Stuck In The Clouds

The Felice Brothers

2011-08-06T15:10:00.000-04:00

The Felice Brothers

Celebration, Florida

2011

In an alternate universe, bizarro Stephen King sits at his typewriter in 1977, feverishly pounding out what may be his masterpiece set in an abandoned high school in Beacon, NY. The caretakers are a band from the Catskills and set about recording an album in the haunted hallways and anxious auditoriums, eerie stairwells and disturbed cafeterias. The surreal setting places the band at unease, removes their comfort zone, prods them to creativity and the loss of abandon and the joy of exuberant discovery. The creation process achieves the movie-dream vision of standing in the midst of dozens of holographic projections, manipulating them with the swipe of a hand through the air, instantly willing the slightest lark to appear and dance in a Fantasia-like manner. It is exactly this impression that The Felice Brothers give on their album Celebration, Florida.

The album begins with Fire At The Pageant, a rousing march of movement that sets the tone for the record, swirling in and out of chaos. Percussive beats, claps and slams of field recordings anchored with bass and sprinkled with anything from horns to piano, acoustic guitar, sirens and accordions in plunked out melodies combine with a dark and gloomy children’s chorus shouted for a mixture of anxiety and agitation. Call it melancholy and the infinite danceness, call it kids in a candy store, this is an album of songs that flow from sparse to frenetic, moments of aching beauty in between the songs that make your shoulders and hips move like some kind of spooky rock dj’s.

Released on Fat Possum Records (The Black Keys, Andrew Bird, R.L. Burnside, Paul Westerberg, Band of Horses), there is a feel of capturing the joy of creation in freedom, with twists and turns like kids through a Wonka factory, frequently surprised by clever girl veliciraptors. The album has a sense of songs written and deconstructed, smacked up, flipped and rubbed down (oh no!) and reimagined with tons of space, allowing a feel of Woody Guthrie, Michael Penn and Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot era. One imagines a producer on the floor with reels and reels of audio tape and a razor blade, splicing and sweating and smoking, assembling and constructing takes that invoke an amphetaminized^© Dylan or inebriated Paul Moeller.

The setting was real, sans poltergeist, and the band really recorded in an abandoned school, and the empty isolation comes through on the album. Songs like Honda Civic and Ponzi are immediately accessible and complement the bare arrangements of Oliver Stone and Best I Ever Had. And to make sure you’re listening, they don’t mind invoking a few Queen Mothers, just to keep two songs off the radio. With welcome departures from the norm and time-shifting rhythms that fold instantly and enhance the work, it’s an album that feels chaotic and cohesive at the same time. Embracing the whole Music Is Fun mentality, The Felice Brothers embody the idea that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Brian S. Meurer

Warp Factor Nine

2011-04-06T11:52:00.000-04:00

After a leave of absence, I return. After finishing the last review in August, I closed on a house. Renovations proceeded continuously through Halloween weekend, settling in and holidays brought us through to the new year, but hey, we're all busy. Now, with the Austin trip behind us, the writing continues at www.theweeklyfeed.org, looking forward through Waterfront concerts and Derby festivities. I'll leave you with the immortal words of the Hold Steady: We're gonna build something this summer.
b

SXSW 2011

2011-04-06T07:37:00.000-04:00

SXSW 2011

03.15.11

Day Zero

The annual South by Southwest Music Festival in Austin, TX encompasses two thousand bands over five days in every building in the downtown area that has an electrical outlet and a toilet (toilet optional). Representing a wide strata of artists, from the do-it-yourself crowd to the multi-platinum established label types, it is possible to see non-stop music from the crusty-eyed morning to the bleary-eyed extra late evening (morning).

Celebrating its 25^th Anniversary this year, the festival, (known as SXSW), is anchored by the official convention: showcasing speakers, panels, discussions, open floor trade show, select musical acts. It also hosts sites away from the convention center, events that are purely band driven. All around these official showcases, there are countless unofficial ones, sponsored by labels, magazines, and agencies of all stripes that run bands from early until it’s almost early again.

This was the first year that we were able to arrive the day before the official music portion of the festival begins. Credentials obtained, we reacquainted ourselves with Austin, roaming the streets, visiting Guero’s and the Driskill and S. Congress and 6^th Ave. There is an overwhelming feeling of the 1926 Hemingway novel The Sun Also Rises, as they spend some time in sleepy Pamplona before the Festival of Fermin begins with the running of the bulls. There’s a drastic change about to happen, and it’s like static in the air, potential energy that is about to burst into kinetic.

03.16.11

Day One

If South by Southwest in Austin parallels The Sun Also Rises, then Wednesday officially starts of the music portion of the festival with fireworks as people pour into the frenetic streets, chasing and being chased by the running of the bands, including the incidental trampled bystander. It comes with the territory, it’s part of the deal, dodging the loading and unloading of countless and tireless bands, their wheeled amplifiers and overloaded shoulder bags and tightly gripped instrument cases. There’s no denying the grueling efforts of bands here, most playing anywhere north of four times throughout the festival.

Wednesday began at the Convention Center with James Vincent McMorrow near the press lounge. It also saw the advent of the Jawa. A small plush toy for children, tis true, but also an interview accessory that seemed appropriate and grew to be a mandatory post-interview picture. From there we checked in to the Paste Magazine party on 6th with The Civil Wars, offering a stunningly beautiful set in the early afternoon for a deathly quiet audience rapt with attention, no small feat in the distracted, sweaty and overcrowded Austin streets. One of twelve shows over the next few days, they’re making quite the impression. Trampled by Turtles took to the stage afterward to a packed house as we made our way to our next scheduled interview with the enigmatic J. Mascis, a suprisingly low-key individual compared with my idea of the prime mover of Dinosaur Jr.

After dinner and walking around downtown for a bit, I settled in at Stubb’s on Red River, one of the prime venues in town. It’s a large outdoor amphitheater behind a BBQ restaurant and known for it’s musical selection, sound and capacity. First up tonight were Smith Westerns, a young band out of Chicago that has a lot of buzz going for them right now, as they made a lot of must-see lists around the country, enough apparently to snag a prime slot at Stubb’s. It seems their youth pulls them in many musical directions, making their description something like a Ramones/Cure/Dream Pop/Lynrd Skynrd/Wyld Stallynz hybrid, or it could be said that they knew enough of the Ramones to be dangerous, but filtered through enough In Utero to fall short. In the end, the live show of these 19-year-olds was lackluster, embodying the notion that youth is wasted on the young.

In one of the most dramatically contrasting set changes I’ve ever seen, Raphael Saadiq exploded on stage with a high energy performance, backed by one of the hottest, tightest, and dynamically minded bands around. Saadiq took these two-thousand plus people here at Stubb’s to church, engaged the crowd and launched into Sure Hope You Mean It, riding that roller coaster through the highs and lows for all it’s worth, taking it way down dynamically, challenging the audience to some yeah yeah yeahs, and winning.

03.17.11

Day Two

Day two in Austin at South by Southwest began with the word sluggish. However, late nights and early mornings and on your feet in between define the festival. First interview of the day was TV on the Radio, followed by checking out the Seedy Seeds at the Buzzgrinder day party. We made time for the sets on the Radio Stage at the convention center of both Josh Ritter and Emmylou Harris in an appropriately hushed environment. It was quite early in the day to be getting chills from music, a powerful reminder of why an event like this exists: music is meaningful and makes life meaningful and shakes us into awareness. This would be an important thought as the day went on and detours occurred. Our schedules do not always align with artists in the music industry. One of the interviews I was most looking forward to, Raphael Saadiq, had to be nixed when he was delayed by more than an hour and a half. However, in his absence we picked up an interview with Cults.

That delay pushed our schedule up against a Cold War Kids interview, from which they were coincidentally not present due to some other form of typical SXSW chaos. Off we went east of the expressway, an area to which we had never ventured, only to find, unsurprisingly, dozens of more clubs, tents, throbbing music and huddled masses, yearning to breathe free. And there we found Moby. In a sparse, nondescript, graphic design studio nonetheless, as one might expect to find someone like Moby. Quite the surprising and willing conversationalist, he made for a great interview.

We found ourselves traveling down south Congress, over the river and past the shops the area is known for, stopping at HomeSlice pizza for, well, you know, and then on to the showcase at St. Vincent DePaul with American Aquarium, an excellent band from Raleigh NC. This festive set put us in the mood for Antone’s and a killer bill: Band of Heathens, Abigail Washburn, Kelly Willis & Bruce Robison, Emmylou Harris and the Old 97’s. Losing the ability to tell how many days you have been immersed in South by Southwest is characteristic of the event, and if you are having trouble calculating by day two, it’s clearly time to fall like a bag of sand into bed.

03.18.11

Day Three

No rest for the weary, we were up and out the door and walking through town, seemingly not long after many were trickling into bed. A full schedule of interviews began at the Four Seasons Hotel in their amazingly comfortable lobby, complete with balconies overlooking the lawn gently spilling into the Colorado River. Fresh from an early downstairs showcase, the first interview of the day was G. Love, still animated and full of caffeine and dragging us all with him. Up next was a mere block away, on a balcony overlooking 2^nd and San Jacinto we set up for a great interview with two of the fine members of The Head and The Heart, representing themselves well with a full slate of performances this week.

We had a quick brunch and intelligent discussion with Chris Walla of Death Cab fame at the comfortable Manuel’s on Congress. He was here in support of some of his production projects like Telekinesis and Lonely Forest, as well as in advance of a new Death Cab album. Through constant stop-bys and introductions, we talked about projects and OMD, sounds and influences and inspirations. It was surprisingly one of the more laidback and interesting discussions of our week.

Stepping into the bright Texas sun, we made our way to the next interview, now with Ellie Goulding on the 22^nd floor of the Hilton. With one of the more impressive views of the city, Goulding and her crew held this suite for interviews. She turned out to be surprisingly personable and relaxed in the interaction, showing a bit of her fun side.

After a bit of rest in the press suite in the convention center, we grabbed an interview with Lohio, followed by Cheyenne Marie Mize. After this full day, we caught sets by Surfer Blood at the Cedar Street Courtyard, Theophilus London at the W Hotel for the Nylon party, and headed to Antone’s for the Head and the Heart. Theirs was a great, energetic, powerful set, made all the better by the knowledge that they were good people.

Our final stop of the night was at the Driskill Hotel, a landmark in Austin if ever there were one. Grand and opulent, it is also a pivotal anchor of SXSW, connecting the main arteries of 6^th St. and Congress. Their Victorian Room was housing an ASCAP party, and we were able to catch a couple of sets, the first of which was Dan Wilson. He of Semisonic and Closing Time fame, these days he does a lot of co-writing, including Josh Groban, Adele, and the Dixie Chicks, with whom he won Album of the Year and Song of the Year at the Grammy’s in 2007. Songs from his solo album were the set on this night, featuring Tracy Bonham, the Dixie Chicks Martie Maguire, and Jeremy Messersmith. Tuneful, well constructed songs, this was a very enjoyable set. He was followed by the Nashville band the Civil Wars, consisting of Joy Williams and John Paul White, featuring their amazing voices, his acoustic, and some kind of cosmic interconnectedness that was chilling to hear. It was like a science experiment running a current of electricity through the room. This was their final of 12 shows, and they appeared neither weary nor any less than ecstatic to be on stage, going all Nikola Tesla on the crowd, who absorbed with utter attention what was happening on stage, bursting with applause at the end of an incredible set at the end of an incredible day near the end of an incredible week.

03.19.11

Day Four

Our final day of fun in Austin at SXSW found us settling into the groove of interviews, the sequence of set up for cables and lighting and cameras and audio moving with the fluid efficiency of the industrial revolution. Our first location was a church by the capitol putting on the AOL party. While waiting on the Dodos to finish their sound check, we happened to be stationed near a T-Mobile sponsored ice cream sandwich truck: choose your dream cookie (chocolate chip, snickerdoodle, etc.), choose your dream ice cream (vanilla bean, mint chocolate chip, etc.) and they will literally hand your dreams over to you! If only all dreary waiting spaces (hospitals, government offices, traffic jams) had these guys, the world would be a better place.

After the Dodos interview, we paid a final visit to the convention center for one last plundering of the press room followed by the interview with Afie Jurvanen from Bahamas, who is also the guitar player for Feist. A genuinely affable guy, he made for a great, laidback and informative interview.

Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel with two more left, we girded ourselves for one more trek to the other side of the expressway, to what was known as the Fader Fort, a fenced in absolutely huge area that felt more Mad Max meets refugee camp. Sponsored by Fiat, this stage ran for days and had a lot of notable acts. Our interview was with Jamie from the English indie pop band the XX. Falling on the reclusive and less than comfortable end of the spectrum, we finished and took a quick loop through the rest of the Fader Fort and left humming California Love.

Our final interview of SXSW was at the Central Presbyterian Church, at 8^th and Brazos. We met Sharon Van Etten there in a fun and free flowing interview in the courtyard before she prepared for the Red Ryder showcase that evening. We talked with her and her band for a bit and walked back to the hotel for a brief rest before heading out to absorb one final night of the festival.

We stopped by the capitol for a recap video on the way back to 6th. We popped into a few places there, being the main drag and the most accessible to the largest number of options. Maggie Mae’s rooftop is usually a good option, and we caught the set of Wolf & Cub at the Aussie BBQ party before dropping by the Hilton to hear a few songs by Kim Taylor in a quiet, quiet room. Not far from here we heard the Dead Milkmen play Punk Rock Girl, sending me straight to seventh grade and all that comes with that. We dropped into Stubb’s for a bit, unfortunately hearing a band called Electric Touch, who managed to combine the worst of the Killers and Poison in 1986 and injected it with what Freud might have called the Pomp Ego. Fortunately, Tres Mountains provided the palette cleanser of aggression, combining Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament and Mike McCready with King’s X’s Dug Pinnick on vocals. We took off after this and went back to the Central Presbyterian Church to catch some of the sets by Rural Alberta Advantage, Jukebox the Ghost and Great Lake Swimmers. We bounced around the town the rest of the night, ending up at the Parish for Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, running in to friends as well as Michael Stipe. It’s just one of the weird things about Austin, you never know when you’re having dinner next to Jack White, giving directions to Michael Ian Black, walking next to Aziz Ansari or having routine occurrences next to people you’ve listened to and laughed with halfway across the country for years.

It was refreshing that most of these artists we interviewed were down to earth people, usually not difficult or awkward socially or arrogant. Of course, there’s nothing like being surrounded by two thousand other bands to shatter the illusion that what you do is completely unique, that since you pluck a string or open your vocal chords that you belong amongst the elite and are in a class of your own. It’s kind of like how when you get married, it’s this beautiful thing because the other person finds you special and unique and you feel the unconditional acceptance of being yourself. Experiencing South by Southwest in a band is more like the exact opposite of getting married.

The Sunday that ends the week in Austin is one of the strangest experiences there, the emptiness contrasted with the pandemonium of the previous nights. In many ways, it is exactly as Hemingway describes Pamplona after the Festival of San Fermin, after the crowds have gone, after the noise has gone, after the charge that runs through the streets like electricity has dissipated. South by Southwest may be grueling for bands and the search for success more akin to buying dollar scratch-off tabs, but I really love that optimism. I think that each of us chooses music to be the soundtrack to our lives. We live deeply, we hurt deeply, we experience great joy, and that music is forevermore attached to those experiences, is there to amplify the joy and soothe the hurt. To those who create, this is the meaning and the reward; from the rest of us, thank you.

Brian S. Meurer

The Decemberists - The King Is Dead 2011

2011-04-06T07:34:00.000-04:00

The Decemberists

The King Is Dead

2011

The latest album by The Decemberists achieves something that few records do these days; as soon as I hear it, I instantly feel the impulse to scan the room in search of an acoustic guitar. The King is Dead is ten songs and forty minutes of reaching for the elation of feeling, projecting songs that could be sung in the open prairie around a fire with your closest friends under the stars on a warm evening. It tugs at the strings of what only exists in the listener’s mind, that mythical place of nostalgia for the way it used to be, a kind of static momentum that is all feeling of motion without the need to actually move.

When we last left The Decemberists, they had released their exquisite album The Hazards of Love, and subsequently taken more than a few critical hits over the height of its ambition. That album was all about the grandiose, complex narrative of a prog-rock opera, and obviously not everyone’s cup of tea. The King Is Dead strips away extraneous flourish and boils each song down to its essentials; it’s as straightforward an album as the previous album was elaborate, less Corinthian and more Doric.

A lot of fuss has been made drawing parallels between REM’s Document/Eponymous days and The King is Dead. And yes, there’s quite a feel of that here, with its jangles and backbeats, and Peter Buck even appearing on three songs. But I think that there is a lot more to pull apart here, and you don’t have to go further than the title to see the Smiths/Morrissey nod. But it’s a gentler, kinder Morrissey that Colin Meloy channels, the kind of Morrissey that you take home to meet your mom, the kind of Morrissey that is your next door neighbor and bakes apple pies for you. With different teeth and a boost in the surly, This Is Why We Fight could have fit easily and perfectly on Are The Quarry.

Make no mistake, there is no prog-rock opera here; this is an album of songs. It reminds me of the idea of the first Counting Crows album, that breath of fresh air that showed a song well constructed could stand on its own without an electric guitar. These stellar, crisp acoustic guitars really do sound amazing. It says a lot about the engineering of sound when the quality makes you want to reach for the nearest instrument. Don’t Carry It All opens the album with a boom-boom-whack and a harmonica that sets the tone for this collection of homespun rock of the folkiest kind.

Somehow, The Decemberists are consistently able to pump out instantly singable melodies that feel like déjà vu, like you sang these songs everyday in a past life. Background vocals and harmonies are able and hauntingly handled by Gillian Welch at just the right hair-raising places. Colin Meloy does these melodies that are in higher end of his range while having the female harmony singer with a naturally higher voice do the lower harmony part. It’s the blend that etches directly into your hippoampus. Case in point: Rox In The Box- “And it’s One Two Three on the wrong side of the lee”, just try not to sing along the second time you hear it. It’s almost like a common human genetic trend that identifies and reverberates melodies, resonating in the deep recesses of the brain.

Sometimes it doesn’t matter what the influences are as long as it feels right, and this album has a great feel. Don’t Carry It All shows that this album is about the elements; Calamity Song is a great example of that Athens Backbeat, Down By The Water falls on the laidback side of The Smiths, they all fall together like shuffling a deck of cards. Despite whether you find this album to hearken to the early days of REM or fall in line with Moz, just make sure that you find it. Your Spring and Summer will thank you.

