Flying Lotus-Do the Astral Plane/DJ Shadow-The Number Song

Summer is a time for experimentation. And no, I don't mean chugging a bottle of Drano while wearing a coat made entirely of live ferrets. I mean writing a book, taking a trip, or growing a beard! Yes, for the first time in my suddenly not that short life, I am growing a beard. And it's fun! It's like I'm building an entirely new face. And there are surprises along the way. Oh yes. I figured the beard would simply grow in brown, like my hair. But no. Oh no. The base color is a reddish-brown (Crayola term), and there are quite a few gray hairs joining the party.

One would think that these gray hairs would immediately send me into a panic, gazing into the mirror to see my own mortality staring back at me in the form of twelve to seventeen wispy strands of existential angst. Nah. I think they look cool! I feel like this look will lend my bad puns a certain gravitas they've been previously lacking. And the possibilities of beard art are seemingly endless. Perhaps I will rotate dying the beard different colors, like Michael Cera's girlfriend does with her hair in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Perhaps I will turn the mustache into a Rollie Fingers style handlebar, or a Fu Manchu.

Will I probably end up doing any of these things? No. But has my face been transformed from a static, lifeless cardboard facade to a dynamic palate ready to be embellished in any way I see fit? No, not really that either. But yeah, I got a beard!

Speaking of experimentation, DJ Shadow and Flying Lotus are two of the best experimental "dj/producer/IDM/EDM/people who create sound" artists of recent memory. DJ Shadow's a bit past his prime, but Endtroducing still stands up as an amazing album. "The Number Song" mixes a sample of the Metallica instrumental "Orion" with crazy drum samples. "Do the Astral Plane" by Flying Lotus has everything but a sample of the kitchen sink. Groooooooan. See that bad pun goes over better with the beard. Really.

Joni Mitchell-Carey/This Flight Tonight/People's Parties

There have only been a few times in my life when I've thought to myself, "Have I ever been this happy before?" One of those times was at Iguazu Falls in Argentina. My friend and I walked the trails for a few hours, and everywhere we went there was a spectacular new perspective. Looking from the edge of the rail and watching the water plunge downward, or craning our necks to see the water crash down towards us. The sound of the falls was both powerful and peaceful, like a thousand hummingbirds on steroids. Rainbows might seem a bit cliche in conversation, but when they spread across a clear blue sky speckled with the foam from countless waterfalls, it's an amazing sight. And this place had more rainbows than a Lucky Charms commercial.

Maybe the best part was when we took a little speedboat into the actual falls. The driver took us right by one of the biggest ones and said, "Are you ready to go in?!" We all yelled affirmations like schoolgirls at a Taylor Swift concert, and he gunned it straight into the fall. The fall seemed to get exponentially taller as we approached it, and my friend and I clutched each other to brace for impact. Our giddy yelps were blotted out by the crashing water, and when we re-emerged into the daylight we all screamed at the driver to go again. He obliged, and we did another circle. Between the beauty of the scenery, the peaceful grandeur of the waterfalls, and the excitement and comradery our group felt in experiencing this together, it immediately jumped into the top five on my list of "Top 10 Best Days Ever." It's currently sandwiched somewhere between the time my first record went platinum and the time I knocked out Apollo Creed.

When I can't travel for one reason or another, I like to listen to a little Joni Mitchell. Most of her songs deal with love, some exotic, exciting place, or a combination of both. The way her love songs rise above generic is that she really bears her soul. Reading her lyrics is like dissecting a frog in fifth grade science class. It's all there to see, and sometimes it ain't pretty. Thankfully, she can write, so her lyrics don't come across awkwardly emo so much as exposed, vulnerable, and honest. The lighter songs often deal with exciting places, and in transporting me to Paris, Africa, or wherever, it's both a vicarious journey and an inspiration to go there myself.

My two favorite Joni records are Blue and Court and Spark. "Carey" is a really light-hearted, fun song on a pretty intense album. "This Flight Tonight" is magical. It sounds like she's playing the acoustic right next to the speaker, and her vocals sound so good. I also love the acoustic sound on "People's Parties," and the lyrics are incredible. Here's a couple of stanzas:


All the people at this party
They've got a lot of style
They've got stamps of many countries
They've got passport smiles
Some are friendly
Some are cutting
Some are watching it from the wings
Some are standing in the centre
Giving to get something

Photo Beauty gets attention
Then her eye paint's running down
She's got a rose in her teeth
And a lampshade crown
One minute she's so happy
Then she's crying on someone's knee
Saying laughing and crying
You know it's the same release

The transition from "People's Parties" into "Same Situation" is perfect, but I can't replicate it through youtube, and three youtubes is enough, dammit!

