Dec
28

The Best of “Real Customer Quotes”!

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The following is some of the best form the past few years.  They are all 100% real.  Look for more being posted soon!

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“(the band) is kinda heavy on the Australian water stick, which I usually like but, they really over do it.”

“It’s like someone put a bag over my head and beat me with a Stooges stick”

“I started listening to Neil DIamond because of Killdozer.”

“Doris Day had nothing on Julie London”

“Frank Zappa has a new CD out? I thought he retired?”

“Records are awesome! I don’t have many, I’d rather buy video games.”

“This record is exactly like this other one but different”

“I’m into real ‘out there’ music. Ya know, like Weird Al”

“You don’t have to worry about being right , you just don’t have to care about being wrong.”

Dec
12

Best of 2009 lists!

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*******Cooper **********
(no, the stereo is not broken; the record is suppose to sound like this.)
Nels Cline “Coward” (Cryptogramophone)
PJ Harvey/John Parish “A Woman A Man Walked By” (Island)
Polvo “In Prism” (Merge)
Nisennenmondai “Destination Tokyo”
(Smalltown Supersound)
Bygones “By”  (Sargent House)
Jim O’Rourke “I’m Happy And I’m Singing And A 1, 2, 3, 4” Editions
Mego (reissue)
Sir Richard Bishop “The Freak of Araby” (Drag City)
Final “Reading All The Right Signals Wrong” (No Quarter)
Volcano Choir “Unmap” (Jagjaguwar)
Evan Parker & Ingebrigt Haker Flaten “The Brewery Tap”
(Smalltown Superjazz)
[Recommended Listening...]
Nels Cline + G.E. Stinson “Elevating Device”
(Sounds Are Active)
The Thing “Bag It!” (Smalltown Superjazz)
The Frame Quartet “35mm” (Okka Disk)
Jim O’Rourke & Loren Connors “Two Nice Catholic Boys”
(Family Vineyard)
Secret Chiefs 3 “Traditionalists: Le Mani Destre Recise Degli Ultimi

********Kim ***************
(in no particular order)
Los Angeles Nuggets               “Where The Action Is! 1965-1968”
Boston Spaceships                    “Zero to 99”
Arctic Monkeys                        “Humbug”
Reigning Sound                        “Love & Curses”
The Midwest Beat                     “At The Gates”
Paper Cuts                                “You Can Have What You Want”
The Spits                                   “Self titled fourth album”
White Denim                           “Fits”
Built to Spill                             “There Is No Enemy”
Dinosaur Jr.                               “Farm”
Vieux Farka Toure                     “Fondo”
Bawku West Collective               Vol. 1
Death                                         “For The Whole World To See”
Antiprism                                   “Antiprism”
Omar Rodriguez-Lopez             “Old Money”
Yo La Tengo                                      “Popular Songs”
{other hightlights}
Dinosaur Jr. at the Majestic
Steely Dan at the Riverside Theater
re-dicovering Ian Hunter’s discography, Hugh Masekela
& Amon Duul

******Monya (the calculator ninja) ********
1.  Volcano Choir: Unmap (Jagjaguwar)
2.  Big Star:  Keep an Eye on the Sky (Rhino)
3.  Them Crooked Vultures:  Them Crooked Vultures (DGC)
4.  The Flaming Lips:  Embryonic (Warner Brothers)
5.  M. Ward:  Hold Time (Merge)
6.  El Valiente:  Daceton (Self Published)
7.  Built to Spill:  There Is No Enemy (Warner Brothers)
8.  Neko Case:  Middle Cyclone (Anti-)
9.  The Vaselines:  Enter the Vaselines (Sub Pop)

********Dave Zero (of space sector 2814) *********
(in no particular order)
Reigning Sound  “Love and Curses”
Pains of Being Pure at Heart   “self titled”
Cheap Trick   “The Latest”
Viex Farka Toure    “Fondo”
The Spits     “Self titled fourth album”
Son Volt  “American Central Dust”
Something Fierce    “There Is No Answer”
Death    “…For the Whole World To See”
The Pretty Things  “Philippe DeBarge”
Big Star    “Keep An Eye On The Sky” (box)
Zero Boys   “History of…”
The Thermals  “Now We Can See”
Vetiver   “Tight Knit”
Honorable Mentions:
Dinosaur Jr.   “Farm”
Califone  “All My Friends are funeral Singers”
Patterson Hood “ Murdering Oscar”
Zola Jesus    “The Spoils”
Papercuts   “You can Have What You Want”

*********Hank (as seen in the MadCity Music Commercial Extravaganza!)
10. Dream Death                                           Pittsburgh Sludge Metal LIVE 1986
9. Reigning Sound                                         Love & Curses
8. Deicide                                                      Till Death Due Us Part
7. Death                                                         For All The World To See
6. [live music]                                                 *Butthole Surfers  LIVE @ The Barrymore
5. Flipper                                                       Generic (Gone Fishin’ re-issues…suffer with them all over again)
4. (Dio era) Black Sabbath                            Mob Rules and Heaven & Hell (not 2009). Sheer Awesomeness. Defies Time.
3. Shrinebuilder                                             s/t
2. [live music]                                                 *Maryland Deathfest  3-days of heaven in hell
1. LEAFBLOWER                                      16 yr. old Doom Metalers from Mt.      Carol, Illinois who named their band after the bassist’s lawncare job. Video is of first show at local church talent event.



Oct
18

Music Reviews, Afterthoughts, Recommendations & Considerations…

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Nels Cline + G.E. Stinson- “Elevating Device” [Sounds Are Active Records 2009]

Five stars might seem generous, and admittedly, it is. However, provided that the context for the rating encompasses even SOME of the current mainstream music menu, these recorded flavors are to be savored. Nels Cline should no longer need introduction, and I’m a bit disappointed that the title he does seem to receive most recognition for is lead guitar for that pleasant and harmless (perhaps read as non-stimulating, but I know that’s my own perspective) little group, Wilco… C’est la vie. Those who have submersed themselves into Cline’s sound world have experienced the eclectic and disparate tastes that he brings to every project and group; written composition and incidental improvisation. G.E. Stinson I know considerably less about. He’s done a number of Bay area impro-one-offs, one of which, L. Stinkbug, included Cline (and on a parenthetical side note, Stinson was also a six string slinger on Cline’s Atavistic sonic bomb “Destroy All Nels Cline”). Apart from that, he apparently spent time in Shadowfax, a band I know nothing about. Together on this recording, the two coalesce again to form an electro-gurgle in subatomic HI-FI resolution. The microcosms of amoebic squiggles and slurred tectonic distortions seem to be recorded as pristine as one can get. I have yet to get through this with headphones, so I didn’t hear if they were hard-panned or what, but it sounds as though they’ve assimilated into a single guitorganism, if you will. Actually, in my opinion, this is not unlike the “Banning + Center” recording with Cline and Jeremy Drake melting together with how much sympathy they have as collaborative players. As a utilizer of the guitar myself, there is simply the concept of manipulation and exploration within the confines of the instrument that has me pulled into this recording; and while that and the fact that this is, in a crude summation, a long free-form piece, are maybe only going to subscribe to an esoteric bunch, its an entire galaxy of tastes for that small cluster of us to enjoy…

- Cooper