Supergrass: St. Petersburg

Supergrass is an indie rock and Britpop band from Oxford, UK. Currently the band consists of brothers Gaz and Rob Coombes, Danny Goffey, and Mick Quinn. Like many other British bands of the '90s, Supergrass' musical roots lie in the infectiously catchy punk-pop of the Buzzcocks and the Jam, as well as the post-punk pop of Madness, the traditional Mod Rock of the Kinks and Small Faces and the glam-rock of T. Rex.

Supergrass has never gotten much love stateside. For whatever reason their crazy mash up combination of hard guitar riffs mixed with melodies, three part harmonies, great lyrics, and a decided lack of "cool" mentality just didn't take. My theory is because Weezer was doing an American equivalent over here mixing Kiss and Beach Boys, versus Supergrass doing Rolling Stones, Buzzcocks, and Elton John on the other side of the Atlantic.

I saw them in concert during the Life on Other Planets tour in L.A. Great show, I was thoroughly drunk by the end, my ears were splitting and one of my friends was scheming on how to get backstage and steal the backdrop at the time. We never succeeded. But we did buy nifty little posters. In any case I'm a big fan. They never seem to disappoint.

A little while ago they released a "Best Of" collection featuring, well the best of their work from the debut album I Should Coco up to Life on Other Planets. A good place to start if you've never heard them. their styles can vary heavily from album to album, so This will give you a nice sampler platter.

More recently Supergrass released Road to Rouen and its definitely a change of pace for Supergrass. If you start at the beginning of their career and listen to them, the music sounds like exactly what they were at the time, Dorky Hyperactive teenagers. Now ten years and four albums later their music has matured accordingly. This is primarily a lot more down-tempo than anything I've heard from them as a who;e before, though hints of it have been showing up on the last two albums. Right now you can here the who;e album on Supergrass' Official Site So if you've never bothered or just are curious now is a good time to check them out as it wont cost you a dime.


Off the new album here's the video for St. Petersburg

And also Low C

P.S.

A little known fact: The term supergrass is used in Northern Ireland to refer to arrested paramilitaries who divulged the identities of their compatriots to the Royal Ulster Constabulary in exchange for immunity from prosecution, essentially, an informer. In many cases, the supergrasses were granted immunity from prosecution, as well as substantial sums of money. Many convictions based on supergrass testimony were later overturned, and the supergrass system was discontinued in 1985.

The Redwalls: Thank You

Wow! Every rock band that comes along owes at least a little sumthin sumthin to the Beatles. That's a given. But the Redwalls, man ... They owe EVERYTHING! It's been a while since such a direct correlation could be drawn between the beatles and another band since, since, I don't know .... a Beatles cover band I guess.

Logan Baren does a great Lennon impression. The music is very Rubber soul. I really dig the 60's throwback vibe. Particularly of note are the numerous harmonies in the music. That in of itself is quite rare in music as most bands are lucky to have ONE member that can sing a lick, and the their doubly lucky to have figured out to put that one in front of the mic. But to have three of them who can harmonize together.... Me Likey.

The Redwalls are currently touring with Hot Hot Heat around North America right now.

Here is the official site for the Redwalls.

Please enjoy the video for ">Thank You

The Pixies Sell Out

Ever heard of them?

Here's a cut from the New Live DVD released recently.


Where is my mind?

P.S. Kim is the shit.

Babyshambles: Killamangiro

So Kate Moss, former girlfriend of Peter Doherty, former lead singer for the Libertines, and current front man for Babyshambles, recently blamed Pete for selling the phone video of her snorting yay for cash to buy drugs.

Considering Peters past brushes with the law, including breaking into a former bandmates house to jack shit to sell for Heroine, this sounds credible. But Kate's indignant tone amuses me. After all she's a supermodel partying with Rockstars. I don't think anyone found this too much of a surprise. It's not like her profession isn't riddled with this type of shit anyway.

Now Babyshambles. I completely stayed away from the Libertines when they were still together for fear of too much media exposure. Nothing can kill an OK or even great band for me like too much of it. British and American magazine were cranking out reviews of these guys like freaking candy. Not to mention all the shenanigans at the live shows, robberies, fights and model fucking.

