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The Black Crowes are lashing out at Maxim magazine for reviewing the band's new album--apparently without actually hearing it first. The review, published in Maxim's March issue, gives the Crowes' 'Warpaint' a rating of two-and-a-half stars out of five. The writer...has not heard the album.
--Black Crowes Say Maxim Review a Fraud, Associated Press, Feb. 23, 2008

Bear in Heaven-Red Bloom of the Boom
The latest effort by BIH, RBOTB, is a swirling, dizzying, daring, vertiginous ride. "Bag of Bags" blends angelic harmonies with toast. And "Fraternal Noon" left me wanting a warm sweater that I could then layer over a T-shirt only to be too warm and have to wear just the T-shirt.

Rating: Double Tall Sugar Free Vanilla Latte. Or, Go Bears!

These United States-A Picture Of The Three Of Us At The Gate To The Garden Of Eden.
By the time I finished reading the title the album was already over.

Rating: 2 F**ks and 1.5 Yeahs.

Kaki King-Dreaming Of Revenge
I've been waiting for this CD for 11 years and it finally arrived. "Life Being What It Is" is King at his best, while "Open Mouth" is King even better than he usually is. "Air and Kilometers" is a beautiful song about traveling in a plane in a country that uses the metric system and "Montreal" is about a city in Canada.

Rating: Happy Milkshake.

Wye Oak-If Children
This album is one, long beautiful poem beginning with the line "If Children.....". I don't even need to tell you the rest. It's Whitney Houston's "The Greatest Love Of All" except angrier and totally against mid-wives.

Rating: 7 divided by 3 times 10 plus your sun sign.

The Shins-Honey Poke Shimmy Lantern
James Mercer and crew can do no wrong. They've added the Decemberists, the Thermals, and Spoon to their lineup. Recorded inside a deer carcass, the sounds on Honey Poke are haunting and cervid. These songs will change your life back to the way it was before The Shins changed it the first time. Remember that song "Red Rubber Ball?" It's on this album!

Rating: $800

The White Stripes-Pale Pail
This album was recorded on an abacus.

Rating: Seborrhea

Tift Merrit-Another Country
Tift Merrit sings the book by James Baldwin.

Rating: Really, really fun.

12:03 AM ET | 02-28-2008 | permalink

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A Plea For Banishment

I was cleaning out a drawer the other day when I found a CD my friend made for me labeled 'The Doors-Live in Stockholm 1968.' I then proceeded to pull out the three or four Doors albums that I have and gave them a listen. It was bright and sunny and I had the windows open and I will admit to a small amount of embarrassment when "Light My Fire" just wouldn't seem to end. I imagined by mailman walking up my front steps and hearing the Ray Manzarek solo through the wall and the moment felt right out of The Big Chill to me. No, I wasn't wearing a cowl neck sweater, drinking Chablis, swaying to the music, or hanging out with Tom Berenger, yet the feeling of awkwardness lingered. (As a side note, that movie ruined at least a handful of decent songs. Merely hearing a song from The Big Chill makes one feel so self-conscious and contrived that even the act of listening becomes a parody. And, yes, I know that The Doors are not on that soundtrack, but the ubiquity of "Light My Fire" has the same effect.)

But I digress. My point is that many people I know hate The Doors. And by hate I mean that they seem to have a "Why Jim Morrison and The Doors Are The Worst Band Ever" essay memorized and ready to go at any given moment. (Possibly this essay is available on the Internet in order to help the cause). I'm sure you've heard the anti-Doors diatribe, it usually begins or ends with the words "pretentious" or "Lizard King". Fair enough.

There are some bands on whom people don't agree--turns out not everyone thinks The Beatles should be deities--but these bands tend to garner at least a begrudging amount of respect from the naysayers. Or, their importance in the grand scheme of music is hard to deny even if one doesn't particularly like it. I would put the entire Jazz genre into this category as well as Bob Dylan and James Brown (yet there are many others, for sure). But then there are a handful of bands that are so vehemently abhorred that the mere mention of them might ruin, say, a perfectly relaxing road trip or a dinner with friends. These are bands or artists for whom the haters can find no good reason for them to have ever existed. (Yet they have to have been big enough to be worth arguing over. No one is going to get literally or figuratively punched out over a band like Bush or Marcy Playground).