Gang of Four-Damaged Goods/At Home He's a Tourist (live)/Natural's Not In It/Randy "Macho Man" Savage and "Mean" Gene Okerlund being awesome

I have jury duty tomorrow. San Francisco never fails to send a jury duty summons on a yearly basis. I always postpone it to the summer, and so here I am. Doing my duty as a citizen of the United States of America. It won't be that bad if I'm chosen, as long as it's not some boring trial about zoning restrictions or a fender bender. If I'm gonna get chosen for a trial, I want it to be for something juicy, like a dog mauling case involving a rabid chihuahua, or a billionaire heiress accused of shoplifting two hundred boxes of Fruit Roll Ups.

It would be interesting to observe the entire process of a jury trial, though I'm sure it wouldn't conform to all the cliches that movies and TV shows have hammered into my head through the years. There will probably be no star witness called to the stand, and no cross-examination showdown culminating in the witness lunging at the defense attorney screaming, "YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT JUSTICE! MY BROTHER DIED FOR HIS SINS, AND YOU'LL DIE FOR YOURS!!!!!!!"

The thing that appeals to me about trials is the intellectual showdown aspect. It's like that Gladiatior movie, but instead of Russell Crowe and some random villain with undefined muscular tone and a creepy steel mask, it's two brains staring each other down in the center of the ring. It's like the Wrestlemania of the mind. Actually, it'd be pretty sweet if each attorney had a finishing move. At the end of his closing argument, if he knows the trial is really in the bag, he can get the other lawyer in a figure four leglock, finish him off with a suplex, or do a body slam from the turnbuckle.

I definitely had a wrestling phase when I was a kid. Some of my favorites were The Iron Sheik, Andre the Giant, Jake "The Snake" Roberts, Bret "The Hitman" Hart, and of course Randy "Macho Man" Savage. Obviously wrestling is fake, and obviously it's totally corny, but the man was freaking hilarious. "Macho Man" passed away recently, and beneath the songs I'm posting a classic clip of him with Mean Gene Okerlund, who was an amazing straight man for all the weirdo wrestlers. The end of the clip is gold. "Can I ask a question, Macho Man?" "NO MORE QUESTIONS!" "I'm sorry about that." :D

To get me in an ideological lather before the possible trial, I've been listening to some Gang of Four lately. They have great lyrics and killer buzzsaw guitars, but above all else the rhythm section in this band is incredible. "Damaged Goods" is perhaps their "hookiest" song, "At Home He's a Tourist" shows how great they are live, and their kickass rhythm section owns "Natural's Not In It." I had no idea that "Natural's Not In It" was used in the Marie Antoinette soundtrack. Whatever. JUST FUELING MY IDEOLOGICAL FIRE.

Metallica-For Whom The Bell Tolls/One/Disposable Heroes

I'm a hyper person. This manifests itself in a few ways. I'll be driving to school early in the morning, and instead of slowly easing into the morning with some NPR or a laid back Miles Davis record, I'll choose to taser my cranium with glitched out Aphex Twin tracks, or pummel my eardrums with a really heavy Sonic Youth record. Every once in a while I'll have to consciously stop myself and put on something a little more chilled out. This idea may or may not occur to me, depending on my mood.

Sometimes tending towards the hyper side can come in useful. I bat leadoff for my softball team, and it's not because I'm the best hitter. I generally hit singles, but I hit them pretty regularly, and once I'm on my base my spastic energy usually works to my advantage. When I'm in the outfield, I might back up the left fielder while playing right center, just because I'm bored and feel like running. This doesn't always help anybody, but it's fun!

There is, of course, a down side to being hyper, even on the softball field. I lost my spikes a couple months ago, and I've been playing Russian Roulette and going without since then. Last night I hit a single to an outfield playing unnecessarily deep (apparently their team is deficient in the scouting department). I ran to second, and then thought that the mediocre throw might allow me to make it to third. It didn't, and I had to throw on the brakes and quickly get back to second. Well, I busted @#*. For some reason I also like wearing basketball shorts while playing softball, so my exposed legs ended up looking like the filling for strawberry rhubarb pie. Being the indomitable warrior that I am, I toughed it out and scored, but my legs are still looking pretty rugged today.

