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[wayfaring stranger]

Direktan link

Arthur Lee stayed on fringe despite his early acclaim

By Greg Kot
Tribune music critic
Published August 6, 2006

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

"I never did like to be categorized as a blues singer, or country or
rock," Arthur Lee once told the Tribune. "I like Beethoven, Jackie
Wilson, the Beatles. I believe God put me on this earth to do all
kinds of music."

Lee, who died Thursday of cancer at age 61, was one of rock's most
inscrutable and enduring mavericks. In the 1960s he led Love, a
biracial hippie band with a switchblade attitude and a handful of
classic albums. Lee was the band's aloof, opinionated and strikingly
handsome mastermind and lightning rod. He accentuated his oddness by
walking around town with a moccasin on one foot and triangle-shaped
granny glasses. Yet Lee was something of a musical savant; though he
couldn't read music, he orchestrated dense concept albums with strings
and horns that were the equal of anything recorded by Brian Wilson or
the Beatles.

A footnote

At the height of their fame, most notably with the release of the 1967
masterpiece "Forever Changes," Love and Lee were the most buzzed-about
band on the Sunset Strip. "If we could be as big as Love, my life
would be complete," the Doors' Jim Morrison once said. After signing
with Elektra Records, Lee poured most of the band's $5,000 advance
into a new Mercedes, with the intent of touring the country in it. But
Love rarely made it outside of Los Angeles to perform, and became a
footnote in many rock histories.

"Everybody had different hobbies, and some of those involved drugs,"
Lee once said. "We were all young -- I was 19 when I signed with
Elektra -- and the rest of the guys didn't realize how serious I was
about music."

Poor relationship with label

Elektra President Jac Holzman, whose label included such artists as
the Doors, the MC5, the Stooges and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band,
wrote that Lee was "more talented" than any of them, but "in his
career and his relations with the company he was a basket case."

Love's classic five-piece lineup, which included Lee and guitarists
Brian Maclean and Johnny Echols, stuck around only long enough to
record three brilliant albums: "Love" (1966), which included the
band's first hit, a furious, erotically charged reinvention of the
Burt Bacharach song "My Little Red Book"; "De Capo" (1966), which
included the punk precursor "7 and 7 Is" as well as the sprawling
"Revelation," the first sidelong track in rock album history; and
"Forever Changes" (1967), still regarded as one of the pioneering
orchestral-pop albums.

In contrast to Summer of Love fare such as the Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's
Lonely Hearts Club Band," "Forever Changes" reflected on the horrors
of the Vietnam War and racial discrimination with bittersweet music
and surreal lyrics. In "A House Is Not a Motel," Lee described streets
running red with blood, "and if you don't believe me, turn on your
tub." The song "The Red Telephone" contained his manifesto: "And if
you want to count me, count me out."

As a black artist making his way in a society divided by racial riots,
Lee saw no other choice than to remain on the fringe. "I was just
being honest and real about my concept of how life really is," Lee
said in a recent interview. "I saw the same [expletive] repeating
through the years, whether it be war or whatever."

Lee's confrontational stance and his refusal to follow a prescribed or
coherent musical path sealed Love's fate as a cult act. Lee recorded
with different Love lineups through the '70s, then drifted through a
solo career that gained focus when he hooked up with the Love acolytes
in the band Baby Lemonade in the early '90s.

Costly mistake

Just as he began to tour again, Lee was convicted on gun charges in
Los Angeles and spent nearly six years in prison. He was released in
2002, and returned with renewed determination. In 2003, he toured
Europe and North America with an expanded version of Love that
included a string and horn section and performed "Forever Changes" in
its entirety.

Lee was thrilled to get the opportunity: "It's an honor to finally
present this thing the way it should have been presented 35 years
ago," he said at the time. A few months ago, when he was being treated
for cancer, musicians such as Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant, Mott the
Hoople's Ian Hunter and Yo La Tengo rallied to stage benefit concerts
for him, a testament to a troubled artist whose music had touched
generations.

[wayfaring stranger]

link za klip

Randy Newman's peers pay tribute on album

Monday, August 14, 2006
By Shay Quillen, San Jose Mercury News

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Some people come to a Randy Newman show expecting to hear one of the
gentle, reassuring numbers he's written for movies, like "You've Got a
Friend in Me" from "Toy Story." But while he'll usually perform one of
those soundtrack songs onstage, most of the material in the show is
designed to provoke, not comfort.

"I play the one song," he says, "and then they heckle me for the rest
of the show."

Newman, 62, is on the phone from his hotel room in France, where he
performed at the Nice Jazz Festival as a much louder Kanye West played
nearby. ("Jesus walked through half my show," Newman cracks, referring
to the rapper's 2004 hit.)

It's been nearly 30 years since his only hit as a performer, but
Newman has become a familiar presence through his work in high-profile
movies and his many appearances on the Oscar telecast (he has 16
nominations and one win). Yet it is the music from his pop albums,
especially his early '70s LPs, that has made him a revered figure
among his peers.

"I've never met a songwriter that I've thought was worth a darn that
didn't love Randy Newman," says Nashville singer-songwriter Allison
Moorer.

Moorer is one of 12 acts featured on the Sugar Hill label's new
tribute CD, "Sail Away: The Songs of Randy Newman." Both Moorer and
her husband, country-rock renegade Steve Earle, chose songs from
Newman's audacious 1974 concept album on the South, "Good Old Boys."

"I think he sees it for what it is," Moorer says of the longtime Los
Angeles resident's view of the South. "He sees the beauty; he also
sees the tragedy. I think we Southerners who do see it that way love
it when somebody else does."

No one tries to copy Newman's original arrangements, which typically
pair his Fats Domino-style piano with string settings recalling the
Hollywood scores of his uncles, Alfred and Lionel Newman. Moorer, for
instance, performs "Marie" with an overdubbed mandolin "orchestra"
played by Sam Bush.

The album's producer, Steve Fishell, says he wasn't surprised that
notables such as Bela Fleck, the Del McCoury Band and even Guster
accepted the invitation.

"He may be our greatest living songwriter," Fishell says. "He writes
songs on multiple levels. He will set you up with a really simple,
sweet melody, and he'll write something about infanticide or world
destruction or bigotry."

The CD's title track, sung here by bluegrasser Tim O'Brien, weds an
achingly beautiful melody to the words of a slave trader enticing
Africans to board his ship with promises of a life of leisure in
America.

Then there's the scathing "Rednecks," sung here over crunchy electric
guitar by Earle. "That song is a double-edged sword," Fishell says.
"You start off hearing this racist talk about black people, and you're
shocked, and you want to hate this person, and then Newman turns the
song around on you."

The album also features "Louisiana 1927," a song about a catastrophic
flood that was adopted by artists like Aaron Neville after Hurricane
Katrina hit. Here it's performed by Louisianan Sonny Landreth.

Newman, who was born in New Orleans, says he is appalled by the
corruption and incompetence he's seen in the aftermath of the storm.

"Everyone's always laughed at ... the kind of government they had and
just sort of winked at it, but you know when something like this
happens, you want things to function, and nothing does," he says. "But
the federal government's the worst of all. ... I was talking to Dr.
John, and he's scandalized. And it takes a lot to scandalize someone
from New Orleans."

One song that's not on the tribute CD is "Short People," a blunt
attempt to ridicule prejudice that became Newman's only pop hit, in
1977. Newman says it's not the one he would have picked.

"It will be in my obituary, the first sentence," he says. "That's the
one big mark I've made on the country. It's not a bad song. I mean
there's songs I like less that I've written. But I would rather have
had a hit with almost anything else."

Although Newman has received Oscar nominations for his scores to
dramas like "The Natural" and "Seabiscuit," he says most of his film
offers these days are for cartoons. "I'd like to do a dramatic
picture, but I don't get offered 'em," Newman says.

He is trying out a couple of new songs on tour, he says. One is a work
in progress he is calling "A Few Words in Defense of My Country," in
which he sings, "The leaders we have may be the worst that we've had,
but they're hardly the worst that this poor world has ever seen,"
before elaborating on the shortcomings of rulers such as Nero and
Caligula.

Newman plans to release an album of new songs -- his first since 1999
-- on Nonesuch next spring.

"I have a song called 'Fat and Angry,' " he says. "I could call the
album that. I don't know."

[wayfaring stranger]

Jim White i Johnny Dowd u akciji

Hellwood "Chainsaw of Life" (Munich Records 2006)

Welcome To Hellwood – Population 3. Be Afraid

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

There has been a lot of collaboration on the Americana scene of late. The members of Golden Smog found the time to record a third long player while those busy guys in Calexico also tied-up with Iron & Wine for a release. Yet for lovers of the darker, weirder side of the genre, Hellwood is the one you’ve been waiting for. After nine years of talking about it, the cool and often creepy Johnny Dowd, a man that has that David Lynch knack of raising a laugh while he’s unsettling the hell out of you, has hooked up with his regular drummer and composer Willie B and the ‘hick-hop’ visionary Jim White to bring ‘Chainsaw of Life’ to the table. It’s a natural blend for the long-time friends who also worked together on the Jim White film ‘Searching for the Wrong Eyed Jesus.’

Despite associating these artists with the dirty south, the album was recorded in a cabin in central New York that was plastered with obituaries of dead musicians. It’s a weird and wonderful journey the three artists paint with characters and scenarios that stretch the imagination. With every listen, new nuances about these stories reveal themselves, whether it’s Dowd’s funky ‘God’s Back Pocket,’ which shares a theme with John Goodman’s character in ‘O Brother Where Art Thou,’ or the co-written frenetic ‘Man in a Plaid Suit’ about a frightened obscure man who only lets his hands out of the pockets of his Plaid suit at night.

The record is dominated by Dowd, his ‘Thank You Lord,’ ‘Chicken Shack’ and ‘The Good Die Young’ adding a forceful and heavy invective. White, however, tones down the darkness with the dreamy and beautiful numbers ‘A Man Loves His Wife,’ and ‘Dream On’ as well as the oddball pop of ‘Spider in the Bed.’ As such, the album is no a smooth ride as it veers between styles at an alarming rate and a multitude of voices are apparent. The appearance of a Talking Heads riff (‘Crosseyed & Painless’) on ‘Ten Commandments’ comes straight out of leftfield. However this only serves to intrigue.

For fans of Dowd, the inclusion of White augments his vision without watering down his style. For fans of White, Dowd gives his lyrics a creepier feel, the hip ‘Fireworks Factory’ a case in point. All three artists chime in with songs that would stand out on any of their solo albums and they feed off each other’s strengths. If you’re planning a trip anytime soon, Hellwood ain’t like any place you’ve been before.


Date review added: Friday, August 11, 2006
Reviewer: Nic Fildes
Reviewers Rating:
Related web link: Johnny Dowd Web site

Edited by wayfaring stranger, 17 August 2006 - 20:57.

[wayfaring stranger]

Direktan link

BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE

Just one big happy family, eh?

How can you keep track of a band with no fixed line-up, scores of side projects, and whose founder is disappointed in himself? Laura Barton reports from Toronto on the soap opera that is Broken Social Scene

Friday August 25, 2006

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Ableary-eyed Amy Millan is winding her way across Toronto in a
desperate search for coffee. The traffic lights switch to green and
she scans the streets with a face dogged by a hangover and startled by
makeup. A pair of sparkly red ballet slippers sits in the passenger
seat. We pull up outside Jet Fuel Coffee in Cabbagetown, where Millan
used to work, and she is two steps on to the pavement when the
heckling starts. "Hey Amy!" they holler. "Aren't you some big star
now?"

Millan is indeed some big star here in Toronto. Poised to release her
solo album, Honey From the Tombs, she notched up a fine reputation
with the Montreal-based band Stars, flaunting a voice that is
fine-spun, breathy and distinctive. But it was her role as a vocalist
for Broken Social Scene that truly led her into the limelight; with
Millan, as with so many Canadian artists today, all roads lead to
Broken Social Scene.

