Maceo and the All The King's Men: Doing Their Own Thing

Do you own a pin stripe suit? No? You should. This record would complement your new suit perfectly and I wouldn't steer you wrong. In fact, I know a guy who can get you into a gold pocket watch and suit this afternoon, real cheap. Some cologne too I think. Well, thank you sir, it is funky as hell isn't it? Indeed. You too. Goodbye.

Maceo Parker was born to light your ass on fire. This is fact, I can prove it with data and I've got a lab full of funky motherfuckers in lab coats that will back me up on this. Think I'm wrong? Nope. James Brown had faith that Maceo Parker was bad enough to lead his band and that's about all I need to know. Besides which, all you really need to do is listen to this album and let your hips do the voting.

Even among the least funky of crowds say, a retirement home in Ohio, the head-nodding quotient is higher among Maceo Parker control groups than any other listening segment. It's science bitches, and it works. This album is the King's Men at the height of bad-assery and it they burn it up through the entire album. This is melting a hole through my laptop with Breakestra, James Brown, The Quantic Soul Orchestra and Parliament.

Good for: Lighting you up when the world really wants you down.

Check out some tracks at Last.fm!

Neko Case: Fox Confessor Brings The Flood

I'm watching the stars glide past my eyes in the back of a 1976 Buick station wagon, the smell of the vinyl seats mixing with the pine trees flying past. This is a late night trip down an ancient road past the city lights and noise. Here is the sound you need while you watch moths struggle to join the fluorescent oblivion of a gas station parking lot sign on the road back from a place you never wanted to be.

Neko Case weaves your desire for a better life around a rusted state road sign and wraps the whole thing in an old newspaper before passing it down the bar to you. This album exists in that incredible undefined space between country music, indie folk and singer-songwriter material. It makes me remember why I think genre is bullshit. It's so hard to pin this album down and it's even harder to try and put a label on Neko Case.

Her work has ranged significantly since starting out and it just keeps getting broader and better the more she works. On another awesome note, she grew up in Northern Virginia which is none too far from my own city of Richmond and knowing a bit about the area gives me an understanding of the musical authenticity she's seeking. For those who don't know, Northern Virginia is like Disneyland for conspicuous consumers. It's ridiculous, trust me. This album is rocking me gently with Ryan Adams, Nick Drake, Gillian Welch and Ron Sexsmith.

Good for: Watching blue smoke curl off the bar in a Waffle House just down the road from the dump.

Listen to samples at Last.fm! I recommend you check out Star Witness, soooo awesome.

Fleet Foxes: Sun Giant EP

If we were a tribe in a Zach Braff's head, this is what we'd be playing every night around the fire. There's this other worldly thing floating around Fleet Foxes, like the monsters from under your bed have all come out to join the band. I'm standing in a field watching a faerie tale evolve in front of my eyes and I cannot move. Fleet Foxes play what they describe as baroque harmonic pop, but I think it sounds like the Doors have come floating down through the ages to sit in on a Decemberists session and play the tambourine.

There is this amazing vocal harmony work running throughout the album and other passages that hit a simplicity that I really only find in traditional bluegrass and the like. This EP is their second and I'm really looking forward to going back to their self titled EP and being just as mesmerized by these shining strands of hope and loss that they call songs.

This EP is glittering in my mind with TV on the Radio, The Flaming Lips, Broken Social Scene and Neutral Milk Hotel.

Good for: Watching birds dance high above the tree lines, smoking a pipe and thinking it might rain.

I don't normally do this, but they don't have anything on Last.fm.
You can hear a few tracks on Myspace.com

I Muvrini: A Strada

I have to admit, I don't speak Corsican. Until I listened to these guys I didn't even know that Corsica had it's own language. Not that any of that really matters. The spell that they weave transcends language and enters that rare realm of communication without words. Which is kind of strange, considering that the Corsican tradition they're pimping is primarily vocal.

I think that they're trying to tell us that language doesn't mean a whole lot, and I agree. Corsica, for those who don't know is a tiny Mediterranean Island south of France and their music doesn't sound like anything you've ever heard before. Sweeping melodic structures are built like cathedrals only to fall into this sea of harmonic drone that is trying to sweep you away into the night.

You can get lost in here, it's an open invitation to fall completely into sound. There's hints of North Africa, touches of France and a healthy line of Latin liturgy running throughout the album and it takes you to a place so unique that you might not want to come back. It is levitating through the air with Sigur Rós, Godspeed You Black Emperor, Tony Scott and Tool wondering when you'll be joining them.


Good for: Meditating on top of a mountain during a thunder snow.

Listen to samples on Last.fm!

