V/A - Four Songs by Arthur Russell

Various Artists – Four Songs by Arthur Russell
Rough Trade, 2007
Acquired: Love Garden Blowout Location, New, 2009
Price: $2

Curated by Jens Lekman, this is a small tribute album that probably made a big impact. I know I definitely sought out Arthur Russell's records after hearing this record. Something so haunting and beautiful, and really, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Did I mention it's great? Verity Sussman of Electrelane opens the record as Vera November with a solo piano version of “Our Last Night Together,” which just kills. My love for Electrelane has been throughly expressed on this site, so no surprise there. Lekman covers what coincidentally ended up becoming my favorite Russell song, “A Little Lost,” via a solo-Kalimba (thumb piano) version. Also on board are Taken By Trees, who cover “Make 1, 2” and Hidden Cameras frontman Joel Gibb who does “That's Us/Wild Combination” w/ El Perro Del Mar on backing vox. Every artist feels perfectly plucked to bring new iterations of Russell's haunts to life. Strangely, there are no cellos here. I thought for sure someone would bust one out, but nope! No cellos!

Hüsker Dü - Flip Your Wig

Hüsker Dü - Flip Your Wig
SST, 1985
Acquired: Love Garden, Used, 2010
Price: $8


I've been working my way through Michael Azerrad's Our Band Could Be Your Life lately. I never read the whole thing. It was assigned for my Pop Culture of the 1980s class and we only read the Black Flag chapter in that class, but I knew I wanted to read the rest of it someday. Fuck, that class was amazing, come to think of it. I mean, any class that requires you to read about punk rock is a good one, right, in particular that book. So I read the Minutemen chapter and then I skipped a bunch of pages and read the Husker Du chapter because, quite honestly, Husker Du is one of my favorite bands of all fucking time...in the future. When I'm 30, Husker Du will be in my top 5. There's some work to be done, but I know they will be there. I will obsess over Zen Arcade with the best of them. I know, I know. But right now, here's where I'm at: I adore New Day Rising and I wrote a song that directly references “I Don't Want to Know If You're Lonely” and that's my extent of Husker Du. But it should be more. Combining punk rock distortion with pop hooks is my goddamned bread and butter.

According to that book, this should have been Husker Du's major label debut. It's their most accessible record, apparently, and um, yeah, I kind of get that. It's catchy. But there's still a lot of New Day Rising in this one, after all, the records were released in the same year. 1985! Both before I was even fucking born! So yeah, writing about this record is weird. As if I know shit about anything, but Husker Du is the only band I deliberately steal from when I write songs. I long for Bob Mould's chord progressions. And Grant Hart's intensity in “Keep Hanging On,” fuck, to achieve that would be a goddamned dream. To find an album with at least four songs that leave me drained is a triumph. Blah blah blah blah blah. I felt like every song I ever wrote was just a different iteration of “Every Everything.” And how come I've never listened to this goddamned record before? Goddamnit. Goddamn, damnit. How does this band have two other records that are more highly acclaimed? Because this, my friends, is just tops.


It's alarming how well "Makes No Sense At All" syncs up with um, the theme song from "The Mary Tyler Moore Show."


But fuck if "Makes No Sense At All" is the most perfect blend of punk and pop ever. Listen to that shit! GODDAMNIT. GODDAMN GODDAMN A THOUSAND TIMES GODDAMN!

Various Artists - What's Up Matador

Various Artists – What's Up Matador
Matador, 1997
Acquired: Love Garden, Used, 2008
Price: $8

