Category Archives: Entertainment

Art, CD Review, Entertainment, Lists, Music, pictures, reviews, Video

Classic Album Review: III

Leave a comment

Artist: Sebadoh
Full Title: III
Year: 1991
Label: Homestead
Grade: A-
Tracks:
1) The Freed Pig- 9
2) Sickles and Hammers (Minutemen)- 7
3) Total Peace- 8/9
4) Violet Execution- 9
5) Scars, Four Eyes- 9
6) Truly Great Thing- 10, Best Sebadoh Track, Hands Down!
7) Kath- 8
8) Perverted World- 8/9
9) Wonderful, Wonderful- 8
10) Limb By Limb- 8
11) Smoke A Bowl- 7/8
12) Black-Haired Gurl- 9
13) Hoppin Up and Down- 8
14) Supernatural Force- 8
15) Rockstar- 9
16) Downmind- 7
17) Renaissance Man- 8
18) God Told Me- 8
19) Holy Picture- 8
20) Hassle- 8
21) No Different- 8
22) Spoiled- 10
23) As the World Dies, the Eyes of God Grow Bigger- 9

Comments: This album is the definition of Lo-Fi! This is just about as low as it gets. We hear very raw recordings of what some slick shit would masacre into a clean, traditional pop song. Not Sebadoh! This enormously influential group/album unleash a lengthy LP of noisy, loud, quiet, and everything in between sounding numbers. Singer/Guitarist, Lou Barlow (formerly, at the time, now presently, of Dinosaur Jr) and crew utilized a Portastudio cassette tape recorder to achieve this distinct, lo-fi sound and it absolutely gives the album a certain feel/vibe. I’ll admit, this is the kind of record, you don’t listen to track by track over an over again, but there is much to be appreciated here. With that being said, there are many notable tracks. From the get go, “The Freed Pig,” is rather catchy and serves as a memorable opener. “Violet Execution,” “Scars, Four Eye,” and others continue in this fashion. Then, you have your bizzarre, quiet, incredibly lo-fi tunes in “Total Peace,” “Kath,” “Smoke A Bowl,” and several others. Lastly, there’s the “low pop” songs, as I have dubbed them lol. Two strongly stand out and thefore I have granted them the highest of scores, with a 10. First, we have “Truly Great Thing.” One of the most passionate, yet simple songs I have ever heard. First thing that came to my noggin, THIS IS A FUCKING ELLIOT SMITH SONG! Seriously, this sounds just like ES. Being a fan of him, this works very well. You could say, it is a truly great thing ;) Secondly, we have the classic, “Spoiled,” as seen/heard in Larry Clark’s disturbing film, Kids. If I was asked to point to the best example of Sebadoh’s lo-fi style, I would have to place the Burger King hat on “Spoiled”‘s little dome. The final track, “As the World Dies, the Eyes of God Grow Bigger,” showcases Barlow’s wide vocal range: from line to line he SCREAMS and then softly sings, back and forth. It’s also a very humorous ditty, my favorite line is, “EVEN MY GRANDMOTHER LOVES TO GET HIGH!” He shouts this with all his might. Overall, some songs are better than others, but it is worthy of at least one listen and has become a respectable addition to my record collection.

Chris

Art, Books, Culture Jamming, Drugs, Entertainment, history, humor, pictures, Politics, Quotes, reviews

