33 posts tagged “derek”

 10/10/2008 19:49:42  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

C Rayz Walz & Kosha Dillz - I Love Jews C Rayz Walz & Kosha Dillz 1 comment Tour Dates 10/11/08 Kosha Dillz @ Red’s Bar Sioux City, Iowa 10/13/08 Kosha Dillz @ Riot Room Kansas City, Missouri 10/14/08 Kosha Dillz @ Nutty’s North with Murs + Kidz in the Hall Sioux Falls, South Dakota 10/18/08 kosha dillz + flex mathews w/ SLICK RICK @ Ned Divines washington DC, Washington DC 10/19/08 kosha dillz + flex mathews w/ Cunninlynguists @ 13th Floor Herndon, Virginia

Links: crayzwalz.com koshadillzmusic.com myspace.com/crayzwalz myspace.com/koshadillz4life

 09/28/2008 21:12:56  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

Giant Panda-Speakers Pop

Giant Panda

A week or two ago, just for shits n' giggles, I watched the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards--a rather ironic spectacle, considering that MTV has virtually nothing to do with music anymore--and I came away from the experience with a splitting headache and a meager handful of insights:

1. Katy Perry is ridiculously hot.
2. Russel Brand is a colossal douche.
3. Goth fashion has now become positively mainstream (see Rihanna's opening performance of "Disturbia" to see what I'm talking about).
And 4. Popular hip-hop artists like TI (and T-Pain and T-whatever), Young Jeezy, and Lil' Wayne demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt the old adage that crap always floats to the top. If these schmucks are the forefront of hip-hop, then hip-hop is truly a played-out, moribund art form. One we should just take out behind the shed and...well, put it out of its our misery.

Fortunately, they're not. Despite what many contemporary rappers will tell you, making lots of money, banging lots of women, and selling a few million ringtone versions of your "hit" singles does not equal success in The Game. As all the best emcees know, wine, women, and song are transitory things that don't count for much in the long run. True success in The Game comes in delivering music so full of talent that listeners--even those who generally don't dig a lot of hip-hop--will be talking about it, praising it, analyzing it, and being inspired by it long after the release parties have ended and the singles have disappeared from the charts. And if people aren't talking about Giant Panda's (MySpace) second full-length album Electric Laser looooooong into the future, I'm going to be surprised and, more importantly, appalled.

Giant Panda are an international, interracial crew of emcees currently gettin' bizzy in Los Angeles. Founders Newman and Maanumental are both originally from Seattle, but the trio's third element, Chikaramanga, hails from Tokyo and brings a very distinctive Asian flavor to the group with rapidfire flows in both Japanese and English. But Chikaramanga is but a single lion in the lyrical Voltron that is Giant Panda: all members have strong individual talents that combine to create a rap kaiju that truly deserves to bust out of the independent rap scene like Godzilla escaping from Monster Island to stomp the bling-encrusted dullards who currently "rule" hip-hop into the  dirt. But thanks to the crew's relationship with LA's legendary People Under The Stairs (MySpace)--Chikaramanga and P.U.T.S.' Thes One are two of the minds behind Tres Records, one of the hottest independent hip-hop labels Out There and current home of Giant Panda--the black-and-white behemoth from both sides of the Pacific could very well be poised to rise to stardom with Electric Laser just as Atmosphere finally began gathering widespread love with their magnum opus When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold.

Giant Panda aren't quite as "serious" as Atmosphere, whose lyrics have always dealt with tough issues with a bare-souled honesty rarely spotted in rap, but that doesn't mean that Giant Panda can't handle deep subjects. They just tend to focus more on the fun, oldskool block-party aspect of hip-hop. With song titles like "Laser Beam (Scotty's Theme)," "Precise Calculator," and "Do The Robot In Cyberspace," the Pandas are clearly proud of their nerdy side, but though their work features samples from Tron and Real Genius and lyrically touches on everything from robotics to superheroes, they aren't nerdcore--which means they will definitely appeal to geeks like me while not limiting their appeal only to geeks. Their funky oldskool beats and witty rhymes will immediately catch the ear of anyone with a taste for off-the-wall rappers like the Fu-Schnickens, Digable Planets, The Beastie Boys and Del The Funky Homosapien, and their slightly retro sound will thrill jaded hip-hop fans who long for the glory days of the genre's origins. But Newman, Maanumental, and Chikaramanga are not here to celebrate the past, but to use that oldskool sound to create a wormhole to the future, and they've brought back a truckload of asskickin' jams to prove that hip-hop will long continue to be a vibrant underground sensation that can absorb any and all cultural influences and still remain true to its roots.

So let's take a look at the tracks themselves, shall we? After the obligatory little intro piece, "Justin Case" explodes with an early-'90s beat, a groovy horn hook full of bootyrockin' '70s-funk flavor, and the instantly catchy chant, "Just in case you didn't know, here we go!" This song introduces the crew's three rappers and encapsulates the essence of Giant Panda perfectly. Newman and Maanumental are skillful emcees with rapid deliveries that'll have you waving your hands in the air in seconds. And even though I didn't understand a single word of Chikaramanga's Japanese flow, the energy of his delivery and rhymes keeps the jam alive even when you  might not be able to follow the lyrics. The group's B-boy stylings are in full effect on "Speakers Pop," whose synths and beats and rhymes will demand you turn up your speakers to the top notch so you can "let it bump-bump, let it knock-knock." Somewhere in LA, right now, someone is breakdancing to this song atop a flattened refrigerator box on a streetcorner. I guarantee it. "Laser Ray" is a bitchin' superhero tale and "Precise Calculator" is dedicated entirely to Chikaramanga and his numerically-precise but ultrafunky Japanese/English flow. "Cinemax" is a hilariously swanky celebration of watching softcore pr0n on Skinemax, as we all used to call it back in the day, with your girl in the hope that it might inspire her to give you a little somethin'-somethin', and "Do The Robot in Cyberspace" is...well, if you even have to ask yourself what that means, then you can just go back to your R. Kelly and your Souljah Boy.

But Giant Panda do tackle serious topics occasionally in their rhymes. "Same Old Shit" catalogues the everpresent, inescapable forms of bullshit that make life miserable, and "Pops" is a touching--if extraordinarily danceable--exploration of gay parenting and the manifest stupidity of thinking that gay people can't raise children just as well as straight folks.

All in all, this is a bright, blazing, electric laser of an album that is guaranteed to bring some neon to even the grayest day and will vaporize any of those overblinged lotharios who think they've got the rap world in a chokehold. If they step to Giant Panda, they're going to find themselves reduced to sad little piles of ash.

