mu6ism-blog

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Pfarmers - The Commune

I know this is about an actual commune, but it just felt too applicable to the mood of my world today. 

This album comes from three of my favorites in one place, Menomena, The National and Sufjan Stevens, though not the better known members of any of the above. Because my internet is utter shite today and I’m working a tight deadline, I can’t write much about it other than they prove their worth on just this one chair-dancing-head-bobbing track. Danceable despite the startlingly appropriate lyrics, “The hits keep comin’... we are are in a deadlocked race to the bottom. Smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em”

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Toad the Wet Sprocket - Pray Your Gods

This song came up in my shuffle today. I’d forgotten how much I loved it. I feel the lyrics are particularly applicable to my state of mind today. I especially love the Dona Nobis - for those not familiar with latin or liturgy - grant us peace.

Toad was and is and always will be one of my favorite bands largely because of their wonderful lyrics and while this album carries a pretty heavy critique of religion, I feel it’s mostly well earned. Do with that what you will. It’s a fantastic album and this is one of the best moments.

[mu6ism-blog]

The Veils - King of Chrome

It’s a song about long haul truckers. Really. Oddly, it’s not the first -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sd5ZLJWQmss. Ahhh the glorious 70s, when a trucker could go by the handle “rubber duck” and it was somehow acceptable. Or was it the 80s? I’ve never actually seen the movie, I just know it exists for some unknown reason.

Back to my point. The Veils’ new album, Total Depravity, dropped yesterday and —oh my God—it fully lives up to its name. It feels like audio insomnia, that sleepless desperation that comes after you’ve been awake for hours and your thoughts go dark. In fact, that may be the best way to listen to it; good speakers in the dark. I’ll find out tonight.

I especially love what they did to Iodine & Iron, a song which has only been performed live, to my knowledge. They infused it with this wretched loneliness that I never got from previous versions.

There will probably be those who think (and vocally complain) that it’s too different, too produced, blah, blah, because I hear it. I’ve made my thoughts on those people clear, so I won’t reiterate. I will disagree completely. I love this left turn outta nowhere in their music and this, on my first listen, is my favorite Veils album to date. It was worth the wait, IMO, and I heartily recommend listening beginning to end.

[mu6ism-blog]

The Pretenders - When I Change My Life

The best version of a classic and one of the best melancholy songs ever written, according to...me. It captures the essence of that ‘if only I'd been different  things would be better’ trap we all get stuck in now and then. If you’ve never looked back and thought about how your life would be if you’d only made a different choices, taken the left at Albuquerque, this song might not make sense to you and congratulations. But for the rest of us... Chrissie Hynde manages to sound beautifully wounded and hopeful at once and it cuts, because we all know, most often the change never comes. 

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Kurt Vile - Pretty Boy (by Randy Newman)

I’ve heard this song—the Randy Newman version— a hundred times at least, but today, I heard this cover for the first time. I don’t know why, it’s not THAT different from the original, but it hit me. Hard. A satirical statement on the maleness of male; that biting wit that makes Randy Newman who he is as an artist. It’s what I think of when I hear his name anyway.

Not this time. This time, instead of the typical tongue in cheek humor I usually find in his catalog, Kurt Vile just brought out the sadder, repressed side of the lyrics for me. 

Maybe it’s a mood. Whatever. Great song and great cover anyway and worth a listen on a slow Monday night.

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Phantogram - You Don’t Get me High Anymore

Yeah, I know it’s been out for awhile, but I was hanging back, waiting for the video. It was a worth while wait, I think. It, like their music,their stage presence, and their overall look, has taken a sharp uptick in production value over the past decade or so. 

I’ve been a fan since they first released ‘When I’m Small’ (& if this song is your first acquaintance with them...go back a few years). Around that time, I saw them in a bar. A literal BAR. I think I paid $10 to get in. There was a six-inch high platform in a corner that had just enough room to stand as long as you didn’t move around too much, and the sound guy was the worst on the planet. I saw them more than heard them, but the overblown level of bass gave me a cardiac arrhythmia, so that was fun. 

