Yay, welcome back to reality everyone!  Something about stuffing your face with turkey and pie for days upon days makes going to back to work/school really difficult.  But hey, Christmas is right around the corner, and the good news is, there’s plenty of music happening in Austin this week.

Monday, November 30th

The Finest Kind, Erin Ivey

A very interesting combination of music today at the Ghost Room; dub reggae meets folksy Austin vibes.  Doors open at 6 pm.  For cost info, contact the Ghost Room.

Jackson Browne: Solo Acoustic

Yeah, you know you know all the songs…check out Browne on tour supporting his latest album at the Bass Concert Hall tonight at 8 pm.  Tickets are $29.50 – $49.50 and you can still get them here.

Tuesday, December 1st

Del The Funky Homosapien

The entertaining rapper will perform with an entourage of support singers at Ace’s Lounge tomorrow night.  Doors at 9 pm, tickets are $18-$20 and you can pick them up here.

Metric

The Canadian electro-rock band comes to La Zona Rosa tomorrow supporting their album Fantasies (and if you missed my review of it, read it here).  Doors open at 9 pm, tickets are $23-$25 and you can buy them here.

Wednesday, December 2nd

Skinny Puppy, Vverevvolf Grehv

Classic experimental industrial-metal rock at Emo’s.  Doors open at 8 pm.  Tickets are $25-$30 and you can buy them here.

The best album cover ever?

Last night on VH1 Europe they did a countdown of the top 25 albums of all time.  Prince made no. 3, and, inevitably, I guess, Thriller made no. 1.  But REM’s automatic for the people made no. 2.  What I found very weird about this, is that people since about the mid 90s have been intentionally forgetting that, between the period 1977-1995, ‘mainstream’ rock, or ‘establishment’ rock, was cosidered by the listening public to be entirely different from ‘alternative’ rock.  At least, that was the case in the US.  In britain, they always seemed to blur the line more, and ‘alternative’ acts often scored top 10 hits, which in the US happened much more infrequently.  But there was still a clear idea that alternative was alternative, and mainstream was mainstream.  And today, people realize this when shopping for music on Amazon:  i.e., “the killers” and DCFC are known to be ‘alternative,’ with ‘emo’ in the latter’s case being a subgenre of alternative:  and everyone has always known that Prince belongs in an entirely different category (of its own–file under ‘weird.’) 

So why are people conflating alternative and ‘pop’ music, to the point where I often hear people lump together alternative with ‘pop,’ so as to distinguish it from ‘R&B’ and ’Dance?’  To do so, I argue, is to entirely miss the point of the ‘altnertive’ movement.  In its heyday, every single person who listened to alternative was aware that it was ‘counter-cultural.’  In essence, alternative contiued the 1960s and 70s trend, which was anti-establishment, and went along with, in some form or another, the popular marxism of the day, which was highly suspicious of corporations, and thus, the record industry.  This of course, presupposes that its listeners have the mental apparatus to appreciate social complexity–to understand society as a system, and/or who are concerned to be articulate about their interation with the world.  Pop music proper, is therefore ‘for the masses,’, i.e., for the majority of people, who, unfortunately, do not have either the will or the IQ power to grapple with complex responses to their environment.  That’s why pop music, e.g. Elvis and Michael Jackson, is generally lyrically incredibly banal.  Both the 60s protest stuff, and, punk, and alternative, and now, things like emo, are thus distinguished by their more sophisticated lyrics.  So, what we are talking about here, then, is music for those who are fortunate enough to have the apparatus and desire to engage with lyrics.  Unfortunately, after 1995, lyrics went out of style (see below) and the entire culture’s level of articulateness, I would argue, has suffered since then.   

By the time that alternative came of age, however, I would argue that it had become much more personal.  While the 60s and 70s Woodstock stuff was decidedly public music – to be performed live, e.g., the doors–and often had impersonal lyrics (e.g. Bob Marley– cryin’ lion zion…. what the hey is that all about?), by the 80s, the goth movement brought music into the bedroom, i.e., into the personal minds of the listener.  Morrissey of course puts it best:  ’When I lay in awe on my bedroom floor,” etc. 

Many people put punk together with alternative, but I see a divergence from the beginning.  Groups like Joy Division and the Cure and Souxsie were always much more cerebral, sensitive, and appealed more to the introspective person, rather than punk, which was often so absurd as to be a simple testosterone fest, despite it’s often radical-marxist lyrics.  In short, I think that punk sucks, becasue though it was perhaps good that someone was doing it, i.e., being socially aware in their music, I believe that their methods, which were essentially violent and anarchist, are inherently self-defeating.  Thus I have never been drawn to it. 

Alternative, on the other hand, foregrounded the individal emotional and (crucially) intellectual response to the world, and thus, can be seen as a re-visioning of the eighteenth-century Cult of Sensibility, which was spearheaded by Goethe, and was then brought to fruition by authors such as Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Jane Austen, and Keats, who, for the first time in history, asserted that the experience of the individual (particularly of the sensitive individual) truly mattered.  The artist figure, the thinker, the solitary philosopher, was worth listening to, they argued, and this could be anyone–not simply the great.  This encouraged reading and thinking and sensitive people everywhere to stop being deferent to their social superiors, and to really take their own inner dialogue seriously.  This is arguably a very crucial step on the way towards mass democracy. 

