One of the best stations out of the Philly area, 88.5 WXPN, is doing their annual modern rock madness! This event, which originated on the now defunct Y100 radio station, takes the idea of March madness and replaces all the b-ball teams with their most popular and influential modern rockers. Naturally there is nothing from the 60s, there are some early new-wavers and punk (Costello, Joy Division), some 80s icons (The Police, Depeche Mode) and then of course alot of 90s and current bands. The bracket is running everyday until the end of the week, so check it out and place a couple votes!
1. "Four Freshman Locked Out As The Sun goes Down" - No Kids 2. "An Eluardian Instance" - of Montreal 3. "Walking On A Dream" - Empire of the Sun 4. "Summertime Clothes" - Animal Collective 5. "Firecracker" - Steel Train 6. "Molly's Chambers" - Kings of Leon 7. "Saturday Nite" - Blitzen Trapper 8. "Multiply" - Jaime Lidell 9. "I Was Made For You" - She & Him 10. "Knotty Pine" - Dirty Projectors & David Byrne 11. "A Summer Wasting" - Belle & Sebastian 12. "We'll Sing in the Sunshine" - The New Christy Minstrels 13. "Everyday" - Buddy Holly 14. "Memory of a Free Festival" - David Bowie
Well, last year they somehow managed to get Radiohead to play two nights (unfortunately the other night was Jack Johnson), but overall this years line-up has way more depth and hey its alot closer than that other one (Bonnawho?). Here's the list:
07-31 Beastie Boys, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Vampire Weekend, the National,Fleet Foxes, MSTRKRFT, Q-Tip, The Pharcyde, Organized Konfusion, the Knux, Ra Ra Riot, Seasick Steve, Telepathe, Shearwater, Heartless Bastards, Flying Lotus, College Humor Live, Arj Barker, Eugene Mirman, Bo Burnham
08-01 Tool, My Bloody Valentine, Gogol Bordello, Arctic Monkeys, Neko Case, the Ting Tings, Yelle, Crystal Castles, St. Vincent, Tokyo Police Club,the Cool Kids(!!!!), Kool Keith, Cage the Elephant, Chairlift, White Rabbits, Electric Touch, the Postelles, Black Gold, College Humor Live, Tim & Eric, Judah Friedlander, Jim Jeffries
08-02 Coldplay, Echo & the Bunnymen, MGMT,the Black Keys, Elbow, Silversun Pickups, Mogwai, We Are Scientists, Ghostland Observatory, the Gaslight Anthem, Etienne De Crecy, Lykke Li, Akron/Family, Steel Train, Kitty, Daisy & Lewis, College Humor Live, Janeane Garofalo, Michael Showalter, Todd Barry
Back in December when the track list for the Dark Was the Night compilation was released, it read more like a “who’s who” of indie rock. From the well established (Yo La Tengo, The New Pornographers) to relative new-comers (Bon Iver, The National), the artists comprising this collection generated the type of tidal wave buzz that is precisely desired when trying to raise money and awareness for HIV and AIDS.
The key to this sprawling collection (2 CDs or 3 Vinyls) is its impeccable sequencing and strength of material. Kicking off the collection with the vibrant Dirty Projectors/David Byrne collaboration “Knotty Pine” is exciting, and it settles nicely into the hush and whisper of the subsequent tracks. The eerie title track performed by the Kronos Quartet leads effortlessly into Antony Dessner’s chilling interpretation of traditional folk song “I Was Young When I Left Home.” Then there’s that mysteriously short Iron & Wine song “Stolen Houses (Die)” with Sam Beam’s tongue-in-cheek “Our mother’s mothers saw in black and white/But all that’s over now” connecting with a Grizzly Bear & Feist duet before ending the first disc with an uncharacteristly epic and glitchy Sufjan Steven’s song.
But quibbles aside, the bottom line of a fundraising compilation is that listeners get good music while donating to a good cause. With Dark Was the Night listeners actually get some of the finest music released this year, and with it a new standard for what a charity compilation can be.
One of the predominant trends that emerged in indie music in 2008 was the re-establishment of the woodsman. Bon Iver (who’s newest EP landed in the Billboard top 20) recorded an album in his father’s Wisconsin cabin, while Fleet Foxes managed to tie Americana and traditional English Folk music together with a sound so overly drenched in reverb it felt like it was actually relaying down from the mountaintop. And while this trend will certainly bring undeserving attention to certain new acts, it will also shed light on those genuine carriers of the American Folk song tradition, who would have otherwise wallowed in obscurity.
One such artist, Alela Diane, a kindred spirit and woodswoman of the Pacific Northwest, just released her first official album on Rough Trade records, To Be Still. The album’s 11 songs are all centered around Alela’s rustic, effortless voice and finger-picked acoustic guitar. To her credit there are no gimmicks on this album- no Joni Mitchell impressions or Feist sing-alongs- and the result is one of the most authentic releases of the year.
The album’s opener “Dry Grass & Shadows” sets the pace, and introduces the themes that have dominated Alela’s career and continue on this release- earth, family, and the struggle to find a lasting love. But these themes exist, of course, as the shell of Alela’s world, and at times they are hardly discernable from one another. In “Age Old Blue”, a civil-war sounding duet with old folkie Michael Hurley, Alela sings “The sea beneath the cliff is the blue in my mother’s eyes/That came from the blue in her mother’s eye/Thrown all down the line” with the aged innocence of a woman singing the songs that she once heard as a child. The longing on this album is unavoidable, but we also get to see how someone born in the wrong century gets to deal with our over industrialized, beeping and blipping world. On the banjo laden “The Alder Trees” she’s “Laughin’/Little Girls Clappin’/Ghosts weavin’/Our hair to baskets,” reveling in the closeness.
To Be Still is certainly a more produced effort than the torch-songs of her self-released debut The Pirate’s Gospel (2006); but the percussion section never becomes distracting or abrasive, the various instruments (mandolin, banjo, contrabass) are fitting and never sound forced, and the introduction of light string accompaniment all come together seamlessly. True to form the record was produced by her father, who also tours with her, and most of the accompaniment was performed by him and several close friends of Alela. On the album’s closing track, “Lady Divine”, Alela manages to tie all her pursuits together into the beautiful eulogy “Those songs whistled through white teeth/Still scuff the day” followed by a charmingly whistled melody, a swell of acoustic instruments and, if you listen closely, the rustle of her mother’s footprints in the leaves. (3/15/09)
Aside from the obviously bad lyrics (“I don’t know what I like to do/But I know what I like to do”), Kweller also tries to save his worst tracks with an unnecessary abundance of slide steel guitar and other faux-country cornyisms, i.e. the truck driver handset radio outro of the otherwise energetic “Sawdust Man.”Sure he’s got a kid now, and so he’s probably been playing more Townes Van Zandt than Steve Van Zandt around the house, but someone or something needs to kick the life back into this pony. Whatever happened to the shape shifting mini-epics of “How it should be” and “Tylenol” (“Give me a fucking machine gun/To blow you the fuck away from me”) or the lyrical sincerity of “In Other Words” or “Sundress”? Is “You gotta fight, fight, fight/All the way” the best chorus he could muster over three years?
The albums closer “Homeward Bound” (not a Simon & Garfunkel cover, unfortunately) is perhaps the albums most cohesive moment, recalling the country gospel of “Let it Be” minus the choir. With just light piano and vocal accompaniment, Kweller wisely saved this relative gem for the last track, keeping people like me optimistic enough to pick up whatever he puts out next. A word of advice for Ben: Get back on that horse and pretend like this album never happened. (3/8/09)
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