I’ve reached that crumudgeony point in my life where I rarely take the time to listen to new music. Of course I like to blame my lack of new musical libido on the quality of music that you kids listen to now-a-days. But I have to admit that I’m getting old, and the years of my musical hermitage in Bisbee have taken their toll. But here’s something new that I like!
*BLING!*
The Uncanny Canadian points out that Pitchfork liked this album. Is the song of our enemy our enemy too?
PS – I also like these kids. Saw them at a festival at Parc de la Villette in Paris – very low on kitsch for a Japanese girl band and high on energy.
Pretty.
It’s not the Field Mice, but it’s good.
The Pitch-bags are wrongheadedly stubborn and contrary in their wrongness, so that sometimes they get their feet mixed up with their ears and the wrongness crosses the contrariness and they get one right.
I’m sure it’s not on purpose.
Pugsley help me, I also like OK Go, for their ultra low budget videos, if nothing else.
good vid. it adds much.
Call me a man with a wang bigger than his brain, who are these guys?
Hey, Wang Bigger Than His Brain (WBTHB), which guys don’t you know? M. Ward or Pitchfork or MadHatter or TC or the Field Mice?
Cool song. And that bird animation is flippin’ cute.
I haven’t kept track of M Ward. I have Duet for Guitars #2, which I think was his first album. (Or his first solo album?) I’ve been meaning to check out his more recent stuff.
Those who like M Ward should check out David Pajo, though I guess I’d be slightly surprised if you guys didn’t already know about him. (Up until recently he called himself Papa M. Before that he was Aerial M. He was originally a member of Slint, and was apparently also in Zwan. I’ve never actually heard Zwan, though it turns up more hits than anything else for a YouTube search on David Pajo.)
Here’s a track from the album Pajo. Though it doesn’t seem to be the album version, and also seems badly compressed.
Thanks for the link Plover. My favorite part of the animation is the fireflies with torches (towards the end of the song on the tree).
I think that Duet for Guitars was released on OwOm records, which is owned by local Tucsonan Howe Gelb of Giant Sand. That’s how I first came across M Ward.
I have some kind of limited edition copy of Duet for Guitars. It says it was recorded in Portland. The label appears to be called co-dependent, and to be based in Seattle. Howe Gelb is not mentioned in the acknowledgments, but there is a thank you to “Bruce Licher in Arizona”. Maybe the regular release was done out of Tucson?
The bugs in the video are cool. And at first I thought they were holding torches too, but I think they may actually supposed to be lighters. The animation on the birds I especially like is the flappy motion when they’re flying near the end.
Gregor, you were supposed to have first come across M. Ward from at least three different Friday poop shoots I have done. i think I’ve reviewed songs from both the Transfiguration of Vincent and Transistor Radio.
Plover, thanks for the music leads. I hadn’t heard of David Pajo, having done my darndest to never find anyone two degrees of separation or less from Zwan.
When the YouTube search came up, it suprised me that Pajo would be in a band with Billy Corgan. Conceptually, that’s almost like Neko Case doing a duet with Toby Keith or something. I thought Zwan was actually supposed to be pretty good though. I guess I’ll have to check out the stuff on YouTube.
The Papa M album Whatever, Mortal is similar to Pajo, while Live from a Shark Cage is instrumental (though the mood is similar). When I first heard Shark Cage, I would compare it to the album Cluster & Eno (yes, that Cluster and that Eno).
Pajo also contains the best Simon & Garfunkel song not written by Simon & Garfunkel, “Manson Twins”. The lyrics are sweet in a psychopathic sort of way.
I’ve never heard the Aerial M stuff, but I think it’s supposed to be closer to an ambient electronic type schtick.
Slint is apparently one of those bands that influenced a lot of other bands but that most people outside the music business never heard of. I’m not quite sure how to describe Slint – maybe if members of the Velvet Underground and King Crimson decided to form a grunge band?
It looks like a new DP album came out last week too. I’ll have to search this out.
Just finished watching the video for High Lonesome Moan. It’s really really nice. Very hushed tones and some beautiful melodies. I also liked the butterfly images. Did you notice that the video was produced by Bearded Music and the band is Papa M? If you put those together, you get Beard Papa. I sense a Japanese cream puff-related scheme going on here.
I can think of competition for the best Simon and Garfunkel song not written by S&G: Pageant Square by Kingsbury Manx. I think PP has my back on this one.
I don’t have any Slint, but I’m known to really suck, so it doesn’t mean much. But I thought that King Crimson did form a grunge band. Isn’t that what all that Thrak and Thrakattak stuff is essentially?
I got half your back.
I don’t remember what Thrak sounds like (though I remember not liking it all that much) and no King Crimson from that era seems to be available on YouTube. However, there is more recent King Crimson on YouTube, which is at least better than I remember Thrak being. And also exemplifies fairly well the aspects of King Crimson I was referring to.
One odd thing about this recent King Crimson stuff: the track the construktion of light almost feels like an attempt to prove that a lot of Geddy Lee’s ideas were thefts from Robert Fripp.
Slint got back together for some shows last year, and there are videos of those up on Youtube. So far the ones I’ve looked at are terrible quality, but this one of “Nosferatu Man” ought to at least give some sense of what they sound like.
Here’s what your buds at Pitchfork have to say about Slint (scroll down to number 12). Though, to me, the fact that the P-Fork Allstars have Talk Talk’s Laughing Stock at #11 in their list (and that Mouse On Mars’ Iaora Tahiti is included) is actually a better testament that there might be a few brain cells rambling about their offices. Though the fact that Biosphere’s Substrata and Cat Power’s Moon Pix are not even on their list tends to kill that idea. And that tindersticks’ second album is also missing pretty much finishes it off. Also, putting Elliott Smith’s Either/Or over his XO just seems like an exercise in poseurifaction.
The only Kingsbury Manx on YouTube is “Harness and Wheel” which seems to channel Elliott Smith (and I haven’t heard anything els eby them). However, it may well be that my judgement on non-S&G S&G songs is enfeebled by the paucity of examples I’ve heard.
Plover, do you secretly write for pitchfork? Did you know this review was coming out today:
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/record_review/38185/Pajo_1968
I actually liked Thrak. It was different and kind of brassy, like Yes rediscovering music with Big Generator and 90125. But it pales in comparison to their earlier proggy and super wanky music. I’ll explore Slint some time soon and definitely Pajo. As I learned from the above review, he spent some time in Stereolab and Tortoise, so I am triply intrigued.
The video guys are M. Ward? I gues that will have to do.
Okay it took me a second to figure out whom WBTHB was even though I gave him the acronym.
And I googled Duet for Guitars #2 and it was indeed released initially by Howe Gelb’s label but it looks like it’s on another label now.
Ok, from M. Ward’s own website:
Ahhh! So do you have the extra super duper rare Type Foundry record?
Yes, it’s numbered 124 of 1000. I got it back when it came out. (Does this get me a Pitchfork secret decoder ring or something?)