Giving You the Best that I've Got...

I guess I'll keep the mood all-like fall-like and gush about my theory on autumnal playlists. Livin' in Ohio and experiencing each change of season I've found the fall a time when listening habits become much like the year before or before that. For some reason there are certain albums that just resonate better this time in the calendar. Albums or songs that evoke memories much stronger than others. Granted I've locked myself in the basement to master Guitar Hero III, but there's a reason I keep trying to conquer "One" by Metallica. Metallica just sounds better when the trees are slowly becoming bare and ominous. Right? Or Urge Overkill. Anything by the Misfits. The Posies - Frosting on the Beater. Megadeth. Geto Boys. Tammy and the Amps.

Sure there's plenty of new things to listen to that fit the mood:

A Mountain of One - perfect for a pre-sun commute, in morning silence, to one of Columubus' many fine public schools.

Tiffany Evans - "Promise Ring" -- my deep attraction to light-hearted quiet storm fare never falters.

Brittany -- Yes. Blackout is as neon-coated and darkly pop as the critics allow.

Psychedelic Horseshit and TNV's (new one) shitpop -- for the anxiety that precedes the anxiety of the holidays.

And that Black Swans record Change keeps me up late on the screened in porch through colder and colder smoke breaks.



But for me two songs have won out. The first from Anita Baker's landmark album
Rapture. Listening to "Sweet Love" is being 10 years old again and in Tae Kwon Do. For some reason the sensei was a huge slow jams man, and his clock radio would always have the Dayton classic R&B station on stealth-like in the back office. No matter what we were doing you could hear it's soft whisper from beyond. It was most prevalent when we had our final meditation. Whenever I want I can hear Anita's voice in this rousing song and transport myself to a time when meditation was in a white cotton uniform on a bamboo floor, the only time to actually think and revel in a young boy's life. For a 10 yr. old, that was some peaceful shit. It was in that moment that I would dream off and find myself in the foreign locales I've been lucky enough to see. I owe it all to Anita.



Then there was Sepultura and "Dead Embryonic Cells." I was 14 and sitting shotgun with Big Tim Dafner in the Cutlass Supreme. I suppose like any half-way rebellious teen we were searching for dirt weed, cheap cigarettes and the supreme evil in heavy metal music. Back then it seemed like we had found it with Danzig, Cannibal Corpse, Deicide, and our secret weapon, Pungent Stench. Sepultura was up there with the top three (Slayer, Anthrax, Megadeth), but it wasn't until now that I know how potent and influential they really were. Seeing movies now re: the strife in modern day Brazil, the guys in Sepultura were speaking from the ultimate pit of humanity. Not Africa, but somewhere where opportunity is shoved in your face but yanked away at an instant. Belo Horizonte, where they originated in this late 80's/early 90's turmoil was the real deal for the type of apocalyptic imagery Sepultura conjured both musically and stylistically. It's only now that I've realized how devastating Arise truly is. I'd love to go on a little field trip through the creepiness of the Miami Valley we journeyed; be it tracing the ghost of Polecat Rd., the satanic ritual sites outside of Huber Heights, the head-shop in New Carlisle, or various gravel pits where underage kids could get high. Sepultura as a constant would have made all the difference, at least it does now.

Live at the Circleville Pumpkin Show

The perfect pre-Halloween celebration. What better way that to celebrate pumpkins than with over-salted pumpkin seeds, cult desserts like pumpkins donuts and waffles, pumpkin burgers, pumpkin candles and helmets. You get the idea. I never knew the gourd was so edible and useful in the home.

So there's a pumpkin shortage this year? Not in Circleville. They had the things in all shapes, sizes, and colors. They had the precise scent of dying leaves and cold stone buildings wafting through the air. Wednesday was locals night maybe, the downtown cretins and dark back alleyways lent the town the feel of some place haunted.

But the parade through the city -- with marching bands from Logan Elm, Teays Valley, and Asheville, dentists in Chryslers with their high-school, Pumpkin Queen hopefuls on the hood -- became a microcosm of idyllic smalltown america. Congrats to Andrea Turner btw (really, read through this link).

Perhaps it's a sign of my old age that I actually enjoy such preciousness. Either way it's better than any fair. It's a show. Bring a flask though, for I searched for Pumpkin Beer high and low to no avail.

For Noise Enthusiasts Only...

