Soon... You'll Thing Its Tragic When That Moment Arrives

Oh, but it's magic, it's the best years of our lives...


Cockney Rebel Soon...

James Mercer and Danger Mouse Make beautiful Music Together?

All live performances from the King Of Sampling Mr. Mouse himself Brian Burton (on leave from Gnarls Barkley) is playing on and releasing an album from big time folkie James Mercer of the Shins!! The name of the band is Broken Bells and is yet another step in the complete transformation of dance -this time the electronica side of it all. Expect the album early next year with a follow up soon after.

Soon

Barbra

Streisand

Village

Vanguard

2009

Reviewed

Maria Callas: "I Lived for Art"

Writing about Tosca the other day got me thinking about Puccini which got me thinking about great Puccini singers which got me thinking about Maria Callas -the great soprano and one of my favorite singers in any genre and I'm not a big opera fan. Maria callas was something of the Madonna of her time and lived a diva's life, just like one of the Verdi or Puccini (or even Wagner at an earlier stage of her career) opera's she sang.
　
Dead at the age of fifty four, she was a bad tempered, plate breaking shrew. She got dissed on the cover of Time, fired by the New York Metropolitan Opera, walk outs at La Scala and, in a romance that makes everything Madonna has ever done seem like kid stuff, lost the love of her life richest man in the world Aristotle Onassis to JFK's widow Jackie Kennedy. Aristotle married Jackie who morphed into the Jackie O of 70s legend. Towards the end of her life she lost a ton of weight and, hardly coincidentally lost her voice and soon her life.
　
Maria Callas didn't have a beautiful voice but she had a complete voice, full of shadings and full of feeling. The timbre isn't really pleasing but, like fine food, like caviar or steak tartare, it is an acquired taste and once you have acquired it you can't let it go. Renee Fleming, possibly our best Soprano right this minute, can't sing like Callas singing Verdi's Macbeth or Puccini's "Visse d'Arte": an unbearably beautiful aria she performed in Zeffirelli's Tosca (yeah, it all connects doesn't it?) at London's Royal Opera House at the end of her career.
　
I got into Maria Callas in 1995 after watching Terrence McNally's play Master Class about the year Maria gave a masterclass in singing at the Julliard in 1971-1972. The play was moving but the musical interludes between acts was breathtaking.
　
Leonard Bernstein called her The Holy Bible Of Opera. Here she is singing "Visse d'Arte" as mentioned above:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZXwz0gj5fY
　
They don't make divas like that anymore.

New CD Releases Tuesday September 29th, 2009: Genesis Show Customary Restraint

11 CD live Genesis box set? Look at it this way: 1973 - 1975, must own. 1976 - 2007, must be shot at dawn...


Dethklok - Dethalbum II
Mariah Carey - Memoirs Of An Imperfect Angel
Madonna - Celebration [2 CDs]
Paramore - Brand New Eyes
Alice In Chains - Black Gives Way To Blue
Miranda Lambert - Revolution
Barbra Streisand - Love Is The Answer
Breaking Benjamin - Dear Agony
Selena Gomez & The Scene - Kiss And Tell
La Roux - La Roux
A.F.I. - Crash Love
Ghostface Killah - Ghostdini, The Wizard of Poetry
Push Play - Found
Dawes - North Hills
Lynyrd Skynyrd - God And Guns
The Avett Brothers - I And Love And You
Robert Earl Keen - The Rose Hotel
Patty Loveless - Mountain Soul II
Joshua Bell - At Home With Friends
Bob Schneider - Lovely Creatures
Kris Kristofferson - Closer To The Bone [2 CDs]
Hope Sandoval - Through The Devil Softly
Fred Hammond - Love Unstoppable
Zero 7 - Yeah Ghost
7 Worlds Collide - Sun Came Out
Chris Smither - Time Stands Still
Genesis - Genesis Live 1973-2007 [11 CD Box Set]

DJ Tiesto: Rock Star

Very popular Dutch DJ Tiesto has just completed a three date sold out run at Hammerstein which is interesting but not the reason for this post. Here is the reason for this post as reported tin NYT: "Tiësto’s next album, “Kaleidoscope” (Ultra), is due for release on Oct. 20; through the Hammerstein set, the video display often showed kaleidoscopic images. The album is not a disc-jockey set — Tiësto does those for Sirius XM satellite radio — but a collection of new songs and instrumental tracks. Tiësto collaborated with singers from inside and outside the dance-music sphere, among them Jonsi (from Sigur Ros), Kele Okereke (from Bloc Party), Nelly Furtado, Priscilla Ahn, Cary Brothers, Calvin Harris and Tegan & Sara. Most tracks are poppy songs about love, devotion and inner strength, buoyed by the trance beat." This is yet another step in the evolution of dance away from anonymous DJing to the Mark Ronson DJ as rock star which is changing the genre by leaps and bounds.

So you wanna be a rock and roll star...?

Diddy has left Warner Bros for Interscope and while he is taking his record label Bad Boy he is leaving his stable of artists -why Warner Bros., would want em is another question entirely. So Diddy is gonna hafta reload and Making the Band will only give him one group to work with. This is your opening: form a band fast and sign with Bad Boy for a lifestyle of the rich and famous. You don't have to be talented or even sell records: none of his acts do!!! So get to it folks and don't spare the Cristal...

The Costello Show? WHAT????

I first owned Elvis Costello and the Attraction's Live At El Mocombo as a boot in 1978, it was a great recording of a good set, but I owned better (though not better sounding) at the time. It was officially released in 1993 as part of the box set 2 1/2 Years, and was also made available to those who bought the other three CDs separately. It's a pretty good live album, recorded in Toronto and with EC snarling "We've come to ask for our country back...". Half My Aim Is True and half This Years Model and all taken fast and hard with the Attractions at full trottle. Though 1978 it was more punk than new wave and what it lacks in nuance it makes up with in brute force.
　
　
But why the fuck Elvis is making this the first release of his The Costello Show live performance series on Lost Highway records of complete concerts is beyond me. I can't think of anything more anticlimatic. Everybody who wants it owns it. Does he not have the early Stiff tour on tape? Or even before that, the D.P. Costello material I would kill to hear from when he performed country-pub rock and opened for bands like Dr. Feelgood in 1975.
　
The only other album officially mentioned is Elvis' performance at Hollywood High in California. Again, anybody who bought Armed Forces back in the day got a some of these songs on a free EP given away with the initial release. Though I am more excited about this one because there are only three songs on the EP including a terrific "Watching the Detectives" and I wouldn't mind hearing the lot. I did think he was a bit better on the Model than the AF tour and I'd like to confirm my memory with my own ears.
　
　
I am really excited about this, it is simply the best idea he's had in years. Costello has never released enough live stuff, always just add on tracks to EPS and extended albums. There are tons of Costello concerts I want to hear again. It is just a real pity he chose such a completely naff way to begin the series.

