Entertainment, Lists, Music

Top 10 Concerts of 2009!

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By: Glen

1.
Bands: Black Lips/Gentleman Jesse & His Men/Mean Creek
Venue: Middle East Downstairs
Date: March 7, 2009
Grade: A+
Comment: Meeting Cole before the gig. Getting handed beers from Ian. My favorite band playing all my favorite classics. Great mix of moshing and positive crowd interaction.

2.
Bands: King Khan & The Shrines/Mark Sultan/Homosexuals
Venue: Paradise Rock Club
Date: May 14, 2009
Grade: A+
Comment: Khan is a legend of a performer. He really got the entire room energized. Everybody was grooving and  singing along to his sexually provocative lyrics. It’s too bad that  I wasn’t able to appreciate Mark as much as I wish I could have at the time.

3.
Bands: No Age/The Beets/Lemonade
Venue: Wellesley College
Date: April 2, 2009
Grade: A+
Comments: Met Randy and Dean before the show. Hugged them after the show. The show itself? Fantastic. By the end, I was all sweaty from jumping around like crazy in between Dean’s drum-kit and Randy’s guitar set-up. A plus was that I recognized every single song that they played.

4.
Bands: KK+BBQ/Dum Dum Girls/Downbeat 5
Venue: Middle East Downstairs
Date: October 29, 2009
Grade: A+
Comments: Like I said before, Khan is a legendary performer. BBQ is a master at all three of his crafts: vocals, guitar, and drums. Combine the two and what do you get? A thing of beauty. Rockin’ out and singing along, always.

5.
Bands: Jay Reatard/Nobunny/Hunx and His Punx/Box Elders/Useless Eaters
Venue: Harpers Ferry
Date: October 2, 2009
Grade: A+
Comments: Quite the freaking bill, huh? I witnessed the greatest overall opening experience at this gig because garage-pop has that sort of effect. And what about Jay? His music was tight and this time around I really was able to connect with a greater majority of his songs than before. F-U-N times.

6. Walkmen/Here We Go Magic/The Dig – Middle East Downstairs – September 19, 2009 – Grade: A+
7. Arctic Monkeys/Screaming Females – House of Blues – December 13, 2009 – Grade: A
8. Pixies/Jay Reatard – Wang Theatre – November 27, 2009 – Grade: A
9. Sonic Youth/The Feelies – Wilbur Theatre – November 22, 2009 – Grade: A
10. The Rifles/Mike Fiore – Great Scott – September 23, 2009 – Grade: A

Culture Jamming, Entertainment, Femmes, News, Politics, Random, rant, Sex

CALLING ALL GIRLS (AND GUYS)…

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…..TO WRITE WITH THE KLYAM IN OUR GLORIOUS, REVOLUTIONARY DUTY TO PRESENT BIASED, SUBJECTIVE, UNDERGROUND PROPAGANDA TO THE ROBOTIC MASSES! JOIN THE UNDERGROUND, INDEPENDENT MEDIA AND HELP DISMANTLE THE VILE, CORPORATE, MAINSTREAM MEDIA. IT’S US AGAINST THEM: OUR PROPANDA VS THEIR PROPAGANDA.WE NEED GIRLS BECAUSE IT’S A FUCKING SAUSAGE FEST HAHA, BUT SERIOUSLY GIRLS, GUYS, HERMAPHRODITES, IT’S ALL GOOD. JUST JOIN TODAY!

DON’T MAKE ME START DRAFTIN’ YOU KIDDIES!

Chris

Entertainment, pictures, Random, Sex

I’m Just As Repulsed As You… chuckles

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I saw an advertisement for Volvo cars that utilizes classical conditioning to excite customers about their products. The ad conditions its viewers to get “excited” when they see Volvo cars like they get “excited” for sex. Specifically, the ad features a parking brake in its upward position to resemble an erect penis, this is accompanied by the caption, “We Are Just As Excited As You Are.” The marketers are aiming at the 16-40 year old male demographic. They hope guys will learn to associate the company’s automobiles with horniness, so they will go out and buy them. Fuckers… why they can’t just associate horniess with big black boots like fine, upstanding, citizens.