It reminded me of the last time I skinned up my legs this badly. I was at summer "gifted camp" (nerd alert!), and I was running back to my Western Carolina University dorm as fast as I could. I was about to execute a trade of some old Batman comic book for a copy of Metallica's Ride The Lightning, and boy was I pumped. I was running faster than lightning, if you catch my drift. I ran around the corner, and while I excitedly saw the dorm coming into view, I completely failed to notice that the sidewalk suddenly ended. It was only about a two foot drop, but when I landed on the concrete my legs suddenly knew pain like they had never known before. After nervously glancing around to ensure that no one had witnessed this Wiley Coyote-falling-off-the-cliff moment, I proceeded to drag my tattered carcass the rest of the way to the dorm. The only thing that kept me going was the promise of rubbing alcohol and speed metal. In the end, however, perhaps my ordeal allowed me to relate more easily to James Hetfield's tortured cries and Kurt Hammett's furious shredding.

Metallica has become the poster band of lame in the last decade or so, with Lars Ulrich's Napster whining, their bloated symphonic versions of old songs, and that silly documentary filled with band bickering and art buying. Back in the day, however, they were pretty awesome. I worshipped Ride The Lightning, Master of Puppets, and ...And Justice For All, and the following songs were my favorites from each album. Master of Puppets was the album I loved most, but the video for "One" immediately caught my attention. A KID GETS EVERYTHING BLOWN OFF IN WAR AND IS FORCED TO CONTINUE LIVING?!?! THAT'S SO MESSED UP, AND SOOOO... METAL.

Black Star-Respiration/Mobb Deep-Shook Ones, Part 2/Tyler, the Creator (featuring Hodgy Beats)-Sandwitches

When I heard about the Rock the Bells lineup this summer, I almost lost it. Gza performing Liquid Swords, Raekwon & Ghostface performing Only Built for Cuban Linx, Nas performing Illmatic, Black Star performing their self-titled album, Mobb Deep performing The Infamous, Lauryn Hill performing The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, etc. So many absolutely classic, legendary albums from the 90s performed front to back!

But it also frustrated me that there aren't many new hip hop acts that I'm really excited about. Granted, I don't exactly listen to (new) rap quite as much as I used to, but it's still pretty obvious that the overall quality has gone down. Recently, however, the group Odd Future has been making an impression. They're really just a bunch of kids (one of them, Earl the Sweatshirt, is actually supposedly in juvie right now), and they're very polarizing. Their production is often great, with dark synths and grimy beats. They can all flow, and Tyler's gravelly voice fits the production really well, especially when juxtaposed with Earl's more youthful-sounding voice. But there's just one problem, and it might be the problem that keeps them from blowing up.

They're offensive. Like not just throw a curse word in here or there offensive, but almost every ________ophobic type of offensive you could think of. I don't know, I've long since stopped writing off music because I disagree with the things people say in it. Do I listen to this music to learn moral lessons, or because I want to model myself after the artist, or because I'm voting for them for some kind of office? I think you could extend this type of thinking to almost any sort of art. If you read Lolita, does that make you a paedophile? If you watch Texas Chainsaw Massacre, does that make you a serial killer? If you listen to Mobb Deep, does that make you a gang banger?

Tyler actually says, "It's f*cking fiction," in one of his songs, and that's how I look at it. Some of the artists that people lionize were actually total jerks, such as John Lennon (deadbeat father to son Julian), Bob Dylan (wielded his intelligence like a machete), the Rolling Stones (misogynists who obliterated Marianne Faithful, among others), etc. I'd rather completely separate the artist from the art, and take from the music only what I want to. And I do see glimmers of meaning poking through the uber-aggressive lyrics, when he raps about the rejection he feels from being abandoned by his father, or being a confused, hyper nineteen year old with the world suddenly watching and judging his every move.

The most compelling thing I've ever seen by this group is the video for "Yonkers" (which I'm not gonna post, cause this is a family site!), and while there's some pretty disturbing images in it, I watched it with my jaw on the ground for the entire time. Isn't that what "art" is supposed to do? Now, I'm not putting these guys in a post with these legends to compare them with Mobb Deep or Black Star. About half their stuff is good, and half of it is meh. But at least they're doing something different! I look forward to seeing where they go from here. I'm posting Tyler the Creator and Hodgy Beats on Jimmy Fallon. Great performance (listen to the beat kick back in as Hodgy Beats starts the second verse), and there's Mos Def at the end of the video. IF HE LIKES IT, IT MUST BE GOOD.

