Jimmy
Daily Download: Ananda Project “Into the Sunrise”
The original version of “Into The Sunrise” is dance music for the Friday night lounge, but here, Frankie Feliciano gives Chris Brann’s track a bit of a tweak, adding soft female vocal melodies, Balaeric breakbeats, and light, ethereal synths that elevate the original to an even sweeter level.
Download this song as an MP3, or preview a week’s worth of tracks at the XLR8R Podcast. Subscribe using iTunes, or with an RSS reader of your choice.
Magik Markers Boss
On BOSS, Magik Markers compose and perform actual songs, which is a major left turn for these noiseniks, whose reputation paints them as free-rockers damaged by tangled strings and headless beats. Under the helm of producer Lee Ranaldo, the duo tempers its energy into mud-caked psych rock for a moonless American wasteland. Elisa Ambrogio mainly sings in an exhausted washing woman’s pace on dirges like “Axis Mundi” and the wearied, elegant piano ballad “Empty Bottles.” The Markers’ habit of collapsing into white noise rarely figures here, but they indulge in irritating loops of tortured screams on “Circle.” Overall, BOSS signals a healthy direction for a band that otherwise kisses the plastic explosives strapped to its chest.
Devin the Dude
Devin the Dude spends a glassy-eyed afternoon crate-digging in San Francisco’s Amoeba Records. Devin, renowned for collaborations with Snoop and Andre 3000, gives it up to everyone from The Eagles to Whodini while shopping, but lingers longest in the country section, singing Randy Travis and Ronnie Milsap tunes word-for-word.
Tour: Crystal Castles
Fans, prepare to be terrorized by the Toronto-based duo Crystal Castles and its 8-bit mayhem this fall. We know them, of course, from their spontaneous, seizure-inducing tracks that scream noise, noise, noise, but also from remixes for the likes of Bloc Party, the Klaxons, and Uffie. Should you need further inspiration to buy a ticket, click here.
Tour Dates
09/08 Montreal, QC: Les Saints
09/13 Monterrey: Aura Club
09/14 Toreo Mexico City, MX: Roots Magic Club
09/15 Ciudad Juárez, MX: The Hard Pop
09/19 Philadelphia, PA: The Trocadero
09/20 Washington, DC: 9:30 Club
09/21 New York, NY: Webster Hall
09/22 Buffalo, NY: Town Ballroom
09/24 Detroit, MI: Saint Andrews Hall
09/25 Chicago, IL: Metro
09/26 Minneapolis, MN: First Avenue
09/28 Denver, CO: Bluebird Theatre
09/29 Los Angeles, CA: Neighborhood Festival
09/30 Mountain View, CA: Buddhalounge
10/01 Scottsdale, AZ: Marini Ranch
10/02 Pomona, CA: The Glass House
10/03 San Diego, CA: House of Blues
10/05 Los Angeles, CA: Henry Fonda Theater
10/08 Portland, OR: Wonder Ballroom
10/09 Seattle, WA: Showbox
Simon Reynolds: 20 Years of Noise
Though he’s lived in Manhattan nearly 15 years, British music writer Simon Reynolds has championed UK underground sounds like grime and jungle long before we Yanks caught wind of them. Following his groundbreaking tomes on rave culture (Generation Ecstasy) and post-punk (Rip It Up and Start Again), Reynolds’ latest book, Bring the Noise (Faber), collects 20 years’ worth of his journalism and criticism, focusing on the relationship between white alternative rock and black street music.
XLR8R: Why does Bring the Noise focus on the relationship between white underground rock and black street music?
Simon Reynolds: Well, it’s probably the single most important motor of change in rock history… to the point where rock history wouldn’t have even happened without these white-on-black relations of fascination, projection, appropriation, mutation, etc. But if it has been the motor of change, then right now that engine is sputtering. Hip-hop is where the problems start… You have figures like The Beastie Boys and, more recently, The Streets, but just looking at The White Rapper Show from earlier this year, you can see how difficult it’s been for whites to take on hip-hop and take it anywhere new. If they just copy it, they’re redundant; if they white-ify it, then it’s no longer accepted as hip-hop.
Is electronic dance music a bridge between those two worlds?
