March 30th, 2007
No, the above photo is not an actual photo of me at work at Sea Level. Sadly, I don’t have fins, nor a garrulous lobster pal named Sebastian, nor a coral bra. Well, maybe I’m lying a little. I can’t deny my penchant for a good coral bra. Please keep this a secret between you me and the FBI. Would it make you feel it any better if I called it a manziere? A bro? Nah, too ethnic.
Anyhow, its week 5 at Sea Level and I’m a little perturbed, (in a complete shocker.) At the exact moment when I was about to put in that old Afu-Ra album, Body of the Life Force, a couple of old graying yuppies walked in, hand and hand. Which is fine and all, but honestly, why even bother asking me where the country music section is? I don’t know fucking shit about George Strait. Between that and the hipsters with kids (a more frightening proposition unto itself) that have currently invaded the store, I’m stuck bumping the infinitely more placid Besnard Lakes Cd while swilling a diet coke. Of course, the Besnard Lakes remain awesome, but I’m fiending for some “Whirlwind Thru Cities.” Ah well. At least, the hipster parents bought a record. Even it was Amy Winehouse, who I continue to boycott. Not like it matters.
In other news, the weirdly yoked old man that comes in every single Friday rain or shine, has yet to receive his Ibiza Vol. 6 CD. He is very upset. Last week, we even specially ordered him Ibiza Vol. 5. This is after reading him Amazon.com customer reviews of every item in the Ibiza series. Apparently, “Real Ibiza’s creators Chris Cocco & Bruno Leprete have given us this CD out of love, rather than the commercial motives that seem to drive the more recent Ibiza CD’s….and it shows.” Who knew? All I know is that once again this Saturday night, another senior citizen dance party will be lacking in fine rave music from Ibiza. Is there no decency in this world?
Posted in Miscellany, Are You From the Lester Bangs School of Thought? | 3 Comments »
March 29th, 2007
Indeed, the Times are a changing. Specifically, the LA Times, where I will be running the Buzz Bands Blog for the next two weeks while Kevin Bronson’s out of town. Of course, working for the LA Times is a dicey proposition, considering with my big mouth I’m perpetually one Man Man diatribe away from being all Andres Martinez’ed and shit.
So please go over to the Blog and say hello. I apologize in advance if I’m not as mean as I normally am. I’ve had to take an extra large dose of Klonopin to restrain my most vicious instincts. Mmmm…Klonopin. Anyhow, I’ll be posting at both sites every day for a while, so go easy on me if The Passion is even more ill-thought out than usual.
Today’s post at Buzz Bands tackles TV on the Radio openers, The Noisettes, who after a few listens I’m not sure if I like or hate. I’ll have to catch them live at Coachella to see whether or not they’re less Karen O and more Love is All. And who’s got time to listen to them when I can listen to the new Dungen album for the 8,321st time.
The Klaxons Album Cover: Totally Deep (for 14-Year Olds)
Yesterday’s buzz bands blog concerned album reviews from British “Nu-Ravers,” The Klaxons. I’m not saying this CD is anything special. It’s not half as good as last year’s Rapture album and not a 50th of as good as that new LCD Soundsystem, but if you’re into that whole “rock dance music” thing you’ll probably like it.
The Klaxons are huge in Britain, the NME wants to have crazy ecstasy fueled sex with them (something I never ever want to think about) and they have been called leaders of the “Nu-Rave” movement. Take a listen to their single, “Golden Skans” which went to #7 in Britain. I imagine if I was British, on designer drugs, and a teenager, I would find this record pretty awesome. Thankfully, I am none of those things. Every time I hear the word “designer drugs” I feel like I’m swallowing a pair of blue jeans.
Download: The Klaxons-”Golden Skans
Prodigy: Once Again Proving that Everything 50 Cent Touches Turns To Suck
The only other album covered at Buzz Bands worth talking about is the new Prodigy album. Which is shockingly, a pretty good record. The M-V-P award goes to Alchemist, who might be the most underrated hip-hop producer in recent memory, saving this and the new Evidence from total boredom. Dusty moaning soul samples complement menacing keyboards and gritty drum tracks, propping up P’s simple but effective tough talk. Ian Cohen goes on at length in Stylus and I co-sign all of his points. It’s probably the best Mobb Deep album since Hell on Earth and while it’s nowhere near as good as the early stuff, it remains rock-solid.