Links: myspace.com/giantpanda

 09/25/2008 07:27:30  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

Mixel Pixel - What Ever Happened to One

Mixel Pixel

Mixel Pixel (MySpace) is one of those "cute" bands whose sugary songs and kindergarten melodies usually make my teeth ache. They've even been dubiously graced with the abhorrent adjective "twee," which pretty much means "as sickeningly precious as an army of hummels and giant-eyed puppy paintings." The cover of their latest album, Let's Be Friends, is a crowd of little cartoon characters reminiscent of the doodles that I sketched in the margins of my notebooks in grade school. Now, I'm certainly not one of those stuffy critics who thinks childlike, let's-just-have-fun-and-write-some-nifty-little-songs music is inherently bad--but generally, the kind of over-self-consciously "cute" music typified by, say, the soundtrack to Juno just leaves a bad aspartame taste in my mouth. So why, then, do I like Mixel Pixel so much?

The answer's simple: their songs are fun and catchy, but behind the toy sounds and candycoated melodies, there's some real depth to Mixel Pixel's lyrics that give their youthful music a very grown-up appeal.

Mixel Pixel's history has a lot to do with their experienced sound. In 1995, founder Rob Corradetti was inspired to begin experimenting with recording by everything-and-the-kitchen-sink musical experimentalists like Beck and Ween, and was joined by collaborator Matt Kaukeinen when Rob relocated to Delaware in 1997. They released their first album, Mappyland, in 2001, after the duo had moved to Brooklyn. With the addition of third member Kaia Wong, the band was complete and began building a substantial following in the US and Canada with their adventurous music and imaginative live performances. To date, they've released a number of independent albums and three LPs on indie labels, the third and latest of which, Let's Be Friends, is now out on Mental Monkey Records.

MP's music is a playful composite of sounds: guitars, synths, old 1980s Casio keyboard rhythms, and sounds produced by a variety of musical toys. This gives them a very intimate kind of sound that immediately calls to mind visions of teenagers writing songs in someone's bedroom littered with toy keyboards and Fisher-Price drumsets. The production is much better than you'd imagine, though, as is the quality of the songwriting because, remember, Mixel Pixel have been around the block a few times. Though their music may hearken back to childhood noodlings with Mattel pianos, their songs are written from a mature perspective that nonetheless has not abandoned the glee of youth.

Let's Be Friends is a warm, tender little album of songs about friendship, very obviously written from the heart. Here's the band's official story behind the album:

Rob and Kaia wrote Let's Be Friends in the spring of 2007 following parallel break-ups from long term relationships. Helping each other get through tough times, they channeled their experiences - both concerning shared life on the road with the band and as individuals - into a semi-fictional, mostly-factual batch of songs.

At the core, Let's Be Friends is about a boy and a girl who are best friends in a band - in the Big City. It's about their friendship but it's also about their individual desires to find love, to seek adventure, and to follow their dreams. On a broader level it's about loving one another - not as lovers - but as friends.

Mixel Pixel - Sinking Feeling

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"What Ever Happened To One" opens the album with an 8-bit Casio beat that soon blossoms into a pleasant guitar riffs and synths that support Rob and Kaia's duet vocals. Though the song has a shimmery, upbeat sound, the lyrics speak of tough matters: at one point, Rob sings, "My parents are dead, they're up in the sky," and Kaia answers, "My parents divorced when I was five" but later the two come together to deliver the line, "You found me on a planet of five billion people" that hints at the power of friendship to overcome life's difficulties. "Sinking Feeling" has a touch of The Raveonettes in its occasional bursts of distorted guitars but is primary built of a pure acoustic guitar melody and a robotic rhythm and catchy lyrics that speak of everything from puffy stickers to French ticklers to cats lying in the sun. Even a track with a title as eye-rollingly cute as "Favorite Sweatshirt On" reveals a more experienced side, as does the title track, "Let's Be Friends," which reveals that the lines about parents in the first song were flat-out lies. In this way, the album depicts the growth and development of friendship in all its many aspects, the good as well as the not-so-good. "Fake Girlfriend," with its cheap, hollow beat and zippy melody, is a highlight as Rob compares the false love of a "fake girlfriend" to the true, solid love of a good companion. Finally, the album ends with the somewhat melancholy, but ultimately reassuring "Distant Station," in which Kaia affirms, "We only have so much time together before we die / so that is why I want to be your friend forever / on this little planet." This is not some saccharine, all-too-typical love song, but a final summation of the album's main point: boys and girls don't have to be lovers to love on another unconditionally.

Let's Be Friends is ultimately a sort of concept album that sounds a bit like Beck collaborating with Suzanne Vega, whose sunny music will bring a smile to your face even as the songs themselves deal with heartbreak, uncertainty, and other rocky subjects. It's consistently uplifting without suffering from forced cheerfulness, and at just a few minutes over a half hour long, it doesn't overstay its welcome or overstate its message. It's...comforting. Listening to this album will make you feel warm and fuzzy, but won't drown you in a false sense of oh-everything's-just-so-wonderful security. And that's how Mixel Pixel can be both cute and substantial at the same time.

I'm going to give this album to my best friend/pseudo-adopted sister Jamie as a belated birthday present this year. Fellas, ladies, if you've got a great friend of the opposite sex, I suggest you do the same. In a world supersaturated with albums about love and loss, it's nice to see a record that affirms the power of plain ol' friendship, which is always there for everybody (hopefully) even when the greatest love and the greatest loss are gone.

Oh, and get out there and see the band play! They'll be performing on September 26 at Bodega in Brooklyn, New York--and won't be playing live again until November 25 (at the Cake Shop, again in Brooklyn, with Yip-Yip)!

Links: mixelpixel.com myspace.com/mixelpixel

 09/13/2008 09:39:04  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

Cock Rock Disco

Cock Rock Disco (MySpace) may be my new favorite label. Though their website is liberally drenched in cheesy '70s polyester-and-porn graphics, there's nothing retro about Cock Rock Disco. In fact, most of the label's artists--from the well-known "Miami Knight and Debonair Slave to the Soundwave" Otto von Shirach (whose latest ear-monster Oozing Bass Spasms I just reviewed) to mysterious mad scientist of sound Vorpal--sound like they come from some remote future...a strange, surreal place where radioactive epileptics stagger and twitch among the melted ruins of 20th-Century pop culture. If you're looking for quality breakcore, experimental, and IDM music, then Cock Rock Disco should be one of your first stops--mainly because they offer a number of albums by representative artists totally free! Let's have a look at some of those free albums, shall we?

CRD is the brainchild of one Jason Forrest (a.k.a. "DJ Donna Summer"), who founded the label in 2001 primarily as an outlet for his own material, though the label has subsequently grown to include many more artists from all over the planet. Like many indie label founders, Forrest was interested in creating a label to promote a specific genre of music--in this case, breakcore and experimental electronics--but the scope of Cock Rock Disco has expanded over the years to include a wide range of electronic styles, offering something for everyone, though still focusing on music that I like to call "spasmolytic freakout jams."