Brian S. Meurer

The National

2010-08-06T09:20:00.000-04:00

The National

High Violet

2010

Standing out as one of the best albums of 2010 is High Violet, the fifth and newest album by the National. It’s a set of eleven stirring songs that smolder and ignite, held together by eddies and riptides that provide a rare sense of cohesiveness. It might be fair to say that this is an album that is absorbed rather than listened to.

Falling somewhere between a crooning Sinatra and Robert Smith, between a late and subtle Morrison & early Presley, singer Matt Berninger’s voice is a trippy barritone, with lower register melodies intense, clipped and dour enough to make Depeche Mode smile. Heart wrenching lyrics celebrate & embrace the pain and discomfort of sadness, staring headlong into that abyss, unflinching and willingly. It takes an ocean not to break, indeed.

You can chart the growth and success of this Brooklyn (by way of Cincinnati) band over the course of their ten-ish year existence, from music charts to reviews to copies sold. And High Violet is not the exception. The ability of the drummer to shake a slower, off time song, get mathy with it and subtly launch it into high gear provides a crackle and sizzle that doesn’t go unnoticed. Neither does the understatedly scraped fuzz and hum of an echoing electric guitar part, for that matter. The album is extremely evocative, a guy who has lost it all, at the end of his rope. The ability of the band to impeccably express this is impressive, particularly for a semi self produced record (Peter Katis assisted a bit).

A word I used earlier is smoldering, and I can’t find a more succinct description. There is utter beauty in these songs that build in dynamic layers, mixed from on high with a view of the song as a whole, pulsing through the push and pull of sixteenth note muted acoustic guitar string echoes, amplifying the hi-hat strikes, highlighting tension with the quarter notes of a piano melody. At any given moment, there is always a doom part, an instrument or sound that seems intent on raising the hairs on your arm, like a signal in a horror movie. There aren’t so much harmonies as hauntings, otherworldly breathings, uneasy whispers that combine with bass flutes and harmoniums and French horns that are arranged and mixed so well you have no choice but to absorb it.

There are too many highlights on this album to list here; the first single was Bloodbuzz Ohio, the second Anyone’s Ghost. I need to point out that the track Runaway was originally titled Karamazov, referencing Dostoevsky’s 800 plus page tome, immediately increasing the level of interest in the exegesis of the lyrics. This only serves to enhance that which is already on many levels a stellar album. It feels like it connects to so much more than music. High Violet compels you to follow the band into that darker part of human experience, that sadness that we can’t fix in others or ourselves, where paradoxically the only way to shake it is to fully experience it.

Forecastle 2010 Day Three

2010-07-15T15:51:00.003-04:00

Forecastle 2010 Day Three

The final day of Forecastle 2010 felt like the final day of a music festival: bleary eyed, sunburned, spent, fatigued, dehydrated, malodorous and worn down. Pushing through that by any means necessary in the pursuit of auditory rapture, and early Sunday had a lot to choose from: Vandaveer, Dar Williams, Sara Watkins, Minus the Bear, the Commonwealth, the Fervor. Crowds grew as the day got going, all leading up to the evening sets, beginning with the West Stage at 7:00 with She & Him, that combination of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward. Releasing two albums over the past couple of years, the band is set perfectly as a breath of fresh air with those sweet vocals drenched in reverb and that Brian Wilson-like production. It sets everyone at ease, caters to those exposed nerves that need soothing. Into the first song, the crowd is politely chill, and in Louisville, we are nothing if not polite. As though shaking off the funk, excitement breaks through the mere absorption of the band and the people make their appreciation known. A lot of what She and Him do is very 50’s, like what all the radios play at a classic car show, or a late night commercial advertising a compilation of cruisin’ classics, sponsored by Quaker State. But man, that voice is pure beauty, heavenly, otherworldly. The band is in great form and dynamic: they shuffle, gallop, follow the cues of the bandleaders. She loves her tambourine and the crowd loves her. A two-song encore ends with an amazingly soulful version of “I put a spell on you” with just her and M. Ward and a few thousand of their closest and newest fans.

I ventured over to the East Stage to see Company of Thieves, a band that has recently had a surge of popularity in this city. In the midst of a new recording period, they took a break for a flight to Louisville to play Forecastle and didn’t disappoint. Opening with “Oscar Wilde” and taking most of the crowd by surprise, the band was clearly enjoying the moment and focused on its continuing trajectory. Genevieve is always amazing to watch, to physically see such a huge voice come out of such a tiny body, her animated movements and sparkley dresses engaging the crowd. The band sounded great and the vocalist also treated us with appropriate use of the tambourine. There was a great element of that elusive groove running through their songs and kept the people in front of them moving.

The last time I saw Spoon was in Austin on their riverfront, Auditorium Shores, so it seems fitting to see them again on ours. The band opened with one of the most perfect opening songs, “The Beast & Dragon Adored”, much to the pleasure of the onlookers feeling the teeth of the guitar and resonating boom of each intricately placed drum hit. But the crowd is more mesmerized by this display than hyped; a hip begins to move, followed by the leg bounce, and now a head nods in rhythm, and I can see shoulders begin to connect with the axis of the hips and they glide and move. Spoon is a monsoon, a tidal wave demanding crowd submission with sheer ferocity and tenacity. Those guitars cut in just the right place, bass is perfectly distorted, piano notes hit exactly where they are supposed to and nowhere else. The second song, “Got Nuffin’”, is exceptionally longer than their normal songs, but the straight strums and eighth-note repeating attack of the bass throb has placed the crowd firmly in their palm. A six piece brass section of saxes and trombones, from Louisville nonetheless, backs up the band on a few songs, further endearing the crowd to their hearts. By the fifth song, “You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb”, there’s not a person not gyrating in some fashion or another. And if they aren’t, it’s because they’re dead inside. At one point, Britt Daniel, the vocalist/guitarist, dons a bass and jumps into a drawn out, sparse throbbing intro, feeling for all intents and purposes like a techno song, and right when it would normally go the typical “oom-siss-oom-siss” techno part, the drummer does some crazy fills and the song ends. The band rolls through “Is Love Forever”, “Don’t You Evah”, “Fitted Shirt”, “I Summon You”, “Written In Reverse”, “I Turn My Camera On”, “The Underdog”, and “My Mathematical Mind”, closing the night with “Black Like Me”. I realize that Spoon always makes me want to get a telecaster. This is also one of the last thoughts I have for the evening. I took off after the Spoon set, and rightfully so, have a nice pang of regret every time someone describes the Flaming Lips show to me. Next year, maybe I’ll personally get sponsored by Red Bull.

Forecastle 2010 Day Two

2010-07-15T15:49:00.002-04:00

Forecastle 2010 Day Two

Saturday began for me at 3pm at the East Stage, where a band known as Mucca Pazza was set to begin. Twenty to thirty people enter the stage, all in non-matching marching band uniforms. Guitar, accordion, trombones, saxophones, bass drums, toms, sousaphone and pompoms come together in what can only be described, by themselves nonetheless, as a circus punk marching band. It sounds like the soundtrack to a Tarrantino directed James Bond movie filed in the 1920’s. All instrumental, it’s one of the most entertaining shows I’ve seen yet, and it’s possible that the most fun was had on stage. Maybe they were the ones in High School marching band that got kicked out because they were too weird. All the better for us. It’s a great and inspiring set and almost makes me forget that I’m already sunburned.

Over on the West Stage, Grace Potter & the Nocturnals took the stage to a sizeable crowd and performed an eclectic, genre spanning set that made it difficult to pin down. Her voice definitely has aspects of Dolly Parton and Sheryl Crow, but depending on the song could be classified as country rock, jam band, and southern folk pop. The sound was good, guitars had great tones and a B-3 filled all the right spaces like a good organ should. Her songs cover all the bases to meet your multi-genre needs.

By 5:30, the crowd really begins to thicken as the showtime for Cake grows close. There are many Cake t-shirts down front, and as I have learned through extraneous chatter, there are a lot of fans of the band in this town, and that excitement can be felt. They take the stage and leap immediately into the one two punch of Comfort Eagle and Frank Sinatra, ensuring that the tide of the crowd is with them. Vocalist John McCrea is bent on two things today: crowd interaction and his vibraslap. Both are featured prominently in the set. A melodica appears, as well as a guiro, that wooden Latin percussion instrument with cylindrical grooves that you rake a stick across. Cake seems to be in top form, both tightly professional and energetically enjoying what they are doing. The hardcore fans are up front, but there are also a lot of softcore fans, with a cursory familiarity of the band (as the guy five people behind me who keeps shouting “Run The Race!!!” repeatedly, apparently wanting to hear the song whose actual title is “The Distance”), or those who have no idea who the band is, as evident in the couple behind me. She says she likes them because they are rock and roll like the Rolling Stones. When the band did their version of “War Pigs”, I’ll quote her now saying, “Now that’s what I like, when all the new bands like Cake (!) play the old songs. This was worth it, there’s my seventy bucks right there.” Personally, I had forgotten how good cake was, and truly enjoyed the show. And as the lady behind me nonsensically pointed out, “Looks like they want to have their CAKE and eat it too!”

Both unfortunately and fortunately, I missed the first half of Devo’s set due to filming Kyle’s interview with Cake. By the time I made it back out, it was a fully involved Devo show, with their silver grey uniforms that come in handy if you are shooting a film and need a stuntman to be protected while being lit on fire. Their sparse stage was as welcoming to the crowd as their message when “Whip It” came out in 1980 and said “Hey, not only is it ok to be geeky and different, it is awesomely preferable to be geeky and different!” Their set was upbeat and really enjoyable and the crowd was with them all the way. Are we not men? We are DEVO!

On Saturday night, after Devo, it’s pretty safe to say that the hyped up crowd was quite ready for the Smashing Pumpkins. Not so fast! Collect yourself, pace yourself, savor your anticipation. Apparently situations such as this call for a DJ. You might be resting in the media tent recovering from the creeping signs of exhaustion, nursing your purchase from the taco truck, when you notice the rhythmic ripples pulsing at the top of your water cup, Jurassic Park-like. Then come the crushing, interior organ shaking, oxygen destroying bass hits. It might remind you of high school parking lots and rumors of cruising, metallic rattling, the grinding apart of joints meant to remain joined. Hypothetically. The act on the main stage, after Devo and before the Pumpkins, is known as Bassnectar, a DJ, or electronic music artist, out of San Francisco. His appearance has an Andrew WK vibe, with his long hair and white t-shirt, but most comparisons stop there. The set is an amazingly integrated audiovisual presentation, with a full movie sized screen blending colors and images and flashes to accompany his blend of beats with the occasional pixies, nine inch nails, beatles and white zombie thrown in. It’s coreshaking, and the glowstick kids are happy. Waves of people were jumping in rhythm excitedly and ratcheting themselves up for the headliner soon to come.

I headed over to the East Stage to catch the set from Edinburgh’s own We Were Promised Jetpacks. Signed to Fat Cat Records and label mates with Frightened Rabbit and Sigur Ros, I expected a lot from them. One minute into the eight minute opener, I knew I wouldn’t be disappointed; a rousing, explosive, tight and passionate study in the absurd musical equation whereby the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. An early sound issue that looked to be a dysfunctional cord only served to stir some of that Scottish anger, make them push to release and overcome. It was clear by the second song that this is exactly what happened. This is one of the most aggressive sets I’ve seen; a band with something to prove, intent on blistering. And it was really loud, too.

Back at the West Stage, the crowd continues to thicken as the LCD lightshow from Bassnectar is dismantled and the drums and guitars are checked. It’s the closest quarters it has been all day and begins to feel like the Great Lawn might implode. Planning perfectly the end of the previous set and the ensuing mass exodus to the lavatories, I find myself quite close to the stage with thousands of people at my back. Lights are tested, microphones are tested and anticipation builds. And builds. The Smashing Pumpkins take the stage, pick up their instruments and open up with Today, followed by Astral Planes, Ava Adore, and Hummer. As one of the bands that graduated from the school of Alternative Rock, they proudly wear their seriousness and disinterest on both sleeves, apart from the few times that smiles were flashed in recognitions of a fan’s excitement. Mr. Corgan told the story at one point about being escorted around town and asking his driver what they make here; the response, “Bourbon, baseball bats, horses, and hot Kentucky women” elicited much goodwill from the crowd, who were held with rapt attention for the majority of the show. And honestly, considering a lot of the stories I’ve heard regarding a Pumpkins show, I think Forecastle came away with one of the better ones.

Forecastle 2010 Day One

2010-07-13T06:10:00.000-04:00

Forecastle Festival 2010

The ninth edition of Forecastle found itself occupying 75 acres of Waterfront Park in downtown Louisville, bringing its blend of music, art and activism to an expected thirty thousand people this weekend. Three main music stages showcased a stellar lineup, including the Flaming Lips, Spoon, Smashing Pumpkins, Devo, Cake, Widespread Panic, Lucero, Drive By Truckers, She & Him, Modern English, Arnett Hollow, We Were Promised Jetpacks, Vandaveer, Sara Watkins, Against Me and Company of Thieves. One electronica/dj stage, one circus stage, one sustainable living roadshow area and one outdoor extreme sports showcase rounded out the lineup of scheduled events.

Stretching from the Wharf to the Upland Meadow, the main stages hovered near the water to the north, while the dozens of food and merchandise tents were located along the southern edge, near and under the I-64 overpass. Everything from gyros to gumbo, burgers to pommes frites, tacos to a NY slice could be found along with ample serving locations and selections from the BBC. Merch tents were stocked with an assortment of shirts, beads, purses, hand painted clothes, rope sandals, flowy blouses, jewelry, hammocks, reusable water bottles, hats, screenprints, frisbees and other miscellaneous environmentally friendly items. A string of tents along this theme included EcoZone, Toss Out Fuel, Up a Creek and Eco-opolis.

Friday was a get-to-know-you day, a familiarization with the layout, scheduling and crowd flow details that inform stage and band choices, along with the navigation and logistics that requires. Manchester Orchestra shredded, blistered and chopped their way into the crowd’s spleen. Arnett Hollow offered their brand of Sunday-back-porch-good-time-having social occasion, their tight playing skillfully running the line between bluegrass & jam. After a short presentation of fireworks, Widespread Panic took the main stage, setting the crowd in a harmonious state, and the people twirled blissfully.

I made it a point to catch the Lucero set, headlining the East Stage. Setting up with vocals, electric, drums, bass, keys and lap steel, they brought a high energy punch to the night that electrified the crowd. With a gravelly, Marlboro voice that feels like Tom Waits if he were a tenor and raised in east Tennessee instead of LA, vocalist Ben Nichols leads this punk roots band through songs that can only be described as rollicking. Lucero seems to be trying to redefine what Southern Band means. I’m imagining a kind of one-upmanship battle between them and Lynyrd Skynyrd, a la LL Cool J and Kool Mo Dee. They look every part the working class Southern rockers they portray, as though an east Tennessee bartender bet that the six guys on the stools at his bar couldn’t form a band. And with lines like “She asked me if I loved her and I showed her the tattoo”, it’s clear that they win the bet in my hypothetical band-origin-scenario. There’s also a lot of liquid and cups being thrown at the stage, putting a nice spin on the Blues Brothers chicken wire bar scene, but in this case it’s the band that needs the Gallagher style protective plastic sheet.

Jónsi

2010-05-05T13:26:00.006-04:00

Jónsi

2010

After fifteen years and five albums with Sigur Rós, vocalist slash guitarist Jónsi Birgisson steps out with his first solo work, an expansive Icelandic post-rock-new-age-marching-band of an album. It fully embraces the dualities of the songbird nature of its vocals and isolation in it's use of space, spattering kick drums and breakbeats between flutes and dulcimers and butterflies. And puppy dogs. And cute little baby kittens.

Collaborating with Nico Muhly, the classical composer (The Reader, Grizzly Bear, Bonny ‘Prince’ Billy, Bjork), and co-producing with Peter Katis (Interpol, Frightened Rabbit, Fanfarlo) and Alex Somers (Jónsi & Alex), the album seems a producer’s dream. Sung in both English and Icelandic, these sweet and gentle melodies could just as easily been set against an acoustic guitar, and I think that’s one of the most impressive aspects to this album. The vocal delivery is slanted from a non-English orientation, emphasizing the melody itself rather than the meter of the words, coming out sounding like pure beauty. It expresses such emotion, has that certain je ne sais quoi that if you let that jaded rock you call a heart to crack a little, like some epiphany-stricken grinch, your triple sized heart will break the x-ray machine with a golden twang.

But if this doesn’t happen, if you can’t dream that dream with Jónsi, if you can’t get to that place, then this won’t sound like hope. It’ll sound like the sickeningly sweet optimism of the vocals and lyrics has found a way to make the Polyponic Spree look melancholy. It’ll sound like a falsetto backbeat Jethro Tull, like the Diva Dance from the Fifth Element, like some original Zeusian Olympic soundtrack or hearken a mid-80’s Enyan hit.

The album is immediately intriguing, but not necessarily immediate. It’s accessible in a non-threatening ethereal way, or rather, not accessible in a direct and instantly engaging way. It’s at a disadvantage when perusing the landscape of our current, instant, socially networkable oversharing culture. But some things, most things, that require more from us are ultimately more rewarding if we invest ourselves, if we defy stagnation and set ourselves to stretch and grow. And this is the command of Jónsi, urging us, pleading with us to motion: Go.

bsm

Frightened Rabbit

2010-04-20T23:14:00.006-04:00

Frightened Rabbit

The Winter of Mixed Drinks

2010

Not since William Wallace was declared Guardian of the Kingdom of Scotland has something so notable come out of Selkirk. Frightened Rabbit, the crux of which are the brothers Scott and Grant Hutchison, has released their fantastically titled album The Winter of Mixed Drinks, a deceptively solid effort that shines while masking its intricacies. It’s full of atmospheric texture and understatedly intense rhythmic streams coming from all directions; a sonic washing and rhythmic jolt of an album that manages to scratch the surface of optimism at the very bottom when everything has gone wrong and there’s nowhere to go but up. The closer you look at one specific aspect of the album, i.e., harmony, percussion, rhythm, even in the reverberating echoes, the more complexity you find there.