And this is why I’m interested in alternative music, from the point of view of this site.  I belive that the 1970s and 80s saw a massive increase in the sensibilities of young thinking people–they grew up in households with more money, for one, and they had more opportunities to travel and to interact with other cultures than ever before.  And they had leisure, and many of them, in Britain and the US, studied the arts, even just in high school, this was done seriously, with an emphasis on text, on poetry and literature, and this encouraged many people once again to take this inner dialogue seriously.  Arguably, the 80s bedroom revolution was quite similar to the romantic revolution which emerged after the french revolution:  a public revolution went bust, and so artist figures, who had been so engaged and so inspired by the public’s prospects, now retreated into their own minds, and continued to hold the ideals of the revolution there, in their own private spheres, until such a time as they might once again find public times propitious for their goals of reform, and remaking. 

This is precisely what the 80s bedroom revolutionaries did, and more.  They saw that the 60s and 70s had failed in many ways to produce anything lasting and concrete, besides a welcome liberalization of society–which should not be underestimated.  But they saw instinctually (I did as a high schooler, and I know my alternative friends did), that the political aims of the hippie revolution were largely unfulfilled, swallowed up by the wave of conservativism brought about by reagan (and thatcher).  And so, we moved inward.  We still had ideals, we still cherished the idea of reform–very much so.  But we also began to realize, through introspecton, that our own selves really truly mattered:  our own emotions, thoughts, etc.  But what made the alternative age different from today, ‘the post alternative age,’ is that today’s emo people, I think, have grown up in an entirely self-serving society, which is almost devoid of the ideal of social reform.  In the 80s, there was still some of that public idealism left.  And it made us idealistic, in the best possible way.  We believed that, by reforming ourselves, we could reform the world, make it better.  (see this website–it’s basically proof that i’m still working in that mode). 

I believe that, after about 1995, these ideals basically died, in a big way, in popular culture, and what we’ve been left with is a culture devoid of public ideals.  It’s therefore all been about the desires of the individual, and thus, is essentially unsophisticated:  it’s all egotism.  Emo people are the intelligent version of the ‘gimme’ school.  But their lyrics are still essentially whining–with no underlying vision.  If you have no social dimension to what you do and think, it’s very difficult for this to be progressive–it is inherently centrifugal, I think.  And then, the less articulate version of this has been the triumph of hip hop, which, for reasons we’ll have to leave for elsewhere, has been almost entirely egotistical and self serving, especially after the few attempts in the 80s to make it political (in which case it was tied to the alternative music ethic– NWA and Public Enemy, e.g., did have much that was political in them–but after about ‘93, any impetus to put the political into music fell away, and hip hop returned to simple braggadocio, and glorification of violence, and domination of women–which, when one loses idealism, is all that’s left).

So, to put a time scale on it: i’d say

1950s:  rock invented, in US and britain.

1960s-early 70s:  protest rock– the first ‘alternative rock.’

1977-present.  Punk.  Angry marxist progressiveness.  Ultimately self-defeating.

1977-1995.  Golden Age of Alternative.  Lyrics were foregrounded, personal experience was foregrounded, but enough idealism remained from the 70s age of popular Marxism, that people genuinely wanted to make the world a better place.

1992- Grunge makes its debut.  Mixes alternative with testosterone rock.  Beginning of the end of alternative music.  After this, sensitive artists begin to avoid lyrics.

mid-1990s.  Age of ‘acid jazz’ ‘house’ – etc.  Club music draws the best and the brighest.  But it is a-lyrical, and so, essentially, the age of social engagement fizzles, quite rapidly.  And with it, idealism.  Idealistic music is no longer fashionable.  The only alternative bands who are still producing major albums are some of what we used to call B-quality bands:  i.e., Radiohead and Bjork.  They sucked compared with the giants of the alternative era, but their manneristic squeaking and shapeless music went well with the new anti-lyrical fashion, and so they became huge.

2000-present.  With internet, a great variety of musical styles, but, it’s still true that, when the lyric comes back into fashion, it is now almost entirely personal.  Political, social, progressive agendas are entirely out, and so the music never rises above the purely juvenile.  Whereas Morrissey and Ian Curtis’ poetry has the power of Wordsworth to engage us, and incite us, to think idealistically, the (admittedly good) lyrics of Death Cab for Cutie, or worse, the banal lyrics of the White Stripes, and the Yeah yeah yeahs, never rise above the purely personal of the high school student’s poetry:

‘yesterday i saw a couple/kissing by the train platform/they were so beautiful/i wondered where they were going.’

Etc.  This is drivel–because it’s purely of personal interest.  It has no idealism, thus, no universalism, and that is the essence of good poetry.

