no you can't have a new favorite band (not yours)

Why aren't more people talking about New Young Pony Club?

The uninitiated should hypemachine (new verb):
Ice Cream
The Bomb

remember "cotton eye joe"?

This is the best record review I've read in a while.

when i download music, it makes me dance

Not to toot my own horn or anything, but this blog has once again proven to be its very own psychic friends network. Remember when I discussed that Freestyle digital archive organization? Well, it's here... in blog form!

The teaser site for the new Arcade Fire album features the creepiest succession of images I've seen since the good old Twin Peaks days. My interest is somehow even more piqued to hear what they put out next. Now excuse me while I go have nightmares for years.

The Irrefutable List of Things That I Liked in 2006:

Albums:

Herbert - Scale
TV on the Radio - Return to Cookie Mountain
Francois K - Frequencies
Josh Wink - Profound Sounds 3
John Digweed - Transitions
Lupe Fiasco - Food and Liquor
Mylo - Destroy Rock and Roll
Beck - The Information

Singles (Pop):

Timbaland featuring Justin Timberlake - Sexy Back/My Love
Timbaland featuring Nelly Furtado - Maneater/Say it Right/Promiscuous
Lupe Fiasco - Kick Push
The Rapture - Get Myself Into It
The Gossip - Standing in the Way of Control
TV on the Radio - Wolf Like Me
Hot Chip - Over and Over
Gnarls Barkley - Crazy
Fergie - Fergalicious
Jay Z - Lost One
Beyonce - Check On It
Thom Yorke - Harrowdown Hill

Singles (House and Techno):

Paul Woolford - Erotic Discourse
Mr. G - ECG'Ed (Rekid Remix)
Ame - Engoli
Rocco - Roots 4 Acid
Every - Feelin'
Hardfloor - T2DAC (Claro Intelcto remix)
Nathan Fake - The Sky Was Pink (Holden remix)

Trends That Need To Frackin' Stop in 2007:
-The popularity of boring, growly post-grunge junk (Nickelback, Hinder, that guy that didn't win American Idol)
-Southern hip-hop (with very, very few exceptions)
-The comeback of Weird Al Yankovich (he not teh funny)
-The continued shutting down of New York's nightclubs

I'm kinda saddened by the closing of Tower Records. This will probably shock and amaze everyone that knows me, but back when I was young and not at work 24 hours a day, I could spend hours and hours browsing the racks and listening stations at Tower Records. Growing up in suburbia, having a music store open until midnight on Sunday was a godsend, and Tower was the only place you could find imports and indie records. Of course, the internet has changed everything, and instead of looking at a new band's CD and wondering what they sound like, we can go online and find out immediately (that's a good thing - this would have saved me thousands of dollars years ago*).

I wonder what the corner of 4th and Broadway is going to feel like without Tower there. When I was a teenager first learning my way around the village, this was one of my major landmarks I used to orient myself. Please let it not be another Jamba Juice!

* OK, I'm exaggerating

My iPod broke. Again. My last one puttered out after 2 years and 3 months. This one lasted a whopping one year and three months. Apple has officially made the crappiest product ever that I can't live without.

So, yesterday I came across these videos of Madonna at Coachella and I was like "woah, it would have been amazing to see that show right up next to the stage." Little did I know that these videos were imbedded with subliminal images that would cause me to dream about seeing Madonna perform live in my high school gym. In my dream she performed her heart out even though there were only a few people in the audience, but her show was so inspiring and awesome that we all started rollerskating around the gym like experts, doing stunts that would make the guys from Jackass proud.

Oh, but back to the concert clips. Watching these makes me realize why concert videos are so boring - so much of the excitement of seeing an artist perform live comes from the fact that everyone around you at the concert is absolutely flipping out. When the camera is right next to the stage the sound from the audience becomes an anonymous wave of woos and yeahs. I'd like to see more concert footage from the audience perspective, so that you can really hear people screaming, you can hear that really excited guy behind you go "oh my God!" at the beginning of every song, and the guy next to him scream every single word to every single song until he loses his voice half way through the show.