One unique thread that runs throughout this album is that it paradoxically has a subdued high intensity, as often in a bass part as guitar or percussion. This feeling lends itself to the neurotically palpable sense of isolation and disconnectedness. The industrious tinkerings of soft counter-melodies on keys, the eighth note pounding of strings or delay, the hummable melodies that repeat in your head for days combine with the emotive vocal work to make for a fantastic album. Produced by Peter Katis of Guster, Spoon, Interpol, Fanfarlo, and Jonsi Birgisson fame, it’s masterfully done.

Signed to Fat Cat Records out of London and accompanying an impressive slate of artists including Animal Collective, Sigur Ros, We Were Promised Jetpacks and Jonsi, Frightened Rabbit stands in the top tier and carries their own weight. Concise and intelligent songwriting allow the distinctly Irish vocals to flourish, even if that accent can never fully escape the shadow of Echo & the Bunnymen, Kaiser Chiefs and the Pogues. After touring in 2008 with Death Cab for Cutie and 2009 with Gomez and Modest Mouse, the band’s tour schedule remains in North America for the next few months before returning overseas.

“Swim Until You Can’t See Land” is the first single and really encapsulates the theme of the album in one song. It’s the songwriting, the production, the theme of being burned and at the bottom and testing yourself to the limit in lines like “Are you a man or are you a bag of sand?” and the numbness of “All I am is a body adrift in water, salt and sky.” It is exactly this allusion to water that reveals a catharsis in water and a helplessness to the vastness and currents of the ocean. When peering into the textures of the album, it’s like opening the lid of a shining grand piano, sleek and stunning, to see the incredible tension wires and hammers, deciphering how it operates. It also has the ability to be missed if you aren't paying attention, like code words between potential spies looking to verify a contact. As for Scotland, the most recent thing to come out of Selkirk is no longer the ancestors of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

bsm

SXSW 2010 Day Four

2010-04-02T13:38:00.007-04:00

March 20, 2010 Saturday

I once heard Chris Thile say that South by Southwest is kind of like a reverse meet and greet, where instead of people going to see a band at a concert, bands come to see Austin and its people, star-struck with the beautiful city and the buzz of maddening crowds. Despite this harsh analysis, watching the frenetic pushing of guitar amps, cases and drums through the city streets reveals a great deal of accuracy in the statement.

Our final day at SXSW began in difficulty, facing high winds, a drop in temperature, a lack of parking and long lines. To avoid the bitter wind and chilly gloom, we bunkered down at the Red Eyed Fly with the WXPN party. The inside stage was tiny with a small sound system and had the feeling of a dark and seedy dive bar. It showcased smaller, singer songwriter type acts. Nicole Adkins was first up, just her and her acoustic playing some sweet songs in a sultry baritone. The underpowered inside sound was problematic, as it was completely overwhelmed by competing band volume outside. The rear outside stage was in a large enclosed patio area and had fantastic sound. First up on the outside stage was Dawes, a band from LA and a perfect example of the reason you come to Austin to experience SXSW. Dawes made an immediate impression with their live show and shot immediately to the top of the Bands To Check Out Post SXSW list. In support of their debut cd North Hills, the band plowed through some great songs in the gritty pop and Southern harmonies vein, reminiscent of Springsteen, Wilco, Van Morrison and a dash of the pure pop perfection of Weezer. Intelligent lyrics abound, like “I need a graceful and proud way to accept all the things you don’t know” from Love Is All I Am, as well as an offering from “That Western Skyline”: “All my dreams did not come true, they only fell apart.” I can only hope all of their eight Austin shows this week have been this good.

The next few acts rotated between inside and out, mostly falling short of the intensity and quality of other acts we had seen, including Lissie on the small inside stage. This was her 9^th show in the 4 days of SXSW, with just her on electric guitar as singer songwriter with a drummer/bass player. Outside was Jukebox the Ghost, a kind of dance rock band, but the vocals and melodies were a bit too flip for my unhipster tastes. Most of this time was in anticipation of the Freelance Whales, one of the few bands on my must see list. The odds were definitely stacked against them, being in the small room with a loud band outside and an underpowered system, but there was no reason to worry about a subpar performance. Ten minutes after their scheduled start time, they were still not at the club and got bumped. It turned out that their previous show was in a lineup that was very behind schedule and threw the whole thing off. Leaving the club, we made our way to the Billboard.com Bungalow party with the Carolina Chocolate Drops. This is a three piece banjo, harmonica, jug, fiddle, steel guitar playing band encompassing delta, blues, ragtime and having success on the bluegrass & Americana charts. It was a fun set that included “Cornbread & Butterbeans”, as well as the recognizable “Hit ‘Em Up Style” from 2001, reimagined w southern strings.

South by Southwest can be overwhelming. There are so many bands and venues and sponsored events and underground word-of-mouth attention-getters that it’s hard to choose your direction. But that also makes it easy, if you let it. You’re bound to stumble into things that you could have never planned for, even things that would normally fall outside of your preconceived notions of what you like. Being open to the diversity of bands is one of the greatest aspects of SXSW. Even more fascinating is the diversity of the people, the differing styles, clothes and ages that beg questions of backgrounds and common threads. The answer of which, obviously, is Music, with a capitol M. It seems that when it comes to age, Music keeps the old young and makes the young reach into the depths. It challenges the old to break cycles, habits and comforts, and stretch to find the New. It makes the young project cocksure hypotheses about the future that can only be answered years later, if ever. Regardless of age and identity, South by Southwest is a celebration of the passion music stirs in all of us, and an event truly about finding unexpected discoveries and holding on with all your might.

Brian S. Meurer

SXSW 2010 Day Three

2010-03-31T13:09:00.004-04:00

March 19, 2010 Friday

It has been a couple of days of beautiful weather, seventy degrees and sunny. My slightly sunburned face and throbbing feet are urging me to adopt a slightly less grueling pace than roughly fifteen bands we saw yesterday. I tend to agree with myself. Especially when I’m hungry. Which begins our day at Club Deville on Red River St. for the Brooklyn Vegan/ Magic Hat party and their delicious offerings of vegan breakfast tacos and Hail Mary Granola. Although the lineup included Princeton, Twin Sister, Nicole Atkins & Lucero, we were running short on time to make it down the street to Emo’s to catch a set from the Local Natives, an LA band making some waves. Emo’s was easy to find because of the line out the door and down the street waiting to get in. Through a bit of scouting and reconnaissance, we discovered an alternate and slightly hidden rear entrance to their outdoor patio area, packed with the buzz of a large audience in search of buzz. The band had really tight live harmonies, a fantastic Gretch, mandolin, bass, drums, and an auxillary drummer/programmer, all of which added up to their propulsive rhythms and textured melodies. This was their fourth of nine shows at SXSW, making the most of their time there in support of their debut Gorilla Manor. Despite their Ultra LA hipster high and tight pants with 70’s mustaches, their sound was very appealing, leaning to the rock side of indie, especially the last two songs Airplane and Sun Hands, making the Bands To Check Out Post SXSW list.

We took a long walk down Congress to the WOXY studios and for a tour with Mike & Joe. This is a station that was once based in Cincinnati, uprooted from its terrestrial roots in 2004 to lead the internet in radio and moved physically to Austin in 2009. The building was at one time an old theater, converted to a tv studio, from which live bands have been in and out all week. We were there during the recording of a set by the Besnard Lakes, a band from Montreal and the same one that was ending their big set at Stubb’s last night when we stopped by. They had a great rock sound, but odd in terms of ethereal textures, sounding like an unfrozen haunting in the ionosphere, ending with the songs Albatross and Progress. Our tour of the facilities continued up to the roof, revealing an amazing panorama of the city. Regrettably, after spending so much time and money setting up the new station, a few days after our visit all of their funding was pulled and the team that had just relocated across the country is currently left high and dry. We wish them well and hope they fall into new jobs quickly.

Heading north toward the Capitol on Congress, we made our way to the Paste Vanguard party, catching the very end of the Watson Twins and deciding that it was time for Guero’s, that famed restaurant of idyllic stature that is required on any trips I take to Austin. It’s that refreshing Avalon, the reward of Elysium, the assortment of salsas and margaritas that make a man seriously contemplate living in Texas. It’s in a quaint area full of boutiques and boots, giving you visions of lazy Saturdays and strolls by the mighty Colorado River.

We decided to make one main event our final stop for the evening, the Dickies Sounds Party held at the Lustre Pearl. This was another outdoor stage, and the line to get in here was pandemonium. It had a fantastic line up as the evening wore on, including Here We Go Magic, She & Him, Broken Bells and Surfer Blood. It had some issues as well, enough to put a damper on the evening. First up was Here We Go Magic, and there’s not a way to delicately say this, but they did not sound good. The good news is that might have actually been the sound, as either the engineer or the underpowered system itself was severely lacking. It was as if someone two doors down from you was having a house party or band practice. We had high hopes that it was a fluke, or the band, and that it would get better as the night went on. Up next was She & Him, mainly the project of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward, bringing a large 60’s southwestern surf style that would fit in any Tarantino film. It actually might be more apropos if the project were named Cult of Zooey, as any observer of their audiences can attest. Her voice has a breathy angeic quality and the crowd is in love. There’s lots of bouncy tambourine, even some country and western in there too. M. Ward capably handles guitar and some vocals and is accompanied by two female backup singers, drums and bass. Their sound wasn’t great either, and writing it off on the soundman, we decided that was not the way we’d like to see Broken Bells or Surfer Blood. We decided that they would have to be our priority tomorrow, as we made our way back down Red River, mingling with the crowd exiting Stubb’s, whose main event of the evening was Courtney Love’s reignition of Hole and Muse. It looked as though a good time was had by all. I bet the sound was stellar.

Brian S. Meurer

SXSW 2010 Day Two

2010-03-29T20:28:00.009-04:00

March 18, 2010 Thursday

Garbage removal. It’s the first thing that I notice as we arrive 10-ish in the morning. Last night, with the St. Pat’s day revelry and all, this place was trashed. Literally. Very close to the condition of the Paddock at Churchill Downs circa 7:30 pm Derby night. Amazingly, the streets are utterly devoid of the cans, wrappers, bottles, bags, paper plates and flyers from the previous day. Much respect for Austin for making that happen.

First on the Agenda is picking up our credentials at the Convention Center, the nucleus of Official South by Southwest, with it’s myriad workers and volunteers and signs and lines and sign-in booths for press, radio, labels and performers, most of whom have that overwhelmed and lost look in their eyes. It’s a good thing that there is an artist’s lounge on the fourth floor stocked with snacks, beverages, internet and chair massages. The Convention Center houses the music panels, discussions, mentoring sessions, trade show and performance spaces. This year, SXSW now touts 1900 bands on over 80 official stages throughout the city.

The way all of these stages work is this: a club/bar/restaurant allows a business (NPR, Billboard, Labels, Magazines, etc.) to essentially take over for the morning or evening, allowing as many bands as they choose to play short sets. This, as you can imagine, is a logistical nightmare for most people involved. There is often a backline provided (a drum set, a bass amp, a guitar amp) in order to facilitate set changeovers, but even so the streets are constantly buzzing with musicians franticly rolling amps and carrying cumbersome instrument cases, loading them into illegally parked vans while navigating the influx of scheduled performers. This happens about every 45 minutes all day long at every venue across town.

Credentials in hand, we walked to the 700 block of west 6^th to see our good friend Sean Cannon at the Buzzgrinder Buddyhead room, packed with a full two day list of bands like Wax Fang, Apteka, These United States, Henry Clay People, Vandaveer and the Seedy Seeds, a hand selected list reflecting Buzzgrinder’s personal favorites in a cavernous room with competent sound. Our compliments to Mr. Cannon for successfully managing his first foray into partydom. Another key to an efficient SXSW trip is the ability to find the best places for free food and drinks. Arriving at the Speakeasy on S. Congress for the Vevo/Fontana party, a small buffet of southwestern themed foods and drinks allowed us to make it through an underwhelming Sass Jordan set. We caught a few tunes from Rey Fresco, providing island rock grooves and meshing a rhythmic Latin sound triangulated between Marley, Maxwell & Legend. The name means “king fresh” in Spanish, and with a passionate singer from Fiji, a drummer who builds his own drums, an incredible harp player, and a big bass player with a pencil-thin mustache to accompany his fedora, they definitely have a California feel. Their album came out in December & had a Song of the Day on NPR, and made the short list of Bands To Check Out Post SXSW.

We headed to the Galaxy Room for the Paste day party and caught the last few songs from Fanfarlo, a London based indie pop band, playing for a packed house of enthralled fans. The band multitasked trumpet, violin, mandolin, bass, drums, xylophone, keys, clarinet, and melodica. They had a great sound, reminiscent of Crowded House and the Talking Heads. After their set, we stepped out back to the outside stage under a tent and was treated to a set with Gordon Gano, singer of Violent Femmes fame. Despite having one of the most distinctive voice in alternative rock, his set began with little fanfare, the crowd meandering about, apparently not quite sure who this was. Except for those in the front, who were well aware and questioning the mental capacity of the sparse crowd behind them. With what could be described as a gravelly Midwest tenor, Mr. Gano worked his way through songs from his September 2009 release “Under the Sun”. Multinstrumentation seems to be the order of the year, with guitars, violin, accordion, mandolin, saxophone, bass and drums. By the time that the set was winding down into American Music and Blister In The Sun, the crowd had made the connection and packed in all available space.

The lull between day parties and night parties is usually the opportune time to grab dinner, and immediately afterward made our way to the Cedar Street Courtyard. Over a sunken patio area located between two buildings that contained a stage and a few hundred people, we perched on the balcony directly overlooking stage, giving us a nice vantage for the upcoming Miike Snow show. In the meantime, we had the Paris based Uffie, a synthpop disco rapper attempting to placate the crowd, who really couldn’t quite get into her. Described by one fan as a “crackhead caricature of herself”, she and her DJ were obviously hoping for a crowd more familiar with her work, or at least more sympathetic. When at last it was time for Miike Snow, 6 guys in black t-bird jackets took the stage. They are more like a production supergroup; electronic cyborgs whose instrument is whatever is lying within arms reach, generating a sublime stream of electro pop that also made the Bands To Check Out Post SXSW list.

We met up with a couple of friends at the New West Party as things were wrapping up with Kris Kristopherson, Buddy Miller and Patty Griffin. Deciding not to wait for the Harper Simon show in order to catch the Ben Sollee Daniel Martin Moore performance, we trekked down 6^th and made our way to an old church building, the Central Presbyterian Church at 200 E. 8^th. It seemed the perfect setting for such a reverent, commanding performance in support of their album Dear Companion, which we reviewed earlier. Accompanying Mr. Sollee on cello and Mr. Moore on guitar was Cheyenne Mize, an amazing female violin/electric guitar/vocalist and an incredibly tight drummer, Dan Dorff, who pulled out his old Stomp skills on an amazing rendition of Bury Me With My Car. Surprisingly, expanded songs from Dear Companion were enhanced in this setting and were everything and more that the album could suggest. Afterward we headed to the immortal Stubb’s and caught the absolute end of Besnard Lakes set, spontaneously deciding to treck across town and press our luck trying to get into the much-hyped Stone Temple Pilots reunion. Feeling nostalgic for the 90’s, it was great to see that they still had it, the jerky strut of Mr. Weiland still able to capture the attention of a crowd. The songs sounded great, the band in good form, but the crowd was a bit too fist-pumpy-glory-days for my tastes. The final stop for the night took us back down 5^th to Antone’s to see the Courtyard Hounds, the side project led by two of the Dixie Chicks who aren’t named Natalie Maines. In the same vein as Taking The Long Way, sweetly delivered vocals, acoustic driven guitars and fiddles and tight harmonies define their alt-country sound. The songs were really enjoyable, with even Jakob Dylan joining them for a couple.

As the day wrapped, I regretted not purchasing a pedometer. I would very much like to know how many miles we traversed throughout the day. My shoes immediately shouted "One Hundred!" as we slowly lurched like Boris Karloff in the Mummy, dragging one foot behind us on our way to sweet sleep.

Brian S. Meurer

SXSW 2010 Day One

2010-03-29T13:01:00.008-04:00

SXSW 03.17.10

The South by Southwest Music Festival began in 1987 and is held every year in Austin TX, bringing together over 1,400 bands from all corners of the world, landing in every location anywhere close to downtown that has an occupiable space for a band to set up and an electrical outlet. Swirling around the core of South by Southwest is Ernest Hemmingway’s The Sun Also Rises, set to the 1974 album The Heart of Saturday Night by Tom Waits. Crowds conglomerate into mobs that form and disperse at the drop of a hat, if that idiom is still relevant. It’s an event that is powered by word of mouth and instantly public announcements through Twitter, which exploded here in 2007. It is geared toward those with a deficit of attention, with most bands limiting their sets to thirty minutes and only playing what they feel is their best material. Consequently there is a constant popping in and out of clubs and bars and tents. I overheard a guy on the street say that SXSW is like doing shots of bands. I understood his meaning, but felt it was more analogous to a wine tasting, finding unexpected discoveries and holding on with all your might.

There are one thousand thirty three miles from Louisville to Austin, and that takes roughly sixteen hours to drive. If you pick the right companions, it has the potential to be a journey full of music, comedy and conversation. And quite honestly, with that many hours in a vehicle, you had just better pick the right companions; the kind that will appreciate the serendipity of a well-shuffled ipod announcing the Days of Miracle and Wonder And Don’t Cry Baby Don’t Cry as you shoot through Memphis, and the gentle rebuke That’s Right, You’re Not From Texas as you curse the frontage roads of Texas. We left at 6:30 Eastern time, eight hours to Little Rock, five hours to Dallas, three final and excruciating hours south to arrive finally in Austin, TX at 10:30 pm Central time.

A brief hotel check-in, downtown Austin welcomes your decompression. As the capitol of Texas, Austin is laid out on a much appreciated grid, and for our purposes, the two perpendicular streets that hold our attention for the next few days are 6^th St. and Congress Ave. Housing a dense population of bars, clubs and restaurants, 6^th St. is ideal for the perusal of live music. As we began our recon of the area, we quickly realized that it was Wednesday, March 17, also known far and wide as St. Patrick’s Day. Also known far and wide as Underage Amateur Night, youthful experimenters with adult beverages ruled the scene. While there were a number of bands performing, the main events and destination bands would begin the following day. After a quick lap through 6^th and popping in a small number of venues, it was time to call it a night and get rest for the exhaustathon that was to be the next few days. And make a note for the future to avoid downtown St. Patrick’s Day festivities.

