I guess I started a band in the past month or two. There are no recordings available yet (we’ll be in the studio on Dec. 13th), but you can check out how cool our facebook and myspace pages look? I guess that might be kind of boring without music. Anyway, just putting it out there.

First show is Tuesday, Dec. 15 @ Casa Del Popolo with Grant Hart of Husker Du!!!

PopMatters, July 2008

If there’s a nagging conviction behind Stay Positive, it’s a constant refusal to be pinned down on E Street, revealing a toxic indulgence to revel in the spit and swagger of the punk side of town.

And you thought the Hold Steady were just living on E Street? Littered with early Springsteen analogies ever since they broke through with the bar room tales of Boys and Girls in America, Craig Finn has constantly referred to the debt his band owes to the likes of the Ramones, Hüsker Dü and the Replacements, only for critics to remain defiant of their origins in favour of references to the New Jersey Godfather. If there’s a nagging conviction behind Stay Positive, the Hold Steady’s fourth album, it’s a constant refusal to be pinned down on E Street, revealing a toxic indulgence to revel in the spit and swagger of the punk side of town.

While Stay Positive proves that Finn and co. still love to get with the E Street shuffle, the first crashing notes of “Constructive Summer”, the record’s charged opener, are a “White Riot”-style riff that Mick Jones would be proud of. The tingling piano and made-for-arena drums that follows may be pure Springsteen, but only after he’s been dragged through a dozen chaotic bars by Finn, all the time regaling the Boss with the genius of Bob Mould. Seventeen seconds into “Constructive Summer” and Finn has already dropped an Iggy Pop reference:

Me and my friends are like the drums on Lust for Life
We pound it out on floor toms
Our psalms are sing-along songs

And while the song may break down into classic early Springsteen territory, all Born to Run piano and Finn’s recounting of disappointing encounters with school and church (“I heard your gospel / It moved me to tears / But I couldn’t find the hate / And I couldn’t find the fear … I tried to believe all the things that you said / But my friends that aren’t dying are already dead”), it’s the lethal bark in Finn’s voice as he croaks out “Raise a toast to St Joe Strummer / I think he might have been our only decent teacher” that is the moment the Hold Steady step back and reclaim their punk mantle.

Still, Stay Positive is a curious record. It’s both a progression on Boys and Girls in America — harpsichords, mandolins, even theremins are plucked out for appearances — and an excuse to explore unfinished business. “Sequested in Memphis”, “Navy Sheets” and the title track could have been lost down the back of the studio sofa after the last album. Its appeal (and how fast it will take to get under your skin) all depends on how willing you are to swallow any expectations you have and just approach it as great, solid rock album.

Finn points out much the same in a recent interview with the Guardian newspaper, dismissing any particular concerns with subverting the expectations of long-time fans. “I think it’s more of a challenge for us to make a more consistent, less rambling rock record. Boys and Girls was a step towards that, and Stay Positive is more fully realised,” he says, adding, “as for the fans, I don’t think too much about that. We got our fans by pleasing ourselves.”

The endearing attraction about the Hold Steady—and a large reason behind their solid fan base—is that this selfish attitude to songwriting is not forged out of arrogance. It’s just a way for Finn to say ‘if I wasn’t in his group I’d be in the pit watching them’. This, and a purposeful defiance to pander to the accepted rock and roll game—no asymmetrical haircuts to dress up elaborately-designed style-mag covers; no piercing cheekbones to hang the affections of feigning rock chicks (and critics)—is both refreshing and unprecedented in an age when most new artists seem to come shrink-wrapped in ‘Barbie boxes’ and an American Idol tie-in.

The Hold Steady make no qualms about their age (Finn is 36) and if Stay Positive is strung together by a common theme it’s the act of growing old gracefully. “Constructive Summer” closes with Finn warning “Getting older makes it harder to remember / We are our only saviours / We’re gonna build something this summer.” But it’s the title track, a thumping sing-a-long number as good as any they’ve written, that addresses the issue head-on. Finn name-drops early straight-edge band 7 Seconds as a reason behind the kids giving him credit “for being down with it”, before predicting a time when “These kids at the shows will have kids of their own / And these sing-a-long songs will be our scriptures.”