No Freeze Out At Springsteen's Giant Stadium Shows...

Before the wrecking ball, the wrecking crew, Springsteen anounced at Izod last Spring, and tomorrow five nights of Bruce at Giants Stadium begins. That is something in the nature of 350,000 tickets available which, according to New York's best daily rock critic, Jim Farber, means there are tix to be bought.　
　
The lowest price Farber found on Fansnap.com (a url all live music fans should not leave home without) was an astounding $13. he also notes that tix for U2's two stand also crumbled to a low of "between $38 and $140". This was one of the hottest tix in town and is really surprising.
　
　
Ticket brokering is a tough business and since it has been legalized it is very easy to loose a great deal of money… certainly anytime you are looking at Stadium gigs you are looking at the opportunity for deals to be made.

Weezer To Play Halloween In NYC

Helen Bach's favorite band Weezer are playing Halloween at the Hammerstein Ballroom. Tickets go on sale tomorrow but here are the presale codes which were made available yesterday. For Live Nation the password is “Hollywood,” for Radio it’s 1019RXP. The price is $37.50 plus the usual bullshit handling charges.

R.E.M. Rocked the 90s...

I am not a R.E.M. fan, not even close. I've seen them three times in concert and they have been dreadful each and every time. Riding their monster hit rock album Monster they put on an enormously egotistical and boring performance, last year they essentially performed the disappointing Accelerator from one end to the other at MSG.
　
In the 80s I loved a lot of the Athens, GA bands, folks like the dB's, Pylon, Love Tractor -anything with Mitch easters name on it, but I couldn't bare R.E.M. I panned "Radio Free europe" as a snooze rock mumble and blew off Murmur entirely. From 83 to 91 R.E.M. recorded precisely two songs I liked: "Stand" and their cover of "King Of the Road". So what happened in 91 I have no idea but R.E.M. suddenly lived up to the hype with Out Of Time. Not only was the video for "Losing My Religion" brilliant but the songle used a Georgia phrase that, unlike Mike Stipe's usual oblique rumblings seemed to mean something serious. These were love songs but obtuse, pained loved songs. I have never heard a more thrilling take on pregnancy than "Me In Honey" or a sweeter sounding love song than "Near Wild Heaven". A smash hit for the band and they deserved it.
　
　
The follow up a year later Automatic for the People was a completely uncompromised acoustic beauty. The theme of loss, even a subdued nostalgia, permeates the album and on swelled acoustic blueish gray "Sweetness Follows" the song tantalizes you with a glimpse of the future, of a hope not quite reached, and the songs undertow is more concretely achieved in "Nightswimming". These are the two best songs the band have written to date. "Nightswimming" remembers a better time, "Sweetness" looks forward to better times and in the here and now "Everybody Hurts". A gorgeous, haunting album. And that makes two.
　
In 94 R.E.M. introduced Monster with the monster hit "What's The Frequency, Kenneth" -you remember, that's what Dan Rather claimed the bloke who mugged him and ran down the street shouting the title words. It is R.E.M.'s rock and roll moment (so is most of Monster) and a headfirst assault on media overload. "You said that irony was the shackles of youth, I couldn't understand, You wore a shirt of violent green, I couldn't understand, I never understood, don't fuck with me." It is followed on the album with "Crush Eyeliner" and later still the weird and brutal zoned out "Star 69" And that's the third.
　
　
And finally, here is New Adventures In Hi Fi, the last album with original drummer Bill Berry, long term producer Scott Litt and manager Jefferson Holt. According to Wikipedia R.E.M. claim it was influenced by Neil Young's Time Fades Away though I can't hear it myself. What I can hear is Patti Smith's return from hibernation singing "I'll take you over" on the stunning "E-Bow The Letter" and one of Stipe's very strangest lines, "Aluminum, smells like fear". I hear a great cover of Richard Thompson's "Wall Of Death" (Stipe's improvised "lalalalala" at the intro make death almost welcoming), "Electrolite", "The Wake Up Bomb": it sounded like a consolidation of the past three albums at the time, an encore, a stop gap but a great one. Now it feels like the end, a final bow and a goodbye from what was then the greatest rock band of 1996, and by 1998 would begin a decline so rapid and so complete nobody gives a shit about them now.
　
What happened? It can't be all down to Bill Berry and Scott Litt. On the other hand, what can you make of a rock band so tone deaf, so, ahem, out of time, that their 9-11 song "Leaving New York" was WORSE than Springsteen's. R.E.M. They have released four albums since New Adventures are they are just horrible -R.E.M. took 11 million dollars off Warner Bros and gave em some real bad product in return…. These egotistical has beens should break up.

TOMORROW SOMETIMES KNOWS

In eager anticipation of Falu's concert at Joe's Pub tomorrow I have been convassing Rock NYC contributers opinions of the Hindi-New Yorker. Robert Nevin said "An extremely clever mix of traditional Indian music and western pop. The lyrics aren't especially great, but she has a fine voice. She even pulls off the Indian style vocal riffs nicely." The ever witty Helen Bach was even more succinct: "turn off your mind relax and float downstream…". See you tomorrow, I'll be the one singing "Hey baby don't go yet, please don't go , don't go…" while slugging bacardi's and coke at the bar.

Kanya West In Rehab???