So, my argument, then, is that grunge killed alternative, and after that, we hear people talking of ‘rock being in the shitter’ (trent reznor, 1999–unfortunately his album of that year did nothing to rescue it–the inspiration had died–the age of idealism was largely over).  And until the culture once again recovers idealism, it will continue to stay in the shitter.  Read around on this site, and you’ll see how idealism and moving, real, gripping, engaging art have always been entirely intertwined with one another. 

Thus, all of the following albums, from 1977 to about the grunge era (let’s say 1995–though i do include some grunge), are filled with idealism, even if their lyrics do not explicitly sound that way at all.  And a few albums that come after this time have managed to keep some of that idealism, and so they are included here as well.  Even the industrial music which was a subgenre of alternative in the latter part of this period was not anything like ‘white zombie’ or ’tool’ which came later, and which are genuinely antisocial, antihumanist, and violent–and thus antidemocratic.  I would argue, then, that Skinny Puppy is highly idealistic and progressive, while Maynard what’s-his-name’s “Tool”, which dominated the 90s niche formerly held by bands like Skinny Puppy, replaced it with an entirely anti-idealistic, self-destructive, even psychotic atmosphere, which I argue, still holds the dominant position in our society today (see my post on violence condoning torture for more on this).   Ok, then without further ado (and knowing that we’ll have to discuss these choices at a future time):  here would be my top 25 alternative/industrial albums of all time (and it’s basically ridiculous to put them in order, I think):

Dead Can Dance-  Serpent’s Egg, or Spiritchaser; 10,000 Maniacs – Our Time in Eden; The Cure- The Top; Joy Division- Substance; New Order – Substance; Belle & Sebastian – Tigermilk; Depeche Mode – Violator; Pixies – Doolittle; Loreena McKennitt – The Visit; Smashing Pumpkins – Gish; Tori Amos – Little Earthquakes; The Smiths- Louder than Bombs; Magnetic Fields – 69 Love Songs; The National – The National; REM – Document or Automatic for the People; Skinny Puppy – Mind:  The Perpetual Intercourse; Cocteau Twins – Heaven or Las Vegas; Sundays – Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic; Ministry - Live:  In case you didn’t feel like showing up;  Moby – Play; St. Germain-St. Germain (a-lyrical, but idealistic); Coldplay – Rush of Blood to the Head; Death Cab for Cutie – Plans; Enya – Watermark; Sarah McLachlan – Fumbling Towards Ecstasy; Nine Inch Nails – Downward Spiral or Pretty Hate Machine.  Lisa Gerard – The Mirror Pool.

Ok, that’s 27.  But what most of these have in common, is that they are beautiful, sublime, epic, and/or highly idealistic.  They are not essentially violent (even Ministry-I’d argue), but essentially the opposite–egalitarian, democratic, progressive, empathetic.  They strive for the good, the beautiful, the just.  And so they receive the Platonist’s seal of approval.

In 7 days, I will be seeing Skinny Puppy for the first time. I am still shocked that I was put on the guest list because I answered questions about masonry on the phone. They are also sending me Beyond The Vault. I am going to send them Liber ABA, Liber Aleph, The Vision & the Voice With Commentary and Other Papers: The Collected Diaries of Aleister Crowley, 1909-1914 E.V., and Duncan’s Ritual of Freemasonry (I know it’s not the best).

I love how I never face resistance with people that are secular or not knowledgeable at all about the occult and Crowley.

A finales de los 80 en pleno estallido de la escena alternativa surgió un grupo que fusionaba el techno oscuro de grupos como Skinny Puppy y la furia industrial de Ministry dándole un toque más accesible. Liderados por Trent Reznor, bueno en realidad Trent Reznor es Nine Inch Nails, pronto acapararon la atención de las masas pero lo hicieron a su manera. Ofreciendo unos shows espectaculares y arrolladores y publicando discos matadores , uno detrás de otro, desde su debut Pretty Hate Machine, más techno a su siguiente mini L.P. , Broken lleno de guitarras y mala ostia hasta quizás su obra maestra , The Downward Spiral, toda una obra de arte de destrucción masiva. No menos arrolladores son sus directos. Legendario fué su concierto en Woodstock donde arrasaron con todo literal, desde la interpretación de las canciones a  su set de escena , sin duda fué el punto culminante de su carrera, aunque lo que vendría después no desmerece en absoluto su trayectoria, empezando por su doble disco The Fragile, más ambicioso e introspectivo, o los posteriores With Teeth, Year Zero, o The Slip, más maduros quizás aunque rebosantes de calidad, algo muy difícil de encontrar en los tiempos que corren. Trent Reznor a anunciado un receso para NIN que esperemos no dure mucho…O estamos jodidos, les necesitamos como el respirar.

The U.K. legends of Electro-Punk/EBM are at it again. They are now finalizing their next full-length album of all new material. John Whybrew of PorCon has said, “this will be our most confident, muscular, and our best work to date!”. That alone is reason for any fan of the electronic music scene to get exited. These guys have been making superb quality music since the late 1970’s. With club chart toppers such as, “The Great Divide”, “Hardman” and the most recent, “Amnesia”.