Subversive Book Club Review: We Are Everywhere

Leave a comment

Author: Jerry Rubin
Full Title: We Are Everywhere
Year: 1971
Grade: A-
Why Subversive?/Comments:
The Yippie Master takes us on another visceral journey into the everyday life of a 1960s, Amerikan Revolutionary. Written, while serving a setence in Cook County Jail, WAE reveals the highs and lows of said lifestyle: Riots, conspiracy trials, police brutality, being spied/wiretapped, stoned, LSD, Molotov Cocktails. In fact, the book is dedicated to the Weather Undeground and Rubin discusses them quite a bit, amongst other Revolutionary heroes and heroines, including the Black Panthers, Dave Dellinger, the Women’s Liberation Movement, John Sinclair, Timothy Leary and more. Though this work of incendiary material is quite subversive and colorful (figuratively and literally; filled with pictures and most pages are green, purple, etc) it lacks the zaniness and “shit in the middle of a bank” attitude of it’s predescessor, Do iT!, to an extent. Sure, compared to most books, it’s far more out there, but placed side by side with other Yippie works, it’s far more serious and not as humorous or wacky. I speculate this is for two reasons. For one, Rubin, by his own words, matured… a little bit. He abandoned his machoism and homophobia. In Do iT!, he made cracks about gays and ignored women’s role in the movement/revolution. In WAE, this is not the case, hence there are no photos of naked Revolutionary hunnies, he even condemns the phrase, “getting a piece of ass.” Secondly, the times got worse, with more governmental repression, that called for more militance. People were going to jail for longer sentences (Bobby Seale, John Sinclair, etc) good folks were being assasinated (Fred Hampton), and many were forced underground or into exile (Timothy Leary, Eldridge Cleaver, The Weathermen, etc). The FBI was cracking down on dissidents, like no other time before, they even had many spies, whom posed as activists for years, thus causing distrust amongst eveyone. The government attempted to use psychological warfare to destroy the movement from within. They failed, but it still left many devastated and often fucked up their lives. Therefore, Rubin’s book is not as happy as one would expect. Though, don’t misconstrue me, it’s still quite amusing and inspirational, if incredily outdated (it’s actually outta print!) At one point, Jerry and folk singer, Phil Ochs visit Charlie Manson in prison and “rap”- Revolutionary chat- with him for hours. Go figure. All in all, this serves as a fantastic statement against corrupt and boring Amerika and instead for the creation of a better, more humane society.

Chris

CD Review, Entertainment, Music

CD Review: Happy Birthday [2010]

Leave a comment

Band: Happy Birthday
Release: 3/2010
Label: Sub Pop

1. “Girls FM” – A
2. “2 Shy” – B+
3. “Cracked” – C+
4. “Perverted Girl” – B+
5. “Subliminal Message” – B-
6. “Eyes Music” – C+
7. “Maxine The Teenage Eskimo” – B+
8. “I Want to Stay (Run Away)” – B
9. “Pink Strawberry Shake” – B
10. “Zit” – C
11. “Fun” – B

Comment: Right off the bat, Happy Birthday sounds like Islands. That comparison pretty much dies, though, after “Girls FM.” Considering the band is still obscure as fuck (they were signed out of the blue by Sub Pop after forming in late 2008), it’s necessary to give them a decent amount of credit just for releasing something polished relatively quickly out of nowhere. I can’t really describe the sound too well on this record. It’s merely an eclectic pop record…what the “independent” big shots like to call “indie-pop.” That really doesn’t tell anyone much, unfortunately. On “Maxine,” you’ll definitely hear some surf-pop Beach Boy influence. Like you’re deaf or something if you can’t hear that. I guess I could namedrop Girls as well, but Happy Birthday is much more spastic. They do a pretty bad attempt at garage/punk on “Zit.” I don’t know, I thought I was going to like this record more than it turns out in the end. It’s good, don’t get me wrong, but nothing special.

