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Next Five Minutes
Looking out through the glass
onion that is Amsterdam—bikes
on the right, trams on the left,
here I am: stuck in the middle
of Next Five Minutes (N5M), the
international festival of tactical
medid <www.n5m.org>. It's late
again and I am upstairs in the
hacker lounge at 3am, as usual
writing and smoking in dark
lights and mahogany walls with
a dozen or so pasty-skinned,
Linux-runnin' coders giggling
over their latest anonymous
protocol development. Later I
will discover that my website has
been hacked by some white hat,
packet sniffing my wireless FTP
transfers—welcome to the New
World of ubiquitous insecurity.
A gathering that grew out
of Dutch media activism from
the '80s and the XS4ALL hacker
movement. N5M has become
a central touchpoint for the
networks of Indymedia and the
Independent Media Centre
(IMC). Remix that with hacktiv-
ists, politically conscious artists,
writers and academes stirred
in with contemporary psycho-
geographers and social software
advocates and you begin to
drift into this global network of
resistance that engages the positive production of alternative life
and thought. Despite criticism,
it's not all bourgeois kids with
laptops... a strange mix it is, as I
enjoy a spliff with the Brazilians in
the middle of Leidseplein, completely cracking over the fact
that here, in Amsterdam, (and
at complete odds to Sao Paulo.)
cars, people, and bikes are kept
in separate, perfectly ordered
lanes. In Brazil, media activism is
a different game entirely. While
I question the Brazilians on how
to bribe police officers in a state
of accepted and widespread
casual and criminal corruption—
which they find funny—I also
learn of their work in Sao Paulo.
By assembling social graffiti artists, renegade poster freaks and
other public interventionists, the
group coordinated subversive
public art, eventually managing
to secure their own open studio
space, where artists could come
and work 24/7 on projects in a
supportive atmosphere. But this
was open to immediate critique
that their work was middle-
class and focused on aesthetic
intervention in Sao Paulo city
central, ignorant of the massively
poor sections of the city. They
needed to go to the favellas.
the poor, rural areas... I should
note that the project includes
equal representation of women,
and that this critique came from
a woman member whose name
I am unable to hunt down at the
moment who organised the work
in the favellas. As Ricardo Ruiz of
<basev.has.it> explained to me:
drive 4 hours, too soeed down
the highway through suburbs,
buildings, jungle, then back to
suburbs... keep going: and you
are sf/// in Sao Paulo, this city of
close to 20 million people, almost
the population of Canada.
With the help of funnelled
money from UNESCO, the group
scavenged old computer parts
and conducted workshops in
the favella communities on how
to assemble, test and build a PC.
install and troubleshoot Linux, set
up local area networks, create
content, and access the Net. As
they view it. Net access isn't the
problem. The issue is what you
do once you have Net access.
The Net is often consumed as
a Western product, and what is
needed is the production of localized content, via tactics that not
only link to the world but speak
directly to local networks. In fact,
this was a theme at N5M: the
"deep local" of the Net, the realisation that the Net needs to be
able to work on a neighbourhood
level of social communication, a
pragmatic level, alongside the
global. While the indie-rawk kids
go ga-ga over Friendster.com,
the Brazilians teach the urban
poor Linux. More can be discovered at <www.projetometa
fora.org> and in the writings of
Ricardo Rosas at <rizoma.net>.
Last 10 Restrictions
Despite my enthusiasm for N5M,
criticism is needed. Not on the
level of tactics—for, like Critical
Art Ensemble, I think tactics should
not be negated for the sake of.
"advancing critique"—but rather
in the systematization of speakers
and slick packaging of the "festival." Although attempts were
made' to avoid talking-heads
panels and to provoke dialogue,
many of the invited speakers
spoke on more than one occasion in an atmosphere that made
difficult actual conversation. A
more diverse range of speakers
and a more open system—perhaps borrowing from academia,
a Call For Proposals—is needed if
the Festival is to discard its reputation as a closed circuit of regulars. Not that these regulars have
nothina to sav: hearina Geert
Lovink was a treat, for example.
But when Lovink is speaking three
times, one wonders if there are
not others with perspectives and
points to make. In fact, the best
encounters of the conference
were in the hacker lounge, the
informal dinners, and the two
open TAZ spaces, where ad-hoc
presentations on psychogeogra-
phy and mutant sound-jams disrupted the programmed blocks.
One of these moments came
late on Saturday night. Here's a
few words pounded out on the
keyboard in the smoky light...
Genoa Memories
Amsterdam, Saturday. I had
plans tonight to see a Yes Men
film and catch a lecture or two.
But something detained me.
After meeting Marc Covell, the
British journalist who was beaten
within an inch of his life at Genoa
during the IndyMedia Centre raid
by the police and carabinieri, my
mind was unsettled. Here was a
person, and I felt a gravity pulling
his handshake to a life-affirming
grip. I was haunted by this during
the Locative Media workshop
<locative.x-i.net>, and went
upstairs, afterwards, to write.
Marc found me there—we had
made a date for 9pm, to grab
a possible interview. We did.
Marc told me, over two
hours, of his experience in Genoa
in 2001. Of the violence and
torture. At points both he, and I,
were close to—well, tears. Now,
two years later. Marc has already
. booked a flight—to return, to the
"gates of hell," fo Italy, to Rome.
To return because 72 police officers, including high-ranking officials in charge of Genoa security,
have been charged—charged
with everything from attempted
manslaughter, torture, assault
perversion and obstruction of
justice, to planting of evidence .
I remember following
Genoa—I caught the last
Indymedia transmission from
the Centre saying it had been
raided. That was apparently
Marc's doing. It would be a few
hours, and then a few days and
then weeks until the extent of
the violence—organised police
violence what is technically, fascism—would be revealed. When
the stretchers came pouring
out, when the body bags were
arranged,, the comas, broken
bones, scars, split skulls. These
came to light. A lot of this was forgotten one year later, especially
in North America, after 9-11. North
Americans stopped following the
story. But Europe—thankfully—did
not. Inquiries were launched, and
the EU got involved. And here
we are today with the breaking of the charges.' Finally. And I
think that Marc can begin, now:
for it.is only the beginning. But
also the beginning of the end. Trick or treat, my little guys and
ghouls! Both types of goodies
from the grab bag this month—
we'll start by asking the musical
question, who are The Mystery
Girls? Subject of a New York
Dolls song, it's true, but, more
importantly, five sprightly lads
from Wisconsin with a knack
for catchy, '60s-tinged garage
rock on their two-song debut
for label du jour, In The Red
Records (P.O. Box 50777, Los
Angeles, CA USA 90050). There's
enough rollicking bass, tuneful
guitar and hoarse but not out-of-
tune vocal delivery to keep me
spinnin' these cuts for a while.
Spinning a new seven-inch
last week by The Distraction at
Squares Beware! (Whoops, did I
just shamelessly self-promote my
Thursday gig at The Morrissey?),
I was tricked by a third bonus
song not identified on the eye-
popping sleeve of glass-shattering action by a member of the
California punk combo. I was
enjoying "In The Lipstick," and just
getting'into the Buzzcocks-laced
groove when I happened to
look down and notice the song
was over. Darn you. Distraction,
make your songs longer! The
flip, "Auto Destruct," is another
over-before-you-know-it, pogo-
inducing number that begs to be
put on repeat, and good for the
ADD-afflicted hipsters among us.
(Unity Squad Records, P.O. Box
1235 Hungtington Beach, CA
USA 92647.) Fred, -you've done
it again! Okay, for those of you
who don't know who I'm talking
about (I'm guessing 99%), Fred
has a little label called Zaxxon
. Virile Action Records (www.za
xxonvirileactioh.com) and has
been patting a thousand with
every release. With The Blacks,
his streak is still intact, as this'last
testament to low-down, gritty,
punkified blues is a sure-fire way
to get messed up or fired up,
depending on your mood. Four
tracks to let you decide, "You
Don't Love Me" and "Going
Down" are the standouts here.
The Blacks were from Sweden,
and lead guitar/howler Martin
Savage fronts a new band
called The Locomotions that you
will have to hunt down if you call
yourself a fan of rock and roll.
Many say that the line drawn
between fan and strangely
obsessed is a blurry one, but don't
tell that to the four groups who
decided to all lend their unique
talents to paying tribute to "The
Boss" on a seven-inch compilation called Dancing In The Dark
4. Local kids Operation Makeout
kick out the most spirited rendition of the aforementioned tune,
with Katie and Jesse's trademark
trade-off vocals doing justice
in making yours truly tap his
feet joyfully along, with Anna's
playfully schizophrenic drumming giving the song punch to
spare, r. mutt pairs things down
to just voice and keyboard for
his barely audible version, kind
of like Atom And His Package
trapped at the bottom of a well.
The artist known as Animal might
as well be trapped down there
with him, as I wanted to spare
myself the pain of listening to
this depressing take, so Mirah
gets the last crack and makes
it almost a gospel tune with
pipe organ and slightly off-key
singing. My only gripe—where's
the sax solo? (Monoculture
Records 1353-3202 SE Woodstock
Blvd. Portland OR USA 97202.)
How many bands does it
take to change a light bulb?
new vinyl
by bryce dunn
New York, trio got their name
from a 1932 film starring Marlene
Dietrich whose character, a prostitute-turned-spy, goes by her
code name X27. Well, listening to
their latest offering, this ain't spy
music; instead it.'s the soundtrack
to a rumble in a JD flick. It's rough
and tumble, sweaty and greasy
garage that makes you wanna
run like hell when this gang rolls
through your town. It's like asking Pussy Galore to rewrite the
soundtrack for West Side Story,
complete with odes to "Agent X,"
the detective caught in the crossfire, and "Invisible Boyfriend," the
lovesick guy who means well, but
takes a backseat to the leader
of the pack. (Show And Tell
Recordings, no address given.)
We end this Octoberfest with
Doesn't matter, as long as they
don't cover any more Misfits
songs! The folks at Buddyhead
wasted perfectly good peach-
coloured vinyl on The Burning
Brides doing an average stab at
"Hybrid Moments" and The Icarus
Line getting all emotional with
"Angelfuck," so before I start crying, I'll stop here and not bother
to tell you where you can get this.
Here's one for the strictly
collector types: Bellingham,
Washington blue-collar rockers Federation X have taken to
task covering '70s hard rockers
Budgie and their opus "Nude.
Disintegrating Parachutist Woman," a song so epic it took both
sides of this single to complete!
The only other band I can think
of that used two sides for one
song is The Mummies, and it was
because they ran out of space
and not because of the gargantuan song length. Any fans of
Federation X are better off with
their two full-lengths; again, thjs
is solely for the fanatics among
you. (Wantage USA, P.O. Box
8681 Missoula MT USA 59807.)
Reading up on the band
X27, I found out this Brooklyn,
the English rose, Miss Ludella
Black, who like former sister of
suave (that's ex-Headcoatee
to you uninitiated folks). Holly
Golightly, has struck out on her
own, and like Miss Holly has
friends in familiar places. Her
backing band is The Masonics,
ex-members of The Headcoats.
kind of the Barry Gordys of the
Medway scene, as both Miss
Black and Co. have collaborated before in similar outfits (The
Delmonas, anyone, anyone?).
The three tunes written for
Ludella's smoky vocal stylings
are love-lorn ballads with a twist
of optimism, as evident on "You
Opened My Eyes," and the vintage recording techniques of studio guru Liam "Toe Rag" Watson
gives the overall sound of these
tunes the same feeling as -too
many warm gins going down the
gullet as you sit at the end of the
smoke-encrusted bar, trying to
drink away the memory of a former lover. How's that for a visual?
(Smartguy Records, 3288 21st
Street PMB #32, San Francisco CA
USA 94110.) Gotta go, but we'll
see you all next month for more
sweet seven-inch surprises! •
^>-ula proudly presents the edos f/ll music series:
NEUI MDRK 15
NOW!
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UOULCl - ZUBOT DUO
TUESDiflU OCTOBER SB
FniDiflH OCTOBER 31
CDmmUNITU HAUL
3S\A WEST IDTH >9I/ENUE
f/^ulft.CH
7P'»SCOfc£E* Mishit by
WARNING: DO NOT READ THE
FOLLOWING IF YOU HAVE A
KNOWN HEART CONDITION,
HIGH BLOOD- PRESSURE, OR
PREGNANCY. DO NOT READ THE
FOLLOWING IF YOU HAVE HOPES.
DREAMS, OR FAITH.
What I'm about to tell you is
both shocking and scandalous. It
is also 100% true.
I'm a guitar player. I
play music with my buddies.
Sometimes, we'll play a show
around town. Sometimes people
will tell me that I'm pretty good.
I thank them, but I can barely
look them in the eye. The truth
is that when I play live, I have
to hold back. I have to play at a
level that's a tiny fraction of my
actual ability so that no one will
find me out.
I am your favourite guitar
player. You just didn't know it
In 1999. MCA Records called
me up to record some guitar
solos. Jimi Hendrix wrote the
songs. The record was released
under his name, with the title Live
at the Fillmore East. Jimi Hendrix
did not play any guitars on this
record. I played every single
note.
Last year, I received a call from
Hmmy Page. He called from the
recording studio. He said that
he'd slammed a door on his left
hand and broke all of his fingers.
Atlantic was pressuring him to
record his guitar parts for How
fhe West Was Won. They were
on a tight deadline. Jimmy Page
asked me to record in his place.
The "Dazed and Confused/
Walter's Walk" medley, that's all
his poor guitar playing would
become obvious. He wouldn't
have been able to hide behind
noise. He asked me to record in
his place. The recordings were
released in 1994. Nirvana's MTV
Unplugged in New York has since
sold millions of copies.
Before Kurt died he'd said
that he was going to tell the
/ orn youf favourite
guitar player. You just
didn't know tt was. me...
me. The -20-minute "Moby Dick"
solo, that's me too. I played on
the entire record. Jimmy sat in
the control room, slapping the
table with his-right hand because
he was unable to clap.
About ten years ago, I
became friends with a special
soul named Kurt Cobain. He was
an angel. He wrote beautiful
songs. He just wasn't very good at
playing guitar. His band. Nirvana,
wanted to record an acoustic
record, but Kurt was worried that
world about me. Jimmy said that
the only reason he kept quiet
about my work was because of
my own wishes. MCA made me
sign some things to keep everything undercover. They ripped
up those contracts when they
offered me my own record deal.
I rejected the deal. I'm not a
good songwriter. I'm also not
a very good live performer like
Kurt, Jimmy, and Jimi were. I just
happen to be the greatest guitar
player of all time. •
Chris Burke
Idioglossia
College DJs, eh? They have a
reputation for never being satisfied and they seem to have
an opinion about everything.
A band that fnay have been
the next big thing one month
suddenly becomes yesterday's
waste of vinyl. On to the next
groundbreaking obscurity. If
you're reading this you probably
know one or you are one.
Years of college radio eventually left me calloused. It was
1989 at KUPS Tacoma and I'd
hit the brick wall of disinterest in
music. The world was catching on
to grunge and I'd already had a
snot-load of the shit. Industrial
was turning toward thrash
metal, Manchester was... well...
Manchester (yawn). I started to
look under any rock for something surprising, experimenting
with noise and British twee. Yeah,
that kept me alive for a while.
So. one fine day I'm going
through the motions of being
DJ Bleek of Tacoma and I spot
a promo CD next to the control
board: Chris Burke's Idioglossia.
After playing a track on the air
my divining-rod began to quake.
Magicaily, 1 found a cassette
copy with 45 minutes of the
hour-long album of 29 tracks. This
became one of the most played
tapes of the next couple years,
accompanying me through art
school and beyond. One song,
"The Hat Makes The Man,"
inspired a design project, resulting
in a big fat A+. A little later I found
that the song was inspired by a
Max Ernst painting. Full circle, my
personal link to Ernst.
In fact, Idioglossia is all
about surrealism-. Heavily built
on samples with excruciatingly
detailed research and editing (as
in the song "Freud"), the album is
a marvel amongst sound recycles (or apprapriators) while
still remaining faithful to actual
melody in tracks like "The Bold
One," "Television Repairman"
and "Get Below." Then when it
spins off into the surreal it shines
nicely; "I went running down the
stairs, only problem was I missed
the fourth step and went crazy!"
and in "Everything I Need" Burke
lifts only one word from Joe
Cocker's "You Are So Beautiful
to Me" and serves up a twisted
audio-montage.
14 years passed and all I had
was one cassette side filled. It's
about time I did some research
and get those lost 15 minutes!
Voild! Mode Records in New York
had copies. Unfortunately, the
first package never arrived but
they quickly sent another copy,
God bless 'em. What ecstasy,
holding the actual disc again
after all those years and gobbling
up those precious spare minutes.
Then, 12 years after art
school, I sent off a note to my
ex-roommate: "Hey Tom, I finally
ordered a copy of Idioglossia.
Thought you might be interested."
Tom: "I'd wet myself if I
grabbed a copy of Idioglossia
from you. I think mine is lost. Its
weird, I've had Chris Burke stuff in
my head all week." •
4a«^^6a4Cruipie.rsI;tasv^3ini^
8 Odrx*>eri<x& I fu
furniture in my apartment. I
also had no friends in New York
and no way to check my e-
mail to assure myself I did really
have friends. I was even hoping
that new Discorder editor Merek
would send me threatening
messages about my chronic
lateness, but. he's too laid back
for that. Ex-editor Chris Eng
did get in touch, or at least his
Friendster account did. I am
now officially Chris' Friend, rather
than his Major Source of Stress. I
have been learning all sorts of
new things about various friends
and acquaintances by reading
their Friendster profiles online. It
seems like a large number of my
friends claim to have an Open
Marriage. And here I thought that
everyone I knew was Single, In a
Relationship, or Married. Really,
I'm Just Here to Help! But enough
about my pathetic computer
habits.
After a week of plays in
Williamsburg, long subway rides
to Coney Island and endless
strolls through Central Park, I'm
finally settling down to write. I
am still trying to make sense of
a Coney Island attraction called
"Shoot the Freak" in which a car-
nie barks at bystanders to pony
up cash to shoot a "Live Human
Target" using a paintball gun. The
"Live Human Target" is a young
man who smokes while waiting to
be shot at. Apparently he's also
allowed to do his job drunk.
To further procrastinate, I
reread Eden Robinson's heartbreaking short story collection
Trapllnes, and Melissa Bank's neurotic New York collection The Girls'
Guide to Hunting and Fishing. I've
also discovered that The New
York Times is an awesome newspaper and that the Sunday edition takes an entire day to read,
bagels optional. And in order
to recover from watching the
Yankees lose 13-2 and finding to
my disappointment that Nathan's
which makes the regulation-sized
hot dogs used for competitive
eating doesn't make veggie
hot dogs, I'm listening to the CD
included with the children's book
Sunny. The CD is my Vancouver
soundtrack of the moment: there
are songs by p:ano. The Secret
Three, Destroyer, Veda Hille,
Sparrow and Miko Hoffman. It's
difficult not to think about how
much I miss my family, friends and
my community. I have yet to find
my Same Ten People in my new
city; it's been hard enough to find
One Other Person.
But- Over My Shoulder this
month is made possible with a
little help from my friends. Miko
gave me the children's book
Sunny for my birthday, while Josh
Rose at Zulu Records dug through
two months worth of credit notes
after the Smart Cookie Press
Number One Fan book launch
in order to uncover twelve bucks
I thought I'd lost, which allowed
me to buy Windy. These two
books deserve a feature, but
deadlines and communication problems (not being in
Vancouver, not having a phone
or regular internet access) prevent that from becoming reality.
ROBIN MITCHELL & JUDITH
STEEDMAN
Windy
Sunny
(Simply Read Books)
The books we read as children
stay with us into adulthood. A
few years ago, I reread A WrinJcte
In Time for a children's literature
class and enjoyed every line
of it once again. When I got to 3
class, I found out that over forty
members of the class thought
the book was boring and lame.
They hadn't read it in elementary
school and could not love it the
same way I loved it. I wondered
how they could not feel a kinship
with Meg Murray and I scorned
their derisive commentary. Then I
remembered some people have
happy summer camp childhoods
devoid of books and taunting
from other children. Some people
get to take part in all of the reindeer games and not everyone
grows up filling the role of nerdy
outcast. In time I came to forgive
each and every member of the
class for not being in love with A
Wrinkle In Time.
Vancouver-based authors
Robin Mitchell and Judith
Steedman, with photographer
Mia Cunningham, have created a series that will no doubt
become happy memories for
many children. Each story is clear,
clever and fun, while the pictures
are stand alone works of art.
When I read Windy and Sunny, it
makes me want children, so I can
read them the books as bedtime
stories. In fact, both books end
with a goodnight exchange. How
perfect is that?
"Xs well, the dust jackets of
both books have instructions for
crafts printed on the inside. There
are directions for kite making in
Windy and simple how-to guides
for two instruments in Sunny
(which, as I mentioned before,
has a lovely CD insert.)
Best Of all. Sunny culminates
in a hootenanny, a neighbourhood shindig which gives Sunny
the opportunity to make some
rousing music with a little help
from his friends. •
www.simplyreadbooks.com ACCESS
ARTIST-RUN
CENTRE
;|"3
BIENNIAL OF PERFORMANCE ART
INFORMATION S>
'604.875.9516 ^mSfT H2
www. I i veva ncouver. be. ca
OCT 18 - NOV 29 2003
tr;:x^^
THE 22ND VANCOUVER
INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
runs until October 10 at various
locations
By the time this Issue is out, we'll
have just past the half-way point.
The rest of my life will have fallen
around me in neglected heaps,
my eyes will have become black
holes and I'll have had a couple
of epiphanies. If this more or less
describes you, you might want
to skip to the reviews or just run
off to catch another screening.
. Otherwise, consider that our
access to the worid'i^H^rtfeS^
is distressingly narrow relative
to what's out there; but for two
weeks each autumn, that access
is blown wide open and this is your
chance to see some fiction features, documentaries and shorts
that won't even make the local
art houses, let alone the multiplex.
Of the films I saw by deadline, the
following five aren't particularly
obscure, but they're all good and
you can still catch them—along
with with many others—in
the final week of the festival.
Cowards Bend the Knee (Canada)
This hour-long melodrama from
Guy Maddin {you lucky thingsl)
began as a gallery installation
whose episodes were viewed at
ten separate peepholes. Unless
you had your heart set on lining
up ten times in an art gallery,
give thanks that you can hunker
down in a cinema and hoover
up the feast in one go. The
silent, subtitled action, the grainy
monochrome and frequent iris
zooms are all Maddin staples, but
there's also a very coherent, if
demented, narrative that involves
hockey, commitment phobia,
father issues, sexual frankness,
some gore and a lead character named—of all things—Guy
Maddin. Most interesting was the
strange physical sensation of having to follow the images through
a tunnel in a void. So if you still feel to enchant, but Saddest Music
as though you're at a peepshow, has more than a whiff of both,
that's probably as it should be. and it's a many-layered joy.
P/gg/e(USA)
No film festival is complete without
one reaWy good American indie,
and it looks like this year's honour
is going to the debut feature from
Alison Bagnall (Vincent Gallo's
co-writer on Buffdto 66). Piggie's
credits are thrillingly incestuous:
Savannah Haske plays a damaged, obsessed young woman
to Dean Wareham's (yes, he of
Galaxie 500 and Luna) criminal
drifter, and together to4feM£J3|£.-v
most of the soundtrack's chilling,
country-gothic ballads—which
Haske also sings. Sample lyric:
"Oh won't you rub on my sacrum
tonight...." All the performances
are so well pitched to the film's
tone of abject absurdity that
they seem to be teasing us—yet
they're never kidding. Piggie's
swampy, claustrophobic beauty
will follow you around for days.
The Saddest Music In the World
(Canada)
Any Guy Maddin fan who
has read Kazuo Ishiguro's The
Unconsoled will understand what
a celestial match has occurred
here. The novelist's dreamlike
lamperings with spatial logic
and his absurdist way with melancholy are all over his screenplay for Maddin's latest feature.
Set in depression-era Winnipeg,
The Saddest Music in the World
(pictured below) plays like a
German Expressionist take on
the Hollywood musical. It's also
about the United Nations General
Assembly, America's way of
doing business with the world
and Canada's precarious position as next-door neighbour to an
all-singing, all-dancing monster.
Maddin's vision has never needed narrative structure—much
less political subtext—in order
Secret Things (France)
When was the last time you
covertly took off your bra in the
Metro? Or wore your trench coat
with nothing underneath? These
are the more lighthearted dares
that ex-strip club workers Natalie
and Sandrine set for themselves
while they methodically go about
reclaiming their power over life
and love. As they manipulate
their way through the ranks of
a big Parisian firm, the plotting
^^tSestftasHerand the stakes
higher, until they are thrown a
curve ball that makes the "glass
ceiling" look like a welcome mat.
In true Gallic style, director Jean-
Claude Brisseau leaves little to the
imagination in the sex and skin
department—the climax (sorry)
is like a collision between Fellini
and Catherine Breillat—but the
film packs some devastating lessons about where real power lies.
A Tafe of Two Sisters (South Korea)
This" immaculately art-directed
thriller begins with a hospital
psychiatrist's attempt to interview
a newly admitted young girl. As
proceeding events unrolled in
flashback, I was wishing the good
doctor had been sitting beside
me to shed some light. At first, all
seems straightforward as the titular siblings mourn their departed
mother, fear and resent a usurping stepmother and shrink from
an ineffectual father, but as the
bloody twists and shocks multiply,
it becomes anyone's guess as to
what's going on—and in whose
psyche. It's when the penny finally
drops that one realizes how much
control director Kim Ji-Woon has
had all along—and the extent
to which guilt and grief can
mangle the mind. That's when
the pity and horror really kick in. •
io cdfefae^accS D
Richard Terfry aka Buck 65 is a busy boy these days,
and his latest album Wicked and Weird is set to make
him still busier as he kicks off a tour of the world. He
even managed to pop by CiTR, where Flavia collared
him for a chat.
Successful though homeless. Nova Scotia's Buck 65 (aka Richard
Terfry) is.ready for adventure. Having just released his new album
on September 16, and fresh from a year of European living, Buck is
showing no signs of putting on the brakes. IsrciP^*
With his move to Warner Canada, Buck 65 has jumped into the
mainstream from the deep, dark underground of Canadian hip hop.
Despite his veteran status on the scene, a couple of years ago only
certain kids in the know could cite more than two of his songs, let
alone any album before Vertex. His success centered around "The
Centaur" and "Pants on Fire." Fast-forward five years: his latest album,
Talkin' Honky Blues, is available as a domestic release in 1.8 different
countries, and the single "Wicked and Weird" is getting radio airtime.-
This is due in no small part to his recent label change, but you can't
deny that Buck has steered his ship in a new musical direction.
The album is a sweeter, more lovable version of Terfry's usually
moody, often explicit, organic lyrics and somber beats. This time
around, he includes more instruments, and he is more involved in
writing the music instead of relying so heavily on samples. The result
is an almost folk or country version of hip hop that appeals both to
the get-down-with-the-bass crowd and the let's-hear-a-Jlttle-twang
crowd. He's reaching into new territory, gaining a more diverse
audience, and, most importantly, trying to keep things new and fresh
with each step forward.
DiSCORDER: How was is It for you, personally, living in Paris? How was
it different and how did it affect you, as a person and, by proxy, your
music?
