Friday, August 15, 2003
With just about one week left before school starts again, I have been spending as much time as possible in my darkroom, catching up on printing. Old and new photos. Sheets and sheets of negatives, mostly of bands, have gone neglected for years. Shoot. Develop. File. Someday I'd like to do something with the photos, maybe put together a book of band pictures. Slowly moving towards that goal, I am methodically printing 5x7 roughs. Almost ten years of photos. Slow and low, that is the temp-o. Yo.
Listening to books on tape helps pass time as spend hours in my small, closet darkroom. Lately my mind has been on the sea. Listening to the Book On Tape version of The Perfect Storm, devouring the article in the new issue of Atlantic Monthly about modern day piracy and the utter lawlessness of the sea, searching the web for information on passenger frieghters. All this stems from a longstanding fascination with life on the sea, but that slow burning fire was stoked by my brother's recent completion of marinetime academy and his early foray into the world of the merchant marines. Not a profession I would want, but if I could cook up a decent story proposal, I'd love to spend a year or two at sea, photographing, documenting the life.
Friday afternoon. Lot of record stuff to take care of today. And after a planned trip to Amoeba this afternoon, their might be more still. Let's get busy.
Final Solutions – CD-R (Contaminated)
The Final Solutions debut 7" on Therapeutic has widely been hailed as an early contender for one of the best 7"s of the year. This CD-R ups the ante. A short-circuit, head-on concussion of Reatards red-faced fury and the Lost Sounds' brain-sizzling synth action. You have Jay Reatard at center stage, along with four other guys (Zac, Justice, Quinn Q, Tom) plummelling seven songs into sumbmission, Memphis style. The first song, "Deep 6," is bathed in heavy, sweaty electronics, dirt under the fingers electronics, and is likely to inspire flashbacks in those of you who got the pleasure of seeing the Reatards in action. It sounds like Jay's gonna jump outta your speakers and throttle you good. The next three songs, "Chain, Chain, Chain," "I See You On Path," and "Disco Eraser" are a bit leaner, but definitely not an less mean. That is, they have a vicious starkness that you really notice as "Deep Six" goes into "Chain, Chain, Chain." By the time the boys get to "Russian Interpretor," the vocals and guitars are again swimming in thick fuzz and distortion. And this is how we are taken out in the last two songs, "This Ain't No FS," and "Fuzz Pedal." The last, though still layered in humid noise, still moves at a choppy, catchy pace. Short and sweet. Unfortunately, this CD-R is limited to a scant 25 copies (as all Contaminated CD-Rs). But maybe some brave label out there will step up to release this on vinyl. Could we be so lucky?
Henry Fiats Open Sore – I Was a Teenage Pretty Boy 7" (Ken Rock)
One of my all-time favorites, the bandages Swedes are back with another ass-blistering four songs. Continuing their path towards becoming total rock hippies, Sir Henry and the boys have slowed the songs down a little (just a little) and managed to massage in a little more melody than usual. But that's what has always made HFOS so close to my heart – besides their warmth, compassion and love of God – their songs have the feeling of utter recklessness, like any second they're gonna topple over on themselves and on you; they're fast, but held together tight with a punishing, yet totally melodic kingpin. I can't get enough. For those of you who skate, listening to Henry Fiats is like bombing a BIG fucking hill, going so fast that you HAVE to hang out, you can't bail, even though your eyes are watering, you can't see and you've got speed wobbles so bad you feel like you're gonna get pitched any second. If you fall, you die. That's what this single is like. For those of you who don't skate, hang on tight and enjoy the fucking ride.
Tokyo Knives 7" (Ken Rock)
Add this up: Martin from Savage Records, Jonas (Don Wanna) from Henry Fiats, Macke from the Turpentines and Tomoko, who puts the "Tokyo" in the Tokyo Knives. The sum: an amazing Swedish band, experts all in fiesty garage punk. On this, thier second single, the Tokyo Knives open and close with covers ("Futsu Kayoi" by Kamen Riders and the Victims' "Flipped Out Over You"), sandwiching a brilliantly stupid song, "Smell My Ass, It Sucks" between the two. All three squeezed on to one side the record. All I gotta say is: "MORE! I Want MORE!!!" If you missed their debut (and now out of print) 7" (on Wrench Records), makes haste and track a copy down!
