listen.

swimming with laura

Great Lake Swimmers have sort of barely been on my radar for a while now, basically just to the extent that I knew I'd heard a few songs that I'd really liked.  Well I finally got around to picking up (or "picking up", as in downloading from emusic) their most recent album, last year's Ongiara. And it's really super good.

They are a trio of handsome Toronto-based gents, with that guy in the front there Tony Dekker doing the songwriting, singing and guitar.

Amanda saw a picture of them and told me I'd like them even if they played cowbells and tinkertoys, which frankly is off the mark because I think a band based primarily on cowbells and tinkertoys would be totally awesome no matter how cute they were, but I get her point. Still, though. They're really hitting the spot for me right now. Kind of a hazy, countryish folky blend of banjo, guitars, some other random instruments, string arrangements from Canada's awesome one-man-band du jour Owen Pallett (another fave of mine), and then there's Dekker's vocals, which make me sad in that good-sad-but-still-sad way. Kind of a perfect soundtrack for yesterday's cozy afternoon at home, avoiding the rain outside by making quiche and drinking too much coffee.

Here are a couple of my faves:

Great Lake Swimmers - Your Rocky Spine

Great Lake Swimmers - Where in the World Are You
(you know those double-tracked vocals get me every time. also love the strings on this one.)

And an older one, from their 2005 album, Bodies and Minds:

Great Lake Swimmers - Various Stages

Just for fun, here's the video for Your Rocky Spine, which I think is completely adorable:

And as I was listening to Great Lake Swimmers yesterday, I threw some Laura Gibson into the mix, which was totally perfect.

The young and mesmerizing Laura, on Portland's genius Hush Records (see also big faves of mine Loch Lomond, not to mention hush alums The Decemberists of course), has a voice that breaks your heart and a simple, pared down approach to a classic introspective country folky sound. So good.

From her 2006 album, If You Come To Greet Me:

Laura Gibson - This is not the end

Laura Gibson - Country, Country
("Everybody in the country knows I always sing them country songs, and always fall for country boys."  Ditto that, Laura.)

And she just released this awesome limited edition EP (available for purchase and download here!) called Six White Horses, which is all reinterpretations of traditional songs, including this one I remember singing as a kid (but I don't think the lyrics we sang were this creepy):

Laura Gibson - All the Pretty Horses

Enjoy.

>ben

newsflash: Perfect (again) from now on -- live in NYC!

There's something really awesome about bands performing studio albums in their entirety live in front of an audience.  (don't believe me? go download the live concert recording of Belle and Sebastian's "If you're feeling sinister".)

and it's even more exciting when it's one of your favorite bands, doing one of your favorite albums of all time (see above).

so, is anyone else flipping out over the fact that Idaho's favorite indie rock sons Built to Spill will be performing their 1997 album Perfect From Now On from start to finish this coming September?  Because I am.

So the shows are September 25 and 26 at Terminal 5 (which I actually haven't been to yet but I hear it's awful but I don't care where it is i'd even cross the Hudson to Jersey to see this show).  Tickets went on sale yesterday. Who wants to join me?  Buy them here (thursday) or here (friday).

In case you forgot how good the album is, let this track jog your memory:

Built to Spill - Out of Site

>ben

Arms with Hospitality: this saturday in alphabet city

Though this may sound like an etiquette course on appropriate arm gestures to use while greeting guests into your home, it's ACTUALLY going to be a really good show on Avenue B this weekend.

Todd Goldstein, self-described "Brooklyn-based mid-20s-type" (we already like where this is going) better known as Arms, plays the ukulele, guitar and various other instruments, and sings in a quirky, beautiful voice that at first reminds me a tad of Michael Stipe, then gets progressively more unique and unplaceable.  I stumbled upon this video of him playing the brilliant song "Kids Aflame" live in Prospect Park:

To hear what he does with this song in the studio rather than a tunnel in the park:

Arms - Kids Aflame

It will be the title track from Todd's forthcoming album, due on June 8.

This Saturday, he's playing at Midway (now called rehab apparently): 25 ave B @ 2nd St, NYC, 9pm.