Besides affecting my subconscious and informing a critique of concert footage, these clips also made me realize how much less I sing along to music nowadays. With most of my music listening being either on the subway or in my office, I can't exactly belt it out like I used to driving in my car or in my room studying. No wonder I've been dying to go out to a karaoke party for ages!

Who knew?

"99 Luftballons" is a Cold-War era protest song that tells the story of 99 red balloons floating into the air, triggering an apocalypse when the military sends planes to intercept them.

And you thought it just had a snazzy keyboard riff.

I go through odd musical phases sometimes. For some reason, lately, I've really been feeling freestyle (well, it's probably because I've been listening to the classic dance station all day at work that plays way too many ballads). Not freestyle as in MCs rhyming off the top of their heads, I mean that odd post-disco stuff from the 80's. It's a form of music that's totally ripped on by house and techno purists (myself included), but damn if there weren't some gems from this era. It's also fun picking up on stuff that flew right over my head when I was a kid, like how Coro's "Fallen Angel" samples Kraftwerk's "Numbers" (how's that for street cred, yo?).

As with most music on now defunct independent labels, the bulk of this stuff is currently unavailable for purchase or download, and I can't help but feel that there will be some sort of organization created within the next few years that will preserve (by digitally cataloging) much of this stuff, as well as early house, techno, and rave (for a good laugh, of course). I'm sure I have Lisette Melendez' "Together Forever" in mint condition somewhere (you really must watch the video).

And no, I have no idea why it's called "freestyle". Yeah, it really doesn't make any sense.

The Village Voice has a pretty darn tootin' hilarious play by play review of last night's Grammy awards. I tuned in 3 minutes late, and just caught Madonna's performance. I then spent the next 3 and a half hours waiting to see the Gorillaz' performance, only to find out at the end of the show that I had missed them by tuning in three minutes late. Oh well, that's what the internet is for, I suppose.

Their Pazz and Jop poll of the year's top albums and singles is out as well. I generally hold this list in higher regard than the other year end lists that come flooding around come mid-December, but I'm a bit disappointed by how indie leaning the albums list is. I'm just not all that convinced that anybody is going to care about Spoon in five years.

So, in the spirit of useless lists, and since I caught so much flack for last year's country club unfriendly list, here's what got the most airtime on my iPod this year.

Albums:
Kanye West:Late Registration - Anyone who can make a half blazing, half touching album, and then publicly speak out against homophobia in hip-hop gets two thumbs up in my book.
Madonna:Confessions of a Dancefloor - Amazingly enough, some of the best dance music I heard this year. Props to her for getting a filter breakdown on MTV.
Gorillaz:Demon Days - Music this eclectic and leftfield isn't supposed to be this popular.
Common:Be - Finally, a Common album that doesn't put you to sleep.
The Arcade Fire:Funeral - Yeah, I'm a year late.
Herbert:Bodily Functions - Yeah, I'm five years late.
Richie Hawtin:DE9 Transitions - Minimal seems to be the only thing preventing clubland from becoming an electro dumping ground. Electro must die a bloody death in '06 (please!).
M.I.A.:Arular - Like crack and red bull, great in small doses.
Depeche Mode:Playing the Angel - Is it safe to add Exciter to my used-CD-store-trade-in-pile now?

Singles:
Madonna-Hung Up
Gwen Stefani-Hollaback Girl
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah-The Skin of my Country Yellow Teeth
Ciara-1, 2 Step
Cam'ron feat. Kanye West and Syleena Johnston-Down and Out
Amerie-1 Thing
The Killers-Mr. Brightside (Thin White Duke Mix)
The Game-Hate It Or Love It
Jennifer Lopez-Get Right
Sizequeen-Tribal Madness
Lindstrom-I Feel Space
Gorillaz-Feel Good Inc.

...and now a word from our sponsor.

So, basically, everyone is so in love with their iPods that they can't bring themselves to state the obvious.

Those earbuds suck.

They don't sit in your ear well, have to be dangerously loud for you to hear anything, and I think a tin can could provide more bass.

