SZ Aug '08 Mix

Here's a new mix I've been listening to plenty lately, hope you guys enjoy it. I grabbed that Stars track over at the Mondo Salvo tumblr. If you haven't been there, you really should check it out, you'll find out about a lot of cool music from some of the best mixes on the net.

Zip!

Track List:

1. A Wolf At The Door - Radiohead
2. Bad Reputation - The dB's
3. Hello There - John Cale
4. Fractal Dream of a Thing - Stereolab
5. Tell Me Why (Neil Young Cover) - Radiohead
6. Saved By Old Times - Deerhunter
7. Id Engager - Of Montreal
8. Plaza Trinidad - Destroyer
9. Home - David Byrne and Brian Eno
10. Why I Want To Save You - Stars
11. Come All Ye - Fairport Convention
12. Mirando (YACHT Mix) - RATATAT
13. The Revolution - David Byrne
14. Rollaroll - John Cale
15. The Boy With The Thorn In His Side - The Smiths
16. Elephant Gun - Beirut
17. Veni Vedi Veci (Diplo Remix) - Black Lips

3 Beautiful Live Recordings of Beach House

I'm sure plenty people have seen these already, but I mostly just want them on SZ so I can find them nice and easy. These were done for Pitchfork.tv and they're just excellent, both musically and visually and they fit Beach House's Blurred-Fi sound perfectly (you think that'll catch on?). They remind me of the way performances were shot in the 70's. Enjoy!

"Gila"


"Holy Dances"


"Apple Orchard"

Guest Reviewer Matt Duffy (sort of) Reviews New Byrne / Eno Album

At work my co-workers and I have a little something we call the "album of the week". We post a CD and a review of an album to the bulletin board for the rest of the office to enjoy. It has gone largely unnoticed and I don't think anyone has actually taken advantage of it, but still, we persist. This week we've chosen to honor the new David Byrne and Brian Eno album Everything That Happens Will Happen Today. Usually Duffy finds a positive review via Allmusic or Pitchfork for the posting, but the lack of an advance release means that none of the major review sites will be posting those for a least a week or so. So Duffy went ahead and wrote a Pitchforkian review of it, and since I think this shit's hilarious, I'm posting it here. Enjoy...

I can still remember the summer of 1992 -- mowing lawns every day until my piggy bank was full. I rode my bike over to Groovestax and traded in those meager earnings without hesitation for a cassette tape of Kris Kross’ Totally Krossed Out. I can still hear the crinkling of the cellophane as I opened my prize. How many hours did I spend lying on my back, staring at the image of those two youngsters, with “Jump” blasting from the boombox and me unable to understand a single word of the new, as yet unfamiliar urban parlance?

A lot has changed since I bought my first album, but thankfully David Byrne and Brian Eno have not. In this long-awaited follow-up to their 1981 My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, the duo deliver a nice pup to the doorstep of your very own pre-fab dreamhouse, nestled in the suburbs of your alienated, modern, CGI mind. I haven’t really listened to the whole thing yet, but I can tell I won’t need to – the Devil is still in Byrne’s teeth, and Eno’s knack for studio wizardry seems only to have improved with age.

You can’t buy this one in the record stores (yet), but kids today won’t need to. Even if they did, they couldn’t. Because record stores aren’t selling it. But what kid worth his salt wants to go to a dusty old record store anyways? They probably don’t even know what a “record” is. Bunch of punks. Their parents don’t teach them any respect. I shudder to think where the country might be headed in 20 or 30 years.
--Tavis Giarzhiccienne, PitchforkMedia.com

Zip! - Home & One Fine Day

Buy it here!

Big Dipper Videos!

Check 'em out...

All Going Out Together


Younger Bums


Faith Healer (Official)

"Big Sky"

Big Sky definitely ranks pretty high up there amongst my favorite Kinks songs, so I was pretty happy to see that one of my favorite bands (and WFMU's resident cover band) Yo La Tengo took on the song back in 1986 on their debut LP Ride The Tiger. It's a very faithful cover of the song, maybe even a little too faithful, but they definitely do it justice. I only recently picked up Ride The Tiger and while they're not yet at their peak, it is a really really great first album. Grab the zip file for both versions of Big Sky and my favorite track from Ride The Tiger, The Cone Of Silence.