And yet while Stay Positive might find Finn in existential contemplation of his past, present and future, thankfully it doesn’t keep him away from his observational wisdom in recounting tales of hedonism, naivety, drugs and alcohol in small town America. “Joke About America” may not be their finest five minutes, although it’s an absorbing song based around a sweet Hammond groove, a telling, slow beat and a dark narrative of splintering music scenes and friendship. But Finn’s lyrics are exceptional:

Back then it was beautiful
The boys were sweet and musical
The laser lights looked mystical
Messed up stuff felt magical
Girls didn’t seem so difficult
Boys didn’t seem so typical
It was warm and white and wonderful
We were all invincible

Elsewhere, while you’re contemplating Hold Steady’s consistent attention to thunderous, playful rock, Stay Positive has a knack to take you on a few sharp left turns. Straight after the rousing “Sequested in Memphis”, “One for the Cutters” kicks-in with a majestic harpsichord line that, even though it undercuts a great Craig Finn narrative, is still enough to make you check the CD cover for proof it’s still the Hold Steady and not Tori Amos. “Lord, I’m Discouraged”, leaves E Street and the punk quarter far behind and drifts off on a desolate tale of helplessness as a lover fades into addiction. Somewhere between Buffalo Tom and R.E.M. at their most melancholy, it features a painful piano line as Finn comes to terms with the “excuses and half truths and fortified wine”.

Stay Positive closes with the joyous “Slapped Actress”, a reference to Opening Night Director John Cassavetes (“We are the actors / The cameras are rollin’ / I’ll be Ben Gazzara / You’ll be Gena Rowlands”), but also seemingly pointing to the constant burn of touring:

Sometimes, actresses get slapped.
Some nights, makin’ it look real might end up with someone hurt.
Some nights, it’s just entertainment, and, some other nights, it’s real.
They come in for the beating, to see the stadium seating.
They’re holding their hands out for the body and blood, now.
We’re the directors, our hands will hold steady.
I’ll be John Cassavettes, let me know when you’re ready.

Grinding along on an infectious, spiralling crescendo, the piano holds the melody together before being overtaken by a J Mascis-style cacophony of guitars and a rising chorus, Finn closing the song and reaffirming the Hold Steady conviction at the same time, “Man, we make our own movies / Man, we make our own movies”.

I’ve seen a sudden increase in the blog visits in light of the previous Essay on Masculinity post – I think my 12 readers like the Chuck P. narrative – anyways . . . I know I’ve been disregarding this blog for a while, but my reader(s) have taken second slot in light of university admissions, and scholarship shit. Hopefully in a couple of months, the haze will die down a bit.

I digress.

Let It Be Album Cover

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been listening to what I’ve been told is an Indie-Alternative Rock album which fucking defined the 80s. While art-popper REM was breaking out to the college masses; The Replacements were making some of the most influential alt-rock/pop of the 80s. Despite appearing on Saturday Night Live and later on, getting signed by a major music record label, The Replacements never caught on.

An Amazon Reviewer who happened to grow up in the 80s said that depending on which night you saw The Replacements, they were the best band or they were the worst band. Never did a band fall from grace as fast as The Replacements did when they broke up on the 4th of July, 1991 at a WXRT concert. He states,

If I remember correctly, after playing for about a half hour, members of the band started snapping at each other, and eventually Westerberg threw up his hands and stalked off the stage. And the Replacements were history.

Along with Husker Du, The Replacements defined the 80s Alt-scene – the influence of which spilled into succeeding generations – Colin Meloy of The Decemberists, REM, Actress Winona Ryder and countless other rockers and social personas have pinpointed that no band has captured the very essence of angst as Paul Westerberg did on Let It Be.

To get it straight, Paul Westerberg is a horrible singer the way Bob Dylan was a horrible singer. Their lyrics; timely instrumental additions made their music.