Chris

Entertainment, Lists, Music

Favorite Discoveries of 2009

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Cool bands (in alphabetical order?) that I discovered for the first time in 2009. Rule: they must not have been formed in 2009/must not have released their first record in 2009. Anything questionable, I didn’t include. And no doubts that I forgot some.

– Atlas Sound
– Black Moth Super Rainbow
– Bloodshot Bill
– Bobby Ubangi
– Box Elders
– Galaxie 500
– Mika Miko
– Portugal. The Man
– Thee Oh Sees

Health/Science, News, Politics

Some Issues @ Climate Summit

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WERS News
The United Nations global climate summit has spurred confrontation both inside and outside of the conference center in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Outside, hundreds of protesters have been arrested by Danish police since the beginning of the summit. Thousands of activists convened in Denmark to march to the Bella Centre, the location of the climate summit, but on the way the group encountered the heavily armed Danish police.

There have been reports of the use of pepper spray and police dogs in controlling the crowds.

Both protesters and the police have been accused of being out of control. Danish authorities have said that the activists were breaking windows and setting cars on fire, while activists have accused the police of being unnecessarily heavy handed. A police spokesman said that protesters who were arrested are being held in a temporary holding location and that they will be released in a few hours.

Confrontation at a climate summit? Whaaaaaat?

Art, CD Review, Entertainment, Health/Science

Classic CD Review: Greatest Hits

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Band: Wesley Willis
Year: Various
Label: Alternative Tentacles

Comments: Wesley Willis was (death, 2003) a joke. The man himself was not a joke…in fact, he was a paranoid schizophrenic who consistently had to deal with the “Warhellride,” or demonic encounters. He was a great story teller, as evidenced in many of the songs in this collection. Wesley was a master at combining vivid descriptions with catchy (but, very monotonous)  outsider pop riffs and phrases. Go to his Wikipedia page and there you find how his songs are structured. This is precisely what makes Wesley’s music a joke. He built a career out of ranting over music. You don’t get a lot of that from musicians today and that’s why people will always react to his music in a wtf kind of manner. Whereas critics say fellow outsider Daniel Johnston’s music ranges from “spotty to brilliant,” Willis doesn’t fit on a paradigm that’s worth evaluating. How do you judge a man who can’t be judged? The demons got to him and got to him damn well at that. If I absolutely absolutely absolutely had to slap a grade range on his Greatest Hits, I’d probably dish out between a C+ and a B. It’s music for a good laugh now and then…not the kind that’s constantly on repeat. Rest in peace, Wes.

Art, CD Review, Entertainment, Music

CD Review: xx

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Album of the Year? Yeah, right. Top 50, maybe...

*Rough Trade Records named this the top album of 2009. But is it? In my never ending quest to find great music, I am reviewing this LP! But wait…I already named my top 5 albums of 2009. That’s tentative, though. So let’s see about this.

Band: The xx
Label: Young Turks
Release: 2009

1. “Intro” – 9.0
2. “VCR” – 9.4
3. “Crystalized” – 9.7
4. “Islands” – 8.2
5. “Fantasy” – 7.8
6. “Shelter” – 8.1
7. “Basic Space” – 8.8
8. “Infinity” – 9.3
9. “Night Time” – 8.5
10. “Stars” – 8.9

Comments: This is the first band to actually cause my sub-woofer to make crazy ass noises. There are some pretty cool beats and stuff like that, but this record isn’t that special. Vocals are kind of shabby and not really unique at all. The “chill-wave” that this record embodies is limited in the sense that you can only stare at your shoes for so long before you fall asleep. In essence, the only things that save this from mainstream success are the male vocals and the consistent darkness and ambiance. Pop music usually doesn’t regard the latter as positive or particularly marketable. And to some degree, I can see a lot of independent-minded people shunning this kind of music or writing it off as done before, or what have you. The album begins to crumble after the third song, but there are some cool spots after that.

Grade: 8.7

Boston based shows/fests – DIY, punk, noise