Sun Kil Moon: Tiny Cities

Sometimes a collection of covers reaches so far beyond its source that it takes on a life of its own and takes you by the hand to the place where it all began. I had never really listened to Modest Mouse until after I heard this record played. You say "Surely you'd heard some Modest Mouse!" I had, but it never really got under my skin the way Sun Kil Moon did.

This collection takes what are now very familiar tunes (Modest Mouse now lives happily on my iPod) and turns them into haunting epics of failure and regret that spin off of steel strings in slow waves, reaching deep inside to turn that knob that keeps you cool about music.

There's something about Mark Kozelak's voice that makes it impossible to keep your distance from him. All the better, I think music is best when experienced directly and that's what this album delivers. This is an old pair of jeans and a dog eared book. These songs are the faded memories of lovers, drifting to the surface on a lazy afternoon. I keep this one right next to my heart along with Iron & Wine, Hope Sandoval, Keren Ann and Elliott Smith.

Good for: Thinking long and hard about the world, looking into mirrors.
Listen to samples at Last.fm!

Thanks Randall, I've been through this with my film scores

From xkcd

If you think this is bad, have the theme from "Conan the Barbarian" play during cuddle time.

The Twilight Singers: Twilight As Played By The Twilight Singers

If you ever needed an excuse to wear black suits and sunglasses, this is your chance. Not that anyone needs an excuse really, more of a score for drinking in an empty bar on a well lit city avenue. The Twilight Singers started as a side project of Afghan Whigs frontman Greg Dulli and several friends that evolved into his full time band. "Twilight" was reworked and co-produced by Fila Brazillia which is one of the reasons that it sounds so different from their later works.

This is such a supremely melancholy album that it makes want to cry. If it weren't for the nice fat Big Beats propping it up, it would be a suicidal depressing endeavor. Instead it comes out as emotionally sincere, darkly sexy and extremely listenable.

This is a fine wine of an album, layers of flavor requiring the utmost attention to gain its full impact. This album is writing poetry and crying with The Postal Service, Portishead, Massive Attack and Radiohead.

Good for: Driving old cars down new streets, singing fresh lyrics over new beats.

Morphine: The Night

Morphine has one of the most unique sounds I've ever heard, a baritone rumble of a band with and endless supply of spectral, seductive lyrics. If I had to make up my own term, it would be Rock Noir. It sounds like your sub-woofer has caught a terminal case of the sexiness and it's not gonna survive.

So quick, get yourself a bottle of whiskey and join us on a trip into the underworld. This is what Bruce Wayne listens to after a long night beating the crap out of psychos, smoking a cigar on the veranda of Wayne Manor, watching the sunrise glint through the remnants of a twenty year old scotch sliding down the side of a crystal glass. The Night is watching you from an alleyway with Robert Rodriguez, Graeme Revell, Chet Baker, Akira Yamaoko, David Lynch and Trent Reznor.

Good for: Watching the city slide by on a rainy night through the window of a broken down, filthy train.

Easy Star Allstars: Dub Side of the Moon

I can't really think of an album that goes this far into stoned out. I feel like I lose my bones every time I put this on. This is the soundtrack to taking a long slow ride through the solar system riding shotgun with Willie Nelson and a seven foot long purple iguana navigating. There's a lingering smell of that vile green reefer you picked up off a chick near Venus and the stars in the viewport are wavering back and forth to the beats flowing past your face in waves of color.

That's just when the slinking snare of "Us and Them" sidles up with the sax line and smoothes your ride out into a nice seven minute weed nap. It's not so much of a tribute or cover of Dark Side of the Moon as it is a re-imagining of the concept filtered through some damn fine production and performance by NYCs Easy Star artists and friends.

Most tributes are bland redubs and new performances of old material, it takes balls to lay an album like this down. I'll definitely be checking out "Radiodread", a re-interpretation of Radiohead's seminal work, OK Computer by the same group of solid dudes. This platter chills with Spacemonkeys vs. Gorillaz, Niney the Observer, Pink Floyd, Thievery Corporation and the biggest joint you've ever seen in your life in the back of your van.

Good for: Watching the sun go down over the Earth from your personal space station.

Guest post by Jerry Vaughn! Meshuggah:ObZen

Consider ObZen a mathematics puzzle. If you add the complexity of Tool, multiply the brutal vocals of Lamb of God, and divide by the square root of death metal, the answer to the equation is Meshuggah. The 5-piece poly-prog metal act from Sweden is back with yet another journey to confuse and astonish their fans. These guys never cease to amaze me with their impeccable sense of timing.

There were occasions that I had to stop head-banging just so I could find the beat again. Quite a few of lead guitarist Fredrik Thordendal's riffs are the sickest I've heard in ages. Drummer Tomas Haake continues to deliver his sick combination of standard and polymetric beats which sound like an orchestra of machine gun fire at times. Jens Kidman's vocals seem as sharp and focused as ever. The rest of the gang delivers a phenomenal performance this time around as well. All in all this is, in my humble opinion, their finest effort since 1998's "Chaosphere".

