For ten seconds in the middle of The Walkmen’s performance of “All Hands & The Cook” during their September 22 show at the 9:30 Club, singer Hamilton Leithauser arched his back, gripped his microphone, and clearly defined every vein in his neck as he held a single note in the middle of the lyric “If you don’t like it, won’t you tell me?” The phrase “ten seconds” is often used as shorthand for “no time at all,” and in most situations, such a short moment cannot hold any significance, but screaming in Leithauser’s sore-throated, somehow suave rasp for ten entire seconds is a feat. He had the stage presence of an angry Frank Sinatra. Guitarist Paul Maroon quietly played his instrument under Leithauser’s yell as the audience cheered on, using their loudness to reach a place of joy as the singer was using his to express frustration. At second eleven, the rest of the band, filled out by drummer Matt Barrick and alternating bassist/organists Peter Bauer and Walter Martin, started playing again. Leithauser took a breath.
The moment, contained within a tense song from The Walkmen’s 2006 album “A Hundred Miles Off,” was rare in its anger. While the band made its name on more aggressive songs like “Little House of Savages” and “The Rat,” Tuesday’s show highlighted music from last year’s “You & Me”— their quietest work so far. That album was partly recorded at the legendary Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee, former home of Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, and nearly every other major rock act of the 1950s. It, and the four or five new songs played at the show, took most of its inspiration from Orbison’s back catalogue, where the slow songs are about staying up through the night trying to convince yourself that you are better off without her and the fast songs are about knowing that you are better off.
“Thinking of a Dream I Had,” an early career track usually defined by its galloping drums and paper shredder-tuned guitar, was significantly settled down for the show; while the drumming stayed furious, the guitar hit a soft, dreamy reverb. During the band’s summer, 2008 tour, Leithauser picked up his own electric guitar during the song to complement Maroon’s, but now a single guitar plays lower in the mix than the bass. In other words, it was adapted into The Walkmen’s new style.
That isn’t a knock, though. “You & Me” songs like “Red Moon” and “Canadian Girl,” reached slower tempos, but expressed as much regret and longing as anything that The Walkmen have ever turned up to ten. These songs, as well as a small number from “A Hundred Miles Off,” were complemented by a four-piece horn section made up of three trumpets and a trombone. One of the trumpeters was later introduced as Leithauser’s wife, and during “Red Moon,” he swayed back and forth while watching her; he was playing an acoustic guitar as she trumpeted in a dual serenade.
Last year’s relatively new material does have edge, but it appears in smaller quantities. “On The Water” opened with muffled instrumentals before taking off as Maroon brought his guitar from wandering to immediate and one of the trumpeters went crazy on a triangle pressed against a microphone. Second song of the night “In The New Year’s” chorus led the majority of the audience to sing along and revel in the optimism of lyrics like “I don’t see the bad times and I never will” while Leithauser’s face turned red from screaming and the fingers he was using to hold his microphone all twitched wildly from their knuckles.
Though the band formed in New York City and is currently based there and in Philadelphia, every member grew up in Washington, and Leithauser noted at the beginning and end how happy he was to play at home. During the encore, a middle-aged man made his way to the edge of the stage, called the singer’s name, and, after Leithauser recognized him, shook his hand. Moments like this created a feeling that the band was giving its former hometown a present, and that a show this good could only occur in Washington.
And yes, they played “The Rat” during the encore and everybody rocked out.
Showing posts with label Alex. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alex. Show all posts
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Yo La Tengo Concert Review: 9/17/09, 9:30 Club, Washington (Originally Posted To TheEagleOnline.com)
One of the great ironies of Yo La Tengo is how little they have changed as a band in the seventeen years since James McNew signed on as bassist, but how incredibly wide their range has become. Thursday’s set at the 9:30 Club showed off this range, covering the quiet, late-night introspection of 2000’s “And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out,” the heavy, near-psychedelic qualities of new album opener “Here To Fall,” and the stripped down covers that have consistently shown up in Yo La Tengo’s shows and albums since their original, McNew-less 1986 inception. Ira Kaplan still burst into long-but-never-too-long guitar solos; Georgia Hubley still played the drums better than she will ever receive credit for.
The lack of change to the trio’s set-up has been a boon if anything, leading to near-psychic connections between the band mates: When Kaplan turned the normally succinct “Let’s Save Tony Orlando’s House” into an extended jam, McNew and Hubley did not miss a beat, continuing the song and playing off of their guitarist’s improvisations, and when Kaplan made a passing reference to the group’s hometown of Hoboken and his marriage to Hubley in between songs, it was acknowledged that if you had paid to see Yo La Tengo, you were probably familiar with their history.