Buck 65:1 chose Paris specifically because I'd lived in the same place
my entire life and I did want a different experience, you know? I
didn't wanna go somewhere and basically just have it be more of
the same. I was just purely excited and I was anxious'to get up every
morning and run around and take It all in. I think it gave me a new
sense of romar*ce and nostalgia and history. I just learned a lot, like
how they hang on to the things that matter, and how culture is not
. disposable to them over there. That's a great thing.... Obviously, my
French also improved a lot and I got lots of ideas for style. And I think
it slowed me down a lot, if you can believe that....
From Nova Scotia?
Yeah, going from Nova Scotia to a much bigger city. They're all
about savouring and taking your time, you know, this is your life, enjoy
it as much as you possibly can. There's a whole other sense of cool
over there, which I really appreciate, so all of those tMngs I hope
rubbed off, or at least I felt them. Alternately, those exact things had
an effect on my music, and gave me a new sense of romance, like I
said, that I poured into it. I think my new album is prettier than some
of my stuff in the past, and I think that has to do with being there and
just being inspired by beauty, because my whole life, because of
where I came from and everything else, I didn't have much choice
but to find beauty in garbage and ugly things, but there it's just over-
the-top beautiful gorgeousness all over the place, and it gave me a
whole new appreciation for those beautiful, precious things.
And the French people? They can be a bit tough, even with their love
for wine and food and all thai.
The crowd there has really embraced me. An interesting thing is
that in most places I've gone, I've felt I really needed to build an
audience from the ground up and it's been a lot of hard work,
whereas there, somehow, magically it felt as if I had a willing
audience just waitin' and ready for me. I'm genuinely starting to feel
love there in France, and* lave it. It's almost like a joke here in North
America, the idea of "huge in France" or "big in Germany," you
know, and whatever, if that becomes me I have no problem with that
whatsoever.
How was the move to Warner? How did you feel about It, what was
the decision there?
Yeah. My motivation for going with a major label in the first place
was to get my music into the hands of as many people as I could,
regardless of what their background was or what kind of music they
were into otherwise. I wanted to break out of just the hip hop circle,
just get out there to a wider audience, and that's a difficult thing to
do with an independent label. The creative process and stuff has
stayed the same. I try to incubate myself a bit from the business stuff,
I don't even realty pay too much attention to that, I just concern
myself with making the best music I can make, and not so many other
things. And they seem to be doing a fantastic job. exactly what I'd
hoped they would do. It's a secure feeling to know that you've got
support in high places, even when everyone working at the London
office of my label is, well, I'm older than all of these people! It's a lot
more organic and down-to-earth than people would imagine.
With this change in the business stuff, you must notice changes in the
make-up of your tans. How do you view the people who come to see
your shows? Because last night (at the Sonar September 18 show)
there was a slew of different people, everything from trip hop kids, to
art kids, to hippies, to 50-year-old Japanese ladies...
I love itl The more diversity the better. I really want everyone to
like my stuff. Kids, obviously, but older people also. Play it for your
grandparents and see what they think. I don't like the idea of hip hop
music having to be an embarrassment. And now I'm seeing people
out who are my own age, which is really nice. I'm seetjrtg the crowds
diversify more all the time. It just makes me feel really good. You want
to have an appeal that crosses boundaries. And I'm starting to see
that everywhere I go.
In terms of keeping things fresh or creatively stimulating for you,
what do you get up to? Pet projects like the collaboration with Sage
Francis?
Yeah, that's coming out on the.Lex label, which is part of Warp
Records in London. It's a record that was produced by DJ Signify
with a little help from Sixtoo. As far as diversifying and keeping things
interesting for myself, I would look particularly to my new album where
I didn't rely so much on sampling; I wanted to actually get into writing
music and playing instruments a little bit. Just trying to motivate myself
and push myself further as a "songwriter," up until now a dubious
claim at best. I'm just trying to make the best music I can without
limiting myself. I don't know where it's going to go next.
Your style?
Yeah. To me this album feels like a fork in the road. It would be really
easy for me to make an album like Vertex over and over again for
the rest of my life. I know not everyone is going to be able to follow
me on this path that I'm going down now. Not everyone is going to
be happy with the changes that get made. But what I've seen so far
is that for every person I lose I seem to be gaining ten more. I accept
the fact that this is going to happen and I have no control over that,
I'll just do what I can to keep myself from getting bored or going stale.'
I just want to take this as far as I possibly can. I've been thinkinga lot
about melody lately and I'm seeing the importance of melody and
how it can help your words a lot. It's something that I'm beginning to
understand, the science of it, behind it. I'm thinking seriously about
taking voice lessons. I'm never going to abandon fully what I'm doing
now, but I'm always looking to take on as much, musically, as I can.
So the new album dropped, mass hysteria has ensued... what next?
I'm assuming you'll be a pretty busy guy?
Yep; Touring, touring, touring. Europe, Australia, Japan, New Zealand,
Singapore, Korea and then the US. I'm basically looking at touring for
about year, which is a long, hard road, but that's fine. I don't even
live anywhere right now; so I might as well just stay out there and
keep sin gin' for my supper.
There are lots of Interesting proposals coming my way, like
opportunities to work with some film-related things, which I'm reaUy
interested in. And I'm also looking at some collaborations. All kinds
of stuff. But I'm really looking forward to the traveling, and the
adventure that happens along the way. And that's the best part of
my job as a professional people-watcher. That's what I do. It's almost
like the music is secondary becuase I don't really think of it In any self-
referentiai vtag. Ws like I say in Wicked and Weird, "the highway's a
story-tefler anctt Just write it down." •
ii Discords The boys from the Black Rebel
Motorcycle Club have a reputation for
being mean, moody and difficult to deal
with. Not for Parmida Zarinkama though.
This Rebel's just misunderstood.
On a Friday afternoon, after a month of pre-booking, we get/3 call
from a label rep and finally Robert Turner, the bassist who shares lead
vocals with Peter Hayes (guitar, vooals). Sounding tired and rather
drained. Robert explained that they were in Philadelphia, getting
ready to play with friends and fellow L.A. kids The Warlocks.
Two years ago the band exploded out of the side of the 'Frisco
scene, wowing everyone (especially the Brits, but they always catch
on first) and were instantly slapped with a reputation that could only
come from naming your band after the W//d Bunch.
Despite the media (mis)conceptions. they're not the allusive rock
star assholes people want them to be. Here is a band that makes the
Strokes look like lazy hipster pussies and gives us another golden idol
to worship. Here is a band that is talented enough to deserve it.
DiSCORDER: With your next record, it's supposed to be a more "rootsy,
Americana" sound—is that where you're going?
Robert Turner. That's where our heads are at right now. That's where
it feels right to go. We have a lot of songs that are ready for that kind
of songwriting style and no one's ever heard it. It's too good to waste. .
It's kind of fun for us to do something different but at the same time
we don't wanna fuckin' like... [says something indeterminate, possibly
about Weezer or weasels].
So you guys are already planning the next album? I heard you've
already laid down some tracks and put them aside from Take Them
On, On Your Own.
It's hard to think about it like that, but we've got a really good idea of
what we wanna do on the next one. This album [Take Them On, On
Your Own] was really free, there's no concept, no interference. It was
all just the sound the band makes put onto a record. That's what I like
about this album. But the next one is the exact opposite: It's going
through something completely different that's not natural to the three
of us. It's like a side of you that there that you need to recognize, you
know? It'll be a different process, a totally different process. I'll have
to change the recording and the sound and everything.
I read an interview in NME talking about the recording of the last
album, and it was in a really shanty London studio that doubled as a
club on weekends....
[Laughs]
Is it going to be the same thing with the next album? Is the record
company pushing you guys to get producers and a nice studio?
We had all the doors open to us; we could have done whatever we
wanted. We could have hired a million dollar producer in a billion
.doHar studio but we didn't think that would add anything worthwhile,
you know? Except money and money never sounds good [pauses.
then laughs]. It might feel good, it might look good, but it doesn't
sound good. There's no need for that, it's not really a part of the art
we're making. It's there as far as the record company will supply it but
we'd rather save a bit making it and see a couple of fuckin' dollars
back from it someday [laughs]. You know, rather than wasting a
million and being in debt forever.
You guys are sometimes lumped in with this supposed "new rock
revolution." How do you feel about thot?
[Sighs] Um, we get some magazines that do and some that don't
know what to make of us. I don't really know what to make of us most
of the time, 'cause we've really made our own sound.
I don't think you guys sound anything like the White Stripes or the
Strokes, but a lot of magazines put you with them.
Yeah, well, I can understand the spirit there, the spirit of those bands.
We all want things to go back to basics again and remember why
rock and roll was made in the first place...stick with some limitation in
the sound and the break down of fhe song. And not lose the plot, you
know? It seems the first thing to go.
How do you feel about the comparisons to The Jesus and Mary Chain
and Primal Scream?
[Pauses, then laughs] Primal Scream? I dunno...they're good
company, but at the same time, um, it's really about the music, about
the way we look, you know?
The media really play on your image, give you guys that dark,
rebellious but sexy kind of air. I was actually kind of intimidated to
interview you guys 'cause they gave you such a "fuck you all" rep!
But you seem nice!
[Laughs] Yeah, seem nice, so far.
So far. %-i'?-V--,";
[Both laugh] '•' jl|l||jj
With your new CD and the "U.S. Government," people seem to be
trying to give you a more political reputation. How do you feel about
that? Are you guys more political now?
Um...l dunno. Everything is becoming more direct with us, with what
we're singing about. There's one song on the record that's about
political stuff, and it's fair to comment on it. It's on people's minds, so
it's going to get out there, but that's not what the band's about.
Speaking of government stuff: Drummer Nick Jago's work visa. I read,
that he was bom in Iran (so was I, by the way). With things being the
way they are right now, was the trouble he was having related to that?
He was born there...that's where he popped out [laughs]. But he's an
English citizen and his father was making maps or something for the
British government. That was never the hard thing. I think it's just hard
for everyone right now, you can have an almost perfect record and
still everyone's way too paranoid about letting people come and go
as they please.
Generally, I end with a stupid question, so here it is: Jack White
collects human skulls, what do you collect?
Um...airplane ticket receipts.
Oooh, that's a good one.
I collect them from everywhere I go. I'm really obsessive about
keeping the tickets from the destination and where I left from. I got to
■ keep them all or I'll never remember where t've been. Peter collects
postcards; he has his whole wall covered in, like, old postcards he's
collected from all around the world. It's really cool, actually, that's a
great hobby to have, 'cause in the end you can put them all on your
wall and it makes amazing wall paper.
Nice. I collect concert tickets.
Oh yeah, I used to do that. But then, like, we got in a band and
everything....
Lost track?
[In a kind of nostalgic voice] No, you don't have to. ..it's really sad, it's
really rock star, you know, it's like, you don't have to pay for tickets
anymore, you get let in, with your name on a guest list....
You'd think that'd be excellent!
No. I never have to pay to get in, so there's never a record...just
in and out the door...which is good cause you save money, or
whatever...but I was the same way, I was the same way. But not
anymore. I don't know what Nick fuckin' collects....
Where is Nick right now, is he with you guys?
Yeah, he's roaming the streets right now [laughs]...l think he's trying to
find himself [laughs again]. He keeps losing himself....
Identity crisis?
[Laughs] It's no crisis, if it was constant it'd be a crisis... may be it's
constant, I dunno. He loses everything, he loses his clothes, his wallet
every week, glasses, backpack, everything. Once he lost his suitcase,
that was crazy. I suppose he'd collect things if he could keep them. •
Q.Oc*fcber2O03 Yl
m
Kid Koala may spin records in clubs, but
he doesn't expect you to dance.
Interview by Natalie Vermeer
Kid Koala is a scratch-happy musical genius. He confirms that
turntables are indeed musical instruments through his quirky
samples and cuts. His manipulations bring to mind keyboard and
string instruments through his rapid strums and animated taps and
deliberate warps.
Last year alone. Vancouver was privileged to host him many
times, first with his tour with Dan the Automator, Mike Patton and
Jennifer Charles in Lovage, then with his jazz band. Bullfrog, and for a
solo show at Sonar. He has toured with many others as well, including
Ben Harper and Radiohead. Earlier this year, he released a beautiful
picture story book, Nufonia Must Fall, through ECW press, full of his
cartoon drawings with a piano soundtrack. He presented scenes
and songs from it, amongst other things, during his book launch at
the Planetarium in March. Needless to say, this former Vancouverite is
always doing something new and is a very busy and talented fellow.
Last month, I emailed Kid Koala, also known as Eric San, to solve
some mysteries and to ready myself (and you!) for his Short Attention
Span Theatre show happening this month. He' was in Europe at the
DiSCORDER: Hi Eric!
Kid Koala: Hello.
Why must Nufonia fall?
Nufonia is a place where people have no fun.:, ever.
Why can't robots sing?
I think they can... maybe they are just shy.
Things were looking so promising—why couldn't Malorie and the robot
[from Nufonia Must Fall] be together on the plane in the end?
They were in a cosmic sort of way, you know?
Do you plan to write a happy (ending) love song or story?
Yes, the new book with the Ninja [Tune] album has Grandmaphone
defeating the fire-breathing Ogre with some yarn and birdseed. And
even the Ogre is happy because he gets a new ski hat.
How long have you known DJ P-Love?
Many people think we look disturbingly alike so possibly we were
separated at birth. But actually I remember meeting him in '97 or
so... we were both deejaying around Montreal at that time. That kid
is super musical... you should definitely keep an eye out for his stuff in
the future.
What gave you the idea for the awesome bingo intermission during
your book tour shows?
It's a pedagogical trick we used to use in Language Arts class back
when I taught first grade. It's kind of a sneaky way to introduce the
characters of the book to people. I am very happy you enjoyed
yourself.
How did you meet Lederhosen Lucil?
I've known her for years, since 1993 or so, but it wasn't until about
three years ago that I heard she was doing this Lederhosen Lucil thing.
You guys better watch out... she's AWESOME. She sings these quirky
beautiful songs over her casio keyboard. And she wears these various
lederhosen and braids and speaks with this faux-Bavarian accent
sometimes. This girl is RAZOR SHARP! You can try to heckle if you want
to but be forewarned: shS's super quick and you'll probably get
smoked.
How do you have your records organized?
"Dance music" and "other."
What and who are you currently involved with?
[I'm] doing a record with Mark Robertson from Bullfrog, rehearsing for
tour with P-Love and Jester [and] drawing space people.
What inspired the Dixieland jazz sounds on your new album [Some of
My Best Friends are DJs, out October 7]?
Isn't that what the kids'are listening to these days? Actually. I have
been a fan of jazz music for many years. And I finally got a chance
to visit New Orleans about three years ago. it was really inspiring to
me to see/hear jazz being played in the city where it all started. The
day I left New Orleans. I decided to try to do a hand-cut turntable
version of "Basin Street Blues" (a song I heard many of the bands play
down there). Anyhow, I didn't know how long it was going to take or
how demented it would sound but I felt like trying to do a turntable
rendition of that song.
Why is 2003 the time for short attention span theatre?
It was time to do a tour that matched the recordings better... I
thought it was kind of weird to play kind of party-rocking music in
a club and then send people home fo listen to tracks made out of
coughs and sneezes.
What can we expect for your show on October 19?
Vinyl vaudeville! Songs, storytelling, •sifJiness. three DJs, eight
turntables, a piano, some turntable foley, some silent animation, more
interpretive dance music and Lederhosen Lucil! You'll laugh, you'll cry,
you'll meet that special someone (possibly). •
Kid Koala brings his Short Attention Span Theatre show to the
Commodore on October 19 and you should go.
(B 0\3CjORD£^ There's something rumbling in Rhode Island. It's making one hell of a racket and it's very probably
wearing a mask. Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the wonderful world of Load records.
In the last year, chances are that if you're not wearing slinky pants
and applying more hairspray to an already inflated '80s obsession,
this is the music you've been listening to. Friends Forever—CRASH!
Lightning Bolt—BANG! Noxagt—WHALLOP! All have released records
of unhinged genius on Ben McOsker's Providence-based imprint.
Load, along with a lot of its bands, have been gathering pace
for a few years now, but it's only in the past year that its output
has emerged as the discerning choice for those seeking a true
alternative Making generalizations about a label's entire roster is
always dangerous and always detracts from each band's separate •
personality, but I think it's safe to say that the term "bloody great
racket" pretty much covers it. And I mean great in both senses of the
Let's let label h
n explain himself:
Can you remember the moment when you first thought: "Right, that's
it, I'm going to start a label." And what was the motivation?
Some friends of mine had just played a show at CGGB's with their
band. Boss Fuel. I was a little drunk and said I'd put the seven-inch out.
The motivation was to just get the record out. My next release was the
one that changed the direction of the label, with the band Von Ryan
Express. A sideways-stepping choogle of colossal proportions. Weird
and rockin'.
Describe your typical day running Load Records.
A lot of production stuff, proofs, layout, etc. Mailorder, etc. A lot of
time is spent on press and promotion... answering emails, calls, etc.
Other days might be booking tours. Lots of different stuff. No two days
are the same. -'frJNm
Does Load Records employ a staff or is it just you?
Load is me. and my girlfriend. Laura Mullen. I pay her for layout of
records. We are a good team. Interns are coming in October.
Do you still run the whole operation out of your basement?
We have a an office upstairs. The basement is where I keep
backstock. Its really just eight or nine palettes with LP's and CD's and
some shelving. We have another room that is used for paste up and
whatnot as well as putting together mailorder.
Name a band you really wish you had on Load.
I like Gang Gang Dance, but they are working with other labels.
Load's roster seemed for a long time to be composed of bands whose
sound was generally pretty spastic and maximalist. Now with bands
like Noxagt and Khanate in the line-up, things are rounding out into a
heavier, more decisive flavour. Was there nothing much of interest in
this category to adopt before? Is heavy difficult to do well these days?
As the label puts out more records it's only natural the sound would
extend into other areas. I've put out heavy bands in the past like,
Astoveboat, Vaz, and the Brainbombs, so I think Khanate and Noxagt
are in the line of bands in the past. Plus I think that both bands do
a freaked out take on heavy. In Khanate's case, slowwwwww and
heavy. In Noxagt's case, sabbath'ed out and angularity is the means
of attack.
Load seems to me to be taking things up where Skin Graft kind of left
off, taking chances on some very bizarre bands (who also love the.
theatrical aspect of performance). Does it seem to you like you're
'taking a chance' with some of these bands, or is this completely
normal to you?
I really try to think of myself operating in the tradition of Bulb Records
more than Skin Graft. Bulb was doing it first, doing it weirdest, and
rocking it out to the max... Prehensile Monkey Tail Skrink, Bullet in the
Head. I think the world's hjjnger for bands doing Interesting music
with over-the-top presentation has not gone away. I don't think a
record, adequately promoted will do poorly. There is a home for every
record... just a matter of finding the home.
Are Friends Forever ever going to play INSIDE a club?
They have played inside a club as far as I know. They just usually play
inside their van.
Why is there such a huge inexplicable proliferation of Rhode Island
bands that dress up as animals?
I think its vice versa. There are a lot of animals that dress up as
"I must distance myself, especially from major labels, which are just
the cocaine whims of A & R guys. I want to put together compelling "
packages that aren't as tradable with file swapping." So do you think
then that the whole downloading thing is effecting music business?
My label has done fine and I know tons of my releases are being
traded as MP3's. However, it may hurt the sales somewhat.
Lightning Bolt and Neon Hunk are apparently drug-free. I found this
shocking. Does this hold true for other Load bands? If there are no
drugs, then seriously, what fuels this madness?
Since many of the bands are not in the traditional rock band mold
they don't feel the need to "play" that way. Not all the bands are
necessarily drug/alcohol free. It's not a test to get on the label or
anything. Madness? Load runs a good time rock and roll label.
Hot Hot Heat are from Victoria, near Vancouver, they might read this.
Is there anything you'd like to say to them?
Hello from Providence.
What's next on the release schedule for Load Records? Any tours that
might come to Vancouver?
September has Vincebus Eruptum a pummeling sludge station
between Flippers-ville and Eyehategod-town. Also out in September
is a JO'VCD from one-man musical shotgun, Mr. California and the
State Police. Think the short bus with shots of tequila lined up down the
center aisle.
October has a Total Shutdown LP (CD on Tigerbeat 6), a Khanate
double LP (CD on Southern Lord), and a Kites LP/CD. November has
the USAISAMONSTER LP/CD. January has a Necrimonitron CD and a
double sided DVD/CD of animation, "Pick a Winner," from the plaid
underbelly of America as sung to the Load Records catalog. •
«4 O&ther 2&B Lightning Bolt (pictured left)
Wonderful Rainbow
With this, their third album. Lightning Bolt made a huge leap
from their previous material and delivered one of the roughest,
heaviest, and funnest chunks of raw transcendence released in
2003. The most obvious difference between Wonderful Rainbow
and their earlier albums (which are still pretty awesome) is the
introduction of sonic diversity. Where before they cruised in
the single gear of colossal, punishing riffs, they now introduce
fragility, melody, and quiet beauty into their gut-wrenching
feedback squalls. The result is nothing less than the total
transformation of being through noise—after seven tracks of
jaw-dropping, mind-bending anthems, the restrained loveliness
of the title track feels like a cool sponge bath following a ten-
round bout with an exploding robot unicorn. "Two Towers" is
unquestionably the album's high point, though—after a warm-
up of stupidly technical kit-bashing, the two Brians (Brian C. on
talking drums, Brian G. on bass) that comprise Lightning Bolt kick
into a monster two-note groove that rages for a full five .minutes,
slaying everything in sight while cycling through intensifying
sonic phases. In the next track, "On Fire," and the following
"Longstockings," Gibson even drops the distortion altogether for
minutes at a time and plays with a cathartic clarity that clears
the head as it pummels the body. This is the kind of thing that
separates Lightning Bolt from their contemporaries in weirdo
noise-rock—they have little interest in the arty ambience of their
friends Black Dice, or the avant-garde ambitions of jazz-metatlists
like Ruins. Instead, they strive for the wide-eyed enthusiasm of
a child's crayon drawing, their ham-fisted, blood-and-sweat
approach defying attempts to intellectuafize their crazed power.
All you can do is lie back and feel the topography of your brain
shift under the tectonic weight of Lightning Bolt's noisy brilliance.
Noxagt (pictured below)
Turning It down since 2001
Hey kids, do you like metal, but are turned off by the posturing
vocals? I know I am. Thank god then for Noxagt's Turning it
Down since 2001.
If Black Sabbath and The Dirty Three ever played a gig
together on the flatbed of a truck that was being slowly
driven through a lake of treacle, this is most probably what
it would sound like. I kid you not, this record is loud, heavy
and vvvvveeeeeerrnTyyyy slow. And, oh, how wonderful.
Slightly akin to label mates Lightning Bolt, the bass is the
prominent instrument, but Noxagt are far less feverish and
more lumbering. They also have way more viola. That's right
kids, viola!
This trio have been together since 2001 (as the title of this
album would suggest) and consist of bass player Kjetil D
Brandsdal, viola player Nils Erga and drummmer Jan Christian
L Kyvik, Noxagt (pronounced Noxact) are spear-heading the
Norwave movement heading out of Norway. If you thought
black metal was dark and menacing, then wait til you hear
this.
Itt
'£$T
**f
Sightings
Absolutes
Missing those old HAIRY PUSSY albums you sold for beer? Well just relax
your eardrums my friend, SIGHTINGS have got yer back covered. Their
second album. Absolutes, finds these obnoxious noise makers torn
Brooklyn creating the antithesis of so-called "music" in a wondtsw,* "
cacophony of found sound, guitar feedback, and generafmcryherxi.' ;
Coherent vocals are not an issue. That being said however, you'll find
yourself singing along without having an idea about what's coming
out of your mouth. Good'shit. >*~?5&.-^S;
s/t
Their set up may be conventional—bass, guitar, drums,
vocals—but what ain't so ho-hum about Khanate is that
they're one of the few bands who manage to do deep,
dark and heavy to good end. And they're not afraid
to make the songs long either—a good sign they're
not ashamed of themselves to begin with. (Or maybe
they have nothing but disdain for their audience's lack
of patience and simply want to punish them—another
trait I deeply respect in a band.) But the really refreshing
thing is that none of them fucks it up by climbing all over
each other like a bunch of horny, leg-humping mutts;
no, these lads are exemplary graduates of obedience
school. Imagine four very lean, well-groomed, well-bred
hounds who are quite content to sit in noble repose until
it is time to strike. Indeed, this two-song document of
musical discipline is perhaps the sparest rock album I've
ever heard. It's beautifully open and slow, a recipe we all
know makes you close your eyes, anticipate the landmark
bass-and-cymbal punches and drop your head along in
time until you lull yourself into some kind of blissful Satanic
trance. Blue ribbons for the lot.
Friends Forever
KUIball
The sadly defunct Blinding Light Cinema showed the documentary on this
amazing band who tour incessantly and play in WAL MART parking lots all
over the good ol' Yew Ess of Eh. Their tunes cannot be explained here. Just
buy the damn thing. They dedicate the album to the Denver Broncos fer
chrissakes.
15 JK3CX>«X5fc The members of Zeus say goodbye to TAS 1000
and embrace spiritual enlightenment.
By Kimberley Day
A show of epic proportions occurred on Friday, August 29, 2003. That
show involved a couple of bands whose names have since been
evaporated into nothingness because of the awesome power of the
opening act: Zeus. The tiny stage at the Picadilly Pub was set up with
two drum sets facing each other from the left and right sides of the
stage, and two keyboards facing each other from the front and back.
At 10:15pm, the venue erupted into omnipotent sound that caused
everyone watching to hold their breath until the end of the 7-minute
set. The drums were as explosive as lightning, and the keyboards cast
a shower of melody onto the crowd. No, it was not a miracle, but
one could say that it was an act of God. The King of the Gods, to be
more precise. Zeus himself-^in the form of four talented musicians-
performed for the crowd of dozens, exposing the listeners to his
powerful, enlightening brand of magnificent sound.
After the set. I chds^at three of the Zeus band members and
a few others into the alleys behind the puis Jfli;the bowels of West
Pender's alleyways. I managed toask Zeus some questions SSfcoutfi,/' *
their band's music, future, and the band vriS^they were formerly
associated with, TAS 1000.
I sprinted, knees-to-the-chest, out of the Picadiily^to.dround
10:30PM that night. Ahead of me were trjtfcp^;trails of Matt'Krysko,
John Rogers and Scott Howard, formeriyof.^^yiOOO and currently of
Zeus. Upon turning many corners, I notiCe$4$ijt*|he three musicians
had stopped and were standing in a circle around what appeared
to be some sort of vigil. Careful to stay near the wall where 1 couldn't
be seen, I sidled up quietly until i could see what was.tiappening. To
my amazement, Krysko, Rogers, and Howard were standing above
TAS 1000 manager Jay Watts, who seemed to be meditating in front
of several photos of Oasis' Noel Gallagher, lit up b/s§e8i'ted votive
candles. As beautiful as the setting was, ljCcMdnot sit back and
appreciate the spirituality, I needed to get on with fhe interview. ■
I stepped into the candlelight and quietly asked, "Can I ask you
guys a few questions?" Howard nodded his head at me, and then at
Krysko, who proceeded to scream, "SNAP OUT OF IT!" and slapped
Watts across the face, ending the meditation session and invoking
the first of several temper tantrums from Watts. Howard consoled the
crying Watts and managed to stop his screaming for long enough for
me to get the interview started.