Another document of a time and a place, this time the late 90s with maybe the most reputable indie label of our time. Well, maybe Sub Pop is more reputable, but Matador's pretty close! This one's pretty diverse and has a couple of bands I've never even heard of and most of Matador's heavy hitters. Pavement covers Echo and the Bunnymen's “The Killing Moon” with pretty much awesome results. The GBV track is choice, and Tobin Sprout has a jam on side four! And Guitar Wolf! And the demo version of Yo La Tengo's “Don't Say a Word” which is just fucking plain gorgeous. Early Spoon, with the band really starting to come into their own. A typically pretty Cat Power track. On top of that, the liner notes are have these “Little Known Fact”s written by Matador that are full of sweet praise and...facts. Ex. “Chavez are often described as a “super-group”, but we've never heard of any the bands they were in beforehand. Their “Unreal is Here” video used 15,000 Smashing Pumpkins fans as unpaid extras.” “By the year 2000, every punk rock fan in America will have had the chance to play “Kick Out the Jams” with Guitar Wolf at least once.” “Vocalist Britt Daniel is much better looking without the sunglasses (and you can tell him we said so). If there's a better songwriter alive, please have him send us a tape.” It's sweet, and this is a great compilation full of bands that I like or bands that I should like. Fuck, this Tobin Sprout song is just so, so good. I do not know how that guy does it. The thing is, before I even got obsessed with GBV, his songs were always my favorites. “To Remake the Young Flyer” was the one that made me spend a good couple weeks with the holy trinity of Bee Thousand, Alien Lanes, and Under the Bushes Under the Stars and started this whole chain reaction of adoration. The Kite Tails even learned the Toby b-side “Dodging Invisible Rays” for a couple of shows! And natch, his solo stuff has always been pretty top notch. Not as frequent as Bobby P's, but most definitely more solid.

College Basketball: or How I Learned to not get Upset By KU Getting Their Asses Kicked and Love the Loss

I attended the University of Kansas for five years. It ended up being a colossal waste of money that I will be paying back for the next 30 or so years. I never really was one for school spirit or ever giving a shit about college athletics. From what I saw, the school spent more money on their football and basketball teams than they spent on putting decent teachers in the classrooms, and when you're paying a constantly rising tuition, that sucks.

Earlier this year, the KU Basketball team got in trouble. Of course, if you payed attention to their record, you know I'm not talking about anything that happened during the season other than Brady Morningstar's drunk driving incident which got whitewashed after the new year instead of him getting kicked off the team (honestly, this is Lawrence, do you think the authorities have the...authority to banish one of the team's great white hopes?). No, I'm talking about the basketball team getting into a fight with the football team in front of Wescoe Hall, which is easily the dumbest building to get in a fight in front of on campus. I mean, yeah, the football and basketball teams who represent the SAME FUCKING SCHOOL getting into a fight is beyond just plain goddamn idiotic, but in front of Wescoe? Seriously, this building was designed to be a PARKING GARAGE. I should know, I was an English major, and most of my classes were held in that sorry excuse for a "learning facility." But anyway, despite KU's basketball team possessing a whole hell of a lot of class and grace (thanks mostly, I think, to Bill Self whipping these guys into shape), they were mostly a bunch of dumbasses.

I mean, seriously, who picks gets in a fight WITH YOUR OWN SCHOOL? If you do shit like that, there are consequences. And I'm not talking about my famed "KU College Basketball Curse of 2005." Yes, it's true. I once cursed the KU basketball team due to traffic. I was going to see Sideways at Liberty Hall with my girlfriend at the time and it took us 40 minutes to get from Hashinger Hall to Liberty Hall. Thus, I cursed KU basketball and their unholy traffic and KU ended up choking in the second round. I don't like to take the blame, but I will. I'll also take the blame for a tornado demolishing Greensburg, Kansas in 2005, which I cursed after getting pulled over in that town during a 24 hour run from Phoenix to KC in the Summer of '05. I am sorry I cannot control my stupid whims, I really am. I thought the curse was broken after KU succeeded in capturing the whatever championship of whatever in 2008, which made 5 hipsters in a Lawrence upstairs apartment rejoice, hug eachother, and participate in loads of debauchary in the downtown area of our fair city of Lawrence that fateful evening.

So, basically, the whole season was a bad omen to begin with due to the players being a bunch of babies. I don't even know why the teams were fighting, I just know that they did, and that they did it on campus which completely undermines all of the grace and class they play with. So, maybe this is someone saying, "Hey, KU, yeah you had a great season and yeah, this is really the best team you've had in shit knows how many years, but they don't know how to behave like adults so they will be punished."

"And how will they be punished?" one might ask.
"By losing to Northern Iowa in the second round of the NCAA tournament."