Dev/Null - gorechestra

Dev Null

Dev/Null (MySpace) is one of CRD's premiere artists, and this Alston, Massachusetts-based madman's latest free EP, Necrobestial Sadobreaks, is an ugly, vicious album of thunderous metallic violence that manages to smash black metal blastbeats and grinding electronics together while still creating suprisingly catchy tracks. The opening song, "gorechestra," is a stirring number that sounds like it should be the end-credits theme for a hyperkinetic zombie movie: ominous orchestral samples twine with 2000bpm beats to create images of howling undead hordes tearing each other limb from limb in a cannibal bloodbath that would make Ruggero Deodato himself queasy. Four shorter pieces, "grind1" through "grind4," are built entirely from savage speed-metal samples and shredded beats; and though the longest of these pieces is just over a minute in length, they still feel like complete compositions rather than throw-away sketches simply because each little track packs more development and movement into thirty seconds than most artists can jam into an entire album. "Zombie sunset" is almost shocking in the way it combines a frenetic beat with a languid, downright pretty, melody, and "society of defilement" splices heavy metal with spastic electronics and ominous bells to close the album on a high note. Though short, this EP is a monsterwork seething with intense musical ideas: the perfect soundtrack for the splatterpunk movie in your head!

Vexkiddy-You Only Think Twice

Vexkiddy

Vexkiddy 's (MySpace) Knocking Out Numbers , on the other hand, is a horse of a different color. Or rather, colors. Swirling, neon-bright, 'shroom-generated colors. The group describe their music as "micro-rave, not breakcore" and...well, that's as good a description as any, I guess, for music that really defies any convenient genre description. What we have here are nine tracks, each precisely three minutes and three seconds long, that mix zippy beats with all manner of musical samples: acid-techno electronics, big band sounds, cabaret sounds, and sounds that cannot possibly have earthly origins. The introductory number, "Arguments Yard (backyard propaganda)" features skittery beats, blippity acid electronics, and a surprising sample of the Twilight Zone theme song that just comes out of nowhere as if to let you know--just in case you haven't realized it yet--that you're not in Kansas anymore. All of the other tracks are prettymuch the same, and they blend together so seamlessly that, for all intents and purposes, this album can be considered one giant mix, with all manner of blurred, chopped, sliced, bit-crushed, and mangled sounds stitched together into an exciting festival of breakbeats that is, at times, surprisingly melodic. That's what makes Vexkiddy stand out: amid the chaos of frankenstein beats and hallucinatory sound, there are moments of calm melodic bliss, which clearly hearkens backs to Aphex Twin's Richard D. James album and gives listeners' brains occasions to rest. In fact, this would be a great album to give to someone who has never experienced this kind of music before: it's challenging, yes, but not completely alien in structure or sound. Imagine the Greys from Close Encounters of The Third Kind attempting to communicate by blasting back at us samples of human music all blurred and blended together into a collage of sound in order to show us that their thought processes are clearly different than ours, yet share a certain common appreciation for certain sound structures, and you've got a good approximation of where Vexkiddy are coming from.

Ladyscraper - Hooke

Ladyscraper

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The UK's Ladyscraper (MySpace ) is a howling-mad beast of a completely different spectrum, one that destroys any eye that its falls upon, so be careful with this one! Albums like this should come with warnings like "May Cause Brain Damage" or "Danger! This album contains sounds that can damage the spacetime continuum." Their free album, The Death of Mary Poppins, will literally curb-stomp your ears and may result in the sudden implosion of your speakers. Imagine the most furious, most Satanic death-metal imaginable done entirely with electronics, minus the idiotic growling/screaming/farting vocals, and you've got a close approximation of The Death of Mary Poppins. Filthy gabba kicks and staccato snares crackle beneath lacerated synth squeals and julienned samples. But here's the thing: Ladyscraper may be incredibly harsh--and believe me, by the time you're done listening to this album's ten tracks you'll feel like you've just been beaten senseless in the most horrendous mosh pit in hell--but their music is most certainly full of fun! Wait. What? How can music that practically knocks your teeth down your throat be fun? Well, it is! Because Ladyscraper clearly are not SAD-crazed Norwegians or goat-slaughtering Brazillian lunatics. This album samples Bugs Bunny and Beavis & Butt-Head cartoons and all manner of humorous other sources, for god's sake! It's full of quirky little audio winks and nudges that let you know that Ladyscraper isn't here to roll you for your wallet and leave you for dead--they're just working out a metric tonne of nervous energy and thrashing around madly for the sheer joy of the adrenaline headrush that wickedly harsh, aggressive music gives you. There are even moments of neat little melodies on some tracks, like "Hooke," and you'll be surprised at the variation that this tour-de-faceplant album offers up. But be warned: you might melt listening to it.

Vorpal - further ruminations on a theme from the first track of my last album

Vorpal

And finally, there's Vorpal 's (MySpace) The End. This album is more like an EP, to be honest, in that it contains only six new tracks and three remixes of tracks from Vorpal's extraordinary debut album, An Incomplete Guide to Vorpal Music. But the title track, "The End," is a whopping 16:18 long! After the horror-flick bloodbath of Dev/Null, the psychedelic spasm of Vexkiddy, and the aural beatdown of Ladyscraper, Vorpal's music sounds positively tranquil--the broken junglebeats of "The End" and the skittery rhythms of subsequent tracks like "further ruminations on a theme from the first track of my last album" and "some sort of a travel theme" are submerged in brittle but beautiful washes and smears of tranquil ambience. The beats may be sparse and held together only by shoestrings and wads of Dentyne, but the soundscapes that swaddle them like soft, fuzzy clouds of bioluminescent eiderdown soften their broken edges and create a very unique listening experience: both spastic and relaxed at the same time. A friend of mine described this album the best, I think, when he compared it to lying in a cool, shady field trying to calm down after you've just run a mile trying to burn off a meth high. Even as your heart is flailing in your chest and your blood is fizzing in your veins, the clouds above you are sliding by in slow, delicate motion and slowly, slowly, the shadows are lengthening as the sun sets. In light of that metaphor, The End is a perfect title for this album. Lastly, a few words about the remixes: Mothboy's reconstruction of Vorpal's own reconstruction of Eric Satie's "Gymnopedie" isn't so much a remix as a completely original track that just happens to feature a few samples on loan from Vorpal's track, but labelmaster Jason Forrest's mutation of "autechnicolorschranz" is a wicked mix of ominous synth stabs, hacked acoustic guitar lines, and tachycardic beats that gives this otherwise laidback release a shot of whatever the heck Bruce Banner injected into himself that turned him into the Hulk.

So there you have it, ladies and gents--free music from Cock Rock Disco! And this is just a small sampling of the free releases available on CRD's downloads page. Also check out DJ Donna Summer's mixes, Dev/Null's rave-a-licious 92-94 Oldschool Jungle Mix, and many others: there's something here for everyone...though, of course, by "everyone" I mean poisonous mad monsters from the toxic sewer-swamps of Tromaville.

