Today’s Radio Dick will digress into semi-rant this weekend, not particularly because the tracklist I’ve got below is bad, but more because I’m knee deep in New Moon nonsense. Considering the soundtrack issue is relevant and thought-provoking, I wanted to follow up on my already disdainful, yet mildly successful take on my initial fears and frustration with the album’s indie-heavy cast. I work in an American high school. This means I had half of my classes skip school on Friday because they were up until 4AM catching the first showing of New Moon. Parents fully understand in this country that if a killer new tween-friendly film hits the theater at midnight, a fully excused absence from school the next day is logical. We can’t have our children sleepy at school. Additionally, that opening of Macbeth Sally will miss ain’t got shit on Jacob vs. Edward.
This is troublesome on a whole bunch of levels. As a music blogger, I choose to focus on the soundtrack. I have yet to hear a single teenager mention Grizzly Bear or St. Vincent or Bon Iver one time in all of this facebook Twilight madness. Nobody cares about the music of the film. It’s all about that one guy’s ripped midsection and trashy interpretations of Gothic novel standards. I haven’t heard children running into my classroom proclaiming their love for solemn indie folk yet. Mind you, I’m speaking from outside of the stadium here, having not read the novel or viewed the film. However, I expressed my frustration a couple of months ago about how artists should pay more attention WHERE they showcase their art.
As I mentioned in that previous post, I don’t particularly have a problem with bands attaching their music to television or film, but I’d like to think some bands have more discretion about which shelves they put their art on to showcase. Grizzly Bear may just have written one of the best albums in existence with Veckatimest and Yellow House isn’t too far behind, if at all. It’s problematic when bands who soar to such artistic scopes attach their artwork to things like New Moon. If the novel had more literary merit, or if the film was going to be appreciated for something other than abdominal muscles and rehashed love archetypes, maybe I’d be more understanding. Truthfully, the soundtrack has some excellent music, and because teens aren’t focusing on it, I’m either entirely correct on my argument, or it’s being tossed to the ground. I refuse to belly up to the film and soundtrack, and am particularly uneasy about some of these artists pairing up their work with all of the things associated with the series.
As far as my Radio Dick list today, bunches of tracks have been released into the ether this week and I just kind of lumped them all together and culled them all week. Of course, the biggie is Beach House’s new single,”Norway” which tape-manipulates its way into your brain pretty quickly. The band creates crushing slow-tempo ear candy, and while “Norway” is more accessible, it points to the excellent full album about to hit the shelves. Jason Boesel teamed up with a whole slew of folks to release some new tracks, and “Hand of God” has been playing all week for me. We’ve included our live rip of “Cousins” from Vampire Weekend, which Brian ambivalently mentioned Friday in his post. CFCF covers Fleetwood Mac’s “Big Love” and Beck also hits the list with a 10 minute quirky ball of Beckness with “Harry Partch.” People Eating People is a band I caught over at I Guess I’m Floating through the Music Alliance Pact, and “All The Hospitals” is another favorite of mine from the list. Overall, this is a a pretty poppy and electronic list. Enjoy, and if you’ve got any commentary on the New Moon issue, throw it in the comments section. I’ve got plenty to discuss.