Good For: Kicking old ladies, road rage, breaking shit, and 52 minutes of mathematics.

Count Basie: Breakfast Dance and Barbeque

Imagine the most pimped out breakfast you can. Eggs stacked to the ceiling, fresh orange juice and mountains of fluffy pancakes, pastries of every description threatening to topple over and crush you. Coffee so fresh it looks like an oil slick on tar. Serve it all on fresh linens draped over card tables set up in a park, beautiful spring morning, fresh green life everywhere. Now add yourself in formal wear, smashed on mimosas at 7 am, Sunday. That's what this album sounds like.

I found it on a random journey through Basie's work and I think it stands tall in a damn fine collection of works. Especially nice for me is "In a Mellow Tone", track 3 on the cd release. It's great for waking up in the morning, a real mellow slow start that builds up to a swinging ass brass wall that'll knock the fuzz right out of your head. Damn that's nice. This platter snaps its fingers with Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller, Frank Sinatra and the crew while picking out a fresh suit at the department store, winking at your mom.

Good for: Searching for that mythic middle ground between elegant, wasted and waking up.

Strung Out: Twisted by Design

If Me First and The Gimme Gimmes are punk rock in clown shoes, then Strung Out is punk in a tuxedo, all washed up and ready to meet your mom with a dissertation on sociology. They make what is at times a formulaic and simple genre something incredible and new and have done so without sacrificing what most people listen to punk for, energy and lyrics.

Twisted by Design is Strung Out's 3rd album released on Fat Wreck Chords and I think represents the perfect mid point in the bands growth into a progressive punk rock force. The lyrics are a well balanced blend of failed romance, social critique and pure poetry. There is one song on here that is pure inspiration to me. "Reason to believe" is an anthemic rant about modern living that anyone born in the last hundred years should feel deep down in their gut. Or they're dead inside. Or apathetic. Meh.

This album is trying to start a revolution with The Refused, Pennywise, Good Riddance, Bouncing Souls and Rancid in my record crate.

Good for: Getting pissed off about the world and your ex and heading out to tell them both off.

Bill Frisell: Blues Dream

I've rarely listened to an album so aptly named. Blues Dream is exactly what you get here, a sublime journey through misty fields and abandoned railroad yards, always watching your back. A mood of danger and uncertainty lingers in every track. If I had to walk through all of Alabama in one night, this is what I'd listen to. Bill Frisell has consistently produced instrumental albums of superior quality and awesome range in his equally stellar career. It's good to see a guitarist who is willing to step outside of a "signature" sound and get down in a whole new way. I'd equally recommend East West to the eager listener, a Bill Frisell album of different style but similar scope covering jazz in dreamscapes the way Blues Dream does the blues tradition. This album hangs out with Little Axe, Slang, Eric Clapton and Joe Henry in the corner with a bottle of booze.

Good for: Walking down railroad tracks during a steel grey morning, regretting last night.

Iron and Wine: The Shepard's Dog

I started listening to Iron and Wine a few years back, and every time they release a new album I love them a little more. The Shepard's Dog is a direct evolution from In the Reins, an album produced and recorded with Calexico.

The influence of those sessions is all over this album, larger arrangements, more complex harmonies and significantly more vocal presence than earlier albums. I appreciate the stripped down ballads of earlier works, but this albums dynamics gives it a little more room to wiggle. I've always thought of their earlier works as late night blueberry wine, crickets in the yard, summer breezes and lamenting loves lost.

This album finds me enjoying an afternoon with friends, driving down dirt roads to secret places and washing my face in sunlight. It lives in my iPod with Jim White, Damien Rice, Elliot Smith, Sun Kil Moon and Calexico.

Good for: Making out on the banks of a river, drinking beer in the sun. Going back to your place for dinner and undressing by the ashes of the fire (from Resurrection Fern, Track 8). It's like that.

Nujabes/Force of Nature: Samurai Champloo Soundtrack, Impressions

I am constantly impressed with the evolution of anime scoring in my lifetime, watching it migrate from classical cues mixed with J-Pop to this hybrid of incredible depth and innovation. Don't get me wrong, Samurai Champloo isn't the first anime TV series to blow my face off with it's scoring (Cowboy Bebop wins that honor), but it is the latest and greatest.

Impression sways between the spectral and the concrete with ease, leading you down the road without feeling forced. It makes you nod your head, which is what good hip-hop should always start with, then it starts to tickle your soul which is where great hip-hop begins. In my collection it plays well with Blockhead, DJ Shadow, Harmonic 33 and Cut Chemist.

Good for: Driving down the road feeling bad-ass in your Honda.

