it can't be bad, right?

is it bad that i can't go a day without listening to laura veirs' saltbreakers album? cause i gotta be honest, it doesn't feel like a bad thing.

it's one of the few cds that upon playing, anyone around asks who it is and replies "i like this." which i think is proof of something beautiful, or at the very least, good.

what impresses me is her ability to be upbeat, witty, catchy, reflective, quiet and down-tempo all on the same album. which is one reason i think i listen to it every day; it's hard to get sick of an album that travels such distances.

so good i forgot it was raining outside

cut off your hands is my new favorite band of the day. i think the band i would compare them most to is foals. yeah. i need this on my ipod. according to youtube this video was made in 3 days with 1500 inkjet printouts. all their videos are pretty cool. well the gloomy weather is hindering my ability to write well so watch & listen to this video. i hope you love it. :D



and if you love that here is something a little crazier from the band robot tigers which includes some of the guys from cut off your hands.



p.s. just a little hint if you didn't already know this...if you Ctrl+click (command+click for mac users) on a link it will open it in a new tab so you don't have to navigate away from this lovely blog.

summer awesome series

thanks to city weekly's blog, here's the latest on your tax dollars hard at work...the summer twilight concert series at gallivan center. after years of quality, albeit hippie/folk music, this year's line up has a decidedly legit feel to it.

you be the judge though and tell us what you think.

july 10 - the roots (ever heard of 'em?)
july 17 - andrew bird, josh ritter
july 24 - de la soul
july 31 - keller williams, yonder mountain string band
august 7 - nada surf, tim fite
august 14 - tbd
august 21 - broken social scene
august 28 - neko case, crooked fingers

weezer, chris crocker, star wars kid & shoes.

weezer recently released this video for "pork & beans" & i love it because it makes me feel better about spending my life on a computer. if you don't recognize any of the internet celebrities in this video then you probably have a much more productive life than i do. i know them all by name. as far as the song goes; it's alright. when i heard this song on the radio i had no idea it was weezer, surprising since they usually have that distinct weezer sound. if this song is a reflection of the rest of the new album it is not going to be anything special. however they won me over with this clever video...for now.

be gentle with me

i am sure i've posted this on my personal myspace before because it is something that i just can not keep to myself. to be honest, i haven't listened much to The Boy Least Likely To but i certainly adore this video. be sure to check out the rest of their tunes, i know i will be.

thanks

thanks to all of you who came out to the nightmare of you tour last night. i have a feeling edison glass and paper rival made a few new fans last night.

speaking of the bird & the bee...

wanna see something neat? then watch this video a super creative girl made for the bird & the bee song "again & again." She made it using the mac OS X operating system.

whoa-oh-oh.

i just realized that as much as i love love love love love the mgmt album, oracular spectacular, i've never written a blog on it. someone better slap my wrist. maybe you remember the of montreal show i wrote a blog about? yeah. and that show is where i first heard the indie hippie stoner electric goodness of a band that used to be called the management, ironically. starting off with time to pretend this album sucks you right in. i can listen to it over and over and over and over and over and over and over etc.... you really can listen to it if you're in any sort of mood as well. happy? yes. hyper? yes. chill? yes. sad? you bet your ass - it'll pick you right up. the perfect mixture of dance and unique (i need to find a thesarus) vocals come through mgmt and their growing popularity isn't suprising. so go check this magnificent piece of art out and i dare you not to dance (like, yeah right). sweeeeeeeet.

favorite songs: time to pretend, weekend wars, the youth, electric feel, kids, 4th dimensional transition, pieces of what, of moons birds & monsters, the handshake, and future reflections.......oh wait, that's the entire album. silly me.

foals. because you all deserve it.

i just got the new foals album about an hour ago, i can tell already i'm going to be a little attached to it for a few days. previous to this album they had only released singles, so this moment has been highly anticipated by the few of us who seem to know about the awesomeness that is foals. doesn't seem right that no one knows of them which is why i'm doing my best to spread the word. or maybe everyone does know & they just don't like foals. that is ok, but it would be hard for me to understand. however someone just told me they love neil diamond & i have a hard time understanding that too so what do i know? sometimes parts of foals music reminds me of minus the bear intros but i guess the best way i can explain it is that it is less calm that mtb oh & with a totally different sounding vocals. it's the kind of music i can have playing all day & i won't get tired of it. it is so interesting & complex that you hear it differently each time you listen.
here's their video for balloons. i'm not sure how i feel about the video. something about it makes me uncomfortable, i think it's the weird hand motions the girls make. but i also keep watching it so i guess i love it deep down with all my heart.

