LCD Soundsystem - LCD Soundsystem (2005)

the first track on each of the album's two discs references Daft Punk. of course this is a great album.



this is one of the few albums (up there with the White Album, Drukqs, etc.) that i think truly deserves to be two discs long. like the Beatles and Aphex Twin, James Murphy (he basically is LCD Soundsystem) just had too many things to do. the Beatles wanted to do surf rock, punk rock, folk rock, and even weird sound experiments. Richard D. James wanted drum & bass, eerie minimal piano pieces, ambient techno, and even a 30-second sample of his parents wishing him a happy birthday.

what does Murphy want? he wants to make you dance. there's slow stuff, fast stuff, soft stuff, hard stuff. something for everyone, as long as everyone likes to dance. an acid disco garage house pop psychedelic punk rock medley, LCD Soundsystem's debut/self-titled album is an electronic dance music masterpiece, still the best LCD five years later.

i'm not going to say anything about the music though. i'm not really going to say much anything actually. i just want to share some of this album's amazing lyrics, usually the least important factor of any music to me.

i'm really easy to please lyrics-wise. you can repeat "ooh baby the music sounds better with you, love might bring us back together" for seven minutes and i'll be in ecstasy. this doesn't mean i can't tell the difference between that kind of trite (though strangely elegant) couplet and, say, the poetry of Bob Dylan.

Murphy's lyrics fall everywhere between the two extremes. the lyrics for the song "Yeah" are pretty much just "yeah yeah yeah yeahyeahyeahyeah yeah. yeah hey hey hey hey" and "everybody keeps on talking about, no one's getting it done" (what the fuck is it?). the first track gets a little more complex. here's the first verse:

well Daft Punk is playing at my house, at my house
i'll show you the ropes, kid, show you the ropes
i got a bus and a trailer at my house, at my house
i'll show you the ropes, kid, show you the ropes

it's a song about Daft Punk playing at his house. what more would you expect? you gotta PA the house, Sarah's girlfriend is working the door, the robots descend from the bus, etc. etc. oh yeah Murphy loves singing about music, though he usually takes it a step further:

beats on repeat, beating on me
from every car in the street
there's constant repeat on repeat
of your paranoid, heartbreaking beats
on repeat

it's a five song repeat, beating on me
your favorite band helps you sleep
and here comes the new stylish creep
from every car in the street
on repeat
on repeat

.
.
.

i wish i could complain more about the rich but then
all their children would line the streets,
come to every show,
no one wants that

i wish i could complain more about the rich but then
all their children would flee the schools,
come to every show,
drugged and unwashed

i wish i could complain more about the rich but then
all their children would line the streets,
come to every show,
unwashed and drugged and
beats on repeat, beating on me
on the radio
on your radio
on your radio

music about music! "Daft Punk is Playing at My House," "On Repeat," "Disco Infiltrator," "Beat Connection," LCD Soundsystem is all about dancing yourself clean and being hyperaware of it.

the best example of Murphy's clever lyrics and super self-conscious irony comes on the first track of the second disc, "Losing My Edge." the song starts with a miminal thumping bass line backed by a couple snares and hi-hats. then comes Murphy's nasally singing. then come more hi-hats and a little flickering guitar. the vocals start whacking out, echoing like there are two James Murphys in the room. the guitar starts creaking like an electronic insect, still minimal. when we hit around 2.5 minutes, cymbals crash announcing a less restrained, more potent bassline, still playing the same old minimal phrase though. it won't stop until the song ends. the drums pick up a little more. the guitar gets a little whackier. slowly, always slowly building to a paranoid, anxiety-ridden, frustrated cry for help at the end: "look at all the good music i know!" here are the lyrics, in full:

yeah, i'm losing my edge.
i'm losing my edge.
the kids are coming up from behind.
i'm losing my edge.
i'm losing my edge to the kids from France and from London.
but i was there.

i was there in 1968.
i was there at the first Can show in Cologne.
i'm losing my edge.
i'm losing my edge to the kids whose footsteps i hear when they get on the decks.
i'm losing my edge to the Internet seekers who can tell me every member of every good group from 1962 to 1978.
i'm losing my edge.

