6 posts tagged “music”
Sorry Steve, I know the psychic repercussions cause bad things to happen to you, (video clip of Albini falling out of bed, getting kicked across the floor by an invisible boot) but I just ripped all the Shellac albums to MP3. Had to for reasons of portability and logistics. Don't worry though-- I lovingly replaced them into the hand-stamped Fireproof Press jackets and put the originals back on the shelf.
For the rest of you.. Here's a taste of the newly digitized Albini. From 1994's "At Action Park" here's Shellac with CROW.
What's the best music documentary or concert film you've seen?
DA Pennebaker's documentary of Bob Dylan's 1965 tour of the UK, entitled Don't Look Back. I knew next to nothing about Dylan before I saw it but fell in love with his sarcasm and certainty in his own talent. The scene in particular that stays with me is his evisceration of Time Magazine which... well, looky here, it's on youtube!
Tomorrow is my last day at this company after seven years of working here. There are a lot of other people for whom today/tomorrow is the end of their employment as well. The mood is very strange because half the people (the people who are leaving, especially the ones with nice severance packages) are chipper and enthusiastic, while the folks who aren't getting laid off are really weary and apathetic. I'm somewhere in the middle because I'm leaving (yay), but without a nice severance package (boo). Over in the other building they're doing mass exit meetings throughout today and tomorrow and lots of people are headed out the door. So in the spirit of the times, here's a playlist for today.
'Imperial March' from Star Wars
'Exodus' by Bob Marley and the Wailers
'Swift Urban Departure From What Was Once an Innocent Soul' by Esem
'Goodbye Cruel World' by Pink Floyd
'Exit Music (for a film)' by Radiohead
'Perfect Day' by Lou Reed
'Leaving you Behind (without knowing where to go)' by Hermann & Kleine
... Any other suggestions?
As a matter of fact, I out-geeked a comic book store owner trying to get my hands on the Evil Ink trade paperback for Good Apollo. The conversation went something like:
Eric: You guys have these books? (Shows Mike the publisher, author, title he's scribbled into his Moleskine)
Mike: Uh..no, I've never heard of this...
Eric: Oh man. It's the nerdiest thing ever. This prog-metal band needed to explain the backstory behind their four concept albums so the singer wrote a comic book about it. It's a sci-fi thing about these genetically engineered cyborgs that overthrow an interstellar tyranny.
Mike: OK that definitely sounds like something that I would be into, but we don't have it. Who did you say the publisher was?
Yeah, so. If you see me wearing headphones it's because I'm aware of how annoying this is and I'm doing my best to contain it. Please bear with me, if past history is any indication these outbreaks rarely last longer than four or five months...
Not sure what the legalities of uploading mp3s to vox are, but it's not really my problem, izzit? So here's one of the many choice cuts off the album, track 3 "PBS KAE".
Top electronic releases of 2005, courtesy of the entity known as 110011. I went through and added some capsule reviews in italics for the releases I've heard -- and I'm leaving the rest of the list up as a tickler to find some new stuff! 110011's taste is impeccable so I'm sure it'll be worthwhile to (soul)seek out.
alphabetical order with artist - album [style - label].
afx - analord series [electro acid idm - rephlex] yes they really are all that.
alex smoke - incommunicado [idm electrotech - soma]
amon tobin - chaos theory ost [cinematic breakbeat - ninja tune]
antiguo autòmata mexicano - microhate [min tech - background]
autechre - untitled [idm - warp] autechre are generally about 2 albums ahead of me. i realized this when 'draft 730' came out and i went back and listened to LP5 and it really clicked with me. there are parts of 'untilted' that i got right off the bat but now its about going back to 'confield' and really soaking in it.
bad sector - kosmodrom [dark tech ambient - waystyx] 110011 posted this in his 'space' series and i really like it. nice and ..err.. spacy... with good russian control-tower samples. i didn't realize it was a recent release though, it sounds like a mid-90s FAX release -- and that's a good thing.