There you go. And the thing is, if you watched that game, without any bias, you would have been rooting for Northern Iowa. Most people probably were, other than people who take brackets seriously. I mean, they were this nobody team from fuckneckville and they fucking trounced the #1 seed! I mean, how cool is that? And watching Ali Farokhmanesh hit that three with ABSOLUTELY FUCKING NOBODY AROUND was really, really kind of beautiful. And you know why it was beautiful? Because it summed up everything KU was bad at, which was guarding the fucking perimiter. That whole game, dudes were taking shots from the outside and nailing 3s and the Jayhawks never, ever seemed to notice this. Well, not until the end, and even then, fucking Farokhmanesh got the ball, showed up at the three point line and stopped. Just fucking stopped! And then he had a thought process. The average player might have just gone for the easy lay-up, but given this game he most definitely thought "Shit, these guys suck at guarding 3's, and NO ONE IS AROUND and this is just like practice so why the hell not" and shot. A brilliant play, and they won the game and Lawrence got really, really angry. And people are still mad but I can't understand why.

And the thing to say is "it's just a game" but for most people it's not. I don't know why, but it's not. I'm sad, but only on a really cosmetic level. Really, I'm indifferent because whatever, it's sports and, to parapharse Spoon, if you have no fear of the underdog, you will most definitely not survive. KU played like absolute shit and got their asses handed to them and really, if you play a game that bad, no matter who you're playing, and you lose, you really can't be too bummed. You've just got to accept it and move on. I saw people CRYING that night, and tweets about Lawrence being on suicide watch and yeah, I'm sure that's just a joke but really? Even in the absolute of hyperbole would college basketball really matter to anyone that much? It's really fun to watch, but honestly, KU's basketball team had an off night and it was embarassing. Ok, move on. Boo hoo, Sherron Collins' last game was a really bad loss, ok, he moves on and probably makes millions of dollars and no one remembers it.

So, basically: everyone is going to be sad for a few weeks and then going to forget about it and eventually remember how awesome it was when KU won in 2008 and everyone got the day off school and got to flood downtown. Now some other town gets to have that! And really, is KU even worth having spirit for giving how little effort they put into their actual school? Like I said, one of their primary buildings is a would-be parking garage and only in my final semester did they make any improvements to it, and even then, those improvements were for staff offices and new desks (granted, the desks were AWESOME). But yeah, none of it matters, everyone will get over it, and no one will kill themselves because KU lost and blah blah blah blah blah.

I actually met Sherron Collins twice when I was working at Chase Court, a rather blah apartment complex near campus. Once he called up to pay his rent asking and upon my greeting simply said "Ya'll take cash?", to which I said no and instructed him in the ways of money orders. Then he brought one by and after that, I noticed that the manager had removed all of the KU basketball players' files which was kind of funny. The next time I met Sherron (as the announcers refer to him, which I think is a bit rude since I think it's more respectful to refer to an athelete by his surname, but whatever) was when he locked himself out of the weight room. And as I was walking down to the weight room with him I thought "Fuck, this guy is like, fucking famous in this town. People really respect this guy and this is like an US Weekly moment where it's like 'They're just like us! They lock themselves out of the weight room at their apartment complex.'" And you know what, I tried to remain cool about it but I still got excited because I knew this guy was hot shit and througout the season, he was and I always thought about that. And when he missed almost all of his shots against Northern Iowa, I thought about that same guy. Just like any of us, someone who is really good at one thing, and he's really good at basketball but like all of us, sometimes we fuck up. And it's usually at the worst possible moment, but we get over it and you know, life as we know it doesn't end. And think about how awesome it must have felt for those guys on the Northern Iowa team! Even that unfortunate looking neanderthal. I was secretly happy for them because really, how often do you get to beat the top dog? Not very often, that's how often.

Still, I still got pretty bummed when I saw those dudes crying on the court.

Various Artists - Rock Stars Kill

Various Artists – Rock Stars Kill
Kill Rock Stars, 1994
Acquired: Love Garden, Used, 2007
Price: $6

What is it with all these early 90s bands trying to sound like they're playing at 45 speed? The first song, by the aptly titled Tourettes, caused me to get up and check to make sure the button wasn't pushed in on the turntable. Now, this comp has a very strange and very awesome mix of bands. There's Japanese noise-weirdos Boredoms, Kim Gordon's side-project Free Kitten, indie-pop darlings Helium, Smog, Spinanes, fucking RANCID, and Kathleen Hanna doing a song for Evan Dando. It's all too thrashy for my tastes though. I mean, I can't imagine listening to this thing all the way through very often, other than for a few of the choice cuts here. Mostly, at least for me, it's more of a document of a time and place where everything was excited and noisy and full of energy and kind of sounded the same.

