American Idolatry
March 28th, 2008
I will be guest-blogging for Idolator today. In the words of Snoop, “follow me, follow me, follow me, follow me, but don’t lose your grip.”
I will be guest-blogging for Idolator today. In the words of Snoop, “follow me, follow me, follow me, follow me, but don’t lose your grip.”
In honor of the Genius’ Liquid Swords performance at the El Rey this Saturday night, I have an article in the new LA Weekly, analyzing the unimpeachable brilliance of the record and why nearly 15 years after its release it’s regarded as one of the genre’s finest. It’s not really my place to say whether it’s good or not, but I had more fun writing this piece than almost anything else I’ve written. Thanks also need to be said to the infamous Barry Schwartz of Disco Vietnam for helping me decipher an album that manages to be both very accessible and completely impenetrable. Pause.
LA Weekly: Liquid Swords of Truth
Download:
MP3: Genius/Gza-”Duel of the Iron Mic”
MP3: Genius/Gza-”4th Chamber”
I’m pressed for time today, what with running around Los Angeles trying to show Clean Guns the ins and outs of this warped, weird town. And yes, this includes trips to In-N-Out. So I apologize for it being a light week of posting. But in order to appease your blood-lust for new, good music, I’m upping some not-so-new, but still incredible tracks. Specifically, two cuts from Now-Again Records’ spectacular Carolina Funk record.
According to the press release, the album “looks at the vibrant and original scene in the two rural states of North and South Carolina. Curated largely by resident North Carolina researcher and collector Jason Perlmutter, Carolina Funk presents 22 of the best, rarest and most sought-after heavy funk songs ever recorded, with breakbeats to spare. Without any large urban centers, much of the musical output of the Carolinas has been limited to single towns, with bands and their records seldom venturing further than the state line. From inspired percussive instrumentals to heartfelt slabs of soul; from rediscovered tapes in the garages of retired musicians to funk 45s so raw that they were blessed by James Brown himself.” Did you hear that? Heartfelt slabs of soul? Sounds delicious. Or not.
MP3: Frankie & The Damons-”Bad Woman”
MP3: Paul Burton-”So Very Hard To Make It (Without You)
10. In conjunction with The Knux’s performance, we will be serving fresh cappuccino’s with mocha twists.
9. Because Nico the Beast, 1/2 of Clean Guns nearly beat up the fake Spiderman on Hollywood Blvd today. While the details of the altercation remain murky, the phrase, “I will destroy you, you 38 pound bag of bones!” was heard.
8. Because Wallpaper cannot possibly be as boring as actual wallpaper. (Statement does not apply to habitual LSD users.)
7. For the sheer ironic pleasure of using the phrase, “Hell Ya,” at a night promoted by Hell Ya. You guys like irony, right. Please don’t answer that question.
6. Because The Knux’s video for “Cappuccino” reminds me of Class Act and lo and behold, today on Hollywood Blvd I saw none other than Christopher Reid, aka Kid o’ Kid N’ Play. Obviously, this is the sign (no Ace of Base.)
5. Because Wallpaper might be the hardest band in the entire country to locate via “Google Search.” However, thanks to this peculiar quirk of nomenclature, I can safely report that wallpaperbase.com is a fantastic source of military wallpaper.
4. Because I will be there. Probably drunk. Probably making all sorts of outlandish claims that may or may not include: inventing the javelin, transforming the world of traditional iron smelting, and pioneering, “the remix.”
3. Because I watched Nico the Beast and Zilla Rocca kick freestyles today that were better than 92 percent of “underground rapper’s” written material. On a side note, if any grainy footage ever surfaces of me participating in said freestyles, rest assured that it is not actually me and instead it is the work of my twin brother, Pierre, a man who moves in unsavory French circles.
2. Because the “Cappuccino Remix” that dropped yesterday might be better than the original and dare I say it, reminds me an awful lot of Southernplayalistic-era Outkast.
1. Because if you download the three songs below and don’t like at least one of them, you are probably cursed to a life of hate, pestilence and mirthlessness. On the bright side, that qualifies you for citizenship in at least four ex-Soviet republics.
Download:
MP3: The Knux-”Cappuccino Remix”
MP3: Clean Guns (as Fairmount Park Commission w/ Triple Nickels & 2ew Gun Ciz)-”The Grind”
MP3: Wallpaper-”Evrytm We Do It”
Every time I write about Jens Lekman, I’m tempted to compare him to Morrissey, even though I know I shouldn’t. After all, both songwriters specialize in witty and literate love-lorn laments sung in a smooth, mahogany baritone. And invariably, any time you can compare someone’s voice to an article of fine office furniture, it’s a good thing. Granted, Jens hasn’t written anything nearly as good as The Queen is Dead but really, who has? Besides, Lekman has one thing on the notoriously chilly “Pope of Mope,” namely an inherent charm and affability unmatched by few songwriters in recent memory.
You can sense Lekman’s likability on his records. “A Postcard to Nina” finds him posing as his lesbian friend’s boyfriend for her bigoted German father. ” Yet rather than censure the old man’s ignorance, Lekman takes the softer, kinder approach, wryly poking fun at the awkwardness of the meeting and the weird, kindly e-mails that Nina’s father sends Jens in the aftermath. The hardest thing in the world is to be funny without being mean (perhaps one of these days I’ll learn how), but in person, Lekman is the rare person who manages to be supremely nice without ever being dull. Forget the songs themselves, which are almost uniformly good, his between song banter is flat-out hilarious. With the timing and delivery of a crack stand-up, Lekman regaled the crowd with background stories that played like DVD commentary.