Links: cockrockdisco.com myspace.com/cockrockdiscolabel

 09/07/2008 19:46:46  ♥ written by vu ()

Ladyhawke - Dusk Till Dawn (Pascal Gabriel Radio Mix) 5 comments Inga Swearingen - Happy to Be 1 comment Patterns Spiral Into Swarm 1 comment Sal Kimber - Met Police 2 comments

These podcasts keeps getting longer and longer! I promise to cut it down next week.

Download #22:
Download this episode (71 min), subscribe over at weheartmusic.mypodcast.com

Some bands/music that we used in the podcast are: Philanastasia, Inga Swearingen, Sal Kimber, Beatnik Turtles, Canvas Solaris, and Ladyhawke.

PART ONE: News topics covered are Michael Jackson goes on secret dates with Pamela Anderson, Guns N Roses wants blogger to "rot in jail", Album leak welcomed by Metallica, Heart Lash Out At McCain Campaign’s Use of “Barracuda”.

PART TWO: Meet the Meat Extender, Alex and Brian talks to us about their punk band.

PART THREE: I originally requested the Music Success book to compare and contrast to The Indie Band Survival Guide, but having read both books, I have to say that these two books are not really in the same league. Both are written for different audiences, and both are worth looking into if you're thinking about promoting your band.

MUSIC SUCCESS IN NINE WEEKS
by Ariel Hyatt
cyberprbook.com

Music Success in Nine Weeks Book (2008)

Billed as a "step-by-step guide to supercharging your PR, building your fan base and earning more money," this 2008 book comes in both print and electronic version, and retails for $34.99 (there is no discount for the e-version, the last time I checked).

The book reads like a self-help book and generally is a breeze to get through. On a quiet evening, you can get through this 128-page book in a matter of hours. Don't let the 100+ pages discourage you, if you take away non-essential spacing or "notes" and exercise, I would guess this book is no more than 50 pages of solid reading.

The things I like about this book is that it's very easy to follow and read. No pretentious tones, and it's written through the eyes of Ariel Hyatt, a publicist who's been in the music industry for at least twelve years. Sometime her writing falls too much on the personal side (dealing with her past experiences or mentioning she's married to a blogger), but I sometime think that's part of the charm.

I also liked her money-saving tips, from free website endorsements to doing your own PR work. Writing your own biography and networking seem obvious to me, but if you're new to this, then reading the step-by-step guide is essential.

Like most self-help books, this book really depends on your participation. I would only recommend getting the printed version and following the instructions explicitly, otherwise the book might not work for you.

As an exercise, I did try and apply some of the tips to promoting W♥M: for instance, I will only give out my business card if someone asks what I do (instead of bringing up what I do in conversations). I have also thought about building the email list, which I think might not work for us (since people already subscribe to our RSS feed or via the neighborhood networking)... but I really should be more aggressive in promoting our Twitter which you can subscribe via email or text messages. Ironically, this account was setup by Ryan in the UK and twitter recently dropped their option to text to UK mobiles.

THE INDIE BAND SURVIVAL GUIDE
by Randy Chertkow and Jason Feehan
www.stmartins.com
indiebandsurvivalguide.com

The Indie Band Survival Guide Book (2008)

Billed as a "complete manual for the Do-It-Yourself musician", this hefty 300+ book by Randy Chertkow and Jason Feehan, two members of the band Beatnik Turtle, details their experiences and success in this essential guide.

The book is very affordable ($14.95, but obviously you can get it lower online), so there is no excuse to not owning this book. Although it's written for the musician, I think this book can apply to anyone interested in the music industry or work in promotions.

The book is broken into two sections: Get Prepared and Get Fans. The first part focus mostly on your image/branding and web presence, while the second part focused on publicity, distribution and getting booked. Between the two, I felt that the second part is the big hurdle, so you may want to focus more on the first part - which goes into details from picking a searchable band name to your website's content.

The book is very detailed, so as a guide book, which is not necessary cover-to-cover read, I suggest skipping to topics that interests you. You can get lost in all the details, for instance it goes into image color formats (RGB, CMYK, Black and White Line art and Grayscale), which I found very interesting - but might not apply to you.

From a web developer, I liked reading over the band website chapter. They stressed over the 'contact page', from their experience (and mine), that there are many opportunities that present themselves just by making contacting you easier. They also noted that if you're comfortable, you should also include a telephone number, as ABC Family/Disney (aka traditional media) still does business through the telephone. From a promoter's point of view, I can tell you that I have passed over some band because there was simply no way of contacting them.

Other interesting thing I discovered reading the second part (since this is the part that is most unfamiliar to me), that you can actually have your CDs in smaller stores as consignments (where they pay you only after they sold your CD). Even if you don't sell any albums, it works as a small advertisement for you as people will start recognizing your name. It even goes into detail about giving an extra store copy as a promotional device - really great tip.

For emerging bands there is a section to have banter or "stalling banter" prepared, in case you break a string on your guitar. Personally, I have always enjoyed when a band is talkative, and it really does help add to a band's showmanship.

They do admit in the forward that this book is best used by acting and doing, in addition to using the book as an idea or theory. The low cost and invaluable guide, I highly recommend this book to anyone remotely interested in music.

Links: www.weheartmusic.com news.weheartmusic.com podcast.weheartmusic.com

 08/29/2008 18:14:18  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

Tricky - Puppy Toy Tricky 1 comment Tour Dates 09/04/08 The Filmore At Irving Plaza New York 09/05/08 The Trocadero Philadelphia 09/06/08 9:30 Club WA 09/08/08 House Of Blues Chicago, IL 09/09/08 Phoenix Toronto, Ontario 09/11/08 House Of Blues Anaheim, CA 09/12/08 Henry Fonda Theatre Los Angeles, CA 09/14/08 The Independent San Francisco, CA See Also Massive Attack http://weheartmus... I was originally going to write about Portishead, and somehow I mentioned Massive Attack, and then I started thinking about them, and I guess I'd much rather write about Mezzanine than Dummy. Now if that sentence just confused you, those respectively are the landmark albums of Trip Hop, a style o...

Tricky (MySpace) is all over the place. Originally from the UK, he's lived in London, New York City, Los Angeles. After prettymuch singlehandedly creating the hip-hop genre through his pioneering work with Massive Attack and his debut solo album Maxinquaye, he's written music with everyone from Cypress Hill's DJ Muggs to Björk, Tha Gravediggaz to Goldie. He's worked in film with Jerry Bruckheimer, Luc Besson, and John Woo, and god only knows how many soundtracks his music has graced in one form or another. He's been described as everything from a thug to a genius and has had record deals with more major labels than Prince. Hell, he even founded his own label, Brown Punk, with friend Chris Blackwell--and directed a related film helpfully Brown Punk - The Movie.

Throughout all this activity, the only constant in Tricky's life has been music--but even his musical art is infused with chaos, as it incorporates elements of all manner of different styles: hip-hop, gangsta rap, blues, rock, electronica, R&B, IDM, folk, and reggae (to name only the most prominent allusions).