So I stumbled upon this video having no preconceived notions about this band and whether to get my music snob nose up before listening. Surprise! I like it. It's arty, simple, catchy, slightly rough, low on production tricks. Seems to meet the criteria. So I do a little web surfing and ...

What?! Peter Doherty is the front man for this band?! What the Fuck?! I've been tricked.

So grudgingly I listened to Babyshambles. I have no complaints. So mustering my righteous rock anger I went back and dug up libertine CD copies someone gave me in the hopes of turning me to the Cult of Personality that was (is) the Libertines. People still talk about these guys like they're Gods.

....Fine. I'll admit it. They're good. Happy?

Here is the official site for Babyshambles. Not much here.

And for comparison official site for The Libertines.


Update: Ok Ok Ok Ok Ok Ok. Hold on. somone wrote me and told me some more shit that makes Peter Doherty the most entertaining Vocalist out right now for dipshit stuff. On "Down in Albion" The guy performing the track called Pentonville is some mutherfucker he met in JAIL! WTF?! You meet someone in the slammer and then ask him to guest on your next album? Maybe he sold the spot for H. HEE Hee HEE HEE!!! To Top it off Kate Moss does backing vocals on "Belle Et La Bête" BwAAAAAAAAAHAAAAhAhAHhaahhA!! *sniff*

Just thought I'd share that.

Plan B: No Good

Stop motion. Old Technique in videos. But when Coldplay put out the video for Trouble, the formula for music videos was written for ... well until the next "cool" cheap way to make a video comes along. We've all seen the carbon copies that have been floating around. All edited together using flash and lots of paper dolls.

Stop motion used to be what flash motion is today. Nobody uses it anymore, mainly because its time consuming to set up each frame. The most memorable one is Peter Gabriel's Sledgehammer, which consistently shows up in top"x" videos of all time on every station except BET, and I think it gets honorable mention for having black women singing in the final verse.

Anyway the point is this. Plan B, is nobody I've heard of. Further more he's no one I care about. He's a rapper who is white, and therefore is destined to be endlessly compared to eminem. Sorry but its true. And yes he does sound kinda like him. His styles not bad, but his word choice is forgettable. The production is solid, and the beat is enjoyable. Overall I'll give it a 7.

The video is stop motion. It's pretty good stop motion as well. Just watch it and think about how long it must take to arrange all those items moving around for every frame here. What is it, 8 per second? Then think of how you plan that out so your mouth is forming the correct sound for each word to correspond with the song and the video. Complicated? Definitely. Worth it? I think so.

Gold Star!

Click on the top to see it.

Diamond Nights: Arena Rock Revivalism Taken Seriously?

So what do you need to know?

1) Diamond nights is a 70's revivalist arena rock type band. Think Darkness only without the spandex jump suits and falsettos.

2) It doesn't come off as campy.

3) Influences: Cheap Trick, Thin Lizzy, T-Rex, The Cars. You'll hear them all in here. If you like that, you love this. If not you'll hate it.

4) Retro bands usually fall flat on their faces after one album. It's a short career, mainly becuase you've got no where to go to. Write something original, your fans will hate it, and non fans wont listen since they hate you for not writing something original in the first place. Do more of the same, and your fans won't buy it anyway because more than likely the next big nostalgia band knock off has debuted and stolen the spotlight away. (Cough Cough. Darkness!!. Cough!)

Diamond Nights: Popsicle will probably be that. A fun listen but by no means anything lasting. but in the mean time enjoy it for what it is. Cue extended mastabatory guitar solo.

The Girls Attractive

The Rakes: 22 Grand Job

Now, when you listen to this, I want you to think of the opening theme to Kids in the Hall. Is it just me, or does the guitar riff remind you of that.
So, what about The Rakes? I can find no reliable accounting of when these guys came into being as a group. But they've been doing the euro tour thing pretty heavily for the last year. 22 grand job has been getting a lot of praise. It's obnoxiously catchy, super short, and singing about poor people in the city. A sure fire trifecta guaranteed to have this thing bouncing around inside your head like 22 slug, and doing just as much damage in the process. I just spent the last 12 hours humming this freaking thing to myself. The goddamn guitar riff is a BAR SCALE! IT'S BASIC SHIT!!!

