She got a TV Eye on Me!

Yes, I'm watching a few things- the continually ongoing brilliance that is Portlandia. (Seriously, if you're not even going and watching clips from Youtube, or something, do I know you? Who are you? Why are you reading this? You clearly must be making fun of me. Is there a drinking game involved? Can I play? Because I can pickle that.)

And, now, the return of The Walking Dead, or, as the last episode showed- The walking Dad.

Seriously, one of the things that moves this show forward is the subtext of an exploration of masculinity. If you watch the show, you're probably starting to nod your head. This is a show about what it means to be human, first, Zombie panic armageddon second, but then, in a very strong third- what it means to be a man. Not just because there are so many Male characters, but because so much of the plot revolves around questions like how to be brave, how to be a father, how to balance courage with caution, how to accept both the comfort and the carelessness of women, and mostly, how to make the hard decisions. I know that I come from a pretty backwards place, sexism-wise. I was raised in a super-traditional family for gender roles. I gravitated towards hyper-masculine things by nature, as well- Boxing, motorcycles, fixing things, physics, misunderstanding girls, yup, I'm pretty much a guy. Many of my friends are guys, too-Mechanics, Engineers, Firemen and so on. I was raised in an enlightened age, though, so, I am aware that there are other ways of being, and I can even see the short-comings in my own way. But, my default position is pretty caveman. So, a show like this really does speak to me. Sure, there are no zombies, but there is crime, and piss-poor choices, and environmental woes, and a lot of jerk offs out there totally lacking in character. So, I can relate to the struggle of how do you raise your son so that he can protect himself, but also have hope and joy. I can understand how you have to have the courage of your convictions, but be prepared to have those convictions challenged, and then, sometimes collapsed. So, you tell me, what kind of a zombie show has a guy like me considering stuff like this? Yes, that's right, a damn good one.

On the other hand, I don't always watch the good stuff. I was excited for HBO's Luck, and the people involved ( Hoffman, Nolte, Farina, Michael Mann, Jill Hennesy, etc) really are great, but it just fails to move me. I know it's good stuff, but I'm just not that into it.

So, with my taste fully in question, of course, you shouldn't just take my word for it, but decide for yourself- Is The Walking Dead a feast, while Luck is a salad wrap? I don't know, but I can tell you what I like...

Skronk!

Again, I don't have much to say about Buildings "Melt Cry Sleep". I like it. Produced by Bob Weston, and if you know who that is, you know which ballpark it's in. This is the skronky free range Pig-F&%# stuff that would've been on Amphetamine Reptile or Touch and Go circa about 1988. Some Jesus Lizard, a little Shellac, some Cherubs,a whole bunch of Cows. If you dig that sound, I don't know how this will offend your ear, but it certainly won't expand your horizons any, either. Yes, I'm a bit late on this party, but my aim is to truthfully just talk about what I'm really listening to, and I just got this last week, and just heard it today, so, there you go, mystery solved- I'll bet you don't always listen to "hot off the presses' stuff before it gets reviewed by Pitchfork, either!

A Place to Bury Strangers- Onward to the Wall

I don't mean to slam them, because I enjoy this. But this could be a Jesus and Mary Chain tribute band. I mean not quite PsychoCandy, nor exactly Automatic, but somewhere inbetween. Maybe Darklands? I don't know. They're more propulsive than the JAMC, but really not so much as to say it's a different thing. I enjoy this sort of thing, a very lot, and it's a lot of fun. But, really, I can't say much more than that.

Shearwater- They finally get it!

I've never posted about Shearwater before, have I? The reason is simple- I haven't liked them. Oh, I've heard 'em before, but it's always sounded like overly arranged pretentious drivel to me. So, what's different now?

They've finally made a "rock" record, that's what. The thing is, I might enjoy all kinds of music, from Dvorak to the Dead Kennedys, but my "filter"- my baseline aesthetic is pretty solidly in the "rock" category. Not metal, not punk, not rockabilly, and so on, I'm pretty much a "rock" guy. I really can appreciate the intents and desires that go into, say, Bop jazz, and I can enjoy that, but I'll always go back to 4/4 driven by the backbeat rock music. Rock is really elastic, and can encompass a lot, so I don't think of it as anything truly limiting, but the overly ornamented, 50 page booklet-y thing that Shearwater did before just wasn't really "rock"- it was more or less folk-jazz with some progressive "rock" (a la Genesis) flavouring. No thanks, for me.