At this point enters the best fourteen dollars you will ever spend. They sit in your ear and actually cancel out a good portion of the nails-on-chalkboard squeaky subway breaks. But, the sound, my god the sound! With the volume set to only 50% you still feel like you are in your living room listening to your home stereo. Everything sounds so much warmer, and bass is very well represented without the distortion and clipping from Apple's earbuds.

Kicking Apple's earbuds to the curb - it's a good thing.

I was able to really test out the Rhapsody service this weekend as I churned out spreadsheet after spreadsheet. Side note - did I mention next week is my last week for school? Anyway, I'm in heaven. Any service that lets you stream the entire Depeche Mode discography (every mini-e.p. and single ever released is on there) one second and then stream the all 16 glorious minutes of the original 12" version of Donna Summer's "Love to Love you Baby" next gets seventeen thumbs up in my book.

I got to check out the entire catalog of two artists I've been meaning to check out for a while - Sergio Mendes and Vince Guaraldi. Sergio Mendez is the bossa nova king, and after a couple of his albums I felt at peace with the earth and I was dying for a good martini. Vince Guaraldi is perhaps best known for providing the music for the Charlie Brown Christmas Special. His stuff is amazing as well.

The service is not without its snags, though. The house and techno offerings are severely limited. There's hardly anything there (e.g. not even Richie Hawtin), and although Orbital's catalog is on there for some reason the original version of "Chime" is absent. Also, the service completely crashed Firefox twice (which, knowing Firefox, may not be Rhapsody's fault).

The next step is dedicating a computer for the living room to stream this stuff through the stereo.

OK, so after hearing some glowing reviews, I've just subscribed to Rhapsody. Basically, you pay 10 bucks a month for the ability to stream 1.3 million songs a month. No downloading of files- you are basically renting access to their library. It's kind of an odd concept to get used to, but the first hour you're on board you're like a kid in a candy store. The selection is impressive. For example, the following artist seem to be very well represented:

-Tom Waits
-John Coltrane
-Miles Davis
-Fela Kuti
-Pavement
-Kraftwerk
-Ibrahim Ferrer
-Pet Shop Boys
-Neutral Milk Hotel
-Franz Ferdinand
-Cocteau Twins

So, there's a lot to explore beyond the usual chart-toppers. I didn't delve into the hip-hop selection too much yet, and as expected the house and techno offerings were mainly limited to the larger labels such as Astralwerks, V2 and FFRR (are they still around?). Still, it's amazing to be able to hear almost anything you want instantly, I'll be able to check out artists I've been meaning to try for years, and it works on my PC at work so I am no longer dependant on the radio. Now, let's see how long this service lasts.

It never fails. Every winter John Lennon's "Happy Christmas" gives me the chills like I'm hearing it for the first time.

It annoys the crap out of a lot of people, but I'll be damned if there ain't no music like Christmas music.

The new Depeche Mode is about 30,000 times better than Exciter, with a refreshing return to a more synthesizer driven sound slightly reminiscent of Violator and Music for the Masses. Unfortunately, it lacks the sweeping dramatics and beauty of those classics. It's definitely worth picking up, but don't expect to hear anything as timeless as "Enjoy the Silence" or "Blue Dress."

If you like the Arcade Fire, check out "Cold Wind" from the Six Feet Under soundtrack. Just lovely.

Hmmm, ten songs I'm totally into right now:

- Robert Owens : I'll Be Your Friend (an old house classic, heard it in Miami a couple weeks ago and it sounded so fresh)
- Depeche Mode : Never Let Me Down
- The New Radicals : You Get What You Give
- Kanye West : Gold Digger
- The Game : Dreams
- Gorillaz : Feel Good Inc.
- Joey Beltram : Energy Flash
- Armand Van Helden : Flowerz
- Orbital : Halcyon + On + On
- Chic : Dance, Dance, Dance (Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah)

I hereby tag Phyllis Gabor and Loneliness is Pornography

Much is being said about the closing of CBGBs, I think it's time for the place to go. The longer it stays open, the more images of its heydey in the late seventies are tarnished.

Just a few blocks down from CBGBs on the Bowery, though, another NYC establishment is closing its doors too. Satellite Records will soon be no more as well, at least in brick and mortar form.