Zip!

From The Fire: Part 3

David Byrne - Uh-Oh
(Amazon Link)



I was extremely happy when we pulled this one from the box of burned cd's because it is just one of those albums I had always wanted to pick up, but for some reason or another never did. First off, this is easily my favorite album cover from ANY Byrne project, solo or otherwise. Every time I look at it I smile. And the album does it's best to live up to it. Coming out 4 years after Naked (wait, whaaaaa? $0.85 on Amazon? Get that!), the final Talking Heads album, Byrne pretty much picks things up right where that album left off by continuing to fuse and filter the rest of the world's music through his own unique and brilliant sensibilities. While there may not be anything here as instantly catchy and beautiful as Totally Nude or (Nothing But) Flowers, it's still well worth your time. Let's face it, it's David Byrne, just watching the guy step up to the plate is exciting. Enjoy the three tracks here, and if you just can't get yourself enough Byrne, pick up a copy of Look Into The Eyeball ($1.70! What's going on here???), for me, it's the best of his solo work.

In the zip you'll find three of my favorite tracks from the album:

1. Now I'm Your Mom
2. Hanging Upside Down
3. A Million Miles Away

Download!

SZ July '08 Mix

Hey, haven't posted in a looooong while, so I figured I put together a mix of the tunes I've been listening to a lot of lately. Hope you enjoy it!

Download!

Track List

1. Socs Hip -Lilys
2. Akula Owu Onyeara -The Funkees
3. Army of Ancients - Dr. Dog
4. Bros In Arms - The M's
5. Achoo - Sparks
6. Fairfax Rag - Harry Nilsson
7. I'm Lost Without You Here - Rocketship
8. fri/end - Thurston Moore
9. Bonnie - Big Dipper
10. Seven Fingers - Black Francis
11. Amplifier - The dB's
12. The Sublimation Hour- Destroyer
13. Million Dollar Bash - Fairport Convention
14. Soy Solo Para Ti - Victor Boa Y Su Musica
15. Gone - Travel by Sea

“Lovey Dovey” & “Nip Sip”

The Clovers popped onto my radar after Oxford American featured their amazing cut One Mint Julep on their 2007 music edition. I’ve since got a copy of this outstanding compilation featuring 22 brilliant Rhythm & Blues tunes. These tracks just ooze doobie-di-does, bar room smoke and truly inspired vocal arrangements. Two of my favorites are Lovey Dovey (so that’s where Steve Miller got the line, “really love your peaches, want to shake your tree”), and Nip Sip (the White Light / White Heat of R&B drinking songs). Dig the tunes…

Retread Sessions

Thanks to the great blog Flux=Rad I now have a new regular pit stop on the internet: The Retread Sessions Vimeo Page. Great acts like Akron/Family, Jose Gonzalez, Do Make Say Think and many more are up on the site already. I really love the aesthetic of these videos. Here's a particularly awesome one below. If you like the sample, make sure you go to the actual Vimeo page to watch 'em in HD.


No. 6 Bill Callahan - "Nothing Rises To Meet Me" from Retread Sessions on Vimeo.

Nobody Knows The Trouble I’ve Been

Do I really need to tell you about this album? Isn’t that album cover enough? No? Ok, here we go…

I’ve only recently discovered Spider John Kroener, but already the encroaching stages of obsession are upon me. First, I stumbled across Running, Jumping, Standing Still (psst…) and just let it play day in and day out, but that wasn’t enough. I needed to hear more. So I immediately got Nobody Knows The Trouble I’ve Been, and it’s absolutely brilliant. To crib a sentiment from the liner notes, he makes these well-worn songs sound fresh again, as if he’s the one who originally wrote and performed them. Hell, the guy even rescues Cotton-Eyed Joe from it’s jock jam peril, that alone earns him major kudos. Here’s a couple of diddies that go down particularly easy, enjoy…

“Headache” Video

You gotta love randomly typing “Frank Black” into a youtube search and getting an awesome video you never knew existed for one of your favorite songs. This thing is hilarious, (especially those back-up singers). Still have to pick up that new mini-album, heard it’s pretty great. Enjoy…

Big Dipper!!!

