But I'm back now. And I brought some killer tunes with me.
This one is called "Tank vs. Dinosaur" and it's just as awesome as it sounds.
Tank vs. Dinosaur
1. Cassetteboy - "From Now On"
2. Smoking Popes - "Welcome to Janesville"
3. Afghan Whigs - "Somethin' Hot"
4. Elvis Costello - "Stella Hurt"
5. Noisettes - "IWE"
6. Death Cab For Cutie - "Bixby Canyon Bridge"
7. The Weakerthans - "Aside"
8. Mad Caddies - "The Dirge"
9. James Kolchalka Superstar - "Magic Finger"
10. Beck - "Profanity Prayers"
11. Thunderbirds Are Now! - "PPL R ANMLS"
12. Earlimart - "Sounds"
13. She & Him - "This Is Not A Test"
14. Kevin Bewersdorf - "I'm Bruce Willis"
15. The Submarines - "Thorny Thicket"
16. My Morning Jacket - "Wordless Chorus"
17. Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton - "Reading In Bed"
18. Scarlett Johansson - "Anywhere I Lay My Head"
19. Islands - "Creeper"
20. Hot Water Music - "Bleeder"
21. The Hold Steady - "Slapped Actress"
22. The Raconteurs - "Attention"
23. MC Hawking - "The Dozens"
24. Cassetteboy - "Duck Breath"
And, you might note, the return of commentary.
Cassetteboy is a cut-up artist out of ol' Britain who likes to make people say awful, terrible things. In this case, a news report on safety turns into horrible advice like "... In case of a fire, take the lift. Fires are safe." This comes from a very appropriately-titled album Dead Horse (as in, beating a...)
And now, the triumphant return of Chicago's Smoking Popes, heroes of mine and great songwriters all. "Welcome to Janesville" is from their comeback album Stay Down and it's a polished gem of Johnny Cash storytelling wrapped in pop-punk perfection.
Oh man. Time for gushing. I found a copy of 1965, the "final" album of legendary alt-rock band The Afghan Whigs. For $6. Brand new. So, to celebrate, here's the first song on the album, a soul-drenched rock track complete with sleazy bedroom talk, a chorus about getting high and feeling good, punchy piano lines and R&B-style backing vocals. Gloriously dirty.
And of course, my man Elvis. Not the dead one, the other one. The British Elvis. Elvis Costello. His new band The Imposters joins him on this slow-burn rock track, "Stella Hurt." The album, Momofuku, is a combo of fuzzed-out rock and guest muse Jenny Lewis from Rilo Kiley (not on this track, sadly).
You ever wonder what the Yeah Yeah Yeahs would sound like if they were from England? Wonder no more. The Noisettes are here to beat you senseless with their razor-sharp art-rock. This song, "IWE" is from the album What's The Time, Mr. Wolf? and I don't know what either one really means.
The first two tracks on Death Cab For Cutie's latest, Narrow Stairs, are very unusual. For these guys, anyway. They're filled with noise-rock endings, as in "Bixby Canyon Bridge" and then the supposed single from the album, "I Will Possess Your Heart" takes 5 minutes to get started. It's like they changed their name to Death Cab For Noise Rock. It's an amazing tranformation that surely took a lot of balls.
OK, stop me if you've heard this one before. Dude from a hardcore punk band that was all about shout-along choruses and meat-head riffs starts a new emo band. That sounds like a recipe for disaster, but it comes together beautifully on The Weakerthan's album The Left and Leaving, which is exemplified in songs like "Aside" where he says he's "in love with love and lousy poetry."
Horns? On my rock album? Yes. The Mad Caddies are still waiting for ska's "third wave" and hopefully they'll get their wish, since they put out kick-ass tracks like "The Dirge" on a regular basis. Keep It Going is a killer album, full of dancehall, DIY and ragga by the boatload.
You may know James Kolchalka from his amazing diary comic "American Elf" but he's also a musician. Of the funny kind. From the greatest-hits (sorta) collection Our Most Beloved, here's "Magic Finger" a loving ode to his own genitals. Sample lyric "It's my dick / it's a magic finger / pointing at all the pretty girls"
If you don't love Beck by now, either you've been out of the loop quite a while or you just don't like music. This track won't cause you to run and get his discography, but "Profanity Prayers" is the kind of fuzzy energetic track that exemplifies his 8th major-label release Modern Guilt.
Thunderbirds Are Now! What can I say about them? They have a bad-ass album Making History, they write funky fresh indie-tastic rock tracks like "PPL R ANMLS" filled with chugging bass and fiery keyboards. And yet, no one has picked up on their awesomeness. Sad.
I must have been sleeping, because Earlimart put out 4 albums since I last checked (which was the glorious Everyone Down Here). Their dynamic Elliott Smith-meets-Sonic-Youth aesthetic still hasn't changed and they're the better for it. "Sounds" is a deceptive track - starts out rock, ends mournful. Just like the album it comes from, the 2004 masterwork Tremble & Tremble.
