sparkrobot

New live rock galleries up: The Coloffs, The Paper Dolls and The Zip Guns from Friday night at The Funhouse, Seattle.

Tim Robbins’ Keynote Speech at the National Association of Broadcasters’ Convention Monday evening. This is just one of many gems.

In the ’70s, radio took a serious nosedive when Edwin Armstrong invented FM to eliminate the static and noise associated with AM and unwittingly provided a home for easy listening jazz rock, overly dramatic disco songs and 20 minute psychedelic sitar jams.

There are more photos over here.

I picked up The Breeders‘ new record Mountain Battles over the weekend. My favorite song so far is “It’s The Love” on side B. A bonus: there’s a Vaughn Oliver designed booklet on the inside. The printing is stunning.

Also just got a documentary on Beulah from the Netflix, A Good Band is Easy to Kill.

A good weekend? Maybe. But then again, I have to file my fucking tax return. So, maybe not.

I ventured out last Friday to catch a couple of bands. Peter Parker and Dept of Energy played live at The Comet Tavern. The Comet is a cool venue to see shows. The bands play live on the floor, but it’s dark as shit in there, making photography difficult. The Globes opened the show, but I didn’t have the Nikon tuned in to get any shots of them. I posted some photos of Peter Parker and Dept of Energy from the show to the Live Rock Photos gallery. Enjoy. Or not. I’ve also posted them to Flickr.

Last.fm is setting music free. As of today, you can play full-length tracks and entire albums for free on the Last.fm website.

Something we’ve wanted for years—for people who visit Last.fm to be able to play any track for free—is now possible. With the support of the folks behind EMI, Sony BMG, Universal and Warner—and the artists they work with—plus thousands of independent artists and labels, we’ve made the biggest legal collection of music available to play online for free, the way we believe it should be.

Of course, the major labels are all name-dropped, but the real big deal here is:

We will be paying artists directly… If you make music, you can sign up to participate for free.

Stated simply, they’re employing a shared advertising revenue model to pay contributors; both the label type and the artist type.

Today we’re redesigning the music economy.

For reals.

Here’s a link to my profile on Last.fm, if you see some stuff you like, participate.

Read the original post:
Last.fm – the Blog · Free the Music

Take it or leave it, here’s a list of some interesting records, all released this year and in a particular order, followed by short commentary.

Blitzen Trapper – Wild Mountain Nation
Slackers with guitars AND a Pavement reference here. Leaving that aside, there’s a lot of genre blending here just home brewed enough to keep it lively and hooks, hooks, hooks.

Thurston Moore – Trees Outside the Academy
Lauded Sonic Youth guitarist Thurston Moore’s solo effort recorded at the home studio of J. Mascis.

Shellac – Excellent Italian Greyhound
What is there to say? Steve Albini still thinks corporate rock sucks. And he’s right.

Ted Leo and The Pharmacists – Living With the Living
With a more expansive sound on this release than previous efforts, this record has been listened to, and relistened to by myself more than any other this year. iTunes can not tell a lie.

Les Savy Fav – Let’s Stay Friends
It’s worth buying this record for the fuzzy bass sounds alone. Rage in the Plague Age and Scotchguard The Credit Card. It’s like cerebral Polvo, but in 4/4. Won’t you come and meet me in the present tense?

Grand Champeen – Dial “T” For This
Earlier in the year, I saw these guys play an early Sunday show in Tacoma at Hell’s Kitchen. Yeah, me and like 3 other people. This release is more sparse an pop-oriented than their others, and better for it. Solid rock songs and the recording itself sounds great. Also, the record released in 2007 I listened to second most.

The Shins – Wincing The Night Away
I know they’re all like, popular and stuff now, but, like, um, like, they’re like, good n’ stuff.

The Sea And Cake – Transparent
Pure twee pop from Chicago statesmen. Putting the C back in Cake.

Gogol Bordello – Super Taranta!
Carnivalesque Gypsy Punk. This records easily gets the award for worst cover art, but it’s got a fuck all punk rock attitude that’s hard to ignore. I haven’t seen them play live, but I’m certain this is where it’s at when it comes to this band.

Dinosaur Jr. – Beyond
J. Mascis and Lou Barlow back together. It’s neither Bug nor Green Mind, but the next best thing since.