Hot rumor of the day: Kanye West in rehab according to the National Enquirer... apparently he has been drinking heavily since his mom Donde died in 2007. Though Kanye's drinking doesn't seem to have effected his productivity any it certainly could have lead to the lack of judgement in his by now infamous "imma gonna let you finish..." Grammy moment.

Britney Spears new Single "3" simply the best

"1, 2, 3 not only you and me, got one eighty degrees and Im caught in between" from Britney Spears singles collection, this newbie "3" is yet another awesome dance pop single: infectious dance beat and saucy lyric, nobody is better than Spears right this moment. Here's the youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pn83Q-3s9UE

Muse Are Furious At You by Brett Jensen

Muse are one of the hottest groups in the world, they just opened for U2, and have a very big new album. Rock NYC contributing writer Brett Jensen reveals all...

Exactly one half of Matthew Bellamy is furious with you.

The Muse front-man simply cannot conceive why you haven’t overthrown your oppressive, alien-denying tyrants yet. According to Mr. Bellamy, the governments of the world have likely conspired within the next decade to instigate an alien invasion. I’m not joking.

Muse’s last two albums, Supermassive Black Hole and the recently released The Uprising have been utterly awash in revolutionary furor. Aliens are out there, your governments are conspiring against you, and only love will prevail. In Supermassive’s “Assassin”, Bellamy lets it be known that he’d be fine if someone killed all the world’s leaders. In “Uprising”, he (along with some very populist chaps yelling “hey” in the background), remind you that the system needs to be destroyed.

So, get to it.

Or wait, is he serious? He seems rather mellow for a person assured of the space-based doom of the planet. Reference any interview with Matt Bellamy, and you’ll see him giggling about all the conspiracy theories that he’s read. He’ll tell you with a knowing grin that it’s all very silly, but that he enjoys reading it very much!

“Very much” enough to write a three part symphony to end The Uprising which deals with Bellamy’s belief in panspermia, and mankind’s need to expel from Earth our “code to the stars”.

So what gives? The music is certainly exciting and beautiful. What are we to take from this?

The Uprising is an outrageous, yet beautiful album. As with any Muse song you’ve ever heard, you will be unable to catch all nuances with one listen. For all the melodrama and pomp, the Devon-based trio has again put together, a gorgeous little package. There’s nothing else in the landscape of music in 2009 to compare the album to. It’s a very standalone and weird work of art. Unfortunately, whether it is “weird” or “art” will depend entirely upon the listener.

A (very, very, very) common criticism of Muse is that they’re bombastically over-the-top. Yes, my good gracious - yes they are! Please take a deep breath, and let me know what gave you the silly idea that maybe they’ve ever pretended not to be. My advice to all who encounter Muse is this: Don’t even attempt to take it seriously. It’s meant to be breath-arresting fun, so just have fun listening to it.

Imagine a movie critic sitting down in front of Star Wars for the first time just to complain that intergalactic space travel isn’t real. (and what’s up with those laser swords!?) We’d all give him a shy smile and admit that we know it isn’t real. We’re there for the fun. Any lessons you pick up along the way should be taken with all the salt in the world.

Muse’s maybe-view of the universe isn’t intended to be certain. Certainty isn’t fun. Uncertainty is the mother of all romance.

Matthew Bellamy plays Rachmaninoff-level piano solos at a rock concert, and guitar enthusiasts will debate his place among the greats of all time. If you want subtlety… leave the Bayeux tapestry, Faberge eggs, tickertape parades, and Muse alone. They are oh-my-god not for you.

Tiger Mountain Taken by Mike Nessing

Rock NYC contributing editor Mike Nessing reviews Brian Eno's 1974 classic Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy.

The first time I heard Eno’s second solo album was when I was about 15 years old.
It was recommended to me by an older sibling who intrigued me with talk of this English conjurer who was too busy to be in a band, and strove for a higher form of aural expression. Eno was more interested in treatments of sound, and playing his tapes in order to experiment with pitch, timbre, and effects.

Tipped off that this album could be taken out at the town library of all places, I hopped on my 10 speed bike, library card in hand. I could tell right away that this was going to be a demanding journey (the album, not the bike ride). The record jacket itself was daunting, with it’s mosaic depictions of our hero in varying sizes and clarity. It turned out that the cover art was a metaphor for the ingredients inside. This music is very much a mosaic. Some of it very big, some of it very small. Songs appear that strike you right away, while other tracks insist that you explore them, too distorted to even make an initial impact.

Luckily, I was up for the challenge. One of the first things I picked up on was the element of whimsy. With an opening track titled “Burning Airlines Give You So Much More”, this was going to be either a terrorist manifesto, or groovy tongue-in-cheek beat poetry. Fortunately, the latter won out. I would later discover that Eno’s lyrical approach was basically him riffing random syllables on top of his backing track over and over to himself. Once he hit on a combination that complimented the music, he plugged in words that most closely matched those syllables.

The comedic elements don’t end there. Over the course of this LP we are confounded by all sorts of random sounds. Typewriters, whistling, goat-bleating sax riffs, blatantly spooky keyboard sounds, drums and other instruments intentionally recorded to sound like toys, and guitar solos that have been severely manipulated with pitch control and other types of “Enossification”.

Underneath it all though, is a very complex beauty. The basic tracks anchor the whole statement. They are extraordinary in their musicality. The backing vocals seem to emulate Gregorian Chant, but in a much higher octave. Today, we would refer to them as “soundscapes”. Eno was on the precipice of defining an actual approach toward music that had never been explored before. This would eventually be coined by him as “Ambient”. Music that exists in the background, at a volume level so low as to not call any attention to itself. The very beginnings of this approach can be found here, buried under all the mischievous overdubs and off-kilter dark lyrical themes. Eno was soon to discover that by peeling everything away, an entirely new musical language was available.

New Music Week Of September 28th, 2009: Miranda, Madonna, Mariah and Hayley!!