But chaos does not necessarily equal diversity. Whereas I loved the wide range of songs on Maxinquaye, Tricky's second official LP Pre-Milennial Tension left me severely unimpressed: it sounded more like a compilation album of various artists rather than the production of one musically-adventurous soul. Hell, Tricky's pompously-titled Nearly God, an assemblage of collaborations with a wide range of artists like Terry Hall, Björk, Alison Moyet, and Neneh Cherry, was a thousand times more cohesive than his second album! But that's what can happen when you're suddenly thrown into the spotlight and declared to be the Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread. Tricky freely admits he'd lost his focus. Fame and fortune can be quite a distraction.

On September 9th, the US release of Tricky's latest album, Knowle West Boy, will hit the shelves courtesy of Domino Records, though it's been out since July in the UK and the lead single, "Council Estate," has been out even longer. After years of doing this and trying that, Tricky has decided to settle down and devote his full attention to producing a very diverse, but tight and consistent, record inspired by the experiences of his youth. Here's what Tricky himself has to say about the album and what it's title and content means to him:

Knowle West is where I was born. It's a white ghetto. I didn't know what racism was until I left. My family's mixed race, so we don't see colour. I grew up on a council estate more as a white kid, but with Jamaican roots. But all of us there had something in common...we were poor.

I realised that I'd never written anything for these kind of people. I met a guy in Notting Hill who told me his songs had got him through being in prison. That's amazing...but I'd never deliberately written anything for people like him, and me, and the people I grew up with. Like "School Gates" [the final track on the album]...that's the true story of my girlfriend getting pregnant when she was 16. And that's something every kid can relate to. Everything on that song is true. "Council Estate"...that song is the upbringing me and friends had. That's why the album's called Knowle West Boy....I wanted lyrics like The Specials and Blondie and Banshees songs I loved as a kid, that someone like me can relate to.

And true to his word, that experience is exactly what the album delivers. Much as many a council estate in the UK is a melting pot full of people, sounds, languages, and cultures from all around the world, so is Tricky's Knowle West Boy, which collects all the influences and memories of Tricky's youth together and synthesizes a seriously groovy portrait of the earthy life of the estate.

Every song on this album is distinct in style, but all are clearly related to one another not only by their lyrical content but by the palette of sounds that Tricky uses to paint each track. "Puppy Toy" is a straight-up rockin' blues number with a slinky beat and a crashing chorus, a smoky piano loop and buzzing guitars. "Veronika" is a skeletal, malevolent number consisting of nothing but a distorted beat and scalding vocals. "Council Estate" is a jumpy post-punk number with a Gang of Four bassline and Buzzcocks guitars. "Past Mistake" is a straight-up triphop number that recalls Tricky's early work. "Coalition" is a grinding combination of overdriven bass, hip-hop vocals, and unsteady violin melodies. "Slow" is a cover of the sexy Kylie Minogue club banger that turns that song's 8-bit synthpop groove into a headbanging guitar jam with sputtery oldskool synths and double-layered vocals. "Baligaga" is a reggae song constructed atop a bassline that could've come from the latest Klaxons album and "School Gates" is a mostly-acoustic folk number with some deliciously offkilter slide-guitar moments and deathly synth strings that complement the doom-laden tone of the sound perfectly. And all of it is held together by the album's common production values and arrangements: layers of clean and distorted instruments piled up beneath Tricky's characteristic vocal performances.

Tricky doesn't consider himself a vocalist, although I think his dark drawl, whether singing or rapping, is very distinctive and naturally lends his lyrics a much more personal touch. But this album is full of other vocalists, as well: Alex Mills, who complements Tricky's own voice with sultry female vox on "Puppy Toy"; a fellow named Rodigan, one of Tricky's friends from The Bronx, delivers the delightfully stanky reggae lyrics on "Bacative" and "Baligaga"; and Tricky's own ex-girlfriend, Lubna, who sings on "Past Mistake" and "School Gates"...which gives those songs such a brutal, personal punch, considering that things were going bad between her and Mr. Trick at the time the songs were being recorded. The vocalist on one of the tracks, "Joseph," is just some guy who Tricky met busking outside a food shop in LA--the track's named "Joseph" because Tricky has since completely lost contact with the guy, and hopes that he will hear the track and get back into contact! Talk about chaos!

But it all comes together so well, because this time, Tricky's not working with a mess of other folks trying to pull together an album out of a hundred different performances and lyrics. This record is all about him, and as such, it holds together very well despite the wild swings in style and tone from one track to the next. No matter how diverse the arrangements and the songs' contents are, they are clearly the creation of one man's vision--and nothing can hold together an album like the need to find your center and revitalize your art once more by revisiting your roots.

As Tricky himself says, "Now I'm feeling like a kid again. That's why the album's called Knowle West Boy. This is where I'm from."

Links: knowlewestboy.com myspace.com/trickola

 08/27/2008 22:07:46  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

KMFDM - Tohuvabohu KMFDM See Also Atari Teenage Riot http://weheartmus... Atari Teenage Riot is, how can we say it? They are a hardcore/techno noise band from Berlin, Ger... 2 comments

The 1990s--particularly the mid-'90s--were the Golden Age of Industrial Music. Nine Inch Nails was registering industrial on the pop-music charts with Pretty Hate Machine and its more metallic, but still amazingly accessible, follow-up Broken. Skinny Puppy offered up their monumental "swang song" The Process. Ministry was riding high on the popular success of their breakthrough album Psalm 69. Bill Leeb & Rhys Fulber released tons of new music every year, either under their primary moniker, Front Line Assembly, or as Delerium or any one of a hundred other names. Even as legendary Wax Trax! Records were being bought out by TVT, acts like My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult were still touring and putting out tremendous albums like Sexplosion. Klaus Larsen's Leaether Strip helped launch the West Coast Gothic/Industrial label Cleopatra Records, who eventually became one of the decade's primary purveyors of scene releases. On the East Coast, Mentallo & The Fixer helped establish Philadelphia's Metropolis Records as a major player as well. And, of course, there were hundreds of indie acts--like Fektion Fekler, Alien Faktor, Pounce International, and Terminal Sect--cranking out harsh little masterpieces on hundreds of small labels throughout the United States and Europe.

One of the forerunners firmly entrenched in the industrial assault's frontline were KMFDM (MySpace). Formed by Sascha Konietzko in 1984 in Germany, KMFDM eventually moved to Chicago, where they became one of Wax Trax!'s pre-eminent industrial bands by combining fist-pumping, system-ripping metal guitar grind with sparkly synths and nuclear dance beats. Now centered in Hamburg, again, after a brief period in Seattle, KMFDM are celebrating their 24th anniversary this year with a whole slew of new releases: twenty-four 7" vinyl single featuring classic cuts and new material, remastered editions of all their classic albums (now available through their new indie label KMFDM Records, distributed domestically here in the states by Metropolis Records), as well as an album of brand-new material, Tohuvabohu (which actually came out last year, in 2007, though somehow I missed out on it until now--my bad!), and a related remix album, Brimborium. Since Tohuvabohu is their newest collection of never-before-heard material, I'm going to focus on that album alone, and hopefully explain to readers how it has single-handedly revived my hope in the industrial genre.