The album opens up with the track that best defines The Replacements: I Will Dare – the story of what seems to be a relationship-phobic kid that’s willing to take a chance if you’re willing to take one too.
I think Black Diamond is the weakest track on Let It Be – while managing to stay true to the original Paul Stanley, Kiss release, it doesn’t add much weight of its own.
Tales of sexual ambiguity in Androgynous; insecurities seemingly trivial and the sexual come with the delivery of a stand-up comedian in Gary’s Got a Boner and Tommy’s Getting His Tonsil’s Out! The latter of which was about late Tommy Stinson’s fear of the dentist. Unsatisfied – a moving relationship song on the album was what introduced me to The Replacements as I was watching Greg Mottola’s spectacular Adventureland.

– A Spectacular Performance of “Bastards of Young” off their album “Tim”. Bastards of Young was featured in Adventureland as well.

If you’ve ever liked a Green Day album or a Good Charlotte track or anything to do with the alt-rock scene, this is for you. This is your adolescece in 33 mintues, 51 seconds. Good old-fashioned college rock – cum teen-angst cum classic rock. Undefinable, eternal – if not in your collection, then through Simple Plan or Bowling for Soup or whatever mainstream  garbage you listen to.

Megaupload Link! : http://www.megaupload.com/?d=EGH2UAVB – But I prefer you buy this one

Pitchfork have been uploading these awesome video diaries from No Age at ATP in NY. Check them playing Nervous Breakdown with Bob Mould in their hotel room and then also jamming with Bradford Cox (Deerhunter and Atlas Sound fronter who is also part of Karen O and The Kids on the Where The Wild Things Are soundtrack) and Jim Jarmusch (Stranger Than Paradise, Coffee and Cigarettes) in their hotel room.This is all kinds of cool.

Pitchfork have been uploading these awesome video diaries from No Age at ATP in NY. Check them playing Nervous Breakdown with Bob Mould in their hotel room and then also jamming with Bradford Cox (Deerhunter and Atlas Sound fronter who is also part of Karen O and The Kids on the Where The Wild Things Are soundtrack) and Jim Jarmusch (Stranger Than Paradise, Coffee and Cigarettes) in their hotel room.

This is all kinds of cool.

1. Eight Miles High 7″. Hoewel Zen Arcade m’n favoriete album is, en vermoedelijk een van de sleutelplaten in m’n leven, is het beste wat ze ooit opnamen de cover van “Eight Miles High” van The Byrds. De song werd als single uitgebracht en is niet op een album of compilatie terug te vinden. Ooit schreef ik er dit over: “ If you thought that the original version already had an eerie, paranoid vibe to it, I dare you to check out the devastating cry of anxiety that Hüsker Dü’s version is. Although you could label it ‘hardcore punk’, ‘alternative guitar rock’, ‘modern psychedelica’ or whatever, it’s more than just a piece of music. It’s a statement, a gut-turning blast of emotion, a sonic thunderstorm and one of the most intense things you’ll ever hear. The bass intro is replaced by Mould’s distorted guitar, which rages on throughout the entire song. To today’s standard, the song sounds horrible, the Gibson sounds like a blanket of confused noise, the drums sound trebly and the vocals are muffled, but MAN… The Byrds never recorded anything this intensely melancholic, insane and desperate. Mould’s vocals become increasingly manic and by the time he gets to the third verse, he’s barely understandable. During the second part, his vocals might as well be meaningless, nothing but an outcry, howled passion over a dense guitar racket. As Azerrad also argues: at this point, the band went way beyond the confines of “punk”, they were making music you could cry to, music that could turn you upside down, make that made you feel you were alive and alter your perception of music. It’s exactly the core of the song, the honest, bare-naked passion and intensity that’s the key element of all the rock ‘n’ roll that I love. Music doesn’t have to be measured in insane dB-levels, but when its intensity and sincerity are thisreal, it makes more of an impact than any amount of amplifiers can conjure up. Never ever has any song by any artist made such an impression on this guy.”  Hey, ik was wat jonger en nog onnozeler dan nu.
2. Zen Arcade
3. New Day Rising
4. Warehouse: Songs And Stories
5. Flip Your Wig
6. Metal Circus
7. Candy Apple Grey
8. Everything Falls Apart
9. Land Speed Record
10. The Living End

NP: John Zorn – Femina

e a música de hoje é hüsker dü.