to all the kids in Tokyo and Berlin.
i'm losing my edge to the art-school Brooklynites in little jackets and borrowed nostalgia for the unremembered eighties.

but i'm losing my edge.
i'm losing my edge, but i was there.
i was there.
but i was there.

i'm losing my edge.
i'm losing my edge.
i can hear the footsteps every night on the decks.
but i was there.
i was there in 1974 at the first Suicide practices in a loft in New York City.
i was working on the organ sounds with much patience.
i was there when Captain Beefheart started up his first band.
i told him, "don't do it that way. you'll never make a dime."
i was there.
i was the first guy playing Daft Punk to the rock kids.
i played it at CBGB's.
everybody thought i was crazy.
we all know.
i was there.
i was there.
i've never been wrong.

i used to work in the record store.
i had everything before anyone.
i was there in the Paradise Garage DJ booth with Larry Levan.
i was there in Jamaica during the great sound clashes.
i woke up naked on the beach in Ibiza in 1988.

but i'm losing my edge to better-looking people with better ideas and more talent.
and they're actually really, really nice.

i'm losing my edge.

i heard you have a compilation of every good song ever done by anybody.
every great song by the Beach Boys.
all the underground hits.
all the Modern Lovers tracks.
i heard you have a vinyl of every Niagra record on German import.
i heard that you have a white label of every seminal Detroit techno hit - 1985, '86, '87.
i heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '60s cut and another box set from the '70s.
i hear you're buying a synthesizer and an arpeggiator and are throwing your computer out the window because you want to make something real.
you want to make a Yaz record.
i hear that you and your band have sold your guitars and bought turntables.
i hear that you and your band have sold your turntables and bought guitars.
i hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that i know.

But have you seen my records? This Heat, Pere Ubu, Outsiders, Nation of Ulysses, Mars, The Trojans, The Black Dice, Todd Terry, the Germs, Section 25, Althea and Donna, Sexual Harrassment, a-ha, Pere Ubu, Dorothy Ashby, PIL, the Fania All-Stars, the Bar-Kays, the Human League, the Normal, Lou Reed, Scott Walker, Monks, Niagra, Joy Division, Lower 48, the Association, Sun Ra, Scientists, Royal Trux, 10cc, Eric B. and Rakim, Index, Basic Channel, Soulsonic Force ("just hit me"!), Juan Atkins, David Axelrod, Electric Prunes, Gil! Scott! Heron!, the Slits, Faust, Mantronix, Pharaoh Sanders and the Fire Engines, the Swans, the Soft Cell, the Sonics, the Sonics, the Sonics, the Sonics.

you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.
you don't know what you really want.

i know i want to listen to every one of those artists now.

Thee Oh Sees: Live

they certainly have some sick albums, eps, singles, etc, but make no mistake: Thee Oh Sees is a band best served live.



i spent my last two nights seeing them: the first, at a dirty garage show in Los Angeles, and the second, at a tiny classroom trailer on UC Irvine's campus.

jumping, headbanging, sweat, pushing, pulling, falling, rising, spinning, turning, punching, being, being, being, being: it's better than ice cream and liquor.

every time i've seen them, they open the set with Enemy Destruct, the first track off of Help. of course, it's considerably sped up and, like a firecracker, the previously still pond of people leaps into a torrent of raging rock & roll-induced madness.

their songs, though bursts, just explosions of energy that don't last very long, make up for their shortness in sheer intensity. when you're gasping for air and limb a minute in, you're happy to be able to breathe when they finish at minute two. that said, i have yet to see them live without experiencing one of their songs drawn out to its extremities, stretched minutes upon minutes into infinity, a brutal chant of rhythm and melody that possesses your feet, makes you think it's punk rock disco night across the universe.

the rest of the band fucking rocks, but it's clear that the lead guitarist, John Dwyer, is the general in this war. like a sun, all our energy we owe to him. and, like a good military superior, he's always dicking around. whether eating his microphone like in the above photo, forcing the head of his guitar into the ground, or hopping like an lsd leprechaun, Dwyer attracts all eyes in the room. (that is, if you don't have hair or fists in your face already.) at one point last night, he shoved his microphone against the head of one of the drummer's toms and started guitar-humping the amp to draw as much fucked up feedback from it as possible. keep in mind, this is halfway through a 10-minute epic of a jam whose only recognizable lyric (to me) is "all you need is the summertime oh oh," repeated over and over. eventually Dwyer gave up (or was fulfilled) and the drummer somehow mustered up the energy to bust out some cracked out drum solo that had one kid in front of me convulsing until he collapsed on the floor, where he continued to shake his arms, legs, and head anyway.

this band is why i have long hair.

