The Thermals - "Now We Can See"

Musically drawing from the punk tradition, The Thermals explore themes beyond their genre. As far as punk bands go, they're pretty intellectual, constructing concept albums about dystopia and religion's entanglement with the nastier parts of United States policy. These three carry the chill vibe of lo-fi folk-punk but charge it with an amped-up sound. The video for their single "Now We Can See" off of the record of the same name features some adorably dorky dancing from lead vocalist Hutch Harris. Enjoy.

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Alabama 3 Covers "Hotel California"

Alabama 3 and Their Eagles Cover

If you have traveled anywhere AT ALL in the entire world, you are well aware of the fact that The Eagle’s “Hotel California” is one of the most played songs to this day and is covered often by foreign bands playing English and American covers.

 

I’ve never understood the reasons for the continuing popularity of the song because “Hotel California” is almost a million minutes long and has several stanzas of lyrics that can’t be easy for non-native English speakers to memorize. Of course, some countries may have different standards for what makes music popular; it could just be that the longer a song is, the more impressive it actually seems or appears to be.

 

Whatever the reason may be for the “Hotel California”’s continued popularity, it doesn’t seem like The Eagle’s most popular song will fade away into oblivion any time soon. Despite how incredibly long “Hotel California” is and its relative unpopularity in urban America, there are actually some good covers of the song, including the following version, which was done by Alabama 3.

 

Alabama 3 is a British band who is probably best known for writing the Soprano’s theme song, “Woke Up This Morning.” Go ahead and listen to Alabama 3’s cover of “Hotel California.” Just remember that no one will judge you if you don’t make it through more than two or three minutes of the song; no one is going to blame you for it.


 

 

Walter Lure LAMF featuring original Rent Party guitar player Joey Pinter

   WALTER LURE( XHEARTBREAKERS  LAMF NYC)

                                           FEATURING JOEY PINTER

(FROM THE WALDOS ORIGINAL RENT PARTY LINE UP)

                                                                  JUNE 10 ALEXS BAR LONG BEACH

                                                                    JUNE 11 THE REWOOD LOS ANGELES

Sugarland to Play in Cleveland

With a name like Sugarland, it would be hard to not like a duo—even if their genre isn’t your preferred one. They sound like a board game or a fantasy place made of gingerbread houses and giant lollipops. After seeing the two perform on the hipster kids’ TV show Yo Gabba Gabba, I concluded that, though perhaps a bit annoying, the group is pretty cute, and I’m sure their show is going to be one worth seeing.

Sugarland will be at the Blossom Music Center this Friday, May 13. Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush will be sure to perform their major hit, “Baby Girl,” as well as other Sugarland favorites.

Pixies Versus the Boston Sound

What makes the Boston sound? These days, thanks to films like The Departed, most people think of rabble-rousing Irish skinheads barking oi punk when they think of Boston music. Though our exports to the history of music are few, they include one of the most important bands of the past few decades: Pixies. 

It's easy to forget that Pixies were a Boston band. They owe as much to Californian surf rock as they do the punk tradition. But it was their unusual alchemy of their sources that ended up as alternative rock as we know it today. The bait-and-switch between hushed verses and screaming, manic choruses was patented by the frontman of the Pixies, Black Francis. The methodical tempering of energy can still be seen all over contemporary rock. 

As important as they are, Pixies didn't seem to come from any music scene in particular. They weren't incubated in a space like New York in the '60s and '70s or Seattle in the '90s. Their sound was formed in Boston, but not because of it. 
Nor did they come to define the Boston sound. It's funny that the "quintessential" Boston band, the Dropkick Murphys, actually seem to be a step backward from Pixies with regard to music history. Black Francis and the rest of Pixies forged their sound out of a post-punk era, drawing us into a new chapter in underground music. The Dropkick Murphys merely reiterate the punk born out of midcentury England.

Really, it would make more sense for Pixies to be a Seattle band. They are, in spirit. Nirvana owed much of their innovation and popularity to Surfer Rosa. Modest Mouse also rode on the back of the entire Pixies catalog in the development of their sound. Isaac Brock in particular models his vocal style after the manic delivery of Black Francis. Pixies shipped their influence across the country and it took root on the opposite shore. 