Makes No Sense At All (Hüsker Dü)

Walking around with your head in the clouds
Makes no sense at all
Sell yourself short, but you’re walking so tall
Makes no sense at all
Is it important? You’re yelling so loud
Makes no sense at all
Walking around with your head in the clouds
Makes no sense at all
Makes no difference at all

You concern yourself with evidence
It’s evident to me
Well you say you’ve got the tiger by the tail
But I don’t see these things that way

Production gets underway this Saturday in New York, and our very first interview is with none other than Jack Rabid, publisher of The Big Takeover for the past twenty-five years. Along with seeing the Mats “a few dozen times,” Jack deejayed their very first New York gig at the long-defunct Great Gildersleeves (Also on the bill? Fellow Minnesotans, Hüsker Dü, as well as future Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz and his band, Young and Useless). In Jack’s own words: “Used to help drink their rider with them before sound check from 83-85 before it got harder to get backstage. Good guys for sure, but boy, could they put em away. I used to drink one to their five.” Should be a good interview.

The last post brought me here:

This would be the segue:

Grant Hart – You’re the Reflection of the Moon on the Water

Grant Hart is best known for his drumming and writing with Hüsker Dü and for co-founding Nova Mob. This track comes from his fourth solo album, Hot Wax, which came out October 6th. It’s awesome.

“Blonde” by abless on flickr.

Witchy and melodic and also super-strong, with this really wicked organ-and-rides vibe that makes it driving and Doors-y, the song is basically the same four verses repeated and I didn’t even notice until I typed out the lyrics. The music is so insistent that it just seemed natural. Hart has said that the lyrics are inspired by the Dalai Lama and the composition by Patti Smith; both influences are totally there. You’re going to love it! Listen!

You’re the reflection of the moon on the water
You’re the reflection of the moon on the water
You’re the reflection of the moon on the water
but you’re not the moon

You are the scent of the sea on the night wind
You are the scent of the sea on the night wind
You are the scent of the sea on the night wind
but you’re not the sea

You are the shadows from the light of a fire
You are the shadows from the light of a fire
You are the shadows from the light of a fire
but you’re not the light

You are the sound of the rain on the dry earth
You are the sound of the rain on the dry earth
You are the sound of the rain on the dry earth
but you’re not the rain

You’re the reflection of the moon on the water
You’re the reflection of the moon on the water
You’re the reflection of the moon on the water
but you’re not the moon

You are the scent of the sea on the night wind
You are the scent of the sea on the night wind
You are the scent of the sea on the night wind
but you’re not the sea

You are the shadows from the light of a fire
You are the shadows from the light of a fire
You are the shadows from the light of a fire
but you’re not the light

You are the sound of the rain on the dry earth
You are the sound of the rain on the dry earth
You are the sound of the rain on the dry earth
but you’re not the rain

Verses repeat a final time.

Also by abless on flickr.

Undertones: “My perfect cousin”

Hüsker Dü: “Something i learn today”

Bo Diddley – “Hey, Bo Diddley” and “Bo Diddley”

Monks: “Complication”

The Fall: “I can hear the grass grow”(cover do The Move)

This morning brings the news that unemployment has reached double digits for the first time since 1983, rising from 9.8% to 10.2%.  And the U.S. economy has had a net loss of jobs for 22 straight months, the longest on record, dating back 70 years (to, yes, the end of the Great Depression).  There are 15.7 million unemployed, including a record 5.6 million who have been unemployed for six months or more. Since the recession officially began in December 2007, the number of unemployed has more than doubled, by 8.2 million.