Hospitality will be playing as well -- also Brooklyn-based, they're a quartet operating in a quaint chamber-folk realm reminiscent of early Belle & Sebastian and the like, with lyrics that wouldn't be out of place on Tigermilk or If You're Feeling Sinister: "You're the only girl on the team, you don't golf, you don't smoke, you don't understand the jokes" from Betty Wang, below.  It appears as though they're doing a little residency at Pete's Candy Store in Williamsburg right now, playing every Thursday night.

Hospitality - Betty Wang

and now for some links:
Arms website / Arms on myspace / Hospitality on myspace

see you saturday?
xoBen

listen gets bicoastal.

the reason you didn't hear much from us last week is that listen went on the road to beautiful PORTLAND, OREGON.

it was a pretty awesome trip, with all the trappings of your typical trip to the PacNW: crazy-beautiful nature, yummy seafood, cool laidback people, and some fun nights out on the town (nightlife points of interest include the talented performers at silverado, and the murinal at the eagle).  I also whipped up a little mix CD of some of my favorite portland-based bands to provide the soundtrack in our hot-hot-hot rented chevy impala (not even kidding), so I thought I'd share some highlights from that mix.

Sleater-Kinney - Dig Me Out
this is the title track from what i think may have been the first truly indie CD that I ever owned.  I bought it sound-unheard based on a friend's recommendation, and as a shy kid almost exclusively immersed in the indigo girls and tori amos at that point, i didn't really know what to think of it at first, but it didn't take long for me to get into it. these girls taught me what it meant to rock out. once when i was in college i cut all my hair off to this song and felt REALLY cool and misunderstood.
{{Sleater-Kinney}}

Quasi - I Never Want To See You Again
Another track from the early-ish part of my love for indie music, Quasi is a divorced couple, Sam Coomes (keyboards) and Janet Weiss (drummer; incidentally, also drummer for S-K).  the spare keyboard-drums combo makes for a pretty unique sound, and sam has a really sweet tenor voice that he uses to sing with a clever yet poignant dare-I-say Chekhovian perspective about the plight of the modern working class and the rat race in which we - i mean they - i mean we - are mired.
{{Quasi}}

 

Horse Feathers - Walking and Running
I've blogged about these guys quite a bit, and not just because frontman Justin Ringle is a friend from high school. Words Are Dead was one of my favorite albums of '06 - it's gorgeous.  They recently got signed to Olympia, Washington's Kill Rock Stars which is exciting. This track is from their daytrotter session last year. (photo by Jason Quigley, from HF's myspace page)
{{Horse Feathers}}

Loch Lomond - Bird and a Bear (I Am The Bird)
Loch Lomond - A Field Report
I just ran across these folks a couple months ago and have really been digging them.  I believe there is some crossover in the lineup between them and Horse Feathers.  "A Field Report" contains the awesome line "The sound of children laughing makes my eyes bleed."
{{Loch Lomond}}

Menomena - Wet and Rusting
Menomena - Gay A
Another recent Portland discovery, Menomena sort of calls to mind Animal Collective, but they strike me as being both more experimental and more pop-oriented, if that's possible. Wet and Rusting would have easily made it onto my top tracks of 2007 if I hadn't somehow missed it until a month ago. A bizarre and complex pop song with some erratic rhythmic stop-and-go to it, along with some killer piano hooks, it's all built around the simple (yet undeniable) refrain "it's hard to take risks with a pessimist."

Gay A is a track from the Wet and Rusting ep, cleverly taking issue with those Christian camps where self-loathing homosexuals go to either "cure" themselves of their "condition", or learn ways to ignore and stifle their sexuality. With the ironic opening line "All my pathetic and small life, I made big steps with small strides to fight what just feels right" the song illuminates the wrongheadedness of such an approach.  So I was kind of troubled to find a recent interview on the (awesome) blog You Ain't No Picasso with bassist Justin Harris, containing the following passage:

JH: A friend of mine went to one of those… like, places where they didn’t want to be gay any more.

YANP: Like a religious camp?

JH: Yeah. Like one of those where they didn’t want to be a part of the gay lifestyle any more. It’s based on my misconception about what that was. I was under the assumption that you go to these places to not be gay any more, but that’s totally not what it is. It’s just for people who don’t want to be in the gay lifestyle. You can’t really can’t stop being gay. But the point isn’t to rid you of your gayness, but just to help you if you don’t want to be a part of that lifestyle.