BSS is a Canadian supergroup or artistic collective, call it what you
will, that began in 1999 with Kevin Drew and Brendan Canning, and has
been accumulating members ever since. Today some 20 musicians drift in
and out, including solo performers Leslie Feist and Jason Collett,
plus Emily Haines and James Shaw of Metric, as well as countess
others. BSS has somehow succeeded in producing three albums: the
mainly instrumental debut Feel Good Lost (2001), the exceptional and
impressionistic You Forgot It in People (2002) and last year's Broken
Social Scene. But it is live that they catch fire, as a kind of indie
jam band. At times BSS on stage will accommodate five guitarists,
horns, drums, strings, three female vocalists and a couple of male
voices to create a whirling, diving, clamour of sound, in shows that
can stretch to three hours.

Today the offices of the BSS's Toronto-based record label, Arts &
Crafts, are crammed with boxes of merchandise, waiting to be shipped
across to Olympic Island where tomorrow the group are curating a
festival. The show will see 10,000 fans make the short ferry-hop from
the mainland to bask in the sunshine and in performances by Raising
the Fawn, J Mascis, Feist and Bloc Party, with a grand finale by BSS.

To Jeffrey Remedios of Arts & Crafts, the Olympic Island show is a
celebration of four years of hard graft, during which all involved
lived with a persistent fear "that we were going to fuck it up". Five
years ago Remedios was working for Virgin, craving a little more
independence, a tad more creativity. "At the same time what was
happening in Toronto was this incredible burgeoning music community,"
he recalls. "All these bands were starting to really come together,
all these clubs were full, everyone would be going out to see local
bands, which was a relatively new thing for us. It sort of hit
critical mass at a certain time."

Already a good friend and sometime roommate of Canning and Drew, he at
first took a mild interest in their project. "But then they made You
Forgot It in People, and they got me into the studio and said
whaddyathink? And I said I'm in, I'm totally in." That meant leaving
Virgin to found a record label, management company and music publisher
with Drew, "that would just be like an arts collective, like the whole
is bigger than the sum of its parts, that kind of theory".

Arts & Crafts started with one band, Broken Social Scene, and has
grown steadily since. "Social Scene really are the band that are at
the centre of this community," insists Remedios. "The true ethos of
that band is a collection of people collaborating together from other
projects. So they're in the core. In the beginning they would play
shows at [Toronto venue] Ted's Wrecking Yard, and they'd play all new
songs every show, and they'd play once a month. You Forgot It in
People was birthed from that. So one week James and Emily from Metric
would be there, the next month Feist, the next month Amy and Evan from
Stars. And it just hit, it hit really fast."

Back in Cabbagetown, Millan, propped up by latte, is attempting to
explain the complex, intertwining histories of the members of BSS. She
first met Kevin Drew at summer camp. "And of course Emily I met on the
first day at school. She came up and asked where the music class was.
We walked in and we were late, and there was what felt like 200 kids
all facing us. But it was better because we had each other, and that
sort of bonded us as a force. We were very, very good friends for a
very, very long time. Emily was already writing absolutely amazing
songs and I started singing with her and ..." She has barely begun her
story when another fan wanders over. "Amy! Hey Amy!"

While its shape-shifting enormity has been part of BSS's attraction,
it has also provided its own complications, particularly for Canning
and Drew. "The family is constantly expanding," nods Canning. "But we
let ourselves get pulled in a lot of different ways, and you can kinda
forget we're the founding members of this group. It just feels like
this abstract thing." And the difficulties have not just been musical.
"Over the years there's been such emotional tumult. It must be the
same with every band, but then when you throw men and women together
and start playing music together, it's like being at summer camp."

It's easy to imagine that Canning and Drew might grow a little irked
by the constant to-ing and fro-ing of their band members, but Drew
insists not. "It would annoy me if their bands were bad. But they're
not. Bands like Stars and Metric need to be there, and we've been very
grateful for the time they've devoted to us." Besides, he argues, they
enjoy a kind of symbiotic relationship. "They will burn out on their
own shit and come back to us and say, 'Can I just not think about
stuff for a month?' And they take that energy and they use it really
well in their own bands."

Two BSS members currently pursuing another project in earnest are
Emily Haines and James Shaw, singer and guitarist in the more
straightforward, punky Metric. "James and I write with BSS pretty
regularly," she explains, "but it's a very different kind of role,
especially for me. I really enjoy playing the supporting part. Social
Scene is about donating yourself. And the thing is, we don't see each
other that often. It's a way to romanticise your friendships, because
you don't have to put up with the day-to-day."

Though Metric formed in New York, the band members have since returned
home to Toronto, making them more available, presumably, for further
collaborations. "It just felt like the right time," says Haines.
"[Canada's] a pretty utopian place at the moment, there's a lot
happening. I guess what keeps me going is my interest in other people.
Everyone I know, that seems to be their desire: to collaborate. They
need to connect."

Drew, however, isn't feeling the connections so profoundly these days.
"None of us has any time any more in this band," he says over dinner
the night before the Olympic Island festival, spearing his pasta.
"There's lots of families and personal stuff, other bands going on, so
Social Scene has become ... it's lost a bit of its love outside of
when we're together, but when we're together it's there." Does the
loss of love concern him? "It disappoints me a bit because I feel that
if we all gave it 170% then we would be doing a lot better than we
are. We were always a music band that loved music. And we've now gone
into a format of playing the same songs all the time. It's great
because we have rotating members so you always have different magic,
and personality-wise it's difficult to always be on the road so it's
nice to have different conversations. But we've been touring non-stop
for the last four years now, so it's just at a point where we've got
to find something new about it."

He is quick to point out that he has thoroughly enjoyed the past few
years. "But it's also been some of the most stereotypical narcissistic
times in our lives," he says. "I think you hit a point where you're
disappointed in yourself maybe, and that point for me was when I kind
of took it for granted. And it's also very difficult to make music
when you're talking about it all the time, you're always planning your
future and where you're going to go and all that, and it does suck the
life out of why you wanted to do it."

What would he rather talk about? "I'd rather learn," he replies
earnestly. "I'd rather use conversation as an education platform,
instead of talking about booze and how fucking hard it is to cope as a
group or a family or a band. We were always an experiment in intimacy.
That's something Jason Collett said to me once, and I liked that. I
liked the idea that people were into us because it never was supposed
to work with this many people, and financially we were supposed to be
ruined and internally we were supposed to be ruined. There's be a lot
of fucked up things that have happened over the last couple of years,
but we're still here and there's still love for each other."

It is 12.59pm on Olympic Island, and there is a still patch of calm
before the gates open. The sun shines slow and steady, beers sit
cooling in big icy barrels. You hear the squeals first, then the
thunderous approach of the first stampede of hipsters charging across
the grass to secure their territory at the front of the stage. By the
time Broken Social Scene take to the stage shortly before 9pm, the
crowd is itchy with anticipation. It is an outstanding, unexpectedly
moving performance, the already preposterous number of band members on
stage bolstered by the friends and family that seem to spill from the
wings. The night concludes in a final, stunning triumvirate of Ibi
Dreams of Pavement, It's All Gonna Break, and KC Accidental. And, for
a glorious while, Broken Social Scene, in all its fragmented,
dissonant, weary parts, seem again united.

Five essential records from the Canadian scene

Broken Social Scene - You Forgot It in People
Back in 2002, cramming umpteen musicians on to an album seemed an
outlandish concept. Yet You Forgot It in People bloomed with a
mesmerising creativity, best illustrated by the breathless,
otherworldly Anthems for a 17-Year-Old Girl.

Metric - Live It Out
One of this year's best albums so far, this is the second offering
from Metric, and marks out Haines as one of the brightest stars in
music right now. Politically charged and with a stoked-up fire in its
belly, Live It Out is also disturbingly danceable.

Feist - Let It Die
The solo project of BSS's Leslie Feist. Unabashedly romantic, Let It
Die is steeped in cocktail jazz and bossa nova; it's her most
sumptuous offering yet.

Stars - Set Yourself on Fire
Stars are made up of Chris Seligman and Pat McGee, along with BSS
members Amy Millan, Torquil Campbell and Evan Cranley. Their piece de
resistance is this album from 2005: a cathartic confection of strings,
horns, colliding female-male vocals and Casio keyboards.

Jason Collett - Idols of Exile
Collett is a part of BSS's wall-of-guitar sound, but here he drifts
back to his folkier roots to bring us a delightful album, full of
summery, wistful tracks such as Hangover Days.

· Broken Social Scene and Metric play the Carling Weekend at Leeds on
Friday and Reading on Sunday

Edited by wayfaring stranger, 25 August 2006 - 18:39.

[djeneralche]

Direktan link

DJ Shadow
Knockin’ Doorz Down

Known for his genre-bending beats and turntable tricks, DJ Shadow is bringing the MC back to the forefront on his new album. The Cali native speaks on discovering the hyphy movement, retiring his MPC and the evolution of underground hip-hop.
Posted In: Features

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

With this new album, you really changed direction. What made you decide to work more with MCs and less on instrumental material?
Because of the success of the first [solo album], I guess I felt like I had to follow that format a little bit. I started out working with rappers. When Paris was on Tommy Boy in 1989, ’90, he was the first person to put me in the studio. All the early records that I made usually used rappers. The only reason I started doing solo stuff was because I was too pig-headed and I wanted to do my own thing too. I don’t rap, so it ended up that I [got] inspired by people like Mantronix and other instrumental stuff. All along—even when I was doing those other instrumental records—on the side I would still do production for people, [and] obviously I have a rap label that we started. I got to a point in my career where I just didn’t feel like segmenting everything anymore for the sake of protecting this fan from this type of music and this fan over here from this type of music. I just decided to cram it all into one album.

It seems like a pretty bold change. How did you know your audience would respond to the new material?
I did a mix CD last year called Funky Skunk and I sold like, 50,000 [copies] or something like that. It starts off with Three 6 Mafia and it goes into all this crunk stuff and then it goes into funk music and then it goes into really obscure mid-school hip-hop, like late-’80s hip-hop. Then it ends up with this laid-back guitar music. When that CD blew up the way it did, among a lot of different types of people, that’s when I realized, Okay, if I approach my own record the same way, I can do this.

If I’m going to make rap, I want the rap songs to hit with people who listen to rap. If I’m going to make a hyphy song, I want it to hit in the hyphy community. I don’t want it to be on some toned-down hyphy. So I just decided to approach the album that way, as opposed to maybe sparing fans of mine who don’t like rap so much. They’re going to get the full impact of the rap that I like. That’s why I worked with people like Banner. A lot of people just assumed that I didn’t like commercial rap or gangsta rap or whatever you wanna call it. But I grew up on all rap, and continued to listen to all different types of rap, be it Geto Boys in ’88, or OutKast in ’95. And I think the biggest misconception people have about what I do is that because sometimes I do albums that don’t have rap on it that somehow I don’t like rappers.

This album has Q-Tip, David Banner, Phonte, E-40, Keak Da Sneak, and others. Which of those collaborations was most exciting for you?
For me, getting E-40 on the record and especially having him doing a whole song. It’s hard to get 40 to do a whole song. That’s pretty rare in the Bay. And that was a real honor. Plus, he’s the big man. After 2pac’s not around, Mac Dre was murdered a couple years ago, everybody in the Bay really appreciates 40. And I think the reason people appreciate him is because he appreciates everybody else. And so, being able to work with him was great. Banner was the first person that I reached out to. The first verse [on “Seeing Thangs”] we did in 2004. And then I stopped working for about five months because my wife had twin baby girls. And then [with] the Phonte Coleman track, I was just really impressed with his talent. He can sing, he can rap, he can do it all really, really well and really fast. He knows exactly what harmonies to do. To me, he’s massively underappreciated, and I didn’t even really know he was like that until we were in the studio. He’s really disciplined. He really knows exactly what he wants to bring to the table. Out of everybody that I worked with, I remember just being like, “Damn, I didn’t even really know that this dude was that talented.”