I'm thinking I skipped over this because it's such a solitary record, not for the masses, the proles. Thurston Moore has put out a great bunch of releases this year, half of them much like the split between 16 Bitch Pile-Up and Mike Shiflet, and half of them like the MV/EE's Gettin' Gone (rootsy, incense-burning, myth collections), and one that puts both sides together (Magik Markers brilliant Boss). The solitary albums have been vinyl only, pressed in tiny amounts and spit around to inquiring heads (i.e. Lambsbread R.I.P.) and for that Moore is philanthropist rather than label mogul. He knows these recordings have a purpose, not a mass audience, and judging by the amount of pure "noise" Moore ingests in a day (see Bull Tongue) the 30 minute romps from Leslie Keefer and this one here are his bliss-out moments (or cave retreats).

Solitary -- if someone says they listen to "noise" records at parties, with friends, they're lying. Even in a live setting, with crowd, and the "mercy applause" that concludes even the more irritating extremes of the "noise" sub-culture, a spectator is likely to get trapped and/or escape in a deeply personal singular experience. There are no knowing glances to the people around you, no high fives and critical mumurs. The only sign that the "band" is acheiving an altered state is within oneself. Quality noise is a conscious trip without medicine, measured by one's own enlightenment. It's telling that "noise" enthusiasts treat the genre like a religion. I would attend the next NO FUN FEST, but I'm not sure if I'm devoted enough.

Make Like a Fetus and Abort is the perfect break-out for the Bitches. A space odyssey on the outer limit's best morphine, portioned like a radio drama for the hearing impaired. I've seen a few Pile-Ups in my time and it's quite an emasculating live show -- not homicidal femme fatales out for male blood, but these girls got demons they need to release. Knives, screwdrivers, cross-stitch, a massively hot DJ de-grooving dollar opera records,fake blood, fake puss, fake bruises (have you seen the pictures?) boiling in a mess of chum and broken strings and howls. These are nightmare quasars, the primal screams that rush out the ears once you've pressed you palms against closed eyes. Childhood fear, adult-hood taboos. Space travel without any scientific data.

And Mr. Shiflet? Well he's been loafing on the pulse of "noise" for many, many, years. His Gameboy Records will one day be documented in some elaborate, gold-plated, box-set. Extract, Behold is a fitting a title as one can find in the "*****" world. The Ohio ex-pat, now in Japan, is an artisan of drone, through static and long, buzzing, chords, he reveals jazz-like melodies. You've got to listen hard, much like those hidden eye photos, to find them, but once you do you'll dispute the claim that one man's construction site is another's form of transcendental meditation.

It must be noted that though both artists now have different locales, the recordings found here were recorded in Columbus, OH, USA. Again, I of the B Holder.

Live with Billy Corgan's Corpse

Yes. Another big box concert, but I had legitimate hopes, expectations, 3/4 of Siamese Dream in ripe October moonlight. I can't say I was let down. Billy Corgan is a consummate showman. Really. He's the alt-rock generation's Jimi Hendrix. He fucking owned the guitar and even though this night he plowed through 3/4 of Zeitgeist instead, that lazer-beam tone was ever-present. "Hummer" alone was worth the price of admission and in the context of a live show coupled with half a fake reunion, those new songs actually worked.

But alas, Billy is a zombie, the "zero" of his song (and numerous t-shirts I've seen since), which might explain the awkward noodling through "White Rabbit," Joan Jett, and the Van Halen-esque hammer-ons. Honestly, the last twenty minutes of the "real" show were nothing but band jam, excursions through "Heavy Metal Machine" and whatever else Billy felt like playing. Just drop it all, contact All Tomorrow's Parties, and take the Dream on the road. Hell, I'll even take an exclusive Adore tour. Love that one.

Obligatory In Rainbows Post

Ga ga ga ga ga ga haven't been interested in Radiohead for years. Ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga asked me what I would pay for In Rainbows and I said 0.00 £GBP. Ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga late one night they discreetly and impersonally gave the album to me before I could (steal) borrow it from a friend. Ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga sounds exactly what I expected Radiohead would sound once OK Computer signed off. Ga ga ga ga ga ga as a result, I'm loving it, ga ga ga ga ga, it's simply not an album, ga ga ga ga ga, but truly an experience. Ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga, alright, alright, already, I'll shell out $80 for the discbox, get off my back. Ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga, have placed them on a pedestal as the world's most important band, ga ga ga ga ga ga, and such a gesture as In Rainbows has proven to be, ga ga ga ga ga (1.2 million (free) downloads), ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga ga, might just prove them right.

