point of all this is that the movie removes everything that is good about the Harry Potter franchise and replaces it with everything that is bad. Essentially, then, “The Half-Blood Prince” takes Harry Potter where no story should ever go: into the “Twilight” realm. Magical action and dark suspense have been replaced by teenage awkwardness and forced romantic conflicts, and no one seems to have noticed.<br /><br />See, the great thing about the Harry Potter series is that it manages to create a beautifully magical realm that is almost entirely separate from our own. The books are interesting because, while teenage romance factors into the stories, it always takes something of a backseat to the intricately woven good-vs.-evil plotline. Want to know why? Because high school problems are boring. Awkwardness isn’t funny in these stories; it’s just awkward. Maybe I’ve grown out of these movies, but I really think that the hype created by shitty, boring romances like “Twilight” has seeped into the Potter franchise, and I’m disappointed by that. The fact that two movies are being made out of the final book doesn’t dissuade me from this conclusion, either. I can only hope that the filmmakers ignore the misplaced hype and get back to what made J.K. Rowling’s fantasies great to begin with.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-23490765223117480692009-07-19T17:56:00.000-06:002009-07-19T17:57:38.741-06:00Bonnaroo 2009: Part 6 (Sunday, Final)Sunday morning found us awake early, baking in the early Tennessee sun for one last time. We took the opportunity to take down our tent and canopy, as we were planning to leave the festival grounds right after the last set that night. An hour later, we gathered enough energy to make the trek to Centeroo one last time. Our schedules diverged a bit today, as Ben wanted to see Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, while I was more interested in Dillinger Escape Plan. I figured, they added a ton of energy to Nine Inch Nails’ performance of “Wish” the previous night, so they would probably put on a pretty decent show on their own. Unfortunately, it turns out the Dillinger’s music falls into the same trap as much of today’s hardcore/metal scene. Jerky phrasing and overemphasized screams ruined what could have been a decent metal band. While the band’s instrumental ability is not to be underestimated, their songwriting leaves much to be desired, focusing on confusing riffs and arrhythmic time signatures instead of melodic, traceable song construction. I couldn’t take it for more than a few songs, and soon stepped back to grab some shade while I waited for the next act.<br /><br />After Ted Leo had finished, we met up and headed over to What Stage to catch rising hip-hop vocalist Erykah Badu. Her latest album, “New Amerykah, Pt 1: 4th World War,” garnered overwhelmingly positive reviews, and I wanted to see if her voice translated to the live setting. I should feel lucky to say this, but this turned out to be the first really frustrating show of the festival. Badu set herself up for failure early by delaying her scheduled set time by over thirty minutes, and then sending out a backing band to play the same funk rhythm over and over again for almost another ten. The fact that artists can get away with being so late is one of the only things I hate about live music. By the time she showed up, I was almost willing to forgive, but her actual show fared no better. Both her attitude and her music were annoyingly pretentious and preachy, and her sound was thin at best. The only part of the set I actually enjoyed was at the end, when her DJ played her offstage with Lil’ Wayne’s “A Milli.” I’m not kidding. I was so pissed at this point that I felt the need to rant, so I did, as Ben will confirm. The only thing that kept me going was the promise of a few good shows before the end of the festival.<br /><br />We grabbed some much-needed barbque fare from the What Stage area and waited for the last show I was eagerly anticipating, Snoop Dogg. Now, regardless of your feelings about hip-hop, Snoop is the shit. He just is. I can’t think of a more gangster person in the world, much less one who makes good music and doesn’t come off as washed up. The show started almost on time, and we weren’t disappointed. As simple as his show was, Snoop provided the musical and comic relief that I desperately needed after the dual frustrations of Dillinger and Erykah Badu.<br /><br />I then headed over to That Tent to catch the last few minutes of Coheed & Cambria. I was actually pretty excited for this, as I like a few of their songs, and I’ve always enjoyed appreciated their instrumental ability. It didn’t really matter that they’re essentially a less talented, more poppy version or Rush, because I like Rush. I got there in time to catch fan favorite “Welcome Home,” which rocked considerably harder than I expected. However, the intensity was short-lived, as the band soon moved into less familiar territory, and I was quickly put off by their insistence on playing five-minute guitar solos without structure or melody. The show ended soon enough, and eventually it was time for us to head back to What Stage for Phish’s closing set.