Grade: 83 (B-)

Art, CD Review, Entertainment, humor, Lists, Music, pictures, Quotes, reviews, Video

Classic Album Review: At Action Park

Leave a comment

Artist: Shellac (of North America!)
Full Title: At Action Park
Year: 1994
Label: Touch and Go
Grade: A
Tracks:

1) My Black Ass– 10, Open up a can of whip (black) ass!2) Pull the Cup- 7
3) The Admiral- 8/9
4) Crow– 9
5) Song of the Minerals– 9
6) A Minute– 9
7) The Idea of North- 8
8) Dog and Pony Show– 9
9) Boche’s Dick– 9
10) Il Porno Star– 9

Comments: Steve Albini is Killing Me Slowly with His Songs! At Action Park delivers a full blast of audio assault and yet it’s so soothing to my ears. Albini and crew whip you with their guitars, so brutal you are wetting yourself in Kim Gordan’s panties. But, it aint rape man ahaha, it’s a fucking fix! Most artists I adore are very pop like in nature. With Albini, it’s a whole other kitten to tackle. The Albini “sound” is heavily guitar driven, mean fucking guitars complemented by pounding drums (“Crow” is a great example of this). The record opens with the beloved, fan favorite, “My Black Ass,” an immensely catchy number and one of the best guitar riffs in all of Rock music. There’s a spectacular groove that just rolls through your headphones and slides down your skin; it feels better than sex… ok, I have no authority to say that :( but, it will one day feel better than sex :). This groove thang is commonplace throughout AAP, but is best exemplified in the closing track, “Il Porno Star,” which highlights one of Albini’s greatest talents: Dark, strangely humorous, and often malevolent lyrics. Albini shouts, “Porno Star Arrives… No English… No Money.” Go Figure. Overall, I highly recommend this classic to all Albini fanatics and newbies as well. If you don’t like it, you can kiss MY (BLACK) ASS!

Chris

Entertainment, Music, News, Quotes

Ham Talks New Album

Leave a comment

Hamilton Leithauser on The Walkmen’s untitled sixth studio album:
I’m not 100 percent sure what’s going to be on it; we’ve written so many songs. We wrote a lot of songs for You & Me, but we ended up basically using like 90 percent of them on the record because we wanted it to be a long record. But this time, I think we recorded 22 songs or something like that. There’s talk of doing a 20-song record or something, a White Album kind of a deal. But I don’t think that going to fly because I’m not sure that all of them deserve to be on it. But I mean, I don’t know. It’s coming along nicely now. We just did our first session by ourselves. We haven’t done one of those, where we engineered everything and recorded, in like five years. I’m really happy with the way we did it. I was actually impressed that we could still do it.

CD Review, Entertainment, Music

CD Review: Beat The Devil’s Tattoo [2010]

3 Comments

Band: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Release: 3/2010
Label: Vagrant

1. “Beat The Devil’s Tattoo” – A-

2. “Conscious Killer” – B-
3. “Bad Blood” – B
4. “War Machine” – B-
5. “Sweet Feeling” – C+
6. “Evol” – C+
7. “Mama Taught Me Better” – B
8. “River Styx” – B-
9.”The Toll” – B
10. “Aya” – B
11. “Shadow’s Keeper” – C+
12. “Long Way Down” – C+
13. “Half-State” – B+

Comments: Kasabian, say what?! My reviews are based on impulse and usually aren’t structured AT all. Like what I just said. I brought up Kasabian and then made a random comment. And then I just did it again. Okay, what I meant to say is that as soon as I first popped on “Beat” all I could hear was the band Kasabian with a bit more overt influence of the blues and garage rock. That’s basically a pretty good thing. I think the song could have exploded in some parts more effectively, but overall it’s memorable and great and all that crap. There is an apparent line in between forgettable and pretty cool. For a song like “Bad Blood,” it’s something that I normally would dig, but has me scratching my chin at some points. It’s funny how BRMC really wears its influences on its sleeve. I can even see a band like The Dig drawing influence from BRMC, even if it’s unintentional or indirect. Just look up The Dig and you’ll see what I mean. The thing about BRMC is that they seem to give a shit about what they are putting out. A lot of other garage rock bands that I love and adore don’t come across as spending a shit load of time on every song. I’m not being critical of one way or another…just putting what I hear in words. Another thing I’m getting: BRMC is probably a tight live band.

Grade: B- (82)