White Liar - Miranda Lambert - The crazy ex-girlfriend is back and this country singing sweetheart of the rodeo is as tough and smart as she was on her terrific sophomore effort. I bought a couple of other songs off album # 3 Revolution and they are all great, especial "The House That Made Me" -a lovely, lump in the throat, ballad, but this country swing with what sounds like a hand picked steel guitar rocks in all the right places country rocks your world. Single Of the Week.
　
　
Celebration (Benny Benassi remix) - Benassi's remix sounds old fashioned but not in a bad way, the echoy Madonna vocal has been done before, usually by Benny himself, and the vibrating bass is made to be blasted loud just like back in the day.
　
　
H.A.T.E.U. - Mariah Carey - The third song I've heard off Memoirs Of An Imperfect Angel is the third knock out in a row, apparently a much better album than last years disappointing E=MC2, Carey seems to have toned down her hip hop tendencies and settle into a gorgeous pop groove.
　
Careful - Paramore - Sure I loved Riot and thought "Misery Business" was one of the best single of 2007 but they were dreadful in concert in 2008 and I thought the Twilight song was a major bummer. This is the second song off Brand New Eyes and the second huge disappointment. It sounds like paramore only without the melody. Oh, and Hayley looks just like Marie Lynn and I don't particularly wanna think about Marie Lynn.
　
Check My Brain - Alice In Chains
Death To All But Metal - Steel Panthers
Keepin' Halloween Alive - Alice Cooper
Wheels - Foo Fighters
OK, pop pickers, which of these cats is joking you and which is serious? It's really hard to tell but the best of the lot is parody metal hair band Steel Panther "death to mariah carey, death to sheryl crow, they can kiss each other round the camel toe" they sing and it's hard not to bang your head in agreement. "Keepin' Halloween" isn't quite self-parody, when you're stick us beheading dolls on stage and playing golf it's kinda hard to make fun of yourself. "Wheels" is really nothing at all: it floats away as you listen to it and Alice In Chains is death metal as long term career move, not bad but not very good either.
　
　
Falling In Love At a Coffee Shop - Langdon Pigg
Naturally - Selena Gomez & the Scene
You know the Pigg song from that AT&T, right? Well, it's much, much worse over four minutes. "Naturally" is a rare misstep for Selena Gomez -a rock song that doesn't rock and doesn't pop.
　
　
Spring Can Really Hang You Up (Quartet Version) - Barbra Streisand - Not that Barbra really needs it, I mean, she's the definition of taking it all too seriously, right?, but Diane gives Barbra a seriousness, a musical gravitas, especially on the Krall Quartet versions, completely invisible on work like 1999's A Love Like Ours. This is seriously beautiful fully informed Streisand and Frans Landesman was a wonderful lyricist whom Streisand does justice to on this smokey, jazzy cover.

Celebrate?

I am guessing Madonna's latest greatest hits package Celebration is a money move and I sure do love the songs, especially the "Celebration" remix. And I realize the collected videos being sold on DVD is the true reason behind it, because for any Madonna fan it is essentially useless. Still, Madge shoulda got together some cutting edge DJs and given us the dance mix of our dreams and not yet another greateregurgittion of songs from the 80s. I think all that Kabbalah stuff is ruining her business sense.

Adam Lambert's Debut Album Beating the World In Presales

Sexiest man alive (he's the one with the eyeshadow) and one of the top two talents to get their start on American Idol pre-order's of his debut album has beat out the Madonna greatest hits package and The Beatles to take the number two spot in Amazon.com sales.

The album features redone (Lady Gaga's producers) and max martin, the bloke behind "Since you've been gone". With the possible exception of Kelly Clarkson there hasn't been an AI remotely close to the thrilling, star power, vamp camp spotlight stealing Lambert. If the debut album has anything as powerful as his cover of "A Change Is Gonna Come" this winter is gonna be all Lambert all the time. The album is released november 24th...

itunes have sold more than 5 billion songs

How much is 5 billion songs downloaded?? Something like 500 million albums. Doesn't sound so much right, but figure it is increasing by a billion a year by now and it sure feels like a monopoly. Amazon.com and Walmart.com are much cheaper but they aren't as easy.

Unless the online universe is ready to concede the game to Itunes, somebody somewhere (hey Gates, if at first you don't succeed) better do something. Itunes will soon be at $1.50 -if some enterprising young man takes a hit and comes in at $0.50 they can run itunes out of business.

Lucy Is Really In The Sky With Diamonds Now

Lucy O'Donnel Vodden died of lupus yesterday. She was forty-six. In this day and age lupus (it is an inflamation of various body parts that occurs intermittently and kills off the immune system, Huffington post call it: "a chronic disease where the immune system attacks the body's own tissue") is rarely fatal which is sort of odd but Lucy's life must have been altogether odd. Julian, John Lennon's son, drew a painting of Lucy O'Donnell when they were both three year old children, and it was the inspiration behind "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds". "I remember Julian and I both doing pictures on a double-sided easel, throwing paint at each other, much to the horror of the classroom attendant" Lucy would say.
　
　


Mrs. Vodden married thirteen years ago and spent the last five years of her life hospitalized with Lupus.
　


　
It's a sad, strange story : fame finds us and an easily forgotten moment in a woman's life becomes a defining characteristic at her death.

Fooey On the Foo Fighters

In 1998 I couldn't throw a brick without hitting a Foo Fighter, Dave Grohl's very succesful follow up to Nirvana. If they weren't opening for the Rolling Stones they were playing interminable sets and bringing festivals to a full stop.
　
　
　
　
"This Is A Call" wasn't terrible and the band are energetic enough but Dave Grohl writes terrible songs, "My Hero" is just awful and "The Pretender" is worse. His loud-fast, verse-chorus pales in comparisons to, forget Cobain, Stone temple Pilots. Grohl has precisely two gears: slow and fast and the fast is bad and the slow is worse. Foo Fighters has taken to releasing doubles just in case we miss the point. Next up is a greatest hits package: run for your lives...
　
　
　
　
In my opinion, the worst band in the world. I mean, nobody expects Creed to be in any good, we expect better off Grohl.
　