Hole-Violet/Breeders-Cannonball/Live-Mirror Song/Nine Inch Nails-Head Like a Hole/Nirvana-Drain You/Pearl Jam-Corduroy

I just finished my sixth year of teaching, and before yesterday I had never been to a graduation ceremony. I decided to go yesterday and check it out. It was a nice ceremony, and got me to thinking back to my high school days. I'm not sure what the senior class songs are these days (or if they even have them anymore), but when I was in school it seemed that every class was "assigned" either "Don't You Forget About Me" by Simple Minds, or "These Are Days" by 10,000 Maniacs. So, ummm... that Simple Minds song might be Molly Ringwald & Andrew McCarthy's song, but it ain't mine. And, let's just say that I wasn't exactly sold on Natalie Merchant.

When I was in high school, it was all about confusion. Not necessarily confusion like not being able to decide between a Butterfinger or Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Blizzard at Dairy Queen (Butterfinger nine times out of ten), but just not really being able to process things. High school is like those magnets people put up on the fridge with all the different facial expressions. joyful! WORRIED. jubilant! EXASPARATED. whimsical! DEPRESSED. anticipating! INDECISIVE. I was plagued by the inability to distinguish between the profound and trivial events in my life. The trivial was profound. The profound was trivial, or at times not even acknowledged. Up was down. Down was up. Sideways was... sideways going in the other direction.

Of course all of this goofiness was constantly filtered through the prism of music, and in my case it was filtered largely through the prism of 90s grunge/Buzz Clips/Yo MTV Raps!/120 Minutes/Headbanger's Ball/Beavis & Butthead/etc. That may or may not be a good thing, depending on your perspective. I'm gonna leave rap out of this post and focus on rock, because a lot of the 90s rap I was into I've already posted about, and I'm gonna need to post about it again soon, because I just saw a crazy rap festival lineup that I'm insanely pumped up about. But I digress... often.

So 90s people often seem to fall either into the Nirvana camp or the Pearl Jam camp. Obviously the Nirvana camp is a much hipper camp to be in, both because Nirvana holds up better musically, and because Kurt Cobain's suicide has absolved him of any responsibility to continue making quality music. Nirvana is a better band, and I liked them back then, but in terms of hours logged listening to during high school (HLLTDHS), I guess I was more of a Pearl Jam guy. So sue me. Call me a square. I know you are!

I think I will simply say that for all the sh*t Courtney Love gets (and deserves, at this point) for being a hot mess, the argument about whether Cobain wrote Live Through This is pointless. I don't really care if Cobain wrote it, played all four instruments, and somehow morphed into a strung out-looking blonde to sing it, there's some good songs on there.

All of these songs were musical fridge stickers for me, and it's nice to go back and listen to them again. High school was strange and confusing, but in retrospect it was also a lot of fun. Below are some of my favorite 90s rock songs, with the corresponding emotional itches scratched.

Hole-Violet: random aggression with no real target or focus


Breeders-Cannonball: The sun is out and the humidity is under 99%!


Live-Mirror Song: Feeling earnest about something. Perhaps I'm not quite sure what I'm feeling earnest about, but lyrics like "holy desert shield" (?) and "said unto this man" sound really important and deep.


Nine Inch Nails-Head Like a Hole: Aggression with a target, or I just kinda wanna drive fast.


Nirvana-Drain You: Rocking out like Beavis and Butthead.


Pearl Jam-Corduroy: I can't listen to Who's Next forever!

Tortoise-Djed/Seneca (Live & Studio versions)

I mentioned attention spans in the last post. I've actually felt mine eroding to a certain extent over the past ten or so years. In fact, I'm pretty sure it wasn't that great to begin with. But having easy access to computers, ipods, iphones, instant music, instant scrabble, instant coffee, and instant karma, I'd be lying if I said it hasn't had an effect on me. In a way that's sad, I guess, but if I'm cognizant of it, and I wield this microbe-sized attention span as a weapon with which to mercilessly ration out my ever-so-important time, then eventually I will be able to look back upon having lived the most efficient life in the history of man. Or something.

Take Tortoise, for instance. They have some long songs. One of them, Djed, is approximately twenty minutes long. Too much for someone with a short attention span, you ask while checking your other three tabs to check on airline tickets, an IM conversation you're barely paying attention to, and a game of angry birds? NO! See Djed is awesome, every section is distinct and beautiful, and the last half of the song pays the listener off with some of the most incredible music there has ever been (if you MUST only listen to one half of Djed, listen to the second half, but you're really missing out on the full experience).