Portion Control has always been a leader in the Electro world, having directly directly influenced (and name checked) by the likes of Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails, Frontline Assembly, Skinny Puppy, and Orbital to name a few.

The band has taken a brief pause from their live performance and touring so they can focus on completing the album, and working on other related visual projects. The album is scheduled to finished in the next few weeks and to be released worldwide by their label partner, Sigsaly Transmissions. We expect to see the album hit the streets in January 2010.

The band has also recently completed an overhaul of their website (portion-control.net). Improved navigation, content, and a new CD/MP3/Merch shop where you can get tons of music in high quality digital audio and CD. Check out the web site, and you may just find the free Mp3 “Harderman”.

Check out these videos of Portion Control in action:

I went through an excruciating break-up this past spring and it impeded my watching Repo! The Genetic Opera for months and months (and months). Bad break-ups tend to have that effect on me; they render me incapable of subjecting myself to things that remind me of the breaker-upper. Now, over half a year later, I’ve finally watched it and while I think it’s a work of genius I also marvel at how the songs I love best on the OST could have been recorded more than ten years ago. Look, things move fast these days (thank you, internet). The 90s already seem hopelessly dated. In the 90s I identified as a goth/rivethead hybrid with my toes dipping in the punk pool, and in my opinion the best song on the Repo! soundtrack (in my opinion) is Zydrate Anatomy, but it sounds as though it could easily be the result of a(nother) side project via Jorgenson/Ogre/Reznor/Connelly/Rankin circa 1992 (or maybe an offering from My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult). Not that that’s a bad thing. I still love me some Pigface, truefax.

What it’s done is inspire me to re-listen to Skinny Puppy’s Remix Dys Temper, an album of remixes by non-Puppies. Now I want to hit the clubs and start a career as a DJ. I should really look into that. I have a pretty great old school Industrial and Goth collection. This town never had particularly great DJs when I used to go out. I’m not sure how one gets into that racket but I’m going to look into it. My apocryphal significant other Carlos (D.) used to frequently spin records (yes, RECORDS. No CDs allowed. That makes me hard as hell.) and while the one set I have access to is fantastic, I’d lean more heavily toward the Goth/Industrial genre. Not that there’s anything wrong with mixing it up a bit. An online friend of mine who’s half my age downloaded said set and her mother (who is my age) burst into her room in raptures when she heard it seeping out from under the bedroom door and insisted of listening to the whole 2 hour set. The man’s got talent. Oh, did this post just sneakily turn into a Carlos D post? Be prepared, that’s going to happen. A lot. Fair warning.

[You can download Carlos D's  set at The Guggenheim  here (pt.1) and here (pt.2).]

My new friend, Melker the panda.

Idag har jag faktiskt  inte sovit till 4, istället har jag varit i skolan och haft engelska, sovit några timmar på dagen, och kollat på film. Engelsk grammatik är så jävla drygt, vilket jävla miffo kom egentligen på att singular på svenska ska va plural på engelska? Det är bara förvirrande.

Filmen heter Requiem for a Dream, och den var väldigt bra. Knarkig och flummig, en film helt i min smak.

Idag fick jag mig en ny vän, han heter Melker och råkar vara en panda.

Sömn är extremt överskattat, tänk vad mycket tid man förlorar egentligen. Skinny Puppy däremot är inte överskattade, de kan helt ärligt vara ett av världens bästa band.

He had about 4 to 5 different costumes throughout the entire performance.

Lots more photos always posted on my LiveJournal. I posted one Skinny Puppy picture on my Flickr {might not be viewable yet} – If not, then here it is, just click to see big version

We are going to see Skinny Puppy tonight at the GlassHouse!

© Skinny Puppy

Very busy weekend filled with excitement, fun, friends, family, etc!! Skinny Puppy tonight with cool opening acts. Tomorrow lots of shopping in Los Angeles and other areas…. Halloween night our guys Burning Image take the Stage at Robertos in ChinaTown – Los Angeles, CA. along with a lot of other bands, dj’s, and the list goes on….

This Halloween flyer was made by ME & was used to promote this event.

I can’t wait to get dressed up! I dress up everyday but it’s always extra fun right before a show.

*kiss kiss*

El Grupo que redefinió los parámetros de la música eléctronica e Industrial llevándolos a otro nivel. Tanto a nivel Musical como visual todo es impactante en Skinny Puppy , cualquiera de sus conciertos es un viaje más allá de lo que un concierto de Rock es normalmente. Oscuros, profundos , arrolladores cada disco es una obra maestra con pasajes que van desde lo ambiental al más desenfrenado ataque de guitarras y percusiones que puedas digerir . Tras un receso motivado por la muerte de Dwayne R. Goettel, teclista y programador , en el que Nivek Ogre , cantante y Cevin kEy aprovecharon para participar en múltiples proyectos casi todos interesantes, volvieron a la carga con un espectacular directo grabado en el Festival Doomsday de Dresden , y a continuación nos ofrecieron uno de sus más espectaculares discos en estudio, The Greater Wrong Of The Right, aunque prácticamente todos tienen ese calificativo, aunque quizás sea The Procces donde alcanzaron la cima a nivel creativo. Vuelven a estar de gira y a ver si de una puta vez alguien los trae a España.