You’re from Northern Cali, but a lot of people might be surprised to see you working with artists who could be labeled “hyphy.” How did you get into hyphy music?
[After] my last album came out and I came off the road, I made a decision to move my studio out of my house and into the Mission district in San Francisco, in the city. I was commuting to and from work for the first time in 10 years. When you’re on the road for an hour and a half everyday, you burn out on all your CDs and you just find yourself turning on the radio. And in late 2002, early 2003, me turning on the radio coincided with the main urban station in the Bay Area, KMEL. A lot of local artists around that time had taken them to task, because they are a Clear Channel station, for not playing local artists. They responded by playing local artists, and that coincided with the emergence of the hyphy movement. So early songs like “White Tees, Blue Jeans and Nikes” by Keak, the early Federation stuff like “Hyphy” and “Go Dumb,” Mac Dre stuff like “Get Stoopid” and “Thizz Dance,” all these songs are being played for the first time on the radio and I’m hearing them…it was just luck. When I was driving to the studio, it was during the mix hour, so I was hearing a lot of local artists. Growing up in the Bay, a lot of the names I remembered from ten years prior, but a lot of them I didn’t know. I’m 34, [so] I’m ten years older than most people in the scene. People like Turf Talk are in their early 20s. I was hearing the music and it was just compelling me. Everywhere you go, kids around you are just being, “Oh, she’s hyphy, he’s hyphy, they’re acting hyphy.” “Oh, he’s way too hyphy.” It’s no different than living in New York probably like in ’87, ’88. The culture was just so thick that it was inescapable.

Then I started going to shows. Last summer was really crazy because Keak Da Sneak had this song out called “Superhyphy” that was just so anthemic in the Bay. I was at Summer Jam, which is the big live show for KMEL, and when he came out there, just seeing 30,000 kids go stupid like that was just so ill to me. I’ll never forget that. And that was just a week after we recorded “3 Freaks.” Then October came around, I gave it to the radio station and they just flipped for it. So for the first time in my life, I’m getting radio play. One thing led to another, and from that song, people started knowing who I was. People are like, “Oh, that’s a slapper. We should do something.” It was just a whole reintroduction to my own area.

A lot of artists who were closely associated with the whole underground scene in the ’90s seem to be opening themselves up to different types of rap these days. Where do you think that trend comes from?
Well, for me, it’s a long answer. If you were passionate about and listened to hip-hop prior to it crossing over in 1989 and 1990, then you have a certain understanding. In California, where I come from, we didn’t have WBLS, KISS FM, Red Alert and all that. We had our people that was playing rap, but it was very segmented. It wasn’t really until Tone Loc, MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice that rap crossed over on radio nationwide. If you go back and read The Source from the late ’89, early ’90, all you’ll read about is people being uptight about the future of rap and who was going to control it. Was it going to be controlled by the people who created it, or was it going to be controlled by these record labels who don’t really care about it or understand it? There was a big movement in hip-hop to keep it pure and keep it real and all that. And that had a valid place. Having already been a listener for eight years [at] that point, I really aligned myself with that sort of ideology, which was the real versus the fake, or real versus commercial. That made sense for a while, but by the time records like The Chronic were coming out…being from California, that was massive. Everybody loved that record. The term “backpack” didn’t exist back then, [but] anybody from any backpack group that you could think of from California back then loved The Chronic. Before that they loved Ice Cube, before that they loved N.W.A and even before that, in my case, they loved C.I.A. World Class Wreckin’ Cru, I loved that shit too.

I guess what I’m trying to say that it made sense, at a certain point, for there to be what ended up becoming the underground hip-hop movement or backpack rap or whatever. But as far as I’m concerned, it hasn’t really applied to my listening or my musical tastes for a number of years, at least since ’96. [But] even then, I didn’t stop listening: back in ’94, ’95, I was listening to Bay Area hardcore rap the same way I was listening to the Geto Boys from Houston. I loved Miami Bass. I was all over the map. I guess because I tended to adopt a lot of musical theories based on people like Bambaataa and Flash and later the big underground hip-hop ideology, I just tended to meet those type of people, and that’s how I ended up working with a lot of those type of people. But as far as the type of music that I listened to and liked, it was always pretty consistently well-rounded. I never made the differentiation between gangsta rap and whatever else there was. There’s good gangsta rap and there’s bad gangsta rap. MC Eiht is good gangsta rap. Ice Cube is good gangsta rap. There was a lot of garbage gangsta rap too. That’s the only differentiation I ever made: quality versus fly-by-night bullshit. But even some of the fly-by-night bullshit became good: I remember 8Ball and MJG in the early ’90s, I was like, “I don’t know I’m not really feeling this.” But then they kind of came into their own, around ’97, ’98, and it made sense to me. Sometimes people just need more time to gel.

Working with such a diversity of MCs, your production has gone in some new directions. How did you go about capturing these different sounds?
After my last album, I decided I didn’t want to make records on the MPC anymore. That was decided before I ever knew that I was going to make a hyphy record or anything like that. After my last album, I just felt that I wouldn’t ever do anything better on that instrument. So after I came off tour, I spent a year at that studio I was commuting to, learning how to make music in different ways. I felt my sound was ready for a change and I felt like that was going to happen inevitably if I changed my method. So I started using software synths and my samples wouldn’t live in the MPC anymore, they would live in the computer. I bought a control 24 for ProTools and was using some synthesizers and outboard gear just to vary up my sound a little bit. I started realizing that a lot of the sounds that I was hearing or a lot of stock sounds I was playing with were not unlike the sounds that people like Rick Rock were using in the hyphy scene. It was still a good two years, though, until I sat down and I was like, I love this music too much, I just gotta try to make something. And the first time I tried to do that, “3 Freaks” was made. And when I made “3 Freaks,” I knew I didn’t want to use…if you want to make a beat like that, you have to know somebody who can ride a beat like that. So it was literally, Who do I like the best out of this scene right now? Who’s really gassin’ on the radio? Well, at that time, it was Keak and Turf Talk. So then it was just a matter of, I’ll reach out to them, roll the dice and see what happens.

Edited by djeneralche, 25 August 2006 - 19:53.

[wayfaring stranger]

Direktan link
DJ Shadow
Knockin’ Doorz Down

Known for his genre-bending beats and turntable tricks, DJ Shadow is bringing the MC back to the forefront on his new album. The Cali native speaks on discovering the hyphy movement, retiring his MPC and the evolution of underground hip-hop.
Posted In: Features

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Izgleda da ce njegov novi album biti kandidat za jedno od najvecih razocarenja godine ... steta ... a lik je tako kreativan i ima veoma zanimljive ideje ...
TNX za post !!! ... osecam se tako usamljeno na ovom topicu

[djeneralche]

Bas htedoh da prokomentarisem da bi bilo bolje kad bi bilo nekog prevoda al to je ipak malo previse. Nego za BSS pise za neki koncert sto treba da odrze

Today the offices of the BSS's Toronto-based record label, Arts &
Crafts, are crammed with boxes of merchandise, waiting to be shipped
across to Olympic Island where tomorrow the group are curating a
festival. The show will see 10,000 fans make the short ferry-hop from
the mainland to bask in the sunshine and in performances by Raising
the Fawn, J Mascis, Feist and Bloc Party, with a grand finale by BSS.

Otkud BSS grand finale pored J Mascis-a

A i ovaj spisak 5 esencijalnih kanadskih ploca

[wayfaring stranger]

Direktan link

Radio Birdman rises up like a phoenix

By Greg Kot
Tribune music critic
Published September 1, 2006

Radio Birdman, one of Australia's first and best punk bands, broke up
in 1978 before they ever got a chance to tour America.

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Now, the reconstituted Birdman--with four original members, a retooled
rhythm section, and a hard-hitting new album that picks up where they
left off 28 years ago--is finally getting that chance. The first
American tour brings them to the Double Door Saturday.

"We never got the invitation the first time," says Rob Younger, the
band's singer. Which, given the sextet's status as the pariahs of the
Aussie pub scene, was only fitting.

In the early '70s, when Younger and his future Radio Birdman sidekick
Deniz Tek began playing in bands, the clubs were teeming with rock 'n'
roll steeped in '50s and '60s nostalgia. Younger set out to be
different. He was an avid reader of Creem and other U.S. underground
music magazines, where he discovered bands such as the Velvet
Underground, Stooges, MC5 and New York Dolls.

He formed his first band, the Rats, with a fellow Dolls fanatic, and
they specialized in playing songs written by their cult heroes from
overseas. Tek, a Detroit native who had traveled to Australia to
pursue a medical degree, was in another punk-influenced band, TV
Jones. "It galled me that someone else was on to the same thing as
us," Younger says with a chuckle. "That's how I became aware of Deniz.
He was the guitar player, the songwriter, basically the most talented
guy in the band. And then they kicked him out because he didn't smile
enough, wasn't commercial enough for them. I couldn't believe it!
Right away, I knew we'd hit it off."

Tek joined forces with Younger, who took care of singing Tek's songs
and provoking the crowd at concerts. The band showed up at clubs where
they were instantly despised by management, who felt they'd been
misled. "These proprietors would think we'd lied to them calling
ourselves a rock 'n' roll band," Younger says. "To them, rock 'n' roll
was ['50s Australian star] Johnny O'Keefe."

On the way out of shows, the band would often have to fight off drunk,
rowdy fans ticked off by Younger's antics during the show. "We loved
it," Younger says. "We figured to get that kind of reaction, we must
be doing something right."

But within Sydney, the band started attracting a loyal following. The
music echoed the alienation of the Stooges and the MC5, and demanded
action. "There's gonna be a new race/ Kids are gonna start it up,"
Younger sang in Tek's "New Race," a song about seizing control of
one's destiny. The band dressed in matching dark-gray combat shirts
and wore arm patches bearing the band's red-and-black logo. The
hardcore fans followed suit, which caused at least one prominent
Australian music columnist to describe the band as fascist.

"People saw the word `race' in the song and over-reacted," Younger
says. "The song says nothing about militarism or facism, it says `kids
are gonna start it up.' It was written as a youth anthem at the
suggestion of our producer at the time. And the matching shirts looked
smart. I like it that we looked like we belonged in a band together.
We caught a lot of [expletive] because of it, but we couldn't have
cared less. It was a way of pushing buttons, of separating ourselves
from the people who didn't get it or us."

By 1977, the band's brand of flamethrower punk was gaining a larger
following, and a deal was struck with a U.S. label, Sire Records, home
to the Ramones, Talking Heads and another newly signed Australian punk
band, the Saints. Radio Birdman's sole U.S. release, "Radios Appear,"
contained "New Race" and is now regarded as a minor punk classic. But
back then, it barely registered outside of Australia, exacerbated by
the band's lack of touring. On a hellish tour of the United Kingdom in
1978, Radio Birdman was dropped by Sire and broke up. Another album,
"Living Eyes," came out, but by then it was too late.

"We disintegrated socially and economically," Younger says. "I was
angry at my bandmates for what I considered their appalling behavior,
even though I was just as much to blame. None of us were experienced
or mature enough to see the bigger picture."

Eventually, the squabbles subsided enough for the band members to
consider a reunion. They began playing together sporadically in 1996,
and got a shot of late-arriving recognition when Sub Pop Records
released "The Essential Radio Birdman: 1974-1978" in 2001, marking the
first time much of the band's best material had been issued
domestically.

With original members Younger, Tek, keyboardist Pip Hoyle and
guitarist Chris Masuak in the fold, Radio Birdman recently released a
long-overdue third album, "Zeno Beach" (Yep Rock), to pave the way for
the first North American tour. The music does the legacy proud, with
Tek's venomous guitar leaping out of the mixes like a cobra.

"We didn't want to come over to America as a nostalgia act," Younger says.

He's still getting used to the idea of playing in front of audiences
that actually want to enjoy the band rather than fight it. "Acceptance
is a two-edged sword, and I lament it," he says. "We used to be
different from everyone else. But there have been so many outrageous
groups since we first started, far more extreme than we ever were. So
how do we stand out? There's no contrivance about what we do. We just
have to put whatever we got into the gig, and hope people get off on
it."

[wayfaring stranger]

Direktan link

Shellac
Wanna fight about it?

Writer: AARON JENTZEN

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Serrated, slashing guitar, mathy drum workouts and pummeling bass
grooves may be trademark elements of Shellac's sound, but the
legendary underground band's also the subject of an old jibe: The
songs, it goes, are all about baseball and/or Canada.