So what is the Boston sound if it's not evident within the city's most important export? Does Beantown even have a distinctive vibe like the bands from California or Chicago or New York? Maybe not: it seems the youth culture of the northeast is concentrated entirely within New York. Boston is a great city, but it's not exactly a young city. Its creative capital doesn't match that of Manhattan or Brooklyn these days. Many of Boston's young adults are packed into colleges, and maybe that's not the best environment for fresh sounds to grow. 

There is a surviving hardcore and punk scene in Boston, but it's not enough to push the city to the edge of the music scene. In truth, we're a city of anomaly when it comes to influential bands. When we do spit something important out, it's very important, but we don't spit much out terribly often. Not that there's anything wrong with being a punk hub. For those who know where to find it, the music scene in Boston is alive and well. It just tends to be insular and site-specific rather than progressive. 

(Photo courtesy last.fm)

Remember Creed?

What ever happened to the band Creed? They were so popular when I was in high school. I remember their song, “Can You Take Me Higher,” being such a big hit. It was used to promote that cute spacey cartoon, Titan A.E., and I know I played it often enough to drive my boyfriend insane.

I never knew that the band was a Christian one, though, until some Christian friends told me they were. Even after that, there was still speculation on whether or not they were really a Christian group, or if they happened to just be all Christian musicians who played rock music. Officially, I think they were simply known as post-grunge, more than anything else.

I do remember them separating and forming the band Alter Bridge a while back, but I don’t remember anything they made as the new band.

It turns out that they reunited in 2009 and made a new album, though I don’t remember it and can’t vouch for any of its songs. Since then, they’re taking another break from Creed, while the main singer makes his own solo stuff and the rest of the gang focus on their Alter Bridge material. Apparently a new Creed album and tour are expected to be released in 2012.

How Do You Define Alternative Music?

In the sixth grade, Mrs. Johnson, our music teacher (known especially from an epic moment when she tossed her shoulder pads out of her shirt, exasperated with them), went around the class, asking what type of music everyone liked. Living in semi-rural Missouri, most people said, “Country.” Some said rock. I said “Alternative,” and after that, everyone else wanted to say that, too.

But honestly, I didn’t mean it the way that I said it; I meant that my music tastes were wide and alternated every day. I liked country music, too, back then; but I was raised on oldies music that my mo loved, and hard rock that my dad loved, and much of the stuff in between. Sure, I liked The Offspring, The Flaming Lips, Nirvana; I just thought they were called “rock,” and that my word, “alternative,” just referred to enjoying different types of music.

Of course, I know much better than this right now. All I have to do is listen to the Adult Alternative music station on Music Choice to know what my peers meant versus what I meant. At least I wasn’t lying; I liked a lot of that music, too. But how do you really define it?

Also known as alternative rock, this style of music was started in the 1980s, and stemmed from punk music before it. Early alternative bands included The Cure and R.E.M., though that, too, seems to be too gray of a definition for me, since both sound like “rock” to me. Today, when I think of alternative music, I picture System of a Down, maybe, or M.I.A., which are much harder than the stuff we listened to growing up.

Many consider alternative rock as an umbrella term for several other subgenres of music, including punk, grunge, indie pop, gothic rock, and indie rock music. This makes sense to me; if you listen to an alternative radio station, you pretty much get this range. The funny thing is, if you put on an oldies or classic rock station, I’m usually guaranteed to like 9 out of 10 songs; it’s more of a 50-50 shot with an alternative rock station, since it varies so widely. If most of the bands I’ve listed above are played, for example, I’ll probably keep the station on; but if something wildly different—and particularly hard enough to where you can’t understand any words and a bunch of talk about demons or killing people can possibly be heard—comes on, I’ll probably switch the station.

I don’t really like labels anyway, so I guess it’s cool that alternative rock is so difficult to define. Yet when you’re explaining your music tastes, it really doesn’t tell you much about the person, does it? The Cure is pretty different from System of a Down, which is pretty different from Florence and the Machine, after all.

