RTP-area local music and culture

[Steven Keith <skeith AT capstrat.com>]

This is the ³essence² of memorable music that the music genome de-compliers
(Pandora) are trying to crack. Its like measuring je¹ ne sais quoi or
elation or some such other purely subjective and immeasurable thing. Arcade
Fire has this ability to bottle and distill this essence better than many.
 
I was trying to put my finger on what it is with ³Wolf Like Me² on ³TV on
the Radio¹s² Return to Cookie Mountain that makes me need to hear that
fucking song twice a day. Incidentally, Every Yo La Tengo album ever put out
has at least one mysteriously addictive track like this. Also Fugazi¹s
³Waiting Room² I would argue has that essence as well.
-- 
Steven Keith
Director, Interactive Communications
Capstrat
P:(919) 882-1972
M:(919) 771-5219

(Music that doesn't really sound like anything else immediately
identifiable is like that sometimes.)  Then all at once, on about the
fourth or fifth playing, there's some aspect that comes out through
the whole of everything else and I go "Okay, now I get it."  I think
on "Funeral" it was the one-finger piano on "Rebellion (Lies.)"  On
Gang of Four's "Entertainment" it was the tom-toms and hi-hat on
"Natural's Not In It."  On Mission of Burma's "Vs." it's the loud-
quiet-loud part in the middle of "Mica."


On 3/26/07 9:53 AM, "DJ Golf" <djgolf AT mindspring.com> wrote:

> 
> 
> For a while there I thought I might be the only person who thinks Win
> Butler sounds a lot like Ian McCulloch circa "Porcupine" on some of
> "Neon Bible".  Several folks told me he sounded like David Byrne on
> "Funeral", but I never really got that.
> 
> "Neon Bible" isn't as good as "Funeral", but not many albums released
> in the last decade are.  It's kind of like 25 years ago when everybody
> was saying that REM's "Reckoning" isn't as good as "Murmur."  And I
> figured the inevitable anti-Arcade Fire backlash would be here pretty
> soon.  Now's as good a time as any, I suppose.
> 
> "Funeral" for me was one of those rare albums that has the intangible
> "something" that you can tell is there, but doesn't necessarily reveal
> itself all at once.  Kind of like when I heard Joy Division or Mission
> of Burma or Gang of Four for the first time.  I could tell it was
> good, I just wasn't sure why yet and was compelled to keep listening.
> (Music that doesn't really sound like anything else immediately
> identifiable is like that sometimes.)  Then all at once, on about the
> fourth or fifth playing, there's some aspect that comes out through
> the whole of everything else and I go "Okay, now I get it."  I think
> on "Funeral" it was the one-finger piano on "Rebellion (Lies.)"  On
> Gang of Four's "Entertainment" it was the tom-toms and hi-hat on
> "Natural's Not In It."  On Mission of Burma's "Vs." it's the loud-
> quiet-loud part in the middle of "Mica."  But I digress.
> 
> Not to completely change gears here, but I was just reading the new
> Wire this weekend and one of their critics completely blasts the new
> Stooges album.  Granted, I could understand it not being that great
> (the snippets I heard on NPR the other day were kind of like a really
> raw version of the last couple Iggy albums) but this guy just had a
> huge hard-on for Steve Albini (in the bad way) for some reason and
> couldn't get beyond the whole "I am white and full of testosterone and
> hate bass" idea that he was, fairly or not, projecting onto it.
> Reviews like that annoy me, even if the record in question isn't any
> good.
> 
> And speaking of testosterone, the Grinderman album (Nick Cave with
> Warren Ellis and a couple of Bad Seeds) is really really good.  Only
> out as an import now - domestic release in a couple of weeks.  It's
> drunk and horny and sweaty and snarling and profane, and Nick plays
> guitar (which he apparently took up 6 months ago.  Think of Blixa
> Bargeld's six-string work on the early Bad Seeds, with the amp on 11.
> Fun.)
> 
> Thank you, that is all.