Live with the Arcade Fire

In recent years I haven't paid much attention to big box concerts. There's truly not a worthy venue to drag top-tier acts through town. The LC Pavilion (outdoors only) comes closest, so I was obliged to go see Arcade Fire and LCD Soundsystem. I've seen both before, in much more intimate settings, therefore entering with a feeling that neither have adapted to playing to 2,000. I've made such an obvious lackluster post to report only "goodness," this may rank up there with the best of them -- purely based on both bands ability to connect (and I was at least 100 yrds. away). LCD with a blown-out dance party -- featuring crystal clear, white-hot melodies met with the slightest shifts from James Murphy's soldiering electronic backbones (as a live band it's the man and machine forming one giant undulating wave). The now-nearing orchestra level (I think there were 13?) Arcade Fire (a Canadian E-Street Band?) brought a show that careened through an emotional roller-coaster, splitting evenly between dramatic renderings of the more sombre Neon Bible and the exultant hymns of Funeral. It was almost like a Flaming Lips show with much better taste and class. I haven't seen woodwinds rock a stage since Mercury Rev.

A brief moment containing "Intervention"...just to show you my point of view. Not bad for a lawn.

Dirty Black (Indian) Summer with Mudboy

Ever since I laid ears on Heavy Winged's We Grow I've been intrigued by the going-ons of Not Not Fun. So infatuated in fact that late one night, drunk on CBC IPA, I ordered up a full-stack of their latest vinyl offerings (all limited and packaged with intricate bonuses). Now...I'm elevating on my daily commute to work via Robedoor's latest, Ritual Heirs, a four-part drone perfection, or am simply giggling at how the youngins in Belly Boat have laid waste to CocoRosie's career with something much more tuneful and intimately strange.

Ask any hipster his/her favorite season and 9 times out of 10 they'll answer with Indian Summer. I myself am guilty of siding with that one week after our first "hard freeze" when the harvest sun warms dying foliage and the air is crisp with simultaneously hints at life and death.

Not not sure if Not Not Fun has a premier artist at this juncture, as every other one of their releases gives off a anonymous, tribal, organic vibe. Kinda like "We were Providence natives before Providence natives were cool," rally round the totem pole and chaos pad, type stuff. Mudboy is the real deal. Look, it says "Get Your Mind On," and from what I can gather this is a one-man show. Well this guy's made what might just be the finest noise record of the year in Hungry Ghosts! These Songs are Doors, not to mention the most meticulously crafted piece of wax I've seen in sometime (die-cut, hand-colored, oh my). Volta be damned. Anyways, Mudboy's gone and made the perfect soundtrack for the inevitable Indian Summer, a piece of music that will at once sooth you into frantic meditation and calm you into welcomed terror. Got that? There are prayer bells circulating, howls in the horizon, back-masked whispers of devil-blasted children, throbbing electronic scribbles at every darkened corner. In essence, Hungry Ghosts is the haunted house I'm not able to attend because of my wife's asthma, nestled somewhere in Southeastern Ohio, near a Shawnee burial ground uplifted by extra-terrestrials. On a more manageable level (and not in my over-active psyche) he falls neatly between the Finnish forest-freak-folk that's still under-appreciated and the loop-crazy sedation of Excepter, who have yet to craft their masterpiece.

Needless to say, Not Not Fun is providing essential listening, artifacts that serve as diversions to modern mediocrity.

"Fuck the Bible...It's Got Too Much Spin"

I'm just saying. I would be speaking in toungues here about recent Siltbreeze releases from Factums and XXNOBBQXX, but neither record has been found near my mailbox. So I have to pimp the only way I know how. There are copies of Magic Flower Droned floating around the greater Columbus metropolitan area, and I'm sure they're making face-melting believers out of most listeners. This shit is golden trash. Give me time. I've got a plan. More to come. Psychedelic Horseshit still have four or five or six more local shows before they become slaves to the road. I'm just saying. Besides Sword Heaven and the obvious, PHS be saviours. For reals.

