Friday 11/28
Life for silence is a rhythm too has been kind of hectic the last couple of weeks, with work being busy (Xmas is the busy season for me) and home being busy too - 3 and a half weeks until the new baby girl arrives, so preparations are ongoing. All of this has left pretty much no time for any kind of music discussion here, and that sucks. Hopefully I will be able to find some time this weekend to recommend some tunage to y'all.
Wednesday 11/26
New mp3s today...two tracks from the Placebo covers album - Kate Bush's Running Up That Hill, here stripped of it's driving percussion and turned into a moodier,edgier and darker track. The other is Serge Gainsbourg's The Ballad Of Melody Nelson, one of my fave Serge tracks EVER. It was hard to pick songs to put up because the whole covers album is good, but these 2 in particular stood out. The other 2 pack of songs is from April March's recently released Triggers. The title track is a funky instrumental, and Le Coeur Hypothéqué is a lovely Frenchified pop tune with a beauty of a piano riff. The album was co-written and produced by studio whiz Bertrand Burgalat, and shows a very deep Gainsbourg influence. Great stuff - enjoy.
Monday 11/24
Duran Duran will be honored by the Brit Awards in February, recieving an award for their outstanding contribution to the biz - 25 years and 70 million in record sales.
Kraftwerk to play 3 shows in the UK next spring. You Brits are some lucky bastards...
Dixie Chicks singer Natalie Maines continues to speak her mind about the war in Iraq. You go girl!
Sunday 11/23
Time For Football
The Vikes held on today to beat an average Detroit Lions team 24 - 14, and they had to rely on their defense down the home stretch to do it. Corey Chavous and Brian Williams both picked off passes and returned them for TDs in the final minutes of the game, sealing the win for the Vikes. Once again the team looked inconsistent, and they were flagged for 11 penalties. If it had been another team it probably would have been a loss. Next week they travel to St. Louis, and I think it's pretty clear that they're going to be outmatched.
Saturday 11/22
I was able to do a little shopping today and picked up the reissue of Placebo's Sleeping With Ghosts. It's now a 2CD set with the bonus disc being all cover tunes. I've been able to give it just one listen and I have to say that I dug it. Brian Molko's voice is really what I've been unsure about in the past, but I've decided that it's not that bad after all. The covers are really fun, some of them being pretty straight versions (Bigmouth Strikes Again/20th Century Boy/Where Is My Mind) while some of the others go in a new direction (Running Up The Hill/The Ballad Of Melody Nelson). Now on to the album of originals...
I had a copy of the Talkingheads box set Once In A Lifetime in my hands today but put it back on the shelf. The collection is big, with a few previously unreleased tracks and an expanded version of their video collection on DVD, but the package itself was what made me skip it for now. It's the height of a regular CD, except that it's like 2 feet wide. It's not going to fit anywhere on my CD shelf, and I found that to be a bit annoying. More music geek anal retentive rambling I know but whatever.
Time For Football
Last week's Vikings loss to the Raiders put me in such a funk that I ignored writing about it at all this week. The 6 turnovers on offense destroyed the many chances they had to get back in the game, and Duante Culpepper looked a lot like he did last year when he led the league in sucking turnovers. Tomorrow the hapless Detroit Lions are in town looking to break their streak of 21 consecutive road game losses. Now normally at this point I'd say that the Vikes should win handily, and they should, but the way things have been going I'm less than optimistic. Go Vikes.
Friday 11/21
The Telescope Game is the new best way to kill time on your computer. It's kind of a golf game but with some added twists. You will get sucked in...
Warp Records is launching Bleep.com next month and will be the first music label to offer it's entire discography as mp3 downloads. That's some serious tunage, and there are a few rarities that will be in there that I will be interested in checking out!
LCD Soundsystem's new single is called Yeah and will be out sometime in the next month or so. It's going to be awfully hard for James Murphy to match the hugeness of Losing My Edge.
Radiohead are going to be programming a week's worth of radio on BBC6 Music at the end of December.
I haven't had a lot of time this week to deal with putting up new mp3s, so you will have to wait until next week for some new tunes...
Thursday 11/20
The votes are in and the 2004 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame class is ready to be inducted. Inductees include George Harrison, Prince, ZZ Top and Traffic. I can't wait to see The Purple One's induction...who will give the speech, what songs will he play etc... The ceremony is March 15th in New York.
Damon Albarn's solo album is out December 8th, and as I previously wrote is limited to 5000 copies on vinyl. It will be a double 10" on white vinyl or picture disc. Anybody want to hook me up with a copy?
Wednesday 11/19
I had a chance to do a little bit of music shopping at the Virgin megastore, and hauled in an absolute deal of a score - The Kinks' The Ultimate Collection. An import collection, 2CDs, 44 songs, all for the sale price of $9.99. It was too good to pass up. I also found the Human League import Very Best Of 2 CD set, the second disc being all new remixes of some of the big hits. Sure I own most of the first disc, but hearing the remixes is what it's all about, especially Riton's mix of The Sound Of The Crowd. Money well spent.