People sometimes ask me what the best concert I've been to is. Well I'm certain of two things. One of the two best concerts I've ever seen was Prince, and the other was Tortoise. Prince is f*cking Prince, and he absolutely tore the roof off. But Tortoise was equally amazing, because even though they're almost scientifically precise with their playing, they also kick gobs and gobs of *ss. That's why I'm posting both the live and studio versions of Seneca. The song rocks so hard, and the groove they settle into rules. Yay Tortoise. :)

tUnE-yArDs-Bizness

The enjoyment I derive from watching Olympic track & field races is inversely related to the length of the race. If I gotta watch some dudes run in a circle seventy-five times, and wait a seemingly interminable amount of time just to see the wolfpack separate in the last lap, then count me out. I'm good for somewhere between sixty and four hundred meters, and after that I'd rather take my chances on a horse biffing into the water in equestrian. Does this mean I have the attention span of a horsefly? I don't know, but I gotta make my move on Words With Friends. Be right back.

Next week is the last week of the school year, and I feel like I'm at the end of one of those really long races. The part where I've been running for so long I can't even remember when the race began, and all of a sudden I'm like "Oh, ****! There's only one lap left!" So I break into an awkward sprint for the finish line, jostling for position and half breathing, half dry-heaving. I know I'll make it-I always do-but there's always that thought in the back of my head. What if I clip the last hurdle, face-planting into the hard surface while everyone whizzes by and I pound my loser fists onto the track? What if I tear my Achilles seven strides from the finish, and I have to hop across the finish line with everyone pity-clapping and secretly thinking, "Woah. Sucks to be him!"

One of the ways to push these negative thoughts out of my mind is to occasionally blare music into my cranium. And right now I am really enjoying blaring this particular song, and watching this great video. The kids in the beginning are freaking awesome, and I feel a certain kinship with all the adults making those crazy faces in the second section. I, too, feel the compulsion to make bizarre faces on occasion. I don't, on the other hand, decorate myself with white board markers and indulge in slow motion interpretive dance. But hey. Sweet video.

Amon Tobin-Four Ton Mantis/Get Your Snack On/Like Regular Chickens/Nightlife

For some reason, before this week I had never heard the song "Chicago" by Frank Sinatra. I found it a little strange, actually. I feel like, even if you're an untouchable like Sinatra, you should only write one anthem for a gigantic US city. He's from Jersey, so he shoulda just stuck with "New York, York." Or better yet, why not write a song for Newark, New Jersey?! People are gonna love NYC whether or not he sings a song about it. The Yankees are gonna have more money than God and make the playoffs every year, whether or not his song plays after Mariano Rivera saws the last hitter's bat in two in the top of the ninth inning. If I were an internationally adored crooner, I would write songs for lesser-known and more downtrodden US cities, cause those are the cities that need them!

So here are some chorus ideas I have for songs. AHEM...

Our 2012 was 1958,
Robocop came way too late,
Somebody saaaaave Detroooooooit!

The economy sucks, that jerk Lebron left us,
Looking for a meat cleaver in Cleeeeevelaaaaaaaand.

G-ville! Great college town! Party, rock out, and dance.
But drive ten minutes, it's the banjo player from Deliverance!


Ok, maybe I have to polish some of those. Anyways, Amon Tobin is incredible. Quick side note: I've pretty much given up on constructing posts with stories related to the songs I'm posting. Hence the complete lack of transition between the story and the music! Here are four great Amon Tobin tracks (I can't choose-he rules so hard). My favorite part in any of them might be 2:45 into "Like Regular Chickens," when the two guys from David Lynch's movie Eraserhead say "I just, uh, cut them up like regular chickens." "Oh, sure, just cut them up like regular chickens," then the drums absolutely freak out, with the slower drums eventually coming back in in the background. So good.

Robyn-In My Eyes

Pop stars seem to be getting younger and younger. I think I saw a girl with braces in a music video recently, though I'm not sure if that "Friday" song even counts. Regardless, it's gotta be tough for someone like Robyn, who is over thirty (!) and actually had a hit in the twentieth century.

This song kinda kicks ass, though. Good beats, and it's strangely uplifting. Makes me want to be all I can be. In honor of Mother's Day, here's to a pop star that's actually old enough to produce offspring!

Jefferson Airplane-White Rabbit/Echo and the Bunnymen-Killing Moon

Not having a laundry facility on-site was always a deal-breaker for me, but when I got my new place a few months ago, everything else was perfect, so I decided to go for it. Going to the laundromat hasn't been that big of a deal so far, but today was a bit out there. Maybe it's because I have today off, and the Monday day crowd isn't the same as the weekend crowd.