Darkness On the Edge Of Giants Stadium

I will be catching Bruce Springsteen on October 2nd at Giants Stadium and I am particulalry thrilled because he will be playing an E Street masterpiece, Darkness On The Edge Of Town, in its entirety. This is particularly significant not only because Darkness is a great album but also because I think it means we won't be dogged by his miscreant new album Working On A Dream all night .
　
　
Before we go further, here is Springsteens studio albums graded for you
　
　
Tunnel Of Love, Grade: A+
Nebraska, Grade: A +
Born To Run, Grade: A +
Born In the USA, Grade: A+
Darkness On The Edge Of Town, Grade: A+
The Wild, The Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle, Grade: A
The River, Grade: A
Lucky Town, Grade: B+
Human Touch, Grade: B +
Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J., Grade: B
The Ghost Of Tom Joad: Grade: B
Devils & Dust, Grade: B-
We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, Grade: B-
Magic, Grade: C+
The Rising, Grade: C-
Working On A Dream, Grade: D+
　
　
　
So Darkness is way up there. Darkness is also a sophomore effort in everything but timing. His fourth album chronologically, it is the immediate follow up to his breakthrough Born To Run and the one where he had everything in the world to prove. So instead of playing to his audience, Springsteen came up with a brooding work that works as an extended metaphor, his relationship with his father is mirrored in his relationship with his country. The album is just about flawless and has survived to include several songs integral to Bruce's live performance including "The Promised land" and "Badlands". Can't wait to hear it live.
　

THINGS TO DO ON HALLOWEEN 2009

1: Buy Costume
2: Drink lotsa Margaritas
3: Read Iman's review of the MJ movie This Is It

Devoted To The Everly Brothers

In the early 60s two Jewish kids from Forest Hills, Queens wanted to be the Everly brothers, so they formed a duo and wrote a song called "Hey There Little Schoolgirl" and nothing came of it till one of them went to England as a solo act and rode the tailcoats of the folk explosion before returning to the States and joining back up with Art Garfunkle to form a hugely successful duo performing folk music mixed with Everly Brothers harmonies.
　
　
Tom and Jerry weren't the only musicians inspired by Don and Phil Everly. All of the Beatle's country-rock material borrowed liberally from The Everly Brothers, Nick Lowe and dave Edmund owe them a debt that Edmund repaid when he headed their back up band for the Everly's re-union tour in 1983.
　
Brother's from Kentucky (Don is the older one), there Dad was a musican and they started off young working on the radio before being handed Felice and Boudleau Bryant's song "Bye Bye Love" in 1957. The good looking, well mannered and turned out duo were a big hit with the ladies and started a career mining a rock and roll closer to its country roots than Presleys bluesier take on it. But it was REAL rock and roll; the brothers toured with giants like Buddy Holly and their string of singles with Cadence Record was crossover by definition.
　
There is a Cadence anthology of all the Everly brothers singles for them and it is heavenly, one gorgeous song after another. No, it wasn't the bloody minded assault of the Sun records, the rockers, covers of stuff like "Be Bop A Lula" mix it up with novelty songs like "Bird Dog," dead girl song "Ebony Eyes" and straight to the heart ballads like "Let It Be Me". All the songs seemed to work from an acoustic guitar strum, the brothers would harmonize on the rockers, trade verses and join together on the chorus. They sometimes wrote their own songs "Cathy's clown" is one of theirs, often covered Bryant songs and made each and everyone sound uniquely brotherly. I wrote a post a couple of days ago about the Beatles harmonizing -well, they learnt it from 60s girl groups and the Everlys.
　
The material is of an enormous quality. "Bye Bye Love", "Wake Up Little Suzie", "All I Have To Do Is Dream", "Claudette", "Bird Dog", "Devoted to you", "Till I Kissed You", "Let It Be Me", "Cathy's Clown", "Walk Right back" "Be Bop A Lula", "Price Of Love" -this is the equal of the Stones run in the 60s… a ridiculously great achievement. And maybe they didn't rock that hard, they still rocked plenty, give a listen to their version of Little Richard's "Good Golly Miss Molly".
　
On a song like "Devoted to You" sung in close harmony with a shuffling drum and the brothers sharing the same melody together. The bridge, "I'll never hurt you, I'll never lie" goes down an octave before returning to the verse (chorus?) "Through the years my love will grow, like a river it will flow It can’t die because I’m so--" Your Grandma was swooning over that, I can promise you.
　
By the 70s the hits stopped happening and the Every brothers acrimoniously broke up for ten years till the 1983 tour.

I saw them playing with Simon and Garfunkle at MSG in 2003 and it was a highlight of my concert going life. You can't love these guys enough, they were the most touching and beautiful harmony singers of a generation. I wish they'd go on tour again it's been too long

Falu's Indie Hindi Sound Playing Joe's Pub October 1st

We can thank George Harrison, or at least Ravi Shanker, maybe I mean Bollywood for making Hindu music no longer exotic. But it still isn't, how you say, rock.


The problem with Sitar music is that it is classical not pop and the problem with Bollywood soundtracks is it is a sort of overblown orchestrated pop: it sounds like it's waiting for Celine Dion to make her entrance.


Enter Falu, Thursday October 1st at Joe's Pub 930p. Falu is a gifted Indian singer who lives in New York city and plays an awesome conglom of traditional India music using electric guitars. her original song in Hindi "Rabba "is on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UIXOYhPuMQ. It is a guitar based raga which doesn't sound crossover at first but the more you hear the stronger and more multi-culti it becomes and the stronger the guitar rings. It isn't crossover but it's moving in that direction.

The song is off her 2007 album Falu where she gets near to bringing her traditional sounding vocals and the indie rock that is all around her together. Songs like "Without You" is so New Yorker in the way that people like Jerry Rivera sound both Latin American and simultaneously New York City. She is already loved here and I'm guessing anybody who has been around Indian music will be very impressed. Will it crossover?when your resume includes stints with the likes of Bernie Worrel and Wyclef Jean anything is possible.



That's Joe's Pub Thursday October 1st, 2009 @ 930p.