Simply put, the industrial music genre completely and utterly collapsed in the late-'90s/early-2000s thanks to the overwhelming influx of "EBM" and "futurepop" artists like Apoptygma Berzerk, VNV Nation, and a horde of indistinguishable others. This crap was not industrial music: it was bad trance, at best, and completely untalented, repetitive nonsense at worst. It seemed like any jackass who could combine a steady 120bpm thurd-thud-thud beat with some crunchy or bleepy synth loops and some inane lyrics about humping machines or losing faith in humanity could get an industrial club hit. What had happened to industrial music that stood for something? That dared to challenge "the system" while smacking you upside the head with join-in-the-chant choruses and stomping beats? When it became apparent that the genre's leading lights were abysmal groups like Icon of Coil and Funker Vogt, I was finally forced to admit that industrial music--oldskool industrial full of rage and machinery and creativity--was dead. When KMFDM released the thoroughly boring WWIII in 2003, I heaved a sigh of depression and shed a single tear of rust and mercury, for even one of the most consistent industrial acts of all time--one of the very founders of the genre itself--had succumbed to the plague of mediocrity, as well.

But then, only a year later, Skinny Puppy returned with their comeback album, The Greater Wrong of The Right, which proved that real industrial music was still being made...at least by the biomechanical gods who had created the sound. Front Line Assembly, too, proved that they were still going strong with 2004's Civilization and 2006's Artificial Soldier, both of which his listeners with wicked rhythms and corroded synth melodies from the wastelands of post-nuclear Canada. Hell, even Insekt returned in 2006 with Teenmachine, an album so packed with meateating industrial mayhem that listening to it literally left you with the taste of burning metal in your mouth. Could it be? Was industrial not dead? At least the old soldiers of the genre still seemed to be capable of busting out the jams as always!

Well, KMFDM was still carrying the torch as well, even though I'd lost track of them. Which is why I'm damn grateful to have stumbled upon Sascha K and Friends' newest album, Tohuvabohu, just the other day. Industrial is not dead. And KMFDM have released an album that embodies all the sonic and lyrical ideals that made such titanic albums like Naive and Adios rock so goddamned hard.

"Tohuvabohu" in Hebrew means "waste and void," which--at least in terms of album names--is about as industrial as you can possibly get. No, it's not a particularly original concept. And neither is any of the music on Tohuvabohu. But so friggin' what? KMFDM have maintained a loyal fanbase for 24 years by being an incredibly consistent band with a very personalized, trademark sound. Now, that whole disco-beats-meets-metal sound could become tedious and repetitive in the wrong hands, but Kap'n K and Krew have always realized that there are many ways to remain tonally consistent without becoming bogged down in recycled sounds and motives. One of the easiest ways to do this is to explore melody and arrangements, and though you usually don't find the terms "melody" and "industrial" mentioned in the same context, you simply have to admit: one of KMFDM's greatest strengths are their melodies. Classic tracks like "Virus" and "Juke Joint Jezebel" have irresistible choruses that will always get dancefloor crowds singing along. They also have the capability of writing ultrafast speed-metal assaults just as well as they write ominous dirges and straightforward dance jams. Another of KMFDM's tricks is self-referential: songs like "Light," "Sucks," "A Drug Against War," and "Superpower," the opening track of Tohuvabohu, all mention KMFDM. It takes balls, but also a certain amount of tongue-in-cheek humor, to write lyrics like "Stronger than ever, ever before! / KMFDM is a drug against war!" But you've got to admit, those lyrics will implant themselves in your head and live there forever!

In all these aspects, the band are back at the top of their game with Tohuvabohu. "Superpower" is a self-referential celebration of KMFDM's quarter-century of experience, mixing a straight-up funkay bassline with a perfect sing-along chorus--"Superpower! / A force in its own! / Superpower! / We're going it alone!"--headbangin' guitars, and samples of phone messages left by fans explaining what they really like about KMFDM's music. Egotistical? Yeah...but its inspiring. In this one song, KMFDM is not only acknowledging its faithful fans, but explaining why they've told the record industry to kiss their asses and go 100% independent at last. In an age when so many bands are blowing off record deals in favor of going totally D.I.Y., KMFDM in this one single song have justified themselves and their longtime fans adoration. Oh, and it's got a killer sax solo, to boot! This one track is a text-book study in one of KMFDM's favorite subjects: ripping the system--bucking the majority trend for doing your own damn thing and loving the freedom of it.

KMFDM - Not In My Name

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The rest of the album, even when dealing with much darker subjects like political chaos and violence (subjects that KMFDM have loved to write about since Day One), is still full of jubilant, high-energy synthlines, disco diva vocals, and scalding-hot guitar licks. "Tohuvabohu" will have you screaming along with its chorus as you clean up your M-16 to get it ready for the battle against world imperialism. Not only is the music clearly packed full of love for its art, but Sascha Konietzko's lyrics exhibit a keen awareness of sociopolitical problems around the world. Whether denouncing any and all holy wars in the blistering "Not In My Name" or damning the slack-jawed, sheeplike masses who blindly follow leaders (political, social, artistic, and so forth) in title-track "Tohuvabohu," Konietzko is writing lyrics--in English, German, French, Spanish, Latin, and even Hebrew (I think)!--that aim to inspire listeners to educate themselves in what is happening around them and take action. Here in the United States, with a presidential election coming up in a scant two-and-a-half months, KMFDM's message to get off your ass and take fixing the system into your own hands is extremely timely and necessary.

So, OK...KMFDM kinda suffered a bit of a slowdown earlier in the decade. But they are back, folks. Whereas young punks may be wiping their butts with the dregs of industrial music, the Good Ol' Boys--Skinny Puppy, FLA, Insekt, even Ministry--are still Out There keeping the battleflags flying and providing anthems for the culture wars. KMFDM, we salute you for again doing what you do so damned well!

Links: www.kmfdm.net myspace.com/officialkmfdm

 08/26/2008 09:19:54  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

Otto Von Schirach - Her Blood Is Poison Otto Von Schirach Tour Dates 08/30/08 at club jupiña colada/PS-14- MIAMI, Florida 09/02/08 RENO @ BURNING MAN AFTERPARTY / Grand Sierra Resort RENO, Nevada 09/19/08 TILBURG @ ZXZW WITH DOORMOUSE TILBURG 09/27/08 MOSCOW-RUSSIA @ SICK FEST VI MOSCOW 11/08/08 PRÄZISIONSWERK ESPENHAIN 12/05/08 Reggie’s Rock - chicago, IL* 12/06/08 Miami, Florida MIAMI, Florida* 12/11/08 Elysium - Austin, Texas* 12/12/08 The Knitting Factory - LA, CA* 12/13/08 Historic Sweets Oakland, CA* 12/20/08 Fez Ballroom - Portland, OR* 12/21/08 Nectar lounge Seattle, WA* * otto + venetian snares + cyrus + naha Read More Otto Von Schirach http://sites.goog... Otto von Schirach is an IDM and breakcore artist from Miami, Florida. He is of Cuban/German desce...

Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with Otto von Schirach (MySpace)? Did his parents put too much (or too little) LSD in his bottles when he was but a wee one? Was he psychosexually molested by his own invisible friend at the tender age of 17? Is he even human, or could he actually be that legendary PimpBot 5000 "breakdancing prototype" who supposedly escaped from the CyberDyne's labs before it could be decommissioned because it had developed a software quirk that made it always want to do The Worm in front of Roman Catholic nuns? Is he proof of de-evolution?

These are questions which may never be answered. But that's okay, because whatever is going on in Otto von Schirach's mutant mind, it's 100% Totally Cool. And his latest album, Oozing Bass Spasms, is proof positive that the man has a talent for funky weirdness that would stagger even Mark Motherbaugh.

So, let's see--what are the known "facts" about Herr von Schirach? He's definitely from Miami, Florida--that much is certain--and he is thought to be of Cuban/German descent, though there are those who maintain that birth records show that he is, in fact, the son of J. R. "Bob" Dobbs. Miami is a swirling vortex of musical sounds, so Otto grew up listening to everything from booty-bass to salsa to IDM/breakcore to death-metal, and all of these influences appear in varying combinations in his work. The psychotic, abstract, and oftimes vertigo-inducing beat-salads and massacred tones of his earlier albums on Miami's Schematic Records (one of the labels that pioneered the IDM movement in electronica) brought him to the attention of industrial gods Skinny Puppy, and his contributions to their two most recent albums, The Greater Wrong of the Right and Mythmaker, not to mention the fact that he opened for them on most dates of their tours in support of those albums, earned him a lot of notice and critical acclaim.

And now he's back with a new album on Cock Rock Disco, and it's a very noticeable departure from his earlier works. And as much as I loved the unrestrained insanity of those earlier works, I think Oozing Bass Spasms may be the breakthrough record that will make Otto von Schirach a household name...at least in households of beautiful mutants.

Otto's first album, 8000 BC, was a challenging slab of mangled sounds that pummeled the senses so completely divorced from reality that listening to it would make Antonin Artaud himself into a gibbering wreck. Later albums like Chopped Zombie Fungus and my personal favorite, Global Speaker Fisting, were just as crazy and weird, but were much more controlled and listenable affairs, with bouncy beats and recognizable--if completely whacked-out--lyrics that managed to sound like gangsta rap done by Terrence McKenna after he's ingested enough mescaline to make his neurons bubble. There's always been two competing elements in Otto von Schirach's work that, until now, have never managed to gel properly: his love of surreal, slashed-and-burnt soundscapes and his love for silly club beats. Finally, on Oozing Bass Spasms, these two elements have come together to form an album that will make you dance and make you feel as though you've taken one too many hits of the brown acid at the same time!

Though the album is, of course, all over the map--it wouldn't be an Otto von Schirach album if it weren't--it's still primarily powered by overdriven 808 and 909 kicks and snares, weird raving synths, samples from porn movies, and Otto's trademark chopped-up vocals. "Subatomic Disco Divas" and "Nightmare Nipple F" launch the album with laugh-out-loud samples and simple, but extremely catchy vocals. If "Subatomic Disco Divas" doesn't have you chanting "Honeys on the flo', let 'em ride, let 'em ride / honeys on the flo', let 'em ride, let 'em roll," then get your ass off the dancefloor. But just when you think this is going to be an album of eccentric, but certainly danceable, cuts of acid techno with a little IDM thrown in, Otto busts you in the mouth with the wicked gabba blast-beats and hideous shrieking voices of "Magnetic Rave Headache" (which really will give you a headache if you listen to it too loud). "Gelatin Fixation," with its opening sample, "Big...wet titties," is a slower, slinkier number with a woozy bassline and a headbobbin' beat that wouldn't be out of place on any contemporary gangsta rap album. The lead single from the album, "Dance Like a Hoe" and "Romance in the Club" are beastly club bangers that manages to lampoon shallow club music while still providing beats that demands booty-shaking. "Her Blood Is Poison" is an amazing chunk of straight-up electro whose Afrika Bambaata beat and bassline are held hostage by the creepy, downright evil warbling vocals and "Zombie Halloween" is a light-hearted little track that captures the glee of flesh-eating and trick-or-treating on The Greatest of All Holidays perfectly. "Sliced Doves on Codeine" is the most funked-up remix I've ever heard--a downright terrifying mutilation of Prince's "When Doves Cry" featuring a buzzing kickdrum pound that will make your blood sizzle. "Fried Eggs in My Ear" brings back the black metal blast beats and mixes an 8-bit rendition of one of Beethoven's hooks with skullcracking percussion and demonic screams from the very carnival of hell.

Oy! This is an exhausting album. Seriously...there's so much energy in Oozing Bass Spasms' explosive beats, freaked-out lyrics and samples, and tortured synths that listening to the album straight through will make you feel like you've just run three miles uphill to escape from a horde of Killer Tomatoes. Nonetheless, this is still a surprisingly listener-friendly album full of memorable hooks and jams, whose wicked but childlike humor will leave you with a smile on your face and a tangled mass of poisonous mental fungus growing in your brain. This is "Intelligent Dance Music" at its finest, mainly because Otto von Schirach clearly doesn't take himself too seriously. And neither should you. So just get the damn album already and open your Third Nostril to its omnipotent Slack-increasing aetheric vibrations!

Links: ottovonschirach.com myspace.com/ottovonschirach

 08/24/2008 18:55:38  ♥ written by vu ()

NEVER GET OUT OF THIS Spin - Not In Love 3 comments

WOW, another epic podcast, with co-hosts Derek & Soup. Although this episode is more topics-centric (RIAA, MP3s, and state of music), I think the next podcast will be half-topic and half casual.

Download this episode (41 min)

Some topics we touched on:

RIAA vs Muxtape, CDs are too expensive, music blogs, internet radio royalties going up twice as much as traditional radio, taping off the radio, whatever happened to recording hunting?, Taping Kills Music, concerts, what we're listening to...

Music used:

♥ David Yazbek - Introduction (davidyazbek.com)
♥ Weird Al - Don't Download This Song (weirdal.com)
♥ Hellsongs - Breaking the Law (hellsongs.com)
♥ Le Tigre - Get off the Internet (letigreworld.com)
♥ S*M*A*S*H - Take Your Breath Away ( myspace.com/llyc)
♥ Spin - Not In Love (spinrocks.com)
♥ Ladyscraper - Gangbanger (hellsongs.com)
♥ Ironlung - Liar (myspace.com/lifeironlungdeath)
♥ Jeff Hanson - I Don't Quite Remember (jeffhanson.net)
♥ P. Hux - Wear My Ring (parthenonhuxley.com)
♥ Elastica - Operate (live)
♥ AIDS Wolf - Down, Holy Ground (myspace.com/aidswolf)

If you want to join us on the podcast, send me an email - I will need your telephone number or Skype username.