Person Pitch - Panda Bear (2007)

the album starts with the sound of a goddamn rollercoaster.

a rollercoaster! the machine which gave you the greatest highs you could ever imagine when you were 10, 15, 30 years old! you ascend into the clouds where a pulsing chant embraces you, and a singer steps out of the chorus to tell you to "always have a good time." and you listen! you tap along, stomp along, sing along, whistle along, walk along, and dance along until jet after jet after jet zooms by until suddenly the darkness engulfs you, and you wonder.

i don't want to write about this album.

there are just some things that can't be converted into words. when you try, your mind turns to sludge, your typing goes all wrong, and the words on the screen reflect that. you start typing things like "it sounds like running through a meadow towards a scarecrow except the meadow is made of brain tissue and the scarecrow is a rainbow unicorn" or "it sounds like if birds had teeth and lizards had wings" or "it sounds like if all the strongest people in the world started living in trees, only coming out to eat squirrels" or "it sounds like purple dipped in cream dipped in fur dipped in girl dipped in music dipped in mind."

the alternative?

i don't know, get stoned? buy a good pair of headphones? when you wake up in the morning, listen to your alarm? hear the rain? listen to the difference between a plate and a bowl? listen to the people talking to you? (just don't listen too closely, or you might not understand what they're saying.)

"hey man what's your problem don't you know that i don't belong to you"

no, you don't. you don't belong to anybody. you're a 12-and-a-half minute composition that escapes on the wings of an owl, you've got the turnpike on your side, trucks zoom past but you laugh because you don't need a ride, you're crying because you're leaving but you know it's the right decision.

what does it mean to not be able to hear a common phrase, such as "i'm not," without singing?

"ready?"

"what?"

"nevermind."

i once read a review that said this song sounded like an Amazonian tribe perform their chants while under the influence of LSD. how stupid. it's just Noah Lennox clicking buttons on a computer. the fucking magic! in his own words, he gave the computer a soul! us humans are all about soul but i don't know what we'll do once computers have them. in other words, i'm not ready.

all of a sudden i'm supposed to enjoy a fast tempo? well, okay. chant me into submission. submit me into chanting. you're getting water everywhere. i may be marine but i might not be me, and it turns out that "/" means i'm not.

"it's not a ticket for you to pick at other people who don't know what's up like you're so sure you do"

ouch.

eventually the ice cream will come around; you can heal your wound and eat neapolitan simultaneously. what's the difference?

tigers, gorillas, seals, koalas, panda bears, and little kids. the artist knows the music.



when my soul starts growing
when my soul starts growing
when my soul starts growing

a
aa
and

i wish
i wish
i know

stop
stop
stop

and here you were, expecting something epic.

it's funny reading reviews of this album because each one of them rings so true while at the same time only capturing one facet of the whole:

"Starting an album with a clattering of industrial rhythms sliding into a huge clap-and-stompalong with angelic vocals and what sounds like the Brotherhood of Man on a vocal loop tip not far removed from Suicide or Laurie Anderson is one way to make a mark." -- allmusic

"Sometimes ominous, sometimes celebratory, always compelling, Person Pitch is as clattering and tactile as a beaded curtain." -- The Onion

"Person Pitch as a whole-- and "Bros" in particular-- evokes the sunshine of Lennox's adopted Lisbon, Portugal home. But it's the kind of light best experienced with eyes closed-- with the rays filtered through eyelids, turning the world into various shades of red and orange." -- Pitchfork

"For an album constructed from so many constituent parts, Person Pitch is amazingly warm and inviting at times, wrapping around the ears, nestling the head, and squeezing like a nice familial bear hug after years of no contact." -- Tiny Mix Tapes