I thought it was. Especially jungle–this wasn’t the reason I was so into it, but certainly one of the many things in its favor was that it seemed to be a totally multicultural youth subculture and perhaps heralded a new post-racial Britishness (which did blossom later with 2-step garage).
You argue that indie rock and hip-hop seemed to have reached a deadlock.
Indie rock has been rearranging the same stale shards of archival sound into slightly fresh mosaics for almost as long as I can remember. Really, it goes back to where Rip It Up winds up–the back-to-the-’60s move made by alternative rock in the mid-’80s. There’s been various bands that pushed the envelope–Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine and, most recently, Animal Collective–but the bulk of it has been doing this retro-recombinant thing. Hip-hop just seems to have run out of ideas. Sonically and lyrically, it’s like a treadmill at the moment. Who was the last truly original persona to emerge in rap? People go on about Lil Wayne, and he’s great, but he put out his debut album in 1999!
In a recent interview, you mentioned the possibility that “it’s not a specific genre but (it’s) music as a whole that has ceased to be at the driving center of the culture.” Why?
[It’s] just a palpable absence of vibe, of a sense that it’s the place to be. You can feel it in the writing about music; there’s this air of inconsequentiality, a lack of conviction. No one is making big claims for anything. There seems to be more buzz, more energized chatter, in other areas of culture like art. The fact that Bob Dylan and Paul McCartney have to break bread–or biscotti–with Starbucks in order to shift their new albums just seems to be humiliating for all of us involved in this music thing!
XLR8R TV Episode 21: Devin the Dude
Devin the Dude spends a glassy-eyed afternoon crate-digging in San Francisco’s Amoeba Records. Devin, renowned for collaborations with Snoop and Andre 3000, gives it up to everyone from The Eagles to Whodini while shopping, but lingers longest in the country section, and sings Randy Travis and Ronnie Milsap tunes word-for-word.
Previous Episodes
Episode 17: Klaxons
Episode 18: Mars-1
Episode 19: Chromeo
Episode 20: My Sing-A-Ling
Eurofighter
Busdriver Preps Tour with Daedelus, Girl Talk
Groomed by the Project Blowed crew in the early-’90s, L.A.-based MC Busdriver has had been all over the country, dropping albums and playing shows since stepping into the solo realm in 1999. Last year’s RoadKillOvercoat–which features production from Nobody and Boom-Bip, as well as much breaking of genre barriers–is still turning heads and gaining acclaim, and with master of weirdness Daedelus and sample king Girl Talk coming along for several dates, Busdriver’s latest tour should be one nutty ride. And our hats go off to the guy for being one of the few indie artists we’ve seen this year make the trek up to the far reaches of Montana.
RoadKillOvercoat is out now, on Anti/Epitaph.
Watch Busdriver on Episode 5 of XLR8R TV.
Tour Dates
08/25 Los Angeles, CA: Echoplex
09/07 Santa Monica, CA: We.@SMBWC
10/26 Salt Lake City, UT: In The Venue*
10/27 Denver, CO: Hi Dive*
10/28 Colorado Springs, CO: The Black Sheep*
10/31 Norman, OK: Opalis
11/01 Houston, TX: Engine Room†
11/02 Dallas, TX: Palladium Loft†
11/05 Tallahassee, FL: The Beta Bar*
11/06 Jacksonville, FL: TSI*
11/07 Orlando, FL: AKA Lounge
11/08 Atlanta, GA: Drunken Unicorn*
11/09 Chapel Hill, NC: Local 506*
11/10 Baltimore, MD: Ottobar*
11/11 Philadelphia, PA: The Khyber*
11/12 New York, NY: Mercury Lounge*
11/13 Allston, MA: Harpers Ferry*
11/14 Buffalo, NY: Soundlab*
11/15 Cleveland Heights, OH: Grog Shop*
11/16 Chicago, IL: Empty Bottle*
11/17 Minneapolis, MN: Triple Rock Club*
11/19 Bozeman, MT: Zebra Cocktail Lounge*
11/20 Missoula, MT: The Loft*
11/21 Seattle, WA: Nectar Lounge*
11/23 Portland, OR: Holocene*
11/24 San Francisco, CA: Great American Music Hall*
11/30 Los Angeles, Troubadour*
12/01 San Diego, CA: Casbah*
*With Daedelus
† With Girl Talk