With a spot on Entertainment Weekly’s “8 to Watch in 08″ and Ann Powers’ SXSW rave in the LA Times, the Wale hype is getting pretty loud, yet it exists for good reason. After all, how many young guns can go toe-to-toe with Bun B and Pusha-T? Not to say he’s quite there yet. From this angle, Bun-B wins the battle royal, continuing the rampage he’s been on in the aftermath of Pimp’s C’s death. Meanwhile, Pusha delivers a pretty great 16 in his own right. But Wale holds his own, sounding like Kanye if Kanye was actually a great rapper. Indeed, between Wale, Jay Electronica, The Knux, Cool Kids, Clean Guns, Blu & others, the next generation is clearly bubbling. Coupled with fact that the 90s vets finally sound interested in making music again, the hip-hop is dead arguments of ‘06 seem, well, dead.
While even I can’t openly advocate Soulja Boy slaughter by an army of aggrieved pre-teens (somebody buy that 12-year old a beer), I can safely say that “Yahh” is the dumbest song that I have ever heard in my life. Granted, peaking at #48 on the Billboard 200 doesn’t exactly match the sterling success of Hormel Chavez’s “Ow My Balls,” but the video has gotten over 6,000,000 views on You Tube, a number any artist would dream of. Thankfully, the LA Weekly alloted me the soapbox to rant about the epic inanity of a track so stupid it makes “Crank That” looks like Beethoven’s 6th.
LA Weekly: Review of Soulja Boy’s “Yahh”
The truth is that I will use any excuse to post the above picture of Devin the Dude. However, in this instance there’s a reasonable explanation, specifically the final print version of the LA Weekly’s SXSW coverage. I had a chance to edit and I think improve on my original Devin story, which ended up in the paper as well as parts of two other entries. Additionally, editor Randall Roberts and Alec Hanley Bemis share their take on that weird week in Austin. Even if you don’t read the article, download the songs below, two of the greatest weed smoking songs in music history. Yes, even better than “The Big Yellow Joint.”
LA Weekly: The Glowing Trough of Music: 5 Days of SXSW
Download:
MP3: Devin the Dude-”Doobie Ashtray”
MP3: Devin the Dude ft. Scarface, Jugg Mugg, Killemall & Ant Live-”Like a Sweet”
Unlike Sasha Frere-Jones, my main gripe with indie rock don’t stem from it’s lack of blackness. More than anything, I have trouble dealing with the idea that Jenny Lewis is indiedom’s official pin-up girl. No joke, I think she won first in the 2006 Stereogum poll and came in second in 2007. The winner last year, of course, being Feist, therein proving the voters themselves have bad taste in both senses of the word. Nothing against J-Lew though, she’s certainly attractive and the fact that she was the star of The Wizard gives her enough street cred to play Super Mario Bros. 3 at my house anytime she wants. But let’s all be honest with ourselves, Jenny Lewis looks like the kind of girl who fakes it every time. Granted, my only evidence is that last godawful Rilo Kiley album that had her singing the world’s least believable sex songs. But really, you could almost hear her yawning.
VV from The Kills, doesn’t need to write tacky and tawdry pop songs about porn stars because everything she does is indistinguishable from the notion of sex. She could recite the phone book and you’d be turned on. To say nothing of the back of the LA Weekly. On-stage, this notion is inescapable. She’s got a a damaged, Suicide Girl beauty, raven hair, cream-colored skin. That prettiest girl in art-school look, immaculately put-together. silverly jangly bracelets, skin-tight black jeans, leather jacket, and a robin hood hat slung low over a searing stare.
From the moment The Kills took the stage at Antone’s, you half expected VV to rip off her jacket and strip, instead she grabbed off her hat and flung it behind her, all id, grabbing the microphone violently, spitting on-stage, lost in her velocity of her own mind. Wavering from a luring purr to a plaintive howl, her voice full of life and death and a whiskey-washed, nicotine-scorched blues. Another guy plays on-stage. I think he goes by Hotel but his real name is Jamie. Apparently, he used to date Kate Moss or something. You won’t notice. Of course, the songs themselves are great, inverted blues riffs, staccato drum machines, grimy, stabbing guitars, urgent, sounding tunes that ring with a smoky air of desperation. Midnight Boom, the Kills’ third jaunt, is a great record, one of the best released this year and with Sleater-Kinney gone, VV is probably the best female front-woman in rock. Plus, I imagine she’s incredible at Super Mario Bros. 3. So to speak.
Download:
From Midnight Boom
MP3: The Kills-”Cheap and Cheerful”
From No Wow
MP3: The Kills-”Love is a Deserter”
From Keep On Your Mean Side
MP3: The Kills-”Kissy Kissy”
Change is good, evolution is better, but I’m starting to think that these two could’ve done this the entire time had Andre not gotten infected by the fierce viral strains of Baduizm. Oh well, what’s three of four years lost when in 2008 we can still get vintage OutKast. And hey, that Raekwon fellow ain’t too shabby. As Noz aptly put it, “this makes me feel 15 again.” Thank him for the MP3 too. In the meantime, right click and cross your fingers that this streak continues.
Download:
MP3: Outkast & Raekwon-”Royal Flush” (CDQ Version)
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