The U-6 unemployment rate – which also counts discouraged and marginally attached job-seekers and involuntary part-timers – is now at an alarming 17.5%.  That’s the highest in the fifteen years that the government has been keeping track of that alternative measure.

Construction, manufacturing, retail trade, and transportation accounted for the bulk of the job losses.  To the extent that there is a bright side, temporary help services and health care services saw increased employment in October.

And if it’s any consolation, the actual unemployment rate, before making the standard seasonal adjustment (because unemployment tends to be higher in autumn) was “only” 9.5% for September and October.

In a not-altogether-unrelated development, labor productivity growth rocketed by 9.5% in the last quarter, about four times its normal rate of growth and the fastest increase since 2003 (i.e., since the aftermath of the 2001 recession).  This includes a whopping 13.6% increase in labor productivity in manufacturing, the largest since 1987.  This is ambiguous news: labor productivity, or output per hour worked, is ultimately the foundation of our standard of living, so rising productivity is basically a good thing.  But in recessionary times, for productivity to be growing almost three times as fast as output (GDP grew 3.5% last quarter), it means firms are producing more with less labor, which obviously does not do much to benefit the laid-off workers.  It may also just mean that firms have a lot of excess capacity, so workers have more capital to work with, which makes them more productive.  And indeed, industrial capacity utilization remains low, at about 70% or less since April, compared with the norm of 80%.  Daniel Indiviglio of The Atlantic provides more perspective on the productivity surge.

Not good, especially given that most forecasts are for a very slow recovery that could take a long, long time to restore the unemployment rate to pre-recession levels.  Paul Krugman says that even the much-touted 3.5% GDP growth of the last quarter is not nearly enough – it would take about a decade of 3.5% annualized GDP growth to bring us to full employment.  A decade of high unemployment is best termed not a “jobless recovery,” but a depression.

1. Minutemen – Double Nickels On The Dime
2. Hüsker Dü – Zen Arcade
3. Black Flag – Damaged
4. Dinosaur Jr. – You’re Living All Over Me
5. Sonic Youth - Sister
6. Meat Puppets – II
7. Saccharine Trust – We Became Snakes
8. Bad Brains – I Against I
9. fIREHOSE – if’n
10. Descendents – Milo Goes To College

NP: Califone – All My Friends Are Funeral Singers

Home Improvements [1994] <- Download

Formado em 1992 pelo guitarrista Otis “O” Bartholomeu e o baixista Josh Higgins — ex-membros do Olivelawn —, o Fluf é fruto da diversificada cena de San Diego do início dos anos 90. Home Improvements, de 1994, é o segundo dos cinco álbuns do grupo, sucedendo a estréia Mangravy. A afeição pelo Hüsker Dü é óbvia nas melhores faixas, começando pela abertura Sticky Bun. Assinalam-se também tendências mais troglodíticas, que colocam o Fluf em sintonia com o stoner rock, então em gestação. Não por acaso, o baterista do Olivelawn, Eddie Glass, na mesma época assumia a guitarra do Fu Manchu — que mais tarde abandonaria para dar à luz o Nebula.

Fluf - Sticky Bun
Fluf - Snapper
Fluf - Twister

]]> http://crixcraxcrux.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/608/ Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:57:30 +0000 James Lafayette Delgado ("Jimmy") Riggs http://crixcraxcrux.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/608/

Listen up chumps.

There are bands and there are bands. The music scene is crazy. Bands start up each and every day. I saw another one just the other day.