With Watts curled up into a fetal position, I began. "Could one
of you please describe the life and death of TAS 1000 in 50 words or
less?" I asked. Howard removed his hand from Watts' shoulder and
replied, "Marta's legs spread open, and out came TAS," to which
Rogers added, "A woman named Marta left this fucking answering
machine in a Value Village store. Matt was a loser, he found the
machine. After he found it, he decided to get creative and we all
decided—since I'm the leader of the band—that we'd make songs.
They sound like shit and they're repetitive."
As Krysko gave reasons for the general population's distaste for
the music of TAS 1000, Rogers struggled to find an intelligent word for
'birth' and then continued with his explanation. "Renaissance. Rebirth.
"Jt^sdrTbf like a rebirth. It's sort of like the machine died and then
there was a renaissance. Vfe put it to music, so it's maybe what Marta
had dreamt of the whole time." We all paused a moment to reflect
upon this statement, some laughed, some nodded in agreement, and
then Rogers grew impatient and yelled "SPEED IT UP!!!"
'V $S#eac I scrambled through my notes for something else to ask.
"What are-some questions or comments that you receive about
TAS 1000 that really bother you?" I asked, a question that earned
instantaneous replies from both Howard and Krysko. Howard went
first. "I've got one. 'Did you write all of that music yourself, or was it
on the machine too?' As if people would sing the same thing into an
answering machine." Krysko immediately began his reply by saying
"Yeah, or, 'Did you fake the messages?'." His face turned a bright
shade of red and he mumbled something to the tune of, "How could
someone ASK that? It was all I could do, to keep myself from —,"
but then he was strategically interrupted by Howard, who further
expressed his annoyance by telling me of a TAS 1000-inspired knockoff
"Someone did a knockoff of TAS," he said, with a tone of
aggravation in his voice, "He phoned his own answering machine,
sang something funny and then looped it himself. It takes all of the
fun out of the process...whatever fun there is. It's pretty grueling,
actually." Everyone nodded in agreement.
At this point, I decided to change the pace of the interview a
little bit, and ask some questions about their new band, Zeus. "So,
what can..." I began, but then stopped abruptly as I noticed that
Watts had re-emerged from his infant-like state and was standing
there with an unnervingly confident grin plastered across his face.
"What can you tell me about Zeus?" Everyone's eyes lit up, and
Krysko began to enthusiastically field the question. "Well, Zeus is a four-
piece," he began, "two drummers, two keyboards. We're brothers,
as well. Two pairs of brothers, really." Howard then clarified this fact
by explaining, "There's Scott Howard and Derek Howard, then there's
John Rogers and Matt Rogers." Matt added "we play short, energetic,
epic rock," completing the description.
I then made the mistake of once again mentioning TAS 1000, by '
asking whether the band would consider Zeus a TAS 1000 side project,
or whether they would like their current band to be thought of as
completely separate from their former band. I knew immediately that .
this was a mistake because instantly Rogers yelled "NO," grabbed the
framed photo of Noel Gallagher from Watts' hands, and sent it flying
across the alley into a brick wall. The sound of the breaking glass was
too much for poor Watts, who began to scream but was silenced by
another warranted slap from Krysko.
To continue discussing the TAS 1000/Zeus connection, I asked
whether the band expected Zeus to be as loved or hated as TAS
1000, to which Howard replied, "Hopefully more loved. Zeus is more
'for the people' than TAS 1000. We put out this adversarial stance with
TAS 1000. We wanted to release live bees on the crowd." Howard's
comments were cut off by Rogers, who, in his first lengthy comment of
the past half hour, said, "Matt and Scott got a little carried away with
the webpage. That's where I sort of stepped out of it. I said, 'Fuck this
shit, the webpage is lame.' They were acting like they were a little bit
(6 October 2/*3 UILL
of comic relief for the world. 'Oh, let's go check out the TAS site and
check out this funny stupid fucking article fhat Scott or Matt wrote.'
Man. Hilarious."
Howard and Krysko both confessed to this tragic flaw, and
Howard opened up in a moment of truth to say, "To his credit, John
actually helped us out a bit. He put us into rehab, and Jay came to
visit us once a week. He brought us cookies, care packages." Krysko
then put his arm around Rogers, shed a single tear, and added, "The
cupcakes were brilliant."
Unfortunately, just as the interview seemed to be going somewhat
smoothly, John Rogers went on a rampage. He grabbed the Marantz
recorder, jumped up on top of a dumpster and shouted, "We still
have more CDs, so buy them! TAS 1000. It's a great CD, despite the
rumours of how we hate it." Krysko joined him atop the dumpster and
added, "We actually love it!" Rogers continued his rant by saying,
"It's actually the best recorded work to date...by TAS 1000." He then
directed everyone's attention to Watts and said, "Jay gets 90%. If you
like Jay, buy the CD. He'll get 90% of the earnings. He's a poor kid.
He's got nothing really going for him. He's pretty much a strange loser,
so we want to give him some cash so he can feed his mouth."
I took the Marantz back from Rogers, as Watts began to speak. "TAS
1000 lost me my job. I had it, I lost it. There's quite a story, actually.
Scott was out of town at the time. This kid who worked in the film
department of a local post-secondary school decided he was going
to do a documentary on TAS 1000. It coincided with Marta's trip to
Vancouver to make fetish wear with a partner of hers. Marta also
works at an Art Gallery. She's multi-talented, but shitty at everything at
the same time. Anyway, so she came down, and on Saturday—while
John was at work, Cass was out of town, Scott was in New York
City—Matt and I did the interview a little drunk. They're a bunch of
bumbling fools, these documentary film sorts. We heard them mention
where Marta was staying, and Matt had a video camera so we
decided that we would go to this hotel and pose as a film crew."
"A supplementary film crew, gathering behind-the-scenes footage,"
added Krysko.
"Exactly," Watts continued, as Rogers, fed up with the lack
of CD-advertising time he was receiving, began to loudly scrape
his drumsticks on a metal parking gate. "So we went in and we
interviewed Marta and her partner, then the other filmcrew came in
later and discovered the ruse. There was an inquiry, and now I will no
longer be working at that school."
Howard, who may or may not have been speaking in a sarcastic
tone, expressed his sympathy to Watts, and then moved on explain
that, "The documentary will be out by the end of this year or the
beginning of next year, on the Special Edition TAS 1000 DVD."
The news of the upcoming DVD release sparked my interest in
whether or not there would ever be a TAS 1000 reunion, and so I made
the mistake of inquiring. Rogers, irate, flew at me and grabbed onto
my shoulders, screaming "Drop dead! We're talking about Zeus! Joe
Strummer died!" Upon this explosion, everyone fell silent and the only
one to take advantage of this silence was Jay Watts, who said, "I love
Oasis. I'm a huge Oasis fan. I just picked up Be Here Now, and..."
Watts was then cut off by Rogers, who exclaimed, "Oasis is awesome.
About TAS, the reason wily we've lost interest isbecause our manager
was pushing us. You know how Jimi Hendrix' manager was pushing
him really hard? It's sort of like that, except with Jay Watts. He's a
slave-driver. We were sick of it, so that's why we lost interest and the
band broke up."
Watts, who chose to ignore Rogers' comments, continued to
explain his love for Oasis, as Howard and Krysko proceeded to lift
Rogers up from his sitting position into the air, carrying him away
from the group. As he was being carried away, Rogers was heard to
shout, "The band broke up because of Jay Watts!" three times, each
slightly less audible from the growing distance between his unwillingly
transported self and the recorder.
Several minutes later, upon Rogers' return to the group. I was able
to ask another question. "What is the fictional story behind Zeus?" I
asked, only to be bombarded by facetious responses. "He's the King
of the Gods." replied Krysko. "You can probably just read up on it."
added Rogers, "There are books about it. You can get the whole
story at the library." Howard then offered, "If you don't read, you can
come to our shows, buy the recording, and learn it all. Zeus is Greek
Mythology for those who cannot read." Rogers quickly added, "Star
Trek! I like Star Trek and velvet ships," quite possibly a nonsensical
addition to the previous statements, or perhaps jab at—or tribute to
—fellow Zeus band mate (who was unfortunately not present for the
interview), Derek Howard.
Upon this indirect mention of Derek Howard, I asked what absent
TAS 1000 band mate Cass Picken (in Victoria at the time of the
interview) would have said, were he present. After attempting for
several minutes to convince me that Joel Herman—known primarily
for his Brian's Funhouse video, screened regularly at the home of three
Zeus members—was Cass Picken, several hands pushed Joel towards
the recorder, into which he stated, "Buy the CD," then retreated into
the shadows of the alley.
It was obvious that things were falling apart, as Watts, Krysko and
Howard had stepped aside to discuss the details of Kierkegaardian
understandings of the Cold War. I decided to end the interview by
asking for an explanation of Rogers' hatred towards TAS 1000.
"Sometimes I'll blame it on the webpage." he began, "but it's really
Marta and how she disrespected Ron Rondon, a character on the
TAS 1000 CD. They had a bit of a falling out, it was brutal. If you don't
respect Ron, then you can't respect John."
I thanked everyone for their time and began to slowly step
backwards. As parting words, Rogers offered the following: "We don't
envision: we are. If you listen to Zeus, you are Zeus. And Jimi Hendrix
says TAS and Zeus wail." •
You can buy many, many TAS 1000 CDs from www.tasl000.com.
John Rogers is hosting an upcoming art show for several local artists,
with performances by Zeus and guests at Video-In Studios. Be there,
or else.
»7 fcisooftoe*. The sample-based organic electronic music of Keiran Hebden (aka
Four Tet) has become so influential that he now finds himself in the
position of having fans that have never heard Fridge, the noted British
post-rock trio that he's been recording with since 1995. His first full
length, the free-jazzy Dialogue released on Trevor Jackson's Output
imprint in '99, caught the ear of experimental dub pioneer Pole, who
approached him to do a split EP. On the strength of that EP and his
first album. Four Tet was signed to Domino records, and the fusion
of warm, folky melodies and laid-back hip hop rhythms of his next
album. Pause, made him a veritable superstar in the world of indie
electronics. His highly recognizable style (dubbed "folktronica" by
some) can be discerned in the work of countless producers of ihe last
few years, and won him fans of no less distinction than Radiohead,
with whom he toured this summer. His latest album. Rounds, sees him
further refining his technique without breaking the mold he built so
well. DiSCORDER awakened the groggy Mr. Hebden from what might
otherwise have been a pleasant sleep to ask him a few questions
about his busy life and upcoming tour with Prefuse 73.
DiSCORDER: You've been really busy lately—remixing the Super Furry
Animals and Radiohead's "Scatterbrain," and your agent said you did
thirteen Brazilian interviews last week. Are you going on tour in Brazil?
Keiran Hebden: [Laughs) No. I'm just doing the regional press for
everywhere. Far away campaigns happen slowly and they take
longer. I'm just kind of catching up there. So I did thirteen Brazilian
interviews.
You're putting out something on Ache records here in Vancouver
soon, right?
Yeah, a split single with this band called Hella.
Oh. awesome! That's kind of a strange pair-up.
That's why I wanted to do it. actually. I get off on all sorts of things
like that, but I always turn them down, pretty much. So when [Ache
records] said in their email that the split would be with Hella, I agreed
to it—the first one in ages. I just sent my track off a couple of days
ago. Hopefully that'll come out soon.
How did you end up on tour with Radiohead? Did they just call you?
Yeah. They're into my music and stuff—they just asked me, really.
You've gene on tour with Dan Snaith (aka Manitoba) and you did that
Notwist remix with him—he's said you're the only person he respects
in electronic music. How did you guys get to be so tight?
Well, about four or five years ago now we met at, like, a festival—he
hadn't made any music yet, really—and he invited me to come to
Canada and DJ at this'student thing, so I went. I'd never been to
Canada before. He said, "Why don't you come out for a few days,
Wen?'1 and I ended up staying for, like, ten days. And wejust got ©n
brilliantly—really, really well—and just became great friends from then
onwards. And when he ended up moving to England to study here
(his family's actually from England), he moved into a place ten miles
away from me, basically.
Do you think you're ever going to work together again?
Maybe. I think the two of us, people keep asking us that, and I don't
think either of us want to or anything like that, we've just both got
so much on our plates at the moment. I think, when you put out an .
album, you just kind of ride the wave of it for a while. You don't really
look for potential new projects to take on.
So if I asked you that question—who do you respect most in electronic
music. Is that a question you can really answer?
Well, there's just too many people, really. It's like, "Who do you
respect most in rock music?" One moment I might say it's Jim
O'Rourke or Christian Fennesz I respect toads, because of the
incredible improvisational thing they do, but sometimes you want to
hear some really hard-hitting drum and bass, or somereaOymythmic
bass stuff. I'm into a lot of music and there's a lot of people who
excite me about what they do, for loads of different reasons.
You're pretty forward abotit stuff that you like: I've react interviews
where you give props to guys like 50 Cent or the Neptunes or the
White Stripes—and "Spirit Fingers" on Rounds is a reference to Bring
H On. right? Would it be safe to say that your relationship to the
mainstream isn't too antagonistic? •
Yeah, I'm not one of those people, you know—I don't like to be a
snob about films or music, especially with a lot of electronic music,
there's an attitude about it where a lot of people that are into it want
to treat it like it's some kind of higher art form. You can believe in
that way of thinking, and still want to absorb things that are from the
hugely commercially successful sphere, and not disregard the ethics
of that.
Oh yeah. I think that a lot of people that are only obsessed with the
underground and the most obscure kind of music realty tend to miss
out on the fact that a tot of things are popular because they really are
good.
Yeah. Completely.
So, Fridge is still together, right?
Oh, definitely. I mean, we haven't done anything in ages, but
hopefully there wfll still be stuff in the future. One of the other guys in
Fridge, Adem llhan, just finished his solo album—just this weekend, in
fact. That's probably going to come out early next year and he's got
toads and loads of stuff going on with that. We've all got a lot going
on, but we'll get around to doing another record eventually.
i wanted to ask you about your live show as opposed to your
recorded material. Every time I've seen you perform, there's so much
more noise than ever comes up on any of your albums. So I wonder,
is there any reason you don't want to put that same kind of noise into
the stuff you record?
Well, the way that the live music seems to have evolved for me, you
know, there's some crazy music that just goes on for an hour, and it's
just got to happen there and then, in that moment, then it kind of
goes away.Whereas, when I make an album, I find myself wanting
people to go back to it again and again. I just think the live thing,
you get caught up in the big sound system and the crowd. I just find
myself going for it more...it's something I wanted to happen, as well.
I always wanted the live stuff to be removed from what happens on
the album, to continue the ideas on the record, for it to be music
that constantly evolves, rather than me being another one of those
people that just goes out and tries to.recreate albums. I want people
to come and see me live to catch a glimpse of where my head's at
that day, you know, what I think is interesting right then.
So, do you And yourself listening to more low-key, relaxed music when
you're at home, most of the time?
Not at all. One of the things I listen to most fe<quffe aggressive free
jazz. One of my main kind of things, at the end of the day—one of the
.biggest influences on me—something I always end up coming back
to. is Albert Ayler, Ornette Coleman, and late period John Coltrane
stuff. Or sometimes I put on more intense party hip hop, or something
like Hella or Lightning Bolt. Those are all sort of things I'm interested in.
You're going on tour again with Prefuse 73. Did the last tour just go so
well you wanted to do it again?
Yeah, he's a really great guy, and it just works so well. People come to
shows, when we play together, definitely to see both acts. We're both
doing something that's quite different from everything else at the
moment, but we seem to have really crossover audiences. It's nice to
go out and do shows with another artist you like—we both enjoyed
each other's albums this year.
So, after you're done with all these remixes and touring, do you have
anything immediately planned, or are you just going to kick back for
awhile?
Well, I've just kind of been finishing a lot of stuff. After this, hopefully—
well, I haven't really made any new music in a long time. What I want
to do is to take some time—the music industry kind of quiets down
in December and January—and work on some new music, and get
ready for all the touring I'm going to do next year all over the world.
Next week, I start two weeks in England, then I do two weeks on the
west coast of North America, then I'm back here for a week before
heading off to Krakow in Poland for a festival, then after that I want to
take a couple months and think about making some new tracks. •
Catch Four Tet at Richard's On Richard's October 24 with Prefuse 73
and Beans (formerly of Anti-Pop Consortium). Hounds is out now on
Domino records.
IB October 2oc$ \-A
V,
Inside the cool, cool mind of Super Furry Animals'
lead singer Gruff Rhys.
By Merek Cooper
Photo by Kevin Westenburg
Super Furry Animals' lead singer. Gruff Rhys, is one of the most laid-
back people I have ever had the fortune of talking to. In the following
interview you will notice that there are no exclamation marks used,
even when he says something alarming or bizarre. It just doesn't seem
appropriate.
And really, why wouldn't he be laid-back? Six studio albums, one
of them written entirely in his native Welsh tongue, and nothing but
critical praise and none too modest commercial success. Just when
you expect them to falter—they must, it's been almost ten years—
■ their subsequent release coolly improves on their already winning
formula. And what a formula! How does one begin to describe it?
It's definitely pop, but it's also so much more. On Phantom Power,
their latest, techy electronica rubs shoulders with pastoral folk, while
country mingles with glam rock, their attitude a mixture of punk's DIY
aesthetic spliced together with the eclectic, try-anything, enthusiasm
of Krautrock.
Despite the laid-back demeanour, Gruff Rhys and his four band
mates are more than willing to engage with issues that make them
mad. Phantom Power is not only a great album, it's an album that
reflects what it feels like to live in the year 2003, warts and all. Songs
like "Liberty Belle," "Out of Control" and "Hello Sunshine" all comment
on the negative aspects of Americanisation. because, as Gruff says,
it's all "out of control." I spoke to him on the line from Toronto about
this and many other things besides.
DiSCORDER: Starting with the new album. Phantom Power. Good job,
great album.
Gruff Rhys: Ahh, nice one.
I wanted to ask you about the recording process of Phantom Power.
You worked with two different engineers, didn't you?
Yeah, we had a lot of help. We started of with Gorwel Owen, who
recorded our first two albums and Mwng. And he's very disciplined—
he gets us out of bed in the morning. Then we spent summer in our
own studio and did the album up till the point where it was almost-
finished but we still needed to do a lot of the singing and stuff. So we
hired Tony Doogan....
Mogwai and Belle and Sebastian's engineer?
Yeah, we got him to come down and he's truly crazy; he hired
loads of guns and he built bonfires for us to sing around, folk style.
You can hear the crackle of the bonfire when we sing at the end of
"Undefeated." If he didn't like the sound of the guitar, he'd just put
the guitar on the bonfire. He's that kind of decisive guy, especially
after a few ales.
On Phantom Power, you express a tot of dissatisfaction with the current
American administration and its foreign policy. A lot of people would '
say you are anti-American, but if s not that simple, is it? It's obvious
that you're influenced by a lot of American culture. Country music
and West Coast psychedelia, for instance?
Yeah, exactly. We love traveling in North America and there's an
incredible energy here that you don't find elsewhere. It's always
inspiring. And all the people we meet are usually pretty cool, you
know, totally switched on politically, so It's a shame they're being
misrepresented by a bunch of arseholes.
But the reason I feel qualified to talk about American foreign policy
is because it effectively decides what the foreign policy is in the
UK. We're half governed by Washington, otherwise I wouldn't
bother dealing in other peoples problems, you know? It would be
embarrassing.
I really like the line in "Valet Parking," "the Euro Zone Is my home."
Because, for me, the UK should realize what a great opportunity it has
to link up with the rest of Europe and It should stop getting into bed
with these American warmongers.
Yeah. That song is set in the year 2010 after the European Federal
Government is set up, so it's a future celebration of travel within the
Euro Zone.r ^^^^M,
Another driving analogy we refer to a lot is that we see ourselves
as taxi drivers, y'know? The main function of a taxi driver is to take
the person, for example, from the station to the house, but on the
way they might talk about what their pets did last night or about their
relationships or about political issues. It's not the main function of
the taxi driver and similarly our main function as a group is to make
uplifting music—if's about melody and rhythm and wordplay—but
occasionally we'll talk about a pet and if politics affects a bit of our
lives that'll make it into our songs, you know?
What I like about your lyrics is that even If something angers you, you
seem to stay very cool, sometimes even putting a humorous spin on
things. That's where you succeed. You have a serious message but
there's always humour and it never becomes too serious or portentous
for people to deal with.
Our songs are about domestic life and we try not to cover up the
humorous aspects—life can be humorous. We don't buy into the
notion that rock bands should be wearing black standing on glaciers,
you know? We wanna make human music but we don't wanna sit on
fences either.
On the face of it/we're paid to travel the bars of the world
playing music. That's the reality of our life. I don't know how credible
that makes our political insight.
But you're an ambassador for Welsh culture nowadays. How does that
feel?
Yeah, it's pretty mental going round the world being Welsh and
meeting people, you know? Like, in Japan, we've come across
people who've learnt the language because of us.
Yeah, I always listen to your Welsh stuff and try and pick out what I
can from the translations.
Yeah. I had a shock with that kind of thing: I was listening to Serge
Gainsbourg and I was getting really into the music and then I started
reading the lyrics and I realised I'd been listening to a concept album
about arses. ■'■■^'ISfii
About arses?
Yeah, about different types of bums.
Which album's that?
I think translated it's View of the Exterior. It's really good.
I'm gonna have to get that album.
Oh shit, I'm mixing it up. "View of the Exterior" is the first song. The
album is called A Man with a Cabbage for his Head. It's really good. It
sounds like Air or something.
Are you still writing Welsh songs?
Yeah, I've got shittoads written—twenty or so.
Do you write In both languages simultaneously?
Well. I'm bilingual, so I write either in Welsh or in English, but I don't
translate from one to the other. I get a bit irritated when I read in
interviews that I translate from Welsh whilst I'm speaking, just because
sometimes I fake my time speaking. I speak just as slowly in Welsh.
I wanted to ask you about the fact that the album is "carbon neutral."
To quote from the album coven "Carbon Dioxide is one of the main
reasons for global warming. Future Forests calculate the amount of
C02 produced in the production and distribution of this CD. Super
Furry Animals and Future Forests win plant enough trees to re-absorb
this amount of C02."
Yeah, we've got our forest in North Wales—the Furry Animal Forest.
They've just planted it so it doesn't look very good at the moment. If
you're looking for a forest adventure, go elsewhere. It hasn't grown
yet it's about six inches high and it's looking pretty bare. Eventually,
we're gonna have live bears and we're gonna re-introduce the wolf
and the eagle to North Wales.
I wanted to clarify a little known tact about you guys: that the actor
Rhys Itans [famous for playing Hugh Grant's unhinged flatmate Spike
in Norting Hill and Puff in Human Nature] was originally the lead singer
in The Super Furry Animals?
Yeah, yeah. Initially, I just wanted to play guitar. We've known Rhys
since we were kids. He's larger than life, you know? We thought he'd
be a great frontman, he's got an amazing singing voice.
Really?
Ahh yeah, incredible. But I think the whole dynamic of the band
would have been very different. We did some demos together, there's
probably about six songs recorded with Rhys. Mostly with original lyrics
by him. Very rock. I reckon if Rhys had been the singer we could've
been more of a Guns n' Roses-style band—glory or nothing rock and
roll. We were very bad influences on each other. We would have
toured the world for three years on the back of a platinum-selling
album and then died.
What's next from you guys?
Well, we're just about to embark on a nine-month tour, which is great,
but it's frustrating us all because we won't be able to record so much.
But we'll probably react to this record—Phantom Power is a very
acoustic album and I imagine we'd do something much more brash
and sonic next time. Hopefully we can come over to Vancouver and
play some.over the top sonic tunes in February. •
We'H be waiting. Phantom Power is out now.
t«* Dsscofcsefc N
(A
W
Viennese record label Mego ("My eyes glaze over'*} has been
realizing its vision of music's future Since the halcyon days of the
'90s experimental music boom. In this proposed future?a kind of
psychedelic austerity or po-faced pranksterism is achieved via
ecstatic laptop tinkering and the harnessing of errors. Mego has given
the world a series of frankly astonislijng^eases tram^tseuseoois
like Farmers Manual, General Magic andfflniwMstalsapiJltijtgpOl: -
projects by legendary figures such as Jim O'Rourke and Merzbow.
Perhaps Mego's most accessible and well-known releases have
come courtesy of Christian Fennesz and Noriko Tujiko, both of whom
will be visiting Vancouver this October. In anticipation of their arrival,
DiSCORDER decided to contact Fennesz and Noriko in order to
provide advance information for the curious and further illumination
for the already addicted.
Fennesz
Avoid meeting your heroes. Chances are you've received that
particular pearl of wisdom before from some other source, but don't
write it off as a mere cliche. This is sage advice because the whimsical
children's author genius will always turn out to be a curmudgeonly
misanthrope who wants you to fuck off, and the tortured artist genius
will always turn out to be a thoroughly genial type who wants to buy
you a drink. And yet it's so hard to resist, bearing in mind that any such
idol will trail a mass of rumour and misconception in his/her wake.
Don't you want to get it all cleared up? Don't you want to know?
Such was your trusty correspondent's dilemma when asked to
interview Austrian computer-music virtuoso Christian Fennesz. Luckily,
the resolution presented itself via the very technology that makes
Fennesz's music possible. We'd do an e-moJWnterview. Of course, this
was just enough contact to destroy my wonderful vision of Fennesz
as the first arrogant, scowling rock-star of abstract electronica.
Thoroughly genial indeed, he began his second e^maHof the
exchange with the salutation "boing!!" The-formafof this interview
also allowed him to be somewhat evasive, and frustratingt^*eeR;inhis
answers. It's unlikely that any real insight was achieved in the process
but. at the very least, a few misconceptions.were put to rest and a
few rumours scotched.
Oh, but some of if turned outto be true. For instance, Fennesz
did indeed start his career (if you wish to call it that) as the guitarist
and singer in a rock band. The outfit in question, Maische, was based
in Vienna and primarily influenced by the My Bloody Valentine/Sonic
Youth school of noise. They were, apparently, moderately popular in
their native land during the early '90s. However, Fennesz was never
quite comfortable working in this format. "Me and the drummer were
singing," he recalls. "I hated it and of course I would be happy to
leave that to the likes of David Sylvian," the ex-Japan vocalist who
contributes to Fennesz's forthcoming album Venice, which will mark a
kind of full-circle \n his work—from song-form to abstraction and back
Fennesz does feel that, although it "depends on the lyrics," the
application of words to music can limit the-meaning of a piece "I
don't think my own music needs additional lyrics," he says, qualifying
that "I do like to work-onother people's songs, thougMust tike Jdid
with David, and I'm curious to hear what he did with orasof the tracks
I sent him."
But we're getting ahead of ourselves. By the time that Maische
started to end,-Fennesz was thoroughly disillusioned with the logistics
of the rock band set-up. His solution was to purchase a sampler and
begin work on what became the Instrument EP. Although ostensibly
a leap into electronic music, Instrument was entirely sourced from
sounds created by Fennesz's Fender Stratocaster and the resulting
music has a great deal of aesthetic common ground with the man's
noise-rock heroes. Hearing that a member of Maische was working on
some electronica, Mego leapt in and offered to release the results,
which they did as a long out-of-print 12" single.
