Album Review: Post-Nothing

This was an album that I picked up mostly because I had heard of the band without having ever actually heard them. And I thought the album cover looked pretty cool, like all the other black and white pictures on this blog. I really was expecting more of an indie rock subtly-gilding-roses Post-Nothing but was pretty pleased to have that expectation turned right on its head. These guys really wail out their choruses, which I've heard before from bands that sound like what I want to call alt-punk-pop, but these guys nail it for me. Sincerely wailed vocals over severely down picked and amplified chords work to produce something that is familiar but also somewhat endearing. The way they sing about hating girls, young guys leaving town, and rocking out, these are all familiar motifs in rock and roll. I guess if I would have one complaint is that they seem to stay fairly in the box with their sound, structure and lyrics. It's not like they don't do any of it well, but I'm not sure their pushing anything or doing anything provocative. A couple of times I kind of wondered if this was really just a creed side band, which sounds pretty bad on the outside, but a well produced, bread and butter, get your common rock tropes here album is pretty much what creed made, and in some ways what the Japandroids are doing. Now on some tracks they do really dig into grooves and let loose on some stuff that is probably too left of center to really fit the whole creed comparison, and when they do that I them best.  I would recommend checking out the whole album as its pretty short light and fun, but the tracks Young Hearts Spark Fire, Wet Hair, and Heart Sweats really made me feel the most energetic and happy listening to them. In a popular video on the power of music, Oliver Sacks quotes Emmanuel Kant as calling music the "quickening art" and although this music is sometimes slowed by how much it plays into common tropes, it's sincerity and lightness really make it a fun and enlivening listen. Try it!

The Veils - Through the Deep Dark Wood

I think if I had to write a pop/rock song, this would probably be my dream accomplishment. It's feasibly achievable with its simple structure, has some great grit and gain of the lead guitar, and has heavy use of toms and snare roll without sacrificing a catchy and invigorating vibe. I think this is the first song off the album, and to make such a strong bold statement instantly I think is pretty cool.

Enjoy.

Also pretty neat is that they put up the link for free download, and its their official profile.

The Photo Atlas, Bruce Springsteen and the Great American Teenage Myth

The Photo Atlas taps into the motifs of what I call the Great American Teenage Myth in the lyrics of "Dress Code". We have kids hopping into a car, hitting the interstate and driving fast even though they won't make it, which is significant not only because its a scene that might as well have been sung by Bruce Springsteen (The first three lines of Born to Run), but because it was sung by guys who grew up in Colorado, not New Jersey, and yet share the same basic events of driving fast and reckless down a highway towards a place they know they won't reach.  There is even a shared wailing of "woah oh", and although it represents the ecstatic emotion of being briefly wild, uninhibited and free in one song, and perhaps a cry of pain from unrequited love in another, both emotions are part of the same event. Because what is the physical scene of the Great American Teenage Myth but running away from home and having to come back? Starting as the little child that packs a couple of peanut butter sandwiches and his stuffed tiger to get away from a hegemonic mom, how much have we progressed to the rebellious teen that just wants to run away and live his dreams. And there in lies not only the image of running but also the sense that The Great American Teenage Myth is a chase of something that has only become more solidified since childhood. A yearning of something that has become increasingly intense, and less and less bearable to not act on. 

But the myth is not satisfied. Calvin returns home and Bruce doesn't know when his dream is going to be fulfilled but he hopes one day. And there is the emotional underpinning of the shared story. It's a time of hope and dreams, but also of denial, impotence and inability. The balance of those emotions, and the knowledge that one has to return back to a cage of home is what creates the tension and ultimately the ecstasy of the brief escape or the grief of returning unfulfilled.

All this tied in with images of cars, the open road, and addressing a romantic interest builds up to create a common story that we can enjoying by nodding and thinking 'Yeah, I get that' when we hear someone else say it. 

Anyway, here's The Photo Atlas's new song "Dress Code" off of their new album Stuck in a Honeytrap. It's fun, angsty, unrequited, and comforts me with a feeling of warm nostalgia for our shared story. 

The Art of Peer Pressure

In my last big article I talked about the humanity and life that the artist necessarily gives to his music, and now I'd just like to talk a little bit about how we as listeners bring our own existence into the work, and in that way create or make its meaning manifest.

On Wednesday morning I read that my D.A.R.E. officer had been found deceased in the drivers seat of his silver ford focus from a self inflicted gunshot wound. I think he was the first police officer I ever met, and the guy that made me think it would be OK to have police officer as my plan B career choice, because simply put, he was just a nice guy. He didn't try to scare us straight, he just treated us like what we were, a bunch of little kids that only really knew about police from cops and robbers. He was gentle, and kind, and I knew that that was what I wanted to be and do with my life.