The Duran Duran Report
I'm back from what turned out to be a great road trip. My bro and I pulled into Chicago at about 3:00 in the afternoon, and checked into the hotel (also the House Of Blues, and about 100 feet away from the club). It's been a while since I've stayed in such a nice place. We hit the bar, then the Virgin megastore, then back to the bar. Showtime was 9:00, so we headed in at 8:30, and were amazed at the size of the place - a lot smaller than we thought! It's a pretty cool place too - from the outside it's ultra modern, almost looking like some huge gray lobster shell, but when you get inside it's all voodoo, blues and gothic. The crowd was a mix of hipsters and a few folks who were teeny boppers back in the day - OK, alot of middle aged women (which worked out well for the sight lines - they were all shorter than me & my bro). The lights went down, the curtain went up, and there they were, all five of them in a line at the front of the stage, strobes flickering, synths pulsing. They walked back to their places and kicked into Friends Of Mine and the house went nuts.
And it was not great. In fact it was borderline Vegas - pantomime kind of stuff, with Simon pouring it on way too thickly, poncing about the stage. They went on to play Planet Earth & Hungry Like The Wolf, and the horror of it all began to sink in...we came all this way for this, some cheesy revival? The fourth song in was a new one, What Happens Tomorrow, and 5 seconds after Simon introduced it and they started to play it was a whole different ballgame. It was as if a different band was onstage, they were tight and jamming, and sounded fantastic. From that point on it was a HUGE show, with all the hits and one more new track. The transformation from so-so
Vegas act to viable, vibrant band was something that was amazing to see, and both my bro and I were blown away by the difference - we couldn't stop talking about it afterwards. In all my years of shows I've never seen anything like it - I've never seen a poor performance turned around like that. Anyway, the band rocked, churning out the songs from the first 2 records and a few of the other hits. The house was sold out, and the fans were screaming - I mean ear shreddingly loud screams - and when they weren't screaming they were singing EVERY WORD TO EVERY SONG. It was amazing to hear and be part of such a devoted room full of fans. So in the end it was all good - they looked good, they ended up sounding good, and they played some great tunes. But it's that transformation on the 4th song that will stay with me as one of the craziest rock moments I've ever witnessed.
Sunday 11/16
Tomorrow I will be in Chicago seeing Duran Duran. Psyched!
I'm sure you've seen the brilliant video for Outkast's Hey Ya - Andre 3000 plays a whole band as they appear on a '60's style British TV music show. My daughter absolutely loves the song and the video, and was so excited yesterday when we got to see it 2 times in a row. It's on heavy rotation on all of the different MTV channels I get so we see it a lot. It's top 5 in the charts this week, with Big Boi's The Way You Move creeping up right behind it. What I think is cool about this track is that it's not hip hop, but actually a weird blend of indie rock and synthpop. I played it at my bar DJ gig a while back and one of the waitresses came up to me and asked who it was. I told her, and she said she that she though it was Frank Black. Weeks later it hit me that Hey Ya actually does sound a hell of a lot like a Pixes or Frank Black tune. It's in the bass line, and in the melody. I love that he dares to do something different, and am glad to see the song is such a hit.
Time For Football
The Vikes are in Oakland today to play the Raiders. I'm getting pretty deflated by my team's mid-season collapse so I am not so sure how today is going to play out. Offensively the Vikes have the edge, but our D is so shellshocked Im not sure how they will respond. Everybody knows what's wrong the D, including the players themselves, so hopefully today will be the turn around - just make the tackles.
Friday 11/14
RIP Tony Thompson
On Wednesday my bro called me in the evening and asked me if I had heard that Tony Thomspon had died. I hadn't, and he said that there was a story on Duran Duran's webpage. I checked and there it was. I started Googling & checking news sites for confirmation and was unable to find anything. Thursday I checked back at Duran's site and the story was no longer there. Now today comes confirmation. He was best known as the drummer in Chic, and for his brief stint in Duran offshoot The Powerstation, and also did work for Bowie, Robert Palmer and Duran as well.
A couple of experimental acts dear to my heart are gearing up for some new releases. Scott Herren's Savath + Savalas alias is back in January. The album is called Aropat and is a collaboration between him and Spanish singer Eva Puyuelo Muns, and is apparently Catalan folk music. Crazy. Manitoba are also back in action, but this time it's only to reissue Up In Flames with a bonus CD of tracks and a couple of videos. According to Pitchfork the bonus disc will be available as a seperate item, so folks like me who already have the CD won't have to buy it again for the bonus stuff. Woo-hoo!
Thursday 11/13
Duran Duran are the artist of the day over at Billboard.com.
New mp3s today are all in keeping with this week's tribute theme, and are some of my favorite Duran moments. The version of View To A Kill is the gorgeous John Barry orchestrated version of the song, all swoony strings. Enjoy!
Wednesday 11/12
Today's Duran Duran item is this MTV News review of their recent Atlantic City gig. Another great review...