I’ve seen them a few times since and each time the venue has been bigger and better and they’ve seemed more comfortable being there. At this point though, they’ve evolved into a fully formed gloss-covered pop/rock band with Clear Channel radio play. And good for them. 

Still, I recommend going back and starting from the beginning before their third album drops in September.

[mu6ism-blog]

Jo Goes Hunting - Run Away

Some news from a good friend came across my desk today. It was a good thing. Something that should be joyful, but instead sucker punched me in the gut. I actually had to get up and leave the space. I distracted myself with spray paint and a project until I felt calmed enough to come back. The weird thing is that it made realize something about myself that I’ve been trying to duck and dodge for a few years and those kinds of revelations don’t come softly knocking. They kick the door in screaming and if you happen to be standing behind it when they do, well....

So when I walked back into the room, this song was up on my shuffle and it seems weirdly appropriate. 

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James Blake - Love Me In Whatever Way

This album is killing my concentration. Seriously.  James Blake has been on my shortlist since his first album. I love the way he uses lyrics as just another textural element to complete the music, wrapping them around the song until you almost forget they’re there. It isn’t complex or even anything you’ll find yourself singing along with, it’s careful and almost barren. Repetitive? Maybe, but it allows the music to wash over the listener as part of an atmosphere without distracting them by offering up a story or wordy sentiment. 

This album—The Colour in Anything— is thicker, more layered, than his previous efforts, but it still somehow retains that minimalism that defines his signature. It’s a solitary listen in the dark—with the good speakers—feet propped up, fist clenched around a good meaty red.

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Radiohead - Burn the Witch

This inspired me to listen to my entire Radiohead catalog yesterday.... from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. ... and I had an hour of the Haiti benefit left when I finally shut it down.

So yeah, I get the new album fever every time. I like the hint at the orchestral tone this one might take. After their James Bond theme that wasn’t, I was really gunning to hear more of that out of them. Maybe I’ll get my wish. 

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Prism Tats - Death or Fame

HUGE new album crush. Like, couldn’t-decide-on-a-single-to-post, album crush. This song only won because of the video and that it kind of sums up the tone of the album. I highly recommend streaming the whole thing.

There are a lot of guitar licks borrowed from 90s grunge and 70s fuzz, which is a trend I’m seeing quite a lot of in newer music, which in the cyclical nature of music and art makes sense. The birth of every movement is a reaction to what came before, after the most recent explosion of 80s tinged electro-pop, it’s natural for the pendulum to swing back to something a little more organic.  

The vocals immediately reminded me of a harder rockin’ Nurses, though musically and lyrically as well, Prism Tats is a much stronger band. In an era of one-hits and success that depends on singles, I feel like there was a lot of consideration given to the comprehensive flow of this album, complete with an instrumental interlude midway through. To me that’s a definite mark of an artist that is considering the whole of their work. Instrumentals aren’t radio ready lyric bombs; they take up “single” space on an album, you can’t sing along and any meaning you attach is of your own making. This one kind of links the two “sides” of the album. Lyrically, it deals largely with the dual nature of popularity and fame. The first half is more concerned with the rise, the second, the fall. 

This is one album that will be on the permanent rotation.

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Prince - Kiss

I’ve been torn over this. To post one of my favorite artists, though he so vocally opposed having his music free online or honor the cause he championed. In the end, the desire to memorialize an artist that has influenced not only my musical tastes, but those of countless other musicians, won out. So, better late than never I suppose.

Prince’s passing was every bit as heart breaking to me as losing the Starman. This seems to be the year that the best of the freaks in this world are being called from it one by one and it makes me nervous for what’s to come. I feel like the afterlife is getting one hell of a concert these days.

When I was young, Prince was naughty music you didn’t play around the parents. Even when I was older, it still embodied my teenage rebellion to throw on a hidden copy of Diamonds and Pearls. The man knew how to put sex in a song. I believe many children of the 90s probably owe their very existence to Prince. (Who doesn’t remember Gett Off?!)

This is much older than that, but Kiss is the first Prince song I remember being aware of and I still know every word. 