As is the case on their albums, Hubley and Kaplan’s voices were often overtaken by their instruments. Even during quieter, sparer songs like “Autumn Sweater,” where the only noises come from two drummers and an organ, Kaplan’s vocals were mixed so low that it was easy to wonder whether or not he was still singing. The decision to keep the vocals low seemed like a defense mechanism at times, especially when Kaplan was whispering out lyrics like “I try my best to hide in the crowded room; it’s nearly impossible.” When his more aggressive work kicked in during initial set closer “Pass the Hatchet, I Think I’m Goodkind,” though, there was no question that Kaplan was capable of being heard when he wanted to be.
Surprisingly, when James McNew sang lead vocals in a falsetto familiar to fans of his solo project, Dump, he was able to rise above the instrumentation, as was displayed during a cover of Black Flag’s “Nervous Breakdown.”
While the first half of the band’s two hour set was heavy on songs led by organ, the back half brought out Kaplan’s guitar hero ferocity, with highlights in the classic “Tom Courtenay” and “Sugarcube,” which was introduced with 30 seconds of random noise by each band member before revealing itself to be Yo La Tengo’s highest charting single and the song that tried to turn the band into a radio sensation. The song is still catchy ten years on, and when the small guitar solos that punctuate the chorus broke out, McNew was clearly smiling. “Sugarcube” led one man in the front row to take his earplugs out. If you’re going to lose your hearing, there are much worse soundtracks to a deafening than a Yo La Tengo song.
Toward the end, Hubley came out from behind her drum kit to play acoustic guitar, a move that Kaplan said was “quickly becoming [his] favorite part of the show.” It was clear that there was affection amongst the band members. The evidence was in every one of Kaplan’s smiles to his wife and in every nod to McNew that signified the introduction of an eight minute solo.
The lack of change to the trio’s set-up has been a boon if anything, leading to near-psychic connections between the band mates: When Kaplan turned the normally succinct “Let’s Save Tony Orlando’s House” into an extended jam, McNew and Hubley did not miss a beat, continuing the song and playing off of their guitarist’s improvisations, and when Kaplan made a passing reference to the group’s hometown of Hoboken and his marriage to Hubley in between songs, it was acknowledged that if you had paid to see Yo La Tengo, you were probably familiar with their history.
As is the case on their albums, Hubley and Kaplan’s voices were often overtaken by their instruments. Even during quieter, sparer songs like “Autumn Sweater,” where the only noises come from two drummers and an organ, Kaplan’s vocals were mixed so low that it was easy to wonder whether or not he was still singing. The decision to keep the vocals low seemed like a defense mechanism at times, especially when Kaplan was whispering out lyrics like “I try my best to hide in the crowded room; it’s nearly impossible.” When his more aggressive work kicked in during initial set closer “Pass the Hatchet, I Think I’m Goodkind,” though, there was no question that Kaplan was capable of being heard when he wanted to be.
Surprisingly, when James McNew sang lead vocals in a falsetto familiar to fans of his solo project, Dump, he was able to rise above the instrumentation, as was displayed during a cover of Black Flag’s “Nervous Breakdown.”
While the first half of the band’s two hour set was heavy on songs led by organ, the back half brought out Kaplan’s guitar hero ferocity, with highlights in the classic “Tom Courtenay” and “Sugarcube,” which was introduced with 30 seconds of random noise by each band member before revealing itself to be Yo La Tengo’s highest charting single and the song that tried to turn the band into a radio sensation. The song is still catchy ten years on, and when the small guitar solos that punctuate the chorus broke out, McNew was clearly smiling. “Sugarcube” led one man in the front row to take his earplugs out. If you’re going to lose your hearing, there are much worse soundtracks to a deafening than a Yo La Tengo song.
Toward the end, Hubley came out from behind her drum kit to play acoustic guitar, a move that Kaplan said was “quickly becoming [his] favorite part of the show.” It was clear that there was affection amongst the band members. The evidence was in every one of Kaplan’s smiles to his wife and in every nod to McNew that signified the introduction of an eight minute solo.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Kanye West Is Doing It
If you were at all keen on Kanye West, I hope you stayed away from Facebook and Twitter for the past week. Every third status update revolved around how evil West was for taking time away from Taylor Swift's acceptance speech at the MTV Video Music Awards, and the comments attached to these posts always carried something to the effect of "WHAT A JERK I HATE HIM!"
And I understand the feelings behind this, but I love Kanye West.