And hey — there may be some truth to it, although the more reliable
constant may be reedy, sarcastic vocals that blur the line between
passive-aggressive and, well, aggressive. "Hey man — hey! / I wanna
have a fight with you / From the way that you behave it is clear to me
/ you would like to have one too," sings vocalist and guitarist Steve
Albini, over on "Watch Song," the closing track of Shellac's 2000
album, 1000 Hurts.

For the past couple of months, the name Shellac has fluttered on the
lips of many Pittsburgh music fans, and with good reason: The upcoming
Pittsburgh show is a rare opportunity to see the band live. Since the
group formed in 1992 — comprised of Albini (ex-Big Black, Rapeman),
bassist Bob Weston (Volcano Suns) and drummer Todd Trainer (Brick
Layer Cake) — ordinary music-biz cycles of tour-record-tour-record
simply haven't applied. Tour dates are few, scattered and sometimes
simply recreational.

Even if you're not a fan of '90s underground rock, a cover-to-cover
reader of Michael Azerrad's Our Band Could Be Your Life or, I suppose,
a skilled craftsperson, you've probably held a little piece of Shellac
in your hands before now. What Albini and Weston do for "day jobs" is
what they're known for among mainstream audiences: Both are
accomplished producers. Weston's credits include Archers of Loaf and
guitar heroes Chavez; Albini has produced everyone from Helmet to PJ
Harvey, from the surfy Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet to In Utero —
you know, the one by that Nirvana band. But it's the smaller fry that
commands most of Albini's time, running the indie-friendly studio
complex Electrical Audio in Chicago (where the main tracking room is
called, tellingly "Center Field").

The band's working on a new album — the first since 1000 Hurts — which
will come out "anytime between now and 2007" on Chicago indie Touch
and Go records. The rumored title is Excellent Italian Greyhound.
Baseball, Canada and dogs? — now that sounds promising.

Shellac with Uzeda. 7 p.m. Tue., Sept. 5. The Union Project, 801 N.
Negley Ave., Highland Park. 412-363-4550 or www.unionproject.org

[wayfaring stranger]

XL Cover Story

An oral history, from Scratch
In the early '80s, Scratch Acid cranked up the Austin hardcore scene by bringing the crazy

By Joe Gross
Wednesday, August 30, 2006

This is the story of a band from Austin.

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

This band formed in the early '80s, rising out of the speed and energy of the hard-core scene. Tiring of that genre's aesthetic strictures, the band looked to older psychedelic rock and overseas post-punk for inspiration. It had a maniac for a singer, surreal and spindly riffs and a really great drummer.

No, not the Butthole Surfers.

The band was Scratch Acid, and the term "legend" isn't entirely inappropriate. It existed from 1982 to 1987, released two EPs and an album and played around 120 shows.

Some of the members went on to form what became backbones of '90s underground rock in Austin: the Jesus Lizard, Rapeman, Sangre de Toro, Ministry, Areola 51, the Damnations and more.

Scratch Acid will play a reunion show at Emo's on Saturday, followed by a set the week after at a show in Chicago celebrating the 25th anniversary of Touch and Go Records. These will be the reunited members' first public performances in nearly 20 years. This is their story.

David Yow (singer, Scratch Acid): "I moved to Austin in '75. My father was an Air Force pilot. I lived there from '75 to '88. I think my seminal punk rock experience was going to Raul's on Halloween night, seeing the Huns. Seeing bands like the Dicks, the Big Boys and the Surfers made me rethink music. I was in Toxic Shock soon after."

David William Sims (bassist, Scratch Acid): "I was a little younger than the other guys in Scratch Acid, and I liked the stuff kids my age liked: AC/DC and Led Zeppelin. I started going to Raul's, started going around the time '60 Minutes' did that report about punk, trying to make it sound like the most awful thing that ever happened. They showed some footage of Johnny Rotten, and it was something I'd never really heard before."

Brett Bradford (guitarist, Scratch Acid): "I grew up in Dallas and Salt Lake City. I got a guitar before I went to military school, a '74 Fender Strat I still play. I followed a girlfriend to UT and ended up playing in Sharon Tate's Baby, which became Jerryskids. After Jerryskids, Rey (Washam) and I knew we wanted to keep playing together."

Rey Washam (drummer, Scratch Acid): "Brett and I were in Jerryskids. We were at a Dicks show in the fall of '81, and Yow, who was in Toxic Shock, asked me if I wanted to be in a band around the time Shock and Jerryskids were ending."

Sims: "I had been playing guitar for a few years and was going to be in my first band. Those guys were a bit older, and they were going to practice at the house Yow and I lived in. I showed up and started acting like I was in the band, and so I was."

The foursome, along with singer Steve Anderson, were brought together at least in part by an increasing lack of interest in conventional hard-core punk.

Yow: "When you start getting really, really fast, it takes some of the the power away. Slower tempos are more like getting beat up."

Washam: "We didn't want to sound like East or West Coast punk. We definitely didn't want to just play that fast thrash."

Sims: "I think I objected to the generic qualities of a lot of what was going on in hard-core. I was a lot more interested in (post-punk bands such as) Public Image and Gang of Four. We could agree on the Beatles and locally on the Butthole Surfers and Big Boys."

Yow: "Public Image, Killing Joke, SPK, Chrome, Led Zeppelin, Ramones, Motörhead, Fear."

Bradford: "Before we ever played a show, we knew we wanted to be our own favorite band."

Throughout its career, the band was most frequently compared to the Birthday Party, the maniacal Australian band best known as the launching pad for singer Nick Cave.

Sims: "The Birthday Party was one of many."

Washam: "I liked them, but I don't really hear it as much of an influence. We liked stuff like (jazz-rock band) Return to Forever, and nobody ever mentions them."

Yow: "I remember doing a radio interview with Michael Gerald from Killdozer, and the guy doing the interview mentioned how much the bands were influenced by the Birthday Party. Honestly, I was a little ashamed at how much I was taking from Nick Cave. But Gerald says, 'Influenced? (Expletive), we rip 'em off!' And that was the end of my embarrassment. It's natural for someone you admire a lot to have a lot of influence on you."

The original Scratch Acid lineup began in the late fall of '81 with Yow, Washam, Sims and Bradford, with Anderson on vocals. Yow played bass and Sims played second guitar. They parted ways with Anderson in '82 and moved Sims to bass and Yow — who was popular in Austin — to vocals.

Washam: "Yow wasn't the world's most proficient bass player, but he was funny as hell, and everybody liked him."

Pat Blashill (writer, photographer): "I was friends with Sims before the band. We learned how to slam dance at the same time at Raul's in 1980. Sims was always the silent but dangerous one. He introduced me to Yow, who was the funniest human I'd ever met. And he just became the world's greatest frontman."

It took some time for momentum to grow. Washam split for a time to play with the Big Boys, replaced for a few months by Rich Malley.

Washam: "How could I pass that up? In hindsight, I'm just glad they didn't kick me out permanently. It wasn't the best move I ever made; the guys in Scratch Acid were my friends."

Yow: "We wrote songs so slowly that it just took time that could have been spent on touring, which is why we didn't tour that much. We just weren't very prolific."

King Coffey (drummer, Butthole Surfers): "My first punk band, the Hugh Beaumont Experience, briefly shared a practice space with (Scratch Acid) when we moved to Austin. We were kind of star-struck. I first saw Scratch Acid at Studio 29, which is now the Texas French Bread on 29th Street. The Butt's drummer got his nose broke by a flying beer bottle, paving the way for me to join the band.

"They were the best new band in Austin, hands down. Rey was the best drummer in Texas, and the stuff they were doing was just so far removed from conventional punk rock."

The band finally released its debut EP, "Scratch Acid," in 1984 on the local Rabid Cat label. Many consider its well-recorded blend of chaotic riffs, thunderous drumming and Yow's disconcerting howls to be a landmark of American underground rock.

Steve Albini (guitarist, Big Black; recording engineer): "I have this theory that any decent record sounds good at 33 and 45. The first Scratch Acid EP sounded awesome at any speed. It's one of the first punk rock records that sounded like there was a really coherent aesthetic to its presentation. The sound of the record, the balance of the band — it's a landmark."

Coffey: "That entire first EP is just incredible, one of the best Texas punk records ever made, one of the essential Texas recordings. It was just so out-of-nowhere brilliant, and it was really cool that it was on Rabid Cat, a local label. (The Surfers) sold out; we went to California (on Alternative Tentacles) and Michigan (on Touch and Go) to release records."

Blashill: "When that record came out, it was clear to me they were completely different. I was so proud of them making this piece of art. There weren't too many bands you could say that about in Austin."

With the occasional out-of-town show and a few short tours, Scratch Acid's reputation as a fearsome live band began to increase exponentially.

Albini: "Oh my God, what an amazing band."

Blashill: "There was this old campus bar called Uncle Susu's. In those days, the punk scene was happening wherever club owners would let you play, and Susu's was the place to go for a season. No stage, the band was in a corner, and during the whole performance the crowd was surging and bumping into Scratch Acid, and they attacked the crowd back. Sims had a real murderous glint in his eye. A really loud and ugly sound, but you never wanted to miss them."

Sims: "It was interesting to going to places like Minneapolis and Seattle, where we were a lot more popular than we were in Austin. It was sort of a shock."

Jon Fine (guitarist, B—— Magnet): "They all looked like members of different bands. Yow in a flannel shirt, super scrawny and nuts, Sims with really long hair, which he flipped around — pre-grunge, remember. Bradford looking like a totally ordinary guy and Washam looking like he just got off a shift at a gas station, being this unreal drummer. They didn't seem to interact with each other, but the music was incredibly together, with this very aggressive rhythm section, and their shows had the texture of being an actual event."

Blashill: "I had a lot of fun photographing them. We once posed them in this creek. The image just made a lot of sense. They looked tattered and torn, covered with weeds. They were just the perfect sort of inheritors of this Austin legacy of 'nature boy crazy.' "

Coffey: "They played this trio of shows. At one, Yow was dressed as Hitler. The next show he dressed like (Butthole Surfers singer) Gibby (Haynes). And then the third he was on a cross dressed like Jesus and performed 'Damned for All Time' from 'Jesus Christ Superstar.' "

Yow: "We opened for Motörhead in Dallas in '85 after Spin magazine ran an article on us. This was my conversation with Lemmy: He was exiting their bus as I was walking past. We bumped into each other. He said, 'Excuse me.' I said, 'Excuse me.' "

Albini: "There was a degree of show business in other bands that was absent in Scratch Acid. You got the feeling watching them that they were being put through some sort of ordeal. It wasn't shtick.

"I remember one time Yow had hidden cookie dough in his pants. At some point, he . . . pulled out a handful . . . and charged the crowd. Now, in a lot of circumstances, your first reaction would be, 'That's not real.'

"I was 100 percent convinced."

The band's album "Just Keep Eating" appeared in 1986. In the winter of 1986 and '87, Scratch Acid made it to Europe, where the band learned a few lessons about weather and the limited financial options in independent rock.

Washam: "Having been in Texas, we had no idea what real cold weather was. We showed up in jean jackets and cowboy boots."

Sims: "Someone told us in some places it was the coldest it had been in 400 years. We had this little Mercedes van that ran on diesel, and a lot of mornings, our tour manager would get up early and call his auto club, and this guy would come out with a little electric gizmo that would thaw out enough of the diesel to start the van."

Yow: "I couldn't believe we were going to Europe at all, and when we got there, we were told we had a roadie and it was Simon Bonney, the singer from Crime and the City Solution, a band we loved and one that was way more famous than we were. We asked him 'Why are you doing this?' He said, 'I get paid. I don't have any money.'

"Bonney (had some problems). He was a real snappy dresser, and we were getting ready to go out one night, and he had been in the bathroom a long, long time. He came out of the bathroom, face was all red, tears coming down and some vomit on his clothes he clearly hadn't noticed. He said, 'How do I look?'