By 1997, and the release of his first Mego full-length hotel.parallel,
Fennesz had seemingly left behind the strictures of rock for something
way more rarefied. The album was a great deal more generically
electronic-sounding than Instrument, with only "Aus," the gorgeous
closing track, showing hints of rootcharmony, instrumentation and
rhythm. The contents of this album may come as a surprise to those
who only know Fennesz through his reputation as the man who
brought warmth to European "glitch" music. Nevertheless, he does
not see it as an austere or anomalous piece of work. "I don't think
-4|aot1ts0OBoicold»"tte<ebukes. "I still Bke4tJ"
■■ tfis next step was to pull in both directions at once—
simultaneously committing fully to computer composition/digital signal
processing (DSP) and taking an aesthetic step "back" into bBssed-out
noise territory. Since then, his work has become less abrasive and the
elements of live guitar andkeyboard playing have comeJncreasingly
•^erflsRfore. Meanwhile,fennesz has become openly scornful of
etectroRi'cd's obsession with software-and-processover music-andr-
results. However; he is quick to deny that his approach now favours
musicianship over programming. "Both are equally important," he
counters. "I am still fascinated with technology." Indeed, although
4»er^u$eBtta3lty-thaRla*ne for not asking any questions about
software, he also—rather surprisingly—offers that "if this is any
help, I use Max/MSP, Reaktor, Logic, GRM Tools, Kontakt, FM7 and
Soundhack." w,j~sijjJSa
Ultimately though, he does agree that there is something
obnoxiously macho about the virtuosic use of high-end software. "It
is like the return of 'guitar solos''" he avers, "and some people get it
wrong." He concludes that, "I'm a musician, not a computer scientist,
so I want fo write music, not 'code'."
It seems undeniable, then, that - for this musician - music will
always be more important than technology. As for whether he's given
up his penchant for extreme noise, he merely teases: "Wait for the
next album..."
Fennesz's DSP noise masterpiece, 1999's Plus 48 Degrees
North..., was released on the British label Touch. It was immediately
remarkable for the'way it wrapped scouring blizzards of distortion
within designer- Jon Wozencroft's rural cover photography. Clearly,
something was happening-here. In rejecting the standard "dots-
and-loops" approach to packaging that is all but ubiquitous in
experimental electronics, Fennesz was taking control of the context in
which his work was received—something most laptop artists appear
to consciously avoid. He evidently loves the design of his Touch and
Mego releases, noting that, "I was lucky enough to work with great
designers like Jon Wozencroft and (Mego's) Tina Frank. I was always
happy with the results." More significantly, he notes that "every
artwork they made for me was well-discussed."
This speaks volumes about Fennesz's all encompassing approach
to his releases, his unwillingness to allow context to be set by outside
forces and his inability to simply do what is usually done. This, along
with the sheer brilliance of his music, allowed Fennesz to create
the image of a laptop musician whose creations were infused
with humanity and personality. Here, it seemed, was an artist who
harnessed new technology to capture the vagueness of human
memory and the beauty of corroded nostalgia in a way that was
radical and in no way obvious, yet very immediate and, to those with
an ear for these things, undeniable.
Having said that. Plus 48 Degrees North... is uneasy listening to
say the least and was never likely to capture a particularly large
audience. Luckily for the world at large, Fennesz had a big move
upWs.'Sleeve. Having already referenced classic rock in general,
and the Beach Boys^j^adrticular, on his Fennesz Plays single (a pair
qf extremely abstracted but surprisingly accessible cover versions),
he set out to make an album that refracted vintage pop through
the scratched tens of pest-Oval glitch music. It was the resulting 2001
Mego full-length Endless Summer (named after both a Beach Boys
greatest hits and a classic surfing movie) that allowed him to make
inroads into the collective consciousness of the indie rock masses.
Fennesz still listens to Endless Summer all the time and notes that it's
"the only record of mine that I can listen to without thinking it was me
making it."
The album matked.a-commercial and artistic high point for
Fennesz. it also represented, at least for the time being, the end of
his relationship with Mego. Thus emerged another of the rumours
this article set ©ut4b<tevestigate—that there had been a falling out
between artist and label. "There were some 'interferences,'" he
admits but adds that "Now we're fine. They are friends." As for the
future: "There are no plans to release a Fennesz record on Mego. All
the upcoming stuff will be on Touch. But never say no."
Along the way, Fennesz's rising profile has provided opportunities
for a great deal of collaborative work. He's worked with dance
companies, filmmakers, installation artists and a whole bevy of top
free improvisers. 'He's also done remixes for the likes of Hrvatski and
Ekkehard Ehlers (perhaps the only laptop artist whose music rivals the
Austrian's for sheer beauty).
Still, probably his most successful and well-known collaborations
ao October 2us "1
Mego records abstract electronic superstars come to
Vancouver for Electric City, and Sam Macklin gets intimate with Fennesz and Noriko Tujiko.
have been as part of FennO'Berg—the knockabout trio he shares
with Mego kingpin Peter "Pita" Rehberg and indie-rock renaissance
man Jim O'Rourke. Their two albums are beautiful, hilarious and
unutterably strange, often all at the same time. Although tie's been
getting more selective with the collaborations he does, Fennesz says
he's willing to do a FennO'berg record "any time" and confidently
states, "I'm sure there will be another one."
And Fennesz's collaborations are becoming ever more
publicly prominent. As well as the aforementioned work with David
Sylvian, he's jammed on stage with Sonic Youth and worked on
the next album by majortabel indie rockers Sparklehorse. This last
collaboration seems especially close to his heart. Indeed, when I ask
him what he aspires to (my big closing gambit!), he responds with a
quote from the band's singer Mark Linkous: "It was like a little child
built up to a fountain."
Fennesz's fascination with Sparklehorse may be puzzling to some
of his hardcore fans but it will certainly help to bring his music to a
whole new audience, even beyond the section of indie-rockdom
that is already familiar with it. But that's nothing compared to what
might have happened if the bizarre rumour that Fennesz was doing
a Madonna remix turned out to be true. He's heard this tall tale too
but apparently it "bullshit" although he'd do it in a shot, given the
chance.
Meanwhile, solo releases proceed apace, providing ample
material for those of us still catching up. Field Recordings on Touch
collected an array of previously released material, including the entire
Instrument EP, while the recent Live in Japan (via Japanese Touch
affiliate Headz) provided a "greatest hits" set that embodies the
perfect summation of and introduction to Fennesz's work.
It also gives us some kind of idea about what will happen when
he presents Live in Vancouver at the Scotiabank Dance Center on
October 25, a new piece commissioned by Dangerous Currents, part
of the Electric City festival. This performance has been long awaited
by his many Vancouver fans and will be a must-hear for all abstract
electronica enthusiasts in the area. It's hard to know what to expect,
as all the man himself will give away is "No visuals, jpsWght." Not
terribly illuminating, pardon the pun.
As for Venice, which was slated for release near the start of this
year, one has to wonder when that's finally coming out. "Strange,"
Fennesz quips, "Mike from Touch is asking me the same question every
day now. It will come out this year."
Something tells me it'll be worth the wait.
Noriko Tujiko
Over the course of four albums (the middle two for Mego), Japan's
Noriko Tujiko has slowly been building a grassroots reputation as
a genius of experimental song craft. Despite the fact that her
amorphously melodious laptop pop seems to confuse the rigidly
dogmatic music media, Noriko has managed to win the heart of just
about every real person who has been lucky enough to come across
her work. Her enthusiastic championing by a select band of fans
and her newfound ability to tour Europe after a move to Paris last
November have helped to raise her profile significantly.
Noriko's second album Shojo Toshi impressed so many
Vancouverites that the Powell Street Festival was persuaded to
arrange a grant allowing her to visit these shores. She played two
shows in town, on consecutive nights, the first at the Sugar Refinery
and the second at The Blinding Light!! Cinema (RIP). Both were truly
superb, with Noriko seated behind her Apple Mac, whipping up
tempestuous eddies of sound and revealing an astonishingly room-
filling vocal presence. I was lucky enough to have a short e-mail
discussion with Noriko about her music. Her English is faltering but sure
as shit a lot better than my Japanese, as they say. She's very gracious
-1 ask her if she minds the^act that everything ever written about her
has compared her to Bjork and she replies: "No, not at all. It's a good
advertisement, no?" She's also clearly confident about her obvious
talents—I tell her she looked taken aback by the warm reception she
got from her Vancouver audiences and she. simply tells me, "It's not
true". Of course not. Nobody who heard those sets would have been
surprised to discover that the other people present had enjoyed them
a great deal.
The bulk of the material presented on those two nights later
emerged as her third album Make Me Hard, which is, to these
ears, her masterpiece - a set of songs so fully realized, so perfectly
addictive, so artfully skewed that it's truly uncanny.
Make Me Hard was quickly followed by a new album. From
Tokyo fo Niagara, on the consistently excellent German indietronica
label Tomlab. This fourth album, perhaps Noriko's most accessible to
date, is ostensibly a collaborative exercise with avant-journeyman Aki
Onda. "He was taking a lot of photographs of me and then after that
we started to make the album naturally," she explains. "I can't even
remember the beginning, of the working. But anyway he was the
producer for the album when I noticed. I had never had a producer
and it was nice. I want to have a producer for the next album too."
. :,>W8!ite9i!tmay seem like a step back to the more straightforwardly
Bjorkidwtfip-hop other debut album .(some of which was re-issued
by Mego as the 12" / Forgot The Title), From Tokyo To Niagara reveals
more and more hidden subtleties and glorious sonic/melodic hooks
with every listen. Noriko explains the differences between the new
album and her previous work in typically "enigmatic" English: "As I
was working alone using only my brain. And for the last album I was
not working alone."
Whatever it is she ma* be getting at here, I'm sure of one thing:
The new album is already capturing the ear of Vancouver's music-
loving public and many new fans must be kicking themselves that
they missed Noriko's Vancouver performances. Fear not, for she
is coming back. Noriko will be performing on October 22 at the
Scotiabank Dance Center as part of Dangerous Currents. Don't miss
out this time. •
Selected Oisoqgrciphy
Fenn£sr.\
1997 Instrument EP (Mego)
Hotel Paral.lel (Mego)
1999 Fennesz Plays (Moikai)
2000 Plus Forty Seven Degrees 56'
37" Minus Sixteen Degrees 51'
(Touch)
2001 Endless Summer (Mego)
2002 Field Recordings 1995-2002
(Touch)
2003 Live In Japan (Headz)
Noriko Tujiko
2000 Shojo Toshi (Mego)
2002 Make Me Hard (Mego)
2003 Froi^okyo to Niagara
_k-^pfeimlab)
fi
&i Discoaas&t D
u
Sit back while Bleek tells you the heartwarming story of
a little new media collective named Snuggles and the
phenomenon of "droplifting."
ORLD UNITE
Attention shoppers! As you peruse the aisle of your random CD rack
you may stumble upon a jewel case with an eye-catching image
and a generous helping of tracks from a variety of artists, most or
all of which you've never heard of. If you're in a store with alarmed
packaging around the CDs, you'll notice that the one in your hand is *
as unencumbered as an angry feminist at a bra burning. Interesting.
Go see what the clerk has to say about it. The kid doesn't know
anything and can't find any info on the store computer. Not only that
but the barcode doesn't seem to work either. Maybe you want it
anyway and they pull a price out of the air and on you go. Perhaps
the track by Evolution Control Committee caught your expert indie
eye and you took the gamble, or perhaps you never gave it another
thought.
Whether you like it or not you've become a participant in the
phenomenon known as "droplifting," a word coined by Richard
Holland (aka Turntable Trainwreck) which is meant to describe the
opposite of shoplifting, bringing in the goods and leaving them for
no sane reason, except to perpetuate a kind of dadaist publicity
stunt. Holland, not being picked up by a label or predicting not
to be picked up, would discreetly drop his discs in stores. Around
the continent shifty characters are lurking around (usually) major
department storesand CD racks droplifting the two thousand existing
Free Speech for Sale compilations under the appropriate file or even
right there in the top-seller display rack.
A loosely knit collective known as the Snuggles New Media
Collective (Negativland fans will recognize the reference from
the "U2" single) are behind the compilation of re-contextualised
advertisements, cut-up, processed, remixed and generally fucked
with. The Snuggles list is at least nine-years-old and originally began
as a Negativland discussion list. List members have taken the DIY
ethic on in a funny yet combative or cynical strategy: "The album's
source material is copy written from several advertisers and producers
. who would charge us way too much money to legally clear the
samples, if they are even willing to negotiate at all. The content of
this album would likely offend them to the point where they wouldn't
want it to exist, as it criticizes their very industry using the same clever
tricks they use to sell their products. Frankly, we don't feel any of
them deserve to get paid a second time for the recordings they've
already been overpaid to produce. More importantly, I feel what
we're doing is making new art out of their old art, and furthermore,
we should be allowed to be financially compensated ourselves for
making such art! This is also one of the subtle ironies of this project"
(freespeechforsale.com).
But hey, now that you know the secret, don't be a patsy. All the
tracks and more are available at the freespeechforsale.com sitel In
fact Free Speech for Sale is the third in a series of compilations from
the Snuggles group, the first two being named The DropTift Project
and Dictionaraoke. not fo mention various other side-projects and
online give-aways from many of the artists. The press kit explains it like
this: "With this recent compilation, we want to show the public the
harmlessness of appropriating samples from commercials: harmless
because the samples will not advertise anything...though they may
say something altogether different, it just won't be the message
the advertiser intended us to hear," explains Every Man. "William S.
Burroughs did it with real text in Naked Lunch, Andy Warhol did this
with his 'Brillo Box' sculpture and his ' 100 Soup Cans' painting, and
we're doing the same thing in Free Speech For Sale with audio." The
web-page designed to closely resemble the "As Seen On TV" site was
built by Snuggles member Pimpdaddysupreme, who also works with
audio-art troupe Workshoppe Radio Phonik, both of which appear on
the Free Speech for Sale CD.
The CD's curator is a multi-talented computer systems
administrator who goes by the afias Everyman. With other members
of the list Jn various fits of flight and fancy, Everyman stepped up to
the task of bringing Free Speech for Sale into fruition. According to
Everyman, the project began being kicked around as early as 2000
right'after the Dictionaraoke compilation. You'll find Everyman's
contribution to the CD under yet another alias, the Button, which is
derived from his three hour late-night experimental radio show Press
the Button on WRUW in Cleveland.
After mailing hundreds of CDs around to interested droplifters,
Everyman began a road trip from Ohio to the Burning Man festival in
Nevada: "I droplifted some of these in the Flying J store by Interstate
80, and I've been doing this at every single Flying J stop. I drop five to
ten of these in the CD section which is right in front of the check-out
counter and they'd never notice. I did this day after day after day
21 Ocbtoerisxa mm^MPTiim^t m & feA^gy ^tpami
Illustration: Pax Lyle
while driving out there., and at one point when I was standing in line I
heard a trucker behind me picking it up and looking at it and he said
the name of it, you know, he said (adding a southern drawl] 'Free
Speech for Sale! This must be somethin' new because I've seen this at
every goddamn truck-stop for the past two days!' I was trying hard to
stifle my laughter." Stopping at the same locations on the way back
from Burning Man, Everyman found that half of the CDs had been
picked up. Either bought or stolen, and that's the nature of the game,
really.
The website offers a place for droplifters to write stories of their
exploits: where they've set the discs (ideally in a "hot new" items
display somewhere), and hopefully soon a victim, I mean lucky
individual, will post something about buying the disc. The stories may
include something like this example from Snuggles' member The
Former Yugoslavia: "The other night the copy of Free Speech for Sale
that I dropped off at Target (Asheville) was stijl on the same end-cap
more than a week later, only it had been moved in front of the new
Lionel Richie CD. So I tried to buy it. Surprisingly, there wasn't much
of a struggle—I got sent over to the customer service desk, they
checked their database and couldn't find any matching products, so
they sent me on my way with it... only to have rhe turn around, come
back in the store and "redroplift" it (this time on a 'popular music'
end-cap in front of one of the registers). Fun fun fun...."
Of course, nobody really sees a dime from this experiment in
nonsensical marketing, so why do it? And why take appropriated
material and rework it to be something funnier, ironic and
consequently more entertaining? "Steve Hise discussed this a
little bit," Everyman ventures to explain, paraphrasing audio artist
and Detritus.net owner Hise: "Where there are different levels of
plundering, there's the subversive level, like why would an artist
plunder, would it be for subversion or would it be because it's so
neat because it's so new, its against the law? You know, I'm doing
this because it'swrong, just like some people smoke pot because
it's technically illegal and they argue that if it got legal it'd probably
cut the amount of pot smokers in this country in half. A lot of people
would try it just because it's legal but then it would just fade away."
This, he says, likely makes up about 75% of the Snuggles collective.
"Then there's the level of plundering that's like. 'I want to do this
because I want to make a statement and I use recycling as a tool for
my art and not necessarily because I only rely on recycling as an art
form.'"
Steve Hise (a contributor to Free Speech for Sale, etc.) told me
about his involvement in the Snuggles group, which he said was
fairly minimal at this point because of his own focus on the art of
appropriation. His website Detritus.net hosts a number of on-the-
go projects, as well as news and issues around creating through
plunder. Or, like the website says, "Detritus is a gallery, a village, a
library, a studio, a news service. Detritus is keeping watch on relevant
events and developments, and always adding more content to its
pages." Among the fine artists Steve calls his friends, and may do the
occasional collaboration with, are People Like Us, The Tape Beatles,
The Evolution Control Committee and Wobbly just to name a few.
I asked Steve Hise about a recent speech he gave at the
Electrofringe festival and got more about the question of why:
"Electrofringe is a yearly electronic art festival in Newcastle, New
South Wales, Australia. I was invited and attended in 2001 (see
electrofringeorg for more details]. My talk there was basically about
using cultural recycling as a form of cultural activism. I also discussed
the history and purpose of Detritus.net, and the three "stages" of
cultural recycling, in my view. What I mean by stages are sort of
modes of operation or rationale in artists that engage in cultural
recycling. In other words, why do people do it? The stages are:
1. The Pleasure of the Intertext
2. The Glamour of Theft
3. Cultural Activism."
He continues: "These stages are not necessarily in that order for
everyone, and often someone will drift back and forth between them
or they co-exist in two or three stages at once. The first is about simply
enjoying the act of cutting and mixing pre-existing cultural artifacts.
It's fun. The second is about-exulting in the sort of outlaw chic of
knowing you are 'stealing' intellectual property. The third is using
cultural recycling as a tool to convey meaning and hopefully make
positive change in culture and society."
tzveryman admits that to the Snuggles group, making a track
compelling without the humour and irony can be difficult but
valuable: "Sam Steven's Cyberphobe ('The Year of my Nervous
Breakdown') CD where he included 9-11 samples. Me and David
Dixon of Stark Effect were discussing that very concept saying that the
one thing that the Snuggles artists use a lot is irony. It makes it cute,
it makes it funny and does make it have a greater impact, but the
one real hard thing to do is sometimes make a track without the use
of irony. It's like the real artistic challenge. I felt that Cyberphobe did
just that. It's really cool, it's not funny but it's still entrancing to listen to.
Negativland has some tracks like that. My favorite one is off the album
Free, which is called 'The Gun and the Bible': It's chilling, I mean the
Bible, this loving, peaceful thing in the name of God and religion,
which stands for the ten commandments, 'Thou shalt not kill' but
there's so many people killed with a gun in the name of religion."
Whether the tracks on Free Speech for Sale are ironic, silly,
surreal, stupid or all of the above, they are unarguably compelling.
Certain tracks and strategic edits are hard to shake from your mind
sometimes, as for example Tim Moloney's "Shatner" with William
Shatner informing you how to choose a career in "TV VCR repair or
TV VCR repair or get a degree in TV VCR repair." and Stop Children's
"Medicine Head 24 Hour" in which "one daily dose provides 24 hours
of headache, diarrhea and abdominal pain." Evolution Control
Committee mixes pineapples with Dippidy doodoo. There is also
Social Security's touching "Hi, Bye" with the advice "for free help
call home.". Toward the end of the disc some of the artists bring
Free Speech for Sale to an almost creepy end with darker audio-
art collages. It's truly a novel compilation with ingredients for the
experimentally-minded and thinking industrial fan.
If that weren't enough, the website includes several bonus tracks
• from these artists and other potential Snugglers. "I don't think the
number has stopped because people keep making them," Everyman
says. "I guess it's not clearly defined but we're always accepting
bonus tracks. If you have some idea of making a song out of a
commercial then by all means, you know, that's what the bonus site
is for." •
To get involved in droplifting, while the discs last, or to And
out more about the Snuggles collective, go to the website at
freespeechforsale.com
33 0iSCO«l«R .KWDGODH
i
Aesop Rock
Bazooka Tooth -
(Definitive Jux)
Ian Bavitz (aka Aesop Rock)
is back with the long-awaited
follow-up to Labour Days, his
epic, paradigm-annihilating
opus. Apparently consumed
with the desire to become even
more than the most ambitious
lyricist on Def Jux (itself arguably the most ambitious label
in hip hop), Ace has stepped
behind the boards to produce
the bulk of this album's tracks
himself (ll out of 15), relegating
long-time producer Blockhead
to just three tracks. The results
are impressive, though not too
surprising—the style is busy and
heavy on abstraction, borrowing liberally from the El-P school
of hard grime and cluttered,
left-field samples. The highlight
accomplishment of Aesop
Rock's solo production career
thus far is clearly "Freeze," a
swaggering sledgehammer of
gutter-funk battle rhyming and
blurting synth-horns with multiple tracks of Ace's trademark
nasal vocals leaping over each
other to deliver lines like "The
roof is on fire where Snoopy sits
right now/You should have shot
yourself in the foot while it was
in your mouth!" His beats aren't
always quite so on, though, a
fact made more evident when
Blockhead returns to the decks
with his funkier, more tuneful
style—a pleasant break from
the frequently taxing complexity of Ace Rock's own crowded
soundscapes. El-P himself guests
as both producer and MC on
"We're Famous," coming with
one of the hottest beats on the
album-a simple but funky loop
of laser-gun keyboard blasts and
shuffling drum hits over which he
and Ace call out every hater
who ever disrespected Def Jux
for not being hip hop, with some
seriously sick rhyming. Mr. Llf also
guests on the standout "11:35."
where he and Ace get into a bit
of that narrative rapping that's
so rare on Aesop Rock albums.
This Blockhead-produced
track far exceeds Ace's previous experiments in storytelling,
24 October 2aa
notably the disappointing "No
Regrets" on Labour Days, the
album to which Bazooka Tooth
will unavoidably be compared
(along with his earlier Float).
Not everyone will find the comparison favorable, this album
being obviously deficient in
the epic sweep and thematic
unity of his last groundbreaking
full-length, but his flows haven't
devolved—in fact, he's in better
form than ever, lyrics-wise, and
the beats .underneath uphold
the unimpeachable Def Jux
rep for bleeding-edge progres-
siveness. There's hardly a shortage of excellent hip hop at the
moment (upcoming releases by
Non-Prophets and Soul Position
have got me chuffed, to say
nothing of Outkast's latest masterpiece) but there's no doubt,
in Ian Bavitz's own words, that
he still "Aesops the fuck out of
the Rock."
saelan
&J1F.
NinALENT
Billy Talent
s/t
(Atlantic Records)
The self-titled debut album from
Billy Talent offers 41 minutes of
head-nodding, toe-tapping
music as well as a short video
clip, "Behind the Scenes with
Billy Talent," when you put the
CD into your computer.
To back up the screaming
vocals of lead singer Benjamin
Kowalewicz. the screeching
electric guitar of Ian D'Sa,
and the rhythmic electric bass
of Jonathan Gallant, Aaron
Solowoniuk provides a sturdy
backbone of beat and quick
fills. The sounds of Billy Talent
can be compared to that of
Alexisonfire. However. Billy
Talent is much more melodic
and I could actually make out
all the lyrics rather than the
mesh of incoherent screams
Afexisonfire offers.
Although their lyrics take on
a cynical view as they basically
speak of being screwed over
by the world, they are not your
average punk band. With their
pleasant harmonies and catchy
tunes, they have a lot more
to offer than just anger music.
recorded media
Overall, I'd say Billy Talent t
just that—talent.
Laney
'i4 :tffr
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Take Them On On Your Own
(Virgin)
And I had high hopes for this
album.... With their second
major Virgin Records release,
Los Angeles' Black Rebel
Motorcycle Club shows us that
even the guys under fjressure
can cut a decent record. Well,
half of it's good, anyway.
Starting where the Jesus and
Mary Chain and Stone Roses
left off. in a sense, more than
a decade ago, BRMC borrows
the wall of sound and adds their
own asinine punk personas fo
their sophomore album Take
Them On On Your Own. "I don't
feel at home in this generation...
Ain't you had enough/ I've had
enough/ Don't fuck with me"
assures vocalist Robert Turner
on "Generation." The strongest
track lyrically, "Generation"
evolves into a neo-shoegazer
mess of distortion and unnecessary effects.
While some predictable tracks
make a worse headache than
sniffing shoe glue, introductory tracks "Stop" and "Six Barrel
Shotgun" are more fun than six
barrels of monkeys. The sound
is reminiscent of The Stooges.
and that voice, that voice, is
dirtier than Iggy Pop. I like it.
"US Government" has so much
potential. "In Like The Rose"
makes me feel like I'm not wasting my time.
If you liked this record or
even BRMC's previously released
treats, you can catch them at
the Commodore Ballroom on
October 17 for a reasonable
sum. Although I will be busy
clipping my nails that night, I
hope some of you will attend
and support your favourite tribute band.
In further news, watch out for
the White Poser U-Pass Guy hitting shelves sometime soon....
Calen Nixon
Chris Clark
Empty The Bones Of You
(Warp)
This is the second Chris Clark LP
on Warp Records. Where are the
vocals? In this epic instrumental
album, Chris Clark exposes a
gothic concrete world narrated with heavy synthesizers.
This emotionally robotic journey
is warped (pun intended—
www.warprecords.com) with a
myriad of cacophonous sounds
uniquely metallic in nature. The
production is cold and slick;
it flows nicely if you're feeling
rainy, or if it's raining on you.
But beware of prolonged listening; I'm not sure if you'll come
out of it feeling intact. There
must be hidden messages in
these compositions because I
get this vague feeling of physical sickness somewhere in my
body. I almost want to see a
Japanimation accompanying
this soundtrack to get a better
visual understanding of these
songs. I've played this on my
CD player at least two times
from beginning to end and I
still have trouble identifying the
songs. Did I just listen to track 04
or 11 ? So forget about playing
this CD on shuffle/random. Track
13, "Betty," was particularly jarring for its analog noises piercing
my eardrums. For a moment, I
thought those darn CDs were
skipping again. Of course they
weren't, but Clark did a magnificent job of fooling me.
The cover is quite confusing. In
the centre, there appears to be
a face or a skull of some sort. I
can't make out what is above
its head, but below there are
tons of crudely drawn fighter
pilots flying kamikaze straight
towards the centre. And there
is this light orange silhouette of
a guy upside down falling info
the fray. Maybe the CD cover is
too small for finer details. When I
see the LP version, I'll stare at it a
few more times and by then I'll
get it. Or when Chris comes to
town in November, I can ask him
to explain it.
Frank Liao
m
Death Cab for Cutie
Transatlantlcism
(Barsuk)
"My God, some fans are going
to despise this record." That
was the first thought that ran
through my head after playing
Transatlanticism through for
the first time. The bright, clear
and polished production which
leaves the listener no dark corners to hide; the lyrics, simpler
and more direct compared to
past albums; and guitars that
alternately blast and chime
where they were once understated—people are going to say
Death Cab for Cutie pulled a Liz
Phair. Admittedly, their accusations may not be entirely without
merit. The vocal "ba-BAAAAs"
on "The Sound and Settling"
are far too glee club; a loud,
distorted guitar bridge tramples
the otherwise delicate and
bittersweet "Tiny Vessels," and
"We Looked Like Giants" trades
nuance for bluster. But to use
flaws like these to justify a criticism that DCFC have ignored
their craft and talent for potential write-ups in Rolling Stone
misses the point entirely.