Brian S. Meurer

Then you comb your hair, shave your face

Tryin’ to wipe out every trace of all the other days

In the week you know that this’ll be the Saturday

You’re reaching your peak

Stoppin’ on the red, you’re goin’ on the green

‘Cause tonight’ll be like nothin’ you’ve ever seen

And you’re barrelin’ down the boulevard

You’re lookin’ for the heart of Saturday night

- Tom Waits

Freelance Whales

2010-03-17T05:24:00.002-04:00

Freelance Whales

Weathervanes

2010

With their beautiful and rousing debut Weathervanes, the Freelance Whales snatch a victorious Spring from the icy clutches of Winter, with fascinating oscillations of meter and melody delivered on big fluffy womb-like clouds of melancholy optimism. Through sweetly delivered vocals fluttering over choice instrumentation I can already see the lime floating in the gin soaked summer nights. And it’s a good thing, because with a band name like the Freelance Whales, the music had better be exceptional.

The album is incredibly appealing, with its pleasant dream-like feel enhanced by the billowy grit of a melodica and microkorg drone under tasteful banjo parts and layered with floatingly hummable melodies. The vocals have an earnest delicacy whose playfulness is only enhanced when the lyrical pace increases, showcased in the near perfection of the second song, “Hannah”. Its gratifying arrangement of driving rhythm and fast paced vocal delivery hits all the right spots, dropping to half time and a syncopated beat, allowing the chorus to release the longing and emotion pent up from the verse. Add the fun layer of extraneous jangly bells and swirls and you’ve got comfort food for summer.

But it’s when the fifth song starts that you realize that you’ve already been hooked; they had marked you in the store before you even knew you were listening and tapping and humming. That song is “Starring”, and that title word moves far past merely memorable into the earworm territory of Wrath of Kahn, only voluntary and pleasurable. The first wash of the microkorg grabs you on a primal level, communicating directly with your autonomic nervous system, commanding it to release endorphins. As soon as the trippy break beat starts, you realize that this album just broke through, just went from good to great. And plus, any album that references kilojoules gets extra points in my book.

The second half of the album settles into a continuation of variations on the theme, including the evocative “Broken Horse” and the fantastic closer “The Great Estates”. Amidst the breathy whispers of repeating vowels and melodic hooks reminiscent of the Police, if Sting had never left the hammock, you’ll find an album that flows easily and fluidly as a trapeze artist, wrapped in a wooly blanket of dreamy glockenspiels, taking a warm bath in electrofuzz melodica. This is the stuff that outdoor evenings in the summer are made for. And considering they have at least nine (9!) shows in Austin this week around South by Southwest, we’ll have plenty of opportunities to catch multiple sets, and I for one hope that their live show can live up to this album.

Brian S. Meurer

Peter Gabriel: Scratch My Back

2010-02-25T09:44:00.002-05:00

Peter Gabriel

Scratch My Back

2010

If I could buy the world a Coke, I’d take the money that I would use to buy the world a Coke and distribute as many copies possible of the new Peter Gabriel album, Scratch My Back, far and wide throughout the land. It is a spellbinding reimagining of eclectic songs spanning the past three decades and is achingly beautiful, emotionally raw and intense. It’s an album that works on many levels, ranging from the deceptively complex and elegant orchestral production to the both powerful and delicate qualities of Mr. Gabriel’s 60 year old voice.

Since 2010 is reliving the mid-eighties right now, it makes sense that the video king of 1987 would be the next in a long line of mass-homage, from Johnny Cash to Springsteen and Paul Simon. His innovative forty plus year career is studded with hits, controversy, landmarks and millions of sales. It is, however, precisely his diminished position in current popular consciousness that allows the leap directly to kinetic energy for the composer of Here Comes The Flood and Mercy Street.

Scratch My Back is a sterling choice of songs and feels like each has an intensely personal connection with Mr. Gabriel. It’s an album without guitars or drums, filtering songs that rely on these into strings and horns. There is a tension that runs through the disc that conjures the artist’s frustrating attempt to express the inexpressible. The songs are evocative, moving and dynamic, completely deconstructed from their original form and suspended in the bouquet of an orchestral chianti. The vocal delivery is emotive and passionate, both gritty and fragile, belting and subdued. The entire album hinges on the thematic and relevant, the meaningful and the unutterable. This is expressive music as high art. And it’s only half the story.

The interesting, nay, genius aspect of this idea will come later this year, when the artists tagged here pick up the gauntlet and choose their own Peter Gabriel song to cover. My mind spins considering who will do what song? Pick a slower piano driven one like Washing Of The Water and bring the guitars and drums? Will anyone be bold enough to touch the Passion album?

Even though the entire album feels like the jubilant slow motion finale of a triumphant marathon, it is sure to have its share of detractors. Some will find it dreary, the orchestral arrangements overwrought, melodramatic, unoriginal; essentially unable to breach short attention spans. There are some people who are unable to find beauty in sadness, or who believe that joy and minor keys are mutually exclusive. Lamentations about the absence of guitars, drums and originally penned source material miss the point. This is not an album of the three minute pop song, compressed and auto-tuned to false perfection, as illustrated by recent Grammy performers. This is an album about stripping away flesh and bone to distill the essence of a song’s spirit, absorbing, inhabiting and internalizing that essence to express something meaningful to the artist. It’s about the moment, and it’s Peter Gabriel’s moment, and it’s about time.

Brian S. Meurer

Yeasayer: Odd Blood

2010-02-08T16:14:00.007-05:00

Yeasayer

Odd Blood

2010

Allow me to go on record officially and dub 2010 the new 1985, and Yeasayer has thrown their chips all in. In a stylistically varied album, they cover a lot of bases and carry a lot of baggage that they must overcome. It is this audacious ambition that somehow fuses the confidence of Prince in Purple Rain, the excitement of the Pointer Sisters in Beverly Hills Cop, and the whimsy of the theme to Fletch.

The sonic landscape of Odd Blood is rife with the synth swirls, keyboard stabs and the percussive gated reverb of a bygone era. It shares a feel with Brooklynite neighbors Vampire Weekend and MGMT, but shows itself to be at the more commercially accessible end of the block. If John Hughes, God rest his soul, were alive today and continuing his cathartic cinematic teen drama in the vein of The Breakfast Club and Pretty In Pink, Yeasayer could fully expect a tap on the shoulder to contribute, if not dominate, the soundtrack.

After the otherworldly opener “The Children”, with its experimentally off-putting digital chainsaw vocal effects, the album settles into an eclectic spectrum with synthpop at its center, betraying just the slightest hint of industrial (please don’t tell Trent Reznor). It’s an album that infuses the essence of mid-eighties gems like Billy Idol’s 1984 archetype “Eyes Without A Face”, the one two punch of Duran Duran in 1984-85 with “Hungry Like The Wolf” and “View To A Kill”, and in a hypothetically fantastic scenario, if Depeche Mode had composed the music for Miami Vice Season Two.

But the album is deceptive like a Trojan Horse. It has a lot to get past, and the listener’s ability to do so may depend on the context and time period in which you grew up. The first listen didn’t click with me; the second gave me pause. Somewhere by mid-album, around the song “Love Me Girl”, almost imperceptively, your shoulders will start to move, maybe one is the snare, the other the kick drum, and you start to think about a time when Tears For Fears, Pet Shop Boys and Simple Minds ruled the airwaves.

“Ambling Lip” is the first single off the album, and it’s a marching pulse of effects-laden island sway. A lot of the album is full of effects that sound as though they were dehydrated into powder, placed in the bottom of a boiling cauldron and set over a witch’s fire to meld and bubble to the surface in strange, unidentifiable forms. “I Remember” includes a cascading waterfall of notes that in previous years may have signaled that you just saved the princess with the clever use of your raccoon suit in SMB3. In other places it’s the synthetic growl of a moog or the squeal of a motion-detector ghost that people hang around Halloween.

Odd Blood is a collection of varied, but mostly upbeat, melodic synthpop songs. It’s this lighthearted sense of post-ironic playfulness that pulls the album through the weighted baggage of its material. It just happens to draw heavily from the year MCMLXXXV, and you can bet what this year’s trendy tattoo will be.

Brian S. Meurer

2009 Year In Music

2010-02-08T11:28:00.002-05:00

Two Thousand and Nine turned out to be a pretty good year in music. At this point, I need to clarify that what I really wanted to do was to let you know what I listened to most in '09 and what meant the most to me.

In my most humble persona opinion, the three best releases of 2009 were Phoenix -Wolfgang Amadeus Phoneix, Elbow -The Seldom Seen Kid (actually 08), and Neko Case -Middle Cyclone. If you lack any of these three and my recommendation means anything to you, get them now. Right behind those three were releases by Gomez, David Byrne/Brian Eno, and Bryan Scary that I enjoyed immensely. While I don't have the time to go back and do in-depth reviews as I have recently here, here, and here, I wanted to at least post music that mattered to me in '09.

Enjoy,

b

Phoenix -Wolfgang Amadeus Phoneix
Elbow -The Seldom Seen Kid
Neko Case -Middle Cyclone
The Decemberists -The Hazards Of Love
Gomez -A New Tide
David Byrne/Brian Eno -Everything That Happens Will Happen Today

Bryan Scary -Mad Valentines

Muse -The Resistance
Handsome Firs -Face Control
Wilco -Wilco
David Gray -Draw The Line
U2 -No Line On The Horizon
Pearl Jam -Backspacer
Sting -If On A Winter's Night
The Hold Steady -A Positive Rage (Live Album)

*not released in '09, but I listened to a lot:

Velvet Underground & Nico 1967
Thom Yorke 2006 The Eraser

Grey's Anatomy is Decadent and Depraved

2010-02-04T21:35:00.006-05:00

Sometimes I wonder what Hunter S. Thompson would say about Grey's Anatomy.

I'm pretty sure after slightly lowering his smoldering, long cigarette holder and glowering an expressionless stare, he'd flip through the nearest Merriam-Webster's and manage to utter the following:

pompous

self-important

conceited

vain, empty

ignorantly arrogant

pretentious

He would then snap the volume shut with one hand, letting it fall at 9.8m/s, striking the floor with a startling sound, pausing motionless until he slowly picks up his Wild Turkey on the rocks with his non-smoking hand. "I don't know who writes dialogue like that, but, I've consumed and imbibed and absorbed a lifetime of most every substance known to man, and I've never encountered anything as mind numbing as that show."

Lost

2010-02-02T22:30:00.003-05:00

Final Season
Episodes One & Two

Locke is a really good bad guy.
Juliette dying more than once is the reason they changed the rules for ice skating in the 88 olympics.
Sawyer is being an irrational punk.

I'm a sucker for southeast asian temples.
Geddy Lee is now translating for the head guy at that temple.
When he turned over that hourglass, I expected to see some flying monkeys.
Locke is a really, really good bad guy

Spoon

2010-02-02T21:37:00.007-05:00

for The Weekly Feed

Spoon
Transference
2010

In the search for insight into the nature of reality and truth, there is a traditional zen koan, a paradoxical question posed from Master to Student, that I have pondered for some time now: “What Is The Sound of Spoon Recording?”

When I imagine Spoon in the studio, I picture Andy Warhol’s working and creative area, The Factory; a spacious warehouse that encompassed a renaissance idea of art, whose maxim, in more ways than two, was anything goes. Any idea could be pursued, as the Factory was stocked with supplies to support any whim: painting, sculpting, music, performance, recording, film, etc. I then imagine the Factory populated with the late, great Jim Henson’s Muppets: Gonzo on bass, Animal obviously on drums, Beaker meticulously adjusting every guitar knob and pedal, Dr. Teeth himself on vocals, produced by a veritable mixologist behind the control board, the Swedish Chef. And thusly Spoon’s Transference arrives into the world.

Transference plots the increasing creativity and complexity of Spoon through their unique view of rhythm-as-Rube-Goldberg contraption, whereby the boot kicks over the bucket that drops a ball on the lever that launches the distorted fuzz bass melody that pushes the floor tom to the third beat, which holds the disjointed guitar keeping time on the offbeat. Like these glorious machines, you are mesmerized concentrating on these workings and their effects. Instead of making this album inaccessible, it becomes filled with grooves, at times thick, nasty, trance-inducing grooves. Snake charmer grooves. If there were a subdued hipster rave at a cool coffee shop, this album would be the house music.

Transference really begins to hit its stride by the third song, The Mystery Zone, imbued with a hypnotic mathematical bass drone that time warps you out of any present context, only realized when you snap out of it as the song finishes, you yawning and rubbing your eyes. This is mainly due to Spoon’s affinity for designating an instrument, melody or rhythm as the constant, that one aspect of a song that is going to be the static premise around which everything else revolves, like a game of Frozen Catchers when you were a kid, always determining who would be “it”.

This theme continues through Who Makes Your Money and into the very essence of a Spoonian single, Written In Reverse. This is a solid set of eleven songs that defy the trap of self-indulgence that plague bands who attempt to shun an outside producer, and it’s encouraging to see Spoon succeed in this regard. In addition to it being their first self-produced album, Transference is Spoon’s seventh album, and has a remarkable depth of creativity for that level of longevity. There is also a variety to the album that keeps it fresh, including that adventure in lo-fi exuberance Trouble Comes Running, as well as the 300 level course in dynamic build of I Saw The Light.

Transference is the sound of a band having fun, with its Rube Goldberg machine of bass, drums, piano and guitars falling into odd places that kick the rhythm in the back of its head, projecting both it, and Spoon, forward.

Brian S. Meurer

Ben Sollee & Daniel Martin Moore

2010-01-26T21:45:00.002-05:00

for The Weekly Feed

Ben Sollee & Daniel Martin Moore
Dear Companion
2010

I wrote one word and jabbed a period. I stared at it for three seconds. Underlined it. The review was complete.

Stirring.

This is one of those refreshing albums that renew your faith in humanity, that give you an exaggerated sense of love for others, that wrap your soul in a snuggie© and wet kiss a golden retriever by a fireplace. How exactly can something as intangible as music do these things? If there were an answer to that, you can bet that Clear Channel and the Major Labels would have it in a tattooed formula for all their artists to follow. And judging by the state of mainstream radio, that just hasn’t happened.

Dear Companion, the collaboration of Ben Solle & Daniel Martin Moore, including Jim James on production, illustrates what can be accomplished when proficient songsmiths embrace an efficiency of space and allow music to breathe, while providing a palpable tension from its contrasts. It’s the cello quarter notes vs. the sixteenths on the hi-hat; the spirited and agile banjo vs. the half-time drag of the drums; the most beautiful vocal parts that turn out to be the inseparable amalgamation of two voices.

This is an album that continues in the rich heritage of Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. and Summerteeth, an album that demands you immediately take a road trip through the Great American Southwest in a dusty convertible, Thelma & Louise style, your destination a covered back porch in Knoxville overlooking a forested ravine with a steaming cup of coffee to counter the nip in the air.

Something, Somewhere, Sometime is the opening track that sets the tone for the album, showcasing that intensity of contrasts, the building anticipation that ends the same way as most songs here: too soon. From here, the album settles into its lower-key theme of savory songwriter goodness. Sollee and the warm intonations of his cello are in fantastic form here, especially on Only A Song and Try, from which you know after the first six notes that it will be one of your favorites on the album. You’re also sure to hear the title track Dear Companion quite a bit, hopefully as a future single, as it’s one of the standouts.

These Kentucky artists come together with a common passion and mission of raising awareness of Mountaintop Removal coal mining. According to Sub-Pop, a portion of their proceeds will benefit the organization Appalachian Voices. The album does manage to avoid any heavy-handedness, relying on the artist’s responsibility to raise thought provoking questions, and in the end succeeds in creating as beautiful a landscape as the one they’re trying to preserve. As Mr. Sollee sings, “It’s only a song, it can’t change the world”. But I honestly can’t think of a better place to begin.

Brian S. Meurer

Vampire Weekend

2010-01-10T13:50:00.010-05:00

for The Weekly Feed

Vampire Weekend
Contra
2010

Vampire Weekend is really taking it on the chin these days. It seems that their ability to divide people into virulent camps rivals left-leaning politics at one of those tea bagger parties. Maybe like those events, it wasn’t necessarily representative of the majority, but the critics were loud and obnoxious enough to make it seem so. I’m pretty sure that Vampire Weekend will be number one on Billboard this week with their new album Contra, so maybe they’re rightly unconcerned about a few hyper vocal critics.

Contra turns out to be a mélange of mid-eighties pop-centric Caribbean/African experiments, with nods in all directions, from Elvis Costello sans-attitude, to the Police’s Synchronicity, a bit of Zep’s Fool In The Rain, and the ubiquitous comparison to Graceland. The premise seems to have been: “What if a cocktail shaker could hold Mento, Latin, African, Calypso, Caribbean and American Indie Pop, and what if a calypso breakdown weren’t a breakdown, but an entire song?” It has all the bloops and bleeps a modern indie record with smart production requires, contributing to what in the end will be a very successful record, and rightfully so. It’s also a bit of a genre-bender, with its’ aforementioned ethnic tangents given a ska-dub-electro-pop twist. Contra succeeds if only because it reaches for something different than everyone else right now.

The album opens with Horchata, an upbeat island number driven by the backbone of a straight kick drum with the fluttering of vocal melodies and plunky keys that, like half of the album, make you long for your old Casio keyboard you had in the late eighties. That theme continues throughout, incorporating strong, anxious rhythms with frenetic melodies, often throwing in a swirl of wispy ethereal background vocal breaths. Standouts include the understated, groovy dub in the tasteful use of space of the palette cleansing Taxi Cab, as well as the gyrating Giving Up The Gun. Cousins is the first single, with Run sure to follow, both fitting in the context of the album as a whole. Occasional trouble arises in the squeaky upper register falsetto, essentially bits of White Sky and Run, but overall the melodies are strong and memorable enough to hold their own.

Controversy and critics aside, Contra is a solid album, especially given the fact that it was so highly anticipated and the pressure was on to deliver. And they seem to take more than a bit of joy at bringing that cocktail shaker to the middle of a Tea Party and serving any who care to join them.