And yet there it is. Stuck in my head, and in my ever tapping toe.

The rest of The Rakes is fairly standard Blur ripoff. And by Blur ripoff, I mean Blur before they decided to go all "world Music is Cool' on us with that last album. What the hell was that? No, The Rakes are more Parklife-y than anything else. Which is ok. What made Blur great was the avant-garde exclusivity that seemed to be associated with them. We'll see if The Rakes can pull off the same. What they do have going for them, is that as a whole, the album tells a quite famiiar story, of struggling to reconcile your social life with your working life. Realizing somewhere along the line that trying to get ahead in life, and trying to get down to the pub to have a pint with mates ona wednesday night at 11 am.m when you know you have to get up at 6 am the next day, doesn't seem to work. We've been there each and every one of us. The agnst.

Pint. Sleep. Pint. Sleep. Tough one.

The irony of course, is that 22 Grand Job is aimed at the working class, which is traditionally Oasis' bit. They must be going for that nitch market in the great unwashed horde.
without further adieu, I present The Rake's, 22 Grand Job

Oh, and I must admit, the Rake's official site is fairly detailed, and worth a look.

Dakah. A good idea gone bad?

So the general idea behind Dakah is that Hip Hop, at it's core is very similar to Ochestral arrangements and symphonies. So, the Orchestra’s founder and conductor, Geoff “Double G” Gallegos, is a classically trained saxophonist who studied at tBerkeleylee College of Music. Gallegos began composing hip hop music for orchestra while working with the Colorado Symphony. In addition to his work with DaKah, he is an active studio composer, arranger, and conductor in Los Angeles. In 2002, the orchestra and Gallegos received a Durfee Foundation Artist Award that led to the release of DaKah’s first studio album, Unfinished Symphony. The orchestra recently released the live album, San Francisco Debut, and performed at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, the New Orleans Jazz Festival, and the South by Southwest music conference in Austin, Texas.
Dakah gets to be 62 members deep when at full strength. They've recently reached the point where they can sell out venues that can handle that many musicians, AKA the Hollywood Bowl, but it amuses me to think about that many people trying to pack into small clubs around L.A. The patrons must have had to stand on the bars, and in bathroomromm stalls just to make room for all the instruments.

In order to create depth and meaning out of so many diverse and seemingly incongruent elements, one must have an overarching vision, which entails working on all quadrants and all levels. One must understand where each of these elements fits in to the big picture, both technically and aesthetically. Plus one must be able to navigate the daunting logistics of organizing so many people on little or no budget, finding the right venue in which to play, and forming a web of harmonious interpersonal relationships, not only within the orchestra, but also within the community at large. And I'm not sure that this gets accomplished.

Love the concept for the Dakah. Can't say I love the music though. Not being a very avid hip hop fan myself, I could be missing scriticaltcal point here, that makes the handful of people recommendednded Dakah to me, love them. But I feel like aside from the sheer massiveness of the group, there's nothing particularly fresh here. Yes hip hop does sound like classical music. All you have to do is listen to the strings sampled in 50% of all hip hop tracks. Well no shTheythey DO seem to have something in common when mixed over a 4/4 beat. How about that!

But I can imagine the live show would be impressiThe the dynamic of any music can be radically altered by the setting you witness it in. Songs that would normally suck coming through a stereo, sound inspired when seen live, and backed by the artists enthusiasm for their work. And I think that might be the case here. After all, why would a ton of classically trained symphomusiciansinas volunteer this much time and effort for relatively little or no pay, unless they were having a blast?
Pa lotalot of big names in Hip Hop have guest starred with them. The Roots, Breakestra, Black Eyed Peas, Macy Gray, Nikka Costa, etc. publiclyaapplaudluad Dakah as something new and exciting.

I just can't hear it.