Bauhaus has been my secret well of inspiration for years. they are poppy but unnerving-ly independent. over the course of their original career (which yielded 4 of the best ‘proto-goth’ albums ever) they crafted a sound that would later go on to be mutated and bled by bands like Skinny Puppy, Siouxsie Sioux, and even Rusty Hack-Saw Project. this could have been enough for the members. they could have rested on that and lived out full lives. but they didnt. they got back together in the mid 2000’s and wrote what i would argue is their most enveloping work.

‘Go Away White’ was written and recorded within 18 days, and is comprised of all first take jams. normally that would make me fear about the quality of the album. but not this time.

the album is a whirlwind of distortion and dub influenced bass. the groves are shattered and dusted with distortion overwhelming white noise, razor sharp guitar, and most of all, Peter Murphy’s vampyric voice. his voice elicits a whole range of emotions, and drags memories out of the listener by force. there is a magic to this album that isnt found on their other (slightly) more focused efforts. back when they were a band the first time they did try to write a little more before someone hit the record button. as a result the chaotic serenity of their unified playing was regimented a little too tightly. here everything seems to boil over on every track.

some of the more stand out tracks are;

‘Adrenaline’

this song is a grinding grooving monster that touches on a genre which i have titled as ‘Rusty’. it is sharp, blunt, harsh, and soothing all at once. the pounding bass-line lulls you as the rest of the song sneaks around and burns you to the floor.

‘International Bulletproof Talent’

this song is classic Bauhaus… just older, meaner, and strangely more organic. the song sounds like it could be ‘Bela Lagosi’s Dead’’s yellow eyed older brother. the one that beats up little Bela and steals his allowance.

‘Endless Summer of the Damned’

white noise done perfectly.

‘Mirror Remains’

this song is the song that would play in the hospital waiting room when i am laying in a bed dying. its light muzak feel twists in a deformed and demented way with the slashed amp guitar and Murphy’s lazy disinterested voice. this is the sound you hear right before you die a degrading and slow death int he sterile whiteness of a hospital.

the album has a solidly ‘peachy’ or ‘melancholy’ tone in comparison to their older material. but with a name like ‘Go Away White’ you wonder if that was a conscious choice.

i think it was.

For this very special edition of Heavy Rotation, I’ve decided to run down my top 5 all-time favorite bands. These are the bands that soundtracked my second childhood, which started as soon as I exited my first childhood/family home.

I was a little behind the times, musically speaking. My parents were very religious which meant that rock (denoted as “secular”) was forbidden and so any music I heard was piped in by a Walkman under my pillow. I did get to listen to Christian rock, which is… well, it’s just fucking terrible stuff. Hank Hill said it best (referring to Christian rockers): “You’re not making music better. You’re just making Christianity worse.”

Consequently, I stumbled onto my favorite bands often after they had already broken up. (Never mind the bittersweet feeling of having lived long enough to see many of them reform, but at the time it seemed a little unfair.)

First listened to the Pixies in 1993. Their last album was released in 1991. The Cure? 1992. Their last album? Well, they’ve had many “last” albums, but for all intents and purposes, Disintegration (1989) was their last great one. The JAMC? 1993. Their next album, Stoned and Dethroned, had me swear off any purchases of their future albums. Love & Rockets? 1993. At that point they were four years removed from the success of So Alive and on permanent hiatus. Skinny Puppy? 1993. Last Rights was one year old and the band had broken up following the heroin implosion that was their modus operandi.

So, of course, they’ve all gotten back together for albums or tours by this point, but during my belated teen angsting it just seemed that God (or somebody) hated me by taunting me with a finite supply of music from my favorite bands.

Previous, less special, versions here:
The Heavy Rotation Archives

Pixies – No. 13 Baby
My favorite band ever with my favorite song ever, if my maths is right. First stumbled across them on the Pump Up the Volume soundtrack with their song Wave of Mutilation (U.K. Surf). Rushed right out and bought Bossanova, which I discovered sounded nothing like that song, but also like nothing else I’d heard before (keep in mind, Nirvana hadn’t fully taken off yet).

Taken from 1989’s Doolittle album, this song features two odd features:

1. It runs nearly 4 minutes long when most of their catalog barely clears the 2.5 minute mark
2. It fades out over an extended (for them) wordless groove.

It’s about strange women and tattoos. More importantly, as you’ll find in the chorus, it’s about tattoo placement.

And then there’s this:
I want brown eyes la loma

You can take that shit to the bank.

I had this shirt and I wore it all the fucking time.