Yes, the songs are less murky
and more verse-chorus-verse
than before, but it's not like Ben
Gibbard and Christopher Walla
went out and hired The Matrix.
This much is evident from the
opening track, "The New Year."
The loud, ringing guitars don't
smack of commercialization,
they actually help make a pretty catchy, poppy song that still
communicates Gibbard's desire
for connection ("There'll be no
distance that will hold us back").
Equally successful and poignant
are "Title and Registration," a
bass-driven reflection on past
love which features a Postal
Servlce-ish xylophone section, and "Expo '86," where
Gibbard's voice alternately
coos and soars over Walla's
melodic guitar work (sadly, there
is no mention of Expo Ernie).
The album's peak, though, is
the gorgeous career-highlight
"Transatlanticism." Even as
more and more instruments
are added to the song before
its inevitable climax, Gibbard's
ache and longing ("I need you
so much closer") stand above
all else in this eight-minute epic
that sounds like the grown-up
offspring of "Pictures of You."
So, bemoan Transatlanticism as
"Pop Goes Death Cab for Cutie"
if you must, but I'll still treasure it
all the same.
Neil Braun
Mark Eitzel
The Ugly American
(Matador Records)
When I first gave this CD a listen,
I couldn't shake the feeling
that Mark Eitzel may have lost
it. The previous singer for the
American Music Club has this
time chosen to infuse Greek
instruments and styles into his
own songs. On first spin it all
seemed to lack a hook, and felt
just too pretty, too produced,
too clean and too impersonal.
Something strange happened
though,' because I found myself
listening to it again and again,
maybe so that I could give an
honest review, but also because
I felt that I might be missing
something beneath the smooth
veneer. After many repeated
listens to The Ugly American,
I've decided that it is. in fact, a
pretty record, but nothing more.
The lyrics are unimaginative,
and the Greek instrumentalists
add spice to the dish that would
otherwise be entirely unpalatable. At its worst, the additional
pop-inflected voice and production that Eitzel has chosen
to work with this time around is
the strangling kitsch that can be
found on songs "Take Courage,"
and "Nightwatchman." At the
album's best ("Western Sky" or
perhaps "Love's Humming"), it is
unmemorable, with tracks flowing into each other and falling
into a mid tempo doze of non
emotions and sparkling mediter-
soren Brothers
^w^r
Adam Green
Jessica EP
(Rough Trade)
Could this be true? An Adam
Green CD that doesn't seem
to earn a "Parental Advisory"
sticker? Of course there is one,
but I can't figure out why. The
only "Moldy Peach" language
available appears on one of
the covers he does! This EP contains, obviously, the awesome
"Jessica" single from his Friends
of Mine album released this past
July. I love the lyrics: "Jessica
Simpson, where has your love
gone? It's not in your music,
no...." The only lo-fi moment
appears on track 3: "Don't
Smoke/ The Bronx Zoo 1989"
which sounds like a seven or
eight-year-old Adam advertising therr
of
lerits of not smoking
going to the zoo. Awww... And
then there's "What a Waster"—
a Libertines cover—an easy
going, guitar strumming version of the cokehead girl song.
And the final song? A cover
of The Beach Boys' "Kokomo"!
With Ben Kweller! Eek! What an
awesome combo! I think this EP
caught Adam in a good mood
(and in a studio!!! Gasp!!!) and
I easily listened to this 20 times
in a row after I ripped open
the packaging. These are feelgood songs, like Neil Diamond
or something...
Natalie Vermeer
Gemma Hayes
Night On My Side
(Astralwerks)
"Album of the year." "A
scorcher." "The finest debuf*
from a female since Beth Orton's
Trailer Park." Or so the promotional sticker reads. Knowing
that these quotes are all from
British tabloids, you can't help
but be very skeptical (speaking
of which, now that our editor is
a Brit, will DiSCORDER be carrying headlines promoting "The
Greatest Band in All Creation"
and then trash said band three
months later?). Indeed, Night
On My Side doesn't deserve
all that praise, but it's not without merit. Hayes' voice can't
compare to the assertive and
arresting Orton; it's closer to
Jewel's minus the preciousness,
which means it's pleasant, but
not strong enough to carry a
song by itself.
Unfortunately, the spare "My
God" and "Evening Sun" are
written to put all the focus on
Hayes' voice. She fares much
better when she sticks to pop-
pier, moFe engaging fare like
the charming single "Hanging
Around" and "Back of My
Hand," as well as the feedback-
drenched "Tear in my Side" and
"Lucky One." Co-produced by
Dave Fridmann, the album's mix
of adult alternative smoothness,
distorted guitars and acoustic
explorations sounds great, but
the album's quieter moments,
designed to sound emotional
and affecting, fall flat. Think of
this album, then, as music for
polite company; it's nothing
revolutionary, it's fairly unobtrusive, and the odd guest might
even compliment you on your
music taste.
Neil Braun
Head of Femur
Mngodom or Proctor
(Greyday Productions)
I like where this band gets its
name. The head of femur is the
point where the cameraman for
the Ed Sullivan Show was not to
film below when Elvis shook his
pelvis. The band explains that
"the head of femur is the point
where rock and roll becomes
sex qnd we balance on top of
it!" Oooh....
So there are three core
members of the band and then
15 guest musicians, including an
accordionist! Zyeah! The vocalist
and guitarist is Matt Focht who
drums for Bright Eyes and there's
another guitarist/vocalist named
Mike Elsener who has played in a
band with Matt before and with
keyboardist/drummer/vocalist
Ben Armstrong. Ben also currently composes music for children's
movies which I find interesting
because many times this album
seems kind of like a collection of
simplistic high school band/choir
songs, but that's not to knock it
I find some similarities with
Bright Eyes but this band is a
lot more accessible and there
aren't many Connor O'Berst-
bursts of cracking, heart-
wrenching vocals. The often
simplistic melodies and lyrics are
endearing in many ways but in
some instances, force me to skip
tracks. They are kind of growing on me, except some of the
especially cheesy lines like in "80
Steps to Jonah" or "Money is the
Root...". Sometimes it seems like
I'm listening to The Flaming lips.
Madness, and Rocket from the
Crypt at the same time.
I think the highlight of this album
is the Brian Eno cover ("The True
Wheel"). Just like how the first
song on this album ("January
on Strike") makes me/eel tike
I'm in an 80s suburban teen
movie, this song makes me want
to skip down the street in my
big-shouldered pink sweater.
It's got Beach Boy harmonies
with robotic new wave response
vocals—howcan you riot love
tt&j?v\
Natalie Vermeer
Jaga Jazzist
The Stix
(Ninja Tune)
I've been listening to this disc for
weeks but haven't been able to
write this review for sometime.
Usually the words come to me
after the first or second listen,
but this time: nothing. The Stix
is a good release; no, scratch
that, this is a fucking great
release! Jaga Jazzist are future-
jazz but not in that Jazzanova,
DJ Krush, or Beatless sense of the
term. Damn, those Norwegians
are keeping it fresh! My head
was just getting around fellow
countryman Kim Hiorthoy's latest release, and now I have this
follow-up to the fantastic Animal
Chin EP by a collective of ten
Norsemen known for fusing
retro-lounge to contemporary
electronics.
The group is both jazzy with
horns and upright bass, plaintive and sweet with guitars, and
electronically rhythmic thanks
to a heavy dose of synths, keyboards and drum machines. It's
like the boys are equal fans of
Ninja Tune, Warp and Stereolab
yet have somehow combined
these influences into something
truly unique. Your cool friends
and not-so-hip parents will both
appreciate The Stix, being so
current in sound and its homage
to free jazz of the '70s. Are the
Norwegians the new Swedes as
far as album sales <
probably not, since
electronica/jazz usually
a backseat to rock/pop/punk .
on the Billboard charts. Let's
just say those Icelanders have
something to worry about.
Robert Robot
%0,
Paula Kelly
The Trouble With Success or How
You Fit Into the World \£|§|# •
(Kimchee Records)
".NeV.e/^^Mdge a record by its
credits. 1 picked this record
up because in its credjjjj,-troth" ■
,fdr^OTCtfe'stra and a chW^^^fe,
listed. 1 had thus assumed that
Paula Kelly was either a classical musician/composer or a
<veryj.<cVeative atmospheric solo
vocalist. Tq n^^^treme disappointment, this was' rief .the-
case. Both the orchestra and
choir are used as single-note
backup instruments throughout
most of the record. The only
colorist moment they give is
at the end of "Where Do You
Go," when the horns randomly
decide to end the song Spanish
Tango style. This sounds very
out of place, seeing as the rest
of the record seems to be a
blend of a modern Japanese
pop group. The Cranberries,
and Shirley Temple. I can easily
imagine this record selling well to
Japanese ESL students—despite
the nonsensical melancholy lyrics such as "through the dizzy
blue, the ground comes into
view," and "over time, filled with
circles in my mind." Listening
to this record hurts my ears.
Regardless, there are some
attempts at style in the later half
of the record, and I would definitely call Kelly 'unique.' So it is
for this reason alone that I would
give this record a three or four
out of ten. Only the extremely
optimistic feminist would score
it any higher—and, even then,
only by a few points.
Eric Hedekar
Well,
takes
Kid Koala
Some of My Best Friends Are DJs
(Ninja Tune)
The second full-length album
by Canada's own, Eric San
(AKA Kid Koala), is more of that
good lovin' you're used to from
Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (Ninja
Tune 1998). Jazz samples over
catchy beats and creative
sound manipulations make the
majority of Koala's tracks on
Some Of My Best Friends Are
DJs (Ninja Tune Oct. 2003) sound
beckoning you to come closer
with one sharp red-nailed finger,
as she provocatively sways her
hips to the music.
The CD is part of Kid Koala's liter-
.,ary>Pr^i©ct, Nufonia Must Fall,
a 350-page love story about
an unemployed robot and a
workin' girl. The theme of love is
explored on fhe disc, most aptly
l^^%fj$iipte .of koala bears'
sexual barks and in "Vrse&ti^h *
Island," a twangy musical manifestation of a lazy sunny day
under a palm ttfs>gi»h Hawaii. The
■ sc«Sfcl?ing is wave-like, floating
through edcto,Jrjgck, and there
is a narratioriJJaijis'orts, guiding
you through the album. "Skanky
Panky" and "More Dance Music"
stand out as strong tracks, both
with cheery, nostalgic jazz melodies and a catchy beat that you
0C^d8«JTUS^U«S
somewhat sentimental scratch __
DJing showcase that r
can't help but bounce to. Then,
there's the stuff that's just plain
different and certainly a little
bizarre, such as "Flu Season,"
which involves cutting recordings of two people sneezing
over classic beatboxing. That
and "Robochacha", a crazy
mix of an electronic voice and
drum beats.
Overall, this record is'
tion on the fun and funky sound j ^\A IcTS BC/
of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, but
with a more personalized theme, 2* ^-0 rs^^
tying in with Koala's Nufonia -^^.'tOWY' WlLS^sl
Must Fall project. The result is a ** rt)u i »sf Lai
5AM' Bob wtseMAiJ
us of just how talented thisgy^^ ^ ON PAY ©wlf •
Canadian artist is at combining _ p ». , P\JLA JAZ"2>
unexpected elements to form ' *»
beautiful yet out of the ordinary S* J°«\ ^ ih^l |p$
music t>ievy PieOjet-jA^
Flavia ^.foy^lChiUr^f
16. £teNAR.\oS Uy iHw.
-OVvVWf" A.c^\ |
IS- jnMb'-KaH.4".
(XrS\o[C
Kitchens and Bathrooms [fe _ ^^j^,^ ft |fe
Vehicles Beyond f I II I kA, C. >
(Sonic Unyon) JacMMia Mfif.*
There's something difficult il.Av\."fob*J>H felKcfc »f
about reviewing a math rock . Amtr.'ti |%"4"")
band. Labelling a band math |$, TV rlour C4^fc5
rock tends to be a bit suffocat- W ( o I»IC "Htf'^
ing and limiting, given how ^, . t
exclusive that style can seem"2ljX V/WN■•
to-be. So I'm going to give the —, C>a ftftjj'.L j, ft ~X\Nt$altj
facts straight up. K and B are a ^ i^ » fi.p
Hamilton. Ontario rock trio who 22 . MYStvTy jPP
like to experiment as much as 23. M/st ^ONtIA^
possible with different rhythms "%A l^lAS^f/ DRAJC^--
^25. IN tVir^'s
Jk>J V-eK^Vy
:i
and melodic lines. The vocals
"Vehicles Beyond"- are scarce
and cryptic, and as such tend 2|p . ^B^V<VJ PeCre
to act as little more than sup- ^A.v'AC^Nt1
porting instruments to the main
feature— the interplay between * ' i
guitars and drums. The songs **( * *— '
have a touch of hardcore andzJ^ . f^gAAjCX>A M"^^
are epic in sound, though not in ^g^^K* 1$ S
length (the longest song, "The^r,» »,»5-rv1^ *\
Commodity," pulls in at barely -T—fAMlU^ *MA|
five minutes). Given the lack of - 0 J p (fr£tf£ l^fi
experimentation with different J * # .
instruments or styles the songs •»« (4At.LC>^"€.^'A/ ,6
can tend to run together, bu
they're all good enough to float
the album as a whole. Songs to " ¥ ^^jjfca4» MllSl'c
note are "Alphabet Conscious"'
and "For Instance, Driving Blind,"
but as there are no songs that
stand out head and shoulders
above the rest, these are chosen for their song titles as much
as anything else. The album art
is a black background, with a
picture of what look like a street
at night with yellow tinged street
lights. Check them out if you're
interested in hardcore experimental music.
soren Brothers
^ew^HV i
SVlf^dfciNptV
35 i>vSOoflDC& Los Straitjackets
Supersonic Guitars In 3-D
(Yeproc Records)
I'd kinda given up on instrumental bands when groups like
Satan's Pilgrims, The Bomboras
and Huevos Rancheros packed
it in because they had gotten
tired of playing (and I got tired
if hearing) a style of music that
traditionally has been an uphill
battle of appreciation because
other bands like them either
relied to heavily on schtick or
not enough on musicianship,
thus bringing the quality factor
down a few notches. With the
aforementioned bands there
was always that perfect blend
of show, style and song that
would never detract one iota
from my appreciative ears.
Then I happen along Nashville,
Tennessee's troubadours of
surf-n-turf, Los Straitjackets and
'. I thank the good Lord above
that at least there's still hope for
instrumental fans to invest their
money in a hard-working outfit
like them. By the time you read
this, seven albums worth of show-
stopping, mask-wearing, gear-
grinding voice-less (unless you
count their sing-a-long record)
■ versatility will have come, seen,
and conquered those fortunate
enough to catch their FIRST time
ever in Vancouver (an outright
crime considering their appearances on Late Night With Conan
O'Brien, numerous film scores
and celebrity endorsements- not
withstanding), but such is life.
For those who have missed this
momentous occasion, you have
this brand new disc of delight
to pipe through those speakers and enjoy thirteen tracks of
big boss beats. From the Link
Wray influenced fuzz-fest of
"Time Bomb," to taking a ferry
'cross The Mersey for "Dipinto
Twist" and "Isn't Love Grand?",
there's still a lot of shakin' to do
with more straight up Ventures-
style surf numbers like "Beach
Bag" and "Galaxy Drive." To
the jazzy be-bop of "Giggle
Water" and the spooktacular
theremin-laced (courtesy of The
Blues Explosion's Jon Spencer)
"Tarantula," the band with a
penchant for twang and a
trick or two up their sleeves (like
guest appearances from X's DJ
Bonebrake and Billy Zoom) make
for a worthy entry into the instro-
sweepstakes and deserved of
many spins at your next shindig.
Bryce Dunn
ing noticably up the middle.
Although some of the mixes fall
into the trap of becoming simply wandering grooves, most of
the tracks are solid. Above all.
Madlib's deep respect for the
artists he is reinvisioning is utterly
evident—right down to the faux-
Francis Wolff photo he has on his
album cover. Very Blue Note.
Lucas TdS
Madlib
Shades of Blue
(Blue Note Records)
Remixes of old jazz records
seem to be as common as low-
rise jeans these days. They are
often a way for a record label
to generate new interest in old
recordings (which are cheap to
re-package), while generating
interest from old jazz fans for
new artists. Plus, the remixers
get the joy of playing with the
work of some of their heroes.
However, remixes in this vein
often come across sounding
fake and forced. Some would
even argue that these remixes
are tasteless (remember the guffaw surrounding Tricky's remix of
Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit"?
So my biggest question when
picking up Madlib's Shades
o? Blue was "How will he fare
remixing the work of Donald
Bryd, Herbie Hancock. Horace
Silver and other Blue Note artists?" Madlib, thankfully, is no
amateur. He's been around
the block a few times and
knows the material he is working with. Plus, to call this album
a "remix" album is not really
doing it justice... it isn't so much
a remix album as a collaboration project to reinterpret eleven
classic pieces. Madlib takes
us on a journey through Blue
Note's record library, remixing
and often altogether rerecord-
ing pieces. There is no doubt
that Madlib has respect for the
original masters whose work he is
playing with—but he also takes
steps to level the playing field,
asserting himself as an artist on-
par with the original jazz cats.
For example. Madlib uses packaging craftily on this release,
creating an "authentic" atmosphere by mimicking the look
and feel of original Blue Note
sessions... looking at the liner
notes, one would think that
over twenty real musicians were
involved in the project—in fact,
it's mostly Madlib himself and his
multiple aliases (including the
"Joe McDuphrey Experience"
and "Yesterday's New
Quintet"). He even credits each
individual sample and each
overdubbed part as a seper-
ate instrumentalist... Taking the
gag to its inevitable extreme,
he even fakes a live recording session at "the Lost Gates,
CA" with a trio and then lets
the listener in on the joke halfway through the tune when
he chops and edits the record-
Mogwai
Happy Songs for Happy People
(Matador)
This release was originally titled
Bag Full of Agony, but Mogwai
came up with the marginally
better Happy Songs for Happy
People instead for their 'proper'
fourth long player. This childishly
ironic title is almost as clever as
the album's art is boring. With
song titles like "Kids Will Be
Skeletons," I don't think Mogwai
is any happier than before.
Thankfully, the real content—the
music—is better than the band's
marketing. No longer a young
team, these five Scotsmen have
managed to carve a niche in
the musical landscape»as primarily instrumental rockers who
take leads from drony shoegazing with a healthy dose of post
rock and something I don't
know yet. I could say HMFHP is
a progression in sound from their
louder, less delicate, guitar-rock
of past. ik^'is&Sii
The quiet and whispered vocals
on "Boring Machines Disturbs
Sleep" are certainly new. The
same goes for the inclusion of
violin. I could also say this is the
sound of a band maturing and
loosing their edge or possibly
no longer as fresh-sounding.
Yet, at moments, this seems
to be Mogwai's best release,
complete with vintage Mogwai
cutting guitars and their more
recent focus on emotive piano
interludes. Jon Peel claims
Mogwai has gone from being
a good to great band with
HMFHP, but I'm not convinced.
This is solid and among?) some
of Mogwai's best work, but
undoubtedly will not convert
those not previously convinced
of the bands right to popularity.
Robert Robot
Plastilina Mosh
Nolo Chicuelos
(Astralwerks)
I am going to start stating that
it would be very unlikely for me
to buy a Plastilina Mosh album
if I was living in Mexico, espe
cially because you can listen to
their songs as frequently on the
radio as you hear Nickelshit in
Vancouver's stations. Maybe I
would be tempted to buy one
here in Canada more for nostalgic reasons than for anything'
else; Because being here made
me appreciate more their salad
of rhythms with a predominant
electronic lounge elements that
could be easily ployed in a mainstream club or include one of
the tracks in a chill out CD compilation: however you can sense
the Latin flavour mixed with
Spanish and English lyrics. Their
music is a satirical portrayal of
Mexican urban culture through
the combination of old rhythms
with new beats. Plastilina Mosh
is cynical. Plastilina Mosh likes
to be ridiculous and they make
groovy sounds out of it. They try
to bring fur coats and burlesque
girls from Mexican seventies films
where the main actors were
"suave" smooth and sleazy
Don Juans acting cool with the
ladies. In their warped version
of pop culture you can see
chihuahua dogs sipping martinis
and maybe you can imagine
ugly people making love with
a funky rhythm over a velvet
beach. Hola Chicuelos is less
compromised and less political
than their previous album. Hola
Chicuelos, which would translate as "Hello Little Lads," goes
between cheesy and pop with
hints of interesting notes. You
have to be in the right frame of
mind to enjoy this CD. Drunk and
funk from Mexico you can like a
couple of tracks like "Peligroso
Pop", "Shake Your Pubis" or
some of the more loungy
sounds. I am going to finish by
saying that if you are thinking of
buying this CD, you'd better buy
another of their creations called
Aquamosh, which is much more
interesting, has better grooves
and is a more compromised
Oswaldo Perez Cabrera
Puffy AmiYumi
Nice
(Columbia)
You know those Japanese kids
you see around town that look
like pop culture came along
and puked up all over them?
That's what this record sounds
like. Every track seems to borrow from a different style of
popular music: "Long Beach
Nightmare" smacks of early
Beatles, "Your Love is a Drug"
sounds like a song The Cars wish
they could have written and
"Tokyo Nights" sounds like the
kind of '80s eurotrash dance
music that Aqua were churning
out five years ago. Even the
cover has Ami and Yumi posing
as John and Yoko on their "bed
in" for peace.
This sort of borrowing and
meandering through pop music
is usually an album's undoing; in
trying to appeal to the widest
variety of listeners an artist (or
producer in this case) will create
an album of songs with little relation to one another. Not so with
Puffy AmiYumi. Somehow the
Japanese pop duo's twin vocal
sound transcends the stylistic
differences found in the music.
This is an even more amazing
feat due to the fact that over
half of the lyrics aren't even
English and those that are don't
exactly pack an emotional
punch. There are two songs
about Tokyo ("Planet Tokyo"
and "Tokyo Nights"), a cartoon
theme song that's actually the
theme song for a cartoon ("Teen
Titans Theme") and a song in
which the duo declares that a
suitor's affection for them is similar to a pharmaceutical product
("Your Love is a Drug").
An album like this would not
work were Puffy AmiYumi not
Japanese. The thought of two
girls from North America singing
an album like this (or two pseudo-lesbians from Russia) quite
frankly makes me want to vomit.
For some reason though. Puffy
AmiYumi come off with enduring
cuteness.
Ian Gormely
guitar chords, solid beats and
country bass riffs need no interruption by vocals. With c.ool
graphic design to wrap it up
and int/Jguing titles like "Twenty
Original Fembots," this CD is very
retro and very cool.
With a spaghetti western
feel evocative of roadhouses
and lonely bars, I recommend
this CD as the soundtrack when
you hop into your classic car
with your baby and drive on
out to find one, or at least find
somewhere secluded.
I have one complaint—this
disc wasn't wasn't long enough.
More, I want more!
Vampyra Draculea
The kamblin' Ambassadors
Avantl
(Mint Records)
The Ramblin' Ambassadors' disc
Avanfi serves up some classic
rockabilly music, with a little bit
of a surf influence just under
the surface. Their deep chunky
Seismic
Portions
(Coqi records)
I wanna completely hold judgment against this CD until I see
them perform live. Circa 1995,
the Melting Hopefuls CD made
heavy rotation in my walkman
for a couple of weeks before
sentimentality led to mighty
boredom. Zoom forward to 2003
landing this terrifically packaged
CD for review: origami and all.
From Ottawa arid proudly adoring Canadian Twenty Dollar Bills
on its cover. Seismic made me
feel age thirteen again and
ready to really love this album.
With sappy new-school soft indie
rock riffs and melodic vocals by
the Sarah Deluca, it was a sure
formula for success.
The cheesy protest sound
clip of "No More Wars" was a
bit much though. I'm getting
too old to sit through this often-
repeated anti-war rhetoric.
How about "No More Coke,"
way more provocative? And
something so important it's
worth mentioning. Beat diggers:
yo, cop this on LP/CD. Lots of
Nirvana-ripoff breaks. I made a
neat remix of "Sleep On It" with
old MPC-60. Type nice.
The instrumental "Portions"
gave me the impression that the
drummer lacked serious funk. A
drummer needs to feel funky.
Frank Liao
The Shins
Chutes Too Narrow
(Sub Pop)
While The Shins' first album. Oh!
Inverted World, invited one a little further down the road of tight
throwback falsetto pop than this
writer.is willing to travel (sober). it was a revelation. I hear, to
enthusiasts, making its follow-
up a relatively anticipated
thing. On Chutes Too Narrow,
America's Top Modelizers (your
friends will explain) maintain the
if-it's-baroque-don't-fix-it-( too-
much) approach, but manage
to slip something noteworthy
into that first record's claustrophobic pop gush. As much as
I'd like to think that it's me who
has loosened up, I'm pretty sure
it's The Shins. Sure, there are
moments that match—even
up—that record's pop ante, but
for the most part things have
been toned down: the helium
bong gathers dust on several
vocal takes, the arrangements
are less gymnastic, the folk of
"New Slang" has quietly spread
through their sound. Of course,
what's gained in this newfound
space is a more dynamic record
and songs, as nicely penned
strumjobs explode pretty
convincingly into rock star fist-
pumpers ("Kissing the Lipless"),
updated pop classicisms, and
kicky psychedelic throwdowns.
Bas/7 Waugh
get to make a landmark record
envied by collectors? Why did I
just bong a can of tomato juice?
The reissue details the birth and
abortion of Solger and the liner
notes include tribute and commentary from Steve and Mark of
Mudhoney.
The three chord guitar treats
on "Dead Solger" and "Raping
Dead Nuns." coupled with
vocals oh-so "sick of the production line and having to meet
the standards" (From "I Hate It")
make this album worth more
than just its history. However, the
raw sound becomes a detriment
to this album when patchy instruments and less-than-favourable
acoustics slaughter the five live
tracks closing this record.
To further my steak analogy, the Germs "What We Do
Is Secret" cover is clearly the
HP sauce on your entree; this
record is either 16 tasty cuts
or fodder unfit for human consumption, depending on your
tastes. Regardless, Codex 1980
will deliver sonic E. Coli and
aural Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease
faster than elected government
overlords can ban it.
Calen Nixon
Solger
Codex 1980
(Empty Records)
Listening to Empty Records' reis-
. sue of Solger's recording efforts
is comparatively akin to ordering
rare prime rib and instead being
served a raw goat carcass
recently defiled by a correctional institute social committee.
A delicacy indeed for hardcore
purists, enter the group that was
Solger with a cacophony of distorted strings accompanied by
satisfying lyrics.
Codex 1980 aims to capture
all of the band in one half-hour
production. Frankly, not a very
daunting task for a legend that
only lasted five months before
they kicked the shallow bucket.
Born under the Black Flag at the
turn of the forgotten decade,
Solger are the angriest Germs
you ever did hear. Why Solger?
Why do four punks from Seattle
Some Girls
Feel It
(Koch Entertainment)
First they were babies and now
they're girls. After the Blake
Babies reunion tour in 2001.
Juliana Hatfield and Freda Love
decided to continue playing
together. They recruited Love's
friend Heidi Gluck to play bass,
among other things, and Some
Girls was born. The result of this
union is their first full-length. Feel
It, a soundtrack album for those
days when you just can't get off
your ass.