black lung - the coming dark age [dark idm tech - ant-zen]
boards of canada - the campfire headphase [downtempo - warp] i actually thought this was a lackluster (hah! hi esa) release that failed to do anything new or interesting. much rather listen to casino vs japan these days for the detuned-warbly-analogue-synth-with-hiphoppy-beats.
boc scadet - vessel in june [ambient idm - clickclickdrone] this is a wonderful, wonderful album. i first heard boc scadet (a pun on Basscadet maybe?) on the Toytronic comp 'Everything is Green' and really dug their early-autechre sound -- actually that whole compilation hits this great 'Crystel'/'Egg' vibe but their entry is on the top of the heap. I got 'temporary oceans' and was a bit disappointed in how ambient it was, but 'vessel in june' sets everything aright. great consistency of mood with enough variation to keep it interesting. For everyone who wishes Autechre had kept making albums that sound like 'Amber'.
bong-ra - grindcrusher [metal breakcore - ad noiseam] Holy crap this stuff is nuts - I don't have this album but I have several bong-ra (another pun? 'bhangra') tracks off Ad N compilations and they are uniformly braincrushing bass-overload workouts. great stuff if you're in the mood, utterly headsplitting if not.
boxcutter - brood/sunshine [breakstep/dubstep - hotflush] the full length boxcutter album 'oneiric' fucking rocks; my fav track is skuff'd but these are damn good too
boy robot - rotten cocktails [idm electro - city centre offices] delivers on the promise of their first album by polishing and extending the tech-house vibe. also check out miwon's 'pale glitter' also on CCO.
danieto - cirugía casual [dub idm - u-cover]
dj distance - 1 on 1/empire [breakstep - hotflush]
enduser - bollywood breaks [ethno breakcore - ad noiseam]
kick-bong - a cup of tea [breakbeat/ambitrance - ultra vista]
koss - ring [minimal ambitech - mule electronic] i'm not even sure i know what 'minimal ambitech' means but it sounds like something i would like.
larvae - empire [breakbeat/breakcore - ad noiseam]
m² (squaremeter) - the frozen spark [dark ambient - ant-zen]
milieu - aurora borealis [downtempo idm - u-cover limited]
mr scruff - mrs cruff [jazz breaks - ninja tune]
monolake - polygon_cities [idm tech - ml/i] oh yes. yes indeed. after a couple of less than inspiring releases in 2002-2003, henke picked up a collaborator known as t++ who has brought some vitality back to the last monolake album, really hitting a dance-friendly groovy stride at the end of the aptly-titled 'momentum'. polygon_cities brings it deeper than we've heard maybe since the chain reaction days.
murcof - remembranza [minimal classical/idm - leaf] i really didn't feel anythng from this, which suprised me as i really liked murcof's first album 'martes'. this one seemed formulaic -- ok, here's your piano chord, here's your violin phrase -- without adding anything to the equation.
shackleton/appleblim - i am animal/mystikal warrior [dubstep - skull disco]
shpongle - nothing lasts... but nothing is lost [ethnodubpsytech - twisted] yes, it's true. simon posford is a kind of god. this album is split into many short tracks (rather than the 7 10-minute long psychedelic workouts of first two shpongle releases) which had me wary at first, but i worried without cause. it's just as good material and the tracks do end up blending and clumping together so one's concentration / hallucination / etc is not unduly interrupted. is there anybody mining a similarly deep and rich vein of psytrance to as great a reward?
sonmi451 - vladivostok [minimal ambitech - u-cover limited]
tipper - tip hop [electro hip-hop - tipper music]
treva whateva - music's made of memories [breaks - ninja tune]
vector lovers - capsule for one [electro techno - soma] mm-hmm! great electro vibe with some truly ass-shaking beats, especially on the title track and 'nostalgia 4 the future'.
various - dissolving clouds [ethno dub breakbeat - interchill]
various - our sound [breakstep/dubstep - destructive]
vex'd - degenerate [breakstep - planet mu]
visions - lapse [dark ambient - cyclic law]