<br /><br />Now, I knew going into the set that I didn’t really like Phish, regardless of their immense hippie/Deadhead following. I’ve just never been able to get into their music. I did expect to be able to get through the entire set, though. The deep fatigue and jam-induced boredom soon had us itching to get out of the festival grounds, and we left with well over two hours left in Phish’s set. We stopped only to grab a waffle ice cream sandwich, which turned out to be a highlight of the day. Seriously, these things are amazing. They go beyond just waffle and ice cream; there’s something transcendental about them that I can’t quite describe, a combination of flavor and texture that leads to an almost religious experience. I can’t accurately describe it in words, but I’d imagine that the face of God provides a similar experience. They were an excellent way to end the festival, and I felt energized as we navigated our way out of the campgrounds and onto the road home.<br /><br />That’s it for the Bonnaroo review. Hopefully you’ve enjoyed it, and I’d love to have feedback on any part of it. New, more random posts will soon follow.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-87071451114353154162009-07-15T02:18:00.001-06:002009-07-15T02:18:40.789-06:00Bonnaroo 2009: Part 5 (Saturday Nighttime)As much as I’d like to say that I’m a huge Springsteen fan, I can’t really claim to know more than six or seven songs, despite his relatively huge catalogue. Mostly, I was excited to see the man onstage, where his crowd-pleasing prowess surpasses legend. Though his set started twenty minutes late and we were past uncomfortable from standing so long, I was not disappointed. The Boss took the stage to massive roars from the crowd, launching headlong into “Badlands.” Though I didn’t know the song, I knew for sure that this man is no joke. The first truly poignant moment came when Bruce stepped to the microphone to sing the chorus line, and the crowd simply took over for him. The look on his face was priceless; it betrayed even his surprise from the crowd’s enthusiasm, and the pure honesty of his expression made me realize that despite his superstardom, the Boss is a real person, without the pretentiousness that so often affects aging rockstars. The show continued with an amusing rendition of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town,” the epic tale of “Outlaw Pete,” and a truly inspiring performance of “Born to Run,” which again had the entire crowd singing with an excitement that I’ve rarely witnessed at any concert.<br /><br />Unfortunately, I felt pressed to leave the show a couple songs early in order to head over to Which Stage, where industrial legends Nine Inch Nails were set to play at 1am. Now, I feel it’s necessary to preface this by admitting that I am biased in favor of NIN, as they have been my favorite band for a while now. I was lucky enough to start the show about twenty feet from the stage barrier, pressed into a crowd that was wild beyond any previous concert experience I’d had. This would be the third time I had seen Nine Inch Nails, the first being in Columbus on their now-legendary Lights in the Sky tour, and the second being on the Wave Goodbye tour in Denver. I was unsure if anything could surpass the Columbus show; it was incredible both musically and visually, as the light setup was a true marvel of performance technology, and the setlist was nothing short of perfect. <br /><br />Despite comments suggesting otherwise, it seemed that Trent Reznor and company came admirably well-prepared for their late night set, which was to be their last in the US (until recently). The band kicked off the show on an unconventional note, opening with “Home” from their 2005 release “With Teeth.” The band then drove into slightly more expected numbers like “Terrible Lie” and “March of the Pigs.” However, the Reznor still managed to surprise the crowd with deeper cuts like the remix of “Piggy (Nothing Can Stop Me Now)” and “The Becoming,” the latter of which was a stunner for me, it being my favorite (and rarely played) Nine Inch Nails track. The show included and appearance from metal outfit Dillinger Escape Plan for “Wish,” which rocked both my and the crowd’s shit to new levels. The set concluded after about 3.5 hours with Reznor’s introspective ballad “Hurt,” which served as a fitting end to both the frighteningly intense show and a very, very long day.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-14264183914659855782009-07-12T11:55:00.000-06:002009-07-12T11:56:16.551-06:00Bonnaroo 2009: Part 4 (Saturday Daytime)This segment will be divided into two parts, for length purposes.<br /><br /><br />By Saturday, the last trace of cool air from the rainstorm had dissipated, leaving our tent baking under the glaring sun. The heat had us out and sweating in the open air by 9 o’clock, forcing a frustratingly early start to what would be a very, very long day. The fact that the first act we wanted to see didn’t start until 5pm didn’t help, either. We ended up walking around Centeroo, taking whatever shade we could find, until we found something worthwhile to do.<br /><br />As it turned out, this occurred sooner rather than later, as we were pleasantly surprised by an act playing around noon. Reports earlier in the festival had indicated that Ilo and the Coral Reefer Allstars would be joined by Jimmy Buffett, whose music I’ve always enjoyed, despite my almost all-encompassing dislike for country music. It always seemed like he took himself much less seriously than many other artists of the genre, while still managing to tell interesting stories colored with a wide palate of emotion, ranging from tales of drunken loneliness to choruses of cheeseburgers. The set with the Coral Reefer Allstars was good afternoon entertainment, especially since we were able to enjoy most of it from a shady vantage.