It's not great. It's not bad.
There are no tempo changes,
and it makes me feel like I'm
listening to one long song.
Hatfield's vocals are casual to
the point of detachment, working like a sedative on the lyrics'
emotional appeal. The band
is more than competent, and
the songs are generally well
crafted, but there's something
missing here. The energy and
honesty that much of Hatfield's
older work (like 1995's Only
Everything) so charming, is
absent, and Some Girls don't-
wear this indifference well. Why
was this disc called Feel It when
there's nothing to feel?
Kat Siddle
Taking Back Sunday
Tell All Your Friends
(Victory)
Tell all your friends indeed, cause
this is one disc they should all
own. Taking Back Sunday are
one of the numerous melodic
hardcore bands that seem to be
crawling out of fhe woodwork
these days. Yet these Long Island
natives have succeeded in transcending the genre. There's
nothing particularly new about
this band; they boast the usual
influences, their lyrics follow the
same heart on sleeve conventions that is so en vogue right
now and their music falls into the
typical rhythmic patterns with all
the breakdowns and explosions
of pent up emotion where they
should be.
What sets this band apart
from its peers is its ability to
write genuinely catchy songs
without sacrificing its energy
or aggression. In fact it's the
slower numbers on this record
where lyrics such as "did I ever
tell you that everything I know
about breaking hearts I learned
from you" ("There is No 'I' in
Team") truly gain their spiteful-
ness. Elsewhere on "You're So
Last Summer", lead singer Ed
Reyes earnestly demonstrates
what a pushover for the ladies
he can be explaining that "you
could slit my throat and with
my one last gasping breath, I'd
apologize for bleeding «n your
shirt." Ouch.
Taking Back Sunday is not
going to challenge the boundaries of punk rock, nor do I believe
is its intention. What they have
done is written an album of
anthems that is certain to make
an impact amongst those of us
who like to scream along in our
cars really, really loudly.
Ian Gormely
John Morgan
Johnny Fever
The Lotus Sound Large
10prrv4am 19*
(©Bander) Vancouver Canada
.progrsssiveentertamiertcorn
Free cover before 11 pm except Oct 31
WWW.-^bH LrECORDS.COM
PO BOX 1381001W BROADWAY #101
i¥w ww mvu mum
www.citr.ca
Martin Tielli
Operation Infinite Joy ,
(Six Shooter Records)
Well, we've waited an extra
four months for this first in Martin
27 Sfiscofcsefc j Tielli's four CD subscription series,
it's finally out and well worth the
wait. The artwork, which was
apparently delaying the release,
even seen the special signed
subscriber's edition. There are
several revisited themes from his
musical past, including a picture
of the Albion Mall and the man in
a snow jacket (from Rheostatics
album Introducing Happiness).
as well as lots of detailed scenes
of Toronto As was promised, this
is a full-out rock album, akin to
was my game.
Now along come Paul
Shrimpton and Andrew Wedman
and give me a reason to reconsider my relationship to Tinkertoy:
the band, that is.
Tinkertoy's Transatlantic
Love Machine inhabits the same
musical space as Fluxion and
Kreidler. Low key in a disturbing
way. the music'quietly burbles
away. The occasional click, beat
and almost recognizable sound
marks the passing of time. The ■
faintest of melodies is described.
Voice fragments hang in the air,
dissipating before comprehen-
his all acoustic solo debut—he
sion.
covers much more ground in
Perfect m
usic for staring out
thfe-one—and there's plenty of
windows.
his distinctive wailing vocals. The
Pes
musicians consist of his touring
band (Piei, Mirochnik, and Smith)
plus producer Jon Goldsmith, fel
low performer in Nick Buzz and
collaborator for at least one of
tne other releases. In one song.
tribute vocals, along with
Apparently, Martin had too
many ideas to just release one
album this year, but it seems like
he had too many ideas even
for four. At first listen, several of
the songs seemed jumpy and
disjointed, but because of this
overwhelming wealth of sound,
there's'something new to appre-
epitc
; incredible
speaks succinctly and frankly of
the ugly side of humanity. Fans
of the Rheostatics who didn't like
...Poppy Salesman (were there
any?) will enjoy this immensely,
especially "Winnipeg" and "Ship
of Fire," which are two of some
really beautiful songs on the second half of the album. And for
those who've been watching/
listening to his live shows, there's
"Beauty On." Keep your eyes
open for the next in the series
- Nick Buzz playing music by
Schoenburg. which will be out in
the next couple of months.
H ^
The Trews
House of III Fame
(Sony Music Canada)
When I say "Canadian pop,"
what comes to mind? A warm
breeze rustling through the golden grain fields? Beer-drenched
house parties? An overall mediocre sound? Sloan and Duotang?
Well, think option c... er, with
some of b and d.
Meet The Trews, fresh out of
Niagara Falls, brought to you by
the good people of the Canada
Music Fund, already spun by
the likes o'f Much East and
MuchMoreMusic.
Somehow, Canadian bands
always draw some strange patriotic pity out of me and I'll reluctantly press play a second time.
i this c
a CD a
Tinkertoy
Transatlantic Love Machine
(Noise Factory Records)
I was never a tinkertoy fan. As
a toy it sucked... wow another
model of an atom... lame. Lego
28 Och>ber2rjD3
go AND actually read the lyric
book. The sound still didn't turn
There is, however, something
interesting in the writing collaborations of Colin MacDonald,
Jack Syperek, John-Angus
MacDonald, and Sean Dalton.
It flows like desperate 3 a.m.
ramblings. like the drunken sentiments you share with a buddy
when your significant other's an
ass, like the reflections that spontaneously arise while watching
those beautiful Ontario sunsets
over those majestic lakes.
Maybe this CD won't overwhelm
you with the urge to actually PAY
for it, but these guys have potential. Maybe someday.
Parmida Zarinkamar
P<
Jorma Whittaker
s/t
(Secretly Canadian)
I have made other people listen to this album. I have forced
them to sit in silence, waiting
for the moment when strings
and drums will come to deliver
the sweetest relief, though the
sounds are already delicio'us in
and of themselves. These people
have sat in silence for longer
than even I had intended them
to, despite the fact that I have
listened to this album enough
times to repeat the lyrios in my
head. This is because each note,
each tonal intonation is achingly
withheld until the last possible
second. And I cannot decide if
it is the delaying of pleasure or
fucking torture.
I do not believe that Jorma
Whittaker could have existed in
music if it were not for this modern age. Without a microphone,
his voice may have disappeared
to secret inside places, lost
forever in the swill and beauty
that is his motivation. Enabled
by electronics, every breath
becomes a hyperbole, or a voice
reflected back and echoed; not
whispered, for there is no warm
breath on my neck. It would be
so simple to believe that he is
alone in- these sounds, despite
a multiplicity clearly evident. In
other incarnations, Whittaker is
part of Marmoset.. Though I am
unfamiliar with their music, it is
frighteningly obvious why he
would have tackled this music of
his own accord. Besides the obvious telephone distortion (Do you
remember these games of our
youth?), exorcism, in essence, is
a solitary experiment.
In his worst moments,
Whittaker sounds like Destroyer
with no soul, lamenting things
so uninteresting as his financial
standing in relation to a new
boyfriend. At his best, Whittaker
will entice you to tear your hair
out, to spew bodily fluids and
your heart into a stew of stinking experience, and then let the
mess ferment until all that is left
is delicate treasures. Drink these
sounds like expectorating cough
medication and abandon to
the dream imagery not so far
away as you may imagine. Do
you remember that feeling of
unquenchable joy of elliptical
movements around a merry-go-
round and the always fought
notion of vomit? If you do not,
than that thin line is where this
album willtake you.
sweetcheyanne
Michael Yonkers Band
Microminiature Love
(Sub Pop)
Every once and a while some
long-forgotten recordings get
dug up by one obscurist music
obsessive or another and see
the light of day, touted to you
and me as works of weird and
undiscovered genius. In some
cases, these fosstts are worth the
trouble of unearthing; the recent
release of Simply Saucer's previously unavailable demos, for
example, was terrific news for
any Modern Lovers fans. Michael
Yonkers' Microminiature Love is,
unfortunately, a different story.
Originally recorded in 1968, Sub
Pop would have you believe
that this bedroom-recording
nut-job was a pioneer of primitive proto-punk psychedelia,
possibly on the merit of his
homemade guitars and pedals. The sad truth is that his
guitar sounds permanently
out-of-tune, and his effects are
nothing that wasn't already in
mainstream use at the time. His
songs are pretty much devoid of
any hooks or dynamics and his
playing is inept, at best, to say
nothing of his lyrics, which are
downright silly. His unintentionally amusing haunted-house
vocals might draw a comparison to a genuine oddball genius
like Joe Meek, but the fact
seems a lot less impressive when
you consider that Joe Meek was
recording about ten years earlier and knew his way around a
great rock and roll riff. Michael .
Yonkers, despite having recently !
played with the likes of Wolf Eyes
and Six Organs of Admittance,
simply does not make the grade
as an outsider rock artist. He traverses the same ground as early
Stooges and Pere Ubu, but with
such a dearth of inspiration that
he gives descriptors'like "primitive" and "psychedelic" a bad
name. Don't be fooled—some
"treasures" are better left undiscovered.
saelan •
Blow the Rent Check!
You're poor, you're homeless, but you love rm^^pi0^§^kt
the Pastoral Folktronic Laptop
explosion. Four Tet must be looking over his shoulder. I'm pretty
sure I heard a hurdy-gurdy in
there somewhere too.
imi;
The Decemberists
Her Majesty...
(Kill Rock Stars)
'Ello. 'ello, 'eM||§jtehat 'ave we
'ere? While everyone is still gently nursing their newly purchased
re-release copies of Castaways
and Cutouts, cheeky young
scallywags The Decemberists
sucker punch their audience
^^'■^^wick-smart follow up
that actuaHyir^w^ves on their
already winning formula.
Spiraling thros#f?$ime, location
and genre, lead singer Colin
Meloy presents us wif*H<^SOT:
junk shop stuffed full dtftpjgip;';
brae and curios for our perusal.
Like some'kind of Wellesian hero,
alternating songs find us fighting
against those dastardlyjjjiffy&on
the muddy battle fields of northern Europe, rWm$ig, a ride on a
clipper ship in the South Pacific
and hobnobbing with a Jewish
debutante in a scene vaguely
reminiscent of an F. Scott
Fitzgerald novel circa 1!9'&2Jgf%0
is baroque indie pop writ large
in maddening detail. It makes
your head spin. Quite*jsi^ijgte
one of the albums of the year,
and to think, in recent iri^^s^»"
Colin Meloy has been rnwsa3»gfi,',~
because he didn't think anyone
would tike this album.
Matmos
The CM War
Maybe two years spenfTraiiing.'
the world on the heels of Bjork
have done MaJmes some good,
at least when if comes to learning how to please an audience.
The r "i War must surely classify
as their most populist release to
date. There arejlti^pdies. blissed-
j§y^Jj£i& and even (sh^^ho^-
ror!) the odd conventional tune.
However, when they say3b»-',Cwil
i^S6rfiflV' ain't kiddin' Fans of
ihe trademarfe#tetmos squelch
and pop mo^Osg^djsappointed
as 0rew Daniel and MC.Schmidf
^^^gl^^te^lS^ century
folk—bagpipes, marching bands
and all—info a beautiful electronic tapestry, carrying it as their
flqg as they march off intg.l^^gfe-
friends Lesser, Btevin Stoe&mgndl
David Grubbs join the campaign
on its merry way and before you
know if, Matmos have cornered
BlgStar
The Big Star Story
(Rykodisc)
"Hangin' out (dum-dum dum
der-der-dert)/Be^i the Street
(dum-dum dum der^der-dert)....'
." Even if you hate the show,
you have to concede thaf Twaf
- *?l|3$^$nas done at least one
good thing during its numerous
seasons on tbelipf;,goggle-box.
Thanks fo an endless^»^e%
sion of re-rui^SfsJightly modi-
-&el#j^fen of Big Star's "In the
Street" now resides comfortably
in the collective consciousness,
hopefully finally allowing the
legendary band's lead singer
Alex Chilton the chance to pull
down some long-awaited and
well-deserved "mad dollar,"
With their chim8(^@pfete^^^^:
sweet harmonies ando^M^':
ing song craft.'|^Star blazed a
trail, which was subsequently followed by just about every indie
band one can name.'MpK^
was, back in the 70s. the record-
buying public didn't payj^Si^^j
blind bit of attention. Inte^gs^i^i
shortly after theJpttease of Radio
City, the group's second^&^^j
Chilton was asked taaMfJMgfiijI,
about all the critical acclaim
they were receiving. His rather
cynical response was "Yeah,
that's nice. I just hope If sells.
We've had critical acclaim
before, but no money." Cynical
]JJ$%&fcs|j$iNton'5 powers of foresight were spol^fcOh sure, they
had tots of underg/ound|p||fiHb
this garnered them very little real
popularity and they looked destined to be the kind of band only
truly apprecialiSijJ'by snobbish
record store clerks and^$$$tjma$
wankers tike me. But like Nick
Drake, a drip-drip-drip of praise :
from the great and thft^^sC,
(Michael Stipe, please take a
bow) has founa^§|!p^alil|fl^fe"
record a very loving txwj|y2p*k.
with this release, hopefully more
people will get in on the secret.
What we have here is &§w%££iL>
your standard greatest hits package, and it serves as a perfect
introduction to the band—if you
know nothing about them, this is
definitely where you should start.
However, as a snobbish wanker,
I have but two gripes: one, the
version of their flagship song
"Thirteen" included hetf$|iE&^..
version and not the ethereal studio take. And, second^f^«fj^s
jw4£@I6 Me." Why not? •
Merek Cooper the Railway in awe. The Rain and
the Sidewalk followed Splatter,
and this one-man act impressed
many with his moody electronic
art-pop music and his witty lyrics. Elizabeth was next and they
entertained the crowd with their
brand of heavy art rock. They
ended the night with the song
"War Is Beautiful" which is one hell
of a catchy song. A tough night
SHiNDiG 2003 Night by Night
Summaries
By Ben La!
How time flies. It felt just like yesterday when I announced to a
packed crowd at the Railway
Club that Black Rice was the'
winner of SHiNDiG 2002. Next
thing you know autumn is here,
the kids are back at school, and I
am hosting SHiNDiG once again.
For the benefit of those who
don't know, I'll give a quick
rundown of what SHiNDiG is.
SHiNDiG is CiTR's annual battle of
the bands (I say "bands" for my
convenience, but solo musicians
are also welcome). For thirteen
straight weeks 27 acts of all styles
duke it out at the Railway Club
to grab one of three prize-winning top slots. Many of the most
recognizable Vancouver bands
have competed in this event in
the past, including Clover Honey,
The Cinch, Three Inches of Blood,
The Organ, Operation Makeout,
Witness Protection Program and
The Salteens, to name but a few.
September 9 was the first
night of SHiNDiG 2003. The three
bands competing were Fiction,
Letters To Grace and The First
Day. Fiction combined oldies
pop, new wave, dance and hard
rock all into one package, and
they delivered a very accessible ,j-fQ \[q VV * ViCtO^V ?
set filled with hook-laced songs.
Letters To Grace is best described
as modem rock with a '60s sensibility, using visual arts to create an
atmospheric musical experience.
And the winner of the night. The
First Day, is a hardcore punk act.
Their set was energetic and tight,
and it blew everyone away.
The second night of SHiNDiG
was September 16. Splatter was
the first band on stage and they
quickly got the crowd's attention with their high-energy metal
show. The singer was charismatic
and funny, and the "hair-windmill" of the bassist left many at
to Jonathan from Vogville
Recordings, the sound system
was repaired before Revisionist
took centre stage. With a newly
acquired vocalist that added
life to their powerful math rock
instrumentais. Revisionist certainly
delivered an impressive show.
The Hooded Fang was last to be
on stage, and they were much
more than a classic stoner metal
Bnabeth, the. winners at the second night of svMQi&, A "Hatful of
for the judges I'm sure, but eventually they decided that Elizabeth
would advance to the semi-finals.
September 21 featured the
loudest night so far, with The
Badamps, Revisionist and The
Hooded Fang all competing on
the same night. The Badamps.
with a crowd of fans gathering .
in front of the stage during the
show, hooked everyone with
their good times punk rock. This
was very impressive considering the Railway Club's sound
system was mostly out of commission during their set. Thanks
Splatter, a&> at fhese^on4 night
Don't tfttoo cto£e (hex \\o).
band. Most noticeable was their
brilliant use of contrasting male
and female vocals whjch added
a new dimension rarely found
in that genre of music. Again
another hellish night of decision
making for the judges, but they
decided on Revisionist in the end.
So that's a quick summary of the first three nights
of SHiNDiG 2003. You can bet
more excitement will come in
future installments of SHiNDiG. On
October 7 we'll have a fun night
of indie-pop with A Common
Mistake, They Shoot Horses Don't
They? and Explaining Colors To
The Blind. The following week,
October 14, the beautiful voice of .
Leah Abramson will battle against '
the finely crafted sounds of New
Years Resolution and Paulisdead.
And October 21 will feature the
first hip hop act at SHiNDiG since
just about forever with The Front
playing with the punk act Martial
Law and the hard-to-describe
act Gangbang. You can't
beat drama and excitement
like that. See you all Tuesday
nights at the Railway Club!
SHiNDiG is held every Tuesday
night at The Railway Club until
December 2. For more information
please visit http://shindig.citr.ca.
Or just come on down. We give
away beer for jokesl
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19 frSCOfiDeR, live reviews
The Last Spitfires Show Ever
August 8
Brickyard
This night wasn't about China-
' (own or Jet City Fix or Spreadeagle. although they destroyed. It
was about staying up until 1:30
in the morning to witness the Spitfires kick everyone's ass for the
last time. It was all about spiffing
beer at the lead singer. It was
about stealing the microphone
and singing the song yourself. It
was about swapping cigarettes
with band members and falling
into amps and singing "Down On
It" in the encore. And dammit, it
was wonderful!
Chris-a-Riffic
Cream Com Barf Extravaganza
August 12
Havana Theatre
Every-second Tuesday of every
month. I should hope you have
the time and good sense to plant
your fat ass into the comfy seats
of the Havana Theatre. That
means it's mixtophonics time,
baby! This time a collective of
fresh-faced Dadaists who call
ttiemselves the Cream Corn
Barf Extravaganza took turns
destroying a small part of Commercial Drive for the sake of the
eleven people who witnessed
it. The booklet I was given was
misleading, though it contained
many disturbing photos, the most
dubious being the back photo of
a naked women with freshly cutoff legs. I was also led to believe
by the group's name that 1 was
going see a lot of good puking
action from the eight-member
group. 1 was even given a blindfold, so I was ready for a spectacle that could only be enjoyed
with the ears. What a frickin'
letdown. No chundering.
The performance area
was littered with campground
eauipment and percussion
instruments and Corn Pops
cereal and chains of all sizes.
Where's the castor Oil? Where's
the smell of rotten banana?
The show started with Ida from
The Beans riding on a stationary bike. From there, the group
spent a good hour smashing
and thrashing in a unrehearsed
melee of pagan lust. What an
exercise in human behavior!
No "musician" spent more
than 30 seconds on one little
project. Too much stimulation!
My favorite acts of musical sadism ingluded Corn Pops being
thrown on a crash cymbal, a big
chain crashing onto a garbage
lid, and the subtle sound of a
pair of pliers snapping the strings
of a guitar. Add some adtordian
and you still have WANKERY! I
did, however, enjoy the grand
attempt at their destruction art.
For the sake of the theatre. I'm
glad they didn't go any further.
Chris-A-Riffic
Andrew WK
The Black Halos
August 26
Richard's On Richards
When in Rome, do as the
Romans do. When in a club
surrounded by the assembled
members of the cult of Andrew
WK—well, you get the idea.
Upon entering Richard's, I knew
that it would be a fight to stay
near the stage as a handful of
250-plus-pound bruisers were
The Raja and the S'Ctewalk: at Shin dig
Phcrfc by Ben Ui
ffJk
bouncing off each other on the
dance floor during The Black Halos' opening set. The Halos gladly
obliged both mosher and non-
mosher alike with their rousing,.
glammed-up punk. Not wanting
to end up as a smear on the floor
dnd ntot willing to hide on the "il-
cony. I stood back and enjoyed
the accomplished feats of both
the Halos and the moshers. The
band finished off with the radio
hit "Some Things Never Fall."
during which singer Billy Hopeless tried to mosh but ended up
getting stripped down to a leopard-print thong. Clearly a case
of giving your soul (and almost
everything else) to rock and roll.
Once the Halos had left,
WK's fans headed to the stage
and began singing his songs,
though it doesn't take much
dedication to memorize "I love
New York City!/ Oh yeah, New
York City!" After a brief instrumental intra, the crowd roared to life
in an orgy of fist-pumping and
devil signs'to the strains of "It's
Time to Party." It certainly was.
Clad in a clean white T-shirt and
blue jeans—a refreshing change
from his dirty whites, Andrew
WK was a whirling dervish for his
hour-long set. The head banging, mike pumps, stage dives,
stage jogging, and scissors kicks
he performed were more than
anyone could keep up with; he
should sell exercise tapes! The
fans lapped up this tremendous
display of enthusiasm. They
stormed the stage throughout
the set, giving everyone a view of
the average Andrew WK fan. As
far as I could tell male fans are
early 20s jocks that live on beer
and Playstation 2 while female
fans want desperately to work at
the Cecil or for suicidegirls.com.
Such fan enthusiasm on such
a small stage did cause some
problems. With 20 other people
with him on the stage, WK could
barely do any moves. Fans also
inadvertently interfered with the
eauipment, which caused a
bouncer to start throwing people
off the stage without warning
I laughed when that overzeal-
ous fool tripped a drum mike,
causing a song to be aborted.
Having said that, it's hard to
criticize a guy who delivers everything he promises. WK's beer-
rawk tunes were pure mindless
fun and his unflagging energy
had everyone sweaty by night's
end. And as for doing as the cult
does, I even got onstage and
crowd surfed once. Now where
do I get my membership card?
Neil Braun
R.E.M.
Wilco
The Dandy Warhols
August 29
Thunderbird Stadium
Radiohead
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks
August 30
Thunderbird Stadium
Recently, it's seemed like (in
cidents of alcohol and sedative-induced air rage notwithstanding) R.E.M. couldn't get
arrested if they tried. Ten years
ago they were the Biggest Band
In the World; nowadays the only
place you may hear them is
on Jack FM. You'd think R.E.M.
would by now be just a bunch
of washed-up has-beens touring only for the money, but their
concert at Thunderbird Stadium
suggests there may be some life
in this venerable institution yet.
Right from the opening
chords of "Begin the Begin," the
band, particularly singer Michael
Stipe, expressed charisma and a
genuine thrill of performing that
you have trouble getting from
bands half their age. With song
lyrics safely positioned by his mike
stand, Stipe strutted, posed and
danced his way across the length
of the stage the whole night, garnering love and affection from
all in attendance. Stipe further
engaged the crowd by chatting
them up after each song, giving
shout-outs to Burnaby and West
Van, and dedicating a gorgeous
piano and vocal rendition of
"Nightswimming" to a recently-
married couple. Energetic as
they were, R.E.M. never let fun
interfere with their performance.
Stipe's voice was as enchanting
as on the albums; Mike Mills' vo- .
cat harmonies, in addition to his
talents on the bass and piano,
helped to bring the more organic
and beautiful songs from the set
•to fife; and Peter Buck's Rickenbacker and mandolin jangle
crafted the core melodies of
some of the most indelible pop
hits of the last 20 years. While the
set lacked older or more obscure
material, the crowd was treated
to a surprise duet performance
of "E-Bow The Letter" by Stipe
and Radiohead s Thorn Yorke.
The band and Yorke then finished
with a supercharged version of
"It's The End Of The World..." that
had everyone bouncing around,
singing and grinning ear to ear.
The type of joy and love of craft
convinced me that R.E.M. likely
have at least one more masterpiece album in them to set
alongside Murmur, Document,
and Automatic For The People.
The support acts acquitted
themselves nicely in the afternoon sun. The Dandy Warhols'
stoner pop-rock seemed to
produce its own blunted haze,
even though singer Courtney
Taylor-Taylor had to soliciHans for
donations of the good stuff. Extended, blissful versions of "Godless" and "Bohemian Like You"
made chemical enhancement
completely unnecessary, though.
Much like their sensational two
nignt stand at the Commodore
last year, Wilco's set was a stunner. Each song highlighted their
impeccable musicianship and
arrangements. Moments like
the. double vocals on "California
Stars," Jeff Tweedy's buzzsaw
guitar solo on "I'm The Man
Who Loves You," and the subtle.
multi-instrument percussion on "I
Am Trying To Break Your Heart"
enhanced fhe crystalline clarity
of their music and created an
ambience you usually only find
on album. While the hour-long
set Wilco had was more than
most opening bands would get,,
the band left the stage with me
wanting more. Doubtless this
was the defining triple bill of 2003.
If R.E.M.'s set was a showcase of past glories, Radiohead s
show the next night at Thunderbird Stadium was firmly grounded
in the present. A much larger
and younger crowd assembled
to hear a set largely composed
of songs from the new album,
Ha/7 To The Thief. Despite few.^
surprises in the presentation of
the new material, the songs
never failed to mesmerize. "2
+ 2 = 5" started the show with a
rollicking, cathartic tone that was
only intensified when Yorke took
to the piano to begin "Sit Down,
Stand Up," only to get up and.
warble "Oh the raindrops/ Oh
the raindrops" while a cascade
of gurgling beats pulsed around
him. A similar intensity carried
through the rest of the set; there
was little kidding around (or dialogue of any kind) to be had on
this night. The rhythm section of
bassist Colin Greenwood and
drummer Phil Selway were primal
forces of nature that dominated
the majority of the set with their
massive beats and laser-guided
precision. Yorke's performance
ranged from verbal freakouts on
"Paranoid Android" to physical
freakouts on the show-stopping
"Idioteque" and even some
dark beauty on piano-led takes
of "Sail To The Moon" and a
hauntingly eerie "Like Spinning
Plates." Yorke even managed
a political sideswipe as the
band used his repetition of the
words 'Alistair Campbell' to form
a sample in "The Gloaming"
which Yorke then proceeded to
march along to like a toy soldier
on speed. Johnny Greenwood
received many a fanboy shout-
out with his detached personality and his manic manipulation
of various electronic and radio
paraphernalia. Radiohead
eventually closed out their first
set with "There There." featuring
both Johnny and Ed O'Brien assisting Selway by pounding out
a colossal beat on two double-
drumkits. With a man on either
side of Yorke banging away on
a drumset, the stage looked
something like a pagan ritual.
During the second encore,
Michael Stipe repaid Yorke by
assisting the band on "Karma
Police," making an already
memorable gig that much more
unique. By the time Radiohead
closed the evening with a beat-
heavy version of "Everything In
Its Right Place." the band had
clearly and convincingly made
its case that they are the new
Biggest Band In the World Today.
Neil Braun SHiNDiG Night One
Fiction
Letters to Grace
The First Day
September 9
Railway Club
"What's the difference between
SHiNDiG and the Titanic? The
Titanic had a good band when
it went down." Davy's jokes for
beer joke put it all in perspective as we began another year
of SHiNDiG. the last bastion of
musical integrity we have left.
