Well this is something new and different. The Arcade Fire have always been into pushing the themes of their albums and the suburban angst from their latest, The Suburbs, is no more clear than in their new video for “We Used To Wait.” The music video website asks you to first enter the address of the home in which you grew up. It then combines music video footage with a Google Maps view of your own home. Neat! It told me it wouldn’t work 100% with my childhood address for whatever reason, and it didn’t, but it was still cool! It’s kind of a gimmicky thing, Arcade Fire, but it’s different and it is pretty neat, so kudos!
Jamie came back with a vengeance! Happy times for Knox Road. Jon went back to school, I’m heading to NYC. Where will our lives take us next? No idea. But if you check out what you may have missed this week…
…yeah, completely unrelated.
To sum up the week, unscramble these letters: SUFJNA.
For those who don’t know, this is the thirteenth iTunes Mixery. Here’s how it goes: I play iTunes on shuffle -> tell you which song comes up -> provide the mp3 and a tidbit -> continue until five songs and embarrassment are complete. Again, nothing’s off-limits – I don’t “fix the mix”. Have a look into my life…
Sun Kil Moon – “Space Travel Is Boring” [MP3] (from Tiny Cities). A gorgeous rendition of Modest Mouse’s original version, on an otherwise disappointing covers album. Mark Kozelek forces a deep introspection here, adding some orchestral components alongside his tranquil vocals.
A Farewell To Arms – “Come Home Soon” [MP3] (from Learning To Let Go). Jeez, this mix is pretty emo. “Come Home Soon” takes me back to my high school days, as A Farewell To Arms (now just Corey Crowder) was one of those standard tries-too-hard-acoustic-pop guys. Still, a pleasant track…without the slightest bit of originality.
Portastatic – “Echos Myron” [MP3] (from Blatant Doom Trip). Another tribute, this time for Guided By Voices. Anyone enjoying the lo-fi hype these days would be remiss not to listen to Mac McCaughan’s solo project, Portastatic. This track is short and sweet, and perfect for the end of summer.
“We’re having some fun
We’ve got music and laughter
And wonderful times
That’s so important in today’s world
Oh yeah.”
Truthful words, no? A few weeks ago while bumbling around my local bookstore I fell upon a 2007 memoir of someone who I haven’t thought about in quite a while. As I turned it over in my hands, a rush of everything he’s done, or should I say everything he’s done that I’ve seen or heard, much of which was filmed/recorded before I had a mind to understand his genre, came over me. His comic genius coupled with graceful aging has stuck in my chest throughout the years. A celebrity crush? Perhaps. In recent years, as he married someone thirty-some-odd years his junior (my age..hellooooooo??) I snorted in disgust and attempted to, well, un-like him. This, of course, was short-lived, only until a re-run of a film crawled into a sleepless evening and I loved him, again, despite young wifey. Oh how I adore my favorite Jerk, Steve Martin.
What more can I say? Simple really: this is just me on a Friday, trying to lure a few (at least I hope it’s only a few) unknowing readers into the dusty archives of good, smart and simple comedy. Sheer silliness. Yes, there are more than a handful of movies from the nineties – stinkers – in his catalog, if you will, but the whole of the not-so-great can be erased by the genius of one film and one film only. Let me get it out of the way now and beg you, PLEASE, if you haven’t, please watch The Jerk. Thank you.
I could gush about his screenplays or his musical ability or the hours of stand up I could only listen to on records after his peak on stage and, later, in live, watered-down versions, as he hosted SNL, his hair growing whiter than white year after year. I’d rather, however, mention Born Standing Up in which he introduces readers to his life before stardom, explaining thoughtfully how and why he behaved the way he did on stage and became a comedian. Insight into family, lovers, music, anxiety all in a palatable, stunningly personal way…as if a friend were detailing tribulations over a cup of coffee. I admire Mr. Martin for keeping a relatively healthy low-pro throughout his career when his peers with similar talents were living and (literally) dying in the fast lane of the spotlight.
I will close with nary a word about indie music this week. I will simply complete the quote I started with, in hopes that I could, someday have AMAZING, too:
“It’s so hard to laugh
It seems that short of tripping a nun
Nothing is funny anymore
But you know
I see people going to college
For fourteen years
Studying to be doctors and lawyers
And I see people going to work
At the drugstore at 7:30 every morning
To sell flair pens
But the most amazing thing to me is
I get paid
For doing
This.”
-S. Martin, 1975, on stage in San Francisco
Happy weekend.
[Abby's Road is a Knox Road feature published every other Friday.]
It’s hard to classify Roy Paymon‘s music, as it blends together several styles of folk, pop, blues, rock, and general Americana. He’s a singer/songwriter based out of Brooklyn, and recently released his self-produced debut album, Guarding Crows.
Check out a couple tracks below, including the stunning “Imonetta” (if you don’t understand why that’s the title of the song then you should check your hearing). Despite the repeated lyrics, however, the song breaks out into something much more after a bare-bones plea that begins with just an acoustic guitar and some haunting background synth, then transitions into an overwrought emotional imploration. This guy’s got the songwriting chops to make it big.
Well Sufjan really likes surprises. First the out-of-nowhere All Delighted People EP, then the news of his long-awaited new full-length, The Age of Adz, and now a stream of one of the tracks from Adz! This guy knows just what we want and he’s delivering. The track is definitely not quite what we’re used to from Sufjan. Lyrically it’s still deep and features that dreamy voice and backing vocals we all love. But musically, it’s decently heavy electronic stuff. And yet this (somewhat) foreign territory still sounds beautiful. What can you say? The dude is just talented.
UPDATE: Looks like we have an MP3 to download as well! Many thanks to Stereogum for this one.