How do you define alternative music? Do you have a narrower interpretation, or one based from another source or series of experiences?

The Very Best of Grateful Dead

If you’re not a die-hard Deadhead and you’re really interested in just buying “the hits” of the Grateful Dead, you might want to grab a copy of The Very Best of the Grateful Dead. The collection is available at Amazon.com for $10.97, though you can also buy used copies as low as $6.

The odds are that your favorite Grateful Dead song is included in this selection. While my favorite, “Sugaree,” is not, some of my other favorites, such as “Touch of Grey” and “Sugar Magnolia,” are on the compilation. Many other popular favorites, such as “Casey Jones” and “Fire on the Mountain,” are also included.

While most Deadheads would probably scoff at the collection, citing many other, less popular favorites as their true “best” work, this album would be a good starting point for anyone who is interested in hearing more Grateful Dead music, as well as for any fans of the top Billboard songs throughout the years. Fans of the movie American Beauty may also enjoy the album, as five of the songs on it were featured in the film.

All 17 tracks may be purchased individually as mp3 files, costing .99 each. Of course, if you want them all, you’d probably be better off buying the whole thing.  

Brainbombs Hate You

What’s actually amazing about Brainbombs – apart from how abrasive a rock band can actually be – is the fact that no member of the band has killed themselves. Yet. With such a tremendous amount of hate spewing forth from each and every song, it almost doesn’t make sense as to how or why these guys haven’t been involved in some sort of atrocious killings or general violence.

Eschewing the sort of staged dramatic stuff black metal bands are given over to, Brainbombs instead choose to wrench out the most offensive rock stuff this side of Korn. Well, it’s offensive in a different way, but you get the general idea. Collecting a handful of new works for this self titled effort, the band sounds as confident in its one or two note ramblings to maintain the slowest pacing possible for a rock track. No, there’s nothing remarkably new here, but it should be painful for some to hear.

Urinating on Flowers. 100 of Them.

Pretty much half of the first and second wave punk acts seem to have been started by folks who maintain their initial impetus was more closely related to comedy than authentic musician ship. 100 Flowers is another group which maintains that. Started as the Urinals during the late seventies, the band issued a few singles, recorded a ridiculous amount of material and subsequently changed its name to the more palatable 100 Flowers. Blame it on the Paisley Underground or myriad other underground influences. The name change, though, also coincided with a significant shift in aural aptitude.

The Urinals, somehow, shared more than a fair share of musical similarities with all the New Zealand stuff at work around the same period of time. No, there weren’t any Tall Dwarfs corollaries as such, but the same sort of fast paced jangly pop stuff ran through both bands recorded works. Hearing the Urinals collected on Negative Capability should sate any fan of reasonably intelligent rock stuff masquerading as sub-tards strangling their instruments. With the name change, 100 Flowers still had use for a few musical ideas worked up during its first incarnation.

As included on 100 Years of Pulchritude, “Dizzy Ms. Lizzy” includes some of the more noisome elements found in the Urinals approach to guitar while its back beat winds up being connected closely to the Texas hardcore groups defining itself in relation to the Minutemen – Really Red and the Big Boys. Firmly rooted in its own place and time, 100 Flowers worked up material like, “California’s Falling into the Ocean,” again referencing its punkier past while still making sure to toss in rhythmic interplay far beyond its contemporaries. Most engaging about the song, is the band being able to include all that with more than a dash of vocal melodicism. Even today, how many punk bands sport harmonies? Not too many.

By the early eighties, when most of LA’s first wave of punk acts were busy working with ex-Doors players or figuring out how to be a Mexican rock band, the Urinals kicked around long enough to be an accidental link to the following era of underground rock groups like 7 Year Bitch and whoever else would wind up being insinuated into Sub Pop’s ultimate domination of the indie rock scene. That being said, the Urinals and even 100 Flowers easily trump most of that schlock. Hey, even Jay Reatard like these guys.

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