Cary Pratt as Prairie Cat

Prairie Cat - Attacks is yet another stellar, and preciously unassuming, release from our friends at Catbird Records. A shame the limited 100 copies hand-painted, presumably by Mr. Ryan Catbird himself, are gone before the world even has a chance to procure them, because mine is a thing of beauty. But you still can acquire the second pressing via the record's co-contributor, Fuzzy Logic. You all should because Vancouver's Cary Pratt is a trimmed and crafty toss of bedroom pop that could only emanate from Canada.

Then again, before I did my research, I swore this was from Chicago. Got to reminiscing about Kleenex Girl Wonder and how I can score a real version of Graham Smith's buried opus Smith: The Album. Or maybe Pratt listened to tons of Sam Prekop (as his tunes have the breezy glide of early Sea and Cake) or maybe Liam Hayes of Plush (where are they now?). These are dudes that basically make their own musical world in the confines of a 8X8 loft, hopefully overlooking the hustle and bustle of urban living.

Catbird has an ear for finding this brand of pristine twee-pop, but it's usually far more troubled, less innocent, more confused by sex than social networking and cardigan sweaters. Cary Pratt or Prairie Cat is a character in some middle-aged man's heartfelt memoirs, only Pratt is really commuting via subway, internet savvy, and infinitely hip to sushi and Kanye West.

Finally...Brazil '70

Soul Jazz Records, responsible for perhaps one of the most essential compilations of the last decade, Tropicalia: A Brazilian Revolution in Sound, has trumped itself once again with it's latest dig on Brazilian musics. Brazil '70: After Tropicalia is even more essential than it's predecessor if only because many of the artists included have rarely been spoken of outside of their homeland. The first batch of Tropicalia pioneers, on the other hand, have been involved in a renaissance of re-issues over the past few years. That crew, including Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Tom Ze, Rita Lee and Gal Costa, are all represented here, showing their progression from the psychedelic garage nuggets of the late 60's into a wide swath of genres that defined the 70's such as funk, soul, folk, prog, and even wild proto-metal (i.e. Lee's brilliant "Corista de Rock"), all without turning their backs on traditional sounds like samba, bossa nova, and the rhythms of the Northeast.

Where Tropicalia was a vibrant rebellion versus the oppressive military government, this strand came at a time when it was simply better to keep one's mouth shut, opposed to imprisonment, complete censorship, and violent ramifications. In turn the songs here are more varied, abstract, almost subversive in their expression of a country suffocating. Brazil '70 is predominantly influenced by hippiedom adapted from our own counter-culture. There's a deep attraction to free love, blatant drug use, and tapping into the metaphysical throughout these songs, maybe even more so because in Brazil the reality was more dire.

Raul Seixas led the pack, claiming several times he'd encountered aliens providing him spiritual truths. He went on to become Brazilian music's mythic journeyman, a South American Jim Morrison (even died an untimely death), but his representation here in "Mosca No Soba" and "As Aventures De Raul Seixas Na Cidade De Thor" are taken from his "experimental" album Krig-Ha Bandolo, a strange mix of biker rock, tribal unity, and soft-hued psych trails. Highly recommended.

Elsewhere on Brazil '70, Novos Baianos flirt with Yes-esque complexities adding regional flavors throughout, Nelson Angelo and Joyce (pronounce Hoy-say) paint a paisley jungle acoustically, and Erasmo Carlos sings a precursor to Tim Maia's forgotten afro-soul records (the obvious next path for Soul Jazz is to sift through these). Still, no matter what was being ingested from their neighbors to the North, Brazil '70 is uniquely Brazilian. To get a feel for what I'm talking about, I found this little compilation video of Secos and Molhados....really, stuff like this can't be found anywhere else in the world.

The Diary of G.G. Allin >> Coming Soon

No one ever believes me that as a young, impressionable teenager, I wrote a letter to G.G. Allin's record label and said letter (a typical fanboy list of questions regarding his validity) was forwarded to G.G. during his stay in Jackson State Prison (1989-1991). G.G. wrote back -- a number of times, with artwork and lessons on life (go for the highest rung, beat down all those in your path-type shit). He even tried to call once, though my parent's intercepted and didn't accept the charges, said he was destined for Troy once he got out. Years later, I've not been able to locate these letters, so my correspondence with Allin is pure myth, though it constantly comes up in conversation with people who knew me then. My fascination with his music and his martial-law antics waned as I have grown older, but this video jolted me into re-evaluating his artistic genius.