a decade before

my wife was cleaning out a closet tonight getting ready for a yard sale and she came upon one of our many cd stashes from yesteryear. after scanning through a pile of mostly rubbish, i picked up an old, old cd. i have a copy of it on my ipod, but it was put on a computer 6 years ago and the quality is really bad (you can always tell by the cymbals) so i grabbed royal's my dear like it had candy inside (i like candy).

long before being a band from scandanavia was the hot new thing, the swedish rock quintet royal was quietly not making it big in america.

to be honest, they were before their time. the delivered female fronted screamo before screamo was hot and america wasn't ready for it back in 1998. by my research they only released one album in america, my dear on tooth and nail records.

i wish it were still in print (an itunes search pulls up another royal that totally sucks it and is not this band that i'm writing about), but it's not. i guess next time you're at the cafe, snag my ipod and see what you think (don't do this). i can't even direct you to a website (this cd is so old, there is no website listed!).

coachella: 23 days later...

ok so i failed horribly at blogging my experiences at coachella. maybe i was slightly overwhelmed because there was so much to say about it. or maybe it's because i talked about it nonstop for the week or 2 after & i, plus everyone else (i'm sure) was a little tired of it. coachella was one of those experiences where so much is happening all around you but you are so exhausted & tired that the whole thing ends up feeling like a dream where you're not sure what DID happen. the music was amazing, the bands played on time (with a few exceptions) it was HOT, there were a lot of very interesting people, & there was always something to do. for 3 straight 12+ hour days it was non-stop entertainment. by the 3rd day i was more often lingering toward the back of the crowds or sleeping in an air conditioned nokia tent rather than fully immersing myself in sets that i would probably pay good money to see play in salt lake. i had no idea i would crumble under all the goodness the way i did, but i can sum it up to just not being prepared for it. you have to expect to be running all over the polo field & missing your favorite bands to see your other favorite bands. i had to decide whether to watch prince's 2.5 hour show & risk getting in a girl fight/getting peed on AGAIN or to leave a little earlier to maintain my sanity(we left early; 1AM). staying the the entire roger waters set or leaving to go to the chromeo & justice dance party(missed the dance party but totally worth it). sleep in or see a band i like but not THAT much(slept in). i still wish i could go back again this weekend & i think i will miss it until i get to go again next year. for now, here is a very brief summary of what i saw...


friday...

dj mehdi opening act of the festival, we watched him since he was the only one playing on any of the 5 stages at that point. he is one happy dj.
american bang if you like kings of leon you will love these guys. bringing back the classic american rock & roll sound.
battles intriguing. we only stayed for a couple songs. sounded like ratatat to me.
black kids these guys & girls were so much fun. great music.
architecture in helsinki those are some silly australians. they were fun & sounded as fantastic live as they do in my earbuds.
vampire weekend honestly, after the first 5 bands i saw these guys were a little boring. but i do like their music. i think it was just nap time at this point.
the national they played right after vw on the same stage. it was good, but the vocals weren't my favorite.
the swell season i would have payed friday's ticket price just to see them. it was incredible. those are some talented people. you MUST check them out.
after swell season we noticed the field beginning to fill up with couples dressed in american eagle & abercrombie & an abundance of baseball hats. it took us a minute & then we remembered: jack johnson was headlining that night. so we left.

saturday...