But Animal Joy? The aesthetics have changed a bit. Still odd instrumentation, still some pretty dirge-like tempos, but the fluttery little bits, and a lot of the excess is gone- leaving behind something akin to Richard Thompson. "Shoot Out the Lights" this isn't, but I wouldn't put it past them to cover "Wall of Death" at some future date. That catapults them, in my estimation. I mean I even copied a song or two onto my Sansa clip ( "Breaking the Yearlings" and "Immaculate"- try them next time you're on the treadmill- it's nice) So, it seems like they might have finally understood what a band like dEUS ( or Thompson, for that matter) has in spades- you can experiment all you want, but tie that stuff to a flagpole of rock, and it comes together is a far more physical way, as opposed to remaining an abstract experiment in your head. You can be sophisticated, or crude, but ultimately that kickdrum and snare centers the music on the body, and Cartesian dualism aside, all we really know is our bodies. Hence- Animal Joy, geddit?

Die Antwoord

So, I finally saw 'em live last night. Two main thoughts:

1. I don't think I've ever seen such a "wired in" crowd before. Constant texting, use of phone cameras, talk about Vimeo, Youtube, Tumblr, etc etc etc. I've seen days at CES that were less wired-in. I realize that I'm old and out-of-date ( Why do you think that embedded video and soundclips are unimportant to me? Because this is more of a journal format, less of a full use of the technology) but I show up to tech conferences for my job(s) and I go to concerts for my entertainment- so I'm more aware than most, but this was at a higher level. It's part of a trend I've been noticing: the mainstream Teenage culture mill, purveyors of T shirts and other cheap declarations of tribal affiliation, has completely gone to the internet, and, as dumbed down as the rest of our mass culture is, it follows the teenagers. Really, people were there so that they could run a feed to their online personalities, and they came from as far as Georgia to do that ( For those wot don't know please see map, here.) I find it ironic that here I am typing away, as well, but I was more in it for the discovery of real, live people, as opposed to what my friend John Ou calls "words on a screen". I also find it ironic that the crowd was so wired-in for a such a physical group. Ninja is noted for performing in boxer shorts and tattoos, Yo Landi for exploiting her Hentai-like sexuality, the lyrics are about Sex and violence as often as not, and their music is all about the kind of techno you would hear at a rave 15 years ago.

2. But what about the band, you say? Well, they're not really a band. I'm not saying that as a slam on rap, or their persona- I mean that part of the act is that they're representatives from the "Zef side". Ninja would punch me in the face for using this phrasing, but I mean it differently than I think most would- they're doing performance Art. I don't mean that they're play-acting, or that it's not "real"- I'm a big pro-wrestling fan, and what Die Antwoord do is very similar. It's not a "performance Art piece' in the sense of a Chris Burden or Karen Finley- it's more like what Stone Cold Steve Austin does. They take some elements of their real personalities, and real culture, and real beliefs, and magnify those aspects to an almost surreal level, then exhibit these larger-than-life versions of themselves in morality plays, to make points about our real, base little lives. So, while Watkins and Yolandi might enjoy both trash culture, and high brow Art, Ninja and Yo Landi celebrate low culture to the point of making it high Art.

So, the question that would be at the heart of this performance would be- what are they driving at? Two things- First; reject external judgements, and rely instead upon your own, and secondly, be happy in your life. It's the same kind of message that punk rock has, expressed in slightly different form. Just like Punk Rock starts by saying that it rejects the power structure of pop Culture, and answers that power by saying "Do it yourself", Die Antwoord rejects what they call "the system" and answers it with their own culture- what they call Zef. To go back to being all internet savvy, they're basically giving voice to those people that hipsters make fun of on sites like "People of Wall Mart" and letting them say back- We don't care about your scorn, we're happy and you're not.

Yes, I admit it- I luv Madonna

It's basically "Hey Mickey" for the post-hip hop self-promoting "luxury Rap" era, but still catchy as all hell. I like "Give me all your Luvin" despite myself.

Whitney Houston and the Grammys

So, Whitney Houston died yesterday. I feel bad for her kids, but only insofar as they lost someone they loved. I think they may possibly be better off without her, but that's impossible for me to know.

That she died right before the Grammys presents an irony, and a point on my moral compass.

The irony is that this was the most honoured female singer . To die right before what is arguably the biggest awards show of the year for American singers would be ironic, and not in an Alanis Morrisette kinda way.

But, the point on my moral compass is this- she's an example of why I left the business end of the entertainment industry.