I'm kinda hoping Psychedelic Horseshit sound like this tonight.

Though Hated provides a graphic summarization of his life, a film I've watched ad naseum, I'm tempted to write the man's biography. Even if it has to be a work of fiction.

Last Anthem of the Summer

Much praise has been hurled towards my favorite anthropologist/dee jay, Wes Pentz, AKA Diplo. And for good reason. Just last week he dropped an incredible little mix over at Pitchfork. But prior to that he's had a busy year; lending a hand to M.I.A.'s spark-fed scorcher, Kala, the summer's indecipherable party record, Bonde Do Role With Lasers, running his increasingly up and coming label, Mad Decent (with bar none the web's best mp3 blog), teaching kids in the Australian Bush how to make hip-hop, and putting the finishing touches on his Favela on Blast doc. (Not to mention the Santogold album, sure to be the next big thing).

Dig deeper into the well of Wes and you'll find he's pretty big on Bmore producer DJ Blaqstarr (also responsible for many of M.I.A.'s zulu-beats), who's building his own little empire thanks to teen sensation Rye Rye. Via her myspace, you'll be quickly introduced to the last anthem of the summer, her hypnotic and primitive ghettotech revamp, "Shake it to the Ground." It's already been subject to a number of remixes, and now Diplo's got into the game, producing a follow-up in "Wassup Wassup." So I'm just saying. I believe the children are our future.

The Magik Markers Get Boss

When the three moons of Magik Markers aligned they were a mighty triptych of enlightened chaos. Shapeless noise catharsis dreaming in dull color. Then Leah crawled into the desert and only Elisa Ambrogio and Pete Nolan remained. Now it's a cross, tilted it's an X -- one's sipping snake oil, the other holy kerosene. Boss means big, and that's big purging, skin shedding at the expense of drifter lullabies and still-hardening exteriors that shelter three-chord punk songs.

The duo does their damnedest to breath life back into the experiment. This is their Bad Moon Rising and the unfurled teenage riot in "Body Rot" predicts they might just stumble into their Daydream Nation. "Axis Mundi" and "Last of the Lemach Line" teeter between hum-able rock dirge and improv's natural luck. There's still a stab and kill first, hide the corpse later, fog to their more challenging movements, though now inflated sonics (Lee Renaldo plays and produces here) make them stick to the bone.

It's "Empty Bottles" that burrows through to the bar that never closes; piano and voice and field/alley recorded silence. Ambrogio is rich with imagery, tiny prayers to new age pagans, or perhaps the whole bulk of words is just a plea to a friend to meditate on something other than mental scar. About time we all meditate this wayward way.

The Beach Shall Rise Again

Give Mark Van Fleet and Aaron Hibbs the keys to the Rock HOF, the MOMA, the Smithsonian, every club in town, because not only are they Columbus' most intriguing/important artists and musicians, they are also impeccable curators.

Last Saturday's Entrance release party, built by Sword Heaven, starring Sword Heaven -- kinda felt like the center of the musical universe -- if just for that moment. It was a battle, not of good vs. evil, but of black vs. white. I've puffed on plenty of death metal in my time...some strands of Norwegian and South Floridian. Nothing is as dark (and emotionally heavy) as Sword Heaven. They are the complete absence of light. The sound of coal miners choking through inevitable suffocation in endless night. Demon exorcisms given in Arctic Ocean submarines. Whenever I encounter a Sword Heaven virgin, I usually guide them towards this clip, which is as good an introduction as I can think of...



Yet...this is not even close to what they've evolved into. On Saturday they added one tiny chirp, skree, clip, sample, scream to their anti-mantra and it was enough to send them into a completely different realm. I was compelled to call it hip-hop even, if in fact early BDP instrumentals were being screwed and chopped at the gates of hell. Heads simply bang, then roll, then chant, then cry, then you start searching for your own core while your standing their, mouth agape. Inner-soul music.