So, I just want to point out that the ex-gay movement is a complex and splintered social phenomenon, and yes, many groups or organizations do describe what they do as curing or treating homosexuality as a condition or disease.  I question what exactly JH means here when he uses the phrase "gay lifestyle".  If he means a healthy, non-repressive relationship with one's homosexuality, then it's unhealthy and irresponsible to be fostering people's avoidance or fear of that.  If he means, as many misguided people do, some sort of self-destructively promiscuous or otherwise unhealthy sexuality, then that's not a "gay lifestyle", that's an unhealthy relationship with one's own sexuality. I firmly deny the legitimacy of ANY formalized attempt to treat, cure, ignore, stifle, or "overcome" one's homosexuality. And I'll leave it at that.
{{Menomena}}

Sorry to end with the rant, but Gay A is a great song, so... give it a listen.

xoBen

on how strange it is to be anything at all

Don't worry: I won't be making a habit of celebrating the 10- (or 5- or 7- or 25-) year anniversary of any good album ever released.  But Feb. 10th marked the 10th anniversary (golden birthday!) of Neutral Milk Hotel's In The Aeroplane Over The Sea, arguably one of the most important albums of the 90s, and unequivocally my own personal favorite album of all time. so please indulge me while I dive back into NMH's world for just a bit.

I highly recommend checking out Pitchfork's double-header of 1997 interviews with Jeff here. He talks about a lot of things, including the "I love you Jesus Christ" song which no one ever seems to get -- it invariably weirds someone out.  Here's part of what Jeff has to say about it:

The thing about me singing about Christ; I'm not saying "I love you Christianity." I'm not saying "I love all the fucked-up terrible shit that people have done in the name of God." And I'm not preaching belief in Christ. It's just expression. I'm just expressing something I might not even understand. It's a song of confusion, it's a song of hope, it's a song that says this whole world is a big dream-- and who knows what's gonna happen.

I also love this part of the interview:

Pitchfork: [After moving to the kitchen for some reason] Wow, you have a lot of melodicas lying around!
Jeff Mangum: Yeah.

Since a good many of you have heard the album (if you haven't, please go buy it now), I thought I could post a few "deep cuts", as iTunes grossly calls them -- some obscure-ish live tracks (is anything really obscure anymore with youtube and 18million musicblogs wherever you turn?) from Jeff Mangum and Neutral Milk Hotel.

Neutral Milk Hotel - Ferris Wheel on Fire
something about this song gets under my skin.  i don't know if it's the terrifying imagery of a ferris wheel falling apart while the crowd below cheers, or the way the catastrophe described is matched by an escalating chaos in the music, or that last line "now finally fading from view is everything we ever knew". a song about the ephemerality of our material surroundings.

Neutral Milk Hotel - Oh Sister
if you're familiar with the album, some of this song will seem familiar -- lyrically it overlaps particularly with Oh Comely and Holland 1945. not sure why it didn't end up on the album... i like it as much as a lot that did. some great lines, and a simple but terrific melody, all matched with Jeff's otherwordly caterwaul (which truly becomes a caterwaul at the end).

Neutral Milk Hotel - Engine
as he says, "a children's song". this was the b-side to Holland 1945.

Jeff Mangum - Little Birds
the only recording (as far as I know) of any song Jeff wrote after Aeroplane. an intensely haunting and creepy song about a little boy whose body becomes inhabited by little birds. it gives a glimpse of what NMH's next album might have been like, had they ever made one. i also feel compelled (as I would) to point out the unsettling gay subplot, sung from the boy's father's perspective:

did you know the burning hell it took your baby brother?
did you see how far he fell and how he made us suffer?
another boy in town at night he took him for his lover,
and deep in sin, they held each other.
so i took a hammer, nearly beat his little brains in,
knowing god in heaven would have never could forgive him.

I was actually going to stop there, but that's a pretty depressing note to end on, so here are a few more treats:

Jeff Mangum - I Love How You Love Me
An adorable Phil Spector cover from Jeff's solo Live at Jittery Joe's album (pardon the extended spoken intro for Engine, tacked at the end of this track)

And two touching video recordings of Jeff solo and with band performing the album's gorgeous title track, one of the most beautiful songs ever written about life, love and death.  The second video is from Dec. 31, 1998, one of the last shows they ever played.

xoB

My wild sweet love

So lately I've been really into the Jimmy Webb song "Do What You Gotta Do".  I've known the Nina Simone version for a long time, and was vaguely aware of Roberta Flack's.  But then I ran across two more recent versions, along with a Linda Ronstadt take from the early '90s! 