The Doors fall into this latter category. And if I were pressed to give a few more examples of artists in the same contentious vein, I would add: the Eagles, Joni Mitchell, the genre known as Riot Grrl, Phish, Metallica, Hole/Courtney Love, Moby, Sting, and to a lesser degree (because most everyone realizes their importance eventually) the Grateful Dead.

Are there any bands whose popularity you feel is a complete affront to music?

Lastly, for all of you Doors haters, all I have to say is "ride the snake, ride the snake".
No, wait, don't. My affection for the Doors doesn't extend to quoting lyrics.

OK, this is the end.

10:23 PM ET | 02-26-2008 | permalink

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Live From The Basement

Saturday night I saw Blitzen Trapper play at an all-ages club off of Division Street in Portland. The venue is called The Artistery. As far as I can tell, it's basically a punk house replete with the ticket takers reclining in cozy thrift store chairs and a few shabby couches to sit on if you need a breather from the basement. (The more OCD side of myself immediately thought 'scabies', but I'm sure the cleaning at this house is A+). Cities like Austin and Cleveland seem to have the all ages mixed with alcohol-for-those-over-21 thing down. But in Portland, you're either in a juice and bagel-serving venue with a bad sound system or in a smoky bar. The few exceptions here--The Crystal Ballroom, The Aladdin Theatre, and The Roseland--cater to people of all ages and serve liquor, but their large sizes lack intimacy, and despite a few eager fans in the front, there is little sense of urgency. Never the less, I've seen amazing shows in any number of venues in Portland, from pristine hipster bars, to old burlesque theatres or dance halls turned rock show venues, to coffee and donut shops with only a vocal PA. But there is really nothing like a sweaty basement show to bring out that one dancer that nears concussion every time he perilously pogos towards the low ceiling, a group of people holding onto the teetering PA speaker for dear life, a fan that has nowhere else to go but on the stage itself, and a few bare light bulbs in lieu of colored gels and strobes. Not all bands benefit from the unruly, unplanned, and unadorned elements of a basement show. But many bands, and Blitzen Trapper is one of them, do.

For one, the fans and the band are forced to interact with very little to mediate the dynamic. Without a barrier, the relationship between intention and perception is blurred. The crowd is part of the music, literally interfering with the sounds, visuals, and sometimes with the players themselves. The people, the walls, the floors, become receptors--everything and everyone radiates the same song. This energy can certainly happen in large venues, in stadiums even, but in a basement show or small venue the atmosphere feels pressurized, always on the verge of collapsing into disarray.

I should add that despite my gleeful immersion into the music, the old lady part of me was worried about the lack of points of egress in the basement. I kept an eye on what looked like the only exit from the room in the event of a fire. I was four steps, no five steps, away. If I knocked over the girl with skinny jeans, a teal headband, and a Flashdance T-shirt, I would be out in no time. And this is why older people don't often go to basement or all-ages shows anymore. Because when you're worried about safety, it makes you feel, well, old.

But I'll go back to The Artistery again. It was worth it to see a band playing for what seemed like mostly friends; getting the sound right by tweaking a few knobs on the amps, the drums louder and deader than anything, new songs that were still revealing themselves even to the musicians, and volume that couldn't be denied.

12:31 PM ET | 02-26-2008 | permalink

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And The Answer Is........

Today I was trying to determine if the sphere of influence from which the indie/alternative/punk rock genres are drawn could be reduced to a handful of bands. This mental exercise has been more difficult than I suspected. With music, there is not a Latin root, a Martin Luther, or an Immanuel Kant. Rather, the task is like staring out at the ocean and trying to figure out what swell constitutes the first wave.

