Yesterday I spent a great deal of time downloading and organizing several hundred megabytes worth of purchased music. I also spent some time catching up on some music I’ve been missing, and/or slow to listen to. One of those bands, Two Door Cinema Club, is yet another entry in the energetic group of youthful power-pop bands writing music that is catchy as hell while alternately being solidly workmanlike in precision and skill. They also are another band intent upon defining themselves as a club. And these guys are even Irish.
The band’s work thus far has received nothing but positive praise, and no less than Phoenix enlisted the band to remix “Lasso” for their 2009 remix collection of Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix. With a positively reviewed album out and recognition by one of last year’s biggest bands, the band certainly will be difficult to ignore going forward.
Two Door Cinema Club – I Can Talk (mp3)
Two Door Cinema Club – What You Know (mp3)
Both tracks from Tourist History
I hadn’t listened to The Morning Benders before this song; as such, I’m not certain how representative this is of their body of work, but this is a grand song – it is sweeping and large; I can envision it playing while the credits for some as-of-yet-unwritten film roll.
Looking into them further, it seems like they’re pretty fertile creatively, having released 5 EPs and/or albums in the past couple of years. Their new album – Big Echo – which is this song is off of, was released today. I’ll get it based on only this, bringing my number of “must buy” albums for this week to an unwieldy and expensive 9. Good thing I get paid on Friday.
And, as a completely unnecessary aside – this post is our 500th on the blog; so, more reason for us to be thankful. Thank you all for coming here to read what we have to say and for supporting what we’re doing. Here’s to the next 500.
I’m going to take another week off of my 1000 Minutes project to talk about a couple of tracks that I’ve found over the past week or so. The artists are relatively new – at least from what I can find; soak these in and then sit back and watch where they go next. If these are indicators, it should be good.
SAFE – Twenty Years On (mp3)
It’s minimal – just voice over top of keys – but you’ll catch some auditory quirks sprinkled into this track from SAFE. A track that talks about cocaine and fist fights has never had such a comfortable song to call home. SAFE is on Lasercave, and has a self-titled cassette EP that’s available right now, which has one of the coolest cover pictures I’ve seen in a long time.
Based on the pictures I’ve seen, I’d have expected a far more grandiose and odd song; but maybe that’s the real peculiarity of SAFE. Or maybe the point is his name – not his look. Make your mother proud: don’t judge this book by his cover.
Ancient Crux – Wing Walker (mp3)
A band with a name like Ancient Crux sounds like they are going to be a lot more grinding than they actually are; and then when you listen to them, you realize that there was nothing to fear. There are shades of punk and new wave just under the surf-pop sheen that is becoming prevalent of late, but nothing that would frighten small children. (If this disappoints you, you might have stumbled onto the wrong blog.)
Looking at their web presence, it’s obvious immediately that the band doesn’t take themselves too seriously. Their MySpace page pronounces that they sound like “something Roy Orbison shit out.” Under influences, they have the video for Busta Rhymes’ “Woo Hah! (Got You All In Check)” with ODB, which is undeniably awesome.
They’ve got a couple of split releases out already, and this particular track comes from their 12” on Family Time Records. I’ll be looking forward to see where they’re headed. It feels good. I want the recipe.
Never having put together a concert before, Dave and I were nervous for probably a straight week for the concert, but Saturday was especially nerve-wracking. It wasn’t that we were unprepared – I think we were making sure our asses were covered for the last month or so – but more that something would go wrong, be missed, etc. I said repeatedly that I was going to be nervous until I saw people I didn’t know walking through the door.
Around 7 we went and picked up pizza and wings, since we only provide the best for the rock stars we bring to town – and that’s what they asked for anyway. Once we got to the venue, however, no one was there to open it, and Dave and I learned a valuable lesson – always get someone’s phone number who works at the venue. E-mail is fine, but when it gets down to brass tacks, phone numbers work best. So, we milled around for about 45 minutes, trying to find numbers until someone showed up to open who told us that we were early, and load time wasn’t until 8 anyway. So that sucked, but we all eventually got inside, warmed up, and the bands did their respective soundchecks.
Walri came running in the door around 9:30 or so, drums and amps in hand, and started playing around 10. They’ve played Bug Jar often, so they knew what to do. They tend more toward the psychedelic vein, but everyone enjoyed their set – as evidenced by their lead singer Amos telling me that they had sold out all their CDs. That was nice to hear.
The Static Jacks were up next, and while we gave them an hour, Henry told me they only had about 45 minutes worth of stuff – especially since the band rips through each song. Their performance was excellent – mixing in a couple of new tracks. For a venue where not many had heard them before (their previous gig in Rochester drew about 6 people – me, 3 of my friends and 2 others) – the crowd was into it.
These Electric Lives rounded out the show, and they are a fun band to watch. It’s easy to tell that they are having a good time, and with it being their first time in Rochester, they told us repeatedly that they were going to bring it. I missed a good portion of their set since I was talking with people, meeting new people, but what I did hear was excellent.
We are very thankful for all the help from everyone – from the venue to the bands to the bartenders – to our friends who came out to support us. We hope to continue to put on shows in Rochester, and have other ideas already in the works. But for our first show, this was memorable, and that is thanks to everyone who assisted us in making it come together. We learned a lot over the entire process, and hope to be able to put together a lot more concerts in Rochester. We have some pictures below, though we didn’t get our act in gear with the camera or iPhone until after Walri was finished, so we apologize to those guys.