It's just such a heartbreaking song.  Sort of a more complex take on that old "If you love something, set it free" cliché, it's all about letting someone go do their thing and figure their shi* out, even though you still really love them.  And you know you might "never kiss those sweet lips again."  Sigh.

Nina's is by far the most robust of these takes.  I like how she doesn't bother herself with protocol, and just kicks off the song by jumping straight into the chorus.  Her delivery strikes me as pretty self-assured - not quite as vulnerable as one might expect from the lyrics.
Nina Simone - Do What You Gotta Do

As much as I love Nina's, I feel like Roberta's version comes a little closer to capturing the essence of the song.  Her confidence seems like it's on the verge of cracking, while assuring her man that he's doing what's right.  It's mostly quiet and pretty understated, but when she decides to wail she'll break your heart.  I love her slight variation of the melody on "come on back and see me when you can" near the end of the song.
Roberta Flack - Do What You Gotta Do

Linda's definitely sounds like the year in which it was released (1993), but despite our collective distaste for early 90s adult contemporary (i know i don't speak for everyone!), she's got some good things going here.  I like the contrast between the delicate breathlessness on the verses and the force on the choruses.  And when she holds out - for 10 full seconds - the "can" on "see me when you can" at the end, that's pretty awesome.  I'm not crazy about the backup vocals or the instrumental arrangement, but you can't really blame her.  It was '93!
Linda Ronstadt - Do What You Gotta Do

Running across this Meg Baird version is what kicked off my whole obsession with this song.  Meg Baird is in the (awesome) band Espers, but she released a solo album last year called Dear Companion with this track.  Totally different from the versions above, she makes it a lilting acoustic folk ballad. Gorgeous.
Meg Baird - Do What You Gotta Do

And finally, a man!  Okkervil River does a bang-up job on this song.  I particularly love that frontman Will Sheff doesn't change the gender in the "girl like me" line at the beginning.  I think this might be the most emotionally vulnerable vocal performance of all these. I love it.
Okkervil River - Do What You Gotta Do

xoben

ps - Geo and Amanda and Ricky and I are seeing Mavis Staples tonight at BAM!  In her honor, I'll leave one more track from her.  I don't think she ever recorded DWYGD, so... here's my favorite track of hers.
Mavis Staples - How Many Times

A Christmas Mix from listen.

Listeners: Geo. Ben.
Geo and Ben: Hm?
L: Where have you been?
G&B: What are you talking about?
L: You haven't posted in, like, three weeks.
G&B: Oh. About that...
L: No, it doesn't matter. It's fine. I know you guys both have really unsatisfying, time-consuming dayjobs.
G&B: ...
L: But I'm home for the holidays right now, and... my mom just keeps playing the Kenny G and Michael Bolton Christmas albums on repeat.
G&B: Oh my god.
L: So... maybe you could hook me up with some non-gag-inducing christmas tunes.
G&B: You got it.  Let's start with some tunes from the old masters.

Ella Fitzgerald - Santa Claus is Coming to Town
Ella Fitzgerald - Sleigh Ride
Ella Fitzgerald - Winter Wonderland
Aretha Franklin - Blue Holiday
Elvis Presley - Blue Christmas
Elvis Presley - Silent Night
Otis Redding - Merry Christmas, Baby
Otis Redding - White Christmas
David Bowie and Bing Crosby - Little Drummer Boy
James Brown - Funky Christmas
James Brown - Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto
The Jackson 5 - Up on the Housetop
Stevie Wonder - One Little Christmas Tree
Stevie Wonder - What Christmas Means to Me
Donny Hathaway - This Christmas
Judy Garland - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

And moving along to some more recent interpretations of the classics, along with some original tunes to add to the catalog.  We'll start with the obligatory block from old Sufjan.

