Bradley's Almanac has posted a compilation celebrating seven years of the 'Nac; it includes Starlight Conspiracy, a new song from Charlene, the Madelines song that gave the site its name, Starlight Conspiracy, and so on. He's even put 'em all in a handy zip!
Hear Ya has a sampler of mp3s from SxSW bands.
Lala is streaming live performances from Noise Pop, including John Vanderslice, Damien Jurado, French Kicks, Snowden, and Midlake.
Grist has a playlist from Al Gore.
Raghav Gupta has an interesting article highlighting changes and predicting more in the music business on GigaOm.
Tripwire reports that Telefon Tel Aviv is releasing a CD of rare remixes.
I like Califone.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Music news], [SxSW], [Lala], [NoisePop], [Grist], [GigaOm], [Telefon Tel Aviv], [Califone]
28 February 2007
Music Around the Web
27 February 2007
Top o' the Mailbox : Thailand
Thailand is another datum supporting the comeback of Cure-style bombast: keyboards fizzing with effects, unbounded reverb, and a certain fey attitude in the vocals are all getting to be staples of the indie-er side of music. Thailand is an electro take on this, sometimes verging on the toytronica, and their December release Motorcade (which can be bought on their Myspace page) is a strong debut. It should be noted that the album was mastered by Dave Cooley, who's also worked with Silversun Pickups, Long Distance Runner, and Dangermouse (on the Grey Album, I believe). Bergerac is the most immediately appealing, with the luscious, drama-queen sweep contrasting nicely with the world-weary lyrics; This Officer's Life is a compelling, tinsel rock shout, as well--none of it is music to be listened to sitting down, or in sweatpants, in any case: it demands glitter somewhere.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Thailand]
20 February 2007
Earworm: TV on the Radio - Modern Romance
Modern Romance is TV on the Radio's stickiest song, more so than anything from Return to Cookie Mountain; it reminds me of sitting on top of the dryer as a kid, and feeling that buzzy wum wum wum wum vibrating through me.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Earworms], [TV on the Radio]
It's a Josh Ritter Kind of Day
It would seem, since Chromewaves is covering his show in Toronto last Thursday, and Kwaya Na Kisser posting his live set from KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic, the world is in agreement. The Animal Years makes up most of the set, but Other Side (from Golden Age of Radio) makes a welcome appearance as well. Josh looks so much like a young Tom Waits that it always surprises me how edgeless his sentimentality is; this is clearest in a live cover of Chelsea Hotel, which is played quietly and soberly, downplaying its anger.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Josh Ritter]
15 February 2007
Earworm: M. Ward - Vincent O'Brien
This, it seems, is the song that plays in your head when you wake up at five o'clock on a day where six inches of water have frozen solid in all the places you want to walk.
M. Ward - Vincent O'Brien, from Transfiguration of Vincent
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Earworms], [M. Ward], [Transfiguration of Vincent]
14 February 2007
Myspace Find: Caitlin Frame
Caitlin Frame is a recent Myspace find; she has some of the pleasing swing of Aimee Mann's vocals, but melodic phrases are executed with less hesitation. She's also the subject of Band in Boston's new set, which means everyone who missed her set at Abbey Lounge last night can get filled in.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Caitlin Frame], [Band in Boston]
09 February 2007
Song of the Day: Belle & Sebastian - A Space Boy Dream
It's hard not to dismiss Belle & Sebastian as unbearably twee, the style change in A Life Pursuit notwithstanding. They're so boppy and hair-floppy most of the time that a flash of imagination like A Space Boy Dream is a tremendous surprise. Particularly given how rarely spoken word really works; but there's a hypnotic flow to this track that fits the dream setting well--or maybe it's just Stuart Murdoch's accent.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Belle & Sebastian]
08 February 2007
New Music: The Glass Set
The Glass Set's CD Something Unknown showed up in my mailbox, languished awhile on my desk, and then found its way into my ears. I'm glad it did, because it's in the vein of Metric, minus some of the aggro: sharp, stylish, angular music heavy on the attitude. Maybe less devastatingly elegant than Metric, but maybe also with more sounds to offer. It was difficult to choose the song to post: Telescope's beat is smart as military buttons, but Something Unknown has a nice, graceful flow in the vocals; Tradition won out as the favorite for the moment, with its easy, catchy bounce.