If I think about the various and most prominent sects of alternative rock--metal, folk, pop, indie, garage--I suppose I could come up with a list of corresponding progenitors. But can it really all be traced back to Black Sabbath, Graham Parsons, Elvis Costello, The Beach Boys, and Led Zeppelin? If so, we are still lacking rhythm, and thus the root of other offshoots like post-punk, industrial, or eletronica. Maybe we need to add Bo Diddley to the list or Lee "Scratch" Perry. But it still doesn't seem right.

A few years ago it felt like every band was the offspring of Gang of Four, Joy Division, and The Cure. Then the lineage switched over to Bruce Springsteen and the Talking Heads. But even those artists, maybe with the exception of Springsteen, didn't feel far enough back in the family tree.

Then again, a lot of the most influential bands probably drew their influences from the cracks and crevices, from old 45s and rare LPs. They discovered Soft Machine and Love, Jackie Mittoo, and Anne Briggs. They chose Sparks over Queen, Blue Cheer over Cream, and The Left Banke over The Rolling Stones.

So, my attempt to reduce the scope of musical influence to five bands was a failed one. Plus, it gave me a headache (though it did prompt interesting discussions with some friends). If all bands sprung from the same few sources we would have only derivative sounds as opposed to inventive ones. It would be Wolfmother instead of Wolf Parade, Darkness instead of Lightning Bolt, and so forth and so on.

Though it would be strange if after much research it all boiled down to someone like Neil Diamond. Thankfully, it does not.

Enjoy your weekend.

2:18 AM ET | 02-22-2008 | permalink

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Cover Me

A few nights ago I went to see some friends play in a garage-rock cover band called The Shadow Mortons. They cover mostly obscure songs, familiar to those who own the Nuggets box sets or who have a vast and rare 7" collection. Garage Rock is a perfect genre to cover: blues riffs made dirtier and looser, Motown style drumming, girl group influenced choruses, and hooks galore. The Shadow Mortons went so far as to play the set twice and no one seemed to mind.

Between that show and the mention of George Harrison's "If Not For You" in a recent blog post, I've been mulling over the idea of cover tunes in my head.

There are covers that showcase a more obscure and theretofore relatively underground songwriter or band. From Nirvana shedding light on the strange simplicities of The Vaselines, to Spoon turning the Natural History's "Don't You Ever" into, well, a Spoon song, to Mudhoney's "D**ks Hate The Police" (by D**ks, of course). And it is trite but important to mention the innumerable blues artists who wrote the original songs that white artists turned into massive hits. In many of the above examples, the discovery of the original band or song serves as a clarification. I love "Molly's Lips" by Nirvana but it makes more sense that it wasn't written in that urgent, frenzied style. And hearing Big Mama Thornton's "Hound Dog" turned a somewhat cartoonish lyric into one that sounded like a line being drawn in the sand.

And what constitutes that subtle difference between a cover tune and merely a different version of a song? Is it only semantics? Is it when the song becomes better associated with someone other than the composer? Like when "Mr. Tambourine Man" became as much The Byrds' as it was Bob Dylan's. Or how "Blinded by The Light" seems to belong to Manfred Mann's Earth Band when it is actually a Bruce Springsteen song?

Often it is a relief to discover another version of a song. "Take it Easy", as made popular by the Eagles, sounds far superior and more earnest as a Jackson Browne song (who was the original writer of the song, though Glenn Frey finished some of the lyrics). Actually, popular Eagles songs often sound better when sung by someone other than a member of the band. "Desperado" is a song I can tolerate only when sung by a child on the Langley Schools Music Project album.

With some covers, I vacillate between the original and the cover in order to gain a broader understanding of the song. Certainly, Ike and Tina Turner's version of "Proud Mary" takes that song somewhere a more rustic John Fogerty never could. But to hear the original is to comprehend the provenance, and thus to appreciate even more what Ike and Tina found in that song--and how deep they dug into the lyrics and the music.