Sufjan Stevens - Lo How a Rose E'er Blooming
Sufjan Stevens - O Come O Come Emmanuel
Sufjan Stevens - Amazing Grace
Sufjan Stevens - That was the Worst Christmas Ever!
Chris Garneau - Christmas Song
The Innocence Mission - Little Town of Bethlehem
Aimee Mann - I'll be Home for Christmas
Low - Just Like Christmas
Low - If You Were Born Today
Low - Silent Night
Pedro The Lion - God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
Belle & Sebastian - O Come O Come Emmanuel
Belle & Sebastian - O Little Town of Bethlehem
Clem Snide - Joy to the World
Tracy Chapman - O Holy Night
Feist - Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming

AND!  If you want to download the whole shebang in one fell swoop, just go HERE (part 1) and HERE (part 2).  So I guess that's actually two fell swoops. sorry.  [but beware!  These links expire Dec. 29th.]

Merry Christmas from listen.

and stay tuned for some year-end lists in the next week or so.

xo,
ben

she works hard for her money

guys. work is really getting in the way of my blogging career.  it's verging on the ridiculous.  the past few weeks in particular have taken a lot out of me, and I've hardly found the time to rigorously curate daily, or even weekly, helpings of fresh tracks for the likes of you all. thank god geo's around to keep it real.

but today i thought we could all commiserate over our shared hatred for our day jobs by way of some songs about ... hating our day jobs.

we'll start with some old songs from Quasi, who hail from Portland, Oregon, where some of us boys may or may not be trekking to in the new year.  Quasi is Sam Coomes and Janet Weiss, they used to be married, and then they got divorced, but they're still in a band together.  Janet also was the drumming third of Sleater-Kinney before they went on indefinite hiatus.  Both of these songs are from the late '90s:

quasi, the happy prole

um, "everyday, we earn our meager pay, but it takes its toll, to play the happy prole."  yes, yes it does.

quasi, smile

that one's not so explicitly about work, but it is about feeling sorry for yourself. which i usually do, when i'm at work. or going to work. or leaving work.

now for some smiths.

the smiths, frankly mr shankly

this position i've held, it pays my way, and it corrodes my soul.

the smiths, work is a four letter word

this is a cover of a song originally performed by Cilla Black (think along the same lines as Petula Clark).  I tried to find the original version but no dice.

and a lovely song from our favorite Glaswegians about a man who's put up with enough bullshi* at work.

belle and sebastian, take your carriage clock and shove it

so good.

and to conclude, probably the best song ever written about white collar malaise. she ain't no dalai lama...

dolly parton, 9 to 5

and on this note, I leave you:

 

go. run free. enjoy your weekend before you have to be back in that office chair monday morning.

(ps - if you haven't been to someecards.com yet, go now and send at least 5 inappropriate ecards to your friends and exes.)

xoben

back in the habit and on repeat

hey kiddos. my apologies, most especially to my blogmate, for being a tad MIA -- and i don't mean the groundbreaking genre-defying English-born Sri Lankan musician -- over the past week (or so).  life just keeps on HAPPENING, you know?

anyway. i went over to Danny's the other night, and while he worked some tailoring magic on a few of my garments, we watched My So-Called Life and listened to Chris Garneau, among other things, and ever since, I've basically had this song on 24-7 repeat.

Chris Garneau - Black & Blue

it takes him about 1:45 to kick into full voice, but man, that moment kills me, each time he sings "oh, oh, i want to catch my death of cold, oh, oh, cause i'm scared i'm growing old."  be careful listening to this song on headphones late at night while it's raining and you're walking home alone to an empty bed. i'm just saying.

interesting interview with mr. garneau here, and here's a terrific video from the blogotheque takeaway show series:

#42.4 - Chris Garneau - We don't try
Uploaded by lablogotheque

on a totally unrelated note, did anyone else see the disaster otherwise known as Amy Winehouse in this clip from the Euro MTV music awards? [ADDENDUM: The clip i posted first ceased to work, so here's another with a corny intro. but it's the same performance.]

i don't know whether to cry, or laugh, or throw my computer against the wall in a fit of rage.  i mean, she's just so talented, and i'm afraid she's going to waste it all away.  look at her.  AMY: Get. Your. Shi*. TOGETHER.  Please.  if not for your sake, then for the sake of all the classic soul-revivalist lovers out there.  Please?