"I said, 'You look great. Let's go.' "

By 1987, Scratch Acid hooked up with Touch and Go Records, the label that was home to such peers as the Butthole Surfers, Big Black and Killdozer. The band released its final EP, "Berserker," for that label later that year.

Sims: "That label was a revelation. The Surfers had turned them on to us."

Coffey: "I played (Touch and Go executive Cory Rusk) a cassette that Scratch Acid had just recorded for what would be the first EP. He freaked out over it and was angry that it was already scheduled to come out on Rabid Cat."

Washam: "Cory Rusk is an amazing person. I've been ripped off umpteen million times, and Cory just kept his word. You do not see that kind of integrity in the music business."

But by the spring of 1987, the time had come for the band to part ways. The band played its last show in May of '87.

Washam: "That last show we made like $1,000. That was a huge deal."

Albini: "Nobody ever said to me out loud, 'We're through after this.' But when they were on that last tour, there seemed to be this sense of resignation."

Bradford: "To this day, I can't believe that I was in the right place in the right time. I couldn't have written my own script any better."

After Scratch Acid broke up, Sims and Washam joined Albini in the short-lived Rapeman. Sims then teamed up with Yow in the Jesus Lizard in 1989. That band went on to comparative fame and fortune and lasted until 1999. Bradford has played with such acts as Sangre de Toro and Areola 51. Scratch Acid's catalog was reissued in 1991 on the CD "The Greatest Gift."

These days, Washam plays music in Los Angeles, the city where Yow is currently employed as a photo retoucher. He makes music occasionally with bands such as the Melvins. Sims works in New York as an accountant. Bradford plays music in Austin.

Yow: "I've had no interest in reuniting the band for money. When asked, I would just quote absurd prices, like we'd play if each of us could walk with $250,000. But getting the call to play for the Touch and Go show was a no-brainer."

Bradford: "I think playing together again was a lot more challenging than anyone thought it was going to be. I was having bad dreams about being up on stage. We got together for four days in July in Austin — six-, eight-hour practices. I think I'm kind of close to where I left off."

Washam: "It was strange counting off the first song after not having played it for 25 years. I was really surprised at how it sounded the same, but a little bit better, like we learned how to play."

Yow: "It was really weird. We're all old guys now, and some of it was really difficult. There's no way I could tour, do six nights a week.

"But man, we played 'Cannibal,' and I got chills."

Edited by wayfaring stranger, 02 September 2006 - 08:34.

[wayfaring stranger]

Mark Linkous:
It's a Wonderful Life

By Trevor Kelley

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Two years ago, as far as Mark Linkous was concerned, Sparklehorse was through. After spending nearly a decade penning albums that were critically acclaimed but commercially redundant, Sparklehorse’s lead songwriter and more often than not, lone member, had given up. He’d abandoned recording a fourth album, Dreamt For Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain, (soon to be released on Linkous’ new label, Astralwerks). He’d lost the desire to perform live, which left him unable to pay his rent. And then there was the depression. Every morning, Linkous says, he’d wake up thinking, “Fuck, I’m still alive.”

Things weren’t supposed to turn out this way. Back in the early ’90s, Linkous was one of the most promising stars of the Alternative Nation—a genuine artist who had more to offer than background music for chugging smart drinks at Lollapalooza. Sparklehorse’s debut, 1995’s Vivadixie submarinetransmissionpilot, even produced the radio hit “Someday I Will Treat You Good,” and was hailed by Rolling Stone as one of the best albums of the year. Things were looking distinctly rosy. And then, while touring Europe with Radiohead shortly after Vivadixie’s release, Linkous overdosed on an ill-advised combo of anti-depressants, Valium, booze and heroin in a London hotel room. As a result, he spent weeks in hospital, was declared clinically dead for two minutes and almost had his legs amputated in the process. Sadly, the incident not only halted the band’s growing momentum but also served as a heavy indication of things to come.

Sparklehorse’s next two albums, 1999’s Good Morning Spider and 2001’s It’s a Wonderful Life, were commercial flops, despite the latter boasting high-profile collaborations with Tom Waits and PJ Harvey. The band’s longtime label, Capitol, couldn’t find a way to break either record and soon Linkous all but disappeared. The singer now admits that his mental state began to fray over the next four years and that he was convinced that “the world was coming to an end.” Eventually, concerned friends moved Linkous from his home state of Virginia to a piece of property they owned in rural North Carolina.

The house that Linkous currently calls home is so high up in the mountains that if he wants to drive anywhere, including the studio where he ended up recording much of Dreamt For Light Years, it takes about an hour. It’s remote proximity, however, didn’t seem like a hindrance when Linkous arrived in North Carolina a few years back—at the time, he’d become so crippled by depression and addiction that he genuinely believed he’d never release a single note of music again. But things changed significantly last year when he began working on Sparklehorse’s new album with Brian “Danger Mouse” Burton, of Gnarls Barkley, Gorillaz and The Grey Album fame.

When Burton arrived in North Carolina, Linkous was still in terrible shape, but he credits his time with the 28-year-old producer for turning him around. Linkous is now healthier than he’s ever been, and is set to collaborate in the next year on separate projects with both Burton and Austrian electronic artist Christian Fennesz. He may have spent much of the last decade in despondency and despair but Linkous finally seems ready to succeed—not only for himself, but for anyone who’s ever lived a life as bleak as his. “I talk to a lot of people,” Linkous says calmly, “and some people out there have had similar experiences. I’m not going to act like I’m so valiant that I’m doing it all for them, but that does help.”

Let’s start at the beginning. When did you know that you were going to be a musician?

MARK LINKOUS: Well, at first I wanted to be a motorcycle racer. I’ve ridden motorcycles since I was six, but when I was eight I saw Johnny Cash on television. That’s when I wanted to be a musician.

Is it true that you were in a motorcycle gang as a kid?

Not really. I guess that I was a mascot for a motorcycle gang called the Pagans. I don’t know why they tolerated a young kid hanging around them. They were pretty badass. The Hells Angels guys wouldn’t fuck around with the Pagans. They were just ruthless. The guy that I hung out with the most, Chico, he got thrown out of a car going 60 or 80 miles an hour for fucking up a meth deal.

Did you ever do drugs when you were a kid?

No, not in my teen years. It was just pot and beer. I didn’t get into hard drugs in my teen years.

It seems like there was this general idea that the incident in London in 1996 was an act of rock star hedonism. Was it?

The thing in London, a lot of it I don’t actually remember. I had a big bottle of Mexican Valium that I had been taking for a while [and] apparently there was other stuff involved that I don’t remember doing—there was a belt in the sink. I wasn’t really addicted to pills. I had a heroin problem for a long time. I would go through spells of doing it every day. I’ve been trying to stay away from it for 20 years.

At that time, Vivadixie actually seemed like it would allow you a few minutes of mainstream notoriety. Was there ever a point where you thought you would be famous?

I did—for five minutes in the hospital in London. They started playing “Someday I Will Treat You Good” heavy on the radio in America, and when I got home from the hospital, someone had called me and said, “You've got a song in rotation.” I thought, “Great maybe it’ll happen.”

Do you wonder why it hasn’t?

Sometimes I do. But I don’t crave it. I wish that things were easier in my life—there’s a lot to be said for going to the dentist whenever you want.

Nowadays, your records only sell 50,000 copies and you tour intermittently. It seems like it would be hard to eke out a living doing Sparklehorse.

It is really hard. But then again, almost everyone I talk to knows five people who are huge fans. So sometimes I do think, “If so many people know my records, why is it so hard for me to eke out a living?” I did a tour opening for R.E.M. a year or so ago in stadiums. I remember talking to one of the guys in R.E.M. and they were like, “One day you’ll have this.” Man, I don’t want to ever play stadiums. I don’t want that at all.

When did you start recording the new record?

Umm… God… Shit, man. [pauses] That whole time frame is kind of a big vortex. I got really depressed and didn’t do anything. I did some tracks up at Tarbox [in upstate New York] but I don’t remember when that was. It was probably 2003 or 2004. I don’t know. All I remember is that there was snow.

What would happen when you would try recording your new songs?

I had no interest in recording at all. There was something about preserving it forever—I had no interest in doing that. That’s the side effect of [my] really bad depression. I thought it was silly. I really thought the Earth had had it and was trying to fling us off. After 9/11, a lot of shit happened. People started dying. It was just this string of stuff. People close to me died. There was a murder recently, that didn’t help much.

Who was murdered?

[Linkous friend and House Of Freaks’ singer] Bryan Harvey and his whole family got murdered on New Year’s Day. It was a freaky, random, fucked-up thing. They caught the people that did it, but they had already killed, like, 10 people.

When you say that you can’t remember recording sessions that happened in the last five years, I can’t help but wonder if you relapsed.

Oh yeah, that was the reason my friends wanted to get me out of Virginia. I was relapsing bad. In [North Carolina] I didn’t know any dealers or anything. When you’re trying to stay clean, there are some great advantages to proximity—or non-proximity.

You said that things really changed when you began recording with Danger Mouse. What interested you about working with him?

Well, people send me CDs all the time. I forget who sent me The Grey Album but I loved it. I’ve always liked certain hip-hop and R&B because some of the sounds are so wicked. I have an affinity to some hip-hop stuff. So I think I had written my manager and asked her if she knew who this Danger Mouse person was, and she got in contact with his manager and he ended up being a big Sparklehorse fan. So that’s how that started. He came here to Carolina, and we just hung out. A lot of stuff was already recorded but [Burton] would take, for instance, a guitar track from a different song that was in a different key, import it into his computer, fuck with it, transpose it, turn it upside down, filter it, and lay it back into a chorus of another song. Just wicked stuff. We’re doing another album.

Really? Another Sparklehorse album?

No, it’s going to be a proper (collaboration). Danger Horse, I think we’re going to call it. I’m really excited to do a true collaboration with him.

You collaborated with Tom Waits on It’s A Wonderful Life and he also plays piano on Dreamt For Light Years. What’s your relationship with him like?

Well, we don’t talk every day. We’re still in touch. We’re not that close but we still communicate.

There’s a story floating around that when he first contacted you about It’s A Wonderful Life you had to get really drunk before calling him back.

I did, yeah. [laughs] I was terrified. I didn’t get really drunk. I just had to have a little Wild Turkey in me before I got the nerve to dial the number. I still get nervous when I talk to him, but I’m not as intimidated as I was the first time.

The other day while doing research for this interview I typed your name into Wikipedia. One of the first items that came up is that you have a chemical imbalance. The second is that you almost died of an overdose.

I don’t know where the “chemical imbalance” came from. I’ve been on every kind of anti-depressant that there is, but I don’t know if I have a chemical imbalance or not.

It must bother you that people constantly associate things like overdoses and chemical imbalances with you.

It used to. For a while there every journalist, whether it was on paper or live on the fucking radio, would ask me about my accident [in London]. I got a little tired of it. But it doesn’t bother me now. People just have a natural sense of morbidity and I try not to fault people for that.

Do you ever wonder how you’ll be remembered?

I did for a while when I was really depressed. I thought that It’s A Wonderful Life was the last thing I would ever make. But now I don’t really think about it. The record is coming out on Astralwerks and everyone there seems so enthusiastic. So many people are looking forward to it and are so excited about it that I don’t dwell on that. I’m just glad that people didn’t forget me."

[wayfaring stranger]

 sparklehorse01.gif   31.93KB   92 downloads

Cini mi se da se velika frka digla oko novog Sparklehorse albuma, a izlazi tek 25 sep. Da li ce biti ovoliko klipova i recenzija kada se album pojavi ...

Direktan link

Written by Caroline Hurley
Sunday, 27 August 2006

"Sometimes it’s okay to be sad…but it’s not okay to sit in your house and do nothing for three years..."

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Since 1995 Mark Linkous has produced records as Sparklehorse - known almost as much for a tragic back-story of drugs, depression and injury, this paints an even more intriguing backdrop to his particular strain of experimental alt-country, even with the upcoming fourth album, Sparklehorse is still something of a mystery. The Skinny got a rare chance to talk to Mark at home in his recording studio…

It’s been five years since the last Sparklehorse album, is this due to you being busy with other projects?