Download:
MP3: Prodigy: “Stuck On You”
Links Brought To You By Catfish Hunter: Because His Name Was Catfish Hunter
Sacha Orenstein at Oh Word compiles one of the greatest lists I’ve seen a while: Rap Songs To Get Bent and Punch A Wall Too.
Dallas Penn: The MLB Facial Hair Hall of Fame. No need to explain more.
Aquarium Drunkard has two songs from the Besnard Lakes. If you haven’t checked these guys out yet you should. And while you’re over there congratulate him on being Sirius’ newest blog radio host.
Cole Slaw Blog Is Having a Tournament of Everything. Featuring match-ups between Jacques Cousteau Vs. The Office (UK). A tough call.
Milk Was a Bad Choice recaps Wrestlemania III. Because it is never a bad time to talk Wrestlemania III. The pure good of Hulk Hogan. The gallic Shrek, Andre the Giant. Don’t even get me started.
Crocktock reviews the El-P show that I attended on Monday. As I already wrote two posts on El in the last week, I saved you guys yet another post on I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead. But as Crock can attest the show was incredible. See El-P when he comes to your town.
Uncle Granbo has a video from the Hold Steady, along with a nice look at a couplet from one of the best songs of last year and any year, “Stuck Between Stations.”
Posted in LA Times | 7 Comments »
March 29th, 2007
Joe from Radio Free Silverlake has things fairly figured out. Or so it seemed last night at his packed monthly Let’s Independent night at Boardner’s in Hollywood, when the cute pixiesh lead singer of The Happy Hollows broke mid-set to regale a story about a blog-obsessed friend of hers, who begged her to meet the man behind the blog, because she LOVES Radio Free Silverlake and reads it every single day. Which of course is awesome in and of itself because who knew blog groupies (bloupies?) even existed. Certainly not me. Whenever I meet someone who reads my blog, the conversation generally goes something like this:
Person (with sneering tone) : Oh, so you’re the guy who writes that Passion of the Weiss blog.
Me: Yeah, I swear, I’m not as much of a jerk as I seem.
Person: Right.
Me: Really, it’s all in good fun.
Person: Yeah, I gotta’ go now.
The Deadly Syndrome: A Ghost Is Born
Which brings me back to point one, Joe clearly has things figured out, judging from last night’s outstanding show led by a captivating, performance from the Deadly Syndrome. I know I wrote about them last month, so I won’t go on and on describing who these kids are. But last night, they delivered one of the most brilliant shows I’ve ever seen from a local band. It was one of those moments where you were struck by the thought that in five years, The Deadly Syndrome will probably be huge and headlining the Wiltern. They’ve been compared to Modest Mouse and Wolf Parade and I’d agree that that particular brand of twitchy electrifying indie rock is probably the most apt way to label them.
Propelled by drummer Jesse Hoy delivering bruising speed-freak drum hits, The Syndrome’s songs contain atomic levels of energy that make it damn near impossible to do anything but tap your foot and nod your head. Songs that start slow and meandering gain steam with each measure, twisting and stomping their way along powerful electric guitar riffs, impassioned haunting vocals and skittering keyboards.
Signed to Dim Mak and with a debut, “The Ortolan” set to drop sometime this summer, these guys are one national tour away from reaching next big-thing-status. And while it’s always a dicey proposition to wager that a band will fulfill their promise on their debut full-length, I’m willing to bet on The Deadly Syndrome. If you live in LA and have yet to see this band live, they are a must-see. And with their next show, an April 14th double-bill at Spaceland with my other favorite local band, The Parson Redheads, the only excuse not to be there is if you’ve got some sort of contagious deadly syndrome.
See Also Brunette Like Me’s Much Better Written Syndrome Review
Download:
MP3: The Deadly Syndrome-”I Hope I Become a Ghost”
The Happy Hollows: Like Sleepy Hollow But On Prozac
It’s hard not to like things with Happy in the name. See the Happy Mondays. Happy Gilmore. And Happy Endings (in the movies, get your minds out of the gutter people). Now, you can add The Happy Hollows to that list. Fronted by mini-skirt wearing, ADD-hyper front-woman Sarah Negahdari, The Hollows delivered a fun, energetic 45 performance opening up for the Syndrome.