Recommended listening: Well, you really can’t go wrong with any of the Pixies albums, but considering that their last two (Bossanova, Trompe Le Monde) tended to reflect Black Francis’ alien fetish, your best bet is to pick up Surfer Rosa and Doolittle. Both are loaded with darkness and dynamic shifts as well as the occasional profanity.

The Cure – All Cats Are Grey
Lumped in with the goth scene for no apparent reason, the Cure spent the greater part of a decade releasing some of the finest albums on the planet (1979-1989). This comes from 1981’s Faith, which is a joyride all the way through, following up on the synth additions of Seventeen Seconds and working as a prelude for the suicidal nihilism of 1984’s Pornography.

“Haunting” does the job to describe this track, as does “funereal,” but don’t let that scare you away. Eerie and atmospheric, the way the Cure was always meant to be.

Recommended listening: I can wholeheartedly recommend any album up to (and including) 1989’s Disintegration (my personal favorite). After that, things tend to get a bit spotty as Robert Smith seemed to be more focused on possible mainstream breakthroughs/possible full band breakups.

Love & Rockets – Haunted (When the Minutes Drag)
The best thing that ever happened to Bauhaus, Love & Rockets saw three of the founding members form their own psych-pop monster while still retaining their original haircuts.

Best known for their inescapable So Alive single, L&R released several albums that covered ground from goth-pop to Beatles-esque psychedelia to underground electronica. This track comes from their debut album Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven. Originally two separate tracks written by Daniel Ash and David J, respectively, Haunted… is nowhere near the soundclash it should be. Instead it’s an aching song of desire and near-obsession that morphs into a kiss-off/dedication to the unnamed object all packed into the ambiguous but pointed phrase: “And this is for when you feel nothing.”

I have this logo tattooed on my arm, done by perhaps the worst tattooist in the Greater Midwest. So, no, I won't be showing it off.

Recommended listening: Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven, Express and Sweet F.A. are the strongest. The rest of their albums all have something to recommend but until you’ve decided that this is the band for you, you might find their genre-hopping to be a bit frustrating and definitely uneven.

The Jesus and Mary Chain – Who Do You Love
Another soundtrack band. Heard them on the Encino Man soundtrack of all places with an awesomely fucked up love song called Why’d You Want Me. Tracked down their debut album first and fell head over heels for the sustained feedback, dark lyrics and towering hair.

This is by no means my favorite track by the Scottish brothers (that would be Upside Down which is 2:34 of someone shoving a cheap guitar through an amplifier) but it was the best I could find on the youtubes.

A truly wicked deconstruction of the song popularized by George Thorogood. Slowed down to half-speed, alternately drawled and howled and punctuated by the siren call of feedback.

Recommended listening: Their first four albums, with Psychocandy and Darklands being the standouts. As they went on, they got more satisfied with their very competent drum machine and tended to dial back the feedback. Beware of Stoned and Dethroned, which ditches their sound completely and much of their lyrical bite. Also worth buying: their first two b-sides collections (Barbed Wire Kisses and The Sound of Speed) which include some of the finest music never to grace a proper album.

Skinny Puppy – Icebreaker
Here’s the point where most of you will say, “Those are all pretty well-known altrock touchstones and etc., but where’s the ringer?”

Skinny Puppy, Canada’s foremost noise terrorists. Fronted by Nivek Ogre, Skinny Puppy laid the groundwork for industrial dancefloors with their sonic nightmares. Of course, this ground was somewhat paved already by the likes of Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire, but Skinny Puppy took the ball and ran with it.

This track comes from Bites, an album that sounded like nothing else in 1983. Full of twisted electronics coughing up damaged chords and distortion, all swirling around Nivek’s bark and several menacing samples.

Recommended listening: Other than their album The Process, everything else is runs the gamut from good-outstanding (although I am unfamiliar with their reformed output). I’m partial to Bites, Remission, Back & Forth Series 1, Too Dark Park and Last Rights. Cleanse, Fold and Manipulate and Rabies can be put on the back burner until the other albums have been given a good rinse.

Here’s a taste of their understated live work:

All tunes in one nostalgic zip file of way-backness.
Heavy Rotation Vol. 19 (link will open in a new window)

-CLT

[All music posted on Fancy Plans... is kick ass and too awesome to be contained. All music is also posted temporarily and, due to its high level of ass-kicking, should not be distributed without a prescription and care should be taken while operating heavy equipment or dancing around the living room (clothing optional, but do remember that the blinds are open/kids are still awake).
Should you wish to have your brilliant artistic statement forced back into confinement, please email me at 2timegrime@gmail.com. Feel free to leave a comment, as that will probably be noticed sooner.
By all means, if you like what you hear (and you will), please support the totally rocking artist(s) by purchasing some music or heading out to see them live.]

So, jetzt muss ich mal endlich diese Musikempfehlung los werden. Leider gibt es wohl keine Originalvideos von Tear Garden und momentan finde ich “Ascension Day” auch besser, aber “A Ship named Dispair” ist auch großartig. Beide sind vom Album “For those who would walk with the gods” aus dem neuen Jahrtausend. Musik machen die beiden Musiker Edward Ka-Spel (Legendary Pink Dots) und cEvin Key (Skinny Puppy) allerdings schon seit den 80ern. Zu empfehlen ist da vor allem das Album “Tired Eyes slowly burning”.