It seems they're playing at Castle Greyskull in Allston tomorrow night. Good timing on their part, or mine, or someone's.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Live music], [Music]
07 February 2007
Earworm & Upcoming Show: Alexi Murdoch
Alexi Murdoch's 2006 release Time Without Consequence is one of those nice CDs where the tracks take turns: each time I listen to it, a different one strikes me. This time it's Home; its lyrical repetition contrasts nicely with the evolution of the sound, from cozy and acoustic at the beginning to the rougher, more impressionistic end.
Alexi Murdoch has a show with DJ Carbo and Midnight Movies at Great Scott tomorrow night, as part of the Fenway Recording Sessions series.
tags: [Music], [Live music], [Alexi Murdoch], [Great Scott]
06 February 2007
a'tris @ Tommy Doyle's
Local favorite a'tris (now semi-local) had their most recent show at Tommy Doyle's on Friday; I couldn't make it, but now there's the next best thing: the whole live set! Conquer All, Difficult Time, and Orion are the new songs, and the rest are off of Appeal. Mason's habit of peeling the middle to end of phrases into the back of his throat becomes obtrusive in Conquer All, but Difficult Time is classic a'tris, nimble and stylish.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Live music], [a'tris]
05 February 2007
Earworm: Decemberists - The Sporting Life
This is one of those persistent earworms that resurface every couple of days; the rollicking sock-hopper sound disguises the bitterness of the lyrics, in the frozen moment of a fall on an athletic field. The Sporting Life has less of a historical setting than most of the songs on Picaresque, but it's no less a comedy-of-manners song.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Decemberists]
01 February 2007
Earworm/Unexpected Cover: Sun Kil Moon - Ocean Breathes Salty
Kozelek's Tiny Cities keeps surprising me: applying the Patented Kozelek Sound--dreamy, melancholy, and gentle--to a whole album full of bombastic, jagged Brock songs is about as unexpected a move as you could find. And yet somehow, they work surprisingly well. Ocean Breathes Salty is remarkable for this, as well as hearing the furious couplet "You tell me what you want and I'll tell you what you get/ You get away from me. You get away from me" in Kozelek's melting, meandering tenor. But upon rereading the lyrics, it's an unabashedly sentimental song: "Your body may be gone, I'm gonna carry you in/In my head, in my heart, in my soul/ And maybe we'll get lucky and we'll both live again/ Well I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Don't think so."
I wouldn't have expected that from Modest Mouse, but this is what covers are for: revisiting perceptions of a song through a different lens.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Modest Mouse], [Sun Kil Moon], [Kozelek], [Tiny Cities]
Ist - I Am Jesus (And You're Not)
I get some odd things in the mail, and ist is certainly one of them. I am Jesus (And You're Not) (from 2005's King Martha) is brash and freakishly energetic with the occasional demonstration of admirable dexterity. The rest of their catalog has more to offer than dexterity: it's a gnarly, more relaxed Modest Mouse sort of sound, with only a touch of this reconstructed-new-retro punk sound; and it's good listening.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Ist]
31 January 2007
Snow Patrol & Dashboard Confessional: A Meditation on Whinerock
Snow Patrol is a guilty semi-pleasure: pleasant--good music for painting red housesbut neither sophisticated nor creative, and increasingly plastic to boot. They're relatively palatable whinerock, with the typical shortcomings and appeal--it's sweet in a wistful kind of way, but guilty of emotional posturing and brooding. The saving grace is variety, or at least a shallower monotony: if the songs' narrator were a person, he'd feel pretty much the same all the time, but for slightly different reasons. Behold Mahogany from Songs for Polar Bears, which is wistful at a relationship that didn't happen, and You Could Be Happy from Eyes Open, which aims at one which did. 