A big thanks to all from the humbled Tympanogram team. Let’s do it again sometime.
We’re going to have a more thorough, self-congratulatory post about it this afternoon, but our birthday show this past Saturday was excellent. All the bands were incredibly accommodating, and all their sets were passionate and fun; we are grateful for their help, their willingness to play, and for their hard work. We met a lot of fantastic people, drank a lot of beer and heard a lot of great music; we hope we can do it again soon.
As for New Releases, this is a big week. There are eight albums on this list that are in my personal “must buy” category, and a lot of Jimi Hendrix re-releases. So, find yourself something this week. There are a couple of tracks after the list like always. Have yourselves an excellent week.
Alberta Cross – Broken Side of Time
Beanie Sigel & Freeway – The Roc Boys
Besnard Lakes – Besnard Lakes Are the Roaring Night
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – Beat the Devil’s Tattoo
Broken Bells – Broken Bells
Frightened Rabbit – The Winter of Mixed Drinks
Gorillaz – Plastic Beach
Jason Collett – Rat a Tat Tat
Jimi Hendrix – Valleys of Neptune
jj – jj no 3
Josh Rouse – El Turista
The Knife – Tomorrow, In A Year
Liars – Sisterworld
Morning Benders – Big Echo
Pavement – Quarantine the Past: The Best of Pavement
Serj Tankian – Elect the Dead Symphony
Ted Leo and The Pharmacists – The Brutalist Bricks
Titus Andronicus – The Monitor
Woodpigeon – Die Stadt Muzikanten
jj – Let Go (mp3) from the forthcoming jj no 3
Broken Bells – The High Road (mp3) from the forthcoming Broken Bells
I haven’t given hellogoodbye much thought since they were the band on The Real World: Austin and the cast had to make a video about them. I bought their debut album – Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs!
I don’t know if their oft-rumored, nothing concrete new release will be uneven, but it’s clear that they are taking their time. If it’s anything like “When We First Met,” it should be outstanding. It’s shiny power pop, and represents what I liked best about the band on their first release. It’s an innocent love song, and it’s pretty damn perfect. If I were still of an age where spinning endlessly in circles was socially acceptable, I can imagine that would do it to this. Listen, and feel the dizziness set in.
hellogoodbye – When We First Met (mp3)
For this afternoon we’ve got another submission. Self described as similar to The Faint and M83, amongst others, Shaw has an interesting atmospheric sound that does somewhat remind me at moments of M83. The five song EP from Shaw entitled Pretending We’re Not Animals, was released earlier this month on Swordfish records. There’s not much going on at the site but hopefully they get themselves going. Give it a go.
Shaw – Sometimes (mp3) from Pretending We’re Not Animals
Everyone who lives in Rochester has an appointment tomorrow evening at the Bug Jar. So be there. In the meantime, go here to understand what I am writing about today.
93. Jefferson Airplane – White Rabbit (mp3) from Surrealistic Pillow
Lewis Carroll’s 1865’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and its 1871 sequel Through the Looking-Glass are some of the most oft-cited works of literature in popular culture. Specifically they are an incredible influence on my favorite show “Lost,” a fair bit throughout but especially lately. I’ve never read the books but I have a date with both of them in the near future. This song uses the imagery from the book to thinly veil drug experiences to excellent effect. For some reason I have loved this song since I was a kid. An odd choice one might think for a youngster, but I enjoyed music odd for a child.
94. Led Zeppelin – In The Evening (mp3) from In Through The Out Door
In high school my friends and I went to a few Laser Shows. Not because we were drunk or anything, maybe, but because we were in our old-school rock phases; deep in appreciation of Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin. I think I fell asleep at the Pink Floyd one, but I distinctly recall this particular Zeppelin song set to the lasers. I went out and purchased this album very shortly afterwards because it was one of the few my dad didn’t have either on cd or vinyl.
I have had the same DVR for a few years now. It is the only DVR I’ve ever owned in fact. Near the time I came into possession of this digital recording cable box, a now unavailable and possibly defunct channel broadcast live music recordings from The Isle of Wight Festival. I greatly enjoy(ed) these recordings and certainly the few Supergrass songs from one of them. I would be remiss if I were not to mention that nearly my entire experience with the band is due to my good friend Steve. He has a long standing love and has supplied me with copies of most of their work. Because of him I’ve come to enjoy the band a great deal, and this track is one of my favorites. It was also the best song from the Isle of Wight recordings.
Supergrass – Moving (mp3) from Supergrass
The practice of using instrumental tracks to lead off an album isn’t always employed, but when it is I do so enjoy it if well done. There are several possible intents when leading off an album with instrumentals. Whether the song is a standalone track, meant to be on its own and lead off the album stylistically or what have you, or it is built implicitly to build a melody and lead into the second track on the album where things really take off. I’m certain there are other intentions made when using an instrumental leadoff, but those are the two most encompassing ideals I can think of.
Surely I have missed many instrumental intros that would be worthy of mention, in addition to many that would not. I am not omnipotent and don’t pretend to know every instrumental intro ever used, nor will I likely even recall every single example I’ve heard. But these two struck a chord with me recently, so they will have to do for today.
Ambulance Ltd – Yoga Means Union (mp3) from LP