No hace mucho que mi sobrino adolescente empezo a darle al patín, me ha costado lo suyo, pero finalmente se ha visto atrapado por su encanto, evoluciona con rapidez y ha empezado a interesarse por todo lo relacionado con la cultura skate. Hara unas semanas lo sorprendí escuchando a los Clash, de algun modo me sentí orgulloso, le pregunte al instante que le parecian y me comento que le gustaban mucho, no me lo podia creer, le dije que tenia esos discos en vinilo lo que devino en una cara de extrañeza….¿vinilo?. En cualquier caso pasados unos dias me llamo para que le grabara algo de musica para patinar, sí tito sí, esa musica que tu escuchas, le comente que yo escuchaba todo tipo de musica aunque evidentemente sabia a que se refería. Inmediatamente me puse a grabarle cuatro o cinco discos que considero fundamentales, al menos para un adolescente con una cierta inquietud contracultural. No podia ser de otro modo, el primer disco que se me vino a la cabeza era obvio, los que os sintais identificado con lo que os cuento sabreis a quienes me refiero. Seguidamente me puse a buscar y rebuscar para acompañar esos discos con un recopilatorio de skate rock, o lo que yo entiendo por skate rock,  aunque este termino simplifique en mucho la magnitud de algunas de estas bandas. Desconozco los gustos musicales del adolescente skaterino actual, pero a los que fuisteis parte de este movimiento hace ya algunos años seguro que lo que vais a escuchar os removera todo por dentro.

No estan todos los que son, pero si son todos los que estan, muchas son bandas miticas, clasicos del genero, otros poco o nada tienen que ver con el mundillo skate aunque si formaron parte de la epoca, para mi claro.

Skate rock comp. (Folk Core)

1. Milk “The knife song”

2. Fugazy “Waiting room”

3. Descendents “Coolidge”

4. Operation Ivy “Sound system”

5. Circle Jerks “Wild in the streets”

6. Doggy Style “Dont hit me up”

7. Ramones “Bonzo goes to bitburg”

8. The Jam “The modern world”

9. Dinosaur Jr “Just like heaven”

10. Angry  Samoans “Time has come”

11. Black Flag “TV party”

12. Wonderful Broken Things ” Roam around”

13. Kirk and the jerks “One way to do it”

14. Lemonheads “Amazing grace”

15. Sub Society “A lot less”

16. Operation Ivy “Knowledge”

17. Kirk and the Jerks “To be a hero”

18. Lemonheads “Ever”

19. Husker Du “First of the last calls”

20. Wipe Out Skaters “Cañonazo”

21. Devil Dogs “Be tru to your school”

22. Barracudas “I cant pretend”

23. Raunch Hands “Live for the sun”

24. Descendents “GCF”

25. Corn Flakes “I believe in you

26.Milk “Theres a war” (by Jason Lee)

27. Wonderful Broken things “Trains”

Aqui os dejo el enlace Skate Rock Comp.

]]> http://20watts.wordpress.com/2009/10/21/editors-pick-192-our-band-could-be-your-life/ Wed, 21 Oct 2009 19:00:22 +0000 20watts http://20watts.wordpress.com/2009/10/21/editors-pick-192-our-band-could-be-your-life/

Bands like The Replacements (above), Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr. and The Minutemen are featured in Our Band Could Be Your Life

Will there ever be another era in independent music like the ’80s and early ’90s? I think not, and Michael Azerrad’s Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground, 1981-1991 hopes to explain why. This book, published a decade later in 2001, attempts to explain and elaborate on the underground indie music scenes that defined the bands that today enjoy mainstream popularity.

Our Band Could Be Your Life focuses on thirteen disproportionately influential bands. None of them enjoyed any sort of mainstream success, but through constant touring, prolific recording, fanzine exposure and other methods of getting noticed, they all sired the bands that we today consider music gods (indie or mainstream).

Without Hüsker Dü, there could be no Pixies. Without Big Black, industrial rock wouldn’t be around. Without Black Flag, Green Day would probably have been a Cheap Trick cover band. Without The Replacements, The Decemberists literally wouldn’t exist. Without Sonic Youth and every other band mentioned in the book, Nirvana wouldn’t have changed the way we listen to music.

In The Replacements’ Let It Be’s 33 1/3, Colin Meloy mentions listening to Let It Be incessantly to get over the self-consciousness over his extended sternum. Books like this one and the 33 1/3 series are both interesting and informative. Speaking from experience, having a working knowledge of a musical genre’s history adds a lot to any critique. We salute you, Mike Azerrad.