For the sake of getting it out of the way early, I'll mention upfront that I don't care about the VMAs or Taylor Swift. You know who had the best music video of the year? Dinosaur Jr. You know who deserved to win instead of Taylor Swift? Whoever actually directed and produced the video that her song played behind.
This doesn't mean that she didn't deserve her time to shine-- it isn't Swift's fault that the VMAs need recognizable faces to deliver speeches, and it's clear that J Mascis won't ever hit the spotlight again the way he did when his band was at the height of their fame with "Feel The Pain," and MTV has to reflect that in their awards shows.
What this means is that I don't find West's interruption to be an open sore on the face of MTV the way the rest of my peers do.
Still, it's rude as hell. We have our new King of All Rock Stars.
A few years ago, Spin Magazine declared Marilyn Manson to be the last American rock star. We had lost our Motley Crues and Diamond Daves, but we still had Manson, and he was going to be the hero who decided to take a helicopter ride to a super-model's house at 4 a.m. He was going to show up to every press event drunk and pass out with his hands on an interviewer's breasts. He was going to marry and divorce the same woman four times over the course of a year.
The problem with this is that Manson is too obsessed with how he is perceived. During interviews, he's always sure to make shocking comments apropos of nothing. Sometimes he's happy that the US dropped atomic bombs on Japan, sometimes he stops the interview cold to usher in whoever he's dating and then proceed to make out with that person in front of the interviewer. He wants the attention and never stops trying to attain it. Axl Rose didn't become a recluse because he wanted the paparazzi to camp outside of his mansion; Ozzy Osbourne didn't drink Nikki Sixx's urine with the intent to publish a book about the event later. For a rock star to be truly interesting, he has to say and do things that happen because he just has some inherent feeling that he must say and do them.
The problem with such wild spontaneity is the consequences. When Vince Neil went on a weeks-long bender, his adventure ended in the deaths of three people. Neil delivered a public apology, but at the end of the day, everybody had to remember that three people had died.
When West loses his mind, the only damage done is inflicted upon West. And the apologies are the best part. After the Taylor Swift incident, West exclaimed that he felt "LIKE BEN STILLER IN "MEET THE PARENTS" WHEN HE MESSED UP AND ROBERT DENIRO ASKED HIM TO LEAVE." In another blog apology, West expressed regret over his actions, followed by this statement, addressed to Swift: "YOU ARE VERY VERY TALENTED!!!!!!! I GAVE MY AWARDS TO OUTKAST OVER ME WHEN THEY DESERVED IT OVER ME... THAT'S WHAT IT IS!!!!!!!! I'M NOT CRAZY YALL. I'M JUST REAL."
In the process of apologizing, West implied that Swift should have given her award to competitor Beyonce because Swift should have recognized that the video made for her song was inferior to the one for Beyonce's. BRILLIANT YALL. Even in his apologies, he can't help but put her down.
West is also head and shoulders above his peers because he is a loud personality in music when loud personalities are diminishing in number. Thom Yorke of Radiohead does not want to be cool and believes that he is not accepted by those who are, nobody really knows what the guys in Daft Punk look like, and if a member of Nickelback was to sit down next to you on the Metro, you wouldn't know him from your plumber. These are the biggest bands of our generation.
Kanye West's explosions are fascinating, Kanye West's attempts at redemption are fascinating, Kanye West's periods of relative silence are fascinating (like today, when he used his blog to post five pictures of high-design chairs and then delete three of them). Kanye West is our rock star. Kanye West is doing it.
And I understand the feelings behind this, but I love Kanye West.
For the sake of getting it out of the way early, I'll mention upfront that I don't care about the VMAs or Taylor Swift. You know who had the best music video of the year? Dinosaur Jr. You know who deserved to win instead of Taylor Swift? Whoever actually directed and produced the video that her song played behind.
This doesn't mean that she didn't deserve her time to shine-- it isn't Swift's fault that the VMAs need recognizable faces to deliver speeches, and it's clear that J Mascis won't ever hit the spotlight again the way he did when his band was at the height of their fame with "Feel The Pain," and MTV has to reflect that in their awards shows.
What this means is that I don't find West's interruption to be an open sore on the face of MTV the way the rest of my peers do.
Still, it's rude as hell. We have our new King of All Rock Stars.
A few years ago, Spin Magazine declared Marilyn Manson to be the last American rock star. We had lost our Motley Crues and Diamond Daves, but we still had Manson, and he was going to be the hero who decided to take a helicopter ride to a super-model's house at 4 a.m. He was going to show up to every press event drunk and pass out with his hands on an interviewer's breasts. He was going to marry and divorce the same woman four times over the course of a year.