Which contrasts to Dashboard Confessional, whose sound is more appealing and textured, but whose lyrics are intolerably whiny. Carabba's more consistent in his whining and posturing--the point is generally that he likes some girl who is for one reason or another an unfortunate choice.
Another difference is the vocalists' performance styles, I suppose; Carabba emotes to the back wall of the room across the street, where Lightbody treats the narrator's sadness with more distance. Since he's singing things like "Do the things that you always wanted to/ Without me there to hold you back, don't think, just do/ More than anything I want to see you grow/ Take a glorious bite out of the whole world", anything that turns down the volume on the knob marked Pathos is helpful: it might even get somebody kicked out of the genre, although neither of these two is in any danger.
The only Dashboard song that sticks is A Plain Morning off of Swiss Army Romance, which is frankly beautiful and possibly less whiny. Which brings up another way to get kicked out of the genre: make music which is simply too beautiful to be dismissed.
N.B.: Whinerock is a term I made up, I think. I'm not clear if it's the same as emo, because I'm not clear on what counts for emo; so I'll use my own term.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Whinerock], [Snow Patrol], [Dashboard Confessional]
25 January 2007
Earworm: Stars - Going Going Gone
Stars aren't news to anybody these days; but their music is still a melancholy, hardnosed, powerpop good listen. Had a strange dream this morning, but Going Going Gone is all that's left of it.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Earworms], [Stars]
24 January 2007
Dayna Kurtz: Texture, no Structure
This is a bit of a shame. Dayna Kurtz and Another Black Feather came with mad impressive accolades: "there's no logical reason why singer-songwriter Dayna Kurtz is not a full-blown star," according to the Boston Globe; she's won "Female Songwriter of the Year" from the National Academy of Songwriters, been on NPR's Morning Edition. And yet. . . I think she suffers from the Cassandra Wilson problem: it's interesting, creative music that somehow fails to compel me to listen to it. This verdict always leaves me wondering if one or five more times through the CD wouldn't change my mind; since that question can always be asked, I've never managed to answer it by other than giving up. She's clearly technically accomplished, her voice has an enviable topaz-smoky timbre, and the arrangement and production are thoughtful and unobtrusive; but somehow listening to a track like The Miracle leaves rather a blank impression. The only exception to this is It's the Day of Atonement, with its graceful urgency contrasting with and coarsened by the blunt, political lyrics. The album leaves the listener with questions: what could she be that she isn't? What isn't she? What will she be?
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Dayna Kurtz]
23 January 2007
The Never @ SXSW
Reverbnation.com is running an interesting SxSW contest: based on traffic, song plays, and registered fans, two bands will get slots to play at the Reverbnation SxSW party. My own pick is The Never, from the strength of last year's remarkable multimedia CD Antartica. It's a good opportunity to play with Reverbnation's various tools, too, which are intelligently designed.
So . . .register for Reverbnation.com, become The Never's fan, listen to The Never--and a deserving band will play at SxSW!
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Cuckoo Canoe Revisited
Or, an object lesson in listening to the whole CD. . . when first exposed to Cuckoo Canoe's music via
their Myspace, I couldn't put them together into a coherent band with a sound. But now I've got my hands on Basketball Freedom Overdrive and listened to it a few times through, it's much clearer: they're a brash, energetic band leaning towards the latter-day New Wave stylings that are making the rounds again. Alaska Wolf Slay is the most clearly infectious, but that vigor pervades the CD. It's a good listen.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Cuckoo Canoe]
22 January 2007
Earworm: Innocence Mission - Moon River
So it was my grandma's eightieth birthday this weekend, and the family had a surprise birthday party with neighbors, coworkers, kindergarten classmates, bridge partners--all of those connections that accumulate in a small town where people tend to stay put. One of the features of the party was a slideshow of pictures of my grandmother, from childhood til now, accompanied by chronologically-appropriate music; one such selection was an instrumental of Moon River. This reminded me that, as unimpressed by Now The Day Is Over as I was as a CD, the cover of Moon River is graceful and compelling.
tags: [Music], [mp3], [Covers], [Moon River], [The Innocence Mission]