When I got there the place was packed, and slightly resembled a casting call for Night of the Living Dead. There was a lady with multiple sores on her face who seemed convinced that every other person in the laundromat was intent on stealing her clothes. She would stare down a person for about thirty to forty-five seconds, then turn around and mutter a few words to herself, a sly grin slowly spreading across her face. Her primary adversary was a man with stringy gray hair, approximately three teeth, Coke bottle glasses, and headphones blaring Led Zeppelin I loud enough for the whole place to hear. The strange thing was that despite the decibel level, he never once even bobbed his head, even at the most rocking parts of "Dazed and Confused" or "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You." He just calmly folded his clothes while Bonzo took two by fours to the inside of his skull.

In honor of my slightly strange trip to the laundromat and Easter, here's "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane, and "Killing Moon" by Echo and the Bunnymen. There's a lot of "OMG DRUGZ" mythology to "White Rabbit," but this song is so great on its own terms. The build-up to the climax that starts at 1:22 is so amazing, and for a minute Grace Slick had a voice that could slay dragons.

I first heard "Killing Moon" in Zurich, and even though I was in this beautiful city with countless things to do, all I could do for approximately three hours was listen to this song on repeat. The intro and when the drums kick in especially blew me away. Great headphones song.

LCD Soundsystem - I Can Change

I've been running away from my past for far too long. I moved out to San Francisco ten years ago, thinking that I could just turn away from the last fifteen years of my existence. Just blot it out, like an unnecessarily snarky comment whited out on a student essay. People would ask me, "Where are you from," and I would say Paris, New York, and Florida, like they would be so bowled over by the first two that they wouldn't even be paying attention by the time they heard the last one. PARIS?!?!?! NEW YORK?!?!?! You must be so cultured?!?!? So sophisticated?!?! In this world, my birthday parties took place at The Guggenheim, and my weekends consisted of leisurely strolls down the Champs Elysees. Let them come to their own conclusions about how long I lived in each place. Never mind that the entirety of my formative years took place in Port Orange, Florida, a sleepy little suburb of Daytona Beach, whose version of the Tour De France consists not of superbly trained bicyclists from around the globe, but of beer-bellied bumpkin bikers from cities like Waldo, New Smyrna, and Longwood.

Sure, my house looked like a museum, but that wasn't really my reality. The sculptures were merely family members frozen in time, without the accompanying cocktail parties, gallery openings, or book signings. My reality was all Florida, all of the time. My reality was playing pick-up football at the park on Reed Canal Road, and hoping that the bigger kids that unfortunately sometimes showed up didn't shove me into the Reed Canal. My reality was a bizarre hybrid of tag and hide and seek outside the mall waiting for our parents to pick us up, the game inevitably devolving into my most hyper friend antagonizing everyone and subsequently getting threatened with his life. My reality was romantic dates at the local putt putt, transportation provided by parents with a mini-van and a little time on their hands.

Living in San Francisco has helped me come to grips with Florida. I love San Francisco, but it is a city filled with affectations. Everybody has a thing, be it organic food, wine, art, politics, non-profits, or general progressive-leaning social change. Most people are into their thing because they're into it, but some people seem to wear their causes like a Burberry scarf. This makes me appreciate Florida, which, for all it's "lack of culture" and general flatness (topographically, demographically, basically everything other than South Beach-chestedly), doesn't really put on airs for anyone.

LCD Soundsystem is an interesting little group. An interesting little group that just broke up. :( When they first came out they seemed a bit gimmicky, with goofy hipstery song titles like "Daft Punk Is Playing At My House Tonight." I kinda clumped them in with all the other ok but disposable dancey indie groups like The Rapture and Bloc Party. But upon closer inspection, James Murphy is a solid producer and a pretty good songwriter. A pretty good songwriter THAT TURNED DOWN A CHANCE TO WRITE FOR SEINFELD. Oops. Anyway, I regret never having seen them live. Seems like they put on a great show.

Husker Du-Chartered Trips/Big Black-Tiny, King of the Jews

Spring Break's over, and I'm mad!!!! Actually, I'm not, but it seemed like a good way to start a blog post about heavy bands. I don't really listen to a lot of loud wall of sound guitar music, but there's something about these songs that set them apart from various other loud wall of sound guitar music. Melody! Melody can do a lot. Melody can turn cacophony into euphony, and dissonance into... uh, what do I put here? Larry Nance. He was a smoooooooooooth dunker.