If you listen to The Best Show On WFMU, you may be familiar with the Boston rock band Big Dipper. Not only has Tom Scharpling sung their praises on his show, he also contributed to the liner notes in the box set. That solid endorsement coupled with the tracks posted on their myspace page was all I needed to go out and buy the beautifully packaged 3-disc set. The compilation collects all their minor label albums along with a whole disc full of unreleased material. "That's all fine and well Danny, but how's the music?" you ask. Fucking awesome! Just song after song of pop rock gems. There's 49 tracks here that are thankfully rescued from obscurity and so far I'm loving them all. Honestly, there's nothing I can say here that Scharpling doesn't put perfectly in his liner notes, so after you sample these tracks, I HIGHLY recommend you pick up the very reasonably priced box set. And if you just want to listen to the tunes, you can download all 49 of them on Amazon for a mere $9. I'm posting All Going Out Together, Loch Ness Monster and Faith Healer from the particularly strong first disc, but rest assured, there's lots more where those came from!

Unhalfbricking

For the last week or so I've been completely hooked on Unhalfbricking, the album from the influential British Folk Rock band featuring Richard Thompson and a bunch of other amazingly talented musicians. The whole album is just beautiful, but these two tracks are my favorite: Million Dollar Bash, one of three Dylan covers here, and the long jam A Sailor's Life. If you think I'm out of my mind during the first couple of minutes of A Sailor's Life, please hang in there, you'll know what I mean when Thompson and fiddler Dave Swarbrick take over. I'm expecting the follow up to this album, Liege & Lief, in the mail any day now, if it's anything as brilliant as this, I'll be a happy man.

50's & 60's Magic, Part 2 of 2

As promised, here's the second installment! Keep those oldies alive!

Zip!

50's & 60's Magic, Part I of 2

So my friend Pedro, (aka memofromturner) put together this really great compilation of 50's and 60's songs. I've been listening to them all morning and it's fantastic. It's like listening to Magic 104.3* without the lame car commercials, but there's also stuff in here Dick Biondi would never play. Enjoy Part 1, check in tomorrow for the next batch.

*On a side note, I just learned that the Oldies Station I grew up listening to in the Chicagoland Area has recently changed to a Jack FM, is nothing sacred?

Zip!

Unit 4 + 2 - Concrete and Clay

I'm hooked on this song right now! And this video just rules, such a simple, straightforward concept that thematically ties in with the song's chorus. Why can't more things be this easy to digest?

Get It!

New Smoking Popes Musics!!!

While sifting through the news section over at Pitchfork, my jaw hit the keyboard when I saw that Smoking Popes had a new album in the works. And while it's not coming out until early next year, they've put a few tracks on their myspace page, and they're sweet!

Growing up in Chicago, I got to catch these guys play their hearts out at the Metro all the time. I'm reasonably sure that they headlined the first show I ever went to without my parents. I came home with the near perfect punk pop ep Get Fired and played it to death on my shitty boombox. Here's two of my favorite tracks from that ep, Not That Kind of Girlfriend and Let's Hear It For Love.

Beck's New Video

Beck's video for Timebomb is pretty awesome, but I couldn't help but think of another socially conscience video (see below) I thought was totally awesome back in the day! Here's a hint... Crystal Pepsi anyone?

The Dead Trees

Any band that cracks the top 4 on Malkmus's myspace (check out sweet tracks from his new album while you're there) is definitely worth checking out. Run over to daytrotter and download the four songs from their session, you won't be disappointed. For your listening pleasure I'm streaming Television, a beautiful slice of Wilco-esque folk that's destined to find a home on many playlists.

On Myspace
6 Song EP - Fort Music

CO-OP

Depending on what song you’re listening to, CO-OP is either making your toes tap or making the earth shake, and occasionally, both. Mixing elements like upbeat keyboards and Eno-esque vocals with grind core guitars sounds like it’d be a tough trick to pull off, but that’s just what they do, exceedingly well. Below I’m posting a track more on the toe tapper side of things called Lo Volume. I often find myself visiting their myspace page just to hear this song. They haven’t released anything official yet, but I’ll be sure to post something when they do. If you’re in the LA area tonight, be sure to catch their show at The Scene.



Bonus Video, this is older and their sound is moving in a different direction, but who can resist a video about two misunderstood friendly robots…