After I bit the bullet and dropped the cash for my Technics 1200-MK2s, I asked my favorite DJ where he got his shit from, because it certainly wasn't at the stores I was going to. Prophetically and with angels flying around his head, he said "Go to Satellite, ask for so and so, and you'll be on your way."

I spent years digging through the piles and piles of vinyl contained within, searching for the secret weapons I'd heard the Friday before. I quickly learned to branch out from the standard Hard and Tribal House sections, into Tech House, Progressive House, Deep Trance, Minimal Techno, and the billions of other sub-genres, searching for the perfect loop. It was incredibly intimidating at first to stare at the walls and walls of underground stuff from all over the world, but pretty soon I was just grabbing everything and plowing through it on the listening stations, pitching down the hard german techno from 160 to 125 bpms to see how it sounded.

You can't imagine how much horrible horrible dance music I heard, but I also heard plenty of moments of genius as well.

A few years ago, it became apparent that something was very wrong. The moments of genius were becoming more and more thinly spread amongst the rest of the crap, the new stuff listed online wasn't available in the store, and you were no longer fighting for a listening station. Every time that I've been there in the past two years I was generally one of four customers in the entire place, and unless I had specifically ordered something online to be picked up in the store, I probably walked out empty handed, feeling like I had wasted my time.

I suppose that just as with CBGB, it's Satellite's time to go. I kind of knew it was coming, but I'm also kind of sad to see it happen.

On Saturday, some guy around the corner from my apartment had a huge used record and CD sale. The sale was to start at 10 am. My train out to Long Island (doing yard work for mom and dad) was at 11:15, so I left the house early enough to allow myself a decent window of time to sort through whatever was there, grab a bagel and coffee, and hightail it over to the LIRR. Since I had planned on getting there at 10 am on the dot, my largest concern was whether the guy would actually be set up yet. I began dreaming of the rare treats that I would find for pennies. Perhaps he would be getting rid of the Adam Beyer remixes to Damon Wild's "Warpath," ending one of my hunts from the past few years.

OK, so it's 10 am, the thing's just started, right? I get to the guy's front stoop and there's like 20 guys there. Every single obsessive compulsive record collector in town was there to get first dibs. Shit was crazy.

Everyone was in this "I'm going to find a bargain" fever. I got shoved about five times within the first minute. I would be flipping through a line of CDs, and someone would come over and start flipping through the same column that I was looking at. I couldn't even make it to the area where the vinyl was, but someone was holding a copy of Nirvana's Incesticide on vinyl that was two bucks.

I was becoming frustrated rather quickly. I hadn't had my morning coffee yet. Then crazy old school Brooklyn lady arrived, and I swear I almost completely lost it.

So this lady comes from down the street, sees everyone going buck wild, and realizes she's missing out on the chance of a lifetime. She grabs the first pile of CDs she sees (from the electronica section I might add, I might also add that this lady is 55 years old) and yells "Can ya hold these aside fuh me?!?" Keep in mind she's not asking anyone in particular this question, as she doesn't see any difference between the crowd of people looking through the inventory for items to purchase and the person sitting by the curb counting his money. Certainly we all would have a hard time identifying the best person to ask questions regarding the record sale in this situation.

She then sees that one of the CDs she's holding has a rather racy cover and decides to tell me "Oh, I won't be buying that one." Then, another question popped in her head that needed immediate attention but was directed at noone in particular - "How much ya got all these tapes fuh!?!?" An important side note here - there were no tapes at this sale, only CDs and vinyl, and all prices were clearly marked with a yellow sticker on each item.

After realizing that she didn't know any of the artists in the pile of CDs she was holding, it was time for the next question. "Ya got any oldies?!?!?" No one answered so she asked this like five times, getting louder each time. I ran over to pay for my item and got the fuck out of there.

I got the Beth Gibbons solo CD that came out a few years ago, but I never picked up for some reason, for three bucks. Word!

There comes a time in every aging record buyer's life when one must ask oneself a truly serious question - do I buy a record I own already re-released with marginal value added content? Sometimes it's really easy to cave in to temptation, especially when it's the best album ever.