See, in my opinion, she was screwed from birth. She was born into this- her mother was Cissy Houston, her cousins were the Warwicks, her godmother Aretha Franklin- how utterly horrible! We, as consumers, simply get to enjoy the fruits of their talents. They have to toil in the fields of manure to produce that fruit. Make no mistake, it's not that I hate them, it's that I pity them. Imagine a world with no true human interaction, but instead, everything is a transaction- a negotiation to get to the next negotiation. Imagine a world that necessarily rewards talent with creature comforts, but punishes it with isolation. If you wonder why so many go crazy, or get addicted to some substance or another, it's right there- the entertainment industry is designed to turn people into things, and trade emotions for commodities.

So, you have to ask why she was the most honoured? I think there's no escaping the conclusion that she was most honoured in the way that a slave is most prized by a master. She bowed the most to her master's whims. Yes, I know who Clive Davis is. As far as masters go, he's relatively benign, but still I think you can guess what I think his job is. That people like him are so well liked in the industry, and that people like Whitney are so celebrated- well, that's where my morals and the culture differ.

So, I hope Whitney gets to rest. I hope that her early death scares her kids away from Whitney's life, because I think there's still hope for them.

The Twilight Sad- No One Can Ever Know

This will be a relatively short review. These guys are bleak. Have been, and will be. They can make Joy Division seem like a party band. However, it's not bleak for bleakness' sake. It's not like Nine Inch Nails where the depression becomes a weird fetish of some kind of tough-guy stance. They're open and honest sounding. It's the sadness of growing into being cynical and bitter, not a pose. So, what's new on this one? Their sound, which was a variation on post-rock, like Aerogramme, is now like a post-punk/early industrial Shoegazer/post rock hybrid. It's like Caberet Voltaire running headlong into the Catherine Wheel, to play pages from a teenage suicide's diary set to music. Uniquely beautiful. This is something new under the sun. I think the bleakness, and chilly cynicism will scare off listeners, which is too bad, because this is some of the best new music I've heard.

That might be why it's called "No One Can Ever Know"

Ok, I'll do it

I'm going to talk about the new Mark Lanegan LP "Blues Funeral". Please note the phrasing. I don't want anyone to think this is a review. I cannot "review" this- I'm not qualified.

I can talk about it, though. Firstly, I can mention how little objectivity I've got. Lanegan could croon an LP of him singing the Universal Building Code, accompanied by a kazoo, and I'd be all about it.

But, immediately afterwards, I can mention that I'm unafraid of electronics. I remember being 8 and getting into an argument with a friend about Queen. He liked them, and thought it was cool that they put a "no synthesizers" tag on their record. I thought it was stupid-to me, it was an artificial and hypocritical self-limitation- they still plugged in guitars, and microphones, and used multi-tracking in the studio, right? So, it seemed dumb to me- like saying "We play basketball without shoes"- sure you can do it, but you'll just play crappier. So, without insulting Queen further, let me just say that from an early age, my stance has been- use every tool you need to get across your point. So, I've got less than no problem with the beatboxes and loops, and synths on this. For those in the "no synths" camp, I'd like to point out that I'm hearing a lot of electric guitars, too, so you won't be missing your favorite sounds, here.

I'm a pretty idiosyncratic listener. I know this, and if you read through my blog, you'll know that , too. In a way, this stuff reminds me of Iggy's post-Stooges work- it's the sound of a guy trying to see how he fits into the brave New world that he helped to usher in. So, just like The Idiot isn't exactly a Punk record, but isn't exactly not a punk record, this isn't exactly a grunge record, but it's not exactly not a grunge record. It's full of strange musings following personal obessessions, like Iggy did, too. I really like that quality- I don't want a singer to try to sound like how they think I want them to sound- that quickly devolves into Nickelback. I want them to have a muse, and to follow it, so's I can listen and expand my world a bit.

Still, I have to go back to that voice. Mark Lanegan could sing just about anything in that sandpaper worn smooth gritty voice of his, and you'll hear oceans of experience and misadventure in it. It's easily my favorite voice in Rocknroll.

I'll tell you another thing you won't hear in a review- this also reminds me of the Butthole Surfers. What I mean is that it smells of "studio psychedelia"- setting some creative people into a room with studio equipment that they don't fully understand, let 'em get ripped, and then let 'em rip on that gear- jarring effects, only some of which work, abound.

So, yes, this is objectively a great new record, but I think it may take a few years for fans' subjective take to catch up to what's there. I love it on an instinctual level, but I think I'll be able to appreciate it in a few months or years.

NEW KILLING JOKE

IN APRIL. I'M TYPING IN ALL CAPS BECAUSE I'M PUMPED LIKE A FRAT BOY WITH A CASE OF MID PRICED BEER.

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