People Eating People – All The Hospitals
Vampire Weekend – Cousins (Live)
Small Black – Pleasant Experience
Crystal Antlers – It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue (Bob Dylan Cover)
In case you missed it somehow, the new Wilco album, creatively titled Wilco (The Album), leaked earlier this week and is now available for streaming on the band’s website. As a result, I’m going to take a few minutes to hop up onto my (mildly) anti-Wilco soapbox and preach about my thoughts on the band. Don’t get me wrong, I like Wilco, and in fact they are a really good band, but perhaps because I am from Chicago, where they are looked at as the next coming of Christ, something about the boys from Glencoe just rubs me the wrong way. Part of the blame falls on the media and other bloggers who seem to go out of their way to heap praise on them, which is not really the band’s fault but it certainly gets under my skin because of my natural tendency to hate what everyone else likes and vice versa. Sure, that’s a vain point of view, but one that I think drives most of the kind of people who would be into a band like Wilco in the first place. The rest of the blame falls squarely on the band themselves however, when they do things as pompous as make documentaries about the process of creating an ‘epic’ album which they have all but deemed a classic themselves before the damn thing is even released. I’ve probably made some enemies by saying that, but before you get your pitchforks out (pun intended) keep in mind that I actually like a good portion of their songs. There are a lot worse things to do with an hour of your time than listen to a Wilco record, but that doesn’t make them the best band in the world. Are they a good band? Yes. Are they “America’s Radiohead,” as some media outlets have deemed them? No, and the comparison is absurd. Regardless of your personal views on Wilco, the new album is pretty decent and definitely worth a listen if you haven’t checked it out yet:
First up today is a track from another highly anticipated album that became available for streaming earlier this week, though this is one that I have been very much looking forward to for quite some time. As a pretty huge Mark Linkous fan, when I caught wind of a collaborative project between Sparklehorse and Danger Mouse earlier in the year, I was both skeptical and hopeful. Though I am not a huge fan of Danger Mouse based on my cursory knowledge of his work, I was aware that he is an incredibly creative and diverse musical genius. Though given the elusiveness of Linkous I couldn’t help but think that there was a good chance the project would never actually come to fruition, especially given the mysterious manner in which it was unveiled. I won’t go into the details on all of that because it is pretty well covered in the link to the stream at NPR below, but I will try to provide some Cliffs Notes for those who don’t feel like digging into the whole story. Basically some posters popped up at SXSW this year touting a project between Sparklehorse and Danger Mouse called Dark Night of the Soul with David Lynch’s name attached. Speculation was some sort of musical film, but we later found out that it would be a musical project featuring a host of guests such as Julian Casablancas, Frank Black, James Mercer, Wayne Coyne, and Iggy Pop. The project was to be released along with a book of photos taken by Lynch. As it stands now, the book will be released without music but packaged with a CD-R that you can use “as you will”, supposedly due to issues between the artists and EMI. In any event, the music has been recorded and is available for stream and download around the net and you can order the book from the project’s own website. I selfishly chose the Wayne Coyne track “Revenge” to post below because I have always been a big Flaming Lips fan, and without getting into too much detail I can tell you that it sounds pretty much the way you would expect a Sparklehorse/Flaming Lips collaboration to sound. Check it out and be sure to follow the link to NPR to hear the rest of the tracks from the project.
Today’s vault track actually came to me way back on Monday when I heard it in a movie that I had rented. I was bored and looking for something in the Redbox that sounded mildly interesting, and based on the mini-overview I read the film The Cake Eaters seemed to be just the flick I was pining for. When I popped it in the DVD player I was feeling mighty optimistic when the opening song playing during the intro was “Lay Me Down” by The Frames from their 2001 album For The Birds. Almost immediately I paused the movie, grabbed my laptop, found the song in my iTunes library, and listened to it in its entirety before continuing to watch. In retrospect I should have just spent the next hour and a half listening to the rest of the album a few times because the movie was absolutely awful. It was basically your run of the mill indie ensemble drama where nothing really happens. If you haven’t seen it, the most noteworthy performance is Kristen Stewart’s portrayal of a sexually curious teen that is afflicted with some sort of disease that makes her look like a retard. I was intrigued for a bit because I thought I might see her breasts, but then I realized that she was only 17 when the movie was filmed and then I just felt dirty. But regardless of the cinematic merits of The Cake Eaters (or lack thereof), it was worth the dollar I spent on the rental just to reintroduce myself to a great song from my younger days. “Lay Me Down” is a gorgeous, heartfelt song about being in love with a woman and wishing to one day be buried beside her, though it is often misinterpreted as a dark suicide note. Either way, its one of the most haunting tracks I have ever heard. Try not to cry while you give it a listen.