Listening to books on tape helps pass time as spend hours in my small, closet darkroom. Lately my mind has been on the sea. Listening to the Book On Tape version of The Perfect Storm, devouring the article in the new issue of Atlantic Monthly about modern day piracy and the utter lawlessness of the sea, searching the web for information on passenger frieghters. All this stems from a longstanding fascination with life on the sea, but that slow burning fire was stoked by my brother's recent completion of marinetime academy and his early foray into the world of the merchant marines. Not a profession I would want, but if I could cook up a decent story proposal, I'd love to spend a year or two at sea, photographing, documenting the life.
Friday afternoon. Lot of record stuff to take care of today. And after a planned trip to Amoeba this afternoon, their might be more still. Let's get busy.
Final Solutions – CD-R (Contaminated)
The Final Solutions debut 7" on Therapeutic has widely been hailed as an early contender for one of the best 7"s of the year. This CD-R ups the ante. A short-circuit, head-on concussion of Reatards red-faced fury and the Lost Sounds' brain-sizzling synth action. You have Jay Reatard at center stage, along with four other guys (Zac, Justice, Quinn Q, Tom) plummelling seven songs into sumbmission, Memphis style. The first song, "Deep 6," is bathed in heavy, sweaty electronics, dirt under the fingers electronics, and is likely to inspire flashbacks in those of you who got the pleasure of seeing the Reatards in action. It sounds like Jay's gonna jump outta your speakers and throttle you good. The next three songs, "Chain, Chain, Chain," "I See You On Path," and "Disco Eraser" are a bit leaner, but definitely not an less mean. That is, they have a vicious starkness that you really notice as "Deep Six" goes into "Chain, Chain, Chain." By the time the boys get to "Russian Interpretor," the vocals and guitars are again swimming in thick fuzz and distortion. And this is how we are taken out in the last two songs, "This Ain't No FS," and "Fuzz Pedal." The last, though still layered in humid noise, still moves at a choppy, catchy pace. Short and sweet. Unfortunately, this CD-R is limited to a scant 25 copies (as all Contaminated CD-Rs). But maybe some brave label out there will step up to release this on vinyl. Could we be so lucky?
Henry Fiats Open Sore – I Was a Teenage Pretty Boy 7" (Ken Rock)
One of my all-time favorites, the bandages Swedes are back with another ass-blistering four songs. Continuing their path towards becoming total rock hippies, Sir Henry and the boys have slowed the songs down a little (just a little) and managed to massage in a little more melody than usual. But that's what has always made HFOS so close to my heart – besides their warmth, compassion and love of God – their songs have the feeling of utter recklessness, like any second they're gonna topple over on themselves and on you; they're fast, but held together tight with a punishing, yet totally melodic kingpin. I can't get enough. For those of you who skate, listening to Henry Fiats is like bombing a BIG fucking hill, going so fast that you HAVE to hang out, you can't bail, even though your eyes are watering, you can't see and you've got speed wobbles so bad you feel like you're gonna get pitched any second. If you fall, you die. That's what this single is like. For those of you who don't skate, hang on tight and enjoy the fucking ride.
Tokyo Knives 7" (Ken Rock)
Add this up: Martin from Savage Records, Jonas (Don Wanna) from Henry Fiats, Macke from the Turpentines and Tomoko, who puts the "Tokyo" in the Tokyo Knives. The sum: an amazing Swedish band, experts all in fiesty garage punk. On this, thier second single, the Tokyo Knives open and close with covers ("Futsu Kayoi" by Kamen Riders and the Victims' "Flipped Out Over You"), sandwiching a brilliantly stupid song, "Smell My Ass, It Sucks" between the two. All three squeezed on to one side the record. All I gotta say is: "MORE! I Want MORE!!!" If you missed their debut (and now out of print) 7" (on Wrench Records), makes haste and track a copy down!
Sunday, August 10, 2003
Changed the layout of the blog so I could include links and easier access to the archives. The archives still have the dapper tuxedo layout.
Real update coming soon.
LISTENING:
NPR Weekend Edition
Real update coming soon.
LISTENING:
NPR Weekend Edition