The problem with this is that Manson is too obsessed with how he is perceived. During interviews, he's always sure to make shocking comments apropos of nothing. Sometimes he's happy that the US dropped atomic bombs on Japan, sometimes he stops the interview cold to usher in whoever he's dating and then proceed to make out with that person in front of the interviewer. He wants the attention and never stops trying to attain it. Axl Rose didn't become a recluse because he wanted the paparazzi to camp outside of his mansion; Ozzy Osbourne didn't drink Nikki Sixx's urine with the intent to publish a book about the event later. For a rock star to be truly interesting, he has to say and do things that happen because he just has some inherent feeling that he must say and do them.
The problem with such wild spontaneity is the consequences. When Vince Neil went on a weeks-long bender, his adventure ended in the deaths of three people. Neil delivered a public apology, but at the end of the day, everybody had to remember that three people had died.
When West loses his mind, the only damage done is inflicted upon West. And the apologies are the best part. After the Taylor Swift incident, West exclaimed that he felt "LIKE BEN STILLER IN "MEET THE PARENTS" WHEN HE MESSED UP AND ROBERT DENIRO ASKED HIM TO LEAVE." In another blog apology, West expressed regret over his actions, followed by this statement, addressed to Swift: "YOU ARE VERY VERY TALENTED!!!!!!! I GAVE MY AWARDS TO OUTKAST OVER ME WHEN THEY DESERVED IT OVER ME... THAT'S WHAT IT IS!!!!!!!! I'M NOT CRAZY YALL. I'M JUST REAL."
In the process of apologizing, West implied that Swift should have given her award to competitor Beyonce because Swift should have recognized that the video made for her song was inferior to the one for Beyonce's. BRILLIANT YALL. Even in his apologies, he can't help but put her down.
West is also head and shoulders above his peers because he is a loud personality in music when loud personalities are diminishing in number. Thom Yorke of Radiohead does not want to be cool and believes that he is not accepted by those who are, nobody really knows what the guys in Daft Punk look like, and if a member of Nickelback was to sit down next to you on the Metro, you wouldn't know him from your plumber. These are the biggest bands of our generation.
Kanye West's explosions are fascinating, Kanye West's attempts at redemption are fascinating, Kanye West's periods of relative silence are fascinating (like today, when he used his blog to post five pictures of high-design chairs and then delete three of them). Kanye West is our rock star. Kanye West is doing it.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
In Defense of Everybody's Favorite Album of All Time
Neutral Milk Hotel's In The Aeroplane Over The Sea is not my favorite album, but it is the sort of album that leaves me wondering if there will ever be anything as good ever again every time Jeff Mangum puts his guitar down at the end of "Two Headed Boy, Part 2." Yes, that sounds like hyperbole, and it probably is, but a large percentage of the music nerd world feels the exact same way, and none of us is faking it or trying too hard to fall in love with something that does not warrant our appreciation.
When I first discovered Aeroplane, I did not know about that following. I wasn't familiar with the name "Neutral Milk Hotel" or "Elephant Six" or "Mangum," I didn't know that the band had only released two albums, and when a friend stuck "King of Carrot Flowers, Part 1" on a mix CD during my sophomore year of high school, I didn't know that everybody everywhere had been waiting for a follow-up for eight years. If anything separates Sam from myself regarding this album, it is that I walked in without expectations. I heard "King of Carrot Flowers, Part 1," I fell in love, and I bought the full album. Hipsters weren't telling me how life-changing Aeroplane was to them; Pitchfork wasn't telling me that Jeff Mangum had managed to part heaven and let pure melancholic expression back into the lives of the many, or whatever the hell they were on about.
That isn't to say that In The Aeroplane Over The Sea can only be appreciated before it has been talked up, but that my love for it has probably become so steady because for all I knew I was initially listening to something that had been released earlier that month in 2005. You have to decide for yourself that something is brilliant, and I was afforded that luxury with an album so highly (and widely) praised that I still cannot believe that I didn't know it existed.
The production quality has never bothered me. Everything is clear and everything sounds exactly as it was intended to sound. I would even go so far as to call the guitar sounds "crisp." This isn't lo-fi in the sense that it sounds rough on purpose; it's lo-fi in the sense that Rick Rubin wasn't around to throw money at it, and the instrumentation never blurs together (with the exception of "Holland, 1945" and "King of Carrot Flowers Part 2 and 3," which are intentional blow-outs) or becomes too obscured to enjoy. That isn't to dismiss Sam's point-- bad production quality will destroy an otherwise good album-- but Aeroplane is produced wonderfully (there's another vague positive word), and easily sounds better than anything from early Yo La Tengo, early Pavement or Mount Eerie (sidenote: Phil Elverum owes his career to this album).