Tonight

I'll be at The Flying Brick, 506 S, Pine St. watching Pedals on our Pirate Ships play live, at 19:00. You should come on out, free show! Your mother would approve.
3-10-08 Update.
It took me a while to get here and update. I'm lazy, it's how it goes. POOPS (love the acronym) put on an awesome show. There is nothing in the world better than direct song writing, no bullshit and no masks up. Matt Seymour writes songs about his life, no filters. The Flying Brick is a tough venue for me, living rooms aren't well designed for watching bands, but it still did the trick. I caught the first couple songs from Ghost Mice before I had to leave and I'm going to hunt some recordings down. Think old school folk and bluegrass wrapped up in modern aesthetics and songwriting techniques. Ahhh, acoustic goodness.

Public transit

I spent the better part of my 20's sans car and I rocked GRTC back and forth to work at Tower for most of that time. Taking an hour to get up Broad St. every day was a real pain in the ass when it took less than 10 minutes by car or scooter. I'm almost certain that anyone who's relied on GRTC for their livelihood has developed a deep and abiding hatred for it. That's not really why I'm here. Bitching about a thing really does very little to end the problem. It does make you feel better though.

I've been thinking of ways to improve the public transit around here and I think there's a few ways to do it without creating tons of waste or costing obscene amounts of money, further indebting our municipal government to private investors. I think a lot of the problems in revitalizing Richmond city's economy can be traced back to the influx of private capital into public coffers and the kind of closed door meetings where public policy is dictated by private investors. Anyone want a baseball stadium in Shockoe Bottom? I thought not. So when we approach creating a functional public transit system that is affordable, scalable and sustainable the first thing we must do is keep investment interests the hell away from it. Public transit has never been, nor will it be, profitable. So why do people keep investing in it? I have no idea, perhaps political weight, perhaps a tax shelter, the methodology and reasoning of investors is beyond me. I'm certain of one thing, it's either fear or greed.

Reusing existing byways seems like the best way to get people around the city. We've done enough blowing holes through neighborhoods (read: Interstate system) in our history as a modern city. I'd say the best bet in getting light rail between the city and its suburbs is the abandoned rail lines and tramway paths that cover the entire area. Richmond is one of the biggest rail centers in the country and the very notion that we don't utilize it to move people around the area is laughable. I need to spend some time researching the existing right of way agreements between local municipalities and rail companies before I'm certain, but it seems like a good idea to lease access to the local lines for commuter traffic. Look at the map, CSX lines mirror 64 and 95 quite nicely.

Light rail has done incredible things for other cities, my favorite is Portland for its use of mixed service transportation. The real problem is getting Richmonders and Suburbinites interested, or dare I hope, excited about the prospect of getting to work on the train in the morning. So how do we approach that? Discuss.

Science Fiction, Double Feature Slide Show

Well, not really but Picassa has served me a fine turn with it's slide show generator.

Blogs about blogging, a blog post

I've been spending the morning digging around for ways to generate more traffic for my blog and looking at other peoples work to see what I like. The best piece of advice I've gotten so far is "be useful". Hilariously, I find my own work to be quite useless. Most blogs are of two types, this here personal rantspace and the other, more useful type that have focus, an audience and somewhere to go with their ideas. I don't think either one is better or worse, just servicing very different audiences and intentions.
I'm enjoying the dead blogs I come across even more, blogs that haven't been updated in 3 or 4 years. They stand as gravestones to an active mind, an idea of some kind or another. I wonder how many of these are dead people's blogs, just waiting out their inactivity period before deletion. Who will I give my Firefox keychain to when I die? I'll have to ask my lawyer if The Internet has legal standing as a person that I can consign my works to posthumously. I'd like to send my thoughts to the Internet the way sailors send their bodies to the sea, to be eaten by predators, lost among the Tag Clouds.
Well, you may notice that there is a Creative Commons tag on the bottom of this page now. It's ok, it's very small but I'd like to point it out now. That's a very important little piece of HTML right there. I'd like to state explicitly that I meant to put it there and I spend a lot of time talking shit about CC work. I figure it's time to back it up. So everything here can be reproduced, shared, discussed and improved upon with attribution including photos. A number of my friends publish CC photos so I'll use their work or my own to keep everything kosher.
I'm considering launching a fo'real blog in the near future. I'd be reviewing one album a day, regardless of genre, publication date or relative hipness. I need to spend some more time researching the IP laws around this but everything I've seen so far seems like this project will take off.

I'll let everyone know what's going on when I've got a site up and running.

03-11-08 Update:
It's on bitches. A Fresh Cup of Awesome

80%

This blog has me in pain I've been laughing so much. I think I hit about 80% Whiteness based on their observations. Excuse me, I need to go get my Sunday New York Times and a latte.

Stuff White People Like