Music Meridian

I just listened to the new System Of A Down and....It's GOOD!

I was able to get a promo copy of the new East/West Blast Test CD "Popular Music For Unpopular People" which is coming out on Ipecac in Janurary.

I suggest you get your own copy when it hits the shelves.

For those that don't know, East/West Blast Test is Chris Dodge and one of my favorite drummers Dave Witte, who you might recall, is playing in Municipal Waste.

There's also some special guests on the new CD. That Bruce guy from Yakuza is playing sax on it for some reason, plus some other musicians of higher calibar.

But overall it's quite good. I almost want to say a lot of it is funky! Sure there's plenty of metal parts and blast beats. But they stretch it out into really cool jazzy grooves and lots of assorted weirdness. It's early to tell, but I think it far exceeds the original East West Blast Test CD. 5 stars.

In other news, I got the new System Of A Down, but I've yet to play it. The new Hella CD kicks all kinds of ass, but I haven't watched the DVD yet. The new Morricone compilation on Ipecac is also mighty fine.

Enough rambling for now...









I've been a member of the King Crimson Collectors Club since it first started waaaaay back in 1998 when they put out "Live at The Marquee 1969". I have every CD that was put out in the club. They're up to 30 releases now.

But the last release they put out came out months ago. I fear that maybe the CD club is dead...?

Then I discover they've launched a new website:
DGM Live!

There's already a ton of shows available there in MP3 and FLAC format. Plus a forum, a bunch of old pictures of the group in action and other fun stuff.

The website navigation is pretty clunky. It's hard to find your way around. But I'm interested to see if this is where the club is heading. I'll try downloading a show or two this week and see what the quality is like. I'm pretty excited! Lot's of rare stuff in there including a full ProjKct One live set!

Awesome California music store chain Amoeba Records is planning to open an online music service, according to Coolfer. This is awesome news, as they're sure to have lots of rare stuff and a cool selection.

Sign me up!





listening to 'dig your own hole today', i thought it'd be cool to have a live chemical brothers tribute band. by my estimation, though, you'd need at least one awesome drummer, and at least one, maybe two, versatile percussionists. you'd need a solid bass player and probably two guitarists. you'd also need a synth player, and on some tracks you could use a small brass section. it would help to have your own mixing guy, to tweak the sounds a bit. someone would have mimic the vocal samples, but that's not too hard. the question is whether you follow the album note for note, or use each track as a basis for something that sounds like it. the chemicals stretch and pull the songs in their live sets, so a live band could do it too. with the right drummer, and a solid supporting crew, it could be really awesome.





in the 80's i listened to whatever my parents played, and they were classic rock, country, and lite rock fans. there wasn't much exposure to pop music, much less new wave or college radio. this meant i didn't hear any kate bush, except maybe 'running up that hill', until after she'd stopped recording. i didn't hear 'the hounds of love' until after i moved to chicago, so in this century. so while i'd heard good things about her, and enjoyed her voice on peter gabriel's 'so', i didn't really know her music.

while kate bush did not enjoy widespread pop success, at least in america, she did pave the way for similar artists to approach the charts later. i would argue that without her tori amos and pj harvey, and to a lesser extent sarah mclachlan and alanis morissette, would never have had the appeal and success they achieved. in fact, tori's ouvre feels like it grows directly from kate's career.

kate bush lives in her own world, so when she creates music it exists independent of external trends. this isn't to say she has no outside influences, but, like a tori amos album, kate's music exists in a bubble and can't be judged against other people's music (though 'the red shoes' comes close). on her new double album 'aerial', kate shows that time has not changed her. the production is modern, meaning no 80's synths or big booming drums, but the sound is distinctly her own. the music is pretty sedate and mature--something my parents wouldn't mind--yet also complex and interesting, while kate's lyrical tendencies lean toward nature and the erotic, and often both at the same time. what this means is long-time fans will have no problem enjoying this album, and it should garner her a whole bunch of new fans who, like me, weren't listening to her in the 80's.

since this is kate's world, the imagery and ideas flow together seamlessly, as does the music, so that each disc is a concept album in itself. the first seems to be about her life these past 12 years, with special emphasis on her son, while the second disc essentially chronicles the perfect day (the amg review is spot on here). i can't say any tracks stand out as superior to others, though the second disc has fewer 'songs' and more transitional pieces, but this is another way to say everything is strong and appealing.

i'm not sure 'aerial' matches quite the intensity of 'hounds of love', and long-time fans may prefer her earlier albums out of nostalgia, but if you're new to kate bush this is the place to start. i'm going to enjoy spending time with this album, getting to know it.

I braved the cool weather this evening and went to see a bunch of hardcore/metal acts at Logan Square audiotorium.

First up, was current favs Municipal Waste. The sound was a little muddy the first couple songs, but was corrected quickly. These guys are old-skool thrash in the D.R.I./Nuclear Assult vein. Great stuff, cool to hear someone still doing this really, really, really well.

Their drummer is none other than Dave Witte, who absolutely was in
the drivers seat throughout their set. He never fails to impress me with his powerful, precise and speedy playing. Pick up their lastest CD "Hazardous Mutation". You won't be sorry and you'll be reaching for your old Thrash cassettes.

Next up was The Red Chord. I've never heard their music until tonight and I must say I was pretty impressed. Metalcore/Grind/Death Metal with just enough weird twists and turns to keep me entertained and interested. Some nice jazzy breakdowns, and the drummer was an absolute blur. Their vocalist was a little too chest-thumping for my taste, but overall the band was very cool. I'm going to have to check out some of their albums.