Jeff Mangum has a very pure voice. It's hard to call it anything else. Neutral Milk Hotel's singer/lyricist is always able to completely enunciate every word and idea. His poetry is itself profoundly and emotionally touching (whatever that means), and the voice only enhances it. Mangum has a terrific control over the volume of his voice. I wish that I could pinpoint why this matters so much, but all I can say is that it does, and let the reader listen for himself.
Anyway,
I think that In The Aeroplane Over The Sea is very good. The music is wonderful and the lyrics are as poetic as anything ever was. That is my review. That is my seventh-grade-debate defense. The difference between Jeff Mangum and the asshole playing guitar in the corner at every party is that Mangum can write lyrics and his band (who I should have emphasized more above, as they are nearly as important as their singer) can write music. I love this album and I can't really explain why. My brain can say "thank God I didn't walk in with unreal expectations," but it can't pick apart why I don't mind one of Sam's points about the "campfire" qualities of Jeff Mangum's guitar playing (though even Sam admits that the horns are BOSS). I asked Sam if I could defend this album a few days ago after he wanted to know if I would be interested in writing on this blog, and I can't just not write anything, but at the same time, I can't explain why I absolutely enjoy Aeroplane. It is moving. It is still moving every time I listen to it.
When I first discovered Aeroplane, I did not know about that following. I wasn't familiar with the name "Neutral Milk Hotel" or "Elephant Six" or "Mangum," I didn't know that the band had only released two albums, and when a friend stuck "King of Carrot Flowers, Part 1" on a mix CD during my sophomore year of high school, I didn't know that everybody everywhere had been waiting for a follow-up for eight years. If anything separates Sam from myself regarding this album, it is that I walked in without expectations. I heard "King of Carrot Flowers, Part 1," I fell in love, and I bought the full album. Hipsters weren't telling me how life-changing Aeroplane was to them; Pitchfork wasn't telling me that Jeff Mangum had managed to part heaven and let pure melancholic expression back into the lives of the many, or whatever the hell they were on about.
That isn't to say that In The Aeroplane Over The Sea can only be appreciated before it has been talked up, but that my love for it has probably become so steady because for all I knew I was initially listening to something that had been released earlier that month in 2005. You have to decide for yourself that something is brilliant, and I was afforded that luxury with an album so highly (and widely) praised that I still cannot believe that I didn't know it existed.
The production quality has never bothered me. Everything is clear and everything sounds exactly as it was intended to sound. I would even go so far as to call the guitar sounds "crisp." This isn't lo-fi in the sense that it sounds rough on purpose; it's lo-fi in the sense that Rick Rubin wasn't around to throw money at it, and the instrumentation never blurs together (with the exception of "Holland, 1945" and "King of Carrot Flowers Part 2 and 3," which are intentional blow-outs) or becomes too obscured to enjoy. That isn't to dismiss Sam's point-- bad production quality will destroy an otherwise good album-- but Aeroplane is produced wonderfully (there's another vague positive word), and easily sounds better than anything from early Yo La Tengo, early Pavement or Mount Eerie (sidenote: Phil Elverum owes his career to this album).
Jeff Mangum has a very pure voice. It's hard to call it anything else. Neutral Milk Hotel's singer/lyricist is always able to completely enunciate every word and idea. His poetry is itself profoundly and emotionally touching (whatever that means), and the voice only enhances it. Mangum has a terrific control over the volume of his voice. I wish that I could pinpoint why this matters so much, but all I can say is that it does, and let the reader listen for himself.
Anyway,
I think that In The Aeroplane Over The Sea is very good. The music is wonderful and the lyrics are as poetic as anything ever was. That is my review. That is my seventh-grade-debate defense. The difference between Jeff Mangum and the asshole playing guitar in the corner at every party is that Mangum can write lyrics and his band (who I should have emphasized more above, as they are nearly as important as their singer) can write music. I love this album and I can't really explain why. My brain can say "thank God I didn't walk in with unreal expectations," but it can't pick apart why I don't mind one of Sam's points about the "campfire" qualities of Jeff Mangum's guitar playing (though even Sam admits that the horns are BOSS). I asked Sam if I could defend this album a few days ago after he wanted to know if I would be interested in writing on this blog, and I can't just not write anything, but at the same time, I can't explain why I absolutely enjoy Aeroplane. It is moving. It is still moving every time I listen to it.
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