Reminiscent of a less-annoying Yeah Yeah Yeahs or even a cross between Autolux and Blondie, the Happy Hollows’ brand of new wave-inspired Garage Rock got the crowd moving, as they displayed a surprising level of polish for a band that’s only been around six months. With a recently released EP to complement their already impressive live show don’t be surprised if the Happy Hollows turn out to be one of LA’s next big exports.
See JAX’s post about The Happy Hollows, with MP3
Posted in Beards, Blazers, & Glasses | 2 Comments »
March 28th, 2007
Granted, Dilated Peoples bore the hell out of me in the year 2007. True, they had a nice run from 97-2001 or so, but now it’s probably time for them to join J5 in that great underground hip-hop heaven in the sky. So it’s understandable that bloggers have pretty much completely ignored Evidence’s solo debut , The Weatherman LP that dropped last week. And while its no masterpiece, the mostly Alchemist-produced album has no shortage of bangers.
Evidence isn’t compelling enough of an MC to carry a solo album on his own, but there’s no mistaking the stellar flow and legitimate skills that allowed him to become one of the rising stars of the underground at the turn of the decade. And wisely, the album features supplements Ev’s shortcomings with stellar guest spots from the likes of Defari, Phonte and Big Pooh of Little Brother, Planet Asia, and Slug. Coupled with ridiculously good beats, the record has an serious shot of making the outer reaches of my Top 10 best hip-hop albums released this year.
Specifically check out his collabo, “NC To CA” featuring Defari, Pooh and (sadly) Joe Scudda, as well as his cut with Slug, “Line of Scrimmage.” While neither break any new ground lyrically, the head-nodding beats and anvil drums should keep heads ringin’ all spring, in any type of weather.
Download:
MP3: Evidence ft. Slug-”Line of Scrimmage”
MP3: Evidence ft. Defari, Big Pooh & Joe Scudda-”NC to CA”
Posted in Album Reviews | 1 Comment »
March 27th, 2007
Dear Sir,
I wanted to thank you so much for wearing that see-through crocheted black nipple-shirt while you were working out today. The fellas’ and I were talking about it in the locker room and agreed that there truly aren’t enough people comfortable displaying nipple in public. You, sir, are a fashion pioneer. Why bother with things like cloth, comfort or sanitation when you can tell the world, here are my nipples, here me roar. I’m proud, I’m scantily attired and I’m ready to bench two sets of 45s on the bench press.
Perhaps the only thing more impressive than the showy curvature of your muscles was your platinum white hair. Indeed, few 60-year old men can pull off the butch Barry Manilow look with such verve and vigor. Not only did you succeed, I even heard one of the girls at the front desk ask, “do you think we need to call security on that dude?” And by security, I think she meant sex.
Clay Aiken: This is Your Future
I also was quite inspired by your sartorial flair. Only a true fashionista would pair high socks with short shorts (or an NBA player circa 1977-1983). Coupled with your see-through nipple shirt, I think you might have succeeded in covering up a whopping 17 percent of your flesh. Kudos. There are many things I like to think about when working out: taxes, the Kashmir question (like Puffy said, it’s all about the partition, baby) and the occasional rumination on how sound it was to cast Tiffani Amber-Thiessen as Leon Phelp’s love interest in The Ladies Man. But not today. Today, the only thought going through my head was: is this guy a meth-head or just a plain pervert? As Phelps himself might say, “yeah, thass cool.”
Ultimately, your decision to dazzle the entire Gold’s Gym with your niptastic display of skin, led me to question my entire place in the Cosmos. Why go through the motions of living when I know that someone else will always look infinitely more superior while working out? One might ask why I couldn’t just buy my own see-through nipple shirt, but that isn’t the point. I’m no poseur. There’s only one original and that’s you! You sassy fellow. In the meantime, each day, I shall live in shame, knowing damn well the astounding fashion potential you wield each time you grab that lat pull bar. You best believe, I will dedicate the rest of my life living up to the example that you have set. The bar has raised high. Nipple-high.