<br /><br />Five o’clock found us waiting by Which Stage for Gov’t Mule, who I’ve seen once before at Red Rocks in Colorado. I’ve always felt like I didn’t get a great taste of the band from that show, despite the excellent venue. They played that gig with moe., who I find to be overzealous imitators of everything that is wrong with Phish. Musical dynamics escape those fellows, and I had trouble focusing for more than, say, three minutes. This could be excused with any other band, but moe.’s songs tend more on the half-hour side of things, so you’ll excuse me for tuning out. Regardless, Mule didn’t impress me much then, and I wanted to give them another chance. The daytime venue didn’t help, but the show felt better, for some reason. The memorable moment came when Mule broke out Radiohead’s “Creep.” Unsurprisingly, this roused the crowd out of a midday stupor, lending some much needed energy to the afternoon. Unfortunately, this only went to support my theory that for all their musical talent (which is substantial), Gov’t Mule is only excellent when they are covering other great songs. To be sure, they’ve proven themselves adept at making good songs great, especially when they go outside the confines of southern rock. It’s just a shame that their original songwriting leaves so much to be desired.<br /><br />Anyways, after the Mule set, we wandered over to What Stage for some much needed relaxation time, stopping to grab some barbeque fare along the way. We camped out by the main venue while Wilco set the stage for the evening with their brand of alt-country rock, which proved to be even better then when we caught them at Bonnaroo 2007. The music brought excellent closure to the daylight hours, and as the sun disappeared, I felt like a kind of peace had descended over the festival. I applaud Wilco for truly recharging the day as we waited for the great Bruce Springsteen to take the stage.<br /><br />Nighttime review coming soon.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-3286959219379671112009-07-03T01:25:00.000-06:002009-07-04T01:28:19.666-06:00Bonnaroo 2009: Part 3 (Friday)Fortunately, the remaining cloud cover from yesterday’s storm afforded the two of us an extra hour or two of sleep on Friday morning, though the cool weather didn’t last long. By noon, the oppressive heat that always comes with the Bonnaroo experience was upon us. Combined with the ridiculous amount of mud left over from Thursday, the environment felt especially hostile. However, the schedule went easy on us for the day, as we were able to stay at Which Stage for most of the daylight hours. <br /><br />Though the little shade available was quickly occupied by sweaty hippies, we took comfort in the thought that the day’s music was sure to be excellent. Our schedule kicked off with Animal Collective, a band whose music I was not especially familiar with, but whom I was eagerly anticipating. While I didn’t quite understand the mass appeal garnered by their 2007 release “Strawberry Jam,” I was surprised to find that I really enjoyed their latest effort, “Merriweather Post Pavilion.” The album’s uniquely electronica-infused experimental rock sound caught me rocking to the beat more than I’d care to admit. Plus, Animal Collective’s fans had previously convinced me that the band was capable of a massively entertaining live show.<br /><br />However, I was quickly disappointed, startlingly so for the hype the show was getting beforehand. The bright Tennessee sun left the band high and dry on a bland stage setup, combined with an altogether uninteresting setlist. Ben and I agreed that this was likely due to the venue, which didn’t seem to jive with AC’s groove. A smaller, closed-air venue probably would have lent itself better, as the band was left without the lightshow for which they are famous. The music itself lacked bounce, and I think the crowd agreed; the many dancing at the start of the set quickly dwindled to a dedicated few, by which point I had lost interest completely.<br /><br />Following Animal Collective was indie-rock outfit Yeah Yeah Yeahs, another band with whom I was not very familiar going in. I feared another Animal Collective-style disappointment, but my worries were soon dissuaded as the band proceeded to rock a strong set despite the glaring sun. The crowd seemed very in tune to the band, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs took advantage, entertaining at the level that I would expect of a band playing a large-stage set at the nation’s largest music festival.<br /><br />However, I should probably note that about 20 minutes into their set, I was hit with a massive head rush that sent me reeling through the crowd to a more spacious area. After stumbling through annoyed Rooers, I threw myself at the ground and waited until I could actually see clearly. Following this, I proceeded to waste 30 bucks on pizza, a poorly-wrapped burrito, a coke, and a frozen lemonade. Let’s just say that the heat did a temporary but effective number on me.