Often, the best covers are not done, but undone. The artist unravels the cohesion of the original song and reconfigures things only after making a small mess of it. Patti Smith's "Gloria" comes to mind, or the White Stripes "Jolene". These covers don't deny the original song, instead they exist as distant cousins to it, or as the black sheep. And when paired with the original, they create a striking duality--good/bad, light/dark. The most remarkable thing about these covers is that when they were released they sounded brand new, and that's about the biggest tribute one can pay to a song.

[To read more about cover songs, check out: Best Cover Tune Ever on the All Songs Considered Blog].

6:32 PM ET | 02-19-2008 | permalink

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Consider The Hickey

Our friends over at Day to Day did a great story on hickeys. You know, those badges of honor you wore on and off up until your mid-twenties? After age twenty-five or so, a hickey is more likely to look like a health scare than a remnant from a night of passion.

My first sight of a hickey was in jr. high. A guy came into English class and showed us all how his girlfriend had made a smiley face out of hickeys on his stomach. I can't imagine what that girl is doing now but I hope it involves her own vacuum business.

Anyhow, it's still Valentine's Day, so if you haven't gone out and purchased anything, or had time to make a mix CD, consider the hickey. Why settle for flowers when you can give, or get, a neck bouquet?

Here is the story from Day to Day. Enjoy.

6:25 PM ET | 02-14-2008 | permalink

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Let's Get It Wrong?

Valentine's Day is nearly upon us and many of us like to express our feelings with music. But just as there are rules to flowers and chocolates (carnations and white chocolate? I don't think so. Not unless the night will be ending on satin red sheets under a mirrored ceiling), so too are there guidelines for the mix CD.

Here then, are ways that Monitor Mix can help you achieve your Valentine's Day music goals.

1. Be prepared to back it up.

If you feel self-conscious about intimacy anywhere but in a bedroom, with the shades drawn and the lights off, then don't put "Love in an Elevator" by Aerosmith on the CD. And you shouldn't put Al Green's "I'm A Ram" on the mix if you're more like a lamb or a cuddly Golden Retriever puppy. This is what's called false advertising

2. Don't put a song on the CD that you would be embarrassed to listen to in the same room or car as the person whom you made it for.

There's nothing worse than that false sense of confidence as you lay down some dirty, sexy track on the mix. Sure, "Whole Lotta Love" seemed like a good idea at the time, but when the two of you are driving up the coast and he pops the CD into the car stereo, you don't want to have to avoid eye contact when Robert Plant starts moaning during the breakdown.

3. If the relationship is new, or you merely have a crush, go easy on the messages in the songs.

You don't want the recipient to feel like they're being pursued by a crazy person. "Ok, she wants to hold my hand, he is dating someone else but likes me, she wants to make out but is scared, he's a former meth addict with good intentions, he likes cats but is allergic, he is going mad with lust, she usually marries for money but has found true love with me", etc.

In the above instance, it is better to be flirtatious than direct. Try something like Neil Young's "Come on Baby Let's Go Downtown", "Work All Week" by The Mekons, or "Send Me A Postcard" by the Shocking Blue. And if you haven't yet said it in person, avoid songs that say "I love you" or "I think I'm in love with you" (see rule number 1).

4. Know the meaning behind the innuendo in songs.

"Pearl Necklace" by ZZ Top is really all I have to say about that one.

5. Don't be a cliche.

Yes, Juno is a great film. But that doesn't mean you have to be one of the millions of people putting the song "Anyone Else But You" on your mix this Valentine's Day. If you do that, you'll be just like the people who put "In Your Eyes" on a mix tape in 1989 when Say Anything came out, or those who wooed their lover with "Up Where We Belong" after seeing An Officer And A Gentlemen. Forge your own path!

6. If you've already sealed the deal--two, five, ten years ago--there's not too much to worry about.

Throw a few classics on there and call it a day. But it might be nice to just make a well rounded mix and to not pummel your significant other over the head with twenty ways of saying "I love you, I know I'm not as funny or attractive as I was when we met, but please don't ever leave."

7. Lastly, two songs that belong on any great February 14th mix:

"The Book Of Love" by the Magnetic Fields, and my personal favorite, "If Not For You" by George Harrison.