Kind of. The Railway Club was
looking as foxy as ever, and fhe
bands were rarin' to fly out of
the gate. Fiction was the first
band, and it looked like the lead
singer was surrounded by gifted
session players, one more unique
looking then the next. The sound
was nothing I haven't heard before, but it was done well. They
were heavily influenced by new
wave and post-punk bands of
the day. and that's all well and
good. However, there wasn't
anything exciting about it. Next!
I The second band, Letters
to Grace, was possibly the nicest band I've ever seen. They
were crazy polite, thanking the
audience for their applause
after almost every song. Someone should have told them that
SHiNDiG! eats up bands like
that. Their slow, sweet harmony-
filled country folk didn't seem
to register even a smile with
the evening's tight-ass judges.
The last song was more upbeat
and they finished off a nice set.
When The First Day started
playing. I asked myself this
important question: when did
NoMeansNo open up a school?
Now, I'm not saying if wasn't
good. It was loud and technical
and thrashy and drummer-licious
and they ended up winning.
Duh! Their guttural theatrics-and
blazing guitars and everchanging
time signatures were just enough
to propel them into the winner's
circle. Free beer is just a little more
delicious and even though we at
SHiNDiG! are off to a somewhat
shaky start, last year's one started
the same way. (Remember that
armpit of a third band in 2002?)
Chris-A-Riffic
SHiNDiG Night Two
Splatter
The Rain and the Sidewalk
Elizabeth
September 16
Railway Club
Featuring the Metal-grrl power of
Splatter, the endearingly bleak
The Rain and the Sidewalk, and
the full-on rawk of Elizabeth,
week two shaped up to be significantly more enjoyable than last.
Splatter started off the night
with a vociferous snarl of peppy,
angry rock. A four-piece, each
member an unusual instrument,
they used their extra strings
and drums to good effect. The
singer, a woman who had one
of the deepest, growliest singing voices I've ever heard lead
them well, snarling into the mic,
prancing around on stage and
keeping up a lively banter with
the audience. As metal goes,
it was fine enough. It might say
something that beyond their
surprisingly pleasant demeanor
the best part of the show was
the unbelievable hair-windmill
the bassist managed to get going during a few of the tracks.
There was nothing particularly
wrong with the group. They were
really quite good, and possibly
quite deserving of winning the
night, were it any other week.
The Rain and the Sidewalk
was the next act to arrive, on
stage, emerging as another one-
man-band. There was something
Joy Division-esque about him
from the start—hopelessly bleak
lyriqjS of a sad, lonely, smart introvert, bracing, simple guitar and
some 'fuzz' to complete the electronic sound. Unfortunately for us,
there were two large problems
with this act. First, and foremost,
the guy simply could not sing. His
voice was truly atrocious. Second, he was visibly nervous, and
was hesitant and stumbling out of
the gate. The latter improved dramatically as the set wore on, but
there was little improvement on
the former. His songs were really
quite good, and the lyrics were
intelligent and darkly humorous.
I hope that he may find a skilled
singer to work with in fhe future.
Given the slowly cresting wave of
'80s and New Wave nostalgia, he
may be well poised to take advantage of that with some work.
Elizabeth, from the start, stole
the show. Elizabeth was really
tight, and clearly having a ball up
on stage. Their brand of straight-
up rock was nothing particularly new or innovative, but it was
hook-laden and catchy, and I
soon found myself enjoying them
despite my best intentions to not
like them. The lead singer was
charismatic, and the earnest,
dreamy strumming of the lead
guitarist was fairly mesmerizing.
Their weakness lay in the other
two members: The bass was often
simply lost amidst the rest of the
sound, and the drumming, while
solid, was nothing more than
that. In addition, there was a
certain sameness to each of their
tunes. More than once I found
myself thinking, 'Haven't they already played this song?' Despite
these faults,, they were entirely
enjoyable, and I'm quite pleased
that I'll be hearing them again
in November in the semi-finals.
Steve Tannock
Calexico
The Frames
Jason Collett
Richard's on Richards
September 24
Picture yourself sitting on an old
but sturdy, dusty hand crafted_
wooden chair. Below you are
creaking wooden floorboards,
and all the walls around you
in the room are painted white.
There's a window with white
lace curtains keeping the sun
out of the room, but you can
tell just by looking at the lace
that the sun is blazing outside.
and you think you can maybe
even hear grasshoppers. There's
sweat on your hands, legs, and
running down your temple, from
the stifling heat. You turn around
to see a beautifully rich tapestry
hanging on one of the walls, thick
and hand woven, bursting with
purple, red, and orange geometric designs all bordered by black
and white. When you wq[k up to
the tapestry to investigate it, if
becomes apparent that the tapestry is in fact only a holographic
projection on the wall and
the designs change -depending on where in the room you
stand. This tapestry is Calexico.
But to start off the night,
it was singer/songwriter Jason
Collett with stories of girls and
marijuana, who lulled the crowd
coming in. His voice may have
been pretty, but the lyrics and
musical style lacked enough
ingenuity to carry it, and it was a
welcome change of pace when
Irish rockers The Frames took
the stage. Full of good energy
(granted some of it borrowed
from a couple of die-hard fans
in the crowd) The Frames got
the crowd moving, even if half of
their songs sounded poppy and
cheesy enough to be primetime
Muchmusic material. Still, their
set was more than saved by a
couple exceptional soggs, as
well as some dabbling into musical themes from Willy Wonka and
the Chocolate Factory. By the
time Calexico started off with an
instrumental from their latest album Feast of Wire the crowd was
actually silent with anticipation (a
rare moment at Richard's given
my previous experiences there).
The thing about Calexico
that I love most is how they take
the cliched styles of mariachi music or spaghetti western and mix
it with new inventive art rock sensibilities. The colours of their music
were vibrant, frequently punctuated by piercing trumpets, and
came across beautifully live, as.
the musicians wove layers of
sound upon each other, creating overwhelming psychedelic
effects at times. That together
with the Arizona-inspired lyrics
and a strangely lo-fi visual show
created an inescapable atmosphere in Richard's like one I'd
never experienced before. No
surprise, however, as it was instantly recognizable that the six-
piece setting up their instruments
before the show was not so
much a band, but a collection of
serious, and talented musicians.
Dueling trumpets, accordions,
acoustic bass, steel guitar, syn-
. thesizers, nylon string guitars, and
'more percussive techniques than ,
can be counted on the fingers of j
my right hand all lended them- '
selves beautifully to the overall
experience. The only complaint
that I had was that by the time
I made it outside after the show,
there weren't any crickets left
chirping under the starry sky.
soren Brothers •
THE BRICKYARD 315 Carrall Sty604.685JB995
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8th Mr. Airplane Man, Clover Honey, Kick In The Eye/
9th Bitchiri Cameros, STREETS and guests/
10th Broadcast Oblivion Despistado, The Charming Snakes/
11th Gorky's Zygotic Minci and guests/
12th Richard Devin, Phoenecia, Otto Von Scherach/
15th The Demolition Doll Rods, Sweet Fuck All and guests/
16th Juction 18, Weak At Best and guests/
17th The Buttless Chaps The Gay, The Rambling Ambassadors/
18th Spread Eagle, The Girls, Hi-Test/
22nd Sharp Teeth, Black List and guests/
23rd Leeroy Stagger, The No No Spots, Grace Nocturnal/
24th Raised Fist, 21st Blow and guests/
25th All State Champion and guests/ KA/^Aa^^
26th Death By Stereo, Himsa, Side 67/ ^ *v«*y n££E!
29th The Dears and Pilate/ V^$2s££f
30th Threat From Outer Space and guests/ h*!Clais
31st Three Inches Of Blood, Goats Blood and guests/
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ockfest
Friday, October 10th
The Purple Onion Cabaret
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§.TEN D01L0R THOMPSON
I-VIBRATOR ©
PiSCQRDEB
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Richards On Richards
1030 Richards Street Vancouver
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CD/LP IN STORES OH $12ppo from mint
Critics | Opulent Canine • Dirty Whispers
Bed of Tines * Fishin' Jim • Robert Smith • snd others
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The Brickyard
Saturday October 19
jLogan's. Victoria
||pPwefora. B.C. band's self-described 'ekctro-country" aesthetic bursts beyond the bounds of precious theory... by
uniting, among other things, heavily treated vocals and a bassline that dps in and out of both genres. The result could be
described as a musical wcombmant [eye]
"...these electro cowboys cruise hard-to-define territory, its true, but at the end of the day. their influence is as much
about sweet, accessible jangly pop as it is bleak remote Kraftwerk 3 stars." [Vancouver GunJ
"„Love This Time works best when the band indulges its rootsier side. An exception is the title track on which guest musician
Ida Nilsen's vocals are almost buried amid swirling keyboard lines, distant computerized voices. -^^aj^^
and robotic drum beat. The song is the album's heart, and quite possibly the group's J||| ||k
crowning achievement to date." [Georgia Straight] Jkm^
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604.822.3017 ext. 3 for low, low rates
3^Oetttasra03 what's bei,
nG Played
at CiTR 101. 9' fi!
October Long Vinyl
October Short Vinyl
October Charts 20 Years Ago
According to some legend, angry elephants never forget.
Thankfully, The Weakerthans are neither angry nor trunky.
1 The Weakerthans
2 Buck 65
3 Raveonettes
4ButtlessChaps
5 Belle and Seb.
6 Hawksley Workman
7 v/a
8 Ken Nordine
9 Quasi
10 Weirdos
11 Value Village People
12 Sloan
13 Husbands
14 Sup. Furry Animals
15 Do Make Say Think
16 Atmosphere
17 Slumber Party
18 Guided By Voices
19 Tomas Jirku
20 My Morning Jacket
21 Gruesomes
22 Frank Black and...
23 Constantines
24 Sparrow %&*&*&
25 Gossip
26 Po'Girl
27 Enon
28 Andrew W.K.
29 v/a
30 High Dials
31 Metric
32 Prefuse 73
33 OX
34 Alan Licht
35Tsurubami
Reconstruction Site Epitaph
Talkin' Honky Blues Wea
Chain Gang of Love Columbia
Love This Time Mint
Dear Catastrophe... Rough Trade
Lover/Fighter Universal
Canned Hamm's... Pro Am
Wink Asphodel
Hot Shit Touch and Go
We Got The Neutrons... Frontier
Repent IMMRNT2
Action Pact BMG
Introducing the Sounds... ' Swami
Phantom Power XL
Winter Hymn Country... Constellation
Seven's Travels Epitaph
3 Kill Rock Stars
Earthquake Glue Matador
Bleak 1999 No Type
It Still Moves RCA
Gruesomology Sundazed
Me Your Tears Spin Art
Shine a Light Sub Pop
Sparrow Overcoat
Undead In NYC Dim Mak
Po'Girl indie
Hocus Pocus Touch and Go
The Wolf Island
Verve Remixed 2 Verve
A New Devotion Rainbow Quartz
Old Word Underground... Elgonix
Extinguished: Outtakes Warp
Dust Bowl Ballads indie
A New York Minute XI
Gekkyukekkaichi Strange Attractors
1 v/a
2 Microphones
3 Hidden Cameras
4aLUnARED
5 v/a
6 v/a
7 v/a
8 Triggers
9 v/a
10 Stuck Ups
11 Clorox Girls
12 Lost Vegas
13 Elliott Smith
14 v/a
15 Ludella Black
16 v/a
17 Shell
18X27
19 Low Beam
20 Federation X
Gossip/Erase Errata
Lanterns
Play "Ban Marriage"
ELCTRK!
Explosion/Tonsils
Fliptops/Gloryholes
Low Rollers/Diskords
Medicine
Black Rebels/Nearly Deads
Last Chance
Neo Psych
Pretty (Ugly Before)
Dancing in the Dark
The Pill...
Icarus Line/Burning Brides
Gimme Shell
Airstream and Dread
Erase Errata is:
a) bored
b) angry
c) your dream date
In the record library of CiTR, these loving words
grace the cover of a Big Country album:
'This is an amazing bad record."
1 Big Country
2 Howard Devoto
3 Alan Vega
4 Elvis Costello
5 Enigmas
6 Tom Tom Club
7 The Alarm
8 King Sunny Ade
9 Bauhaus
10 David Thomas & The F
11 3 Teens Kill 4
12 Violent Femmes
13 Adrian Belew
14 Aztec Camera
15 Monsoon
16 Cabaret Voltaire
17 Rent Boys Inc
18 Flesheaters
19 The Will
20 Subhumans
The Crossing
Jerky Versions of the Dream
Saturn Strip
Punch the Clock
Enigmas EP
Close to the Bone
The Alarm
Synchro-System
Burning from the Inside
eds Variations on A Theme
No Motive
Violent Femmes
Twang Bar King
High Land, Hard Rain
Third Eye
The Crackdown
Squeal for Joy EPt
A Hard Road to Follow
Causa Sui
No Wishes, No Prayers
c
HOW THE CHARTS WORK
}
The monthly charts are compiled based on the number of
times a CD/LP ("long vinyl"), 7" ("short vinyl"), or demo tape/
CD ("indie home jobs") on CiTR's playlist was played by our
DJs during the previous month (i.e., "September" charts reflect
airplay over August). Weekly charts can be received via email.
Send mail to "majordomo@unixg.ubc.ca" with the command:
"subscribe citr-charts." •
36 DlSCofcDcR. ARE YOU SERIOUS? MUSIC
9:0OAAA-12:0OPM
All of time is measured by its art.
This show presents the most
recent new music from around
the world. Ears open.
THE ROCKERS SHOW
12:00PM-3:00PM
Reggae inna all styles and
fashion.
BLOOD ON THE SADDLE
3:00PM-5:00PM
Real cowshit-caught-in-yer-
boots country.
CHIPS WITH EVERYTHING alt.
5:0OPM-6:0OPM
British pop music from all
decades.
SAINT TROPEZ alt.
5:0OPM-6.O0PM
International pop (Japanese,
French, Swedish, British, US, etc.),
'60s soundtracks and lounge.
Book your jet set holiday now!
QUEER FM
6:00PM-8:00PM
Dedicated to the gay, lesbian,
bisexual,.and transsexual communities of Vancouver. Lots of
human interest features, background on current issues, and
great music.
RHYTHMSINDIA
8:00PM-10:00PM
Rhythmslndia features a wide
range of music from India,
including popular music from
Indian movies from the 1930s
to the present, classical music,
semi-classical music such as
Ghazals and Bhajans. and also
.Qawwalis, pop, and regional
language numbers.
TRANCENDANCE
10:00PM- 12:00 AM
Join us in practicing the ancient
art of rising above common
thought and ideas as your host
DJ Smiley Mike lays down the
latest trance cuts to propel us
into the domain of the mystic
al. <trancendance@hotmail.
THE SHOW
12:00AM-2:00AM
FILL-IN
2:00AM-6:00AM
MONDAY
FILL-IN
6:00AM- 8:00AM
BREAKFAST WITH THE BROWNS
8:00AM-11:00AM
Your favourite brown-sters,
James and Peter, offer a
savoury blend of the familiar
and exotic in a blend of aural
delights!
LOCAL KIDS MAKE GOOD alt.
11:00AM-1:00PM
Local Mike arid Local Dave
bring you local music of all sorts.
The program most likely to pby
your band!
THE DIM SUM SHOW
11:00 AM- J :00PM
PARTS UNKNOWN
l:O0PM-3:OOPM
Underground pop for the minuses with the occasional interview
with your host, Chris.
SANDBOX THEATRE
3:O0PM-4:O0PM
A show of radio drama orchestrated and hosted by UBC students, featuring independent
works from local, national, and
international theatre groups.
We welcome your involvement.
<sandboxtheatre@hotmail.c
ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS
4:00PM-5:00PM
A chance for new CiTR DJs
to flex their musical muscle.
Surprises galore.
STRAIGHT TALK
5:O0PM-6:OOPM
CRASH THE POSE alt.
6:00PM-7:30PM
Hardcore/punk as fuck from
beyond the grave.
SOLARIZATION (on hiatus) alt.
6:00PM-6:30PM
Most frequently played songs on AnoilE hosted by Luke
Meat (Wednesdays 11:30 am-1:00 pm)
10) "Mr. Tamborine Man" - William Shatner
9) "Period Piece" - Boyd Rice
8) "Jolly Green Giant" - Negativland
7) "How Long Are You Staying" - Bill Joy
6) "Pink Lady Lemonade (I Wanna Drink You)" - Acid
Mothers Temple
5) "Neither His Nor Yours" - Coil
4) "Meat Eater" - Nihilist Spasm Band
3) "Cooloorta Moon" - Nurse With Wound
2) "Vestal Spacy Ritual" - Masonna
1) "Heathen Earth" - Throbbing Gristle'
10 albums Luke Meat has never listened to (and probably
never get around to...)
10) White Blood Cells - White Stripes
9) / Want to See Bright Lights Tonight - Richard and Linda
Thompson
8) London Calling - The Clash
7) Shootin Rubber... - Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians
6) Double Nickels on the Dime - Minutemen
5) The Woman in Me - Shania Twain
4) s/t - Ramones
3) s/t - Tortoise
2) The Crossing - Big Country
1) Bfack Cars - Gino Vanelli
y°"r guide to
Ci™ 101.9 ^
MY ASS alt.
6:30PM-7:30PM
Phelps. Albini. 'n' me.
WIGFLUX RADIO
7:30PM-9:00PM
Listen to Selecta Krystabelle for
your reggae education.
THE JAZZ SHOW
9:00PM- 12:00AM
Vancouver's longest-running
prime time jazz program. Hosted
by the ever-suave Gavin Walker.
Features at 11.
Oct 6: "Paris Blues" is a newly
discovered concert by pianist/
composer Horace Silver's great
quintet of the 1960s with the
Solid "Blue" Mitchell on trumpet
and Smokin' Junior Cook on
tenor saxophone.
Oct 13: Today is the birthday
of the greatest of all painists:
Art Tatum (born in 1909). We
hear Tatum in the company
of two virtuosos—vibraphone
master Lionel Hampton and the
"unchallenged greatest drummer Buddy Rich
Oct 20: "Contemporary
Concepts" is one of
bandleader/pianist/innovator
Stan Kenton's finest and most
swinging studio sessions. Great
soloists and wonderful arrangements make checking out this
feature a must!
Oct 27: Trumpeter Booker Little
was the Wynton Marsalis of his
day. Well educated and musically gifted, Little broke new
ground and had his own style
despite dying at age wenty-
three! Tonight, his only quartet
date and his most personal
recording.
VENGEANCE IS MINE
12:00AM-3:00AM
Hosted by Trevor. It's punk rock,
baby! Gone from the charts
but not from our heaVts—thank
fucking Christ.
PSYCHEDELIC AIRWAVES
3:00AM-6:30AM
DJ Christopher Schmidt also
hosts Organix at Club 23 (23
West Cordova) every Friday.
TUESDAY
PACIFIC PICKIN'
6:30AM-8:00AM
Bluegrass, old-time music, and
its derivatives with Arthur and
"The Lovely Andrea" Berman.
HIGHBRED VOICES
8:00AM-9:30AM
THIRD TIMES THE CHARM
9:30AM-11:30 AM
Open your ears and prepare
for a shock! A harmless note
may make you a fan! Hear the
menacing scourge that is Rock
i and Roll! Deadlier than the most
dangerous criminal!
<bominsixtynine@hotmail.co
FILL-IN alt.
11:30 AM-1:00PM
MORNING AFTER SHOW alt.
11:30AM- 12:30PM
REEL TO REAL alt.
12:30PM- 1:00PM
Movie reviews and criticism.
BEATUP RONIN
1:00PM-2:00PM
Where dead samurai can program music.
CIRCUIT TRACING
2:00PM-3:30PM
EN AVANT LA MUSIQUE alt.
3:30PM-4:30PM
«En Avant la musique!» se
concentre sur le metissage
des genres musicaux au sein
d'une francophonie c/uverte a
tous les courants. This program
focuses on cross-cultural music
and its influence on mostly
Francophone musicians.
ELECTRIC AVENUES alt.
3:30PM-4:30PM
Last Tuesday of every month,
hosted by The Richmond Society
For Community Living. A variety
music and spoken word program
with a focus on people with special needs and disabilities.
THE MEAT-EATING VEGAN
4:30PM-5:00PM
WENER'S BARBEQUE
5:00PM-6:00PM
Join the sports dept. for their
coverage of the T-Birds.
FLEX YOUR HEAD
6:00PM-8:00PM
Up the punx, down the emo!
Keepin' it real since 1989, yo.
flexyourhead.vancouverhard
core.com
SALARIO MINIMO
8:00PM-10:00PM
THE LOVE DEN alt.
10:00PM-12:00AM
<loveden@hotmail.com>
ESCAPISM alt.
10:00PM-12.00AM
es«cap'ism n: escape from the
reality or routine of life by absorbing the mind in entertainment or
fantasy. Host: DJ Satyricon.
- Aug 5: Pounding System: dub-
wise and otherwise.
Aug 19: Church of Hell: Mars
Attacks!
<DJSatyricon@hotmail.com>
AURAL TENTACLES
12:00AM-6:00AM
It could be punk, ethno, gbbal,
trance, spoken word, rock, the
unusual and the weird, or it
could be something different.
Hosted by DJ Pierre.
WEDNESDAY
FILL-IN
6:00AM- 7:00AM
THE SUBURBAN JUNGLE
7:00AM-9:00AM
Bringing you an entertaining
and eclectic mix-of new and
old music live from the Jungle
Room with your irreverent
hosts Jack Velvet and Nick the
Greek. R&B, disco, techno,
soundtracks, Americana, Latin •
jazz, news, and gossip. A real
9em! ^StSIf
. <suburbanjungle@channel88
.com>
FOOL'S PARADISE
9:00AM-10:00 AM
Japanese music and talk.
EXQUISITE CORPSE
10:00 AM- 11:30AM
ANOIZE
11:30AM-1:00PM
Luke Meat irritates and educates through musical deconstruction. Recommended for
the strong.
THE SHAKE alt.
1:00PM-2:00PM
FOR THE RECORD alt.
1:00PM-2:00PM
FILL-IN alt.
2:00PM-3:00PM
The theme is: there is no theme!
Kat and Claire push around
trolleys of alt-pop. alt-country.
Canadian indie, electroclash,
and other delicious morsels.
MOTORDADDY alt.
3:00PM-5:00PM
Cycle-riffle rawk and roll!
RUMBLETONE RADIO alt.
3:O0PM-5:0OPM
Primitive, fuzzed-out garage
mayhem!
RACHEL'S SONG
5:O0PM-6:3OPM
Socio-political, environmental
activist news and spoken word
with some music, too.
www.necessaryvoices.org
<necessaryvoices@telus.net>
AND SOMETIMES WHY alt.
6:30PM-8:00PM
(First Wednesday of every
month.)
BLUE MONDAY alt.
6:30PM-8:00PM
Vancouver's only industrial-
electronic-retro-goth program.
Music to schtomp to, hosted
by Coreen.
JUICEBOX
8:00PM-9:00PM
Your ears have never felt so
naughty!
FOLK OASIS
9:00PM-11:00PM
Roots music for folkies and non-
folkies... bluegrass. singer-songwriters, -worldbeat, alt country,
and more. Not a mirage!
<folkoasis@canada.com>
HANS KLOSS' MISERY HOUR
11:00PM-2:00AM
FIRST FLOOR SOUND SYSTEM
2:00AM-6:00AM
FILL-IN
6:O0AM-8:00AM
END OF THE WORLD NEWS
8:00AM-10:00AM
PLANET LOVETRON
10:00AM-11:30AM
Music inspired by Chocolate
Thunder: Robert Robot drops
electro past and present, hip
hop and intergalactic funkman-
ship. <rbotlove@yahoo.com>
FILL-IN
11:30AM-1:00PM
STEVE AND MIKE
l:O0PM-2:O0PM
Crashing the boy's club in the
pit. Hard and fast, heavy and
slow (punk and hardcore).
THE ONOMATOPOEIA SHOW
2:00PM-3:00PM
Comix comix comix. Oh yeah,
and some music with Robin.
RHYMES AND REASONS
3:00PM-5:00PM
DJ Knowone slaves over hot-
multi-track to bring a fresh
continuous mix of fresh every
week. Made from scratch,
samples and just a few drops
of fame. Our tables also have
plethora of guest DJs, performers, interviews, giveaways,
Strong Bad and the occasional
public service announcements.
<eno_wonk@yahoo.ca>
FILL-IN ait.
5:00PM-6:00PM
PEDAL REVOLUTIONARY alt.
5:00PM-6:00PM
Viva ta Vetorution! D J Helmet Hair
and Chainbreaker Jane give
you all the bike news and views
you need and even cruise ■
around while doing it!
www.bikesexual.org
OUT FOR KICKS
6:00PM-7:30PM
No Birkenstocks. nothing politically correct. We don't get paid
so you're damn right we have
fun with it. Hosted by Chris B.
ON AIR WITH GREASED HAIR
7:30PM-9:00PM
The best in roots rock 'n' roll and
rhythm and blues from 1942-
1962 with your snappily-attired
host. Gary Olsen.
<ripitup55@telus.net>
LIVE FROM THUNDERBIRD RADIO
HELL
9:00PM-11:00PM
Local muzak from 9 til 10. Live
bandzfrom 10 til 11.
alf.co
tbirdhell
WORLD HEAT
11:00PM-1:00AM
An old punk rock heart considers the oneness of all things and
presents music of worlds near
and far. Your host, the great
Daryl-ani, seeks reassurance via
<worldheat@hotmail.com>.
WIRELESS CRUELTY
1:00AM-6:00AM
FRIDAYS
FILL-IN
6:00AM- 8:00AM
CAUGHT IN THE RED
8:00AM-10:00 AM
Trawling the trash heap of over
50 years' worth of real rock 'n'
roll debris.
SKA-T'S SCENE-IK DRIVE!
10:00AM-12:00PM
Email requests to: <djska_
t@hotmail.com>
THESE ARE THE BREAKS
12:00PM-2:00PM
Top notch crate diggers DJ
Avi Shack and Promo mix the
underground hip hop, old
school classics, and original
breaks.
THE LEO RAMIREZ SHOW
2:00PM-3:30PM
The best mix of music, news,
sports, and commentary from
around the local and international Latin American communities.
NARDWUAR THE HUMAN SERVIETTE
PRESENTS...
3:30PM-5:O0PM
CiTR NEWS AND ARTS
5:00PM-6:00PM
A volunteer-produced, student
and community newscast
featuring news, sports and arts.
Reports by people like you.
"Become the Media." To get
involved, visit www.citr.ca and
click "News Dept."
THE NORTHERN WISH
6:00PM-7:30PM
AFRICAN RHYTHMS
7:30PM-9:00PM
David "Love" Jones brings
you the best new and old jazz,
soul, Latin, samba, bossa, and
African music from around the
world.
www.africanrhythmsradio.com
HOMEBASS
9:00PM- 12:00AM
Hosted by DJ Noah: techno
but also some trance, acid,
tribal, etc. Guest DJs, interviews,
retrospectives, giveaways, and
more.
3(> October 2003 I LIKE THE SCRIBBLES alt.
12:00AM-2:00AM
THE ANTIDOTE alt.
12:00AM-2:00AM
THE VAMPIRE'S BALL
2:00AM-6:O0AM
Dark, sinister music of all genres
to soothe the Dragon's soul.
Hosted by Drake.
SATURDAY
FILL-IN
6:00AM-8:00PM
THE SATURDAY EDGE
8:00AM-12:00PM
Studio guests, new releases,
British comedy sketches, folk
music calendar, and ticket
giveaways.