<br /><br />The refreshments did, however, help me make it to the first set that I had really been anticipating. Brooklyn-based rock stylists TV on the Radio have intrigued me since I first heard their latest release, the critically-lauded “Dear Science.” For a long time, I wasn’t sure what to do with this band. “Halfway Home,” opener for the album, stunned me with its sonic depth and instrumental grace, but many other songs left me wondering where to go. The band’s intense focus on diverse melody and quirky vocals lead me to think that they were just another indie/alt-rock group taking their moment before being forgotten in the blend. Then Ben introduced me to “Wolf Like Me,” a track off the previous album, “Return to Cookie Mountain.” The song changed my outlook completely, especially the live recordings; their sound was so monumentally huge that they simply had to be the real deal.<br /><br />I therefore went into their Bonnaroo set with high expectations, and I was not disappointed in the slightest. TVotR started off on the mellow side, building to that epic sound that I had so far only experienced through Youtube videos. By the time the tandem of “Halfway Home” and “Wolf Like Me” rolled around, I was already convinced: this band rocks in a deep, complex, and evolving way. The grandiose “Staring at the Sun” was the first truly poignant moment of the festival, and when TVotR finished, I wasn’t sure how much more I could handle for the day.<br /><br />It turned out that there was plenty left to experience. We chilled to the music of David Byrne of Talking Heads fame, who put on a solid, entertaining set. Deciding to skip the Beastie Boys, whom I’ve never really enjoyed much, we headed over to This Tent for Public Enemy, who put on a shocker by playing through their legendary album “It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back,” cover to cover. Chuck D and Flavor Flav still put out the goods, it seems, and the show was sick, to be sure.<br /><br />The night concluded with a massively attended performance by mashup artist Girl Talk, who I also saw at Bonnaroo 2007. This year, his crowd was much bigger, his set much longer, and his mashups even crazier. He warned the spectators not to crush each other, apparently a common occurrence at his shows. If a DJ causes that kind of trouble, you know something’s up.<br /><br />So, despite a slow start, Friday was definitely a fulfilling day. The euphoria from TVotR’s set continued through the night, and by the time we stumbled back to the campsite, we were fully ready for the weekend’s delights.<br /><br />Part 4 coming soon, check back.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4284550622843241737.post-69991284847635103792009-06-25T17:20:00.000-06:002009-06-25T17:24:56.392-06:00Bonnaroo 2009: Part 2 (Thursday)<span style="font-weight:bold;">Thursday</span><br /><br /> The first morning at the Bonnaroo campground was deceptively cool. We were able to sleep past 10 AM, leading us to believe that our improvised canopy would keep the tent cool as the sun punished us over the course of the weekend. This would later prove false, but getting one full night’s sleep early on was essential to our survival.<br /><br /> Thursday is usually a pretty chill day at Bonnaroo, as Centeroo doesn’t open until noon and there’s not much music going on for the rest of the day. However, as soon as we ventured out of our campground, we found ourselves staring a massive rain cloud in the face. The storm caught us out in the open, dumping torrential rain on us for about ten minutes. Even though the storm passed quickly over us, it was enough to dismantle many of the campgrounds around ours, though our shelter stayed put reasonably well, considering the amount of duct tape used to keep it up.<br /><br /> After making the trek to repair the shelter and back to Centeroo, we spent the remainder of the day trudging through mud that would stick around for most of the festival. However, we were able to catch a couple acts here and there, the first of which was <a href="http://www.mursmusic.com/">MURS</a>, a relatively underground rapper who put on a surprisingly good show for the stylistic simplicity of his music. His stage antics were enough to keep a good-sized crowd under the Other Tent for the full hour of his set, though the consistent rain couldn’t have hurt.<br /><br /> Two hours and a couple slices of Spicy Pie found us back at the Other Tent for the last big act of the night, West-Coast hip-hop duo <a href="http://www.putsonline.co.uk/">People Under the Stairs</a>. I was especially excited for PUtS, as I’ve always thought of them as one of the better underground hip-hop acts to find relative prominence in the increasingly muddled rap scene.<br /><br /> Let me just say that I really wanted this to be a good set, for my own enjoyment as well as for the success of PUtS. This was probably the biggest crowd they’ve ever pulled, and it was a huge chance for them. However, about two songs in, it became clear that the larger venue did not suit their style. They came out with about as much energy as a Willie Nelson show, with none of the character. The crowd started to thin about ten minutes in, the two of us included. In a smaller, more private setting, I can see PUtS kicking way more ass, especially if more devoted fans were present. The Bonnaroo crowd simply didn’t stick with them, and their stage presence suffered because of it. <br /><br />So, the last show of the night was disappointing, but by that time we were both ready to get of the rain and mud and take one last shot at a decent night’s sleep before the festival really kicked into gear on Friday.<br /><br />Check back for part 3 soon.Colinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11762310592596993959noreply@blogger.com1