"Well, I stopped working altogether for a while; I had really bad depression for about three years and just couldn’t do anything, so that’s the main reason.”

You’re very candid about your experiences with depression…

"Well, it’s easier than making up a bunch of stories (laughs) and besides, I don’t like lying to people.”

You returned to your own Static King Studio for much of this album, having recorded It’s A Wonderful Life elsewhere, why go back?

"Part of it was a product of having isolated myself; I became a complete recluse and lived like a hermit. Also, on ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’, I worked in different studios because I wanted to learn other recording techniques and this was a chance to apply those.”

Do you begin with a concept for an album before you begin, or are they collections of your most recent songs?

"For this album, I definitely had an idea; I knew I wanted to make more of a pop album. I had some songs that were written at the time of the previous album but they felt like anachronisms on that record, they didn’t fit with the tone at all. I’m really interested in electronic music right now too, I love the way that albums like ‘Kid A’ sound and I wanted to try to get to that.”

On this and the previous album, there are many collaborations, is that easy for you?

"Well, sometimes it’s easy and sometimes it’s not. I’m used to doing things my own way and sometimes it’s like by the time I explain to someone else, I could do it myself."

Working with Dangermouse at first doesn’t seem the most obvious match, what was it that attracted you to his music?

"It was actually my manager, when I was really bad; he and other people would send me records to listen to, just to try to get me out of this hole. He sent me ‘The Grey Album’ [Dangermouse’s mash up album of The Beatles and Jay Z] and I just really loved it. So when I wanted to do an album of strong pop songs, he was really down with that."

Is that mainly the sort of music you’re listening to now?

"Yeah, it is really, I like a lot of electronic stuff and some hip hop too, but the sparser the better; Kool Keith and the Dr Octagon stuff and I like Boards of Canada a lot."

It seems to be not only musical influences that play a part in Sparklehorse; there are a lot of literary references in your lyrics…

"Yeah, definitely, I’d say I’m as influenced by literature and film as by other music, particularly the southern gothic writers like Cormac McCarthy and Frank Stafford. When I’m imagining music and how I’m going to make it, it’s as if I can see it, or I’ll think of songs as if they’re smells…"

Nature and animals are a constant presence too…

"Oh, yeah, well, where I live, I’m surrounded by animals, I was almost eaten by a bear once and there are a lot of rattlesnakes about, they try to attack my dog - I had to assassinate one the other day. It’s easier to be around animals than people, especially if I’m feeling really bad."

I wanted to ask you about that line from Hi Fidelity, “which came first, the music or the misery?” Do you think that sad songs make people sad or do sad people listen to sad music?

"I think a lot of people prefer sad songs because it makes them feel like they’re not so alone and maybe it can be a comfort, to say that being sad isn’t such a bad thing, that sometimes it’s okay to be sad… But it’s not okay to sit in your house and do nothing for three years (more laughing)."

Has it worked the same way for you? Are there songs or artists that have acted as a lifeline?

"Yeah, definitely, there’s a song by Gavin Bryers with Tom Waits called Jesus Blood Never Failed Me Yet and that pretty much literally saved my life back in Los Angeles, listening to that song stopped me walking into the sea."

I’ve heard people complain that you’re good at writing rock songs, such as Happy Man, but you choose not to…

"(Laughing) Well, it’s harder to write good rock songs, something that I wouldn’t be embarrassed about in five years time. Pop songs are hard enough without trying to write a ‘cool’ rock song."

What are your plans for the future? Are you still ambitious with Sparklehorse?

"Yeah, I am still ambitious with Sparklehorse, I’m thinking of a covers album, probably seventies stuff like Blue Oyster Cult and Todd Rundgren. We’re planning another project for December too, probably called Dangerhorse but it got bad for a while there, really bad financially, so for now I’m just thrilled to be able to get a record out and pay my rent again."

Edited by wayfaring stranger, 02 September 2006 - 23:53.

[wayfaring stranger]

Ako hocete da postavite pitanje Jasonu Molini mozete to uciniti do 19 sep.
email your questions to me at ned@noloveforned.com by september 19th and i'll compile them all for jason to answer
Evo kako je to izgledalo prosli put ...

Posebno me raduje ovaj deo-> Music: Michael Hurley (everything!)
Prvi put sam cuo za MH na snimku gostovanja Jay Farrara u nekoj emisiji. I kada su ga pitali koju bi pesmu odabrao iz fonoteke od preko 20 000 diskova odabrao je Eyes Eyes - Michael Hurley-ja. Legenda kaze da Farrar ima punu kucu slika MH, a evo sada i Jason, bas lepo ...

Direktan link

Q & A with JASON MOLINA - Summer 2004 (July 14th, 2004)

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Part One: General

From Aurelia H, Adam
1) What’s your favorite book and what kind of books do you read? Any you might recommend?

As far as reading is concerned, I read as much as I can. Books about mathematicians, history books, politics, religion, fiction, plays, and essays. I like as much variety as I can get. There are also weeks when I love reading technical books, things about science and nature.

From Andrew W.
2) What have you been listening to lately? Whatcha been reading? Hell, what movies have you seen?

Movies/etc: Fahrenheit 9/11, Harry Potter (Azkaban), The Story Of The Weeping Camel, Winged Migration, Bubba Ho-Tep, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Family Guy, Space Ghost, The Simpsons.

Music: Michael Hurley (everything!), Cheap Trick “Heaven Tonight”, Oneida “Secret Wars”, Fairport Convention “Greatest Hits”, John Lee Hooker “Travelin”, Ainara LeGardon “In The Mirror”, Warren Zevon “Genius” & “Excitable Boy”, Ramones “Marc Bell Stole My Wife”, Shaheen & Bhatt “Water Lily Acoustics”

From Andrew W., Ross H., Josh E.
3) Any new bands or singers you think we should check out?

David Kitt, Elephant Micah, Viza Noir, The Coke Dares

From Ross H.
4) M.Ward once said that Hank Williams’ “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” is one of the most beautiful/emotional songs ever written. What would that song or album be for you?

Ray Charles’ “I’m Going To Drown Myself” or Merle Haggard’s “If We Make It Through December”

From Athmos
5) What would be your version of a perfect day?

I really don’t think anything could ever be perfect, not anymore.

From Ross H.
6) Who would you most like to play along side of on a bill?

Magnetic Fields, Patti Smith, Lucinda Williams, Willie Nelson, Neil Young, Michael Hurley, Calexico, Silver Jews, Danny Black, Danielson Famile, and plenty of others this is just a few.

Part Two: The Music

From Seth, Thorsten
7) How are things going financially? Is your music successful enough that you don’t need to work another job? Basically I’m wondering if you are able to make ends meet as a full time musician.

It is a hard struggle with regards to the money. It has been a day to day balancing act as I’ve avoided publishing deals, major labels and various other places that could have made me easy money. The goal is to get the records out to everyone who wants them and to pay the band a fair amount for hitting the road. I would love to see all of the players in the Magnolia Band being able to play music full-time. Don’t illegally download the records. It’s hurting us all. Really.

What really hurts is that before a record is released we figure about 5,000 people have illegally downloaded it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve stayed with someone who has all of these records in their collection that are just bootlegs. I don’t care about the live show tapers, I encourage it and try always to include mostly new/unreleased songs on tour. It is sad that for a band that sells records on an independent label, so many people try getting their feet wet by bootlegging us. It wont hurt Madonna, but I still buy her records if I want to hear them.

From Jonathan T., Athmos
8) I find myself listening to your music in the dark by myself and it inspires me. Where does your inspiration come from? Do you write in the dark and/or alone?

I write mainly in the early morning. Most days I try to be up by 4am then I’ll write until aroud 11am and then practice guitar for a few hours later. I don’t go out much and enjoy being at home in the evenings. Right now it is hard to pratice here due to loud neighbors and heavy construction. I share a practice space with the Coke Dares in Bloomington, so that has been very helpful if we can’t practice or write here in Indianapolis.

From Nathan C, Lars., Caleb K, Martyn K..
9) Where did you learn to play guitar? Also, what kind of guitar do you normally use to play at shows? Do you have any favorite guitars, amplifiers, or other equipment? How much do you concern yourself with the tone of the guitar when you play?

I taught myself how to play guitar. When I was very young I would try learning songs as they came on the radio and you have to learn fast that way.

Electric guitars- Les Paul Standard, S.G., Harmony Stratotone, Jerry Jones 2 pick-up mondel
Acoustic guitars- 1970s Takamine Hirade H-8, Martin 000-28 (1909), Taylor 414
Amps- Victoria Victorett, 1964 Vibrolux Reverb, 1973 Deluxe Reverb, 1973 Princeton Reverb, Pignose.

From Athmos
10) What do you think your contribution to art in music is?

I will not be the one to determine this. This one is up to the people who come to the shows, buy the records and generally support this music.

From Tjeerd
11) You once played bass in a hard rock band. How does one come from being a bass player in a hard rock band to leading Songs: Ohia? Does hard rock still influence the music you make now? Whats your favorite hard rock band?

I used to play things like AC/DC, The Ramones, Iron Maiden, Motorhead, and all that “Denim & Leather” kind of music. At the same time I was learning Hank Williams and Carter Family songs. I grew up listening to all sorts of music and the difference between Brian Eno and the more conventional acoustic/songwriter stuff did not seem all that great to me. It was a very natural progression and I never thought about it or planned it this way.

From Bennett S.
12) I found a bootlegged show in which Magnolia Electric Co. covered the first ten seconds of AC/DC’s “Back in Black” while you prepared for the next song. As far as I can tell, the band has never covered the song in its entirety, but my brain would explode if they did. Hearing you howl AC/DC would be like a shot of audible heroine. So, my question is–have you ever covered it in its entirety, and if so (or even if not) would you mind covering it at the show this August in New Orleans?

We’ll think about it, but we have a few other surprises in the cover department. So look for them to show up on the tours in August and October.

From Jenna
13) I just want to know who the redhead is…

(No answer)

From Simone
14) After reading about the lost guitar whose return might in part be due to the protection mark you placed on it and of course listening to Protection Spells, I wondered how much you believe in such things.

I believe.

From Josh E.
15) How did the title for “Steve Alibini’s Blues” come about? I know Steve Albini produced “Didn’t It Rain”, but was he particularly fond of that song or was it something else?

“Didn’t It Rain” was recorded by Edan Cohen in Philadelphia. Originally the record was planned to have been recorded by Steve at Electrical Audio but there were a few things that came up in the schedule that we couldn’t move so it had to wait.

From Tim Q.
16) The Pyramid Electric Co - Are you a believer in the untapped power of pyramids in our modern age? Or do you just like the ring of the name?

That title was referring to the first song on the record.

From Tjeerd
17) It’s possible to interpret your lyrics in several ways. Ive noticed a lot of “religious” links in the lyrics. So my question is: are the songs concerned with religion? Are you a religious person and this is reflected in your lyrics or do you just like the way it sounds?

I think that I’ll say that songwriting and playing music is one of the greatest things in the world. I am working out a lot of things in this music. The images and music come from a different place every time.

From Tjeerd
18) Next to religious elements I find some historical notes in your songs, especially in earlier works. The Civil War, in particular, seems to be referenced in lyrics from the “Black Album”. Do you have a special interest in history?

I am always interested in learning more about history and it does find its way into the songs from time to time.

From Mark M.
19) It seems that you have a strong affiliation or attachment to South Carolina (in particular, Columbia) which is evident in the band name (Magnolia Electric Co), some album symbology, and your fan base in the state. Is this true and if so what is the connection?

I have enjoyed a lot of time in the Carolinas, Louisianna, Kentucky, West Virginia and Georgia especially. But theres really no connection specifically to South Carolina other than having many friends down there. Probably the best BBQ joint in the world is hidden away in Mississippi and we book tours around a visit there.

From Tjeerd
20) What is the link between Songs: Ohia and late medieval, early modern time paper watermarks? The crossbow symbol that appeared first on the early 7″s is a watermark from the late medieval times of a paper maker. How did you come across this and what significance does it have to you?