Following that was Darkest Hour. I thorouhly enjoyed their set which is much more melodic and straightforward metal than The Red Chord. I've seen them a few times before, and I can say that as a band they've gotten a lot tighter, but on the other hand they're starting to ham it up a bit too much, and the lead guitarist is totally in "Rock Star Mode" now. I was a little turned off by his antics, but the crowd of hardcore kids ate it up.

What really floored me this time was how HARD that drummer hits. He was absolutely pulverising his kit. He gets such a huge sound because he's really laying into it. Lightning quick rolls too. Nice work.

By now the crowd was getting a little rowdy and annoying. The stupid hardcore kids were starting to get on my nerves. (Am I getting too old for this crap?) By the time Converge came on I was having enough of their dumbness. I caught a couple songs and hit the streets.

What I heard of Converge was so-so. This was I think my 4th time seeing them, and I've gradually watched them tone-down their attack. The first time I saw them many years ago It was like a nuclear bomb went off. Full on attack...I think they're starting to mellow (relatively so,I guess..."Converge-Lite"?). At any rate, they were a fan favorite to be sure, but I think they're losing their edge. Ah well.

the opener was the like young. they're a local chicago duo, consisting of a male singer/guitarist and a female singing drummer. i like the idea of a female singing drummer, and she wore pink which helped. i liked her hair. unfortunately, she was pretty uncreative on the kit, and her partner was just plain annoying. most drum/guitar duos are noisy and abrasive, but these two seemed to have a sense of melody. that's cool and all, but it doesn't make the music any more interesting. someone liked it, i'm sure, but clearly they were the local opener for a u.s. tour of british bands. i wonder what warp knew about them beforehand.

following them was gravenhurst. i'd read a review of the new gravenhurst album and decided it sounded cool. their sound on stage was very much like 90's shoegaze, a style i like very much. the talking broadcast fans were annoying, but at least gravenhurst was compelling and good. from the opening song i new i wanted the album. i was thinking if i had enough i'd get it and the green & orange shirt they had for sale (it would turn out they were both $15, so i couldn't do that). before they even finished baby and i had both said we wanted the album. i ended up getting it, and she got an ep that had another of the set's standout tracks on it--the one she liked the most.

then broadcast. what can i say? my concept of what broadcast sounds like turned out to be very different from how they actually sound, which was very disappointing. baby said they sound different on album than they do on stage, and in fact their live show bored me to tears (literally i was yawning and my eyes would water). it sounded like the same electronic dance rock that's already swept through this country, and i'm sure i've heard it done better. the singer's voice isn't as good live, and the electronics seemed more abrasive than cool. overall it was a disappointing set. we cut out before the encore.

man oh man, i save the best for last.

yes, it was maybe probably something of a mistake to put buddy holly between cynic and yes, as their styles totally overwhelm the simple rock-ness of holly's wonderful music, but at the same time it was an interesting swing from the relatively modern, back to the origins, then to something in between. rock has come a long, long way since buddy holly, but his music still resounds as impressively as ever. i do own some bad cds, and i even cling to a few of them for semi-sentimental reasons (ahem, a spice girls cd my sister gave me to cheer me up), but nothing i heard yesterday was anything less than cool. the coleman threw me for a loop, and i'm not sure whether it's because i don't have my head around it yet or if something's missing in the jazz-orchestra format. lila downs is a great discovery, both witty and talented. the traffic album, which i listed for monday but didn't actually get to hear until yesterday, is subtly amazing. not as obviously awesome as john barleycorn must die, it still has the same feel of adventure and calm without ever sounding bored or watered-down. as for neil young, well, i'd like a cinnamon girl too.

today i'm listening to five dave brubeck albums, compiled in a box called for all time. the box itself is just a grey box with his name and the title on it, then the five cd cases slide in. they're the same cases you'd get in stores, but in this case i probably got the whole set for less than i would otherwise. now, i might not have bought all five at once, but time out is definitely worth the purchase price alone. add to that time further out, countdown: time in outer space, time changes, and time in, and you have a mystifying array of time signatures and fabulous jazz performances. basically, these four guys put out five albums of top-notch jazz and all you know about it is the song take five. get these albums and hear what you're missing.

Coolfer reminds us that we're still waiting for Guns N' Roses new album called "Chinese Democracy".

In related news, Velvet Revolver is still selling their album like hotcakes. It didn't seem to take them so long....

In other related news, Buckethead plays Metro this Saturday.





maybe you don't care, maybe i'm just showing off, but here's the second installment of 'new music i heard at work today'. these cds brought to me by bmg music club. yes, bmg.

lila downs - una sangre (one blood)
ornette coleman - skies of amerca
cynic - focus
buddy holly & the crickets - the "chirping" crickets
yes - close to the edge
neil young with crazy horse - everybody knows this is nowhere

as for the day before, well, that music was all very cool. tonic may have meandered a bit, but band of gypsys blew my mind properly. bodysong is a soundtrack to visual weirdness, so it sounds pretty weird, but it's mostly cool. i have to hear synkronized in more of a dance/party setting to get it, i think. up the bracket is disarming. i heard all this hype, then felt disappointed because it wasn't as rough as i expected, then noticed the detail and decided it's an awesome album. gorillaz is good, but albarn gets annoying after a while. critical beatdown? yes. ced-gee and kool keith take on all comers. sucka mc's better just drop the mic now.