Happy Valentine's Day!

3:00 PM ET | 02-13-2008 | permalink

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My Night With The Grammys

A truncated dispatch from The Grammys:

The show starts with Frank Sinatra. My first thought is 'What year is this?' but then paired with Alicia Keys this turns out to be one of the least offensive dead-meets-living duets. And classic black & white footage of Sinatra is better (classier?) than a hologram.

Carrie Underwood takes the stage with a bunch of angry feminists bashing on cars. It's Stomp! meets Streets of Fire meets 9 to 5.

Morris Day and The Time. I wasn't expecting keytar so early in the show. Out of all the groups that could have reunited after 15 years, I don't know if The Time would have been at the top of my list. Just when a mirror comes out and I'm trying to recall what Disney movie it's all reminding me of, Rihanna steps in and saves the day.

More love for Canada than for The Band? The mention of our neighbors to the North garnered a bigger applause than the mention of Levon Helm. Ouch. I thought this was a music show.

The camera passes by Jeff Tweedy as Cindy Lauper and Miley Cyrus take the stage. My favorite part is when Miley Cyrus says (in reference to Lauper): "The woman standing next to me won 'Best New Artist' in 1985, which is amazing!" The way Cyrus puts the emphasis on the last part of the sentence makes it sound like she meant either , "wow, can you believe how old this lady is?", or "it's amazing she ever won". Then Cyrus goes on to let the audience know that Winehouse is Lauper's favorite among the nominees. Kids are awesome on live TV!!

Who is Taylor Swift?

Jason Batemen is in charge of bringing the Grammy's into the 21st Century. Viewers get to choose what young, talented classical musician gets to play along with the Foo Fighters in an orchestra conducted by John Paul Jones. Thankfully the writer's strike is over, otherwise this concept could have become its own reality TV show.

Fergie, no. Please stop singing.

Tina Turner looks and sounds amazing. Even the permanent look of surprise on her face courtesy of plastic surgery can't ruin this moment. I love the hints of gospel in "Better Be Good To Me", which are played up in the live version. It gets even better when Beyonce joins her for "Proud Mary".

I turn the channel and watch The Wire.

I think I missed Brad Paisley but I get to see Feist. After the Broadway-like productions of some of the other acts, it's refreshing to see a singer on stage with only a guitar. The moment comes across as brave, even though there are people doing this very thing every night. But not at The Grammys they're not.

Winehouse. It is strange to have such a heavily nominated artist perform from across the pond. The songs and the lyrics come across as alibis for her Grammy no-show.

Is that Josh Groban doing a tribute to Pavarotti? I switch the channel and don't look back.

Final thoughts: The Grammys are like if all the awards in a baking contest went to the frosting. Frosting deserves recognition, but it's only a small part of the cake.

3:01 AM ET | 02-11-2008 | permalink

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All Things Super

Holy Sh**, it' Super Tuesday!

And now, in honor of everything super, here is a list:

Super Annoying: First. In Portland, drivers slow down at green lights in anticipation of them turning yellow. Unless I am missing something, there is only a single shade of green in a traffic light. It isn't a J.Crew catalog. Before turning yellow, green does not fade, or give off a warning message--"Hey I'm about to change, thanks for looking!!--it just goes away.

Second. People who wait until their groceries have been rung up to swipe their ATM card. Unless you are a first time user (in which case there should be a special line, or a seminar), everyone knows that you can begin the debit card process immediately after your first item is scanned. There is no need to treat a debit card like cash, wherein you wait for the total and then fumble with bills and try to make exact change. The whole point of using your debit card is to orchestrate the purchase so that your receipt is spit out at the very same time your last item goes in the bag. At least, that's what I always thought.

Super Promising: That Mitchell and Webb Look on BBC America. The show premiers Friday in the States and I'm hoping the humor will be on par with other British and Irish comedy exports. The Office might be my favorite among the more recent shows, but my first love was Father Ted. If you haven't witnessed life on Craggy Island, you are missing out. Actor Dermot Morgan is sorely missed.