"Person Pitch sounds like everything. To some, the upstroked guitars and vocal stacking in “Take Pills” make it a consummate summer record. To others, the city clacks and tracks, the sampled noise and confusion make it a winter record, the kind of thing you curl up with in front of a frosty window in order to be reminded that something exists beneath the snow." -- Aquarium Drunkard

"Person Pitch sounds like everything."
"Person Pitch sounds like everything."
"Person Pitch sounds like everything."
"Person Pitch sounds like everything."
"Person Pitch sounds like everything."

download or buy.

1967

January 4


February 1


March 12


May 12


June 1


August 5


November 27


December 1

Banshee Beat - Animal Collective (2005)

i don't know what it is. that's probably a good starting point.

if there are such things as favorites, this is my favorite Animal Collective song. if you know what the sublime is, this song is it.

and no, it's not just because it's one of the band's longest songs. it has to do with how this song FEELS.

i'm trying to be eloquent about this, but it's coming out terse.

how fitting, i continue, that it comes to how this song FEELS, because that's the name of the album you find it on. this whole song just FEELS good. it FEELS like head nodding. it FEELS like dancing, swimming, climbing, loving. it makes me want to stretch my arms out, kiss the Earth, hug the solar system, and inhale the whole universe like a delicious sea breeze. you couldn't take enough bong rips to FEEL the way this song makes you FEEL. i want to mail a letter to the President asking him to listen to this song. i want to ask you to listen to this song because i want you to tell me if it's even remotely possible to experience happiness without sadness. i want you to tell me if it's possible to love without feeling a chill run down your spine. can you hug the solar system without burning your belly button?

'Banshee Beat' FEELS like life. 'Banshee Beat' is life. it's sublime.

it doesn't start with a wailing, panning guitar or tribal drumming or a wave of distortion or dazzling, psychedelic strings... no, no, no, it starts with a whisper of a strum. reverberating whispers of strums. crackling.

a man's voice. also reverberated. a hint at a piano. reverberated.

guitars coming from all sides now. whispering. walking past us talking about something. piano tones growing and dying. crackling. crickets. chirping. crackling

the man's voice stops and something starts happening. the crackling, chirping, strumming, ripping, tapping, all that noise grows in intensity. it gets braver. it approaches you, face to face.

the guitars sidle this way and that. and the voice comes back.

a booming bass drum.

every line he sings = every chill i feel.

So I duck out, go down to find the SWIMMING POOL
Hop a fence, leave the street and wet your feet to find the swimming pool
Cause when I'm snuffed out I doubt I'll find a SWIMMING POOL
Hop a fence, leave the street and wet your feet to find the swimming pool

every line he sings = every chill i feel.

the rhythms by now are at full speed, the guitar is strumming along lazily down its own reverberated river, ah ah ah ah.

every line he sings = every chill i feel.

So I duck out, go down to find the SWIMMING POOL
Hop a fence, leave the street, and wet your feet to find the swimming pool
'Cause when I'm snuffed out I doubt I'll find a SWIMMING POOL
Hop a fence, leave the street, and wet your feet to find the swimming pool

every line he sings = every chill i feel.

cue monkey sounds.

listen. download. buy.

The Beatles

today Apple and EMI are releasing two box sets: The Beatles Stereo Box Set and The Beatles in Mono, two epic compilations of remastered stereo and mono recordings of the complete Beatles studio catalog. beautiful. to mark my renewed obsession (sparked by both the box sets and also by seeing the Cirque du Soleil show LOVE in Las Vegas with Adam), i'm making this little post, which falls back on a classic six stars strategy: speechlessness at sheer musical genius.

Spacemen 3 - Taking Drugs to Make Music To Take Drugs To (original release: 1990)

This album makes me feel good.

Enough rock.

Enough feedback.

Hard enough.

Soft enough.

Slow enough.

Long enough.

Monolithic drums.

Dry feedback from the same riff over and over.

Spaced out, drowning vocals.

And textures.

I constantly find myself turning to this album especially when I can't listen to anything else.