Brian S. Meurer

Cooking Musician Interview

2009-08-27T21:31:00.005-04:00

I was looking for my hummus prep notes and oddly enough, found an old, short interview online I did in 07, mainly about musicians and cooking. I thought it was worth preserving here, enjoy.
b

MusiCulinary Opening Weekend--Featuring THE MUCKRAKERS

MusiCulinary is happy to open a new season with an interview with Brian S. Meurer, bassist for Louisville Kentucky band The Muckrakers. He continues a proud MusiCulinary tradition of bass players having some of the best cooking stories, and provides his recipe for Hummus.

MusiCulinary: What is the one cooking skill you're most proud
of, and how/where did you learn it?

Brian: I'm probably most proud of my knife skills. It's such a great feeling when a well balanced knife quickly dispatches with everything on your cutting board. You've probably heard of people throwing babies in pools to make them learn to swim? That's basically the tactic I took. I'd like to say some well qualified sous chef trained me in the finer arts of using a knife. Actually, I will say that. You can believe that, yes sir. In no way did I almost remove a finger and while cleaning blood from the floor decide to cut cleanly, quickly, and efficiently. Absolutely in no way did I stand up, hold up my fist and say as God as my witness, I'll never go bloody again.

MusiCulinary: Tell us about any new type of cuisine or new recipe
you've recently tried out for the first time...and
tell us if you intend to try it again.

Brian: Recently I've been making a lot of a great hummus recipe a friend passed on to me, as well as, but less frequently, pommes frites, which are thicker and tastier than what we know of as fast-food french fries. The key to the hummus is the draining, rinsing and boiling of the garbanzo beans, as well as the fresh garlic and lemon. The absolute key to the frites is the ice bath immediately after cutting, as well as the two frying times. Although neither the hummus nor frites are a new type of cuisine, they both turn out fantastic, so I return to them often.

MusiCulinary: Describe your most memorable culinary disaster.

Brian: Aside from the bloody nearly-severed finger, the bane of my culinary existence is, sadly, rice. Yeah, rice. I know. But I wanted to do it right, no microwaving something in a box. The first time I made a curry chicken dish, I made a great basmati rice, and I thought that rice is easy, no problem. The second, third, and fourth time of making rice, it basically ruined the meal, each time. I kept trying, kept trying to turn out something edible, something in between mush and tiny oblong rocks. To no avail. You need something with rice? How about we use potatoes or pasta as a side dish instead?

MusiCulinary: Describe a typical dinner you would make for a
quiet evening at home.

Brian: Sauteed garlic chicken, peppercorns, green peppers, onions, olives. French bread. A dry cab-sav or chianti.

MusiCulinary: Complete the sentence: "My listeners would
probably be most surprised that I cook
this:__________________________."

Brian: All day long, all day strong
French Onion Soup

The Decemberists @ The Brown Theater 08.10.09

2009-08-21T17:36:00.022-04:00

I love when music sidles up to you, like the slow moving, menacing Mummy in the old Boris Karloff black and whites, or the Creeper from Scooby Doo. It's just sitting there, in that stack of recommendations, and there's so much to do around the house, so hey, two birds. It was in this manner that I absorbed The Hazards of Love by the Decemberists. While not familiar with the band or the album, I was able to put together from numerous background listens that it was aiming for some kind of past-century operatic narrative. In this initial background phase, I was surprised at how many times it surprised me- there was a pace to it; the songs flowed into one another and back again; the abrupt changes were abrupt in the right way at the right time; was that a reprise? The melodies were interesting, the harmonies beautiful, and over repeated listens, those hooks became anchors. And then I got to the lyrics.

By this time I was singing notes and phrases and humming along with the rich melodies and harmonies, until one day during the Rake Song I had to pause. I'm locked in the repeating refrain "Alright, Alright, Alright" when a few of the murky lyrical pieces fall together in my mind and I grasp the dark, dark content. This was the lead single for the album, and apparently generated its share of complaints to radio stations (who subsequently went to bat for the song in its context in the album). As I listened more intently to the lyrics, I recognized the scope and acuity of the narrative, expertly woven and fused with the mood of the album.

The story revolves around William and Margaret, chronicling a journey between meeting and reunification and the complications in between. Rolling Stone described it as "a tale of a maiden knocked up by a shape–shifting beast who may be her future husband. There's also a psychotic queen and three revenge–seeking ghost kids." I began reading through the lyrics, equally impressed with how the story connected and that I was singing along with these words without knowing the words.

It seemed fitting to see the Decemberists at the Brown Theater, the mood of the music enhanced by the ornamental flourishes of a bygone era. Pre show music included selections from Anne Briggs, Nic Jones, Maddy Prior and June Tabor, all 60's and 70's British Folk singers who had a hand in the inspiration of the Hazards of Love, an appropriate prelude. As the band began, they were both strong and playful, light and intense. An enthusiastic, near sell-out crowd on a Monday night, there were some moments that just brought the house down. Main singer/songwriter Colin Meloy has a crisp and clear voice that has both power and earnestness that gives the delivery a real edge. Maybe it's that northwestern accent, like a newscaster working on his non-regional diction, that adds to the mythical quality of the narrative. The two female vocalists on the album, each from separate bands, were able to tour in support of the album, each giving commanding performances of range and energy. They played the entire album, all seventeen songs, front to back, and it was amazing to see it live. After a brief intermission, the band returned for another full set for another ten songs from their catalogue, including the finale of the impromptu action story, a reenactment of "The Tragedy of Seabiscuit", with half of the band moving into the audience with tambourines, drums & cymbals to act out the spontaneous lyrics, culminating with a meteor crashing into Kentucky and wiping out the continental US. It seemed the perfect surreal ending to an evening of antediluvian fantasy.

If nothing else, the sheer ambition of The Hazards of Love is impressive, and the Decemberists have taken hits from those who believe that the effort falls way short. I was actually quite surprised as I made my way through album reviews at the number, and intensity, of negative reviews: Spin calls it "proggish pomposity" for "smarty-pants fans", Blender blasted its "sesquipedalian hijinks". Now, I understand that what could be described as a theatrical folk-rock opera with ornately antiquarian diction might not be your thing, but there's some animosity here, critics taking personal offense at the Decemberists making music they don't enjoy. Entertainment Weekly writes, "Frontman Colin Meloy has many unique gifts as a songwriter — gifts that have all but deserted him on this regrettable attempt at a prog opera. Hazards of Love drowns in convoluted plots, blustery guest vocalists, and comically out-of-place guitar shredding". Another fine example of passing off subjective opinion as objective critique. There's so much music in the world, find what you enjoy and enjoy it. I can only speak to what impressed me- before the next matryoshka doll opened to reveal the ambitious plot- that I was singing along with these rich melodies before I ever reached the underlying text. And for me there can't be a clearer testament to the strength of the music.

Setlist:
Prelude
The Hazards of Love 1 (The Prettiest Whistles Won't Wrestle The Thistles Undone)
A Bower Scene
Won't Want For Love (Margaret in the Taiga)
The Hazards of Love 2 (Wager All)
The Queen's Approach
Isn't It A Lovely Night
The Wanting Comes In Waves / Repaid
An Interlude
The Rake's Song
The Abduction of Margaret
The Queen's Rebuke / The Crossing
Annan Water
Margaret In Captivity
The Hazards of Love 3 (Revenge!)
The Wanting Comes In Waves (Reprise)
The Hazards of Love 4 (The Drowned)

Intermission

Oceanside
July, July!
The Sporting Live
Yankee Bayonette
The Calamity Song
Crane Wife 3
Dracula's Daughter
O Valencia
Crazy On You
Red Right Ankle
A Cautionary Song (w/The Tragedy of Seabiscuit)

The Decemberists

2009-08-10T22:16:00.003-04:00

Louisville KY
August 10, 2009

Louisville's Sordid History

2009-08-06T06:17:00.000-04:00

Bloody Monday, August 6, 1855
Louisville KY

A few years ago I stumbled across a reference to an incident in Louisville's history. I was perplexed. It seemed fabricated; that couldn't happen here, not in my city. Especially with me living here so many years and not hearing about it, without it ever coming up in conversation or school in civics or history. No, surely that's a mistake, the land of urban legend and conspiracy theory. I was the one, however, that was very mistaken.

In 1855, there was a major political party known as the Know Nothing Party, uniting its constituents under the banner of Nativism, or the favoring of existing inhabitants of a region over any immigrants (a wary and ironic eye from the Chickasaw and Shawnee peoples here). Now, this is a pretty sterilized, clinical rendering of the situation; even Charleton Heston's "Damn, dirty apes!" outburst doesn't reach the cold, hard kernel of violent loathing at the heart of the Know Nothing Party, a term now synonymous with anti-immigration and xenophobia. The rise of this party coincided with the major influx of Irish and German immigrants in not only this city but the entire country, with the looming shadow of Catholicism surrounding them, and if the human condition tells us anything, it's that we fear that which is different from what we know.

In those days, newspapers were openly affiliated with political parties, and Louisville was no exception, with the Louisville Journal providing the mouthpiece for its editor, George Prentice (a current statue stands in front of Louisville's Main Public Library). He also happened to be one of the main sources of blame, fanning the embers that would result in a conflagration like this city had never seen.

It was Election Day, August 6, 1855, and the air was charged. The Know Nothing Party was in power- the mayor, most of the council, many judges, the appointed poll workers. Prentice even wrote about the “most pestilent influence of the foreign swarms”, but even in this tense climate, no precautions were taken to provide additional security at polling stations. With the view that only natural born "Americans" had the right to vote, and utter disdain for German and Irish immigrants, poll workers refused access to these foreign-born-naturalized-citizens wishing to cast their ballots. An account from the Louisville Courier, the newspaper of Democrats, states that they were "deterred from voting by direct acts of intimidation, others through fear of consequences, and a multitude from a lack of proper facilities." Altercations increased and intensified into the streets; menacing groups of people were swirling and gathering into mobs and running head first into confrontations, and by mid-afternoon, weapons were making their presence known. "Flying rumors were circulated through the city that the Germans had, with guns and muskets, taken possession of the First Ward polls, and soon thousands of men and boys were running to that portion of the city." From the Louisville Journal, the Know Nothings reacted to news of rioting and bloodshed, "with cries of vengeance upon the murderers, they sought them out and hunted them into the houses that were despoiled or destroyed."

The main areas of rioting occurred in the areas of Butchertown's Shelby and Green Streets as well as the area known then as Quinn's Row, a block at 11th and Main that was a hub of Irish living. Terror escalated with the sound of guns and the fires that were consuming buildings. Quinn's Row was destroyed by flame, as a witness described that "these houses were chiefly tenanted by Irish, and upon any of the tenants venturing out to escape the flames they were immediately shot down." Reports of beatings, stabbing, muskets, cannons, killing, fires and destruction sent a wave of fear throughout the city. Stores were looted and by midnight the glow of fire was all over the city. It was Mayor John Barbee, himself a member of the Know Nothing Party, that to his credit made impassioned speeches to try and calm some of the mobs, saving the burning of St. Martin’s Catholic Church on Shelby St. when he verified there were no stockpiles of guns present, as well as the landmark Cathedral of the Assumption on 5th St.

The rioting went on into the night, and with morning light, the city awoke in horror and disgust. Contradictory and exaggerated news reports assigning blame were carried by national newspapers. The Louisville Courier statement that rings the most true for me is that “the foreigners knew well that they were a small body in the midst of a multitude of persons ready at a moment’s warning to commit any deed of violence. They had long been threatened; throughout the day, in every effort to enjoy that right of suffrage guaranteed to them by the Constitution and laws of this Commonwealth, they had been pursued by mobs of half-grown boys. Their houses were threatened, and warned by the experience of the day, they prepared to defend their lives and property.” Sifting through the records to find truth is an inexact business, with the death toll standing somewhere between 22 and 100, but enough records survive that the black eye is still visible.

It was the New York Times that stated it best in the August 11, 1855 edition, and would be well remembered today, "We trust the occurrences at Louisville will operate as a warning against the heated and maddening controversies, growing out of differences of race and religion, to which they owe their rise. It will take Louisville a long time to outlive the disgrace of the scenes just enacted within her limits."

An Evening With the Old 97's

2009-07-25T00:24:00.009-04:00

I love the din of a crowd before a show, when the music is at the perfect volume and you get lost in the cacophony of the ebb and flow of a room full of buzzing conversations, not making out a single word, just riding the wave of anticipation. It's a humid night at Headliners and it is reassuring to see Louisville turn out to support touring music during the summer. The first act tonight is Murry Hammond, the bassist of the Old 97's, on acoustic guitar and harmonium, in a down-home style straight from the southwest. He's the kind of guy you want around after a hard day's cattle drive, after you build that fire and read some Grapes of Wrath and need a nighttime soundtrack to look at the stars. His voice suits his songs and the feel of what he's going for and was a perfect first act for the night.

Rhett Miller is the second act of the night, and it's just him and his acoustic. He puts about as much energy into an acoustic guitar as possible, and boy does he make the ladies swoon. It's like a mass reenactment of the scene in Back to the Future when the mom as her younger self swings her hair around and says "Isn't he a dream boat?". That's Rhett Miller, in his smart black collared shirt unbuttoned to his xiphoid process, the bane of EMT's everywhere. All of that said, his voice holds up and his hyper-rhythmic strumming hits all the right pops and sizzles of a snare drum. He puts so much of himself into his solo show that I can't even knock him for his looks and supermodel wife.

Set:
1. Like Love
2. Caroline
3. Help Me Suzanne
4. Refusing Temptation
5. Singular Girl
6. Bonfire
7. Come Around
8. Wave of Mutilation (pixies)

The Old 97's are a permission slip for Rhett Miller to cut loose, and there's no acoustic guitar here, but dual electrics. Their set is some of the most fun, upbeat, outdoor grillin, friends-over-for-a-party music I can think of, the kind that moves your hips and shoulders before you know what's gotten into you. By the seventh song, Rollerskate Skinny, when Rhett is singing "I believe in Love, but it don't believe in me", the crowd is eating out of his hand; he is the Pied Piper of Louisville, the High Prophet of Love Gone Wrong. Rhett's getting sweaty, his voice is getting raspy and the ladies are getting crazy. He is not, however, the cocky pretty boy I expect him to be. He has a genuine humility and appreciation for the moment that I can't look down upon. Toward the end of the set, he says, "In my sweaty fervor, I forgot to ask y'all how you're doing tonight?". It seems that the stage is also place germane for fun. In the end, the packed house at Headliners was treated to a good time had by all, with the crowd singing along to their favorites and the band happy to be the Old 97's.

b

Setlist:
1. Dance With Me
2. Barrier Reef
3. Doreen
4. No Baby
5. Mama Tried (Merle Haggard)
6. Salome
7. Rollerskate Skinny
8. Here's to the Halcyon
9. If My Heart Was A Car
10. missed title patsy cline song(?)
11. Question
12. Because I do (from where I stand)(?)
13. Ride
14. Big Brown Eyes
15. She's the center(?)
16. Book of Poems
17. The Easy Way
18. Always hearing voices in the street

The Last Shot

2009-07-18T14:27:00.003-04:00

July 17, 2009
Headliners Music Hall
Louisville KY

Bob Dylan @ Slugger Field, Louisville KY 07.08.09

2009-07-08T22:30:00.002-04:00

Research.

2009-07-08T17:30:00.002-04:00

Time Machine

2009-07-06T19:26:00.010-04:00

It's been a week. A full week. I have spent no money because there's none left to spend, but this macbook pro is a beautiful machine. I love the metallic silver construction, the backlit keyboard, the ease of an apple designed computer. It's been so long since I've used a laptop without it being plugged into a wall that it feels like magic to have a seven hour battery. The screen is brighter, the volume louder, the speed incredibly faster. It also, however, removes some convenient excuses that have allowed me to talk myself out of following through on some ideas.
I've been wanting to take some time and focus on becoming proficient on piano. I taught myself enough to get by and have been putting off a more detailed study and practice of it. Now my laptop is fast enough to plug into the one I have.
I've been wanting to write more and find the discipline to do it, to take time every day and make it a priority.
I've been wanting to record more, throw down another round of quick ideas and flesh them out, expanding to different instruments and sounds and effects and techniques.
I'd like to have more time for photography, to focus on being present and available in any location to pull out that one image that matters.
I find so much value in cooking that I'd like to spend some time studying and preparing and grilling and basting and presenting.
But for all that this incredible macbook pro does, it does not generate time. That's really what I could use more of right about now.

Every New Beginning

2009-06-29T09:46:00.002-04:00

As I lay to rest my beloved ibook, I think about all we've been through. A lot has happened in five years. It travelled the country with me, allowed me to put out fires, write gig reports on the road, play speed marbles, make quick playlists, and watch Anchorman in the middle of the night a multitude times. I'll miss the pearly white sheen of its exterior, the feel of its weight under my arm. At least it wasn't a slow, painful demise. We never talked about it, but I think the ibook would have wanted me to move on. I decided to give it a try. I went to this Genius Bar, it was pretty crowded. I hung out there for a bit in the back, it was getting close to closing time, and I met someone. I was filled with anxiety, blacked out, and woke up this morning with an empty wallet and a new macbook pro. I may not leave the house today.

Beautiful night for a game

2009-06-08T20:25:00.002-04:00

West Virginia, both wild AND wonderful

2009-06-03T17:24:00.002-04:00

If you own a Mac

2009-06-01T16:11:00.002-04:00

Beautiful Lincoln County KY

2009-05-31T19:01:00.002-04:00

Gomez

2009-05-29T20:10:00.002-04:00

Gomez @ Headliners 05.27.09

2009-05-29T20:07:00.002-04:00

Once upon a time in Texas a few years ago, I found myself in Austin and ended up at Stubb's to catch the Nickel Creek show. The band playing before them was called Gomez, and I had never heard of them. It was South by Southwest, after all, so it wasn't unusual to have never heard of someone. However, Kyle's slack jawed look of horror told me that I was about to be schooled.

Gomez hails from Southport, England, and released their first album in 1998, and they just released their sixth album a couple of months ago, A New Tide. They are one of those examples of the music industry that make you shake your head; it boggles my mind that these guys aren't more well known and selling out arenas. I guarantee you have heard one of their songs within the past two years either on a tv show or a commercial, as their last album How We Operate was everywhere. I was fortunate enough to catch their set a couple of months ago, again at SXSW this year, and it was just enough to make me really excited about their coming to town.