The Libertines have had a breakout year, releasing a great, raucous shambling punk rock record produced by The Clash's Mick Jones. It's been the off the record activities of the band that have gotten such huge press, most notably the behaviour of Pete Doherty and his troubles with the law. Now comes this story, which has the other band leader Carl Barat getting drunk in his bath tub and cracking his face open and then going to bed. Read the details of the story and it's pretty horiffic - maybe these lads should lay off the bottle for a while, eh?
!!!'s second album is going to be called Looking Down On Heaven and should see a US release in the spring of 2004. It's about freaking time.
Joy Division 3 CD box set of live recordings - limited edition. 3000 copies, out November 24th.
Tuesday 11/11
Duran Duran week continues with a review and some photos of the boys in action last Saturday in Atlantic City courtesy of Fireballs And Tsunami. In her words, best concert EVER.
There's pretty much nothing of any interest to me coming out today. The Talkingheads box set was supposed to be out today but has shifted to next week. No shopping excursions today means maybe this week I can actually catch up with some of the stuff I've picked up in the last month.
Time For Football
The Vikes stunk up the joint as expected, making Doug Flutie the sports story of the weekend. We'll see how this team responds this week. I'd also like to thank the Philadelphia Eagles for marching down the field at Lambeau last night and beating the Packers. The Vikes still have a 2 game edge in the division.
Monday 11/10
Earlier this year I did a bit here about a rumored Damon Albarn solo album. It's called Demo Crazy and is going to be put out on his Honest Jon's label. The catch is that it's a limited edition - 5000 copies on vinyl only. That's going to be a hard one to get hold of, and I'd love to hear it.
Exactly one week from today I will be in the Windy City to see Duran Duran. Music geek excitement has reached such fever pitch that it's led to a tribute design here at silence is a rhythm too. Woo-Hoo!
Last night I caught another Christmas related ad, this time for Target, and was blown away to hear them use Lene Lovich's New Toy. She is one of those blasts from the past who I have always loved, and I'm so glad she'll be earning some green from the use of that great tune.
Sunday 11/9
Time For Football Part 2
It's 4:45 in the afternoon - halftime of the game and the Chargers are up 28 - 14. The Vikings defense is completely unable to stop Doug Flutie from doing what he wants - he looks as good as he ever has. That "old familiar sinking feeling" Vikes fans have been missing over the first half of the season is back with a vengeance, and this will be a spectacular collapse if he Vikes go on to lose this game. Yikes.
Today I saw an ad on TV for the annual Christmas tour by Mannheim Steamroller. God I hate them.
Time For Football
Today the Vikings travel to San Diego to take on the bleak Chargers. Coach Marty has named the 41 year old Doug Flutie his starting QB in an attempt to revive his "stick a fork in 'em, they're done" team. The Vikes have to be worried about the running game of LaDainian Tomlinson, who earlier this year peeled off a 200 yard plus game. The Vikes need to get back in the win column to avoid a total collapse. This week's game (and next weeks vs the Raiders) gives the team as good an opportunity as they're going to get to win.
Friday 11/7
Har Mar Superstar rides a pink unicorn in a new ad campagin for Vladivar Vodka in Europe. Dude is huge over there, but is still barely a blip on the radar screen here in the US. What cracks me up about him is that he's from my neck of the woods, and in fact is named after a goofy '70's mall here in St. Paul. Boy needs to keep his clothes on though - maybe that's why he hasn't been widely accepted here!
Suede split up. Does anybody even listen to them anymore?
Paul McCartney is releasing an electro track, Temporary Secretary, originally from his 1980 LP McCartney II. Some people over at the electronic music discog site Discogs were all in a tizzy when that album was submitted - McCartney electro? Some of us older folks knew it was right, now here's the proof.
Thursday 11/6
New mp3s today...2 tracks from the most excellent debut album from Canadians The Stills - moody gorgeous rock music in the style of those early '80's bands that we love so much. I had a hard time picking the tracks to put up because they are all so good. The Luke Vibert is just what it's title implies - some funky acid disco music, taken from his admittedly old skool LP. Finally, there's a CD single only Goldfrapp track, and it's also a funky disco flavored number. Good stuff - enjoy!
Wednesday 11/5
The Duran Duran DVD is fantastic. The remastered sound rocks on the home theater, and it was very cool to see some of these vids for the first time. My only complaint was that I could not figure out how to access the easter eggs - of which there are a bunch. Today I checked out the band's website, and was able to find complete instructions there, so I printed 'em out and will try to find everything this afternoon. Another way in which the internet rocks my world.
Tuesday 11/4
It's slim pickings for new releases today - the Coldplay Live 2003 set is out, as is the Guided By Voices box set. The only thing I have on my "gotta get it" list is the fabulous Greatest 2 DVD set from Duran Duran. 3 hours worth of the groundbreaking videos, plus some cool extras.
Monday 11/3
Dizzee Rascal's Boy In Da Corner gets it's US release on January 20th, courtesy of Matador / XL. Matador, you rock. Thank you very much.
Duran Duran - 78 - 03 tour, two weeks from today. Music geek excitement is growing day by day...
Placebo's 2 disc reissue of Sleeping With Ghosts, previously only released in Europe, gets a US release on November 18th. The second disc is all covers, and it's a crazy set of tunes;