the bird & the bee lovely. adorable. sweet. i love love loved them & their bubbles & squirt guns.
vhs or beta it is impossible for these guys to not rock. i was in the front row dancing & sweating in the 2pm sun. they sounded insanely good.
minus the bear played main stage right after vhs so i kept my front row spot. they played my favorite songs. i simply love them.
mgmt is this really happening? did i just see 3 amazing bands & now i am seeing another? yes. mgmt was electric. can't wait to see them again sometime. oh & i was standing right by the guitarist from vhs, i wanted to high 5 him so bad for some reason! haha
kate nash that girl was a hot mess! i don't think she had ever seen the sun. she was sweaty, frizzy, moody & her weird christmas stage theme was tacky. but there's no denying her lovely voice & catchy emotional lyrics are a hit with the hipsters. she was good - the group of girls screaming every lyric behind me was not.
death cab for cutie only watched from afar for a few songs while we re-energized for the rest of the day. they sounded like...death cab for cutie.
rilo kiley so good. so so good. better than i had imagined.
M.I.A. disappointing. there were about a million people crammed in the tent to see her. gunshots are not music. neither are blow horns. she only played 4 songs during her hour long set. yeah.
prince i got peed on. beat up due to some drunk girl's violent dancing. he started about an hour late. then he played 1999 hid behind some speakers for an entire song & then played little red corvette. that's pretty much all i remember. we sat down at the back of the crowd (about a mile from the stage) & heard him do the cover of radiohead's creep but didn't really care because we were barely still alive after having such an amazing day. then we left.

sunday...

slept in, went swimming, arrived to the festival at 4.
stars they were alright, a little disappointing. we left early & noticed that as we walked further away from the stage they sounded better & better. i don't know what was up with that.
autolux i don't even remember them, i was passing out on the grass at this point.
metric got me on my feet. even from the back they were great. very entertaining.
roger waters wow. it was amazing & i have never been much of a pink floyd fan. but it was a crazy good show. the inflatable pig, the plane, the prism, i loved it all. i'm glad we stayed for the whole 3 hour set (missing chromeo & justice).

so that's all the music, there was so much more besides music but that's not what this blog is about. so go check out those bands! & go to coachella next year!

M.I.A. on Sunday

so i attended the M.I.A. show on sunday & aside from the unnecessarily moody people that seemed to be gathered around me & my friends, the show was amazing. much of an improvement to the sloppy 4-song set she did at coachella that consisted of superfluous gunshot sound effects that did nothing for me but make me very anxious. M.I.A., from what i know, is in a league of her own. it's not just about her music, she knows how to entertain. she went to an art school in london & it shows in her set design & clothing choices. there were big screens behind her on stage & i know that isn't anything new but the nonstop video art that plays with her music is something beautiful in itself. during one song it was a different clips of girls & women in traditional indian clothing dancing together and laughing, made to look like it is to the beat of her music. something about the clips was captivating & i'm not gonna lie, my eyes were on the visual art for the majority of the show. at one point in the show (which i tried to capture with my 2mp camera phone) she invited everyone up on stage, i think about 40-50 people made it up there. she let them dance with her & each other for 2 or 3 songs, not a dull moment there. she is bright, bold & anything but ordinary. definitely an artist worth checking out if you haven't yet.

margot and the so so's

i really like margot and the nuclear so and so's. i'm excited for their new album. i'm not sure what i expected when i went to kilby court saturday night with my wife for the margot show, but i didn't really get into it. as i've thought about it, here are a few of the reasons i have come up with...

first off, is margot really the kind of music you get live? all eight of them smashed onto kilby's small stage, quietly bickering with each other between songs?

the other thing is that saturday's crowd was a really different crowd. not different in a fun way, but different in a "how did you hear about this band" way. maybe i just assume too much about margot. maybe i assume that they're very indie and off the beaten path (while still popular) and are only to be enjoyed by artsy, beatnik types. of course, i'm neither of those so what am i really even talking about?

it did sound great though and all the money kilby's new owners have put into the sound system seem worth it. the touring support for margot was really good too. if anyone knows who they were, let me know.

i'll fill chad & the rest of you all in :)

Okay, so for everyone who sort of missed the hype about Nightmare of You, i'll do my best to "fill you in." I've been listening to Nightmare of You since their first self-titled album came out in 2005 and they haven't gotten old. Nightmare of You definitely has a unique sound that you can hear by just listening to the voice of the lead singer, Brandon Reilly. But, in their case, unique is good and it works. They have a mix of dance and more acoustic type songs on both albums with lyrics that are not only profound but you can relate to them..or at least find entertaining. If you go to their myspace to check them out you can hear some of their stuff off their new ep, Bang. Although Bang is an extremely good album, in my opinion, I think you should check out some of their older stuff on these fakers: here or here. I honestly don't believe you will be disappointed. If you like them, I've heard they are great live so you should come check them out when they play at the cafe, May 25.
P&L

promoting this show is a nightmare

nightmare of you will be at the cafe on sunday, may 25th. to be honest, i'm 30 and know nothing about them. maybe some of you can fill me in (sami, keni, et al). of course i've listened to their myspace music, i just don't want to pretend to know all about them when i don't.