In a way, I guess you can call this one of my comfort albums; an album you can turn to any time and feel fine.

Help - Thee Oh Sees (2009)

okay. i admit it. i'm obsessed with this album, not just the album art:



originally, i simply wrote, "another quick, short post. what i imagine when i think about good and fun psychedelic rock: a purple smiling bat that can magically make rainbow arcs squiggle."

i tried to reduce my love for this album to its album art. let me try again: in less than a month, this has become one of my favorite albums of the year.

it's grungy. it's one of the dirtiest albums i've listened to in a long time. the drums are simple, but they provide a perfect backbone to the swampy, distorted humming of the guitar. i can't tell if the vocals have tons of effects put on them, or this guy just sings like a maniac, but i'm at last sure the reverb is out of control. it's like he's singing for a football stadium inside a garage. which brings me to my next point.

it's psychedelic. this guy sings like a retarded angel shaman, or something. i don't know how else to describe it. his voice is high-pitched and harmonious and wonderful, but it's also kind of whiny and just plain weird. beyond the vocals, this will FEEL just like good old rock & roll, nothing psychedelic at all. and yet, there is something in the sound that i think you will find makes it teem with rainbow sparkles and talking purple bats coming out of walls.

it's fun. all i want to do when i listen to this record is get off my goddamn chair and jump around. it's not particularly danceable, it's not what you'd call headbanging music, but i can't stop myself from dancing and headbanging to it.

ambiguous descriptions of a few tracks (which can all be listened to fully and freely here):

electric guitar and bass guitar wind, wind, wind, wind in the first three seconds and then, suddenly, the album blasts off with "Enemy Destruct." drums splashing, maybe some tambourine, and the singing comes in, trippy, like we just got dropped off on the peak of an acid trip.

the second song, "Ruby Go Home," is my favorite on the album, but i don't know why. it starts off relatively simply, with some basic guitar riff, basic drum thrashing, etc etc. the verse involves all sorts of nonsense and the phrase "ruby go home!" the chorus involves a bunch of oh!s and "ruby go home!" the bridge involves repetition of "ruby go home!" there's nothing inherently special about this song. but the band sinks into this moment, this glowing red moment, and they just feel it. they sit there and rock and rock and rock. the moment doesn't end. the guitarist starts fucking around a little bit, nothing fancy, nothing to suck us out of the moment, nothing extraordinary, just more rocking out. and it's catchy, too.

what the hell is that sound at the beginning of "Meat Step Lively?" i have no fucking clue, but it sounds like a baby guitar crying. more rocking out, more living in the moment. except halfway through this one, a wind instrument comes out of nowhere. somebody's blowing on a flute or something, transforming what just sounded like acid-tripped-out Kinks into the pop version of King Crimson or something.

the sixth track, "Can You See," definitely reminds me of something i've heard before. the way it swings back and forth like a pendulum. no, more like a crowd at a show. it's like swaying, not swinging. the bass does it. do do do.......do...do do do......do... and so on.

unfortunately, (for me) the album sort of tapers off towards the middle after an explosive first half, barring one song:

"Destroyed Fortress Reappears" is my second favorite song on the album. this is where the vocal reverbs go nuts. for five minutes he just chants like a high priest over this snare drum march and simple bass/guitar strumming, highlighted with this awfully catchy hook every so often.

i'll admit. the first time i listened to this record i was baked out of mind. i was sitting on a couch in my friend's apartment in the mission, facing one of two tower speakers bellowing out the cool tunes. i really couldn't speak, but i periodically checked with other people to make sure they thought the music we were listening to was as good as i kept thinking. i think i downloaded it the next day.

then a few weeks later, a couple days ago, i went to a bar to see them live for $7. seven bucks! well, not counting beers. but the show was outstanding. short, maybe. but they've only got two albums and each one is full of 1-3min tracks. i expected people to enjoy the show but not rock the fuck out like they did. we were practically moshing. they played "Ruby Go Home" thank god. and i'm pretty damn sure they played it twice as long, illustrating my point that the band has found an inescapably savory moment in that song.

this is good fucking rock & roll, plain and simple.

listen to whole thing here.