Cat Power-Nude as the News

People seem to have something against crazy. A little crazy can come in handy sometimes. Take Chan Marshall, aka Cat Power, for instance. She's a bit of an indie queen, but she also has a rep for being a couple fries short of a Happy Meal. If you buy a ticket for one of her shows, you could get a great show, or you could see her singing from behind a pee-stained mattress (maybe?), gnawing on an audience member's arm (maaaaaaaaybe??), or randomly running off the stage at sporadic intervals throughout the show (slightly more likely).

While some of Marshall's kookiness used to be attributable to drug and alcohol issues, there's no doubt that she's strung a bit tightly to begin with. And while this might make the day-to-day a bit trickier to navigate for her, I think it also adds a certain depth to her music. Her voice sometimes sounds like she's losing it, and her lyrics are pretty raw and intense.

Nude as the News is definitely my favorite song of hers, and has some of her best lyrics:

And I know in the cold light
There's a very big man
Leading us into
Temptation

Jackson, Jesse, I've got a son in me
Jackson, Jesse, I've got a son in me

And he's related to you
He's related to you
He is waiting to meet you

He's related to you
He's related to you
He is dying to meet you

A little angst goes a long way!

Amy Grant-Baby, Baby/Cyndi Lauper-All Through the Night/Howard Jones-Things Can Only Get Better

There is perhaps no more quintessentially suburban experience than the orthodontist's office. Almost every middle to upper class kid living in the burbs spends a significant amount of time reclined in an orthodontist's chair, staring helplessly into the inverted face of his friendly neighborhood orthodontist. Since my teeth were more jacked up than Joan Rivers' face, I spent perhaps even more time than the average kid laid up in an orthodontist's office.

The tone of the visit was immediately dictated by the assistant I happened to get that day. I always hoped to score a cute one, but more times than not I ended up with the one whose mouth looked like she had played hot potato with a hand grenade. Cruel? Maybe. But I had to look up at this lady's grill over an approximately six year period, so I consider this reparations.

While the assistant worked on my teeth, she would inevitably ask me assorted mindless questions about school, sports, and the like. After the preliminaries drew to a close, the big man would come over. I wonder if orthodontists and dentists ever needlessly stall before they come in. They always come in almost exactly twenty minutes after the assistant starts, even if the prelim work has been finished for ten minutes. It's like he's a headlining band, and he says to the concert promoter, "I do NOT go on before midnight!"

I saw Dr. Lecompte's inverted face talking to me so many damn times, I started to see it as a cartoon character of sorts. Dr. Lecompte was not a real person, he was a bald duck with no eyes and mouth who could somehow still carry on an intelligent conversation. Seriously, look at someone's face upside down while they're talking. It's like Howard the Duck the Orthodontist!

Orthodontist's office inevitably tune into the local easy listening station. It makes sense, I guess. Now, I've never been a huge fan of the easy listening genre in general, but there are a few tunes that make choking on a bubble-gum molar impression easier to swallow. First off, of course, is the queen of the orthodontist's chair, Amy Grant. Her concert tours should be sponsored by a floss company. When you leave the office, your orthodontist should hand you a case of floss, an extra firm tooth brush, and an Amy Grant CD.

All kidding aside, I've always liked this song. Why? I don't know. It's catchy. It's happy! Really happy. Usually happy songs like this make me retch a bit, but this one is SO happy, it's like a Prozac laser beam to the skull. Sorry about the ad, but Amy Grant told me that advertising was ok, and I just couldn't resist her cutie-patootie smile.

Cyndi Lauper is just a champ. Always has been, always will be. It's a good day at the orthodontist's office when this song comes on. That bizzare bag-pipe-sounding synthesizer kinda comes out of nowhere at 2:09, though. It's a bit disconcerting. Could cause a routine cleaning to get a bit out of hand.

Sometimes a little party breaks out in the orthodontist's office. Metal-mouth teens rip off their little drool-catching bibs, assistants throw down their plaque-scrapers, and Dr. Lecompte throws on a little Howard Jones! "WOAH WOAH WOAH, WOAH WOAH WOAH." Good times.

Toro Y Moi - Go With You/Stereolab - Miss Modular

I think I was getting the winter blues for a bit there. Well, San Francisco's version of the winter blues, at least. It seemed like it was raining for about six weeks straight. But now, in a nice bit of synchronicity, Spring Break arrives just as the sun seems to finally be arriving for an extended visit.

So it's time for some chill music. When I first heard Toro Y Moi, he reminded me a bit of Stereolab, which is maybe the ultimate chill music. Apparently some people call Toro Y Moi chillwave, but those people are tools. What the hell is chillwave, anyway? Sounds like a Capri Sun flavor.