2010: THE FUTURE IS HERE STICK IT IN YOUR EAR

As the autumn turns to the winter of our discontent and we hold onto our jobs with both hands, let's think of better times ahead. 2010 is round the corner and this is what we expect…
　
　
Arcade Fire, the Shins, Vampire Weekend: VE have their sophormore effort to hoise upon us after what will be a two year recorded hiatus come January and from what I've heard they may well have blown it. The Shins James mercer has fired his drummer and keyboardist of nine years and will be releasing his follow up to Wincing The Night Away, formed his own record label and should be ready to release his most important album since Natalie Portman called the shins a band that'll change your life. The only band with more at stake is Canada's Arcade Fire, a band lead by by the weaned, intellectually damaging egoist Win Butler, have everything in the world to play for and my bet will be the best of the three, a hit album followed by a sold out MSG.
　
　
　
Pavement, Whitney Houston, Barbra Streisand : Nostalgia aint what it used to be but Pavement should do for the 90s what Houston will do for the 80s: take the past and shove it down your throat. Admittedly, her new album is a disappointment but Whitney has what no one can take from her: a catalogue to die for and millions of fans. Pavement were always great live and let's just hope they keep to Slanted, Crooked Rain and Zowie. Streisand is just a hunch but she does have a new album out and should be in the mood for an audience after her Village vanguard gig.
　

Paul Szot: The great young Brazilian baritone who wowed em in South Pacific has an opera this winter at Lincoln center and what's that's over let's see if he can crossover to the mainstream. At Summerstage last summer he sang beautifully but uncomfortably but now is his chance to blow the States away. He has got the voice and he has got the looks but he is missing the ego to command the stage. With the right management Szot could be huge.
　
　

Crossover Dance: Somebody, simewhere, is waiting to break Dance huge in the States: this year has seen a consolidation of all the parts amassing since the birth of the digital dance age ten years ago. Now you'll see the face behind the earphones, now a rock band -an MGMT? Of Montreal? will mix and match with a DJ to form a modern rock dance band and make tons of money.
　

　
The Rolling Stones: Mick Jagger can't wait five years between tours any more. Even a band as popular as the Stones won't be able to sell 75 year old men as arena rockers -figure Jagger will go next year, take a years break, go the following year, and hang it up.
　
　

Bright Eyes: I know my Conor: working with Mike Mogis will give Conor the desire to do some Bright Eyes material (I hear he is playing some with MOF). An album of new Bright Eyes by April, expect them in NYC by the summer.

Worst Beatle Commercial Ever

The worst commercial ever made for anybody ever is the Abbey Road Road Band coming attraction. To say this is creepy doesn't do it justice -you know those smiling Jesus Christs? What they do to John Lennon is much, much worse. It is necrophiliac horrorshow bullshit. I want to see em burnt like the Jesus freaks burnt Beatles albums after Lennon said they were more popular than the big J.



Watch it on youtube and die. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpQkEF4WhJk

He Flies By Night

In 1982 keyb and co-songwriter (not to mention singer) for Steely Dan broke up the band and recorded an album as good as Steely Dan's very best. The Nightfly is the story of a college kid at the turn of the 50s who falls in love, leaves to Cuba where he outruns the revolution, loses the gitl (tp death?) and moves to Miami.




That simple description doesn't begin to express the joy of a song like "New Frontier" where there doesn't seem to be an ounce of sarcasm (let alone cynicism) in the lyric of seduction "I hear you're mad about Brubeck," Fagen says seductively, "I like your eyes, I like him to" before climbing into a fall out shelter "We've got provisions and lots of beer". It's a great sweet swing of a song -it's as good as "My Old School" though without the rancour.



Just as good is... no wait, everything is just as good, but I want to write about "The Goodbye Look" as Fagen tries to outrun Castros new regime. "They're arranging a reception just for me behind the casino by the sea" Fagen warns, "I know what happens, I read the book". "New frontier" rides the harmonica (on a jazz song), "Goodbye Look" a bass and a keyb motif but that doesn't do the song justice. It is just so thrilling -the story is a blast and the end of the story, "Walking Between The Raindrops" might not give us the happy ending we wanted but it swings so sweet we can forgive.




The difference between The Nightfly and Can't Buy A Thrill is not just distance, it's a type of wisdom. It's one thing to sneer at an Ivy League School for jumping you for dealing drugs, another thing entirely to imagine yourself discussing jazz with the girl of your dreams. The future on "I.G.Y" might end up lonely raindrops in Miami but in between Fagen seems to find the distance he needs to view himself and those around him in the early sixties without the sustained anger of his Steely Dan performance.




Fagen has another two albums and neither of them are as good as The Nightfly and both could double as a Steely Dan album. The Nightfly couldn't: it is a self portrait, maybe an accurate one.

Writer On For Rock NYC

Rock NYC is looking for writers. No, we don't pay but when I first started writing for East Village Eye I wasn't paid and I took my published work and got gigs at the Voice and Creem to start.




Rock critics aren't frustrated musicians, we're frustrated writers and given the opportunity a good writer can start a career here. So far I've had the good luck to find three writers who could take what they've posted here and get a gig anywhere.





Now it's your turn. Writing is like anything, just write about anything musical and email it to me at imancharif@aol.com -I'll try and keep the editing to the minimal and leave you the space to say your thoughts. My readership a day has gone from 3 the day I started to 100 a day five months later. With your help maybe I can actually pay you one of these days. At the very least people will read you (average reader spends 5 minutes on the blog -triple the average for other blogs my size).



Your pal,



Iman Lababedi

Soon... Maria Callas!!

Love Verdi? Puccini? You're gonna worship Opera superstar soprano Maria Callas. We're gonna tell you all about her.... soon!!!

The Playlist September 27th, 2009: Bounce Bass

Make Me - Janet Jackson - See, it's easy. Just stick a bouncing bass under a throbbing drum riff, have Janet sing a sexy lyric and have background vocals whoop like MJ and there it is: a great dance track that should be mammoth for her. So why hasn't she done it since Velvet Rope?


The World 99 - Pulp Victim
Hear Me (AC Slater) - Drop the Lime - Both these songs are where the bass really will get you into trouble. Drop the Lime is a blues-rock song with the melody nearly totally in the vocals and the bass riding the song all the way through. "The World 99" also bounces on the bass but it's from not just another time but another space: all synth bass hook.



Cowboy Casanova - Carrie Underwood - Disappointing country-blues riff though Carrie is in good voice.