– Eric Vilas-Boas, Managing Editor

Bob Mould, American guitarist and vocalist for Hüsker Dü, Sugar

Indie Rock is a term given originally to artists of independent status. In other words bands who ran themselves, smalltime labels, small distribution and with no help from major labels. Like all things in the end the corporate moved on this term like a rash, and started to brandish the term ‘indie rock’ referring to younger, newer artists, typically playing retro guitars and amps and shying away from the modern look, a small leather jacket is standard.

Indie rock is a genre of alternative rock that most notably exists in the independent underground music scene. It primarily refers to rock musicians that are or were unsigned, or have signed to independent record labels, rather than major record labels. Genres or subgenres often associated with indie rock include lo-fi, post-rock, sadcore, C86, and math rock, to list but a few; other related (and sometimes overlapping) categories include shoegazing and indie pop. Indie rock artists place a premium on maintaining complete control of their music and careers, releasing albums on independent record labels (sometimes their own) and relying on touring, word-of-mouth, and airplay on independent or college radio stations for promotion. Some end up moving to major labels, often on favorable terms won by their prior independent success.

Radiohead – One of the few major bands who control their output

In the United Kingdom, indie music charts have been compiled since the early 1980s. Initially, the charts featured bands that emerged with a form of guitar-based alternative rock that dominated the indie charts, particularly indie pop artists such as Aztec Camera and Orange Juice, the C86 jangle-pop movement and the twee pop of Sarah Records artists. Some definitive British indie rock bands of the 1980s were The Smiths, The Stone Roses and The Jesus and Mary Chain, whose music directly influenced 1990s alternative rock movements such as shoegazing and Britpop.

In the United States, the music commonly regarded as indie rock is descended from an alternative rock scene largely influenced by the movements of the 1970s and early 1980s and their DIY ethic. In the 1980s the term “indie rock” was particularly associated with the abrasive, distortion-heavy sounds of Hüsker Dü, Dinosaur Jr, Sonic Youth, Big Black, and others that populated American indie labels, separating them from jangly college rock bands like R.E.M. and 10,000 Maniacs, who, by the end of the decade, were signed to major labels. The late eighties band Pixies is said to be the main influence in 1990s-present indie rock

Shellac Yesterday

With Arts Council funding for some independent bands, and an increasing range of advertising and commercial opportunities to distribute music, few popular acts are wholly independent. However indie music in the UK has perhaps benefited from the relatively broad overlap between ‘mainstream’ and ‘indie’ music genres. Radiohead release their music independently, do not accept corporate sponsorship and continue to make music which is experimental. They are also popular and well-known. There are many artists who make original, distinctive music, without aiming for mainstream success, in genres such as grime music. In this sense, the UK retains a tradition of creating original, experimental music, which has one eye on achieving mainstream success without being subsumed by major music corporations.

Indie Band Equipment

Often artists will record on old or poor recording equipment, ostensibly out of financial necessity but also due to the unique aural association such technologies have with “authenticity”, an association created in listeners by exposure to years of demo, bootleg, and field recordings, as well as to older pop studio recordings produced more simply. The growth in lo-fi coincided with the growth of extreme slickness and polish associated with the multitrack pop recording techniques of the 1980s. Cassette technology such as Tascam’s four-track Portastudio became widely available. Prime early exponents included Daniel Johnston, New Zealand bands such as the Tall Dwarfs, who recorded on Tascam 4-tracks.

Guitars & Amps

The guitar simply cannot be an Ibanez, a Dean or anything spikey for that matter!, Fender , Gibcon, Gretsch all the traditional names. It helps if it  looks like it was possibly bought in a thrift shop circa 74′. The amplifier must be valve, preferably a Fender Twin, a Vox AC30 or something of that nature, a modelling POD just will just not cut the scene!