what i do know is that nightmare of you is bringing edison glass and paper rival with them. i've listened to edison glass for a long time and paper rival played the cafe two months ago. both bands represent the best that the indie marketplace has to offer: rich, layered, thoughtful music and lyrics and entertaining live shows. of course you'll only find this out if you buy a ticket to the show and come hang out! it's on the sunday before memorial day so you hopefully won't have school and work and will want to come hang out. tickets are cheaper ahead of time, come by the cafe either of the next two friday's or buy them online here.

ani di stopmakingmusicandgetaproducer franco

la la la beep honk bring wee whoa hee haw willy willy woo isn't music...

i honestly don't get it and i've honestly not gotten it for more than a decade. and asking me to listen to more of it won't help your chances.

great vengeance and furious fire

it's always when you're broke as broke that you find so many cd's that you want to buy...

the heavy are just such a band and their new cd great vengeance and furious fire is just such a cd. and of course, i'm broke.

hailing from just outside bath, england (straight west from london before you get to cardiff - i googled a map), the heavy play the kind of funk rock that you'd swear you heard in a steven soderbergh movie. it's classy and lively enough to play in any nightclub and you can almost hear american rappers lining up with bags of money for samples. while their style is fresh and new, they clearly honor the old funk masters. simply put: they could share the stage with the isley brothers one day and mark ronson the next and both would make perfect sense.

they've just done their intro to the u.s. tour this week (a few los angeles dates, san fran, chicago and three more in new york). they have about 6,500 myspace friends now, i can't imagine this band staying unkown for too much longer.

death cab for me?

does anyone have the new death cab yet? is it good? i don't like the way their first single is mixed. it seems like ben gibbard's voice is too front in the mix. it's as if someone were sitting in the car with you singing along. it's not bad, but it just doesn't sound right to me.

sub pop can do no wrong

sub pop really is the best indie label out there right now. you could argue that with their roster they're no longer an indie label, but let's just agree that they have a knack for a&r and for finding incredible artists.

the newest sub pop band i've taken to is fleet foxes (i know tim's already on board with ff). go spend $.99 in itunes and buy mykonos off their sun giant ep and you'll know what i mean. they describe their music as: "baroque harmonic pop jams." there is certainly that minstrel in the gallery telling old tales with a modern song writing style to it. their style deftly blends old and new but definitely keeps it's feet in the old. i'd compare them to the twin cinema's record by the new pornographers. itunes says they're for fans of beirut and grizzly bear, which is probably true since you can throw a rock and find music fans that like beirut and grizzly bear.


other than that, i've been in mexico for a week and pretty much only listened to the con by teegan and sara and electric version by the new pornographers. i did catch colour revolt in las vegas last week and they were amazing. i didn't take any photos cause i'm a lazy jerk and also cause house of blues barely lets you take your own shoes into their venue let alone a camera.

voices that make me melt.

the new augustana album (can't love, can't hurt) is absolutely incredible. i picked it up at graywhale yesterday after seeing an acoustic set from the band. it's just as good on the album as it was acoustic. frontman, dan layus has an amazing voice. the music is simple and calming. i think that i might even like this second album more than the first - all the stars and boulevards. they are different in really good ways. to me the first album was more plain rock and this one has some country sounds thrown in and i've been really into that lately. i'm terrible at explaining music because it all makes great sense in my head but not so much out of it. go pick up this album and take a good listen. because it's worth it. and if you're broke just go listen to their myspace and realize you need to get some ca$h.

favorite songs on can't love, can't hurt: hey now, i still ain't over you, fire, and where love went wrong.

she's just so charming...

the wondeful kate nash. she's been mentioned on the ship a couple times before and i'm with tim on this - is it okay to say that i'm in love? not too long ago i started listening to the made of bricks album repeatedly. if you have already listened to it maybe you are wondering why i find her charming; she's a bit of a bad ass with a dirty mouth. however, that makes her so real, funky, and honest. she's one of the most unique artists that i've ever listened to. the lyrics to her spunky, dancy songs are what really draws me in. it's not often you hear a girl singing about dickheads and birds shitting on your head. it's fantastic. plus she's got an accent. done deal. take a listen. i promise, you won't be dissappointed.