A Gomez show is impressive from a technological standpoint; I always like to see guys playing the computer, adding blips and bleeps and loops and bass hits (I'm looking at you Airstream Driver). Some iphones made their way to the microphones for some added keys and sonic manipulation. It was also a pretty diverse setlist, spanning the decade all the way back to the first album. The opener, for example, was Revolutionary Kind from 2001's Liquid Skin, and set the tone for the night with it's dreamy dub drive and swaddling groove. Standouts included Win Park Slope, Detroit Swing 66, Airstream Driver, See The World, and actually a number of others. I'm also a sucker for ebow, which made an appearance on Little Pieces. The closing song was a fantastic How We Operate with a retooled intro that allowed a sparse haunting to mesmerize you before kicking into the frantic paranoia of the song. Overall it was a fantastic show that was supported by the city, on a Wednesday night no less, so thanks Louisville for going to Headliners. One quick note about fashion: Gomez is one of the most unassuming, unpretentious bands I've ever seen. At one point I thought that it's funny that these goofballs make such great music. Maybe because it's the kind of guys I normally hang out with anyway.

The Post Derby Blog

2009-05-04T10:53:00.005-04:00

If you have ever spent time in Manhattan, you have probably experienced the unique mix of emotion that usually comes when it's time to leave because you've run out of money and have obligations back home: melancholy, pensiveness, sadness, longing. It's that feeling of having a euphoric time and not wanting it to end. For me, to my tastes, this is very similar to how I feel about the Kentucky Derby, except the exact opposite.

A friend told me a few years ago never to send an email when you're angry or upset; maybe you will feel differently in a few hours or days. Of course this is excellent advice, and was given in response to an "incident" of mine, so we chalked it up to learning. We can assume that this applies to blogs as well, so I gave it some time. For rational analysis. Or to percolate? Simmer? Stew in a crock pot? That's the way this morning has been. Maybe I'm not a Composter, or maybe I don't want to be known as a composting-enthusiast, but I was taking some inside scraps to the temporary-paper-bag-of-compost-until-we-get-a-large-one. This temporary device was looking pretty shabby, especially after the rain, so I decided to transfer it to a more stable temporary device: a dry paper bag. Don't look at me like that. So I stand on the deck, fulfilling some kind of fated Graecian Tragedy, putting one completely soaked-through paper bag of rotting sludge into another. Any normal, sane, awake, caffeinated person would know that the bottom would fall out. Even my half-asleep, uncaffeinated self knew it might happen and to take extra care. Of course it still happened. I don't know how long I stood there. Staring. Sludge. Feet. It was like Jimmy Stewart in Hitchcock's Vertigo, with the spiraling red swirls behind his head, or Uma Therman in Kill Bill, the red background and siren when she encounters her attackers. At some point, I rummaged through the garage, finding an older small plastic can to try and shovel this mess into, when as I pick it up a black widow runs across the handle. It did cross my mind that the police might show up, responding to the screams of what might possibly have been the kidnapping of a 4 year old girl. I don't really know what happened next or how it got cleaned up, as my cerebellum fused. So, it is in this context that I write about the Kentucky Derby.

There are a few good things about the Derby. It is an economic stimulus for the city. It puts Louisville on the map. It's as good an excuse as any to get together with friends and/or family. There's a history involved. If you go, if you like it, if you look forward to it for a full year, then I'm glad it does it for you. Sincerely, I'm glad you enjoy it.

But let's be honest; it's a two minute horse race. They go around a track. That's all.

I think it's the pomp and circumstance, the superficiality, the inflation, the hypocrisy, the waste, and separation of social strata that gets to me. That's actually quite a list. I guess ol' lady justice is tipping heavily to one side at this point. This is a pretty succinct description of what grinds my gears. This is a funny city; I've lived here most of my life. It is strange to me to see the outcome of all of the influences on the city. It kind of all comes down to your view of if Louisville is a Northern City or a Southern City. We have lots of bars. And lots of churches. Both sweet and unsweet tea. Back in the day, Green Street here in our fair city was well known for it's brothels. Changing it's name to Liberty St. can't erase the past. A high Catholic population. A high Baptist population. We hung with the Union in the Civil War (barely). We have our Seelbach Hotel with it's stories of Al Capone and F. Scott Fitzgerald and the Great Gatsby. Most people here also have quite the dialectal drawl. It's quite the mix.

I also think that it's telling that on either side of the twin spires are the hot spots, the exclusive areas. On the west side is the area that includes the Clubhouse Suites, Turf Club, and Millionaires Row. This area is exclusive for people who need to be seen being exclusive. The Turf Club is the white hot end of this, with a grand half-circular staircase and wall of glass to make it easier for the really wealthy to view the absurdly wealthy/famous. On the east side is the Jockey Club Suites, and it is exclusive with the purpose of being exclusive, accessible by one elevator only. This is mainly the successful business/political area.

And then there's the infield. A very safe view from the exclusive areas, encouraged as long as there is a separation via a tunnel, the infield is it's own beast. Most people don't see the poem inscribed on a plaque as you enter the infield:
"Give me your dehydrated, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to drink free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the shirtless, mud covered to me,
I lift my exacta box beside the betting window!"

I also wonder if it's the obsession with celebrity that is setting me off this year. Not even celebrity, I can get that to an extent. It's the celebrities who are known for absolutely no good reason at all. Famous for being famous. Makes my head hurt.
I came home that night and sat down with Hunter S. Thompson's The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved. And I didn't even need to read past the title.

And They're Off

2009-05-02T21:13:00.002-04:00

Thunderhooves

2009-05-02T21:11:00.002-04:00

The Home Stretch

2009-05-02T21:10:00.002-04:00

The Paddock

2009-05-02T21:09:00.002-04:00

Churchill Downs, Louisville Ky

2009-05-01T10:30:00.003-04:00

Derby 2008

Churchill Downs, Louisville Ky

2009-05-01T10:29:00.002-04:00

Derby 2008

Surgery

2009-04-20T16:22:00.002-04:00

Thunder Over Louisville 09

2009-04-20T16:18:00.002-04:00

Waterfront Park

Thunder Over Louisville 2009

2009-04-20T16:14:00.003-04:00

Waterfront Park

Three tickets

2009-04-15T18:09:00.002-04:00

Cold War Kids Ticket
Death Cab Ticket
Parking Ticket

Mental note: decide if Parking is a good band name

A Night At The Palace: Death Cab For Cutie

2009-04-11T18:36:00.000-04:00

Inebriated, they stumbled down the aisle. We heard them well before we saw them, the group of squawkers pulled by inertia and loss of inhibition from the back of the theater to the front, in a herd not unlike a cartoon fight scene, a cloud of arms and legs and elbows and feet. I remember thinking, as they sloshed past our row and doing their best to make out row designation letters, that wherever they sit, they are going to make someone miserable. Now, I have never been given a field sobriety test by the police, but I assume they might employ the widely-assumed-to-the-point-it's-probably-urban-legend nightmare of saying your alphabet backwards. And just as if they were on the side of the road blinded by a police powered flashlight, the concert-goers field sobriety test was spectacularly failed as, after realizing their error in descending row designations, they turned their tasmanian-devil-pigpen-cartoon-fight-cloud around and promptly entered our row.

Transatlanticism was my introduction to Death Cab For Cutie, and it came at the bottom of a stack of seven cds a friend handed me because he thought I might like them. After trudging through the first six cds, I was predisposed to dislike the seventh and lamenting the soon-to-be-loss of a friend. I was doing other things at this point; I was thinking about taxes, composing recipes, finding matches for lonely socks. From the opening half of the first song, The New Year, I decided it may have been a rash decision to excommunicate the poor friend.

The bill at Louisville's Palace Theater consisted of Ra Ra Riot, Cold War Kids, and Death Cab For Cutie. Ra Ra Riot had a fun 25 minute set; the instrumentation changes kept their set lively, as violin, cello, keys, guitar, bass, and drums combined for some intriguing songs. Their songs are a bit difficult to nail down; the pop melodies, perky drums, driving bass, and haunting combination of cello and violin are comparable to washing down a Tylenol PM with an energy drink. I honestly didn't know they were on the bill until I arrived, but look forward to watching their career.
I was able to catch the Cold War Kids set on WFPK's live show earlier in the day. It was the abnormal, subdued set to compliment the evening's animatedly enthusiastic set. I enjoyed both, but the band looked in true form in the evening set, possibly to emphasize that most bands aren't morning people, even if it's at noon. The large stage and sound and lights and capacity crowd bring the best out of most bands anyway. Cold War Kids are also a fun band; this four piece from California stands out for the bright tenor of the vocals, the pushing of a melody to the top of the singers range, the most decidedly west coast guitar tone (bottled right on the beach), and very solid and tasteful rhythm of drums and bass.

It was during the final band changeover that it happened.

At the conclusion of the Cold War Kids' set, it was the last chance for all restroom breaks, leg stretches, and drink procurement before Death Cab For Cutie took the stage. At various times during the first two acts, the group of people to my left were the recipients of icy-black stares of death, throat clearings, exasperated dramatic sighs, and actual verbal confrontation. The constant high volume talking, laughing, giggling and foolishness would ebb and return, frustrating those in the vicinity to distraction. In light of this, in apprehension of being unable to enjoy the headliner's set, we sat waiting for Death Cab to take the stage, when I noticed a young man four seats to my left, elbows on knees, fists on cheeks, spit into the floor. I was appalled. It was shocking. I then noticed the sharp contractions in his abdomen, the reflex and suppression in his neck, the elevation of his shoulders. Red Flags! Air Raid Siren! He promptly began to empty the contents of his stomach onto the floor. His friends didn't know how to handle this situation; "Alex, Alex, just go to the bathroom!" Oh, poor, poor Alex began to rise and lean left to make his way out of the row, but the alcohol was at this point wreaking havoc on his inner ear. He tipped backward. Someday, his friends will learn about trust falls, but as of now, they were still in that embarrassed shame of shock. Alex continued his backward descent and, in a Krameresque pratfall, landed squarely on the recently discharged contents of his own stomach. The row cleared, Alex and his friends dashed to avoid the proverbial cops at the underage party. The poor usher showed up with a 6 inch broom and dustbin. Some kind of cleaning happened, some kind of chemical applied, people (excluding friends of Alex) returned to their seats, leaving the less than desirable smell of a bar at 10 in the morning. Honestly, this was probably the best thing that could have happened, because they never came back. Off with the horns, on with the show.

Death Cab For Cutie takes the stage in an unassuming manner, recognizing the crowd that allows them to stand where they stand, to connect where they straddle the fence between indie band and major label artist. And somehow, they seem to do it. Listening to their latest full length album, Narrow Stairs, it's not the sound of settling by any means. I mean, an eight minute song, the first five minutes or so instrumental, about a letter written by a stalker? The album is textured but not overproduced; clever, but not pompous. What struck me about the live show was how energetic the svelte Mr. Gibbard and company are live, and the complete representation of the band's discography, and how well that mix flowed. Here's the set list:

Cath...
Your Heart Is An Empty Room
The New Year
Why You'd Want To Live Here
Crooked Teeth
My Mirror Speaks
Grapevine Fires
Title Track
Soul Meets Body
I Will Follow You Into The Dark
I Will Possess Your Heart
Little Bribes
Title and Registration
A Movie Script Ending
Long Division
The Sound of Settling
Marching Bands of Manhattan
----
Summer Skin
Company Calls
Transatlanticism

A final note: I have been in uncomfortably loud environments before, more than my share. Either my hearing has been entirely shot, which I don't think is the case, or this was one of the most comfortable and enjoyable volumes of a concert I've ever been to. All except for the insatiably rabid crowd escalating to a crescendo for the encore. That is truly one of the loudest experiences of my life. Louisville apparently loves Death Cab For Cutie.

Death Cab For Cutie

2009-04-10T23:04:00.002-04:00

04.10.09 The Palace, Louisville KY

Death Cab For Cutie

2009-04-10T22:27:00.002-04:00

04.10.09 The Palace, Louisville KY

The Palace Theater

2009-04-10T20:35:00.002-04:00

A wet & rainy Louisville KY night

Cold War Kids

2009-04-10T16:02:00.002-04:00

In Studio 91.9 WFPK 04.10.09
Opening for Death Cab For Cutie tonight at The Palace Theater, Louisville KY

Je Recommande!

2009-04-05T15:03:00.004-04:00

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that innovation thrives no matter the economic climate, that interesting things are all around us, that we are often so busy or so overloaded that we miss the incredible. I realized a few days ago that I have recently come across some amazing things that I'd like to take a moment to recommend. I have, sadly, in no way been paid or received any kind of gifts from any of the following:

1. Roku

The Roku digital video player is this little black box that you can buy for $99. It plugs into the wall for power. It attaches to your internet connection for your netflix account. It plugs into your tv for your viewing pleasure. You may then watch any movie in your netflix instant viewing queue on your tv. Immediately. It's amazing. It seriously blows my mind every time I watch something. It's like going to the video store to rent a movie. Except instead of going you stay on your couch, and instead of walking up and down rows of terrible movies to choose from, you press a button to select from the movies you have already flagged that you want to see, and instead of picking the movie and walking to the counter and waiting in line and paying, it's included as part of your netflix account at no additional charge, and instead of walking back to the car and driving home, you press play. And they have just included Amazon.com's rentable selection, just in case you need to see that special movie, and spend those couple of bucks.

2. Simplify Media

I was turned on to this product by Charles on our drive to Austin. A fourteen hour car drive goes a lot faster when you can remotely access every song on your home computer from the car. Simplify Media is a download for your home computer that allows you to use an app for the iphone to connect to your home computer to listen to any song you have. As if this weren't enough, you are also able to share libraries with up to thirty other people. Thirty other music libraries you can access. I can't begin to describe how immediate this makes any musical inkling imaginable. This can all be filed under The World At Your Fingers.

3. Net News Wire

NetNewsWire is a fantastic RSS reader, one that I've been using for a few years now. All the websites that I choose to keep tabs on in a format that is so efficient it makes me weep. Allow me to go through a list of a few of the feeds I have in mine: New York Times, Freakonomics, Digg, UrbanMonk, BoingBoing, HuffingtonPost, Politico, Daily Intel, Slashdot, Gizmodo, Gawker, Slate, Reason, Wired.

4. Brandon Bird

I have no idea how I stumbled across this website, but these paintings and drawings are so amazingly fantastic and surreal that I have to share. I mean, Christopher Walken in the basement drinking a Tab building a robot with a C3P0 body and Optimus Prime head!?! David Schwimmer swimming in a pool doing noodle exercises with the elderly!?! Bea Arthur of Golden Girls fame wrestling (and winning) velociraptors!?!
You're welcome. And if you receive a Christmas Card from me this year with Mr. T on it, sorry for spoiling the surprise early.
b

Scrabble, Mangos, and the Oxford Comma

2009-04-04T12:00:00.003-04:00

All in a Saturday, the way it should be

Spring in Louisville

2009-03-30T13:54:00.002-04:00

At least that's what the dogwoods tell me

SXSW Day Three

2009-03-23T20:01:00.004-04:00

South by Southwest means different things to different people; publicity firms looking to expand business; bands looking to expand their fan base; record labels looking to expand their band roster; businesses looking to expand their publicity. Most people are looking to expand their experience, notoriety, and contacts. I just wanted to hear some music.
I was here a couple of years ago with the muckrakers; we had three shows, two of which went extremely well. It’s the contrasts that are standing out to me now, the much lower percentage of heavier bands and the larger numbers of electropop bands. There are more female led bands this year, more americana bands, and many more tight jeans.
Today began with the same gorgeous weather we’ve had the entire time here, and the short drive down 1st St. is one of peaceful anticipation, often accompanied by the Beastie Boys or AC/DC, which seems entirely appropriate. After a brief walk down 6th St., I arrived at the first show of the day, Wax Fang at the Troubadour, a typical enough venue for the area; a long shotgun style bar with just dingy enough to proclaim authenticity as a local institution. Wax Fang hails from Louisville, KY and got quite the boost opening for My Morning Jacket. This week they have devoted themselves to playing as much as possible, their sets ambitious, powerful, and loud. Wax Fang sounds like a frightening night spent hallucinating in a southern swamp. The crowd is intrigued and mesmerized. Singer Scott Carney plays guitar and theremin like a crazed conductor escaped from an asylum, while the band stays in the groove and rides the wave of the song. A nice spotlight on Louisville’s eccentricities.
A few blocks down the street, we manage to catch the Bitter Wigs, the latest creation of Josh Hawkins, Louisvillian by way of Chicago these days. This three piece doesn’t so much as play their songs as ignite a blowtorch and take it to your face. The Bitter Wigs land in that late 70’s, early 80’s era of punk and AC/DC, the Sex Pistols and Black Sabbath. Not for the faint of heart, this riff-oriented groove machine lets Hawkins wail his tenor with the best of them.
Finding our way down 6th to Red River St., we head in Mohawk and check out the bill. The next band to play is called Peelander-Z. Well, seriously, nobody wants to see a band called Peelander-Z, but we end up talking to some people we know when a Japanese band called Peelander-Z takes the stage, but may also go by the name Might Morphin Acid Trip, or at least that’s my impression since they are dressed in those costumes, with the singer having a shaved head except for his long pigtails that he has let grow and partially dyed blond over black hair. I’m just going to have to post pictures. Peelander-Z is basically an Absurdist Thrash Punk band, introducing songs through broken English and holding up the song title on poster board, which is also the chorus, which they get the crowd to chant at the appropriate times, which is really the only lyrics to the song. They played such hits as Mad Tiger, the ever-popular Ninja High School, and everyone’s sing-along favorite Steak: Medium Rare. They climb speakers, hang from the rafters, get on top of the tents, enter the crowd and jump rope, and generally entertain the pants of the crowd. Their final song, What The Health – SUPER HEALTH! has the band in a groovy thrash metal number as they invite a few members of the crowd onstage to take their instruments and continue the song while they put on Mexican wrestling masks, a bowling pin costume, a huge green afro wig, picking up the drums, taking them into the crowd, and handing out pots and pans for the crowd to bang until the whole thing falls apart like some steampunk ferris wheel. I’m honestly not sure what happened after that. I’m beginning to think it was all a dream. I’m really trying not to make a gonzo reference here, but I feel it pulling me in like a stifled tourette’s tic.
As the absurdist fog of Peelander-Z lifted, we made our way to the Austin Convention Center, where a thick line snaked its’ way all the way around the concourse. Looking for the will call window, we passed the 900 or so people standing there and went to claim our Rolling Stone tickets to see Echo & the Bunnymen. As the first ones in the doors, we walked to the front of the stage where the cameramen were as the crowd filled in behind us. This was not my doing, and I owe a great deal of thanks to Kyle Meredith for the tickets. It was an event that was being filmed for direct tv and was a 42 minute set of their most recognizable songs.
Afterward, we decided that a short walk and a drive through Austin would allow us to collect ourselves and find a relaxing dinner. This turned out to be at the Green Mesquite, a fantastic BBQ place near Auditorium Shores that served me some of the best turkey I’ve ever had, complemented by a fantastic meal with friends. This gave us just enough energy to make it back to 6th St., and the swarming masses of the streets throbbed with life and was motivating enough to make a few passes back and forth and pop in on whatever sounds caught our ears. At some point, we saw Brigid Kaelin sitting in with various musicians playing saw, later entertaining a group of comedians entertaining her by writing her into a television script. Rocky Top! they yelled. She complied and promptly trumped them with a Margaritaville yodel.
In the end, South by Southwest was exactly what I wanted it to be, full of friends and music and good times. I missed a couple of the bands I needed to see, I picked up a couple of Louisville bands that weren’t on my schedule, so maybe in the balance of things, I only have one foot on the lounge chair in the swimming pool. But I won’t miss the big fight either.
b

I need 10 cc's of Guero's STAT

2009-03-23T09:49:00.002-04:00

Missing guero's already

Texas Sunrise

2009-03-22T11:44:00.004-04:00

This picture doesn't even come close to doing it justice

Austin Convention Center

2009-03-21T22:45:00.002-04:00

Pressed against the stage for Echo & the Bunnymen. Thanks to Rolling Stone for passing up the line of 900 and walking first through the door.