I’ve worked in several art museums in the past and have gotten to handle some great old prints and drawings. I studied watermarks and pewter stamps too. I have no idea why this is so interesting to me. It reminds me of how a ghost would sign their name.

From Tjeerd
21) Do you have some sort of special bond with The Netherlands? Every time you come to Europe there seems to be a focus on shows there. Is this because the booker is Dutch or because of something special about the Netherlands?

I have always had a great relationship with the VPRO. Barry and Maurice have recorded us and fed us more times than I can count.

From Ben T.
22) At the Alfred Knight club in Alfred, New York you played a few of the new songs and introduced some as saying ‘I wrote these for Willie Nelson’. I just wanted to know if that was some humor or if you actually wrote some songs for Mr. Nelson and how that happened.

Yes, I’ve got some songs I’ve written for Willie Nelson. I’ve also sent some to Lucinda Williams. That is where it stands right now.

From Ben T.
23) I also heard rumors of some crazy story about being drugged in some hotel bar and blacking out, waking up to a big dent in the room’s door. I was just wondering if you might relay strange stories of the road like this one.

Well, I spent about 20 hours trapped in a blizzard on the highway. It was the first day of the tour and playing bass was my friend who is named appropriately for that kind of adventure- Max Winter.

From Tjeerd
24) On the last European tour the band was accompanied by a donkey. Why this donkey as a mascot?

That is Don Quixote. He protects the Coke Dares and the Electric Co.. One of his parents was a griffin and one was the sphinx. He once worked in the Chas. Reibenbach Salt Mines and was under a gypsy hex. Hes got all the stories.

From Kurt M.
25) How are your plans for the Frosty Nickel coming along?

The old Frosty Nickel is our root beer bar in southern Indiana. It is hidden but we’re doing fine. The old boxer Magpie Mac came in and gave us an autographed pair of boxing gloves.

Part III The Tours & The Records

From Harry, Richard B., James H., David B., David
26) It has been quite a few years since youve toured the UK, yet there have been very regular tours of continental Europe. Is there something keeping you away from the UK and are there any plans for shows there after the new album comes out?

Theres no specific reason we’ve not been to the UK in a few years. That is just how the tours have worked out. If there was enough interested I’d consider it. I normally only get offers to play big festivals there and I’m not really interested in that kind of show.

From Wojtek, Joop, Lars, Ross H., Kelly, Matthew S.
27) In addition to the two shorter Eastern U.S. tours for 2004 are there any plans to visit other parts of the country and world? Particularly, the West Coast of the US, Holland, Sweden, Poland, or Australia?

The August and October tours are all that is planned for now. You can pretty much bet on a spring tour that will hit some places weve missed.

From Vantomas
28) You’ve released both demo albums and live albums in the past couple of years, are there any plans for such releases related to the upcoming album?

For the October tour we will have a double live lp. The idea is that only two of the songs will appear on the studio record (due early 2005) and most of them are new and not intended for studio versions, similar to the Italian live record. The live versions many times outdo the studio attempts.

There are no plans for a demo record. (see #29)

From Richard B., David I., Andrew W., Ross H., Matthias, Jake
29) Between the multitude of singles and the two tour-only releases (Protection Spells, The Ghost) there is a lot of material that is now out of print. Any chance there will be a reissue of the tour CDs or a collection of the singles?

As far as re-issues of tour records, demos and 7/comp/rare songs it is up to the Secretly Canadians and the fans to decide how to do it. If we do it all at once it would be too expensive. Also the records made for tour-only release were done in small numbers because there was not much demand for them. I think for the ten year anniversary of the “Nor Cease Thou Never Now” single (editor’s note- January 30th, 2006) we could all come up with a good solution. The “Howler” single and several other songs are so long and so badly recorded that listening to them out of context is a problem. I suggest the fans brainstorm.

More valuable to me would be a compilation of songs that were only played live. Does anyone have a boot of the songs I played at the Cat Power shows In Chicago? I wrote those for that night only and never played them again. I would love to have all these songs and attempt them in the studio.

From Ben T., Ross H. , Dago, Josh E.
30) There have been a number of projects over the years that have been announced or mentioned in passing that seem to have fallen by the way-side. (i.e. Western Vinyl portrait series, the two In The Fishtank sessions, a split EP with Scout Niblett, a potential collaboration with Low, and a collaboration with Shannon Wright). How many of these were recorded and went unreleased and are there any current plans to revisit any of these?

-Western Vinyl: Sent them some shitty home recordings. They are not worth releasing.
-Fishtank: Only one session was ever attempted. They had problems with the change of name and I wouldnt release anything under the S:O name, “Didn’t It Rain” was the last one.
-Scout Niblett EP: A rumor only. We never discussed this but we did a 7″ together.
-Low: A record that would have been called Lamb & Flag. I wrote the songs for it ages ago and it was too hard with our touring to make it work. But what a future that might have had…
-Shannon Wright: There was originally a plan to do an EP with Cat Power, Godspeed You Black Emperor!, Bonny Prince Billy, My Morning Jacket, or Shannon Wright. It ended up pairing MMJ songs with “Be Your Own Guid Trans”. They gave us $1500 and I bought us microphones with it.

In the works: band versions of the Chunklet 7″ as well as the songs from “Isn’t It Romantic”. Several new songs intended for 7″s or comps which we will hang on to for now and see about keeping them for the next studio outing.

Edited by wayfaring stranger, 03 September 2006 - 00:07.

[wayfaring stranger]

Direktan link

Touch & go

September 3, 2006

BY JIM DEROGATIS Pop Music Critic

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Throughout the history of American record labels, the most beloved
companies have always succeeded because of the tireless efforts and
bold visions of one extraordinary music lover. Corey Rusk's name isn't
nearly as well known as that of Atlantic Records' Ahmet Ertegun or
Motown's Berry Gordy. Rusk has been content to operate behind the
scenes, focusing on the bands instead of his Chicago-based company.
This non-egotistical, self-deprecating attitude is there right in the
name: Touch and Go Records.

But as he gears up to celebrate a quarter-century heading one of the
most influential independent labels in the United States, the
42-year-old businessman has decided to celebrate with three
extraordinary days of music at next weekend's annual Hideout Block
Party -- and to step out of the shadows long enough to consider his
accomplishments.

"I'm not a limelight sort of personality, but I guess I did feel like
25 years is a long time, and it won't feel too self-congratulatory,
patting yourself on the back," Rusk said as he sat behind the desk in
his unostentatious office at Touch and Go's North Side warehouse.

"We're not a particularly self-promoting label, but the one
interesting thing that made me think something like this would be good
is that we have had so many incredible bands over the years. We have
been really lucky that not only have we survived for 25 years, we
haven't just survived because we've had a few great titles in our
catalog: We have managed to put out culturally significant records,
and at least every four or five years, we have been a part of
something that was new and that hadn't happened before."

Indeed, the 31 Touch and Go bands performing Friday through Sunday in
the street outside the Hideout at Elston and Wabansia -- a gritty,
urban, industrial setting that seems especially fitting given the
label's no-nonsense, hardworking attitude -- are all the testament
needed to make the case for both the label's diversity and its impact
on the underground music scene, with acts ranging from industrial
punks Big Black (briefly reuniting for the occasion) to art-rockers
the Shipping News; the California dance band !!! to Sicilian
experimentalists Uzeda, and the subtle guitar band Seam to the
in-your-face hardcore group Negative Approach.

Touch and Go's roots stretch back to 1980, when Rusk was a teenager in
a suburb of Toledo, Ohio, playing in a hardcore punk band called the
Necros. The group linked with Michigan punk-scene stalwarts Tesco Vee
and Dave Stimson, who ran a fanzine called Touch and Go, to release
their first 7-inch vinyl single under that umbrella. More hardcore
punk 45s followed, and when Vee moved to Washington, D.C., to
concentrate on his band the Meatmen, Rusk wound up running the label
with his first wife, Lisa Pfahler, releasing albums by abrasive,
experimental bands such as Die Kreuzen, Big Black, the Butthole
Surfers and Killdozer, and establishing what some fans still consider
"the classic Touch and Go sound."

The Rusks moved the label to Chicago in the late '80s, and it quickly
became an integral part of this city's musical infrastructure. But in
1990, Corey and Lisa split up personally and professionally, resulting
in the first of the three biggest crises the label has weathered. In
response, Corey started a sister label called Quarterstick with two
goals in mind: Continuing to issue records, and underscoring that he
wanted to work with many kinds of bands, not just industrial-punk
groups.

"I was feeling frustrated for a decade of having only attracted rock
bands, but having broader tastes in music and wanting to work with
other things," Rusk said. "That combined with having discussions with
the woman I was getting divorced from, so that I wanted to have this
thing that would just be mine, where I could do what I want with it,
and it would be a clean slate."

With the divorce settled, Rusk would continue leading both Touch and
Go and Quarterstick -- for many, the two names are now synonymous --
and he would see the company grow to a point where it now employs 25
people, issuing about 20 albums a year and managing a back catalog
with more than 400 titles. (At a time when many of the major record
companies are witnessing steadily shrinking profits, Touch and Go had
its most profitable year ever in 2005.)

"To me, all of that is great as well as terrifying," Rusk said of the
company's current size and stature.

The good part is being proud of what he's built. The scary part is
that so many employees and artists rely on him, a responsibility he
doesn't take lightly.

"I guess maybe one of the reasons that we have made it this long is
that I'm a very responsible personality, and things weigh heavily on
me. If something is not getting done or I feel like a situation is not
being handled right, it bothers me. I take the responsibility of
accounting to and paying our bands on time and properly as my highest
priority, and it's one of the things I've prided myself on through our
whole existence. The world of indie labels that we live in is
constantly full of horror stories of 'I never got paid for that
record.' "

After the quality of its releases, Touch and Go's reputation stems
largely from its ethical business dealings: It pays its bands fairly
and promptly. And, amazingly and legendarily, Rusk says that "99
percent of the records we have put out have been without contracts" --
even after the second and third of the big crises in Touch and Go's
history, when two of its most celebrated bands, Urge Overkill and the
Butthole Surfers, left the label amid a flurry of legal acrimony,
reneging on their handshake deals with Rusk.

"I survived all of those things, but I was hurt by all of them," Rusk
said. "Maybe my personality is to have hurt feelings rather than to
get raging angry. All of those things hurt my feelings because the
label is personal to me. The bands I work with are personal
relationships, and I've only put out records by bands where I have
really liked their music."

To this day, Rusk says every band Touch and Go releases has to have
three qualities: He has to like the recordings; he has to like and
respect the musicians as people, and the band has to be as good or
better live than it is on record. "There is still no rhyme or reason
to how we end up finding a band that we work with. It's still so much
just somebody in a band we work with mentioning, 'This band opened for
us and they were great,' or 'My friend is in a band and they're
great.' But one reason we opted for having this big live event is
honestly because the best bands on Touch and Go, their live shows have
always been better than even their most brilliant records."

Like any indie label that's had a measure of success, Rusk has had
numerous opportunities to sell out to the major record companies over
the years. But he notes that fellow indies that took similar offers
"got piles of money and also had piles of trouble." He maintains that
"at the end of the day, I guess I am a control freak, and I like being
in charge of my own thing." But he also says that he's always had too
much fun running Touch and Go to call it quits -- "Even though when
you do this for 25 years, there are definitely months and years where
you have more fun than others."

"I feel like a lot of great indie labels are started by someone who is
really passionate about music and has a good ear and has friendships
with some good bands and can relate to them," Rusk said in summing up
his experience with Touch and Go. "There's the stereotype of the guy
that starts the indie label where the side of your brain devoted to
music isn't as strong as the business side. I've been fortunate that
somehow, I'm pretty good at both."

jimdero@jimdero.com

Hideout block party

The Touch and Go 25th Anniversary Celebration and the Hideout's 10th
Annual Block Party takes place from 5 to 10 p.m. Friday and from noon
to 10 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, outside the club at 1354 W. Wabansia.
Tickets are $35 for a weekend pass, $15 per day in advance, or $45/$20
at the door, providing the event hasn't sold out in advance.