Diamond Rings - "All Yr Songs"

Today is the first day where I've not had to work at the store OR do some assigned writing thing and it is my first day off in a long time. I'm not even going to the gym, I'm that excited about this day devoted to sitting around the house, chillin' with the dog, working on ye olde rekord blogge, playing video games, and notably, listening to all the songs I've downloaded in the past couple of weeks that I haven't had a chance to listen to yet. This one, "All Yr Songs," is one I downloaded months ago and put on some work commute mix CD back in January. "What the fuck is this?" I wondered, as I listened to it ten times on the way to work and ten more on the way back.

This track is just wonderful. Just light and sweet and simple without seeming like it was thrown together like a lot of the hip new MP3 downloads I have sitting on my computer. Sounds like it was recorded in a bedroom, but with some actual honest to god pop songwriting talent. One of the most interesting aspects of this song is that it adheres to the tenets of the perfect song. Or, that is, it's two minutes and forty two seconds long, which I read was the perfect song length in an article once. Nowadays, every single mainstream rock/pop band has stretched the pop song out to 5+ minutes, filling those extra two and a half minutes with repetitions of the hook/chorus over and over and over again. I've always been attracted to shorter songs, not because of my attention span, but because I'd much rather listen to a song twice than one long version of it for five minutes. And no one wants to be succinct anymore! So when I hear a song like this, I just go "Yes yes, oh thank god yes" because damnit, it's catchy and when it's over I want to listen to it again immediately.

Sadly, I can't listen to any of this guy's other songs because some rap song is playing over his myspace, but honestly, I'm ok with that.

MP3>>>>>Diamond Rings - "All Yr Songs" (via P4k)

A Pretty Goddamned Exciting Radio Rip

I'm finally listening to that new National track that played on some radio station and quickly made its way around the nerdy internet at light speed the other day. I think I read about it at work, downloaded it when I got home, passed out, worked all day, I don't know, it's all a blur, I finally just listened to it...like three times. And it's pretty fucking good. It's fitting, listening to this shitty radio rip because the first time I ever heard the National was on the radio, and no, it wasn't hip-cool college radio, it was on 96.5 the Buzz and I don't know why the hell I was listening to that station. I can't remember, but I do remember hearing the little lead-in bit with all the quick cuts and radio buzzing shit that was all "If you like Interpol, then the National is your new favorite band" and then busted out "Mistaken for Strangers." And I hated it immediately. Not for any real reasons, just because any band that allowed themselves to get sold like that must be in it for some dubious reasons.



And then blah blah blah, heard "Fake Empire" was like "oh gawd, this is so great" and now High Violet is most likely going to be the only new album I buy on vinyl this year. I might even avoid the leak when it inevitably gets shoved in my face. It's almost strange knowing that you're going to love an album. Almost like the opposite of disappointment. There was something about their performance of "Terrible Love" on Fallon that really just caught me, caught me in the same way that Grizzly Bear did when they played "While You Wait for the Others" on Conan a year and a half before Veckatimest came out and while I was mistaken about that record being as amazing as that song led me to believe, people still thought that album was way good. But after hearing "Bloodbuzz Ohio," goddamnit, I just want to put this at the number one record of 2010 spot and write a review about it before I ever even hear the fucker. In my head, this is what American music sounds like. There's something smoky and mysterious about their records, but also something that hits dangerously close to home. It's like the musical equivalent of an Edward Hopper painting. Deceptively simple sounding but remarkably complex and endlessly gratifying and never, ever outdated. I mean, as much as I love the Hold Steady with all my heart, and as much as I will love them until the day I die, their records are always going to remind me of my early 20s whereas these last couple National records and this forthcoming ones are going to be the shit kids are going to be combing used record stores for twenty years from now.

