Her name is Thao Nguyen and she was raised in Falls Church, Virginia. Today, she can be found in Washington DC making beautiful music with her band The Get Down Stay Down. And she's coming to Portland on March 7th with Xiu Xiu. That should about do it. Click below to become a fan.
(This isn't the band Kickball... but this dude is pretty awesome.)
Well now you can! Lisa, or "Drummer" as she is often called, is curating a website called www.video-drumming.com. She is going to post a new video each day and it will have original content on it as well. This will include lessons that she has filmed with her friends and cool stuff like that so now you too can drum like a pro!
Kickball!
Surkin is a French (possibly German?) dude on the institubes label along with some other fine dance acts including Para One (that awesome remix on MSTRKRFT's Work On You 12"). I was fishing around on the internet and stumbled upon this. The posted song "Ghetto Obsession" is the result of putting Biggie Smalls and an NES together in a fusion machine. The image of Mario and Biggie kicking it drinking some tall boys and giving eachother daps is pretty amazing. Surkin is touring all over Europe right now, so if you are in Berlin... woohoo. He's also getting an early start on festival season by doing the Good Vibrations thing. Also, Surkin will be playing as part of the rather lackluster Coachella lineup this year.
I like Devendra, Cocorosie, Antony, and the rest quite a lot, but I had never heard of this documentary "The Eternal Children" (2006) which details the so-called freak folk movement. So you can imagine my glee when i found out such a thing existed. Moreover, the entire thing is available online, albeit split up into 6 parts.
Part One:
click below for the rest
i would normally post the cover art, but i think this picture is pretty unbeatable.
The Helio Sequence have always been a good band; well-received critically, top of the ranks in terms of Portland* (*Beaverton) bands. I've never really given them much thought or time though. Helio Sequence, here is your fair shake. Their new album "Keep Your Eyes Ahead", coming out January 29th on Sub Pop, is rather good. It sounds tighter, more focused, and, well, better than their last few releases. "Love and Distance" is quality, make no mistake, but I can only handle so much of that distinctive, cosmic-synth business. Sometimes, you just have to pick up a guitar and start singing like Hamilton Leithauser (best goddamn name in rock and roll) and Bob Dylan. Reverb is used copiously and effectively, and as such they sound vaguely similar to their equine label-mates. While that bubbling synth isn't gone, it has been faded into the background and a more diverse sound has emerged. Standout tracks include the opener "Lately" and the banger "Hallelujah", but most of the songs are good, which is generally indicative of a decent record. The last song, aptly titled "No Regrets", is a foot stomping last-call, which sounds like one's last breaths expelled into a harmonica, the sporadic wheezing accompanied by your best friends' drunken sing-along; all this seemingly guiding you safely to bed, or the grave.
oh, and shit, you can play that whole bad boy over at their myspace:
MYSPACE
Buy from Sub Pop
One of my favorite bands, Black Moth Super Rainbow, has posted a demo for a song that might be on their next album titled "Eating Us." The bad news (what there's bad news??!) is that "Eating Us" won't be coming out until 2009. But wait! There is more good news too though! According to Tobacco, the man behind the trademark vocoder voice of BMSR, they will be consistently uploading demo's to their myspace for us BMSR junkies to listen to. oh joy!
BMSR myspace!
The first experience I had with shoegazey type stuff was when I bought M83's dead cities... because I thought the cover was fantastic. After I actually listened to it I couldn't have been more happy that I had judged a book by its awesome cover. For Brooklyn, NY's The Depreciation Guild, I saw the words 'shoegaze,' '8-bit,' and 'experimental' tagged by it so... yeah. What followed was an m83 song whipped into shape with some 'pop-sensibility.' (That's a catch phrase that gets thrown around a lot right?) Anyways, this song is presumably about butterfly kisses, which I think most people can agree are quite wonderful. It's kind of like if M83, Broken Social Scene, and Mew (wtf?? right?) made a song together. Anyways, check it out. Their website is cool too, you can download the entire album for free in a zip file, maybe buy a t-shirt or throw some cash at em?
carcrashlander is cory gray and a whole mess of other portland music-makers including laura gibson. i really dig this jam off his new s/t album available via www.parksandrecords.com for 8 bucks!