I think I can safely say that the movie-star-turns-rock-star thing has gone too far. But, having said that, She & Him (which is actress Zooey Deschanel and multi-instrumentalist M. Ward) is effing amazing. Seriously. She sings like Jenny Lewis (also a former TV star!) and her lyrics are really really good. They say they're trying to bring back sweet AM-radio-era music and for the most part the album Volume One captures that era well.
Kevin Bewersdorf is not a rapper. Neither is his alter ego, Jeep Cherokee. But that doesn't stop him from trying his hardest to emulate and mock the crunkified modern rap sound on the genius parody "I'm Bruce Willis" off the yet-to-be-finished album Babes. The beats are cheap and goofy as are the lyrics, which include the gems "That ain't no po-po that's Carl Winslow!" and "Sneaky in the sheets / I ditch that rubber / Yipee-Kay-Ay-Muthafucka." Nothing but "Die Hard" references and generic thuggery. About the 3 minute mark, the script gets flipped. Kevin pulls out the vocoder and laments John McClane's fate ("Oh John, will you ever show your pain?") Genius.
Man, I can't get enough pop music. Cheery, happy, cheesy; I want it all. The Submarines are a fantastic pop group, a boy-girl duo with chops to spare. The album, Honeysuckle Weeks, is a sugary confection that in the end does stick with you, with songs like "The Thorney Thicket".
It's time for another edition of I Was Wrong. When people lauded My Morning Jacket for their debut album, I skoffed. What do those fools know? I made the mistake of lumping them in with Drive-By Truckers and Kings of Leon - bands with which they share a background, not a sound. I laughed when the enigmatically-titled follow-up, Z, landed on a slew of Best Of lists back in 2005. Well, let me say that I was very very very wrong. Here's "Wordless Chorus" as consolation. Oh and the newest album Evil Urges is awesome, too.
You may know Emily Haines from her awesome keyboard/lead singer skills with Metric. But her album with The Soft Skeleton, Knives Don't Have Your Back is more subdued and pretty than one would expect. The lyrics are brutal in their honesty and directness ("with all the luck you had / why are your songs so sad?" from "Reading In Bed") and the spare arrangements of the songs drive it all home. Pretty music for the heartbroken.
On paper it sounds like a disaster. Get the guy from TV On The Radio, have him produce Scarlett Johansson singing Tom Waits songs. An actress who isn't known as a good singer covering a guy who really doesn't sing produced by a guy whose albums tend to be buried in noise. Yet it works. Scarlett's album Anywhere I Lay My Head (and it's titular track) are funky bits of melancholia wrapped in her sultry voice and tied together with bits of piano and guitar. Like I said, it sounds like it should be a trainwreck, but it's actually more like an amusement park.
Honest to blog, I had no idea what the hell people were raving about when they talked about Islands' debut. Then I heard their second album, Arm's Way. I understood. I was grounded and humbled and one with everything (to borrow a phrase from Kimya Dawson). "Creeper" and the rest of the songs on that album are 80s-tinged pop burners with X-Ray Specs guitars, burbling keyboards and just enough lyrical meat to really satisfy.
They've been off-and-on for a decade plus, but Hot Water Music can't seem to quit being unruly punks. Good for them and awesome for us. From the latest B-sides compilation 'Till The Wheels Fall Off, here they are covering one of my favorite bands, Alkaline Trio, doing a wicked, violin-enhanced version of "Bleeder."
I've talked endlessly about how awesome The Hold Steady are. I've done that. I've told you about their Springstein-esque instrumentation, hard-rocking riffs, Bukowski/Burroughs lyrics and fixation with partying. I guess all that's left to tell you is this song is called "Slapped Actress" (watch for the Ben Gazarra/Gina Rowlands line) and the new album is Stay Positive.
I have a guitar addiction. Seriously. I go to meetings. But when I really need something blues-influenced and rocking, I usually reach for a White Stripes album. But Jack White's "other" band, The Raconteurs do the Stripes one better - more guitars, double the singers, add in a bass and blow it all to hell. Get Consolers Of The Lonely ASAP.
Some people think it's not funny to use Professor Steven Hawking's name to do computer-voiced gangsta-rap. I'm not one of those people. MC Hawking, which is basically just two smart guys working with Apple's text-to-speech software, is goddamned hilarious. Though "Family Guy" ran the joke into the ground, it's still a gas to me. The album is appropriately titled A Brief History of Rhyme (a riff on the real Hawking's book "A Brief History of Time")
And we bring it on back to Cassetteboy, taking the piss. This time, they've set their sights on the Crazy Frog fad that was all the rage a few years back. Using Carl from "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" and John Lennon's "Imagine."
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