Thank you for making me a better person,
Jeff Weiss
Download:
MP3: Talking Heads-”Psycho Killer”
MP3: Cypress Hill-”Insane In The Brain”
Posted in It Got Weird, Didn't It? | 9 Comments »
March 27th, 2007
There are several rote cliches that you can always count on finding in Los Angeles. Perpetual sunshine. Sleazy Hollywood types. Pretty girls. And sleazy Hollywood types trying to scheme on
pretty girls in the sunshine. But LA has at least one more thing you can always depend on. Namely, that on any given year, Beck will play several top-secret shows at a small venue on the Eastside, all of them announced at the last minute, all of them sold out within 30 minutes of their announcement and all of them packed to the gills with the aforementioned sleazy Hollywood types and the women who love them.
Last Thursday, the one-time prince (and wanna-be Prince) of Silverlake pulled his usual move, a few rumors circulated about a possible Beck show later that week, and then the day of, the 3:00 p.m. announcement from The Echo that tickets were going on sale. Flash forward five hours later,. a waifish Beck, clad in a black felt Robin Hood hat, wispy mustache and scraggly blond hair, took the stage, vaguely resembling David Spade, if David Spade was a child molester. Nothing against Beck, but the dude looked creepy, gaunt cheekbones jutting out of his face, baggy clothes hanging limply from his body, eyes dull, head down. Apparently, food has been to Adderal on the list of Scientologist-banned substances.
I’d seen Beck once before, at a Greek Theater show on his Midnight Vultures tour seven years before. During the days of “Debra,” when there was no denying Beck’s undeniable charisma, cool banter with the crowd and successful knack for gimmickry and self-indulgence. The kinds of thing that only truly great artists can pull off. The kind of things that lead to beds being lowered on-stage, mid-set. There were none of those theatrics in this intimate club setting. Instead, backed by a talented five piece band, Beck put on a focused if subdued performance, trotting out a host of new songs, yet displaying practically no on-stage banter or rapport with the crowd.
Xenu? Wherefore Art Thou, Xenu?
As for the new songs, they reflect yet another new direction for the chameleon-like songwriter. Whereas on his last two albums Beck seemed backed into a corner trying to re-create the Beastie Boys/Dust Brothers homage of the Odeley-era, the new songs were the most rock-oriented of his career, heavier than anything Beck’s ever attempting. The show had a quasi-jammy feel fueled by beefy guitar solos, scuzzy drum hits and bluesy harmonica peals. The songs might not have matched Beck’s best records (in my mind, the trio of Mutations, Mellow Gold and Odelay, but in his latest incarnation, the ever-evolving artist seemed a bit closer to Mike Bloomfield than Mike Diamond.
While never reaching the realm of the transcendent, the performance was undeniably impressive, especially considering the songs’ still rough-form. Beck’s backing band was perfectly competent and slightly funky, despite having something a sanitized, Blueshammery vibe to them. This wasn’t the raw stomping blues of The Black Keys, This was polished, slightly sanitized, tailor-made for the NPR crowd blues/stoner rock. But the band could Play, charging Beck’s songs with wiry bursts of energy, ripping off power chords, slick bass lines and propulsive drums, even chiming in the occasional melodica solo (which like cornbread, there ain’t nothing wrong with). Interspersing the new material with tracks from the recently re-released The Information, the show had a fun, rambunctious, loose vibe.
In fact, my only gripe was Beck’s insistence on having an irritating terminally white hype-man dancing on-stage directly to his left. We’re talking the sorts of lame dances last seen sometime in an Ibiza discoteque circa 1998. As someone in the crowd pointed out, “is it too much to ask for a hot dancing chick with a tambourine?” Touche. As for Beck himself, he seemed drained of the charisma that made him one of the biggest names in music a few years back, yet there was no denying his prodigious talent and continuing artistic evolution. I wouldn’t be about to start bumping the “Mama Said Knock You Out” comeback linea just yet, but I also wouldn’t be surprised if Beck’s next jaunt finds him treading new ground in his third decade as a recording artist. That is, if the Scientologists or the Super Adventure Club don’t finish him off first.
See Also The LA Times Buzz Bands Blog Review
Download:
MP3: Beck-”Think I’m In Love”
MP3: Beck-”Cell Phone’s Dead”
Posted in Beards, Blazers, & Glasses | 6 Comments »
March 25th, 2007
There’s a moment on “The Overly Dramatic Truth,” the ninth track of El-P’s brilliant sophomore effort, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead , when the Brooklyn-born Jaime Meline doesn’t sound like any of the writerly influences critics typically pigeon-hole him with. It doesn’t remind me of Philip K. Dick. Or George Orwell. Or Aldous Huxley. Or [insert your favorite dystopian chronicler here]. It reminds me of the classic work of another great Brookyln-reared artist, Woody Allen.