Baby Boomer - Monsters Of Folk - Marie Lynn and I agree that this is the surprise of the album, a Matt Ward country-folk nursery rhyme improved by James and Oberst.



Slow To Anger - Superdrag - Highlight of the daytrotter session.


Animal - Miike Snow
Bulletproof - La Roux
Lust For Life - Girls
Blame It On the Girls - Mika
Yes - Manic Street Preacher - From back when Richey Edwards helped make these guys the only band that mattered.


Something He can Feel - Aretha Franklin - This is the other Curtis Mayfield song from last weeks concert. Also from Sparkle, also a stunner. I've been listening to all eight songs off this album and believe it is one of Franklin's masterpieces. It's just about perfect and her upper range has never been purer.

Barbra Streisand at the Village Vanguard Set List

I saw Streisand ten years ago at MSG and was blown away -it was her first retirment concert and over two hours of chestnuts. And I put my name in the lottery for her concert at the 250 persons seating Village Vanguard concert last night but didn't get in.

Here's the setlist anyway:

"Here’s to Life”
“In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning”
“Gentle Rain”
“Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most”
“If You Go Away”
“Where Do You Start”
“Make Someone Happy”
“My Funny Valentine”
“Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered”
“Evergreen”
“Some Other Time”
“The Way We Were”

Luc Bondy's vision of Puccini's Tosca booed at The Met: shouldn't this stuff be organic?

For the past twenty-five years the Metropolitan Opera has been producing Frnaco Zefferilli's lush, plush, production of Puccini's "Tosca". Anybody who has seen it will never forget the gorgeous decor so it is hardly surprising director Luc Bondy's darkly lit and brooding vision is roundly hated by the Met faithful and booed on opening night.




Nobody is complaining about the most important thing: Puccini's music, they hate Bondy's vision of a Puccini without glamour.




New Met director Peter Gelb warned of a shake up in an effort to get the Met to go further than simply resting on the canon but I can understand why people love the old Met productions so much. One wonders why they don't start an off shoot Met working on newly thought takes on the classics, the way the Public does so often with Shakespeare.



Gelb claims that in order for the Met to stay vibrant it must evolve and he is right BUT can't the Met have it both ways?

Ornette Coleman at Rose Hall, September 27th, 2009: Jazz Is Alive

Before Ornette Coleman opening the 2010 season of Jazz at the Lincoln Center at a sold out Rose Hall last night I went to see the French director superb story of a father and daughters love for each other Claire Deny's "35 Shot Of Rum". at the Film Forum. Reading the reviews on line before the movie I noted a comparison between Deny's improvised camera work and Coleman's equal opportunity harmolodics. But they might have meant the aliveness of both artists: they pulsate with the inner remarkableness of simply being here.



Along with Dave Brubeck, Coleman is the last of the giants of the third wave of jazz still standing but when Coleman broke through in 59 with The Shape Of Jazz To Come he sounded way, way out, the way 'Trane would a coupla years later. People couldn't figure free form jazz at all -the chords were strange, the tempo heritical and even today it is an acquired taste. But last night wasn't an acquired taste. Playing as a quartet, Coleman used an electric bass, an acoustic bass and his son on drums to play lively, upbeat, short (six to eight minutes) compositions as playful as they were concentrated.





Coleman sat at a stool in the middle of the round stage and switched from alto sax to trumpet to violin and when he played violin the band became an avante garde noise band-he had played on the 1968 Plastic Ono Band album with Yoko Ono and reunited with her this year at the concert series he curated London's Southbank Centre, Meltdown Festival and listening to him yesterday the connection was very clear.




But it wasn't so much about avant garde rock or even harmolodics, it was about taking off from Tony Falanga's acoustic bass which Falanga hand picked and played with a bow, and became a bedrock for the band to lie into or took the melody in hand while Coleman played in and around him, seeming to ignore the band and leaving everyone free to follow Coleman as he played compositions from Tomorrow Is The Question! all the way to Sound Grammer.


It wasn't a difficult set, it didn't sprawl it levitated and it didn't push forward it consolidated: it was a victory lap for the 07 Pulitzer prize winning Sound Grammer, and a return to the double after using triple bass bands. Denardo Coleman (Ornette's son) drumming was forceful in the extreme and this would be the place for the casual fan to get into free jazz. I have often compared jazz to classical music: a dead art form. Coleman made me very happily eat my words.

Welcome To The Modern Dance

Back in the 80s dance (or electronica or club... whatever) was a simple enough thing: stick on a bass, bleed out the rest, and ride em cowboy but digital technology has exploded in the 00s and dance has merged (sometimes!) with hip hop concepts and away we go.

Now there are as many types of dance as there are DJs and producers and try dancing to trip hop, I dare you, you might be able to wave your arms around in a sorta dead hippie daze but.... It is similat to what happened to rock, blues , jazz and r&b, out of the clubs and into your record collection.

In 2009 you can't cover pop music and not cover dance. How do you write about 09 and not write about David Gueta? You'd have to ignore not just his huge success in the UK but also his remix of Black Eyed Peas "I Gotta Feeling". Indeed, how do you the band of the year, Black Eyed Peads, without covering dance You can either cover and cover pop or you don't and you can't. The future lies with folks like my great-niece Miriam -she loves music she can interact to whether its MJs moonwalk or Miley's do-Ce-Do and Miriam may very well find herself listening to a major amount of dance before she's fifteen years old.

Even more, the Trouble and Bass team produced one of the best concerts of the year at Summerstage this summer and if rock fans don't get Boys Noize, what do they get? What is the difference between Boys Noize mixing the bass higher and higher and a guitar solo? Where's the line? 

And more still, Mark Ronson reinvented Dance and the cover song on stuff like Lily Allen's cover of "Oh My God" and Tigger's cover of Spears "Toxic" mashed with ODB back in 07. The producers behind the original "Toxic" have formed a band themselves, Miike Small.

Yeah, it's going round in the other direction as well. Drop The Lime is a BAND aesthetic where they switch the main instrument from the guitar to the bass but haven't bled all melody out and they are fun fun fun to watch.