Decide for yourself.
A Live show in the House of Blues

Broken Social Scene

As winter sets in to Southern California, and rains starts becoming more of an everyday phenomena, I find myself looking for mellower music that compliments the changing season. Summer and Spring are about loud brash tunes that make you want to go out there and smash your antlers into the neck of that other fucking dear who is sniffing around your girlfriends ass.
Or maybe that's just me.
Broken Social Scene has been referred to as "Supergroup" because of the fact that the roster can go fluxuate anywhere from 5 to 17 members at a time. The reason for this is that BSS likes to create a symphonic melody to back the indie pop style that lays at the core of their music. BSS comes out of Canada, as was formed in 1999 by various members of other failed little indie bands that shall not be mentioned here. Canada spits this type of music out on a fairly regular basis (Dears, Divine Comedy, tragically hip, Halifax's Sloan, etc) but that's OK, since the U.S. could use a slight bit more of it. Death Cab For Cutie will soon be done to death I'm sure, and calling yourself Postal Service will only squeeze one more album out at most.
This is Tea time music. Kick back and enjoy the string section. There are layers here to be appreciated. The overall production is quality, but when you have a band that can combine this many elements together and not turn it into audio mush, than you've got something worth checking out

Here is the Website

cause = Time is making some sort of statement about religious fanaticism here but its fairly ambiguous beyond "BAD." No shit.

Dandy Warhols

I'm not sure what happened here.

Recall, If you will the release of the Dandy Warhols most awesome of albums, Thirteen Tales of Urban Bohemia, In the summer of 2000. I can clearly remember being at a party in the hills, looking out over the spread of traffic and hearing a very ear catching and distrinct song that I later came to know as "Godless." I remember thinking:

"Wow, I haven't heard a horn section this cool since ........."

And then I promptly vomited.

Throughout the next half hour of marathon chucking I was constantly hearing the rest of this album playing on random. One might think I would hate it, as you would probably associate it with bad times. Not so. I fucking LOVED it. This album still stands in my mind as one of the most well crafted bits of rock n roll I have ever had the pleasue to come across.

For the next three years I took that freaking CD on the he road with me from California to Florida blasting it to anyone who would bother to give me a second to listen to how I was from "LA" and that this was the next big thing. Some bought it, some didn't . But when I was done, everyone knew that I was a Dandy Warhols fan to the end.

Or so I thought.

Fuck! Which is why it makes me so sad to listen to the last two follow ups.
Somewhere, somehow, the Dandy Warhols fell off.

Maybe, it was the hype. Maybe with a swarm of media from the US Europe buying up their singles for commercials, the became jaded. Maybe when they stopped sniffing coke off each others assholes (or so rumor says), they lost touch with the hedonistic fire that inspired "get Off," maybe they just got older and wiser. Maybe I did.

All I know is that Welcome to the Monkey House was a MAJOR disappointment, aside from "Last High." A thoroughly bland album. Leaning more towards some sort of Euro 80's synth thingie, versus the raw snooty guitar riffs that sold me in yesteryear.

The Dandy's new album was just recently released, and I'm trying REAL hard to like it. I'm not having any luck so far. I want to like them still. I really do. But I'm just not feeling it. Odditorium or Warlords of Mars is not what I'd hoped, to say the least. But time will tell. I guess it's hard to compare that first adrenaline rush of discovering something new and exciting that seems to promise the world, with something that by now is familiar and perhaps getting redundant. We've both gotten older the Dandys and I.
Perhaps it's time to find a new love....

But before I do, I'd like to pawn this Rock Ho off on some new John. The Dandy's wouldn't want it any other way I'm sure.
If you haven't listened to them before, may I recommend the single that made me a fan? Godless still stands as one of the best singles I've ever heard and the video is no less precious. If you've ever spent any time slumming around L.A,'s various "hipster" spots you'll immediately recognize this as a perfect example of the type of heroine chic bullshit that tends to get pandered around as "Cool" spots. Don't forget kids, It's awesome to be bored. Might I point out the ULTRA-Hip Gay Hula Hooper doing the sexy dance.

Here is the official Dandy Warhols Website. Now in 3-D!