Music Things!

First post! Hooray. Let's get crackin':

Album Review(s):

First off: Where the HELL have the Flaming Lips been all my life?! I can't believe there was a point in time where I felt no need to ever know the Flaming Lips. How foolish of me! I was at the library the other day, and I passed by the Cd's, and I saw what I recognized as a Flaming Lips album, and I thought, "You know, me, I have been meaning to listen to some Flaming Lips, I might as well give it a shot." So I grabbed At War with the Mystics. I didn't put it on right away, but rather, decided to put it on yesterday morning. This turns out to have been a brilliant plan. As "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song" kicked off, I experienced approx. 4 whole seconds of "what the hell?!" followed by roughly 43,200 seconds of pure, unbridled bliss. Sheer, blinding, unrelenting happiness. And that's just the first song. If you, for some reason, have not heard this album, do it now. Like, RIGHT now. Drop whatever you're doing and go find it. Hunt it down, capture it, trap it in your iPod, and never stop listening to it for the rest of the day. Let yourself be immersed in unicorns and euphoria.

On a related note, I also picked up Ringleader of the Tormentors by Morrissey. Morrissey (and the Smiths), by contrast, I have been a fan of for a while, I just haven't felt the desire to listen to him for quite some time. I love this album just about as much as the aforementioned Mystics, because it's the exact opposite of Mystics; where the Flaming Lips are the physical, human embodiment of joy and happiness, Morrissey is the embodiment of all that is sadness and tragedy. Just as they are polar opposites, they are the same thing- an utterly pure expression of a generally indescribable emotional state, and one I find myself fluctuating between constantly. Incidentally, they both seem to be preoccupied with love, in all of it's many forms.

I guess I might as well rate albums on some kind of definable scale. I like seeing that, so why not. All ratings are out of 10.

At War with the Mystics by the Flaming Lips- 8.5 out of 10. Amazing, brilliant even, but it still had it's lower moments. But even those were enjoyable.

Ringleader of the Tormentors by Morrissey- 9 out of 10. Consistently enjoyable, and Morrissey definitely has a way with words. I'd put him as, perhaps, one of the greatest lyricists to come out of the "Modern Rock" era, and the fact that he has kept it up for 20+ years should be proof enough of this.

Show Review: Shinobu/Chotto Ghetto/Pteradon/Bluepoint- MACLA in San Jose, CA, 18 March 2007

To start: Shinobu are amazing. If you don't live in the SF Bay Area, you're missing out, because they play fairly frequently around here. I've had the privilege of seeing them several times in the past few years, but then again, I went to the same high school as one of the members, and as such, saw (and still see) them at a lot of local shows. I'll be honest- I couldn't stand them in high school. But, then again, my musical tastes have grown enormously since then. Worstward, Ho! was, without a doubt, one of my favorite albums of 2006 (not to mention a reference to one of my very favorite writers), and until this past September, I hadn't seen them perform in a few years. I have seen them a few times since, and each show easily tops the one before it. This one was no exception. But more on that later.

The show opened with Bluepoint (I believe...), a band I'd never heard of, and I caught the second half of their set. They're from San Jose, and to be honest, I wasn't super impressed with their set. I liked them, but they were a bit simple and formulaic. Not that I don't like that; I've just seen it done a million times over. They reminded me a lot of Alkaline Trio, but without the awesomeness.

After they finished, Pteradon took the stage. Now, Pteradon, I had heard of. They're great. Dare I say SUPER-great? I do dare. I first saw them a few months ago, also with Shinobu (who they're friends with), and I've been hooked ever since. They're good people, and they do a great show. They have more heart and energy than most of the bands in this city, and in the intellectual wasteland of San Jose, their introspective and witty lyrics are MUCH appreciated. That, and they rock out ultra hard. Picture Dillinger Four meets Jawbreaker meets the Broadways. And I dig that a lot. I see them whenever I get the chance, and I've heard many a good thing about the singer's solo act, I Sing The Body Electric. Anyway, medium sized story short, they were awesome.

After that was Chotto Ghetto, who were, by far, the worst band of the night. I was really impressed with them, but in a bad way. In a, "Wow, it's impressive that they could hear themselves and go, 'Yeah, that's really great'," kind of way. I'm also impressed at the poor structure of the sentence I just wrote. The point is that they were pretty terrible.

After they finished, it was time for Shinobu. Each time I see them, I think to myself, "I've already seen these guys several times. Why am I here?" And then they start playing and I remember, "Oh yeah- it's because I think these guys could be one of the most important bands of my generation. Duh." And I do. I feel this way. It's a blend of Punk-With-Beards and indie rock, and it's amazing. Think the Pixies meets the Weakerthans meets the Lawrence Arms meets Stephen Malkmus meets a basketful of cuddly ferrets. Their set climaxed all over the audience, dragging up all of Pteradon, a trumpet, part of a bass drum, and 1/2 of the employees of Asian Man Records awkwardly playing guitar from within the crowd.

It was great. You should have been there.

-RP