8AM-9AM: African/World roots.
9AM-12PM: Celtic music and
performances.
GENERATION ANNIHILATION
12:00PM- 1:00PM
A fine mix of streetpunk and old
school hardcore backed by
band interviews, guest speakers,
and social commentary.
www.streetpunkradio.com
<crashnburnradio@yahoo.ca>
POWERCHORD
l.O0PM-3:00PM
Vancouver's only true metal
show; local demo tapes,
imports, and other rarities.
Gerald Rattlehead, Dwain, and
Metal Ron do the damage.
CODE BLUE
3:00PM-5:00PM
From backwoods delta low-
down slide to urban harp honks,
blues, and blues roots with your
hosts Jim, Andy, and Paul.
ELECTROLUX HOUR
5:OOPM-6:00PM
SOUL TREE
6:00PM-9:00PM
From doo-wop to hip hop, from
the electric to the eclectic, host
Michael Ingram goes beyond
the call of gospel and takes soul
music to the nth degree.
SYNAPTIC SANDWICH
, 9:00PM-1 1:00PM
PLUTONIAN NIGHTS
11:00PM -1:00 AM
Cutting-edge, progressive organ
music with resident Haitchc and
various guest performers/DJs.
Bye-bye civilisation, keep smiling
blue, where's me bloody anesthetic then?
http://plutonia.ag
EARWAX
1:00AM-4:30AM
"noiz terror mindfuck hardcore like punk/beatz drop
dem headz rock inna junglist
mashup/distort da source full
force with needlz on wax/my
chaos' runs rampant when I
free da jazz..." Out.
REGGAE UNKUP
4:30AM-9:00AM
Hardcore dancehall reggae.
Hosted by Sister B.
In the Booth
with Kid 606
Miguel Trost-Depedro (A.K.A. Kid
606, founder of Tiger Beat6 Records)
brought his Paws Across the World
tour to the Brickyard on August 28.
Accompanied by Barcelona's DJ Rupture, and Sweden's Dwayne Sodah-
berk, the boys brought the electronic
jams of straight-up IDM to retarded
Jungle teetering on Gabber. My conversation with the Kid was aired on the
September 4 installment of the Planet
Lovetron Show (Thursdays 10:00am -
30am).
Robert Robot: What's your story Miguel,
how old are you, where are you from
and where are you now?
Kid 606: I just turned 24,1 was born in
Venezuela. I grew up in San Diego, and
now live in the Oakland area.
Stuff that makes you go mmmmm?
C & C Music factory, Vancouver's
Crack Town, Collage Radio, Arnold
Schwarzenegger running for governor...his latest admission of his involve
ment in those body builder orgies—all
that muscle and sweat is kinda scary
What's the deal with Violent Turd
Records?
Tiger Beat6 was created to release
music that other labels wouldn't
release. Violent Turd was created to
release what Tiger Beat6 wouldn't
release. It's like too hot for Tiger Beat6.
We have too much material to release
on one label.
Are You a Fan of Freeland Hellraiser?
I don't really know him, but I'm a fan
of Hellraiser movies. Do you know this
movie called. Castle Freak?
I own it!
You've seen Castle Freak). [Laughs] It's
so great because it's bad.
Have you had any problems with
Copyright?
Not really, I've had more good things
happen. Jay-Z's publicist phoned
me up and asked me to do a remix
because he'd heard me using his
material already.
Who would you like to work with?
Mainly vocalists...I'd like to do something with Shaun Paul or Brandy, these
are artists I really like and listen to the
most.
Check out ali things Tiger Beat6
and Violent Turd Records @
www.tigetbeat6.com
V
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
6AM
7
8
9
REGGAE LINKUP
FILL-IN
FILL-IN
FILL-IN
6AM
9 1
SUBURBAN JUNGLE
BREAKFAST
WITH
THE BROWNS
HIGHBRED VOICES
END OF THE
WORLD NEWS
CAUGHT IN
THE RED
THE
SATURDAY
EDGE
ARE YOU
SERIOUS?
MUSIC
FOOL'S PARADISE
10
11
THIRD TIMES
THE CHARM
11
EXQUISITE CORPSE
PLANET
LOVETRON
SKA-T'S
SCENIC DRIVE
THE DIM SUM SHOW
12M*
FILL-IN
""»«"'"
ANOIZE
FILL-IN
12pm|
ROCKERS
SHOW
THESE ARE THE
BREAKS
GENERATION
ANNIHILATION
REEL TO REAL
,
PARTS
UNKNOWN
BEATUP RONIN
SHAKE THER?C0RD
STEVE & MIKE
POWERCHORD
1
2
i
3
CIRCUIT TRACING
FILL-IN
THE ONOMATOPOEIA
LEO RAMIREZ
SHOW
BLOOD ON THE
SADDLE
SANDBOX THEATRE
RHYMES &
REASONS
CODE BLUE
MOTORDADDY/
RUMBLETONE RADIO
4
ELECTRIC 1 EN AVANT
AVENUES | LA MUSIQUE
NARDWUAR
PRESENTS
4
ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS
5
6
MEAT EATING VEGAN
:
CHIPS WITH 1 SAINT
EVERYTHING 1 TROPEZ
STRAIGHT TALK
WENER'S BBQ
RACHEL'S
SONG
FILL-IN REvSlTJTION
CITR NEWS AND ARTS
ELECTROLUX HOUR
QUEER FM
FILL-IN
SOLARIZATION
FLEX YOUR
HEAD
OUT FOR KICKS ■
THE NORTHERN WISH
SOUL TREE
A.S.W.
BLUE
MONDAY
/
MY ASS
7
8
WIGFLUX RADIO
ON AIR
WITH GREASED HAIR
AFRICAN RHYTHMS
!
10
1
12AM
1
4
RHYTHMSINDIA
SALARIO MINIMO
JUICEBOX
10
11
12AM
THE
JAZZ -
SHOW
FOLK OASIS
LIVE FROM...
THUNDERBIRD HELL
HOMEBASS
SYNAPTIC SANDWICH
TRANCENDANCE
VENUS
FLYTRAP
ESCAPISM
HANS KLOSS'
MISERY HOUR
WORLD HEAT
PLUTONIAN
NIGHTS
THE SHOW
VENGEANCE
IS MINE!
AURAL
TENTACLES
1 LIKE THE
SCRIBBLES
THE
ANTIDOTE
2
3
4
WIRELESS
CRUELTY
EARWAX
FILL-IN
FIRST FLOOR
SOUND SYSTEM
THE
VAMPIRE'S
PSYCHEDELIC
5
6
AIRVv
AVES
B/
^LL
REGGAE LINKUP
6
L
57 SOCjDRdsR. SUBMISSIONS TO DATEBOOK ARE FREE.
FOR THE NOVEMBER ISSUE, THE DEADLINE
IS OCT 22. FAX SHOW, FILM, EVENT
AND VENUE LISTINGS TO
604.822.9364 OR EMAIL
<DISCORDER@CLUB.AMS.UBC.CA>
Emmylou Harris & Spyboy
Wed 1,8pm
S Centre for the Performing Arts.
Re-Generation
featuring In Essence. Sweatshop Union,
Kia Kadiri, Chin Injeti and Wayne Laval-
lee (Wed 1); Crowned King, Breach of
■fejst. Pepper Sands and Paula Toledo
(Sat 4)
SCapilano College
Godsmack
TtKi 2, 9 pm
a Commodore
Billy Talent
^tf^Sxisonfire
^pitalfield
©earn From Above
thu 2, 7pm
S> Croatian Cultural Centre
Emma Wall
w/ Ashley Schram
Sarah Wheele
lfou.2. 9pm
a* Railway Club
Pri 3, 9pm
%1feiilway Club
The Black Halos
w/ China Town
Jet City Fix
International Playboys
Fri3
® Brickyard
taking Bombs
w/ The Accident
Sharp Teeth
@Pic
The Department
the Starlight Mints
Ember Swift
Sat 11,9pm
Thu 16, 9pm
w/ Rae Spoon (Wed 22)
Xavier Rudd
@ Anza Club
@ Commodore
w/ Yvette (Thu 23)
Sat 4, 9pm
@ Railway Club
& Richard's
The Art of Listening Tour
The Buttless Chaps
featuring DJ Vadim, Yarah Bravo
w/ The Gay
B'z
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
and DJ First Rate
The Rambling Ambassadors
Thu 23, 9pm
w/ Stratford 4
Sat 11, 10pm
Fri 17
@ Cemmodore
Sun 5, 9pm
OPic
@ Brickyard
@ Commodore
Prefuse 73
Gorkey's Zygotic Mynci
Sloan
w/Four Tet
Indie Band Night
w/ Kingsburu Manx
Fri 17, 7:30pm
Beans
featuring the Notes From Underground:
Sat 11, 10pm
@ Vogue Theatre
Fri 24, 7:45pm
Dead Model Shoot, Grace Nocturnal,
@ Brickyard
Tonechaser and'Perfect Strangers
Clover Honey
Sun 5, 9pm,
Moneen
w/ Robosexuals
Los Furios
@ Fairview Pub
w/ Saves the Day
Fourty-Two
Fri 24, 10pm
Taking Back Sunday
Fri 17
@ Railway Club
Queens of the Stone Age
Tue 14
OPic
w/ Distillers
@ Croatian Cultural Centre
Secret Family Recipe
AFI
w/ Camilla
Tue 7, 7:30pm
Crowned King
w/ Poison the Well
Milo
@ Orpheum Theatre
Tue 14
Autopilot Off
Fri 24
@ Mesa Luna
Sat 18.2:30pm
@ ElCocal
My Morning Jacket
@ Commodore
w/ Patrick Park
G3
In 3s
Wed 8, 9pm
featuring Joe Satriani, Steve Vai
State of Shock
Knitting Circle
@ Richard's
and Yngwie Malmsteen
w/ Burn Project
Sat 25. 1 Opm
Tue 14, 7:30pm
Rally Car,
@ Sugar Refinery
Mad Bomber Society
@ Orpheum Theatre
Electric Humor
w/ the Gamblers
Sat 18
Bottleneck
Los Furios
Longwave
@Pic
CD release party
DJ Ska-T
w/ Calla
Sat 25
Wed 8, 9pm
Tue 14, 9pm
Kid Koala
@ Railway Club
iff Pic
w/ DJ P-Love
DJ Jester
Fine Options
The Sweaters
George Thorogood & The Destroyers
Lederhosen Lucil
w/ Stag Reels
w/ Rodney DeCroo
w/ David Gogo
Sun 19, 9pm
Mongoose
Pete Campbell
Wed 15.9:30pm .
@ Commodore
Wed 29, 9pm
Wed 8, 9pm
@ Commodore
@ Railway Club
® Railway Club
Billy the Kid
Hawksley Workman & The Wolves
w/ Red
Broadcast
The Dirty Projector
w/ Serena Ryder
Patrick Jacobsen
Thu 30, 9pm
w/ Joel R.L. Phelps
Wed 15-Thu 16,9pm
Mon 20, 9 pm
@ Richard's
Wed 8
@ Richard's
@ Railway Club
® Sugar Refinery
Dropkick Murphys
Temper Flare & the Thrillionaires
Peaches
w/ Good Riddance
Steve Earle & The Dukes
w/ Pleasure Suit
w/ Electrocute
the Casualties
w/ Garrison Starr
The Neins
Tue 21, 9 pm
Thu 30, 7pm
Wed 8, 9pm
Wed 15,9pm
® Richard's
@ Croatian Cultural Centre
@ Commodore ?|^K|
@ Railway Club
Guided By Voices
Ruflo
Bfflyldol
The Demolition Doll Rods
w/ The Von Bondies
w/ Motion City Soundtrack
Wed 8, 8pm
Wed 15
Wed 22. 9pm
Thu 30, 8pm
@ Orpheum Theatre
@ Brickyard
@ Commodore
@ Sonar
Abernethy and the Trees
Grandaddy
with Paulisdead
w/ Elbow
places to be
i concert venues
misc venues:
! brickyard
315 corral
604.685.3922
cinematheque
1131 howe
604.688.8202
\ cafe deux soleils
2096 commercial
604.254.1195
ridge cinema
3131 arbutus
604.738.6311
cellar
3611 w. broadway
604.738.1959
video in studios
1965 main
604.872.8337
cobalt
917 main
604.764.punk
j commodore
green room
868 granville
695 cambie
604.739.7469
604.608.2871
record shops:
lotus
455 abbott
604.685.7777
active pass records
324 w. hasting
604.646.2411
the main
4210 main
604.709.8555
bassix records
217 w. hastings
604.689.7734
marine club
573 homer
604.683.1720
beatstreet records
3-712 robson
604.683.3344
pat's pub
403 e. hastings
604.255.4301
black swan records
3209 w. broadway
604.734.2828
pic pub
620 w. pender
604.682.3221
crosstown music
518 w. pender
604.683.8774
railway club
579 dunsmuir
604,681.1625
futuristic flavour
1020 granville
604.681.1766
richard's
1036 richards
604.687.6794
highlife records
1317 commercial
604.251.6964
the royal
1029 granville
604.685.7527
red cat records
4305 main
604.708.9422
?Jmp&~ **
66 water
604.683.6695
scrape records
17 w. broadway
.604.877.1676
sypr refinery
1115 granville-
604.331.1184
scratch records
726 richards
604.687.6355
WS^club-. |
1882adanac
604.254.5858
zulu records
1972 w. 4th
604.738.3232
CiTR Special Presentations:
SHiNDiG ■ ■
Witness CiTR's annual music deathmatch every Tuesdays at Railway Club. Beers for
Jokes as always. The first band goes on at 9pm. http://shindig.citr.ca
October 7:
A Common Mistake
Explaining Colors To The Blind
They Shoot Horses Don't They?
October 21:
Gangbang
Martial Law
The Front
October 14:
Leah Abramson
New Years Resolution
. Paulisdead
October 28:
Coin Gutter
The Screaming Eagles
We've Been Had
Mr. Plow
CD Release bash for It's Plow or Never with guests Kill Allen Wrench and Alcoholic
White Trash. CDs and tattoos to be won. The party on Saturday 18,10pm (doors at 8:
30pm) at the Cobalt.
DiSCORDER Special Presentation
Electric City
A month-long electronic music and new media event to guide us through October.
Many artists at various venues, www.newmusic.org/electriccity
Food4Music Rockfest
Come out for a night of venue hoppin' and charity givin' on Friday 10 in support of
the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society. Featuring-Stoffitfcit, Noetic and the Burn
Project (8pm, Purple Onion); Vbrirjiand Vibrator (8:30pm, Pic); Cyanotic, Joykamp
and Insipid (7pm, Richard's); the Flairs and Perfect Strangers (8:30pm, Green
Room), www.food4music.com
38 OctoberaaS HOT HP
wkmamB
ALL REQUEST STUDENT NIGHT
MOST "AFFORDABLE" NIGHT IN TOWN
HAVE FUN AT A CLUB AGAIN
15 WATER ST.
GASTOWN
604 602 9442
WWW.PURPLEONION.COM
13
TliiHSDAYS I
AT THE PURPLE OMION
***********
DJS LOKJ,JUJU,LOGIK& MOSES
***********
15 WATER ST./GASTOWN/604 602 9442" OCTOBER 2003
tftakatiK
H
PEACHES
Father Fucker CD/2LP
WTfc the ElectroclashiChips finally olrn-
pletely fall. Peaches will be standing"
tall in-the neon colored ^^^Kt^M^SL^
her fe^ds, surveying fhe asymmerajpryanl
wreckage She's alfaystieen greater than, a
giant with a bad perm in a land of trendy
gnats/Genre aside, this bearded lady has the biggest balls in popular
music, bar none (sorry Iggy, we're talking balls, keep your dick out of it)
Father Fucker finds Peaches' balls hanging Out of her pants, rudely.. .
"TBpfjlBff IrfWryonefe face as she cajulet VS Willi a liilaiioua spew of
rude words and guttural sounds, backed by hard rocking beats. Think
Tlie Teaches of Peaches, but with more of everything — like a foot-
long hotdog over-heaped with alt the toppings, slopping over the bun
and into your crotch. Will it stain? Yes it will.
C019.98 2LP 19.98
THE FIRE THEFT
S/t CO
We're not sure what the party line is on
this issue, with the rise of punk
Christianity and whatnot, but this is one
great record to smoke bales of weed to. Put
The Fire Theft in the old multi-disc player
with the newest Mars Volta and some old
Floyd or Genesis or Yes or even Jane's Addiction, and then get seriously baked. (Mere's a Zulu suggestion: Keep all doors and windows
closed to ensure extra glazing — small rooms are best.) Yes, this is
some deep soul searching stuff from Jeremy Enigk and the other guys
from Sunny Day Real Estate. That's right, Sunny Day Real Estate.
Amidst the orchestral swoops and deft rock dynamics, there's a palpable sense of reaching out for meaning with substance in our time of
political cravenness and social insecurity. And not the Limp Bizkit
meets Enya that is Evanescence kind of pseudo-seriousness-ness, but
something really heartfelt, Enigk-style: heavy shit that lifts you up.
CD 19.98
TELEVISION
Marquee Moon
(Expanded) CD
Guest Reporter Christa Min of Fucking Bullshit writes: Ever since
1977, it's been hard to make a record that doesn't stink. The release
of Television's Marquee Moon was the invention of the eternal fresh cut.
Half of the bands in the last two decades have been stinking it up by cutting the cheese, while the other half have been trying to fit into
Television's perfect mould. The remastered release of this semen-full J
record includes five bonus tracks—alternate versions of album cuts,
instrumentais, and the shining "Little Johnny Jewel", Twenty-six years
later, Marquee Moon reeks of ice and air. Take a whiff. It smells like real
spirit. AVAILABLE OCTOBER 7
RACIEL'S T
Systems/ Layers
CD 19.98
VARIOUS
DFA RECORDS PRESENTS:
COMPILATION #1 CD
Dear Franny. If you haven't seen me in two months it is not because I
don't love you. I do love you. I am now in L.A. It's a dump, but the
people are nice. I don't know how I got into this, but I've been asked to
ghostwrite an autobiography called The Way of the White Belt. The
guy's name is Florian. Bad choice, but that's fiction. Anyway, I need you
to send me that OFA mixed tape I gave you — the one with: The Juan
Maclean "By the Time I Get To Venus", LCD Soundsystem "Give It Up".
The Rapture "House of Jealous lovers". Black Dice "Cone Toaster",
The Juan Maclean "You Can't Have It Both Ways", LCD Soundsystem
"Losing My Edge", Black Dice "Endless Happiness" and that exclusive
Rapture track "Silent Morning", Thanks. Hi to Boo-Boo. Tell him the
thrift stores hereare^sjJT;?^
CD 19.98
Systems/layers islf)«S«y$
posed for a multi-disciplin;
piece bs^KNewYork based I
dance^heate^ompany tflTr*
Systems/Layers unfolds from the perspective of;
tional tourist watching the lives of a handful of urban dwellers
as they negotiate the demands of modem everyday urban
existence, juxtaposing the hustle and bustle and sense of
ntime/sbace compression of the; big-city with. the. small, prosaic
features of contemporary life. TfWnusic demonstrates the full
range of Rachel's commendable abilities, combining rich
strings and piano with field recordings, occasional noisy ambience and rock instrumentation. Systems/Layers also features a
female vocalist on one track, unusual for the otherwise instrumental Rachel's, which brings out a quality similar in atmosphere to This Mortal Coil, a rewarding reverie that brings the
recording together. Another evocative, expertly played and
long overdue recording by the always smart Rachel's.
CD 16.98
MOJAVE 3
Spoon and Rafter
CD
Somewhere in our collective
psyche lies an abandoned
Fender Rhodes piano. Sure, its
legs are wobbly and the tolex a bit
frayed, but its tone is still warm and its keys still know the
melancholy notes. Next to it are a battered pedal steel and a
twelve string guitar that has seen better days. A crocheted
sunset hangs on the wall, below it a lonely glockenspiel. This
metaphysical space has been, visited countless times by many
young conceptual photographers wishing to document the
uncomplicated and beautiful signifiers of the fragile history of.
folk rock. Mojave 3's Neil Halstead has visited the room on
occasion as well, searching for the ever-elusive real. This, his
latest record, comes from there. A must-have for those documenting Nick Drake, The Fairport Convention and the new
sounds of the neo-folk underground. We recommend this
record while maintaining our nature boy sense of wonder.
CD 19.98
BELIE AND SEBASTIAN
Dear Catastrophe Waitress
CD/2LP
A re we too old for twee? Has such cuteness in pop run its
rAcultural course? Does it make sense anymore? That 90s
innocence is long gone, surrendered to the uncertainty of the
00s. Also, people change and grow as they age, exploring new
ideas and directions. For example, some turn to the big 80s
production prowess of ex-Buggies vocalist Trevor Horn, best
known for his work with Frankie Goes to Hollywood. He's also
responsible for that conterhpora% Russian faux-lesbian pop
duo t.A.t.U. All this is true! Such otherwise inexplicable
changes and choices are bewildering except if conducted by
Belle and Sebastian, renowned for their dry humor and gentle
pop adventurousness. The result of this unpredictable meeting
sounds kind of like ABC, except played by Belle and
Sebastian, Thus, a little jingle jangle and folkie strum amidst
the clean 80s subtext vibe. Enticed? Boy do Belle and
Sebastian love to challenge their leagues of fans, keeping
them guessing with ambiguous cover images and aesthetical
whimsy! In any case, this is so long-awaited it could be a collection of field hollers by the band and we'd still all be as excited as we are. Show us what you've got this time, Belle and
Sebastian. AVAILABLE OCTOBER 7
CD 29.98 2LP 26.98 vinyl
LOCAL MUSK:
JON-RAE
FLETCHER
and the mira
The Road CD
ur loss Jon-Rae Fletcher
has moved to-Toronto
^Wry^ffio^oJesfiQn.^bo kuoiws»WjjaJ,Biyf terioufwJRdM"
blow through the hearts and mindj^hjj^^|e^^^psl|
oflen not even the young themselves,-we surmise und
recall i Nevertheless,' we ere happy to announce mis
impressive new recording bptan-Rae and his talented fj|t
band the River; If ever there was any.fajpt elsu&t about the
genuineness and impress cw s of Jon*R»s lbiltfy it is
resolved by thi& great collection ot songs from ballads, to
sing- ilonqs, to all-out rockers Watching this kid live Is
something else altogether He and his band come on like a
i|p)ious event, uapti^hng audiences-with their country
jfjSJkieiSinGariryj irwoking^jBass conversion of hand clap-
ifljpg and group singing. Thftecording approximates a
Jon-Rae live show: a little rough and tumble, but heavy
with feeling Come on home, buddy
YOUNG AND
11811
life Through
One Speaker CD
Wonder Woman walks along
Jnpf|piljT^$,desolate
arSEf'wjth ^boulders stumped, eventually?dii^bTngmto the »
greenish water, wearing flippers and a sn©rijpl=set, a grey-
blue sky abovetet-Such gently absurd imagery is common
HHs Young aMfSexy aesthetic, imbued with a smajt^^p
sense fltmild pathos and just-darkening humor. Yet thelf
piquantly sardonic attitude is nicely juxtaposed with some
Ol the sweetest and catchiest hooks and phi i es possible
^SSiplejBng the whole picture. The expertness of the bands
singing anil playing is even better on this sophomore
wcsrdir^lfWfBelialreacty strong debut, Stand Up for |
Your Mother. 3W8*Bew record finds the band more in
charge of their rn^fgrial, with a thoroughness and decided-
Jjiess atidible even in the production of the record, completed with the mighty JC/DC. Pop music we recommend.
AVAILABLE OCTOBER 7
CD 14.98
CD 14.98
The Shape of BEATS to COME includes:
ATMOSPHERE
Seven's Travels CD/2LP
Damn it's a good time for new underground hlp-ho"p^^l^^Wv|^ff'
Five Deez s Kinqynasti, Themselves' The
No Music AlFFs, Buck 65 s TaHcin' Honky
Blues, No Luck Club's Happiness and
Vaudvtlle Villain by Victor Vaughn aka MF Doom. And now,
Atmosphere are back in the fold. After their major label dalliance God
Loves Ugly, Slug and Ant are returning tdftSat they do best — emotionally raw lyrics spat over elemental boom-bap backdrops. The results
will surely be enough to make you throw your hands in the air and
holler "return to term!" This is a hard, hard record, in every sense and
its unabashed realness deserves your respect and your support.
CD 16.98 2LP 19.9if
AESOPROCK
Bazooka Tooth CDtfUyl
Ouch! What did we just say about ail the brand-spanking undie hiphop hitting the streets? Jeez, if it wasn't for the bargain prices Zulu
Records is selling a lot of these new joints for ydu'dDe straight broke,
kid! But whatever your financial situation, you're going.to need this
one for sure Just as ruff, intelligent funny, touching, angular, melodic,
experimental and downright funky as tea previous albums, Bazooka
Tooth sees Aesop Rock maintaining an astounding run of form and -
staying right at the top of his game Solid. AVAILABLE OCTOBER 7 ■
KID KOALA
Some of
My Best
Friends
are DJs
CD/LP
And for all you fans of instrumental hip-hop
Like that other alt. CanCon legend Neil
Young, Kid Koala is a virtuoso of inspired
sloppiness. Just as the grizzlcJ rocker can bit ■
stratospheric emotional heights via unabashed
displays of limited guitar soloing technique,
jthe cube*pie tffiMafilfst can blow your mind
with juts and Splices so nonchalantly thrown
together,that tfie^gound lazily brilliant,andHj;>
brilliantly lazy An,admirabl/ concise testament
to lo-fi inventiveness, Some of My Best
Friends are DJs comes packed with one of the
kids'acelaimed comic books, making It the
undisputed: bargain of the month.
AVAILABLE OCTOBER 7
mm 16.98
CD 16.98 3LP22.<
ALL SALE PRICES
" IBIFFECT UNTIL
OCTOBER 31, 2003
ra
SCHEMATICS IN-STORE
Sunday October 12th 4PM
J Phoenecia, Richard Devine,
and Otto von Schirach
Attention all fans of the Electric City!
Free electro demonstration!
LAPTOP DERBY
Plug In - Sunday October 19th 3-5PM
Second installment of Zulu's laptop invitation- j
al! Curated by Open Circuits. An open call
for YOU to bring your LAPTOP to the store,
plug it in and rock us LIVE. Details in the store.
More Music for your complete consideration:
Funky Porcini- various reissues with bonus materials CD P.W. Long- Remembered (Touch and Go)
(Ninja Tune) Spread Eagle- s/t (Local)
The Free Design- Kites are Fun CO reissue (Light in The feobel Campbell- Amorino CD (Instinct)
AWc) Trailer Bride- Hope is a Thing With Feathers CD (Bloodshot)
Potato Polpo-Llce Hearts Swelling C0/LP (Constellation) shuggie Otis- Inspiration Information CD (Six Degrees)
British Sea Power- The Decline of British Sea Power Matmos-The CM MfarOWP (Matador)
CD/LP (Rough Trade) Portastath>/M|im««asaUrtC»(Merge)
Do Make Say Think-Winter Country Hymn Secret Hymn IAmrtobotaiidl^d-Grac»DaysCB(CatiiioW
CD/LP (Constellation)
Zulu Records
1972-1976 W 4th Ave
Vancouver. BC
tel 604.738.3232
www.zulurecords.com
I 'KZCffRQ2\
Discorder
Discorder CITR-FM (Radio station : Vancouver, B.C.) 2003-10-01
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