After reading all the comments and closing the article, I tried to move on and go back to work but "The art of Peer Pressure" just kind of came up in my head. I didn't summon it, I was just tapping my fingers, and there it was, mid beat just humming along in my head.   Now there's something really special to me about "The art of Peer Pressure". It moves, but in a different way. It's not slow or fast, and maybe its because of the clack and the drum, but it's steady in a cold cold way. Kendrick raps softly, and he just keeps going. He lays on word after word of his story saving only the title, select verses, and the chorus to explain it. It's a song that personifies its content, a long aimless drive that just goes until it breaks. In that content he illuminates the duality of who he is and who he becomes, and the strange unresolved tension that that masking presents. I would especially like to present that. This song is unresolved. They drive around, they break in, they drive out, and drive around, and the song ends. Kendrick is still his troubled self, there is no resolution.

And where is there resolution. A cop dies broken, and the criminals hate themselves for the crime, but its all they have to be and what else can the cop do but do his job? Everyone's hurting. Everyone's speaking soft. One was gentle and one was not, and one is being gentle with himself and the other is dead. And yet everything just keep doing. A cop dies broken, and the criminals hate themselves for the crime, but its all they have, their job and their identity.

We made a right, we made a left, but we were just circling life.

***

In writing this I wasn't sure if it was something that I wanted to write about. I didn't want to trivialize something as incomprehensible as a loss of human life, but there's a Jewish tradition that goes that even if you visit the grave of a stranger you leave a small stone on their grave in recognition of their life, their death, and your witness to them.  I'll leave this as my stone. A symbol of my witnessing of a life.

Thursday Special: Please Forgive my Heart; I am the Hood

A little while ago a friend said to me "HipHop is Dead". The more I think about it, the more I wonder if they were being sarcastic. It seemed like an awfully blanket (and for that matter kinda cliched) statement that when you look at it really isn't saying a whole lot. I'm very much of the opinion of that if we think something is worthless, dead, or wrong, that it says more about our lack of understanding of the object than it does about the object itself. Creations and forms of expression,  whether someone might be trying to honestly share something with you or not, should especially be handled with the utmost care.

Now here's why. There's a real reason and life behind creation, and whether it's motivation was money, fame, fortune, or an attempt at sincere communication and outlet, understanding that human aspect is hugely important. Think now of Bobby Womack who, after twenty years of failed career silence because of drug addiction and a recent  diagnosis with Alzheimer's disease, made  Please Forgive my Heart. The content alone of that song would have been powerful enough to move me. But to understand the context that Bobby Womack was writing in, and the sincere human who created that message, makes me understand that the writer is saying something beyond the words in his song.

Now enter Lil B. I won't explain what he's doing or saying, but I would claim that there's so much more to his music than just the content of what he says. That there is a person making those songs and that he should be understood even if the content of his message cannot be. Because no matter how many "Charlie Sheen's" we get, there will always  be an "I Am The Hood" that makes us remember that there is a deep well of humanity that composes each and every one of us which deserves to be wrestled with if only for the fact that it is our humanity alone regardless of what we might try and say. 

In the end, how can HipHop or anything else we've made be dead when there is so much pained, hurt, and frustratingly beautiful human life that created it? And if we do think that it really is dead, then maybe that means we've just stopped trying to care about the people that made it.

Enjoy.

Song of the Week: Leaves

Leaves - Cheers Elephant - Like Wind Blows Fire

I meant to publish this review a long time ago, but never got to it. This is also a nice little bit of pop music, although this time from around King of Prussia area rather than Southern Australia. I think the tagline from the promoters called it "furious" indie pop, which to me was kind of silly. But I understand the angle. The band, despite sometimes soft and dreamy vocals and xylophones, really does have great energy passion in their music, which I believe this song showcased best off of their album. So please, Enjoy. 

As a last note these guys also offer their album at "name your own price" at bandcamp. Give it a download, and if you like it, maybe share the love a little bit.

New Music: Symptoms

Symptoms  - Atlas Genius - When It Was Now

It's a good song. It's also definitely pop, which is a change on this blog. But the rhythm is quick and on point, and the switch of tone in guitar from verse to chorus to break is just delightful. It animates the lyrics, and gives life to what would otherwise be a love/death song with four chords behind it and a great voice in front. Also has shoots of spring in it, which is decidedly appropriate.

Enjoy.

Also as a neat bonus about four other songs are available for streaming or downloading on soundcloud from the same album as Symptoms. I got a chance to listen to the whole thing when it got to our radio station, and I would also recommend it.