I occasionally get emails from 94.7 KNRK because they are an awesome radio station (or were, in the 90's when i listened to a lot of stone temple pilots and soundgarden). I received one today of particular importance:
"We need your help to bring Radiohead to Portland! As it stands right now, the band has dates in Seattle and San Francisco but that's as close as they're getting to the Rose City. You can help by simply emailing portlandwantsradiohead@gmail.com."
There you have it. Tell a friend, let's make it happen!
Also, in the same email a "bootleg" video from Spoon's show at the Crystal Ballroom way back when. peep it
had to get up early today, felt like crap, made 20 bucks, went to the record store, bought three used cds, thinking about napping, found this:
Download MP3
click below for track listing
Intro: DJ 1996 Olympixx + E*Rock
Parenthetical Girls - Love Connection Part 2
Sean P ft. T-Pain - You Ain't Know (Dirty)
Copy - Backward
Strategy - World House/Cam'ron - Mess With Me
Interlude: DJ 1996 Olympixx + E*Rock
Shakey Hands - Summer's Life
The Olympixxx - Funky 808 Breaks Intro
Panther - You Don't Want to Hear This (E*Rock RMX)
Coolie Dance Riddim
The Planet The - Arty Movie
Vitalic - Poney (Part 1)
B*retta - Untitled
Yacht - Platinum
South Rakkas - Carry Feelings
Copy - A Month
Glass Candy - Life After (E*Rock RMX)
The Blow - Hey Boy (Claps)
Chromatics - In The City
Nu Shooz - I Can't Wait [this is a classic from 1986 - #2 on the UK Charts, and a Portland based group!)
Adrian Orange - No Wonder
Outro: (Glass Candy - Intro)
I don't know how I missed this, but I'm pretty pissed off about it. "Sensual Seduction" is the new single of off Snoop Dogg's Ego Trippin' which is scheduled for release in March. The song and video work so well together. Seriously? Snoop Dogg SINGING through a vocoder? Not even in my wildest dreams...
found this interesting news item at the blog "dreams of horses":
Learn Guitar From Laura Veirs
it sounds kind of great, but i don't think my crush will translate into spending 50 dollars an hour. c'est la vie.
The Red River updated their myspace with all new songs. If you don't have Grassblades yet, sample it right here
This is one of my favorite songs right now. No, it's not a cover of the Dylan classic of a similar title, but a song from Adrian Orange appearing on the "Second Marriage Records Compilation". Supplying the spare and baleful instrumentation one has come to expect, he sings "When i saw / your rosy cheeks in the wet air after the rain / Damn, Oh my god, gosh-dang". To read the lyrics is one thing, but to hear his voice descend into the impending darkness is another thing entirely.
Mp3:It Ain't Me Baby
By now, you've probably heard that Marty Crandall, the jokester / multi-instrumentalist of The Shins is in a whole mess of legal trouble regarding purported violence against his ex-gf. Seeing as though it's mostly gossipy and shitty all around, we won't discuss it any further.
Keep It Positive!
Portland band Panther has a new song out from their Feb. 22nd release 14 KT GOD.
It's called "Puerto Rican Jukebox" and you can listen to it here
Local band A Weather has a video out for my favorite song of theirs "The Feather Test". Check it out!
oh, and the red river release show? yes, it was awesome -- those kids tore the roof off last night at the green house. so many horns, so much warmth (literally and figuratively). "Something Good" is the feel-good hit of 2008 and all-time, maybe. probably. as details of record availability/methods of purchase become available, we'll let you know.
Well, here we have a video made by radiohead for New Years, it's quite long (almost and hour) and has all of the songs off of In Rainbows in it. One of the reasons radiohead is so great is because they are constantly doing stuff like this, it makes me wonder if any of them ever actually sleep... Entertaining for most people, obviously a must-view for any fanboy or fangurl.