also, i don't remember quite how, but yesterday i ran across the myspace profile for this Brooklyn band called the Homophones.  And I wouldn't be so presumptuous as to think that a bandname like that or lyrics like "I wanna lick your popsicle" necessarily confirm that they play for my team, but... let me just say that i had a hard time finding many details about them, but they are officially on my radar.  expect more info to be relayed to you as it lands on my desk.  i like this song.

the Homophones - Everyone's Dead

on a non-musical note, here are some beautiful photos (i did not take them) from the amazing secret underground dinner party my dance group performed at over the weekend.  and more photos here.

that adorable boy-girl banjo-accordion duo were a real highlight, and apparently they perform under the name Fall Harbor, but i haven't been able to find any info about them so far.

that's all for now. bye.

>ben

Día de los Muertos

¡Feliz Día de los Muertos muchachos!

what a wonderful holiday

really any holiday that would make building something like this

part of the rituals of the holiday - is a holiday for me.

it's also nice to celebrate life and honor those that have died.
plus you get to eat sugar skulls.
did i mention the skeleton dioramas that everyone makes?
it's also a joyous holiday (well, according to wikipedia).
i should again mention skeleton dioramas.

anyway - today's post is in honor of the day of the dead.
sort of.... or rather INSPIRED by.

i said to derek this morning: what songs should i post for the day of the dead?
and without blinking an eye he said: Marianne Faithfull's The Ballad of Lucy Jordan.

so here it is:
The Ballad of Lucy Jordan, Marriane Faithfull

he also shared this Calexico Vocal Mix of the Goldfrapp song HUMAN

human (calexico vocal mix), goldfrapp

me gusta.

i think this Johnny Cash song is quite day of the dead as well
from the AMAZING mariachi-like trumpets to the wonderful carnival that is falling in love -- it is such a great song.
ring of fire, johnny cash

the taste of love is sweet, when hearts like ours meet
i fell for you like a child
ooooh, but the fire went wild.

i fell into a burning ring of fire
i went down, down, down and the flames went higher.
and it burns, burns, burns, the ring of fire.


cat stevens. oh cat.  this is another one of mom's albums from my childhood.  i just couldn't get enough of teaser and the firecat when i was wee lad.
tuesday's dead, cat stevens

the other woman it brought to mind was Kate Bush.
now, i don't appreciate her as much as i should (but derek has supplied me with all the essential tracks)

and she also sings about ghost loving (that's what that novel is about right?)

wuthering heights, kate bush

has everyone heard of the puppini sisters? they sing andrew's sisters-like close 3 part harmony.  they do a lot of covers, and i DIG THEM, A LOT.
here's their version of this song:

wuthering heights, the puppini sisters.

do you not know why you should appreciate kate bush?
well. i'll let my friend micah break it down for you:
-----------------------------------------
Dear Geo and Listeners:

Kate Bush is, quite simply, the mother of all.

Kate Bush's works are the grand harbinger of the works of any female
(and even male) artist working in pop music today.

Even Tricky says that he carries a copy of her debut album "The Kick
Inside" EVERYWHERE he goes and has bought dozens of copies because he
scatters them all over the globe. Seriously, TRICKY himself cops to
this.

And you know who wouldn't exist without Kate? Tori Amos. Yep.
Goldfrapp. You bet. BJÖRK. Darn right, I went there.

Kate's genius goes so far, that she was only able to tour ONCE and
then never did it again. That's an ARTIST. And, even without touring,
her single "Hounds Of Love" knocked Madonna's "Like A Virgin" out of
the number one spot on the UK charts. Holy cow.

Right now. No, I mean it. RIGHT NOW, get your hands on the following
ESSENTIAL tracks:
"Wuthering Heights"  (you have this now!)
"Babooshka"  (now you have two!)

"The Infant Kiss"
"The Wedding List"
"Hounds Of Love"
"Cloudbusting"
"Army Dreamers"
"Running Up That Hill"
"This Woman's Work" (No, not the Maxwell version. Come on.)
"Wow"
"There Goes A Tenner"
"Rubberband Girl"

I'll be looking forward to the thank-you notes.

Love,
Micah!
-------------------------------
well, that's enough music for any esqueleto, no?

happy day of the dead!
g