Go With You is a sweet song. 3:27 makes me particularly happy. I'm throwing in a Stereolab track cause they put the ill in chill. Actually, they don't do that at all, and I really regret writing the last sentence, but I'm not deleting it because it's part of what makes me the person I am this sentence.

Steely Dan-Pretzel Logic

I thought these guys were so lame when I was a kid. One of them looked like an accountant, and the other looked like an angry fish. They just seemed so adult contemporary and clinical, the opposite of everything I thought was cool about rock. I could see Robert Plant or James Hetfield breaking a bottle over their heads in a barfight, but I couldn't see myself ever listening to their music.

Now that I've MATURED, I realize that Steely Dan rule. It's not really fire-you-up music, it's more chill music. The world-weary lyrics go perfectly with their amazing grooves. At 1:56 it gets so good. Smooooooooooooth.

MIA-Internet Connection (Stanton Warriors remix)

I see all these commercials on ESPN for Bassmasters, which apparently is some big deal fishing tournament. I went fishing once, and I didn't catch anything! In fact, my friend's little brother barfed in his hat, and then later in the day my friend put the hat on my head! Sure, it had been cleaned out, but it still completely freaked me out. I swear I heard a phantom squish.

If we're dealing with heteronyms, I have to say that I fall squarely on the side of the "long A" bass, as opposed to the "short A" bass. I'm not one of those kids that joined the high school low-rider/bass club, put four twelves in the back of my car, and got a sticker on the back of my car that said, "My Bass Hertz So Good," but I do enjoy beats and bass. Not so much bass that you get whiplash sitting in the car, but enough so that you can feel the music. My Honda stock system is enough, if it's a high-quality recording.

The Stanton Warriors are great because even though they often play in "rave" clubs, much of their influence comes from booty and bass records. This MIA remix is bad. Pissed off carburetor sound at :29 + bass drop at :44 = win.

Stevie Wonder-As

You know those scenes in movies where the crazed, belligerent worker holds a bunch of people hostage in the top story of a high-rise, and the police desperately try to talk him out of offing all his co-workers? There's always that point where the guy yells, "Don't mess with me! I'm not screwing around here!" Well, at that point the negotiators need to try a different ploy, because at least one person always eats it so the cops know just how serious Mr. Going Postal is. Instead of offering the guy $50,000 and immunity from the law (nudge, nudge, wink, wink), they just need to blare the song "As" by Stevie Wonder over the speakers.

There's so much love wrapped up in this song, I'm fully convinced that Mr. Postal would immediately put down his shotgun, break down in tears, and awkwardly hug all his hostages. He might even, just for fun, take a jump onto that trampoline thing the police set up. The only danger is that the cops might also throw their guns down and start hugging each other, leaving deaf criminals in the vicinity with the opportunity to cause mischief.

This song is just so amazing. The lyrics are beautiful, Stevie's vocals are perfect, and the background vocals that come in might be the best I've ever heard. I prefer Innervisions a bit as an album, but this is definitely my favorite Stevie Wonder song.

Microphones-Map

Some musicians are performers, and some are meant to sit in a basement, tinker around with sound and occasionally create magic. I once went and saw Phil Elverum, aka The Microphones, aka Mt. Eerie, aka Slightlyupmyownass, at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco. I was very into his album The Glow Part 2, and was excited to hear some of the songs live. Now I'm not sure if Mr. Elverum was on really intense pain medication, but it was honestly one of the most boring shows I've ever seen. I left before it even ended.

I don't think "experimental" music has to be synonymous with soul-crushingly tedious and lifeless performances. Tortoise is a band that makes experimental music, and they were one of the best shows I've ever seen in my life. I'm going to see the anti-establishment, nine-person post-rock group Godspeed You Black Emperor! later this month, and I fully expect to be entertained! They're pretentious enough to move the exclamation mark to after the You in their name, but I've heard that they still put on a good show!

Needless to say, I'm not running out to see any more Phil Elverum shows. However, "Map" has consistently blown my mind since the first time I heard it about ten years ago. There are some great guitar-based songs on the album, but the sounds he creates in this song just kill me.

0:25: The sky is torn off. This sound is so beautiful to me. Reminds me of "The Big Ship" by Brian Eno.

1:28: Beautiful vocals with the ascending drums.

2:21: Glocks! Break yourself!

2:56: Swirly! Can you feel the swirlllllllllllllllllllllllllll...

3:51: Love the drums! Pounding one piano note again and again, with what sounds like an accordion in the background, all caught up in the swirl. Amazing climax.

I would like to live inside this song for a while.