Hot damn! Apparently 4AD dropped a legit MP3 of "Bloodbuzz Ohio" after the radio rip leaked! Brilliant! It's a pretty fine song. As usual, it doesn't really jump out and completely knock you out right away, well, maybe it does for you. What I love about the National is the replay value. I listen to it once through, say "that was good" and immediately I'm listening to it ten times in a row and by the end of those ten times I've lost my shit. Images start sticking out as potent and gripping. "I was carried to Ohio in a swarm of bees." "Stand up straight at the foot of your love." It's just a goddamned beautiful song. I have about five or six more listens through this thing since I started this post and I think five or six more before I can get to sleep.

MP3>>>>>The National - "Bloodbuzz Ohio" (via highviolet.com)

New Teenage Fanclub LP on the Way!

So, a new Teenage Fanclub LP couldn't come at a better time. I've recently fallen into a Guided By Voices-like obsession with the group as of late thanks to the CD store I work at having a copy of their "Shortcut to Teenage Fanclub" comp on hand. The new record, Shadows, drops June 8th on the almighty Merge Records. The track they leaked with the announcement, "Baby Lee," isn't as great as I would like it to be, but I'm excited nonetheless, but mostly because in iTunes "Start Again" just started up and I realized that maybe Teenage Fanclub will tour the States and how I might just die if that happened. DIE OF SHEER POP BLISS! And ok, yeah, I just listened to "Baby Lee" again and I think this just became my most anticipated record of '10! And really, how many bands have THREE AMAZING SONGWRITERS WHO ARE ALL EQUALLY GOOD? Really, how many?

1. Sometimes I Don’t Need To Believe In Anything
2. Baby Lee
3. The Fall
4. Into The City
5. Dark Clouds
6. The Past
7. Shock And Awe
8. When I Still Have Thee
9. Live With The Seasons
10. Sweet Days Waiting
11. The Back Of My Mind
12. Today Never Ends

MP3 >>>> Teenage Fanclub - "Baby Lee"

Dr. Worm

I've been listening to the They Might Be Giants Dial-a-Song compilation every day at work. It's not a great compilation, and I usually get burnt out about 3/4 of the way through each disc, but there are so many gems! Maybe if I'd grown up with They Might Be Giants, things would be better. But I didn't. Actually, that's a lie. One of my first musical memories was buying the "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)" cassette single at a garage sale when I was very young, and becoming obsessed with that song. Now, it's "Dr. Worm," which has evolved into a very, very strange persona I've undertaken to amuse my girlfriend. Notably, it involves me wriggling around on the floor trying to crawl out of the bedroom without using my hands.

Various Artists - Fortune Cookie Prize: A Tribute to Beat Happening

Various Artists – Fortune Cookie Prize: A Tribute to Beat Happening
Simple Machines, 1992
Acquired: Love Garden, Used, 2008
Price: $7

Purchased at the height of my K Records obsession (I still someday want to get a K tattoo on my upper right arm, but only after I am no longer convinced that people won't just think I'm obsessed with Kurt Cobain), this is a pretty sweet-ass compilation of Beat Happening covers. Despite coming out the same year as Beat Happening's final album, You Turn Me On, Fortune Cookie Prize culls mostly from tracks from their first album. There are a couple from Black Candy, one from Jamboree and one from Dreamy. Honestly, my only beef with this record is that A.) There could have been more songs and B.) It's lacking the hits. But that's you know, kind of what makes it cool, sorta. I also much prefer Teenage Fanclub's cover of “Bad Seeds” to Scrawl's. Oh, and also balancing out the cool is the roster, featuring such 90s indie-rock luminaries as Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore, Unrest, Superchunk, and Velocity Girl. Super rad Australian band and K Recs affiliates the Cannanes are on it too! The Kite Tails once attempted a cover of “Black Candy,” which was awesome but I don't think we ever played it live because it was impossible for me to sing as low as Calvin and when I tried I was mostly inaudible. Kim Gordon sings it way better on this comp. I've always wanted to do a cover of “Godsend,” too, one of the great overlooked tracks of Beat Happening's spectacular career. I mean, how many bands are there that never have a slump? I mean, it's not like they were setting the bar TOO high, but in an era when bands try to replicate themselves album after album Beat Happening managed to improve upon their simple formula album after album and are totally deserving of a tribute album!

Here's a little video for one of my favorite Beat Happening songs that's not on this comp, "Tiger Trap."