I made a slow music mix for my mom.
It's uncannily weird. I feel like nobody in the U.S. knows who Evermore is. Wait, what am I saying? I barely know Evermore. In fact, I only own one Evermore song, and the only reason I know anything about the band is that I just looked 'em up on wikipedia and last.fm. 
Thanks a lot Pitchfork.
It's hard to go into a live show with complete oblivion. I rarely pay to see bands whose music I have not previously taken the time to listen to, unless they are openers or something. In fact, I'm the kind of person who goes likes to listen to the band the entire week before the show - even on the car ride to the show. 
"M. Ward appreciates the cobwebs as much as what they're stuck in." - Jenny Eliscu. 
A preview I just wrote on the upcoming Bowerbirds show in Cleveland... love them!For most of us, being serenaded is a rare occurrence. It’s even more uncommon when it involves an accordion. So, when the Bowerbirds flutter into town, treat the occasion with special glee - the kind usually reserved for Halley’s Comet or a leap year. The North Carolina-based band creates gentle waves of songs, dealing with its fascination with the Earth’s sacredness and love through ornately crafted lyrics and sweet, careful folk. Bowerbirds has a rotating cast of musicians, but Beth Tacular (accordion, keys) and Phil Moore (guitar) are its mainstays. Matt Damron is playing drums on tour, as Bowerbirds test out songs from its upcoming album, Upper Air. Songs from Air are spacious soundscapes that seem to draw on artists Bowerbirds have recently toured with – Bon Iver and John Vanderslice. “Northern Lights” is a good example of what Bowerbirds do best; while Tacular’s sprightly piano twinkles, Moore’s swinging guitar rocks back and forth, and his vocals caress with the oozing romanticism of “all I want is your eyes, in the morning as we wake, for a short while.” Megafaun and Craig Ramsey & The Nice People open at 9 p.m. at the Beachland Tavern (15711 Waterloo Rd., 216.383.1124). Tickets: $8 advance, $10 day of show.
I'm going to write more extensively about Bowerbirds in a bit, but I need to spill a bit here briefly. This is a two-person team, Beth Tacular and Phil Moore. Songs like "Northern Lights" ooze with romanticism. Ooey, gooey lyrics like "all I want is your eyes, in the morning as we wake, for a short while" bring to mind the kind of sweet feelings and memories that you wish could last forever.
I seriously am having minor heart attacks. I don't know if that's what you call them. Ohhh, heartACHES. Yes, that's it. I really miss Athens, Ohio. 
"'Idiot Heart' has a melody that is instantly memorable, seemingly already familiar on first listen. It’s like meeting an old friend who you don’t really remember – but they’re so cool that of course you were friends!"
Since when does mixing the trendiest of Afro-pop with the catchiest of power pop get you an album of synth-filled electronic tunes? Since Vampire Weekend’s Rostam Batmanglij got together with Ra Ra Riot’s Wes Miles, giving bloggers around the world somethingother than the damn recession to rant and rave about. Discovery’s LP is the summer’s answer to MGMT, a series of hooky electro-R&B grooves that will be a dance party hit. “Osaka Loop Line” is true to its name, looping synth beats and robotic computer bleeps, and shifting tempo ceaselessly. Eclectic influences infiltrate LP. Discovery gets all T-Pain on us with vocoder vocals on the Jackson 5 cover “I Want You Back,” proving they aren’t afraid to cross over to the mainstream. “So Insane” has sharp Prince-like beats, “Swing Tree” beeps away like your favorite Hot Chip song (or favorite scene in Wall-E), and “Can You Discover?” reworks Ra Ra Riot’s “Can You Tell,” replacing the violin and string arrangements with a maze of wriggled synthesizer and spacey keys. Go ahead: loop the album like Batmanglij and Miles looped the synthesizers. This no-frills, all-fun summer hit is why they invented the repeat button.
A preview I wrote for their Cleveland show, June 25th.
Sunset Rubdown is batshit crazy music that boggles the mind and confuses the soul. Your blabber mouthed uncle who sits in his rocking chair telling made-up war stories might listen to it. Then again, so might that hipster down the street that lines her closet with American Apparel tees and owns a pair of headphones bigger than your dog. This is probably not music for the masses. Wolf Parade’s Spencer Krug took on Sunset Rubdown as a side project, and with the assistance of three (this time four) other musicians he has released three-full length albums under the moniker. The music sounds like a total mish-mosh at times, with screeching electric guitar sneaking between playful keys, stampeding drumbeats, and Krug’s hyperventilating vocals. Problems arise when the songs lose structure; the lack of musical patterns can come off as sloppy and boring. “Idiot Heart” almost makes up for what the second half of the album lacks. Muted guitar and jagged electric bursts are brought to life with a barrage of bells and twinkles and playfully repetitive lyrics about Greek myths and dying in “a decent pair of shoes.” The first few tracks on Dragonslayer are satisfyingly complex, reason enough to (temporarily) sacrifice your sanity.
I'm reviewing Sunset Rubdown's new album, Dragonslayer, right now. I can't really say that I enjoy the album very much. It's much too abstract for me in ways... how the distorted guitar just kinda wanders off, how it doesn't always come together in clean, repeated melodies and patterns, how it just doesn't seem very mathematical. I suppose it's experimental. Wait, isn't experimental supposed to still be mathematical? I'm confused. I'm a big fan of Spencer Krug, and everything he does with Wolf Parade, but in Sunset Rubdown, his side project, he takes it a bit too far away from normalcy at times.
A preview I wrote for an upcoming show... Jay Reatard isn’t afraid to let you know he’s a total asshole. At a recent Ohio show, he only waited five minutes into his set to scream, “The sound fucking sucks. It’s like we’re playing in a fucking trailer garage!” His devil-may-care attitude suits him all the same; the Memphis native whips his shoulder-length hair back and forth as he rips out noisy pop songs on a Flying V. Reatard - whose given name is Jay Lindsey – has been making music under the pseudonym since he dropped out of high school at 15. Though he began his music career with the Reatards and the Lost Sounds, Reatard went solo in ’06. He’s currently touring with a bassist and drummer to promote his upcoming release, Watch Me Fall. His shows are pure energy, a mix of clichéd head-banging, shouting, spitting, and shredding. You’ll bob your head to songs like “See/Saw” and “Night of Broken Glass,” which are simple, quick, and riff-driven, like most of Reatard’s catalog. The raucous and heavily distorted garage rock sets the mood for a nights of reckless behavior and bad decisions.
Grizzly Bear - "Two Weeks"
It's already proving to be one of my favorite songs of 2009. St. Vincent is haunting my life! Her voice is so delicate and gorgeous, and her music is like a fairy tale gone wrong. She finds pleasure in mixing beautiful with disgusting distortion. And I LOVE it. It's like being in the best nightmare ever, complete with a pink parasol that gets struck by lighting and burns to pieces. 
Click on the title of this post to hear my interview with Patrick Muhlberger and Jonny Look, the co-directors of Trailer Park. What's Trailer Park? And why am I blogging about a movie on my music blog?