In particular, “The Overly Dramatic Truth” and its warning to an unnamed younger woman kept reminding me of the scene in Manhattan where an already 40-something Woody Allen lectures a teenage Mariel Hemingway about how she’s absolutely forbidden to fall in love with him. And it’s not beyond a simple stretch of the imagination to picture the bespectacled Woody, flailing his arms around a well-decorated but small apartment, stealing El-P’s words verbatim, claiming: “This is not my ego talking / I know I’m no perfect draw / And I do love the way you lay there / I like the way we talk / Maybe I’m just condescending / Maybe this thing isn’t wrong / Maybe you should lay right there.”
Granted, El-P’s aesthetic isn’t exactly a laugh riot. I mean, the guy did once release a tour-only LP entitled the We Are All Going To Burn in Hell Megamix (which was outstanding, by the way). But onstage he’s arguably one of the funniest MCs around. The albums might be Woody Allen at his most Interiors-bleak, but get Aesop Rock and Mr. Lif around El, and you get something approaching Bananas. And if you wanna talk paranoia, these two heavyweights can go pound-for-pound. Sure, at dinner with Annie Hall’s family, Woody imagines that her Norman Rockwell-painting kin sees him as a bearded Orthodox Jew. But El-P’s double-vision approaches his landscape with images of “cars slidin’ by with the boomin’ system / Like New York is Fallujah with metal-gear-using Christians.”
Woody Allen’s Beard: Made From Mr. Lif’s Hair?
With I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead, El-P has created a masterpiece, a record both explicit and subtle, simultaneously political and apolitical, a record for a turbulent schizophrenic time where gruesome headlines from Iraq sit side-by-side with news of the Dow skyrocketing and Anna Nicole Smith corpse-raping (give them a minute). Heavily rooted in his NYC cityscape, El dips jittery, a “Brooklyn baby / Waterlocked, walkin’ nervous” with a “gonzomatic fear turning [him] Hunter S. Thompson.” Or to put it in the more Allen-esque terms of the fifth track, “Drive”: “I’m not depressed. I’m just a fuckin’ New Yorker who knows that sittin’ in traffic with these bastards is torture.”
The knock on El-P is that he’s the epitome of “nerd rap.” Or, as one of my Stylus colleagues described it, “fucking spaceship plinky plink sampling accordions and rapping about depression rap.” And granted, like many Def Jux records, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead is monolithic and impenetrable on first listen. But with patience and time, its lyrical complexities and Bomb Squad by way of My Bloody Valentine sound grows increasingly more vivid. And in truth, those easy labels just aren’t true. At its core, it’s very much a hip-hop record, with its cavernous booming drums, golden-age worthy story-telling, tightly constructed rhymes, and schemes more intricate and refined than those found on Fantastic Damage.
Ultimately, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead displays a type of artistic growth almost alien to the genre. In hip-hop, artists rarely mature, they just get old and cranky, tossing off nebulous boasts about being “old-school,” or shallow braggadocio about making grown-man rap). El-P is too smart to let his evolution speak for himself. The younger, brasher El-P of five years previous said he’d rather “get mouth-fucked by Nazi’s unconscious” than sign with Rawkus. He titled songs “The Nang, The Front, The Bush, and the Shit.” Now he’s more apt to offer abstract images, like the sci-fi burner “Habeus Corpses (Draconian Love),” which paints an allegorical tale of El and Cage as Abu Ghraib-like guards on a futuristic prison ship.
Allen once said that “life is divided into the horrible and miserable,” and while his words reek of overstatement, it’s not hard to find them somewhat poignant at a time when you can’t open up your newspaper without reading about a never-ending war, a corrupt Attorney General, and a spy-cover-blowing Vice President. It might not be as silky-smooth as a Joplin soundtrack, but the poisoned purity of I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead is no less poignant—a rhapsody in bleak.