Nachfolgendes Video ist übrigens von Electronautpl, der Sequenzen aus der Lovecraft-Verfilmung “Call of Cthulhu” zusammenmischte.

Death feels like the butterfly
can’t escape the scarred lie
Real relationships must die
Underneath a scarred lie

We globalize the others lies
We sanctify the great disguise

What if change gate
Don’t watch it show your shape

Desperate in death
Death will tell them
Death will kill them
Death will tell

First everything must recede
Then all will tell us to fear
and hear the sullen respite clears
into a time never wanted here

We globalize the others lies
We sanctify the great disguise
We globalize the others lies
We sanctify the great disguise

Reach through a life’s test own
Being the worm crawling through

Death feels like a butterfly
Can’t escape the scarred lie
Real relationships must die
Underneath a scar

Now I’ll break on tonight
I’ll escape light light
I’ll escape one tonight
Gravitate slice slice
On the voice I reunite it’s nothing at all
Once divided other sticks all through the eyes of blue

Reach through a life’s test own
Being the worm crawling through

I’ll escape, one tonight
Gravitate slice slice
I’ll escape, one tonight
Gravitate slice slice 

All kinds of perfect: Clutch

Saw Clutch last Wednesday at the Phoenix. I danced like a fool, had some fun in the pit (rolled over my ankle and sprained it, and took the back of someone’s skull in my eye socket) and lost my voice singing. The crowd impressed me, too, perhaps the best I’ve seen in Toronto. I saw Mayhem in June (not my video) but was underwhelmed — it had been years since my last metal show and I  too tripped out by all the kids on their cell phones all night — so I had been worried I’d lost my ability to get into a good, heavy show.

Clutch is one of my all-time favourite bands, inspiring near-fanaticism in me and others that’s well-nigh impossible to explain to those who don’t get it. It doesn’t describe well: post-hardcore, given solid doses of blues and funk so that it turned into a really stoned, less aggro Rage Against the Machine on the way to sounding like beer belly rock. But the band is tight, breathes the most monstrous grooves and has one of the most gifted lyricists around.

Upcoming shows

A lot of bands I want to see in town this fall. A bit of nostalgia (Obituary), a few bands past their glory that I still feel I should check out (KMFDM, Skinny Puppy, Os Mutantes — although the latter may still have some cred, we’ll see), and some top-notch contemporary shit (Bajofondo, Fleck/Hussain/Meyer). There are a few other metal bands I may add to the nostalgia list, but I’m too embarrassed to name them in polite, literate company. I missed Down and Voivod, they played last night, although that show may have been eminently missable anyway.

• Obituary : 25 September, Opera House
• KMFDM : 29 September, Phoenix
• Bajofondo : 28 September, Opera House
• Bela Fleck + Zakir Hussain + Edgar Meyer : 29 September, Koerner Hall
• Os Mutantes (listen to that fuzz!) : 2 October, Opera House
• Skinny Puppy : November 13, Phoenix

Lettuce know if you wanna catch any of these shows!

Cinematheque’s new season

Just got the new Cinematheque program with the fall schedule in the mail and am pleased as punch (they haven’t updated the schedule yet). My Cinematheque membership saved my life last fall, after I moved back to Canada and was still completely out of sorts; I caught a big chunk of the Oshima retrospective (In the realm of the senses is a must-see for those interested in power and desire in eroticism, and deeply disturbing) and Fassbinder’s Berlin Alexanderplatz, a 15-hour adaptation of Alfred Döblin’s novel, screened over a single weekend. I saw little in the spring, only Bicycle thieves quite by chance one day when the gal and I were strolling around the neighbourhood.

Among other dandies, the fall season has retrospectives of the films of Elia Kazan and Manoel de Oliveira. Again, happy for company.

yes, its an actual blog, and its actually called Goths in Hot Weather, and it kicks ass. Out of my own sense of support and reverence for this hallowed/forlorn project, I would like shout out to GIHW during these last days of summer- the accursèd season of hot sun and bug bites.

but first! To get you in the mood… an interlude from our friends NIN

ah… memories!

Great so, Goths in Hot Weather was revealed to me by a buddy sometime in the heat of August, and it really helped me shuffle my sweat and suffering into perspective! What if I had to suffer the noon-time humidity of Philadelphia in laced boots and leather instead of hotpants?! How self-absorbed I had been! There are legions of wan gothic devotees enduring the dual afflictions of summer AND copious black clothing!!! Behold:

(from Goths in Hot Weather)

WELCOME, GOTH LOVER!