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The Chemical Brothers (featuring Beck) - Wide Open

Never have I been a fan of The Chemical Brothers. I don’t hate them, they just fall into that class of electro that I just can’t get into. (Though I will never bring a musician of any kind here just to bash them. I have great respect for the craft and that’s unfair and childish on so many levels. If you don’t like it, leave it alone. One man’s trash and all that.)

Anyway, this is a deviation from my experience with them that I thought was really well put together, and that may be the Beck collab that draws me to it. It’s one of those songs that takes the better points of both artists and feeds them to something new and different for both. The video is also a really amazing and beautiful piece of animation.

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 Yeasayer—I Am Chemistry

Kudos on the weirdest damn video I’ve seen in...I can’t even take a stab at how long. That’s kind of a statement bearing in mind that odd, especially with videos is a point with them. The new album, Amen & Goodbye, is due out on April 1 (which I fully expect there to be some sort of twist to, because... why not?). What I’ve heard so far is pretty much true to form, some tongue in cheek mixed with some politic and a dollop of pop psych, so if you don’t like Yeasayer... not gonna change your mind. If you do... welcome and enjoy.

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 Jeff Buckley - I Know It’s Over

Old and new at once. This lovely album of Jeff Buckley covering music from Dylan to Zepplin, to this fantastically minimalistic version of The Smiths, comes out this month. Most of the covers have existed in one form or another for years, this album just collects them in one place.

Though the album isn’t entirely necessary, for fans of this artist gone too soon, it has some successes; this is one. As a fan of both artists, I love that this cover delivers an entirely new aspect to this song.  It pulls on the sadness, darkness and vulnerability of the lyrics— emotions that are underplayed in the original. Buckley is really good at that. I mean, who ISN’T familiar with his Hallelujah cover?

Other live versions are out there, but I like this studio recording. It sounds so incredibly lonely, like he’s tired and wrapping a set with a song that means something special to him.

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M83 - Do it, Try it

I honestly don’t know what to make of this. The first time I listened through, I kind sat there slack-jawed wondering exactly what was happening. Not much has changed. I’m on somewhere close to 10. 

Now, I have said in the past that I love M83 beyond all reason, and I do. Many, many people were disappointed with the last double album, but I think they’re insane. It’s a masterpiece. I wore it out for weeks and then some. I believe Anthony Gonzales has a rare talent for creating a complex musical atmosphere that transcends simple songwriting. There are few artists in that echelon for me. Most of them do double duty scoring films, which makes perfect sense. From this one single however, it would appear that this album—Junk, out 4/8— is going to go in a much more experimental direction, which part of me is completely behind, while the other part cringes a little. BUT I will reserve judgement until I hear the entire thing. I hope others do too. 

There are parts of this that I really love- that chorus (if you can call it that) is hooky. The plunky piano thing, I love less. Bottom line- I never thought I’d hear something out of him/them that would almost be fitting on the dance floor though, so kudos M83 for trying some new ground. Let’s just hope it doesn’t live down to the album title.

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The Kills - Doing It to Death

Ahhhhhh! What?! New Kills? I had no idea this was coming, but I’m pretty excited about it. Love the Kills, love the tune, love the vid... now let’s see the tour. 

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Alberta Cross - Isolation

Not so much Alberta Cross as Petter FROM Alberta Cross, but whatever. I stumbled across this solo version and... wow. I love the way this really leans heavy on the loneliness, as it should in a song called Isolation. The album version is a standout moment for me, but this might be even better.

Somehow I totally missed the release of this self-titled album, which is extra odd, because I’ve been following them for years. Whatever, I finally came across it and here we are. 

This is Petter at his Neil Young-y best.  Obviously, he holds up with the band as well, but I think this album in particular showcases him in ways prior albums have not. At several points throughout, I had to stop what I was doing and just listen. There’s a subtlety that I’ve never noticed before, even though they’ve filled out their sound with all sorts of new acoustic instrumentation. They’ve built songs that are both rich and delicate and altogether wonderful to listen to.

It made my ‘to buy’ list with one go ‘round.