Rating: A
Originally Published At Stylus
Download:
MP3: El-P-”EMG”
MP3: El-P-”The Overly Dramatic Truth”
Posted in Album Reviews, Best Of | 10 Comments »
March 23rd, 2007
The razor-sharp minds at Idolator , accurately summed up the main reason why I hadn’t heard The Besnard Lakes before their album The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse dropped last with month, Stylus Recommends tag in tow. Namely because at a glance, their name reads like “The Barenaked Ladies,” and in the right light, if you squint just properly, it looks like the album is called The Besnard Ladies Are Dark Whores. Which might be fine in Canada, but here in the states, we like our whores optimistic and upbeat. (And on Myspace)
But in the past month or so, The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horses has evolved for me into a slow-burning classic. It’s nothing remarkable on first listen, just mellow, pleasant and slightly cold-sounding music. But each listen found the album worming its way into the grooves of my head (no John Travolta), its brooding stoned psychedelic guitars and flickering campfire harmonies sounding like the unholy combination of My Morning Jacket and Brightblack Morning Light (with maybe a little Low thrown into the mix). Not to mention, something that the Pitchfork review wisely pointed out: “for all its epic intimations and interstellar overdriving, the album still clocks in at a lean 45 minutes.”
Live at The Echo on Wednesday night, The Montreal-based five-piece, delivered to the fullest, the greatness hinted at on wax. Pastoral songs that meandered at a country-slow gait on the full-length were transformed into a thunderous rain of sludgy guitars and booming cavernous drum hits. Minus the brass horns and strings that complement their classic sound, the band had me digging deeper for comparisons, seeming trippy enough to be a Pink Floyd of sorts for this ADD generation. Don’t get me wrong, there will never will be another Floyd. But The Besnard Lakes might be My Morning Jacket’s closest rival, as heirs to the throne, capable of pairing blistering guitar assaults, with gorgeous harmonies and haunting Floyd-ian anthems.
But Will They Play A Cover Of “One Week”
Emerging surrounded by gray clouds of 70s arena rock smoke, the band took the stage singer/ keyboardist/guitarist, Jace Lasek up front, a huge frizzy mop of hair atop his head, the tall and lanky frontman vaguely resembling a young Weird Al Yankovich. To his left, his wife, Olga Goreas, the group’s bassist and other main singer, unleashed a rumbling bass line that stunned the room. She also stunned the room by being the cutest woman named Olga in the history of Olga’s. Somewhere, Olga Korbut is pissed.
Bathed in reverb, the band shook the venue with “Devastation,” the band seeming creepier and weirder in person, Lasek crooning his ghostly drugged falsetto looking like Weird Al playing Jim James after he’d made a pact with the devil. The rest of the band playing in perfect synchronicity, letting off epic rattling tuneful sonic booms. But it was really their rendition of “For Agent 13″ that displayed their talents, with Goreas creeping into the spotlight with her beautiful, vaguely sinister voice.
But just after pounding through the first four songs of the album, the Echo rudely cut the band off mid-set, as two acts more needed to come on. The crowd erupted in boos, one of the few times I’ve seen that happen for an opening act. Rest assured, I will be catching this band the next time they return to Los Angeles. The Besnard Lakes are the real deal. Lasek owns Montreal’s Breakneck Studios, where he helped record Spencer Krug’s brilliant Sunset Rundown album last year. And in my mind, this is the best album to come out of Montreal since (take that best band of all-time in the history of mankind and the earth.) They might think they’re dark horses, but trust me, these guys’ and ladies’ talent reserve isn’t bare naked.
Also See You Set The Scene and The Little Radio Blog’s Reviews of the Show
The Besnard Lakes On Myspace
Buy The Album
Download:
MP3: The Besnard Lakes-”And You Lied To Me”
Bonus: From Their First (and also very good) Album, Volume I
MP3: The Besnard Lakes-”For Spy Turned Musician”
Get More MP3s and Read More About the Band @:
Gorilla Vs. Bear
So Much Silence
Posted in Beards, Blazers, & Glasses | 8 Comments »
March 22nd, 2007
Ah, the days when Xzibit was a great rapper, rather than a great pro ride Pimper. Nine years back when he dropped the above album and the song “Los Angeles Times.” A song being played on repeat, as I got a story in the LA Times this morning (one that didn’t involve the words “blogger indicted on securities fraud”). Specifically, a mini-feature on El-P in the print edition of Kevin Bronson’s Weekly Buzz Bands Column. You can check it out here.