Well, Van Fleet and Hibbs know their cosmic opposites, Times New Viking, the white hot heat, the beacon light in this equation. The Outer-soul music -- you search for energy bouncing off the tips of your fingers and hairs of your head. Like I said, this night, two of the world's most important bands were absolutely on, and where Sword Heaven were the nuclear holocaust of color, TNV funneled every bit of the rainbow and prism, the crystal and clouds, into their blistering set. I've got to stop with the pre-requisite "I'm biased" bullshit, the nights up late debating whether I should include Paisley Reich in some worthless year-end, top-ten, just because I know the drummer used to hide his dinner in his underwear drawer when he was seven. This is a trio that has criss-crossed the USA a few times this year and come back to Columbus, hobbling, in debt to their eyebrows, bruised, scarred, cocky and wise. But what a wonder it did to those songs. A sticky, oozing, psychedelic gel -- ecstatic and buzzing, hippie-swirls and Manchester pogos -- every piece a thousand new ideas, every break as precise and calculated in the best way possible. These is tight. Shoegaze made rebellious melody. Idiosyncratic noise rock made nursery rhyme timeless. They're dumbing it down, dulling the sharper edges, so that you'll sing along. Funny that guitarist Jared Phillips seems to always pluck the beginning of "Paranoid" between songs, then I realize the monstrous ending they've tacked onto "Fuck Books" is Sabbath. Little Sabbath for now, but in the confines of Bourbon St. I'd like to think it's the Royal Albert Hall or something like that.

"We've never played Mexico before so we'll play all the hits."



So I forgot to count the other ways in which the fellows from Sword Heaven made this world/beach a better place; Swamp Leather (send me something, I'd like to think you're the worthy substitute to a town without Lambsbread), Deadsea (you should already know my love for America's greatest metal band), and the Providence kids that were squirming around like extras from Fraggle Rock -- you all made the night one to write home about.

Live at the Piqua Heritage Festival

Hmmm...Blame it on my upbringing that I'm especially suspect...nah...prejudice against people from Piqua, OH. Of course it's full of dirtier, less-educated, proletariats than its more bourgeois neighbor to the south, Troy. We did after all invent the industrial mixer, the bar code, and the strawberry.

But during Labor Day, Piqua slays my hometown with its history. The Piqua Heritage Festival re-creates those bygones that Troy never knew existed. Being a former Indian conquest, a village conquered by the French, and (still) a vital point of dock along the popular Miami-Erie Canal, Piqua breeds history buffs; pure Caucasians that dress like natives and mountain-men (no mountains in Ohio?), full-on pre-colonial, overnight camps (that prolly rage on homeade moonshine after dusk), and farmers that pride themselves on organics (my father grinned ear to ear with his ear of field corn).

This is the end of my festival season (with perhaps the late arrival of a demolition derby, fingers crossed), but its always the most humbling. My mother remarked this hobby, of re-enacting the life of a plumbing-less nation, is just as much a hobby as golf (for the rich and famous). I tend to agree, though hopefully my future here is behind the lens -- little chuckles towards the guys in buttless chaps, smoking cracklings, churning butter, and telling kids 'bout the good ol' days, will be suitable fantasies with which I'm better off avoiding and (through mindless observation) generalizing for my own amusement.

Up on a School Night With Bad Times

Let's use first names. Dusty wanted me to send him some shots of his band that he thinks I took after hours waiting for him to finally take the stage (on a Tuesday no less). Sadly Dusty, I took no pictures, only a non-representative, poorly videotaped portion of your band's second song. Jeff looked over at me and said that I'm probably loving this because I'm a big fan of Yes. Yes, he was right on. I'm also a fan of the long list of obscure psych bands you channel (Captain Beyond, hello). I just got done reviewing the latest album of faceless drivel by some French uber-psych hacks named Turzi that can't hold a candle to your love of Guru Guru. Ummm....can I start a label and sign you already. SRSLY?

Other than the Deathly Fighter, the only Columbus band I've been head over heels for in the past few months is The Moon and Bad Times, though I wish they'd shorten it to just Bad Times (10X more killer, trust me). Be known, this is only the first time I've seen them in the flesh. And to the bloggeratti, there's simply no audio for you to dwnld right now. Simply wait, good things come to those that. Or venture to Columbus to say you were there, as I'm sure some higher profile shows will come their way once the Columbus Alive (sic) finds out how good they are. Until then -- my lo-tech addition.

Live at the Ohio State Fair

The Ohio State Fair has been an Elliott Family tradition for as long as as I can remember. Unfortunately the 2007 pilgrimage was met with plenty of rain, therefore we spent much more time with the cattle and pork, than we did with the midway and the colorful people that inhabited it.