The day has come! Put down your worn-out copy of Illinois and get ready for The Age of Adz, Sufjan Stevens’ LOOOONG awaited new (song-based) album. On the heels of the mysteriously surprising All Delighted People EP last week, Sufjan has announced the release of the new album (pronounced The Age Of Odds) officially due out October 12 on Asthmatic Kitty (if you preorder you can get an MP3 download as soon at September 28). But if you’re expecting more banjo/tambourine/cry your eyes out music, guess again.
From the label:
“We can say it shows an extensive use of electronics (banjos and acoustic guitars give way to drum machines and analog synthesizers), and an obsession with cosmic fantasies (space, heaven, aliens, love), to create an explicit pop-song extravaganza, augmented by heavy orchestration, and maybe even a few danceable moments. Enjoy Your Rabbit meets the BQE. But with songs. Verse, chorus, bridge, backbeat. Gated reverb. Space echo. Get your boogey on.”
They also say the “Adz” of the title refers to the apocalyptic paintings of artist Royal Robertson, whose work will be used for the cover and inside art. Does this mean we’re dropping the state theme in exchange for an apocalyptic album? Not necessarily. According to Asthmatic Kitty, the album is not built around any kind of “conceptual underpinning.” So Sufjan’s new thing is just that he doesn’t have a new thing. Bold move, friend. Bold move.
The Age of Adz tracklist:
01 Futile Devices
02 Too Much
03 Age of Adz
04 I Walked
05 Now That I’m Older
06 Get Real Get Right
07 Bad Communication
08 Vesuvius
09 All for Myself
10 I Want To Be Well
11 Impossible Soul
Kudos to Pitchfork for picking up on this Vanity Fair article about the woman who appears on the cover of Vampire Weekend’s top-selling album, Contra, and is suing pretty much everybody over it. The polaroid of a blonde-haired blue-eyed girl from the 80s is maybe one of the most memorable album covers of the last few years and has been used extensively in Vampire Weekend’s advertising campaign for the album, as well as tour backdrops, press kits, web sites, etc. But apparently the former model who appears in the picture had no idea her image was being used.
According to the interview with Vanity Fair, ex-model Ann Kirsten Kennis first saw the image in January when her daughter pulled up the album cover online. She says she never signed a release form and thinks the photo was taken by her mother. The band however paid New York photographer Tod Brody $5,000 for the shot which he said he took during a casting session in 1983 (Brody does have a record of being shady and possibly fraudulent).
What the band and label have on their side is a release form dated July 30, 2009 addressed to a “Kirsten Johnsen” (a combination of her old modeling pseudonym with a seemingly random last name) who signed permission to use the photo. If it turns out the form is legit, Kennis won’t have much of a case. But if it’s a fraud, the band, the label and Brody will all be in hot water.
For Vampire Weekend this seems to be just a case of a misunderstanding. It looks like they just found the picture, contacted the person who claimed to have taken it, sent a form to the name of the woman he gave them, and acquired the rights. But somewhere along the line, either Brody figures Kennis will never know and lies to make a quick $5,000, or wires get crossed and they send the release form to the wrong person who mindlessly signs it.
But let’s also not forget that Kennis is clearly digging for gold here. How much did it hurt her reputation that she was on the cover of a number one album? “Oh! You’re that beautiful woman on the cover of that album that’s selling so well! God how awful!” According to the article, she’s currently working on a line of space-themed teddy bears called the “Cosmic Cubs Club.” She could stand to get out of the house every once in a while. I get that using one’s image for commercial use without permission is wrong. But in this case, who’s really losing out?
Big news for Portland band Starfucker! Not only are they announcing a big tour with cute Austin-based group The Octopus Project, but they also signed to Polyvinyl! Wonderful! The band will release Julius, their first single with the label on September 14 (digital) and October 12 (vinyl). Fortunately, we already have an MP3 of the title-track, which sounds promising for Starfucker’s new full-length due out early 2011 on Polyvinyl.
Starfucker Fall Tour
09.23 Neurolux – Boise, ID
09.24 Kilby Court – Salt Lake City, UT
09.24 Urban Lounge – Salt Lake City, UT
09.25 Hi Dive – Denver, CO
09.27 Record Bar – Kansas City, MO
09.29 Juanita’s Cantina Ballroom – Little Rock, AK #
09.30 The Collective – Shreveport, LA #
10.1 Bottletree Cafe – Birmingham, AL #
10.2 Drunken Unicorn – Atlanta, GA #
10.5 Local 506 – Chapel Hill, NC #
10.6 DC9 – Washington DC #
10.7 Kung Fu Necktie – Philadelphia, PA #
10.8 Music Hall of Williamsburg – Brooklyn, NY #
10.9 Cafe Nine – New Haven, CT #
10.10 TT The Bears – Cambridge, MA #
10.11 Casa Del Popolo – Montreal, Canada #
10.12 Wrongbar – Toronto, Canada #
10.13 Garfield Artworks – Pittsburgh, PA #
10.14 Grog Shop – Cleveland Heights, OH #
10.15 Bottom Lounge – Chicago, IL #
10.16 Triple Rock Social Club – Minneapolis, MN #
10.19 Neumos – Seattle, WA #
10.20 Roseland – Portland, OR #
10.22 Great American Music Hall – San Francisco, CA #
10.23 Echoplex – Los Angeles, CA #
10.24 Casbah – San Diego, CA #
10.25 Plush – Tucson, AZ #
Any time a song is named after a Seinfeld joke, you know it’s worth listening to. Art Vandelay, the great importer/exporter can now live forever in the song of the same name by Ducktails, another project related to the ever-growing Real Estate family. The track is the b-side to the band’s upcoming Hamilton Road 7″ on Olde English Spelling Bee, which features the title track on the reverse. The band is also prepping their next full-length Ducktails III: Arcade Dynamics for Woodsist.
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