Peerlander-Z at the Mohawk

2009-03-21T19:05:00.002-04:00

Absurdist Japanese Thrash Trip

Kyle outside the Bitter Wigs show at the Jackelope

2009-03-21T19:03:00.002-04:00

Wax Fang at the Troubadour

2009-03-21T19:02:00.002-04:00

SXSW Day Two

2009-03-21T10:16:00.008-04:00

When I was a senior in high school, I had an English teacher who included a movie in his class: When We Were Kings. It documents the famous Rumble in the Jungle boxing event in 1974 between the former heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali and the then current heavyweight champion George Foreman. The movie had an influence on me because it illustrated an amazing strategy with boxing (the now famous rope-a-dope) as well as showcasing the style of Muhammad Ali, also known as the Louisville Lip, and made me want to know more about my hometown. It wasn't until recently that Hunter S. Thompson stories became known to me as well, specifically one associated with the Rumble in the Jungle event that he was assigned to cover for Rolling Stone. I'm thinking of this because on the night of the fight, Thompson decided that the event would be a non-story, so he chose to stay nestled in a floating lounge chair at the hotel pool.
The kind, kind folks at LEO asked me to check out a few Louisville based bands here in Austin for SXSW: The Watson Twins had performances last weekend; Broadfield Marchers perform late tonight; Wax Fang perform today at 1 pm. I bring this up because I don't want to be the guy in the floating lounge chair at the hotel pool. I'm here with a few friends, and it was Brigid Kaelin who summed up the experience of this music festival the best: South by Southwest is all about riding the wave and seeing where it takes you. Hopefully today the wave will deliver.
Yesterday was a scorcher, the sun was beating down on my baseball hat. We headed in town and first landed at the Insound party. The day started off well with an impressive duo from Montreal performing their sweet brand of electropop, the Handsome Furs. They prefaced their opener with "This is a song Charles Manson stole from the beatles, we're stealing it back". Kyle got an interview with the singer, Dan, and I took pictures of kyle getting an interview with the singer, Dan. We popped in a few places down the street, stayed for a song, popped in a few more, and settled in to hear the Hold Steady. I have to say that so far, theirs is the most high intensity show I've seen, as well as the most crowded. Their singer, Craig Finn, transforms on stage into an exuberant kid in a candy store, a toddler who revels in all the people that have come to his birthday party to see him, basking in the glory of the crowd and delivering his lines with a playfully passionate intensity. Kyle and I headed down 6th for a brief rest at the Driskill, before rejoining the rest of the group down Congress, where we happened upon Guero's once again. And once again it blew my mind. Quite possibly the best mexican food I've ever had. And I got a picture of Kyle with the framed Death Proof photo montage on their wall I'll post later.
The rest of the evening belongs to Bob. We headed a bit further out to swing by the Saxon Pub to catch Bob Schneider, who is apparently king of Austin. I did not know this going into the night. However, Bob went out of his way to make this fact known. It was an interesting night because this first show was solo, just Bob and his classical acoustic guitar, his keyboard, his loop station. And it was amazing. He has these lines that occasionally knock you over the head, or are delivered so quietly at such low intensity as to be inaudible, only to set up the explosion. This room was packed, these people don't talk while Bob plays, these people eat from the palm of Bob's hand, and I see why. You don't want to miss a thing. It makes you sentimental for all the future treasured moments you will have. When his set was finished, he dropped his guitar, walked out the exit door and got in a car. His next set was a few miles away with a full band at an outdoor show, and elvis had left the building.
Threadgill's is located near Auditorium Shores, Austin's downtown waterfront park area, notable to me as the location where I saw spoon a couple of years ago. It seems an institution unto itself, with a fantastic large outdoor patio and stage setup that are perfect for fresh Spring Austin nights, like this one, that attracts all types, including Rachael Ray, who I can't see without thinking of Bourdain's reference to her freakish Joker-like grin. Schneider's full band tonight included an electric guitar player, drummer, the best female bass player I've ever seen, and the accordion/trumpet player, who provided some of the most amazing trumpet/dance combos/entertainment (often playing accordion as a disney robot animatron). It was about two hours of Bob Schneider pouring his charisma onto the even larger crowd, but this time they weren't quiet and hanging on his every word, he was their Pied Piper, their David Lee Roth circa 1984 (go ahead and jump). He had a couple of songs breaking the 12 minute mark, and on top of his amazing songwriting, he did something I've always wanted to do: end the show with Biz Markie's You Say He's Just a Friend. It's hard to imagine that Day Three can compare, but here's to trying.
b

Apologies

2009-03-21T02:43:00.001-04:00

I'm looking at my notes for the day and there's no way I'm going to try to put them in any sort of narrative form tonight. It's been a great long day, lots to report. Tomorrow.
b

Bob Schneider at Threadgills, Austin TX

2009-03-21T02:41:00.002-04:00

At Guero's. Again. And in no way is that depressing. So good.

2009-03-20T22:13:00.002-04:00

The Hold Steady

2009-03-20T19:06:00.005-04:00

Austin TX

6th street, Austin TX

2009-03-20T19:06:00.004-04:00

Uploaded - 3\20\09

2009-03-20T19:05:00.002-04:00

SXSW Day One

2009-03-20T00:47:00.002-04:00

For the record, fifteen hours in a car is just too long, no matter what. Discomfort turns into exhaustion, which turns into delirium, which turns into hallucinations. Long story short: We Arrived.
I've been in the music industry for a while now, and in many ways I am jaded. I am not, however, jaded enough to not fall under the spell of Austin. It's a fantastic place that is best described as eccentric; it still retains its own identity in the midst of the very large and loaded-with-preconceived-notions state of Texas. During the music festival known as South by Southwest, every available room, space, vestibule, or cubicle is taken over by organizations (record labels, booking agencies, magazines, radio stations) and packed from open until close with bands from all parts of the world, usually in blocks of 45 minutes. Spring has sprung here, and it's absolutely fantastic weather. We arrived last night 4:30-ish, caught a few hours sleep and headed downtown: streets are closed, everybody's out and about as music bleeds from one venue into the next. We found our way to the New West Party at Club de Ville and really enjoyed Tim Easton's set. To make this even better, they had a great set up providing small plates of cooked chicken tortillas (pictures provided). Corb Lund followed, and had the fantastic and notable line "Good Copenhagen is better than bad cocaine". We took off for a bit and walked down 6th St., making our way through the crowds, dodging the music bleed, and noting the lengthy lines to get into the more popular places, not unlike the long lines at an amusement park that you decide can't possibly be worth waiting in. Took a break in the Driskell Hotel before heading out again to catch the Gary Louris / Mark Olsen set. It's been a long time since I've seen the Jayhawks in any formation, and it was great to hear them.
A few blocks away we were trying to check out the Hold Steady show, but not only was the club packed wall to wall, there was a line around the block waiting. Headed to the Alternative Press party at 5th & Congress, which turned out to be a DJ party on the roof of a building. While beautiful and full to capacity and definitely a hip an happening place, it was chest-thumping-ly and ear splitting-ly loud. On the sidewalk outside, we found a few options down Congress across the river. After walking 17 blocks or so, we ended up in front of Guero's, and the answer presented itself.
The goal of the night at this point was to make it to Stubb's to see http://www.gomeztheband.com/. As we got in line, security informed us and everyone behind us that they were sold out and that we would not be able to get in. Unless we wanted to wait a bit, then maybe we could. Well, ok. We hung out a bit in line, moved forward and they eventually let us and a few of those behind us in, and it was definitely the payoff of the night. Stubbs was packed and gomez was fantastic (if you are unfamiliar, start with How We Operate) and I'm really looking forward to their new album coming out at the end of this month.
Being on our feet all day has finally taken its toll, so to rest we go. Tomorrow will be another fun filled day. Unfortunately, the wireless networks are severly taxed down here and I am for the most part unable to do any kind of serious writing or updating during the day, apart from the twitter type status updates. With that in mind, you will be able to find out what's going on with us throughout the day in 140 characters or less at twitter.com/bsm1
b

Alt Press DJ Party on the roof on a beautiful Austin day in TX

2009-03-20T00:44:00.002-04:00

Gomez at Stubbs in Austin TX

2009-03-20T00:42:00.002-04:00

Uploaded - 3\19\09

2009-03-19T16:49:00.008-04:00

Beautiful Day in Austin TX

2009-03-19T16:49:00.007-04:00

Downtown Austin, uploading pics

The Way to Eat in Austin

2009-03-19T16:49:00.006-04:00

First stop of the day, New West party, enjoyed the Tim Easton set, and thoroughly enjoyed the guys prepping the incredible food. Hoping to catch the Mark Olsen/Gary Louris set at 4

Hours in a Car

2009-03-18T20:30:00.001-04:00

I'm estimating 14 hours will be the final travel time from Louisville to Austin. We are currently 9 hrs in, passing through Little Rock. 4 guys in a car, music, talk, reading, talk, music. Listened to License to Ill, Mitch Hedberg, Kyle was dj for a bit, rem now. It's going to be a long and late night.

View from the back: aaron's turn at the wheel

2009-03-18T20:24:00.005-04:00

Passing through Arkansas

2009-03-18T20:24:00.004-04:00

Whiplash

2009-03-14T16:13:00.004-04:00

That whole thing about the spring in my step, well, I take it back. This city is famous for its' whiplash weather, its' neck breaking, wardrobe testing, inducing-weathermen-to-a-fever-pitch, capable of jumping or dropping thirty degrees in a single evening weather. And sometimes, it's just too much. I mean seriously, like when you didn't even know it, but you're ready for spring, and then spring comes (Tuesday) and then it's gone (Wednesday), and it drives you mad. Now, let me gather some perspective. I like Louisville, I like that we get to experience all four seasons here, and they are each gorgeous. The change in the smell of the air from winter to spring, from summer to fall is enough for me to get through the dog days of summer and the power failures and incompetent drivers of winter. I realized Tuesday night that I welcomed spring with open arms, to sit outside on a deck and feel the breeze and see the moon and smell the smells of spring and growth. And when I woke up Wednesday morning, I felt robbed. You see, one of the best things for me about winter is pockets. I love wearing jackets and long pants and having pockets full of all the things that you might need; wallets, phones, swiss army knives, money, earphones, flashlights, gloves, toboggans. The massive head fake of letting this go and moving to a jacketless, shorts driven climate and then jumping back is enough to induce grandma "spells". You know, "I'm just having one of my spells". Yeah, me too.
I'm hoping for good weather in Austin this upcoming week, but I can't check it yet because if it's less than stellar, I don't know if I could handle that right now. I've been listening to the sxsw music player to get a feel for and find some standouts that I want to make a priority. There are a few Louisville bands I need to check out: Broadfield Marchers, Watson Twins, & Wax Fang, as well as an old friend of mine Josh Hawkins from Chicago will be there. Kyle's radio show has been interesting because most of what he's been playing are inadvertently bands that will be at sxsw. As for today, it's a day that lacks motivation, or more accurately, sucks the motivation out of you and makes you either clean the house or watch dvd's. And today, I had forgotten how great season 2 of Alias was (thanks rob).
b

Spring Drive

2009-03-11T17:14:00.002-04:00

I woke up today with a spring in my step. Maybe that overstates. Not like Gene Kelly. More like Groucho Marx. But his was more of a squatted slide. Ok, so today I woke up with a spring in my squatted slide. I had to be out early this morning, and maybe it was the atmosphere, or the sun, or the fresh air, or maybe it was the way WFPK was firing on all cylinders and rocked my 20 minute drive, but it was a great optimistic, full of potential kind of morning. This is possibly only because of the contrast with the first two days of daylight savings. Maybe it takes two days to get over the change.
I'm starting to think more about South by Southwest. I'll be going to Austin TX next week, mainly because I'm feeling like that dry sponge for new music and Austin is a big soapy bucket during the festival. I'm looking forward to going with a few friends, like Kyle (who is doing a fantastic job on the weekly feed at WFPK) and Aaron, mainly because it's been a while since we've had a road trip. That's about 2070 total miles, and Kyle and Aaron have proven to be excellent traveling companions. We'll also be there with Brigid Kaelin, and I look forward to keeping a fairly clean schedule to see what we chance upon. Austin is a fairly small city, and just like you can drive anywhere in Louisville in twenty minutes, in Austin you can walk there in that amount of time. I'll also be covering the festival for the LEO, or they will be linking to the site, or copying to their site or something of that sort. I think what I do will be a combination of twitter-like updates throughout the day along with longer blog type posts. And pictures of meals at Guero's.
b

Once Upon A Time Called Now

2009-02-22T17:24:00.002-05:00

Appreciation is a funny thing. Everyone has different tastes, values different things, and it's interesting to chart your life and see when and how you have changed, and the reasons why. Traveling and touring was a major factor for me, that immediate and transformative infusion of observation, experience, and perspective that changes the way you see the world and the way you see yourself. Fundamental questions about preconceived notions, and the reasons those preconceived notions exist. Fears, phobias, and fatigue combine in the crucible of self-examination and begin to melt away into truly experiencing life and savoring every minute of it.

A few years ago we made our way to Austin TX for South by Southwest, one of the largest music festivals in the US. It's a little over a thousand miles from Louisville to Texas, and that's a lot of hours in a car. We had a great experience, played a few shows, met some people, ate well, walked a lot, went to a few parties, and in general just soaked it up. Caught a few shows: Gomez and Nickel Creek at Stubb's; Spoon on the lawn; Jamie Cullen at the Paste party; ate at Guero's (played there too). I found myself missing the city when Quentin Tarantino's "Death Proof" came out and it was based there (including a scene at Guero's). All that to say that this year I have decided to go back. Stag. No band.

I'm not sure when or how it came about. I haven't been involved with much new music lately, and I missed most of last year due to being in the studio. I kind of feel like a dry musical sponge, and I like the idea of being surrounded by over 1800 bands to choose from. That kind of schedule is no joke. And actually, I think that the idea of not performing, not carrying equipment, not setting up drums, not worrying about attendance and performance and tuning, is extremely appealing. To be able to fully enjoy the experience of it all. It's also a great event to run a live blog from, and a local publication is going to be involved, so you may read about how it's going in multiple places. I don't want to overstate, so I'll post that info in a couple of weeks. I'm looking forward to it, looking forward to the people I'm going with, looking forward to the experience of it, looking forward to savoring every minute of it.

Live From Sciatica

2009-01-26T10:48:00.004-05:00

Aw, baby, I know it's been a long time, but you know baby, sometimes we just get too busy.

An impressive distance between posts, absolutely, but here we are. Maybe it's just the ample time I have on my hands today.
Yesterday morning, after not running, jumping, climbing trees or lifting television sets over my head, something went "boink" in my lower back. That was apparently what is uncommonly known as the sciatic nerve. Amazingly enough, it's the longest and widest nerve in the body, and when you mess with this bull, you really do get the horns. One might think that being forced to lie around all day is great. Well, so is chocolate icing, but after a while, you long for a grapefruit. So, I fortunately have a few things to occupy myself: a Larry McMurtry book, the David Carradine Kill Bill diary, access to my laptop (thank you hulu) and phone for access to net news wire, a fantastic rss reader. I watched North by Northwest last night, and have the last disc of Season 1 Alias today. Hulu helps with 30 Rock, Daily Show, SNL clips, Family Guy, etc. and I chase that rabbit down the hole as far as you can. Makes me wonder how I ever missed this:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/16771/saturday-night-live-snl-digital-short-iran-so-far
I think I'll just keep updating this post throughout the day. Watch as sanity degrades. Enjoy!
b

Edit 1
That was so funny! Watch how sanity degrades! Rhetorical sarcasm? Self-fulfilling prophecy? Doesn't seem so funny now. I feel like I'd give anything to go to the kitchen and make some hummus. Or take a hot bath. Or go for a run even. Now I can't get the "Iran So Far Away" melody out of my head, like a worm burrowing further and further in. At least it will be a funny insanity. 30 Rock really is a consistently great comedy. Like when Tracy Jordan asks Jack if he likes Phil Collins. His response: "I've got two ears and a heart, don't I? "
I also got sidetracked because I started thinking of the Summer of George. This is the Seinfeld episode where George gets fired from the Yankees, but has three months severance. He basically does nothing at all and in the end slips, hurts his back, and goes tho the hospital, only to have the doctor pronounce that "Your legs have sustained extensive trauma. Apparently, your body was in a state of advanced atrophy, due to a period of extreme inactivity." Hmmmm.