Goths, I love ‘em! I even used to be one for a bit (well, I was a Didi-Goth for at least 6 months). But there’s one thing that troubles me about our cheery friends: what to do they do in summer? All that makeup, long black leather and rubber must get very sticky. I think we should show our respect for these poor unfortunates, struggling to stand out from the vanilla crowd despite blazing temperatures and sunshine that puts the rest of us in shorts and vest tops. Join me in celebrating the majesty of the Goth, who, eschewing any practicality whatever, still has the commitment to don a full length leather trenchcoat, stupid New Rock boots, and half a Superdrug counter of makeup. All hail the Hot Goth!

Thusly, it begins. A few vignettes are in order. Seriously folks, I think I pissed my pants the first time I read these posts.

Exhibit A:
Goth Like an Egyptian

Gothiness: 5 Sweatiness: 10
I know it’s the 80’s Mark, but you’re in EGYPT. Wearing a LEATHER JACKET. I’m proud of you.

yep. And next, the newest vocab in my fashionista lexicon, friends of all genders, I’d like to introduce: the Gothkini (exhibit B)

Gothiness: 8 Sweatiness: 9 (crotch area only)
Ladieeeeeez! [and whomever else!] Check out this Goth’s cradle of filth! He’s all man, and he’s waiting to satisfy your every need – poetry, navel gazing, and Terry Pratchett discussion groups with dark sexual chocolate drops on top! Witness the muscular physique! Gasp at the bulging source of his power! Swoon at the bullet belt adorned cowboy boots! This, surely, is every (straight) Gothette’s onanistic, narcissistic gothboy fantasy!

und, finally, Exhibit C:
Come Feast at the Bitter BBQ of Banishment

Gothiness: 7 Sweatiness: 6
Take heed mortal, and fear my warning! Tear your eyes from the alluring glare of this Dark Temptress! Heed not the cool, refreshing can of beer and refuse the promise of delicious pre-prepared kebabs with artichoke hearts from M&S! You can plainly see there’s nothing on this fire – like the Dread Pirate Roberts, this evil succubus waits to barbecue your SOOOUUUUULLLLL! Probably in a nice piri-piri sauce.

and with that… let us join hands and march wistfully into the congenial autumnal weeks which await us, just around the bend. Yes! Its our reward for putting up with blistering winters, pollen-filled springs, and the relentlessness of summer:

WELCOME, BLACK MAPS READERS, TO FALL!
Sunshine Superboy

b-b-b-bonus! Goths vs. B-Boys Dance-Off!!!

first of all: holycrapamazing.
second: omg is Skinny Puppy still a band?!
third: you MUST watch the last 10 seconds. Killer!

Chemical Brothers Liveset Rig1

Chemical Brothers Livest rig:

• Doepfer MAQ 16/3
• Clavia Nordmodular keyboard
• Roland Jupiter6
• Roland Octapad
• Octave Cat
• Roland SH101
• 2 x Akai MPC3000
• Korg MS10
• Korg Mono/Poly
• Akai S6000
• Futuretro 777
• Dave Smith Instruments PolyEvolver Keyboard

Chemical Brothers Liveset rig (2)

Peter Gabriel

Peter Gabriel with his Clavia Nordlead

Underworld

UNDERWORLD :

• Yamaha DX7
• Clavia Nordlead2
• Access Virus B
• Waldorf  MicroWave XT (yellow!!!)
• Akai MPC 2000
• Akai S3000 i
• Roland TR909
• Korg Electribe ER-1

Bill Leeb (Skinny Puppy & Frontline Assembly)

BILL LEEB (Skinny Puppy) :

• Clavia Nordlead
• Arp 2600
• Arp Odyssey MK1
• Moog Micromoog

1. color of sun
coming into itself
6:30am

2.  hug someone
first item scrawled on preplist
so we do
in the dishpit
surprised
at how we both hold on
strong
unafraid

3. five of keys
over and over
what grows
after the forest fire
has raged through

4. skinny puppy
sound so thick
i am nowhere but here

5. reunion
7th avenue housemate constellation
from 2002
plus two-year-old lyra
how i can claim myself now

6. steam
rising
sucked into silver hood baffles
above deep fryer
above boiling water

7. bubble tea delivery
plutonic domestic partner in crime
green ringer tee
declaring a safe place for nerds
life just got
even better

8. knife blade
catching on file edge
doing my best 45 degree angle
for a cleaner cut
through red potatos

9. four tears
at albina press
at the overwhelm
of september october november december

10. arm threaded through the space corinne’s leaves
elbow to elbow
search for the pedestrian bridge
we do the work
in a moonrise walk around the block

11. moon
thick with itself
loaded with light
2 more days
until your fullness

12. belly bumps
slow dance
candlelit birthday song
the bear barn
red velvet caked lips, tonuge, fingers
in front seat

13. go into the garden
go under the ivy
hammer claw
digging nails from wall
at photo corners
first rains
thrown down with a fury
falling clean

Dagens band har sina rötter i Degerfors och grundades 2001. Gruppen består av Henrik Bäckström och Oscar Holter. Detta band har tydliga influenser från industrisynthen och deras sound känns igen från grupper som Skinny Puppy och Frontline Assembly. Detta är ett riktigt bra band. Här kommer då dagens låt.

Necro Facility
Methane View
2005