So, even though my summer of festivals has become a bust (sorry festival fanatics but I bought a house), I decided to leave you with a picture of my adventures at the largest state fair in these Great United States. It's a junior pig handlin' competition, jus' so y'alls know.

Introducing...Pale Young Gentlemen

Just look at that picture; a cello, stiff postures, period clothing, a guy in suspenders gripping an acoustic. The Pale Young Gentlemen had me scared before I even cracked open their eponymous debut. Would this be the work of a cut-rate Decemberists, drooling over literature and making parlor games out of pop music. Or could it be the work of some group huffing the same Eastern-Euro fumes smelt by Beirut's Zac Condon? Truth be told, it's a little of both, but in the best way possible. You're going to get a bit sea-sick within Pale Young Gentlemen's adherence to trad-instrumentation and Muse Machine pretension (the kids gotta latch onto somethin'), still it's charming, pulling a listener into a forgotten time that sounds equally like today.

There's plenty of drama, pure melodrama, to be seen here. As if Madison, Wisconsin lends a man nothing in environmental atmosphere and forces one to the stages hidden in stuffy high schools and community theaters. Let's think of those Great Lake States as a mini/little Scandinavia, taking great pride in the stoic...the nuance of songwriting, expressing human tragedy through artistic means. Bergman on overdrive, or Red Bull. Matthew Reisenauer has that voice, much like Rufus Wainwright or Antony, it's arresting in its theatrical grip, a tad of acting (the faux-Brit enunciations, the stuttered emotion), but perfect foil to the weeping melancholy of his piano playing.

There's really no need for cello, or chanted choir, or bass, or guitar for that matter on this disc. Songs like "Saturday Night" and the gripping finale, "Single Days" get their point across simply through Reisenauer's fragile narrations. Randy Newman gets many props from the band and as such it's warranted. Imagining Randy Newman's soundtrack to The Point, maybe Pale Young Gentleman should be producing their own show of morality amongst the societal -- only it would include characters named Nikolai and Fraulein, clad in knickers and cravats. It's totally cool to hearken back to a time your generation never knew as long as you can sense it into song; making us all wonder what it felt like.

Put..Put..Put..Puttin' on the Hits

It was last week that RN'R Robertson and I were commenting on this show and many other things from our childhood. He thought it was more jake than it actually was, and I thought it was less jake. Then we realized we were using an adjective that probably derived from Cleveland. Jacob's Field? Lo and behold, this was a syndicated show and was more than likely sandwiched between Small Wonder and This Week in Baseball on Saturday mornings. It was my dream to be a contestant on this show an lip-sync Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer," just like the video.

A horrific scene indeed. So very jake.

Look What the Rookie Did

Canadian Pop?

Fortunately/Unfortunately the be all, end all, resides with the New Pornographers. And
I really can't argue against such a statement. Mass Romantic was the supergroup at the height of their powers and everything after that has been akin to cool water (it's hard to admit you don't like it or need it, right?), but it's not something you bring up in normal conversation.

"Oh I had some great fucking water yesterday."

With Challengers though, I'm getting a bit sick of the cream and sugar (not to mention the worst album cover in the history of album covers). It was such a relief to get the latest project from Jason Zumpano. In the Co. of Ghosts is nothing to get excited about, it's simply a quaint album of piano instrumentals from the guy who lent his namesake to possibly the most underrated band in the realm of Canadian Pop. Geez, listening to Goin' Through Changes for the first time in maybe seven years brought back a tidal wave of memories. Slept on for sure.

But back to Ghosts which is another quiet triumph for the equally slept on Catbird Records. The CD is a dying format for sure (can't remember the last one I bought), but Mr. Catbird always has something up his sleeve. Jason Zumpano's latest was not intended for public display, it was an artistic trade with friend Jason McLean. Now that it is available for thrifty consumption by the rest of the world, we get both halves. Zumpano's extremely cinematic penny arcade scores (very Vince Giraldi) and hand-numbered, hand-pressed, prints from the mind of McLean (very Seussian, Goldbergian, and Kolchakian). Not something you'll be putting on your year-end top-ten or pumping on the car stereo, but something that will be cherished as a artifact of artists bucking the trend when most people are hard-driving the past in search of fast-money for the immediate future.