Super Tramp: There are plenty of bands with "super" in the name: Superchunk, Super Furry Animals, Supersuckers, to name a few. But Supertramp came first. And if you listen to any classic rock station, you know that this band refuses to go away. Plus, their original band name was Daddy, which is so gross it's almost cool. No, not cool, just gross. Incidentally, I'm glad I came of age in a time when we no longer use the term "daddy" to refer to boyfriends. I love Fleetwood Mac's Rumours, but I cannot stand Christine McVie's "Oh Daddy". Yet put the word "sugar" or "mac" in front of "daddy" and it somehow seems less offensive.

Super Group: Why do these usually go wrong? Asia? Velvet Revolver? Power Station? Mike & The Mechanics? Zwan? It just goes to show that great music is not a mathematical equation. You can't put Hendrix, Bonham, and Joplin together and automatically get the greatest band to ever live. And even though I'd love to see Jack White play with Zach Hill from Hella, that combination might not be magic either. Chemistry cannot be understated. There are a few notable exceptions to the ill-fated super groups: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Temple of the Dog (my Northwest bias), and any group of musicians that Damon Albarn assembles, namely Gorillaz and The Good, The Bad, & The Queen.

As for Super Tuesday, here in Oregon, there is little to do but sit back and watch. But some of you must be in one of the 24 states voting today. So.....what are your thoughts and who did you vote for?

2:43 PM ET | 02- 5-2008 | permalink

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Giant

The Super Bowl is a uniquely American event. But this year it felt more symbolically American than other championship games in recent memory. It wasn't merely two teams competing, but also two American ideals pitted against each other: Perfection, as embodied by The New England Patriots; and overcoming doubts and obstacles to achieve greatness, as exemplified by The New York Giants. As much as we strive for, or claim to exalt, perfection, it was interesting how many people, including myself, were hoping for an upset by the Giants, for them to mar an otherwise flawless season by the Patriots.

Within this context--a battle between grit and glamor--Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers were the ideal Super Bowl half time performers. There was little that Fox or the producers could do to super size or glamorize the performance. No amount of lights or camera trickery could produce action that wasn't there. Petty is no spectacle. He and his band looked like dads dressed up at their daughter's wedding. Petty played some of his best-known songs, from "American Girl" to "I Won't Back Down". The delivery was staid and earnest, with very little flash. The drama and movement of Petty's songs have always been in the lyrics themselves, or in the stripping down of the excess, the sudden emphasis on a perfectly constructed chord progression. "American Girl" sounds like it could have been written in recent years. (It almost was, by The Strokes on their debut album.). And "Free Fallin", a meditation on life, love, and loss, was sung by tens of thousands in the crowd. It was a more heartfelt moment of togetherness than the one conjured by American Idol's Jordin Spark's delivery of our national anthem.

Tom Petty came of age when the earnestness in music was beginning to wane, when disco, glam rock, mythic tales, and pretty boys were all the rage. What Petty's albums lacked in high concept they made up for in structure and solidity. With his modest looks and without gimmicks: no monsters to tame or to slay, no superfluousness at all really, he and his band made records that have outlasted his more outlandish peers. Springsteen is the other survivor from that era. But while Springsteen is a street preacher, with always an air of sacredness and rage to his songs, Petty is more of a street sweeper. His songs speak of what's been left behind or used up, and they put a polish on what we thought to be dull and dreary. His best songs are bursts of possibility born from dinginess, from nothingness; the guitars jangle, the choruses lift you up, and all the while Petty's voice is there to keep things earthbound.

Not many musicians can say that their tour started at the Super Bowl. Beginning yesterday in Glendale, Petty and his band will traverse across the US on and off until August, playing multiple nights at stadiums and amphitheaters. Maybe so many people love Tom Petty because he, like The Giants, is an underdog. With millions of records sold, he may not seem like one; but if you listen, his songs tell a different story.

2:25 AM ET | 02- 4-2008 | permalink

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