Links: weheartmusic.com weheartmusic.mypodcast.com

 08/23/2008 15:58:34  ♥ written by derek ( / www.pegritz.com)

Ra Ra Riot - Dying Is Fine Ra Ra Riot 1 comment Tour Dates 08/25/08 Casino De Paris  France 08/26/08 White Heat @ Madame Jojo’s London, England 08/27/08 Water Rats London 08/28/08 Proud Gallery London 08/29/08 Club NME @ Koko London 08/30/08 Electric Picnic Art and Music Festival Stradbally, Ireland 09/2/08 Late Night with Conan O’Brien New York, New York 09/3/08 Lambi Montreal, Quebec 09/4/08 Horseshoe Tavern Toronto, Ontario 09/5/08 Mojo’s Jamestown, NY 09/6/08 Bug Jar Rochester, NY 09/7/08 Syracuse University Syracuse, New York 09/9/08 The Basement Columbus, Ohio 09/10/08 Case Western University Cleveland, Ohio 09/11/08 Subterranean Chicago, Illinois 09/12/08 7th Street Entry Minneapolis, Minnesota 09/14/08 Jackpot Saloon Lawrence, Kansas 09/16/08 Hi Dive Denver, Colorado 09/17/08 Kilby Court Salt Lake City, Utah 09/18/08 Neurolux Boise, Idaho 09/20/08 King Cobra Seattle, Washington 09/21/08 Media Club Vancouver, British Columbia 09/22/08 Doug Fir Lounge Portland, Oregon 09/24/08 Rickshaw Stop San Francisco, California 09/25/08 The Echo Los Angeles, California 09/28/08 The Casbah San Diego, California 09/29/08 Modified Phoenix, Arizona 09/30/08 Plush Tucson, Arizona 10/02/08 The Loft Dallas, Texas 10/03/08 Stubbs Austin, Texas 10/04/08 Rudyards Houston, Texas 10/07/08 The Social Orlando, Florida 10/08/08 Club Downunder Tallahassee, Florida 10/10/08 Drunken Unicorn Atlanta, Georgia 10/11/08 Local 506 Chapel Hill, North Carolina 10/12/08 Black Cat Backstage WASHINGTON, Washington DC 10/14/08 Ottobar Baltimore, Maryland 10/15/08 Johnny Brenda’s Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 10/16/08 Bowery Ballroom New York, New York 10/17/08 Music Hall of Williamsburg Brooklyn, New York 10/18/08 Middle East Downstairs Cambridge, Massachusetts

For a band only two years old, whose first album, The Rhumb Line, was just released on August 19, Ra Ra Riot (MySpace) have already enjoyed a major rock band's successes and suffered comparable tragedies. First formed in 2006 by a bunch of students at Syracuse University, within a year of their formation they were opening for post-punk legends like Art Brut and Bow Wow Wow, touring the UK twice, and playing the fabulous South By Southwest Music Conference in both 2007 and 2008. Sadly, on June 1 of 2007, their original drummer, John Ryan Pike, died mysteriously after a show--but, fortunately, the band decided to continue on, which I believe is the best tribute a band can ever pay to a fallen member, especially a founding member. Now consisting of vocalist Wes Miles, bassist Mathieu Santos, guitarist Milo Bonacci, cellist Alexandra Lawn, and violinist Rebecca Zeller, Ra Ra Riot have finally released an LP that fully captures all the promise that the band has shown over the past two years and, indeed, have given the indie-rock world a unique boost of energy.

Considering the band's composition--a cellist and violinist in addition to the usual bass/guitar/drum combo--Ra Ra Riot have a sound that straddles both the post-punk genre and the "Americana art-rock" of, say, Arcade Fire. But whereas Arcade Fire, especially on their recent album Neon Bible, have a murky lo-fi sound and a certain atmosphere of portentous pomposity* (which is not a bad thing, mind you: if anyone can write music that sounds like it should be the score to a Cormac McCarthy novel, it's Arcade Fire), Ra Ra Riot--in perfect accordance with their bouncy name--produce music that has that same artful but folksy blend of instruments but eschews gloom n' doom (even in songs with titles like "Dying Is Fine") for a much brighter approach.

"Ghost Under Rocks" and the aforementioned "Dying Is Fine" both have very dancey beats straight out of the post-punk drummer's standard repertoire, but the string-rich arrangements and Wes Miles' clear and energetic lyrics give the songs' their individuality. Ra Ra Riot are not another Decemberists clone, but sound like an amalgamation of later Talking Heads (circa, say, True Stories) and a more controlled, less freaked-out Modest Mouse with just a little of Final Fantasy's neoclassical touch, a little alt-country, and a little Mellencamp-like Americana thrown in. Their songs are tight, gorgeous little rock symphonies with all the lushness of a Michael Kamen/(insert extremely popular rock band wanting to expand their sound here) collaboration but none of the overblown orchestration.

"Winter '05," in fact, is almost entirely driven by cello and violin, giving it a touch of Rasputina, minus Melora Creager's insane twitterings. It's a lovely little number whose melancholy but warm vocals are complemented perfectly by its music. "Dying Is Fine" manages to capture the same disco beat of Modest Mouse's "Dashboard" while still keeping those strings that create so much of the band's uniqueness prominent. In a world in which alternative music featuring live strings prominently is almost always fairly gentle and relaxed, it's nice to see Ra Ra Riot showing that bowed strings do not need to be playing bluegrass or country to flame with life and electricity. At the same time, though, Ra Ra Ruit can write a perfectly straightforward pop-rock number like "Can You Tell," a song that Bryan (or Ryan) Adams and Nick Lowe are probably wishing they'd come up with.

So what have we got here? A band who has split the difference between American roots-music and post-punk, combining each genre's distinctive musical elements together into a hybrid that really, honestly does deserve all the hype that's been bandied about in the past two years. Usually, when indie music journals get all up in arms about some bright young band who might be The Future of Music incarnate, they tend to wallow in unjustified hyperbole and exaggeration. But Spin magazine was 100% right when they declared Ra Ra Riot "one of the best young bands we've heard in a really long time." It's the truth, people. Ra Ra Riot have done what many bands have tried to accomplish over the years, both only a scant few have ever succeeded at: making artistic music fun.

Go see 'em now, dammit! They're on tour with The Morning Benders, Walter Meego, and Pepi Ginsberg.

*I've often said that the cover of Kansas' The Best of Kansas depicts the "sound" of Neon Bible perfectly. You've got your stern, patriarchal, Ahab-like figure pronouncing vocal judgment on a cartoon ship falling off the edge of a cartoon world, all cast in a turn-of-the-century atmosphere with an ominous, almost Faulknerian weight.

Links: rarariot.com myspace.com/rarariot barsuk.com