Jim DeRogatis will preview the festival with an hour-by-hour look at
the bands in Friday's Weekend section, but more information is
available now and tickets can be purchased at
www.tgrec.com/links/tg25. The site also includes free audio clips of
all of the bands in the Touch and Go catalog.

FROM NECROS TO BIG BLACK TO URGE OVERKILL TO CALEXICO

Here is a look at a few of the many definitive releases in Touch and
Go's history, along with founder Corey Rusk's comments.

Necros, "Necros" EP (1981)
The Meatmen, "We're the Meatmen and You Suck" (1983)

Two sterling examples of faster/louder hard-core punk from Touch and
Go's earliest era. "My friends were in all these hard-core bands that
I really loved, and they were the only people that were going to let
me put out their records," Rusk said. "It really didn't start out to
be a serious company."

Big Black, "Atomizer" (1985/1992)

Originally released by Homestead Records in '85, the best album by
Steve Albini's legendary art-punk group was reissued by Touch and Go
in '92, along with the rest of the Big Black catalog. The label has
also released all of the recordings by Albini's current band Shellac,
and the group in between, Rapeman. For many in the music world, the
controversial musician and recording engineer would become the public
face of Touch and Go, which suited Rusk just fine. "In general, strong
public personalities are always going to be polarizing," he said. "A
lot of people love Steve, and lots of people don't." But every serious
alternative rock fan knows his name.

Urge Overkill, "Supersonic Storybook" (1991)
The Jesus Lizard, "Goat" (1991)

Two Chicago underground legends, Urge Overkill merged punk-rock energy
with an international playboy shtick and skillful thievery of riffs
ranging from funk to metal to cheesy '70s pop, while the Jesus Lizard
represented the pinnacle of intense noise rock, with harsh guitars,
driving rhythms and the unforgettable showmanship of singer David Yow.
Both groups would go on to major labels, though many fans say they did
their best work for Touch and Go.

Rachel's, "Music for Egon Schiele" (1996)
Calexico, "The Black Light" (1998)
Sally Timms, "In the World of Him" (2004)
CocoRosie, "Noah's Ark" (2005)

Here's a sampling of the many diverse and eclectic offerings from
Touch and Go and Quarterstick in recent years, including the modern
chamber group Rachel's, desert folk/roots-rockers Calexico,
moonlighting Mekon Timms with a concept album presented entirely from
the male point of view and the sister act of Sierra and Bianca Casady
merging elements of hip-hop, electronica and freak-folk in CocoRosie.
"Rock is my main love, but I also love a lot of other stuff," Rusk
said. "It has always been a more eclectic label than some people have
given it credit for being."

Jim DeRogatis

[djeneralche]

Direktan link

Touch & go

September 3, 2006

BY JIM DEROGATIS Pop Music Critic

Spoiler! --Click here to view--

Throughout the history of American record labels, the most beloved
companies have always succeeded because of the tireless efforts and
bold visions of one extraordinary music lover. Corey Rusk's name isn't
nearly as well known as that of Atlantic Records' Ahmet Ertegun or
Motown's Berry Gordy. Rusk has been content to operate behind the
scenes, focusing on the bands instead of his Chicago-based company.
This non-egotistical, self-deprecating attitude is there right in the
name: Touch and Go Records.

But as he gears up to celebrate a quarter-century heading one of the
most influential independent labels in the United States, the
42-year-old businessman has decided to celebrate with three
extraordinary days of music at next weekend's annual Hideout Block
Party -- and to step out of the shadows long enough to consider his
accomplishments.

"I'm not a limelight sort of personality, but I guess I did feel like
25 years is a long time, and it won't feel too self-congratulatory,
patting yourself on the back," Rusk said as he sat behind the desk in
his unostentatious office at Touch and Go's North Side warehouse.

"We're not a particularly self-promoting label, but the one
interesting thing that made me think something like this would be good
is that we have had so many incredible bands over the years. We have
been really lucky that not only have we survived for 25 years, we
haven't just survived because we've had a few great titles in our
catalog: We have managed to put out culturally significant records,
and at least every four or five years, we have been a part of
something that was new and that hadn't happened before."

Indeed, the 31 Touch and Go bands performing Friday through Sunday in
the street outside the Hideout at Elston and Wabansia -- a gritty,
urban, industrial setting that seems especially fitting given the
label's no-nonsense, hardworking attitude -- are all the testament
needed to make the case for both the label's diversity and its impact
on the underground music scene, with acts ranging from industrial
punks Big Black (briefly reuniting for the occasion) to art-rockers
the Shipping News; the California dance band !!! to Sicilian
experimentalists Uzeda, and the subtle guitar band Seam to the
in-your-face hardcore group Negative Approach.

Touch and Go's roots stretch back to 1980, when Rusk was a teenager in
a suburb of Toledo, Ohio, playing in a hardcore punk band called the
Necros. The group linked with Michigan punk-scene stalwarts Tesco Vee
and Dave Stimson, who ran a fanzine called Touch and Go, to release
their first 7-inch vinyl single under that umbrella. More hardcore
punk 45s followed, and when Vee moved to Washington, D.C., to
concentrate on his band the Meatmen, Rusk wound up running the label
with his first wife, Lisa Pfahler, releasing albums by abrasive,
experimental bands such as Die Kreuzen, Big Black, the Butthole
Surfers and Killdozer, and establishing what some fans still consider
"the classic Touch and Go sound."

The Rusks moved the label to Chicago in the late '80s, and it quickly
became an integral part of this city's musical infrastructure. But in
1990, Corey and Lisa split up personally and professionally, resulting
in the first of the three biggest crises the label has weathered. In
response, Corey started a sister label called Quarterstick with two
goals in mind: Continuing to issue records, and underscoring that he
wanted to work with many kinds of bands, not just industrial-punk
groups.

"I was feeling frustrated for a decade of having only attracted rock
bands, but having broader tastes in music and wanting to work with
other things," Rusk said. "That combined with having discussions with
the woman I was getting divorced from, so that I wanted to have this
thing that would just be mine, where I could do what I want with it,
and it would be a clean slate."

With the divorce settled, Rusk would continue leading both Touch and
Go and Quarterstick -- for many, the two names are now synonymous --
and he would see the company grow to a point where it now employs 25
people, issuing about 20 albums a year and managing a back catalog
with more than 400 titles. (At a time when many of the major record
companies are witnessing steadily shrinking profits, Touch and Go had
its most profitable year ever in 2005.)

"To me, all of that is great as well as terrifying," Rusk said of the
company's current size and stature.

The good part is being proud of what he's built. The scary part is
that so many employees and artists rely on him, a responsibility he
doesn't take lightly.

"I guess maybe one of the reasons that we have made it this long is
that I'm a very responsible personality, and things weigh heavily on
me. If something is not getting done or I feel like a situation is not
being handled right, it bothers me. I take the responsibility of
accounting to and paying our bands on time and properly as my highest
priority, and it's one of the things I've prided myself on through our
whole existence. The world of indie labels that we live in is
constantly full of horror stories of 'I never got paid for that
record.' "

After the quality of its releases, Touch and Go's reputation stems
largely from its ethical business dealings: It pays its bands fairly
and promptly. And, amazingly and legendarily, Rusk says that "99
percent of the records we have put out have been without contracts" --
even after the second and third of the big crises in Touch and Go's
history, when two of its most celebrated bands, Urge Overkill and the
Butthole Surfers, left the label amid a flurry of legal acrimony,
reneging on their handshake deals with Rusk.

"I survived all of those things, but I was hurt by all of them," Rusk
said. "Maybe my personality is to have hurt feelings rather than to
get raging angry. All of those things hurt my feelings because the
label is personal to me. The bands I work with are personal
relationships, and I've only put out records by bands where I have
really liked their music."

To this day, Rusk says every band Touch and Go releases has to have
three qualities: He has to like the recordings; he has to like and
respect the musicians as people, and the band has to be as good or
better live than it is on record. "There is still no rhyme or reason
to how we end up finding a band that we work with. It's still so much
just somebody in a band we work with mentioning, 'This band opened for
us and they were great,' or 'My friend is in a band and they're
great.' But one reason we opted for having this big live event is
honestly because the best bands on Touch and Go, their live shows have
always been better than even their most brilliant records."

Like any indie label that's had a measure of success, Rusk has had
numerous opportunities to sell out to the major record companies over
the years. But he notes that fellow indies that took similar offers
"got piles of money and also had piles of trouble." He maintains that
"at the end of the day, I guess I am a control freak, and I like being
in charge of my own thing." But he also says that he's always had too
much fun running Touch and Go to call it quits -- "Even though when
you do this for 25 years, there are definitely months and years where
you have more fun than others."

"I feel like a lot of great indie labels are started by someone who is
really passionate about music and has a good ear and has friendships
with some good bands and can relate to them," Rusk said in summing up
his experience with Touch and Go. "There's the stereotype of the guy
that starts the indie label where the side of your brain devoted to
music isn't as strong as the business side. I've been fortunate that
somehow, I'm pretty good at both."

jimdero@jimdero.com

Hideout block party

The Touch and Go 25th Anniversary Celebration and the Hideout's 10th
Annual Block Party takes place from 5 to 10 p.m. Friday and from noon
to 10 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, outside the club at 1354 W. Wabansia.
Tickets are $35 for a weekend pass, $15 per day in advance, or $45/$20
at the door, providing the event hasn't sold out in advance.

Jim DeRogatis will preview the festival with an hour-by-hour look at
the bands in Friday's Weekend section, but more information is
available now and tickets can be purchased at
www.tgrec.com/links/tg25. The site also includes free audio clips of
all of the bands in the Touch and Go catalog.

FROM NECROS TO BIG BLACK TO URGE OVERKILL TO CALEXICO

Here is a look at a few of the many definitive releases in Touch and
Go's history, along with founder Corey Rusk's comments.

Necros, "Necros" EP (1981)
The Meatmen, "We're the Meatmen and You Suck" (1983)

Two sterling examples of faster/louder hard-core punk from Touch and
Go's earliest era. "My friends were in all these hard-core bands that
I really loved, and they were the only people that were going to let
me put out their records," Rusk said. "It really didn't start out to
be a serious company."

Big Black, "Atomizer" (1985/1992)

Originally released by Homestead Records in '85, the best album by
Steve Albini's legendary art-punk group was reissued by Touch and Go
in '92, along with the rest of the Big Black catalog. The label has
also released all of the recordings by Albini's current band Shellac,
and the group in between, Rapeman. For many in the music world, the
controversial musician and recording engineer would become the public
face of Touch and Go, which suited Rusk just fine. "In general, strong
public personalities are always going to be polarizing," he said. "A
lot of people love Steve, and lots of people don't." But every serious
alternative rock fan knows his name.

Urge Overkill, "Supersonic Storybook" (1991)
The Jesus Lizard, "Goat" (1991)

Two Chicago underground legends, Urge Overkill merged punk-rock energy
with an international playboy shtick and skillful thievery of riffs
ranging from funk to metal to cheesy '70s pop, while the Jesus Lizard
represented the pinnacle of intense noise rock, with harsh guitars,
driving rhythms and the unforgettable showmanship of singer David Yow.
Both groups would go on to major labels, though many fans say they did
their best work for Touch and Go.

Rachel's, "Music for Egon Schiele" (1996)
Calexico, "The Black Light" (1998)
Sally Timms, "In the World of Him" (2004)
CocoRosie, "Noah's Ark" (2005)

Here's a sampling of the many diverse and eclectic offerings from
Touch and Go and Quarterstick in recent years, including the modern
chamber group Rachel's, desert folk/roots-rockers Calexico,
moonlighting Mekon Timms with a concept album presented entirely from
the male point of view and the sister act of Sierra and Bianca Casady
merging elements of hip-hop, electronica and freak-folk in CocoRosie.
"Rock is my main love, but I also love a lot of other stuff," Rusk
said. "It has always been a more eclectic label than some people have
given it credit for being."

Jim DeRogatis

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Ovo mi ne funkcionise ne mogu da procitam sta je u spojleru
edit: sad radi

Edited by djeneralche, 04 September 2006 - 16:29.