Lets take a look at Jonny Greenwood from Radiohead (circa200)

White Lies Gear Guide:

Here’s the White Lies equipment that we managed to spot: Roland A-37 MIDI Controller, Fender Telecaster with Bigsby, Fender Thinline Telecaster, Gibson ES-335, Boss RV-5 Delay Reverb, Boss TU-2 Tuner, Electro Harmonix Graphic Fuzz, Electro Harmonix Big Muff, Line 6 DL4 Delay and an Electro-Harmonix Holy Grail (sadly now discontinued, replaced by the Holy Grail Plus). Guitarist Harry McVeigh also uses a Hiwatt Hi-Gain Head Amp into a white Marshall 412 cab. Cool.

* Post-punk revival: Placebo, Arctic Monkeys, The View, Maxïmo Park, Franz Ferdinand,Editors, The Cribs, Razorlight, Royal Joker, The Killers, Kaiser Chiefs, Bloc Party, The Futureheads, Interpol, Boy Kill Boy, Dirty Pretty Things, The Wombats, TV on the Radio,The Fratellis, Spoon, The Bravery
* Garage rock revival: The White Stripes, The Vines, The Strokes, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, The Subways, The Libertines, The Hives, Ikara Colt, Motel Motel, Mclusky, Mooney Suzuki, The Horrors, The Von Bondies, The Black Keys, Dirty Little Rabbits, The Raconteurs, Johnossi, Modest Mouse, Little Joy
* Dance-punk: Death From Above 1979, Metric, MGMT, The Rapture, Klaxons, The Presets, MSTRKRFT, You Say Party! We Say Die!, Shitdisco, Hot Chip, LCD Soundsystem, New Young Pony Club, !!!, Q and Not U, Foals, Does It Offend You, Yeah?, Cut Copy, VHS or Beta, The Faint
Additional, less clearly defined genres include:
* Baroque pop: Arcade Fire, Danielson Famile, Sufjan Stevens, The Decemberists, Dry Paint, John Vanderslice, Broken Social Scene, Stars, Cloud Cult, Vampire Weekend, Ra Ra Riot
* New prog: Mew, Porcupine Tree, a.P.A.t.T., Muse, The Mars Volta, Coheed and Cambria, The Secret Machines, Los Hermanos, Battles, People in Planes, Doves,Mystery Jets,Oceansize, Pure Reason Revolution
* Post-rock: Explosions in the Sky, Pelican, Sigur Rós, Mogwai, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Slint, Tortoise, Mono, 65 Days Of Static, iLiKETRAiNS, God Is an Astronaut
* Indie folk: The Dodos, Iron and Wine, Fleet Foxes, Motel Motel, Mount Eerie, Beirut, Bright Eyes, Vetiver, Feist, Bon Iver, Noah and the Whale, Damien Rice, Okkervil River

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If there’s one band, besides The Shins circa Oh, Inverted World, that facilitated my transition from commercial meat-head to underground weirdo, it’s Tora! Tora! Torrance!, a five piece from Minnesota with enough originality coursing through their veins to infect the 1,000 lakes.

Over the course of two albums, Get Into It and A Cynics Nightmare, TTT laid waste to all notion of the pop/punk/rock template, bending their strings and crushing their drum heads on an island previously inhabited by groups like Scritti Politti, Richard Hell and The Voidods, Husker Du, Swell Maps and Notekillers.

See if this wets your whistle:

– Bratty, ridiculously campy snot-punk vocals that can only be achieved with both nostrils plugged
– two guitar shredders apt enough to combine their angular picking into one lumbering beast that is the audio equivalent to a bustling anthill
– a bass player with the skill to not only keep up with the guitarists but actually eclipse them at times
– flailing drum beats that always mind the crash cymbal and always get the head lurching

Five equal points meeting in the middle: It’s a balance every band strives to attain, yet so few achieve it. So delicate, so fleeting, so hunted to extinction is group Oneness. Yet here it was, present in a scrappy, unlikely group of dudes, half of whom probably don’t even play music anymore (if I’m wrong correct me).

And that’s why I’m here: To keep the torch burning. Tora! Tora! Torrance! might not be one of those bands that people talk about in the same breathe as genre mates like Drive Like Jehu, Appleseed Cast and Thursday, but they had the music to match the former and flat-out best the latter.

R.I.P.