We Assume Too Much

2008-12-03T19:49:00.002-05:00

I act as though tomorrow is guaranteed, completely unconcerned with every contraction of my heart, expansion of my lungs, flow of oxygenated blood to my brain. I don't even consider the possibility that a random accident or illness could irrevocable change my life. It obviously goes without saying that I will have shelter, be able to go the grocery, be able to pay the bills. That I will not be the victim of domestic abuse. That the absence of tragedy is guaranteed. The size of this illusion is astounding. I am continually reminded to be thankful for a home, for love, for friends, for breath. I am reminded of those around us in our city who are without, those we don't think about because they don't directly affects us, that someone else will help them, or even those observers who pour out that extra ounce of judgement and pronounce they shouldn't be in that situation, they should pick themselves up by their bootstraps. I don't even know what bootstraps are. Need is need. Grace is grace. Compassion is compassion. All we have is time and money. Usually not a lot of either. Consider ways that you may enrich someone else's life this season. Even if it's as small as cleaning out your home of clothes you haven't touched in over a year (my garage has 10 huge bags to go out), or canned goods, or volunteering phone lines, deliveries, kitchen duty.
Just before signing the Declaration of Independence, Benjamin Franklin said "We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately."
b

United Way
www.metrounitedway.org
Center for Women & Families
www.thecenteronline.org
Dare to Care Food Bank
http://www.daretocare.org/
Habitat for Humanity
www.hfhlouisville.org
Wayside Christian Mission
www.waysidechristianmission.org
Healing Place
www.thehealingplace.org
Dismas Charities
http://www.dismas.com/
Kentucky Harvest
www.kyharvest.com
Christian Social Ministries at Walnut St.
http://www.walnutstreet.org/serve.asp#csm
Safe Place Services YMCA
http://www.ymcalouisville.org

The Hands of the Country

2008-11-07T07:28:00.003-05:00

It's an interesting time to be alive. It feels like something is going on in the country. I think it's a wave of possibility reverberating through red and blue states, hitting some areas and people a little harder than others. I tried to buy a copy of the NYT to have a tangible document of the occasion. They were completely sold out across the country, as I'm not original as I thought. On the flip side of that, there's also a lot of negative factors facing the country, mostly dealing with the economic crisis, including the threat of and actual loss of jobs and homes. We have decided, in my house, that since helping others consists of giving money or time, in lieu of buying everyone (excluding children) Christmas presents this year, we will be refocusing that money and time on volunteer work and local charities. Sticking with the category of not as original as I thought, Michelle at Consuming Louisville feels the same way, inspired by President-Elect Barack Obama: "So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other." Louisville has a lot of organizations that are in place to feed, clothe, and shelter those who are without: Wayside, Kentucky Harvest, Salvation Army. This could mean working in a soup kitchen handing out food, or delivering meals, clothes, kids toys, or anything. It just seems that no one person will make the country better without a change of attitudes and willingness on the part of individuals be the hands of the country.
b

Philosophies of Food While Traveling

2008-11-02T10:45:00.005-05:00

We drove to Bowling Green KY yesterday to play for a big outdoor WKU homecoming event across the street from the stadium. The drive there was remarkable for a few reasons: how hard I laughed on the way there in a car full of guys I have arguably spent way too much time with; that it has to be near fall peak, and while mostly beautiful on a near perfect day, it was more notable that most trees were either empty or still green; and also that it is still good to play music.

When you're in a band and travel, room must be made to accommodate different philosophies of food. A tier system is set up in terms of preferences and absolute refusals. Traveling on a limited budget means that meals must be convenient, moderately healthy, and delicious. After years of honing the system, here's how we typically fare:

Morning: Coffee is mandatory. I mean substantial coffee, which excludes hotel coffee. Independent, local option first, although not usually available. Starbucks second. Cracker Barrel or Dunkin Donuts coffee in a pinch, as in none of the others are available. A good everything bagel is as close to mandatory as you can make something without it being mandatory. I've found that bagels are one of the most perfect things in the world that aren't as available or in-demand as one would think. Cream Cheese, Veggie spread, or even with lox. It makes me want to open my own bagel shop and find out what a person who makes bagels is called so I can put it on my business card.

Afternoon or evening: McDonald's was never really an option with our band. On the road, you can't avoid fast food. We at least are as selective as we can be. Chick-fil-a is our go to for comparative health and quality. You really can't beat their chicken sandwich and waffle fries with a Pibb. Except on Sunday. How many times did we make plans to stop a few hundred miles up the road and let our mouths water for hours only to be met with severe disappointment. Too many to count. Makes me want to open up a Chick-fil-a and violate what I'm sure is their franchise agreement not to be open on Sundays. And sell blankets. Panera or Atlanta Bread Co. is an option, as is Jimmy John's and the occasional in-a-pinch Subway. We were fortunate that WKU provided us with Jimmy Johns, my preference being the Beach Club, made up of turkey, provolone, avocado, cucumber, sprouts, lettuce, tomato, & mayo. Some got a cookie. I did not that a cookie was optional, therefore I was cookieless.

We don't normally do big dinners. The occasional University would take us out, and we've had some incredible meals. We just recently went to Artemesia here in Louisville for some discussion. It's located in the East Market art district of town and has such a great feel to it. The standout mind blower of the meal turned out to be one of the appetizers we got, Bruchetta a la Ann, described on the menu as "Toasted Focaccia, Homemade Marinara, Goat Cheese, Kalamata Olives". If you're ever in the area, go if only to indulge in an appetizer. But for now, I'm just trying to figure out where to camp out Tuesday and watch Election Results come in.

b

Music, The Mind, and Bison

2008-10-25T12:38:00.004-04:00

Most days I wake up with a song in my head. I have recently found out this is not true for everyone. It makes me wonder at the complexities of the human mind. I mean, what is it, exactly, that makes Bobby Brown's 1989 Ghostbusters II hit "On Our Own" or Madonna's 1984 song "Borderline"? I don't like it, but I have to be honest. Except that I do like the Bobby Brown song.
Throughout the day, there is always a song in my head. I often have no idea what triggered it, but yesterday I was able to reverse engineer the mechanism that got me from Elvis to Paul Simon to Jerry Lee Lewis to Jim Morrison to George Thorogood. All of these things make me wonder if it applies universally by profession, as if a chef wakes up craving a dish or a meal.

I've had some incredible times recently. One is Havana Rumba, a perpetual provider of comfort, cool, and mouthwatering cuban food. (Note to self: improve alliteration skills). Fricase de Pollo is my go to dish there, with the Cherna a la Parrilla (grilled grouper, rice, black beans, plantains) as a worthy backup. If only they'd bring back the Pollo Ropa Vieja....
One of the fantastic hidden gems of Louisville is Cumberland Brews, on bardstown road in the heart of the highlands. I was a bit early for the evening plans, so I stopped in next door neighbor Ray's Monkey House, a great coffee shop, sat outside with a latte and chugged through a portion of my current book, of which I'm on my final allowable renewal from the Library. It was a beautiful evening, the first nip of fall, and bardstown road is a great place to sit outside and have coffee.

Cumberland Brews is small and quaint, but one reason for its greatness lies in the fact that it has a hidden upstairs, a secret stairway that is as close to a speakeasy entrance that you'll find. Upstairs has four tables and a bar. That's it. I was there to watch the last presidential debate with some friends, and if ever there were a room for small informal gatherings that may or may not include the heat and rhetoric of politics, this is it. My recommendations include Octoberfest brew and the Bison Burger, which I must say, far exceeded my expectations and actually made me desire a burger again. I even took a picture of it with my phone. But it didn't do it justice. Ansel Adams couldn't do it justice.
b

More Sincerity Than Nobility

2008-10-18T11:56:00.001-04:00

I just thought that was a great line from a book, the context of which is that the character is contrasting himself and his aristocratic relative, stating that the relative is more nobility than sincerity, but he is more sincerity than nobility. It's stuck with me for a few weeks so I thought I'd put it here.

To borrow from Bill Watterson, creator of Calvin & Hobbes, the days are just packed. It's been a blur the last two months working out details for the release of the new album and I think it's catching up to me. Hopefully in the next few days I'll be able to get some decent sleep. It'll be a busy week in Louisville for us, and then on to crafting some fuel efficient travel plans. I don't know if we'll make it much further south than Atlanta, I'm sure the Carolinas will be in play, and we will make good on our intent of hitting the northeast, or at least DC, NY, NJ, Boston, Philly & Chicago. More updates as they arrive.

Tears and Moments of Profundity

2008-10-18T11:53:00.000-04:00

*originally posted on muckrakers blog Sept 9, 2007

I sit now in my kitchen and the waterworks are flowing. Eyes and nose wide open like a broken faucet. I decided today to try my hand at the creation of the perfect French Onion Soup. The main guide is Bourdain's Les Halles book, with a bit of extra guidance from Thomas Keller's Bouchon. As one puts it "French Onion Soup is, unsuprisingly, all about the onions", and right now I am halfway through the cutting of eight large onions. Can you smell me? It's ok, go ahead and say no just to make me feel better, but I'm probably going to have to fumigate my house and not be around anyone for a few days after this is all said and done.

I could be mistaken, but I think that the first time I had the dish was in Manhattan last week. It was odd because I sat down and immediately thought, Yes, That's what I want, when without realizing it, I had nothing to base that decision on. Maybe just the preconscious desire to have me some French Onion Soup. It turned out to be incredible and I remembered seeing it in a book I had, so here I am today.

Last night in the studio, Kyle had stopped by later in the evening, and probably somewhere past one he asked if we had heard the new Silverchair. A large group shaking of the head, and he pulls it up on his computer, plays the video for Straight Line and If You Keep Losing Sleep. Maybe it had been a long day, maybe I was tired and unexpecting something of worth, but it literally blew me away. Stood there with my mouth open, not believing what I was hearing. The strange but fantastic chord changes, the driving rhythm, the singer with a greater vocal range than I realized.
I stated at that point that I couldn't remember ever standing somewhere, watching and listening to something that was truly original and innovative.
I downloaded it this morning and if I have to cry, I might as well have something of this quality to make it better.
Check it out, but now the onions are calling out to be cut.
More to follow as it develops,
b

edit 1, 7:17 pm. Man this stuff takes a long time. I haven't even been able to add the stock yet, as the onions have yet to reduce and caramelize. By the way, Fletch was on tv this morning, which was funny because Rob and I were debating the merits or lack thereof between that movie and the sequel. The former is great, fantastic, hilarious. But Rob made the statement that the sequel was on par with Funny Farm. I immediately lost quite a bit of respect for our favorite front man at that point, since in spite of the title was most certainly not funny.
I'm getting hungry. More soon,
b

edit 2, 8:25 Did I mention this takes a long time? Caramelization has begun. I'm beginning to give up on eating tonight.

edit 3, 8:55 I wish I could import the smell of this, I'm so hungry and it smells sooo good. All ingredients in, being brought to a boil, then simmer for an hour. We'll see.
b

edit 4, 10:20 Soup for me. So good. So good. Happy now. I recommend.
Now go listen to Silverchair, or watch the video. Thanks for indulging me,
bsm

Mojito

2008-10-18T11:52:00.000-04:00

Mojito

So, we went to Mojito (a restaurant here in Louisville) last night, and first of all I must offer congratulations to Fernando. It's actually quite a feat he's pulled off, and I drove home shaking my head that something as silly as food could have been so incredible, or created such an exuberant experience. Havana Rumba was without doubt in my top 3, but I think I really went in with no expectations. We arrived around 8pm Saturday night, I thought it might be a little crowded, since it was the weekend and due to Marty's review, but the place was packed, seriously packed, somewhere around a two and a half hour wait. We sidled up to the bar for a nicely assembled mojito and gin and tonic, a bit clueless as to where to stand for a while. It wasn't too long before we snagged two bar chairs. Looking through the menu, it all looked so good, I decided to try a couple of tapas at the bar. First was the guacamole and chicharritas, which were really good. Light, crispy plantain chips to dip in avocado, lime, cilantro and red onions. Next up was Boniato Frito, sweet potato fries with a sidecar of smoked honey. Smoked honey, you say? Yes,yes,yes and how. This is serious goodness right here. I almost wept. Needless to say: incredible. Trio de hummus next, and they even found a way to infuse an ordinary dish like hummus (garbazo, black bean, and roasted pepper) with some fantastic ingredients and additions.

Let me say a word at this point about the beautiful presentations: from the dish, to the plate on which it's served, to the drink glasses, all very contemporary and just flat out cool. It was somewhere around this point that I realized that my entire dinner was going to happen at the bar, so barkeep! More, more more!
Calamares Fritos were next, and nice calamari though they are, what really set them off was the avocado lime aioli. This was the second time tonight that I actually considered the consequences of lifting the sidecar/dipping cup to my lips. In the interest of decorum I declined, with regret.
Empty plate removed, new beautiful dish arrives, it's like magic. Now landing: croquetas de yuca, a beautiful crab cake in all it's glory, with yet more of the aforementioned avocado lime aioli. You may be no Amazing Kreskin yourself, but I'm sure you won't be suprised that I found the crab cake yet another mouth watering, flavor bursting dish.

At this point, we were squarely tucked in at an hour and a half, completely happy with our good fortune to sit at the bar, and ready for espresso and a dessert, which ended up being the churros con chocolate. I regret to inform you that I only had a very little bit of this excellent dish, as we were sharing and I thought I may lose a digit if I attempted another bite.

So, we laughed, we cried, we talked to Fernando for a minute, as he was just a tiny bit busy, and ate our way through the joys of an otherwise stormy night. Congratulations guys, thanks for a fantastic restaurant.

bsm
07.07.07

Codeine and Pneumonia/ The Essence of the Universe

2008-10-18T11:50:00.000-04:00

So I was fighting off pneumonia last night, armed only with antibiotics and codeine. Powerful weapons indeed. I woke up shocked that I had written a pretty long blog that cut to the core of living and learning. "I was dreaming when I wrote this, forgive me if it goes astray..." P

Life is growth. Stagnation is an abomination. If we fail to grow, if we fail to dream, if we lose initiative, we condemn ourselves to mere catatonic existence, slogging through the rest of our days in a non-thinking stupor. Is this extreme? Possibly, but I feel strongly that without the clarity of a rational mind, we are doomed to hold as our highest goal the philosophy that ignorance is bliss. Let me step back. I was fortunate enough to emerge from my seventeen years of schooling without my desire for learning completely squelched. What I mean is that all those facts, dates, formulas, and timelines do not provide wisdom. Only the application of knowledge can give the clarity of wisdom. I read more now, learn more now, and ask more questions because understanding and communication are extremely important to life as growth.
Let me make the following disclaimer: I am not a big fan of musicals and musical theatre. There are a handful I can get behind, but for the most part I just don..t enjoy them. I believe that every band is allowed a maximum of one person who loves musicals, and that person in ours is Rob. However, one of the few I have found extremely compelling is Rent, the rock musical by Jonathan Larson based on Puccini..s opera La Boheme. Rob was kind enough to let me borrow the soundtrack a year ago, and somehow in spite of everything, I liked it. It wasn..t until last week when I saw the dvd that I had any visuals to accompany the soundtrack. The musical stands on its own, but somehow the story of its.. creation elevates it to a level of poignancy that really tears me up. You see, Larson received a tuition paid scholarship to college for acting. After that he moved to New York City, where for the next ten years he worked in a diner, writing the whole time he wasn..t working. He wrote some plays, but it wasn..t until Rent that things started to come together for him. A few more years, finding producers, cast, and fine tuning the script, and he had it in top shape. The final dress rehearsal, friends and family were powerfully moved by the performance and story, and Larson felt the fulfillment of his creation received by the audience. The critic from the NY Times was there and spoke with Larson extensively, assuring him the power of the writing and performance would make his musical a hit. Larson went home that night and died of an aortic aneurysm. Rent went on to the success he knew it would.
All of this to say that life is short, there..s no day but today, and to forget regret, for life is yours to miss. And that we have a dream. A dream that is larger than ourselves, bigger than any of us individually. It has been with us for a long time and we invite you to join us in this dream, share our experiences, dream with us. Life is growth. Stagnation is abomination.
bsm

Paradigm Shift

2008-10-18T11:47:00.001-04:00

Sometimes you have to stretch out of your comfort zone. Life is about challenges and how you rise to meet them. I love to try new restaurants. It is something that has been an interesting shift in me for the past few years. It has been a bit strange traveling so much in the past year or so to find myself in a new city and finding the same stores, the same new clean, well landscaped Main Street Disneyland type areas, full of the stores that each of you know so well, or watching those with money to spend go to them. Growing up, I loved my big box chains, my Olive Gardens, O'Charley's, etc. Now, I can understand the allure, you always know what you are going to get, it's always going to be the same. But you're missing out. Every city has numerous local joints that offer up a flavor of the city, or even push it out and adapt it, or those who have emigrated bring in a taste of their own culture. It's all at our fingertips. My birthday was last week, and my only prerequisite for the dinner was that it had to be a place I'd never been before. In Louisville, I chose a cool little place called Havana Rumba, in the St. Matthews area. It was out of this world, an over the stands walk off homerun. It was my mental projection of a happenin Key West restaurant, or would fit in well in Manhattan. I won't go into the meal itself, but it's an example of what's out there that we're all missing when we settle, when we're comfortable, when then anxiety of ordering in broken English puts us over the edge. In this town, there is a gold mine website louisvillehotbytes.com that is fantastic, and I fully recommend, nay, endorse Robin Garr in his status as foodie extraordinaire. I have also been fascinated with Anthony Bourdain, a 28-year professional chef in NYC and now world sampler for the Travel Channel. This is a man who gets the concept of good food as gathering, as friendship, as celebration, as well as wildly entertaining and near enlightening to watch his travels. It's the closest thing to a vacation I get these days.
Wrapping up, I implore you, stretch out; do things that take you out of that comfort zone. The first few times I ever took a stage to perform I can't begin to describe the nervousness and anxiety of the whole thing. Now, it's one of the most pure and fulfilling times of my life.
b
08.27.06

Lists

2008-09-01T10:06:00.002-04:00

I like lists. Otherwise I forget. Seems pretty simple. I'll go to the grocery for chicken and pasta and come back with donuts and krunchers. So I need lists. Now that about 73 important things having to do with the release of the album are under my purview, I made a big list using zenbe.com, which comes in quite handy as it links to the iphone. The list makes it seem like the whole unmanageable thing is manageable, this list of 73 important things to do. I should probably stop writing and get to it.