I have been saying since February (here since I started Rock NYC) that the story of 09 is dance music and at this rate I will be a liar because dance will be so thoroughly integrated into EVERYTHING from indie rock (hi MGMT) to pop that the only thing left will be country music. To love tmodern music in 09 is to love electronica: you can dance but you can't hide.

Review Of the Beatles "You Won't See Me"

Writing a post  about Pet Sounds with Mike Nessing got me thinking about back up harmonies. Many years ago I was wandering round Manhattan listening to a mix on my walkman when one of the earphones blew out in the middle of "You Won't See Me" off Rubber Soul  so I couldn't hear Macca, only the back up vocals.

Everybody notes McCartney's back up singing to Lennon on stuff like "Dig A Pony" where he doesn't appear to be there at all -the singing is almost subliminal but "You Won't See Me" is proof if any was needed that the Beatles were a gifted harmony group -it was one of the greatest things about them.

There is an air of resignation on "You Won't See Me," it is a perfecting of the lost girlfriends that populated Beatles For Sale, a powerpop ballad  as opposed to   folk-rock ballad of earlier Beatles vintage. A girl has broken up with Macca but he can't find out why, "the days are few and filled with tears" Macca sings and Harrison and Lennon go "oooh, lala" in the background and it is hauntingly sad. If Lennon had written it you wouldn't have blamed her for hiding but Macca is just in a world of pain and the entire song is devastated. "I wouldn't mind if I knew what I was missing" Macca sings and Lennon sings "No I wouldn't" right after and it is yet another musical conversation by the best friends.

There is no resolution to the song, it jump starts in with a guitar lick and Starr's hitting the cymbal and fades into despondency with the "ooh lalalas" bringing it to a close. But it is almost ridiculously moving, "I won't want to stay, I don't have much to say" Paulie says and he earns every second of the anguish he brings to us. 

I will be writing about Cheap Trick playing Sgt Peppers in its entirety at some point but the Beatles aren't the greatest only  because of Pepper, they are the greatest because of songs like this one especially.

Superdrag on daytrotter.com: perpetual opening band kills

I wonder if Robert Nevin remembers that he and I caught Superdrag opening for Weezer on the Pinkerton tour? Superdrag were riding a real good alt rock song "Sucked Out". A perennial opening band who lived up to Helen Bach's comments about oreo cookies in a previous post (the good stuff is in the midle) they broke up in 2003 but they are back now and their session with daytrotter.com -available free, is absolutely great, especially "Aspartame" which cranks out on apower pop rhythm guitar hook.

Alessana and Medina Lake Live At Webster Theatre , Hart Con, September 25th, 2009: Mismanagement by Helen Bach

I seem to be trending in my desire to see opening acts. The 'alt' scene is so incestuous (how timely!)that its more like hey Ill open for you tonight you open for me next time.

Why on Earth Madina Lake is opening for Alesana is way beyond me.  I chalk up Madinas obscurity to bad management.  They should be so much more.

On this Autumn night its a hop skip and jump to the old former porn cinema The Webster.  Yeah, honest engines it used to be a blue movie house.  They've ripped out the seats but the filth remains.  But its close to home and for the moment is pulling in the acts I want to see so as long as we don't touch the walls or visit the loo.....all's good in the hood.

We opted to take our time tonight, autumn in the air and a shit day so meh...  missed Broadway.. which was ok,... no really.  We saw them.  Yeah.....no.

 

Enter Asking Alexandria a post hardcore band from York England.  Mosh pit! Now as a child of the 80s hardcore movement its pretty funny to WATCH a mosh pit, half of me wants to jump in half of me wants to laugh.  I had 2 young teenagers with me.  I opted to laugh and protect.  Once I got them to a wall for protection I went closer to take some pictures.  The band was really good very tight and had a sense of humor.  Power stances and synchronized headbanging.. good god it WAS the 80s.  Id see them again.  Id wear something a bit cooler.  It was about 300 degrees in that club couple that with flying mosh pit beef heads....sweat pit ewwww.

Up next

 

Madina Lake.

I am so in love with this band  They are so talented so diverse so engaging. My daughter hipped me to them about 3 years ago at the ripe age of 9.  She has amazing taste and as a musician shes got a great ear.  I would have never found them but I'm glad I did! Without exaggeration I believe within the past 2 years we have seen them 4-5 times.  As headliners as part of Warped Tour and as opener.  I will see them a million more times.  I don't think they aim to please I think they're just pleased.  They have no swagger hater angst, they're smiling they're jumping they're crowd surfing.  They love what they're doing.  Again my friend Alex claims they're the nicest band ever.  They ARE.  I have never seen a band happier and kinder. They tour alot so its easy to thirst for something 'new', then you remember they do have a new release but have been on a never ending tour.  Highlight performance has to be the old standard Now or Never.....why? cuz I fucking LOVE that song.

 

The Bled.

Ok Im shallow but I have issue with hairy singers.  It doesn't fit my groove so ya already got a strike on you and I got you pegged as a hippy dirt bag.  Well he wasn't a hippy but he looked like a cross between Jesus and Joe Trohman during the fro' days. 

Screamo.  Ok lets take a second to explain this is EMO music SCREAMED like Satan on Sucrets.  Now we have waif like feather emo boys.....with the voice of Linda Blair in the exorcist.  Spooky.  They weren't terrible but they were so busy screaming I white noised them out.  And that giant hair bugged me.  Great time to wait for the Alesana merch guy to come back to restock (no lie 15 min waiting to by a hoody wtf? AND he was an ass).

Back to the stage.

 

Alesana.

This band has six members.

Yeah SIX ok Im not sure why maybe they're all friends but anyway.

Listening to them gave me a sore throat.  Again more power stances and synch head banging... but they weren't as fun as AA.  They were too serious to full of themselves.  Why the hell do they all dress the same like they're freaking the Coasters or something.  Its dumb. 

5 Songs and out for them.  We'd had enough.

another Oreo cookie night, best part was the middle

Asking Alexandria is going to get some attention from me.  I think I really like them  Madina Lake will forever have my loyalty, maybe Alesana can open for them next time and we can show up late for that one.

 

wow  I love filthy rock clubs.........love them