Having grown up in Los Angeles reading the Times daily, to get published in the hometown paper is pretty rad. Almost as rad as this Rad. As Duke, once put it: in most major cities you read the alternative weekly for good local music coverage. In LA, its the other way around, mainly due to Bronson’s Buzz Bands Column (now with blog).
Download:
MP3: Xzibit-”Los Angeles Times”
Around The Blogosphere:
The Rawking Refuses To Stop Posts A Complete List of Elliot Smith Beatles Covers.
Dodge has an outstanding jealousy-inducing photo recap of SXSW
Floodwatch interviews Sea and Cake
Hidden Track Unveils a new column: I Love Bad Music. Topic 1: Michael McDonald.
Straight Bangin Says Black Milk’s Popular Demand is the best rap album of the year.
Scott Sterling’s been putting in work at Read Mezzanine. And he actually made it to Amy Winehouse this week.
Another new music blog I’ve been enjoying is Galactic Mystery Solvers out of Britain. Basically, anyone who makes Jibbs jokes is a friend of mine.
Another (sorta) eulogy of Jurassic 5, over at Just Sayin, involving record shopping with a very mopey Cut Chemist.
Posted in LA Times | 7 Comments »
March 21st, 2007
So I’m pissed. Surprise Surprise. But for once, I have a legit reason. You see last night, I was supposed to have attended a Spaceland performance from the much hyped, big voiced walking disaster known as Amy Winehouse. Granted, Winehouse doesn’t make the type of music I normally get down with, but for major label pop music, I can’t deny that Winehouse’s sophomore album, Back in Black is pretty solid. It’s not the sort of thing I’m about to bump in my car anytime soon, but it’s pleasant, melodic and the girl’s voice is undeniably monstrous. Plus, any girl who brags about refusing to go to rehab and bitching about scavenger smokers who smoke up all their weed is a-ok in my book.
Or so I thought until last night, when Winehouse bailed at the last minute, another not-so-shocking example of her lack of professionalism. Indeed, over the past few weeks her big-coming-out tour has been plagued by last minute cancellations, see London a few weeks ago, SXSW last week (where she canceled on the Brooklyn Vegan show, among others), and now Spaceland, where the official reason given by her publicist was: “Amy didn’t believe the Spaceland stage was big enough to accommodate her band.”
I call bullshit, considering large bands like The Arcade Fire and The Parson Redheads never had a problem with the stage at Spaceland being too small. And it’s not like Winehouse really needs a 10-person band backing her at all times. I’m sure someone in the band would’ve been cool hanging backstage with a blunt and passing the time away just fine. I’m not sure why Winehouse didn’t just come out and say that the dog ate her fucking homework, which might have been the only excuse less believable than “the stage isn’t big enough.” Which didn’t seem to be a problem the night before at the equally intimate Roxy, where Winehouse performed and posed with celebrities all night long 
With that in mind, I present:
The Top 10 Reasons Why Amy Winehouse Really Canceled Her Show At Spaceland
10. Her Weed Got Lost In Her Marge Simpson Beehive and she refused to perform sober.
9. Her Shangri-La’s Tape Got Misplaced on the Flight From Austin and she forgot who to imitate.
8. A cocaine epiphany at 4:00 a.m. prompted her to immediately fly back to London to be Bat-Mitzvah’d. Again.
7. Had to help re-dye Perez Hilton’s hair a lighter shade of pink.
6. She heard from Britney about a great tattoo parlor in Tarzana.
5. Decided to take Ghostface up on his offer to run trains at the Days Inn.
4. Pete Doherty had climbed ahead of her in the official British rankings of Musicians Who Double As Natural Disasters.
3. She realized she hadn’t eaten in 13 days. Oops.
2. Elvira called and told her she wanted her look back.
1. They tried to make her go to rehab. Maybe next time, she ought to say “yes, yes, yes.”
Download:
MP3: Amy Winehouse-”Rehab”
MP3: Amy Winehouse-”Back To Black.”
Posted in Best Of, It Got Weird, Didn't It? | 12 Comments »
No, the above photo is not an actual photo of me at work at Sea Level. Sadly, I don’t have fins, nor a garrulous lobster pal named Sebastian, nor a coral bra. Well, maybe I’m lying a little. I can’t deny my penchant for a good coral bra. Please keep this a secret between you me and the FBI. Would it make you feel it any better if I called it a manziere? A bro? Nah, too ethnic.
