Never use a cruelty when a joke will do in its place

I've gotten totally obsessed with David Axelrod (the composer, not Obama's right hand man). I picked up a copy of his Songs of Innocence LP at Sonic Boom the other night, and I can't stop listening to it. It's just funky as hell. Come Record Store Day, I may go back and get Songs of Experience and Earth Rot (20% off on vinyl!), and I want to see if I can track down a copy of David McCallum's (the dude from The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and NCIS) Music: A Bit More of Me, which Axelrod produced.

( There's no way I'm making it to all of these: )

So I'd be going from Ice Cube straight to Dave Bazan, and Billy Bragg straight to High On Fire. Jarring.

Read Kurt Larson (the dude with the crazy hair from Information Society)'s hilarious skewering of VH-1 and their Bands Reunited series.

Ever wonder what happened to Dave Riley (the bass player from Big Black)? No? Well, I did, ever since I first read an article about said band in Spin about a million years ago. The article stated that his whereabouts were unknown, and that he had likely overdosed.

Turns out he'd had a stroke. He's alive, and is blogging about it.

I'm obsessed with strings for some reason. Like, orchestra strings. I want to put them on lots of songs. I've always liked the sound of a drum kit paired with strings (see: Rachel's*, Godspeed You Black Emperor!), and to a lesser extent, the string arrangements on disco and R&B records (see: Chic, Love Unlimited Orchestra). Blonde Redhead's Misery Is A Butterfly record has lots of cool string arrangements, courtesy of one Eyvind Kang, who happens to be a fantastic composer in his own right.

Now that the second KNS record is going to finally come out, we're all sufficiently sick of the songs on it and are working on new material. I would love to have strings and/or Mellotron and/or Chamberlin on it. Maybe some horns. I guess this signals where the band enters its bloated prog rock phase. Seven-necked guitars and miniature replicas of Stonehenge are right around the corner, I'm sure.




*It has always irritated the shit out of me that Rachel's has this possessive "S" thing happening with their name. I know they were all smarty-pantsed college kids when they started the band, and thusly they should have known the proper use of the apostrophe. Maybe they were just trying to be different. Visually, their name is the KoЯn of hipster chamber rock.

I just listened to a song that I liked a one point. It involves lots of screaming and thrashing about and whatnot.

I found myself feeling that I could do without the screaming.

Prior to that, I was listening to Ronnie Spector. "Be My Little Baby" et al., and enjoying it greatly.



Is it official? Am I too old to rock? No more rockin' for me?

 



  IS THE NEW
 

ASOW re-entered Soundhouse Recording on Tuesday with musical mensch Jack Endino working the board to resume work on our forthcoming debut album/greatest hits package.

( geekiness ensues. enter at your own risk. )

Put another dime dollar in the jukebox, baby.

I was thinking about retitling my journal with a quote from this Mooney Suzuki song - "In a young man's mind it's a simple world/There's a little room for music and the rest is girls". 'Cause, ya know, that's pretty much what it's been lately. It feels like that's all I talk about up in this sumbitch, at least.

There are probably nobler pursuits, sure, but I doubt there are as many that are as fun.

Key Note Speaker and Kate Tucker both get props on MSNBC.

Looky here.