Bill Callahan – Woke On A Whaleheart
By no means the first release from troubadour Bill Callahan, but the first not under the Smog moniker and instead under his given name. Like most of the Smog records that preceded, this is the kind of album good to put on toward the end of the night, when there are a couple of friends around. You usually can’t count to 20 before someone asks “Wait, who is this?”. Try it.

Black Francis – Bluefinger
I’ve got pretty much every record this guy has ever made. Some are better than others. This is better than most and marks a return to The Pixies era Black Francis pseudonym.

Aesop Rock – None Shall Pass
Scholarly, abstract hip hop. Interesting collaborators on this record, for example John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats.

Wilco – Sky Blue Sky
Nels Cline can beat your ass, just not on this record. But don’t push him. He is however, a welcome addition to the Wilco lineup and adds texture to the seemingly ever evolving Wilco sound. I sorta miss Bennett though. Meh.

I’m Not There – Original Soundtrack
Nels Cline does beat your ass on this one, as part of The Million Dollar Bashers — a supergroup featuring Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo and Steve Shelley, Wilco guitarist Nels Cline, Television guitarist Tom Verlaine, Dylan bassist Tony Garnier, guitarist Smokey Hormel and keyboardist John Medeski. Cline and Verlaine tangle on the opener “All Along The Watchtower” in a fresh and frankly, pretty incredible way. This is the soundtrack to the Todd Haynes film I’m Not There which characterizes Bob Dylan with a different approach and poetic narrative.

“Best of” lists at the year’s end are always subjective. If you’re interested in any of these records and you don’t mind helping me out, I suggest you buy them from Amazon.com.

Fuck DRM. There, I’ve said it. If you’ can’t be bothered with packaging, Amazon also offers a ton of DRM-free titles available for download starting at $8.99 in their MP3 store (256 kbps MP3). I’ve used it a couple of times now, and though it’s not as integrated as using the iTunes store, it’s certainly beats having restrictions on what is possible with content you legally obtain. Amazon offers a download manager which pulls down your tracks and automatically adds them to your iTunes library.

I ventured up to Seattle last Saturday to check out Tacoma’s own The Fucking Eagles (photos) opening up a show with Denmark’s Power Solo (photos) for Jon Spencer’s (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion) new project, Heavy Trash (photos).

As always, it’s always reverent to hear completely anomalous questions from Seattle people about drive-bys, meth and aroma. Some of my photos are featured on the Seattle Indie Pop Rock blog, Three Imaginary Girls in a full review of the show from heather b.

The marketing machine over at The Lomographic Society just dropped limited editions of the plastic lens Holga and new Diana+ in glorious red and white peppermint stripes in coordination with Jack and Meg White of the White Stripes. The Diana+ was recently reissued through Lomo, and the Holga is a 120CFN (with the color flash). They both shoot 120 medium format film and produce notoriously unpredictable results. I have been using a 120CFN for a couple of years. They’re cheap in every way, and it’s a necessity to keep nearby a roll of electrical tape to keep the thing from falling apart. This is all part of the experience. With the ubiquity of digital images, it’s refreshing and surprisingly simple to create unique images experimenting with analog equipment.

The legendary Diana+ and Holga cameras are known for their serendipitous ‘imperfections’ and cinematic qualities. These special editions follow the band’s red, white and black color scheme down to the peppermint swirl on their frame advance dials. Frequent collaborator Rob Jones designed the custom packaging for both sets. Together, The White Stripes and Lomography are taking an analog look at life in the digital age.

For only $180, you too can pick up a $20 camera. But hey, don’t forget, it comes with a bunch of rock memorabilia too. There are only 200 pieces of each the Jack Holga and the Meg Diana+, and purchases are limited to 1 JACK Holga set and 1 MEG Diana+ set per customer.

For the nostalgic, here are some photos of the White Stripes doing an in-store performance at Fallout Records in Seattle back in 2000 taken by Tim Hayes. This was back before they took over the world.

“In the end, though music can be brilliant at times, the whole medium comes off as derivative of Pavement.”

Hah. Hah. Hahahahahahah. Hahaha. Heh-heh. Hah. Hah-hah. Hah.

Maher termed Schreiber’s assessment of music “overwrought, masturbatory posturing intended to make insecure hipsters feel as if they’re part of some imagined elite beau monde.”

That’s a fact actually. I blame the liberal media.

Pitchfork Gives Music 6.8 at the Onion.